New chapter up at last.
Would like to thank the person who commented on the last chapter, I do hope you all enjoy this new one.
And if possible - I' am trying to get to at least ten comment's before get to chapter five so if I may be cheeky and ask, could people help me reach that target... I will love you all if you could, and of course give out the next chapter.
Happy reading, I don't own OUAT and if any mistakes can be seen sorry, blame the lack of spell check.
Coming out of the Parthenon Regina sighed. Ever since leaving America some four years ago and heading for England. Her journey had taken her across the channel and into Europe. As much as Britain was nice in its own quaint little way, it still held no answers for her. She had read up all that she could on Merlin and Arthur as soon as she was able to find a place to stay.
Taking all what she had in savings when she had quit her job … she had been right; Mira was indeed insufferable on hearing her leaving and insisted on a going away party. In the end and with such a fuss kicked up she managed to get it down to just them going to a pub, they did get their drinks at Donny's eventually but she still had to sit there and listen to her near cry about how much she would be missed.
But gone she had, with the promise of a phone call every now and then to see how she was. Regina had kept up that promise which surprised her but she did like the other woman and so wouldn't skip out like she had planned. But once she had reached London she looked around firstly for a place to stay and had ended up booking into a nearby hotel.
Once there she had started looking for her next job. Being a journalist had been fun and so always had the experience and references should she ever wish to go back to it. She didn't think she would find Mal or Ruby here and so was curious to live life how it came at her whilst she searched.
So a week later she was settling in to her new job. Of course when they had asked for references she had given the Mira's number. The blonde being her only friend she knew that she would say nice things about her, the others who had the fortune to have met her – well not so much and so if she wanted the position she knew she had to be as charming and pleasant as she had made out.
She never did find out what the older woman had said to them. With her being coy the next time they spoke, but it didn't matter as she had got the job, it was pretty much the same as what she had been doing in Atlanta except it was in another country. She hadn't actually intended on doing anymore writing when she left, but on realizing just how much further her searching would take her if she had the official credentials to back up her supposed 'Snooping' no one actually gave her two thoughts to her intentions.
She was beginning to quickly get the hang of this world. Though after eight years she should have caught on a lot sooner, if she hadn't been so anti-social that was. It seemed power got you places, just like back in the forest there were two types of power – political and magical – whilst the latter was something non-existent to the realm she now lived in, it seemed that even a junior research reporter could get her places being a normal civilian couldn't.
Just because the board had changed didn't mean the rules had.
So she went to every library she could find within distance even the national archives. Used her semi-power to get a hold of any and all books that told of the fabled wizard and his pet king, (all for research purposes) scoured every word that he had wrote about his workings and rituals even about the arch enemy of his times – Morgana, she had met the woman once and personally found her a delight.
But as much as she liked the other woman, she also knew just how secretive she was. During that time in her company she had heard her scorn Merlin many a time for his blatant need for approval by making his magic known. Yes her own magic was something not unheard of and all round feared, but she was talking about the practices of the art.
The triple goddess and the old religion, she cursed him for disregarding all of that in favour of the stupid royals and their values. If Arthur was his lapdog then Merlin was the sheep happily herded. He wasn't a saviour nor could he be called a fraud. He was just a man who liked the attention and reverence too much in her eyes.
She had talked Regina's ear off and on finally leaving her castle. Had to ask Maleficent who she had gone with just why they had subjected themselves to her ranting's. The blonde had laughed and said she might have been halfway to crazy, but she was an exceptional sorceress with magic most would dream of.
It was true and she had learnt from her so the visit wasn't as tediously boring she guessed. But right now she was willing to bet half those rants true as she could clearly see Merlin was more of a would be philosopher than an all-powerful wizard with the amount of drivel he wrote, some of the journals she could see wasn't even by his hand.
Morgana had been nice enough to read a page from one of the books she had stolen … all part of a nefarious plan of hers, she had told them. But she had read it and had remembered his handwriting and what she was reading now was far from the real wizard himself, which was just as well.
It was the land without magic after all so she had no doubt that Merlin would have ever seen reason to be in such a place, whoever wrote what she was reading no doubt was an imposter or someone trying to emulate the wizard.
Which didn't help her in anyway, and seeing as Merlin was England's biggest magical draw. It meant her searching here had hit a wall. Thanking the people who had begrudgingly allowed her access to the books she made her way back to her flat. Like Atlanta she had found herself another small flat to rent.
A lot smaller and a hell of a lot more expensive but it was home for now as she didn't bother with making dinner and went straight to bed. Changing from her clothes into her pyjamas she fell into bed pondering on what this meant. Her time in England was coming to a close, as soon as she had sourced all she could then she knew she had to look elsewhere.
Which was how she ended up on France were she had studied up on all the myths and folklore legends she could find. Hearing of Lancelot du lac – Once more led back to Arthur – was there nowhere that man didn't get to, which she later learnt meant lake in French which was what led her to the lady of the lake. Then she moved on the European stories.
The ones about the dragons really appealed to her for the obvious reasons as she scoured the pages, she liked that there were so many but had to frown that the slightly repetitive pattern of where they all seem to die at the end by the stupid knights sword. Would it have killed them for once to let the beasty win?
Actually it might have if the dragon did so a bit of a stupid question. It fascinated her about all the stories and detailed legends that seemed to exist within the deeper parts of Europe, idly she had to wonder if this place at one time did hold some magic as some of the stories she chanced upon struck her similar with a few people she had met a time ago.
The accuracy was almost there and so it made her wonder. But ultimately her search wasn't effective there either so on she went – doing odd jobs here and there, just basically being the quintessential traveller – France to Spain to the Netherlands and so on until she made her way to Greece. There she had to admit, she fell in love.
Not with anyone passing by. Though she had to admit the sights were pleasing, she didn't take a second glance. Ever since Daniel had died she had been in a state of mourning that seemed to span a lifetime. It was no different now she was in a different place and she wasn't stupid enough not to know the basics of flings and one night stands, but she just couldn't bring herself to do it.
She had also never been in love before. She had nothing to compare it to, but what she felt for the stable hand was the truest thing she felt to love that didn't extend to familial, she wasn't sure what she wanted at such an early stage but she would have liked the chance to have discovered it with him.
Not possible now and so she felt like it would have been a betrayal to his memory if she went ahead and just threw what she would have treasured with him on a night filled most likely with regret and hate the next day, so paid no heed to attention shown her way. Instead what she had fallen in love with was the culture.
The landmarks that adorned the ancient country, the place was filled with a story that spanned millennia and she was taken in by the iconic structures that she visited. Athena's temple, the acropolis, the Delphi, the muse's waterfall, the gates of Hades - all of them had a story to tell and she was eager to learn about each and every one.
Once more she was engrossed with the fabled creatures the legends told: the phoenix, the centaur … the Hydra.
Now that was something she would have liked to have taken on, she was annoyed when Mal told her about the two basilisks she had fought with and too wanted the chance to try something that was bigger than a deer. But she never got the chance. But this looked way better than a serpent king.
Its nine heads made for a fascinating point – and the fact that one grew back every time you took one off made it even more so, of course there was the off-chance that she might have gotten tired after a while and so leaving herself vulnerable with every head literally all around was something a little concerning.
Yeah- she might not like it so much anymore. Maybe if it was an old one then possibly, but just as well they didn't exist, if they did then it was in a realm she hadn't visited.
Moving on she glanced over the heroes: Jason, Theseus, Odysseus the tragic one Achilles. It was all good for them being martyrs and idiots as such but again didn't help her, in the end she had come to the conclusion – one that she had in every country she went to.
They were just stories.
Nothing about them was real. They were just tales told by very imaginative people; once more she had struck a dead end. Sitting back in her chair she laughed a little self depreciatively, would she ever get a live one? Without waiting or bothering to put the books back she left the library and returned to the small room she had been living from to plan her next move.
That was just it – where did she go from there? It was clear that Greece was the home of all things mythical – sure there was Rome but in essential that was just its equivalent, and so what she found here no doubt would be mirrored there. She sank to the bed wondering what it was she was doing wrong.
She had spent years looking. Every page in every book dedicated to magic she could find. She even went to those who claimed they possessed the art in order to find something – even a bloody trip to Romania and the gypsy's who lived there proved fruitless – nothing but bloody fakes the lot of them.
Oh to naked eyes – to those who believed in such asinine tricks… the people who had lived in the land without magic their whole lives' it would have seemed impressive. But to her – a person who had lived real magic, used real magic… was magic. It was nothing but a peddlers ware to fool gullible minds.
She was actually disappointed in herself for resorting to such means but she was desperate. For all the good it did her it proved just why she was right to scorn such practises in the first place, but surely anything was worth the try?
She reached above her bed and pulled down the bag of crisps she had stashed there. Food had become a good source of comfort to her since she had started her mission. With each failure she would go and binge until she fell into a food coma, wake up feeling sorry for herself, sort her life out before ultimately repeating the same process once more later down the line.
It was a vicious circle, but one she enjoyed – especially if it involved Taramosalata – she didn't know what it was about the small fish but she couldn't help herself when it came to buying bulk.
She didn't get fat – part of the regime of trying to better herself before failing was she ran. Every morning she went to the beach and ran the length of the shore. Of course it wasn't like when she ran with Ruby, she could still never seem to match her no matter how fast she tried and so decided to set a steady pace and go for distance instead.
But she had also come to learn that before she started her healthy kick – she really had no need for whatever she ate she had come to realize she never put on in weight. It had baffled her as she knew she was more than an amorous food lover and could give a pie eater in a contest a run for their money.
So if she ate like a sumo, why wasn't she the size of one? Mira had also called her out on her envious ability to look like a model even after she witnessed her horde an entire pizza to herself on a particularly trying day – she of course wouldn't have called herself a model, she had seen models and never in her life could she be as thin as those women.
Had they ever even heard of food that wasn't processed like cardboard she wondered. She had looked at herself in the mirror once – just studying herself hard, her conclusion was that she was more curvy then thin.
She had a reasonable weight. Fat where it needed to be fat where she didn't want it – but she had to sigh and concede to this worlds apparently body altering rules, she may have fat in new places – one silver lining was that her boobs had gotten bigger she enjoyed bra shopping greatly after that.
She may have gotten more curvier but she never put on weight, nor had she seemed to really age, possibly one or two years but then it was like time after that had frozen - it had her confused … much like her strength that ability had never left her either. That along with trying to figure out the location of the others had been something on her list to accomplish – whilst she had yet to cross the first one off, she did have a slight theory about the second.
The dragon
Her alter ego, Maleficent had said that was an innate part of them. Part of their souls and their bodies. They shared a twin vessel so to speak and so it was only natural that some of their traits had spliced together – the dragon with its immense strength and enhanced senses allowed them to be better than the mortals around them.
Of course the blonde had always stated that they were better no matter what dragon did and did not give them. As they in turn – the magic they had been born with helped the creature side become stronger, be better than the other dragons that they vacationed with on occasion. She knew she was the blonde were the strongest out there; it was only by terms of age and a hierarchy of experience that kept them from exercising that.
Of course when it came to fights it was allowed. The blonde only watching, being the pinnacle of indifference and finding anything that involved scrapping like the beasts they were uncouth and so chose to watch and judge from the top.
There were no dragons to fight but the 'Magical' effects still remained which was why she was more convinced that at one point in time – magic did reside within the land, she just didn't know what made it disappear. She stared morosely up at the ceiling as she chewed each small potato chip methodically as she thought.
Where would her next search take her? Like she had said she didn't think anything could top Greece and so would have to undertake a far more extensive look to see where would be the next that caught her eye. Finishing the pack she threw the empty bag to the side before hoisting herself up.
As much as she loved Greece she had never found a true place to put down roots as such – especially with the destinations being all over the country it made for getting back very hard and seeing as she had no magic that meant going tourist, something she had no problem with considering it was all she had been doing, but she did like her sleep.
For convenience sake it was just easier for her to rent or if had to- book a hotel near to the place she visited. But now she was leaving she had to look a bit further afield, but where to?
It would take some time. Most likely further East and so have to do some reading up on the countries pertaining to Asia, but not tonight, she was far too tired and so deciding and early night was called for she made her way to the kitchen to make herself a small dinner before retreating back to bed where she firmly stayed for the rest of the night.