Sometimes I wonder why I'm always so tired… Then I remember that I stay up every night writing fanfiction. Who needs a purse? I can just use the bags under my eyes.
Chapter 3: Impossible… But Not
Alea walked up to Sand's door and hesitated. She wondered how on earth she was going to explain her plight, but if anyone could help her find a way back to her own world, it was Sand. She didn't particularly like her home, but at least her chances of survival there were significantly higher than stuck in this deadly game, even with the boon she'd given herself at the beginning. Those cheats would only be infallible for a short time. Once she got to the higher-level enemies, they may not be enough to keep her alive.
Before she had the chance to knock, the door opened, and she was greeted with the appraising face of Sand. He looked at her wryly, "Dear girl, are you planning on coming in, or would you prefer instead to stand there all night staring at my door?"
This time, she was prepared for the sight of him, so she didn't react nearly as intensely. Instead, she gave him a smirk, "Oh, I was just admiring the scratch there, it looks almost as if someone tried to stab you through the door. Making friends, Sand?"
He didn't miss a beat, "Yes, well, when one lives in the Docks District, one tends to have difficulty avoiding trouble. Do come inside, before the smell leaks in."
She walked past him and noticed that he was eye-level with her. It was nice to not have to look way up or way down to speak with someone. Her neck might be given a rest. "Where's Jaral," Alea asked, wondering about the wizard's cat-familiar.
Sand eyed her suspiciously. He didn't answer her question. Instead, a small, spotted cat padded out from behind a counter to circle his feet. "How is it you came to know my familiar? I don't believe we have met."
She smiled impishly at this, "Oh, you've never met me. But, I've met you several times over. In fact, I know much about you. You were born in Neverwinter, but you wanted access to a greater arcane education, so you went to Luskan and signed on with the Host Tower mages."
Sand tensed at this, now glaring at her warily with indignation and a slight hint of fear.
Alea held up a hand to placate him, "But, when they asked you to cross a line that your morals simply would not allow, you decided their artifacts were not worth it, and you left, being marked for death in the process. Am I correct so far?"
He reluctantly nodded, and Alea couldn't help but notice that he glanced briefly at a staff, probably wondering if he could get to it before she attacked him.
She simply tilted her head and continued, "Then, you fled to Neverwinter and traded information for safety. You used to live in Blacklake, until you came here when prying eyes got a little too close. Now you own this shop, and keep your eyes and ears open, reporting anything regarding illegal activity within Neverwinter walls – such as Moire and her gang's movements – to Nevalle of the Nine in secret." Finally, she stopped, after proving to Sand that she essentially knew his entire backstory. She watched him, wondering how he would react to some stranger suddenly walking in and telling him that they knew all his deepest darkest secrets. She expected a smart remark. Some sarcastic quip, doused in his dry wit. What she got, however, was nothing but stunned silence.
She raised her eyebrows, expectantly, "Nothing? Not even a wry comment? I gotta say, I'm a bit disappointed."
When she saw his fingers discreetly moving in a spell formation, with blue energy pulsing between him, she threw up her hands in a calming gesture, "Wait, don't shoot! I'm not here to hurt you or turn you in to Luskan or anything. I assure you, I mean you no harm. Actually, I came here for your help."
The blue energy dissipated and he finally found that famously sharp tongue of his, "What help could a simple Luskan runaway – as you make it sound – like myself possibly give to someone so remarkably well informed as you? I may have incredible talent, but considering you were able to somehow unearth those deeply buried secrets, you must have some sort of trick up your sleeve. It's clear where the brains in the family went, poor Duncan must have lost it all to you. So tell me, my dear, what sort of help do you require?"
"Well…" Alea took a deep breath and sighed nervously, "This is where it gets a little complicated." She plopped herself down gracelessly onto one of Sand's more comfortable-looking chairs without actually asking. "You see, I'm not exactly from around here."
"Yes, I can tell as much. A harborman if I am not mistaken, judging from the smell." Sand sat down across from her, with significantly more decorum than she had shown. He picked up a teapot that he had prepared and set it on top of some sort of contraption. Then, after putting in a few herbs that Alea didn't recognize, he muttered something, moving his fingers in a distinct pattern. A small flame shot up below the device to begin heating the kettle.
"I am, and I'm not," she started cryptically, looking at the tiny fire with mild interest, "It's all a bit hard to explain. Umm… How can I put this? Okay, so you know the githyanki?"
He looked at her with a difficult to read impression on his face, "I can't say I've met them personally, no. However, I have read about them in tomes and am somewhat familiar with them."
"Okay, good. Anyway, they live on another plane of existence, right? Sort of like another dimension."
He nodded, "Yes, they travel here through portals from time to time. It's all very complex and often confusing magic. I, of course, have no issue understanding it, but that's merely due to my superior intellect and immeasurable talent. Others are not so lucky." Sand said all this with a straight face, making Alea smile in spite of herself. He was never a humble elf, but he was still right.
"That's good then," she grinned, "because I need your help making an interdimensional portal to a world you've never heard of and that you likely would have difficulty imagining."
"I would leave the sarcastic remarks to me, dear girl, you clearly do not have the knack for it. Points for effort, however." The kettle began to whistle so he blew out the flame and poured our tea into metal mugs. These, unlike most Alea had seen since ending up here, looked well-made and didn't have a single dent or scratch.
She reached out to take her mug from him, "Oh, I wasn't being sarcastic. Nor was I joking. I'm being completely serious." She took a ginger sip and found it to be remarkably soothing. Sand had a gift for potion-making, and she supposed it must branch out to tea. "Mmm, this is really good. Thanks, Sand," she smiled, taking another sip, "I needed this. Being transported to an alternate dimension against one's will has a tendency to stress one out."
His eyebrows shot up in obvious surprise, "Well… You're quite welcome." Then he continued, "an alternate dimension, you say," he asked with a sudden shift in demeanor. Somehow that comment had caught his interest. He muttered something under his breath that I didn't quite catch.
"I wouldn't be surprised if you thought I was crazy, or pulling some sort of trick, but I'd be sad if you did." Alea snapped her mouth shut. She had not intended to say that.
"And why is that, dear girl?" Sand asked, probing her.
Her tongue answered of its own volition, "Because you're one of my favorite characters. Top of the list is Casavir, because he's incredibly hot with the sexiest voice I've ever heard, then you because you saved me from being framed for mass-murder and your sarcasm cracks me up, then Khelgar because he's with the protagonist from the beginning of the game, and so on. My least favorites are Bishop and Qara though. They're just mean, and they've always annoyed me half to death." Good lord, what was she saying? She didn't want to tell Sand about the whole characters-in-a-game thing ever. Best-case scenario he believes her and has an existential crisis. Worst-case scenario he thinks she's crazy and she ends up in a nuthouse. Why was she speaking about it as if it were the most obvious thing in the world? Against her will, and to her absolute horror, her mouth continued to move, "Also because you're way more attractive than I thought you'd be, so I want you to believe me. That way, not only will you help me get back home, but I'll have an excuse to talk to you more often. I think you're one of the only people in this world who I can trust to help me. Plush I blush whenever I look directly at your face, and I don't entirely hate it." Alea dropped her mug and clamped her hand over her mouth to avoid saying anything else. She had already shared way more than she had planned, and she didn't want to do any more damage.
Sand simply stared at her with an unreadable expression. That is, until she called him attractive, then he simply smirked. He knew his little trick had worked. "You may want to stop speaking before you start divulging your darkest secrets. The serum won't ware off for another ten minutes."
She looked at him with panic on her face, "Serum? What serum?" She glanced at her mug of tea as if it might bite her. She soon noticed that Sand's mug remained untouched.
"This, dear girl, is a truth serum. And before you go getting all indignant, here," He picked up his mug and, looking her in the eye, took a large swig. "Now neither of us can lie to one another."
She frowned at him, narrowing her eyes, "the worst part about this is that I'm not even surprised."
"Oh good, then we can skip the part where you argue about how incensed you are that I would do such a thing. You must understand, I need to take every precaution with people who know my past with Luskan. One wrong move and I could end up dead, or worse."
She supposed it made sense. She'd probably have done the same thing if she'd thought of it. Still, she wasn't particularly happy about it. "There was a great deal of that that I never intended for you to hear."
Sand's smirk grew wider, "Which part? The bit where I'm supposedly a character in some sort of game – which oddly enough I actually believe – and that you were somehow brought here by an unknown force, or the one where you said I'm attractive and you want more excuses to speak with me? Honestly, I'm not sure which one I prefer more. The latter is certainly more amusing, but the former is a great deal more fascinating."
Alea was taken aback, "You believe me? I thought you'd reject the idea or at the very least have an identity crisis."
"While it is a ridiculous notion, yes, for some odd reason I believe you. You don't strike me as the mentally unstable type. Magic can be unpredictable, after all, and there are many things that even the greatest of mages, like myself, do not know."
Jaral leaped up onto Alea's lap, making her jump in surprise. When she realized she was not being attacked by demons or monsters, she relaxed and gently stroked the fluffy creature. "So… Does that mean you'll help me? My home isn't the greatest place, and I never particularly enjoyed it. I don't even miss it all that badly. But, I know a lot more about surviving there than I do here, and I have family that will worry about me if I go missing forever. I'd like to get back, if anything to put their minds at ease and to increase the likelihood of my survival. A lot of dangerous things are going to be happening on the Sword Coast soon and I preferred it when it was nothing more than a game. I don't want to be here when things get worse."
He eyed Alea for a moment, then glanced down to Javal. His familiar looked up at him as if in response. Sand nodded absentmindedly to himself, then stood up and began moving about his shop, obviously looking for something. He muttered under his breath as he searched. Eventually, he must've found what he wanted because he grabbed a small bag from inside a drawer and held it to his nose momentarily. Finding it satisfactory, he closed it back up and stuffed it into a pocket in his robes. He turned back to Alea, "I make no promises, but I will see what I can do. In exchange, however, you must promise me this," he paused, "you will never speak of my past with Luskan to anyone but me, and especially not outside these walls. I have wards protecting my more private conversations from being overheard, but if you were to mention my involvement with the Host Tower anywhere else, even in a whisper, there is a chance you could be overheard.
"Fine," Alea agreed, "but the same goes for the whole this-world-isn't-real thing. My companions know I'm from another plane of existence, but they don't know any details. I'd like to keep it that way."
"You have my word. But, dear girl," he gave her a pointed look, "what makes you think that just because we exist in what is only a game where you are from, that this world is not real?"
She wasn't sure how to respond to that, so she just tilted her head, considering the idea. Jaral purred, and it was then that she realized he had fallen asleep on her lap. She wasn't sure what to do about this, so she just looked at him, trying to decide how to escape the situation.
She was pulled from her thoughts when Sand said the oddest thing, "Luskan is full of truthful, kind-hearted individuals who would never consider hurting another person." He nodded to himself, "I do believe the truth serum has worn off."
Alea tried to think of some sort of lie to test this. Eventually she came up with, "I hate chocolate and cherries are the best." Alea hated cherries and was unhealthily obsessed with chocolate, so she was satisfied. "Yep, seems like it." She relaxed, and it must have shown on her face
"Whatever cherries did to deserve your ire, I cannot imagine, but I shall have to take your word for it. Now if you would be so kind as to return my familiar to me, I would be much obliged."
Alea looked for a way to get Jaral off her lap without waking him up but was at a loss. Eventually, Sand took pity on her and walked over to pick the sleeping creature up. Lifting Jaral, the cat growled its discontent at being awoken. "Oh, do be quiet, will you," Sand scolded, placing him on the ground. Jaral padded over to a corner and curled up, quickly falling back asleep. He looked back at Alea and pulled the bag of powder from his pocket. "Here," He poured some into a smaller container and handed it to her, "Put a pinch of this under your tongue before you go to sleep and allow it to dissolve. I will do the same. After three nights of this you should begin to feel the effects."
She looked at it, "What does it do?"
"It's essentially a tracker. It will allow me to find you easily should you go wandering off somewhere."
"Would I be able to tell where you are too?"
"Only if you know how it works."
She figured it wouldn't take long to figure out, considering her level 20 lore skill. "Why do we need a tracker?"
"Consider it insurance. You say a lot of dangerous things are coming this way? It would be nice to know that if I suddenly disappear, someone will be able to find me."
She nodded, "I guess that makes sense. Well, I suppose I should be leaving." Alea stood and adjusted her cloak. "We can talk more about this in the morning, if that's alright with you."
"Right, because I can suddenly just drop all my obligations to help you with your little problem." Sand sighed theatrically, "very well, I suppose I can find time earlier in the day. I'll be by at that lousy excuse for an inn sometime around breakfast to find you. Trust me when I say you would much rather avoid eating Duncan's cooking if possible. If you do, you'll likely live a great deal longer. I shall make breakfast, and you can explain in finer detail about this world of yours."
Alea was surprised. She never expected him to offer her breakfast, but she would eagerly accept it. All she'd had the past few weeks were trail rations and whatever wild game she could catch. It'd be nice to have something decent for once. She hoped he wasn't a terrible cook. Smiling, she nodded her head, "good night, then," and with that, she turned and walked out the door.
Sand stared back at her for a few moments, then turned to examine his shelf for books on portal travel. He had a feeling that the next few months would be very interesting.