Stuck In Magic Read online

  “You can walk back into the Greenwood, if you like,” the older man said. “I just don’t know when and where you’d come out.”

  I pinched myself, hard. It hurt. It didn’t feel like a dream – or a nightmare.

  Cleo and the boys were … where? When and where? Was this the past? Was this a time when magic had actually existed? Or was I on another world? Jasmine and her family looked human enough, but … they were such a strange mixture of races I found it hard to believe they lived and worked together. They looked like gypsies. Maybe they were travellers, moving from place to place.

  “I’m Grandfather Lembu,” the older man said. “And we are the Diddakoi.”

  “He doesn’t know anything about us, Grandfather,” Jasmine said. “He’s in shock.”

  “I don’t know anything,” I said. It wasn’t the first time I’d been abroad, but

  … if magic was real, the world would be very different. Right? “Where am I?”

  “You’re in the Kingdom of Johor,” Grandfather Lembu said, calmly. “Does that mean anything to you?”

  I shook my head, wondering – too late – if they understood the gesture. It was possible it meant something completely different here, if they had had no contact with my world. Or … I looked around, feeling hopelessly lost. What was I going to do? Where could I go? I was as ignorant of this new world as a newborn child …

  “You are welcome to stay with us, at least until we reach the nearest city,” the old woman said. “As long as you honour our ways, you will be welcome.”

  “I’ll take care of him,” Jasmine said. She shot me what I thought was meant to be a reassuring look. “He won’t know how to behave.”

  It was hard not to feel a twinge of panic. I tried not to show it on my face.

  I had no idea of the rules, or how to behave … for all I knew, smiling at someone was a grave insult. Or something. It was terrifyingly easy to give offense if one didn’t know the rules and the offended rarely bothered to give the offender the benefit of the doubt. If I’d managed to get in trouble when I’d moved from state to state, just by not knowing what I was doing, it would be far worse here.

  “First, we bury that … thing,” Grandfather Lembu said, waving at the car. “We can’t leave it lying around for the peasants to find.”

  Jasmine nodded. “Take whatever you want from it,” she said to me. “And then we’ll bury it here.”

  I didn’t want to leave the car behind, but there was no choice. Even if I could get it out of the ditch, the engine was fucked. There was no hope of driving down the road and out of the nightmare. I turned and walked back to the car, going through it to recover everything I could. I’d known operators who crammed their cars with their kit, on the grounds they might be called back to duty at a moment’s notice. In hindsight, I should have done the same. I just didn’t have anything like enough supplies to last for more than a few days, if that.

  Jasmine sat on the ditch and watched me calmly. Her eyes seemed to skim over the car, as if she couldn’t quite see it. I glanced at her in puzzlement, then looked away. She was stunningly pretty, yet meddling with the local women was a pretty universal to get into trouble. I’d known a guy who got into deep shit

  because he’d fallen in love with a girl from the sandbox. And besides, Jasmine looked to be around nineteen. She was practically half my age.

  “I should have brought more,” I muttered. Was the remnants of the car any use?

  Could I tear out the windows for trade goods? What about the gas in the tank?

  Given time, I was sure I could figure out a way to drain it safely. “If I’d known …”

  “You’re not the first person who walked into the Greenwood and came out somewhere else,” Jasmine said. She had very sharp hearing. “All you can do is make the best of it.”

  I straightened. If this was real, a single mistake could get me killed. If it wasn’t … I pinched myself again, just to be sure. It still hurt. The wind shifted, blowing the scent of arid sand into my nostrils. It felt … wrong. I picked up the bag and clambered out of the ditch. I’d go through the bag later, in hopes of determining what I could use for trade goods. I had no idea what was worth what, not here. For all I knew, the small toolbox was nothing more than a curiosity.

  Jasmine stood beside me. “Are you sure you have everything?”

  “Everything I can carry,” I said. “Do you want me to help bury the car?”

  “No need,” Jasmine said. “Watch.”

  She raised a hand. My hair stood on end as the dirt and sand started to rise of its own accord and cover the car. I stumbled backwards in shock, my head spinning in disbelief. Magic was real? I’d seen one spell already, but … I thought I understood, now, how the Native Americans had felt when they’d seen European guns and technology. It was so far beyond their comprehension that they must have felt they could never catch up. The first contact between the two worlds had been an outside context problem … this was an outside context problem. Jasmine, a girl so slight I could break her in half with ease, had enough power to shake the world.

  I forced myself to watch the tiny whirlwind as it covered the car completely.

  The ditch looked ruined. I couldn’t help wondering if someone was going to be very annoyed about that, one day. The ditch didn’t look to be in good condition

  – I could see patches where the sides had caved in – but the hump hiding the car was a great deal bigger. If it rained heavily, it was going to reveal the car …

  Jasmine lowered her hand. The storm faded away. I felt a sudden sense of loss as I looked at the mound. The car hadn’t been a good car, but she’d been mine.

  I’d bought her, I’d refurbished her, I’d repaired her … I felt as if I’d been completely cut off from my life and world. I wanted to jump over the ditch and run into the trees, but Grandfather Lembu was right. There was no guarantee I’d get home if I tried. The sense of unseen eyes looking at me grew stronger with every passing second.

  “Come on,” Jasmine said. “I’ll show you around.”

  I followed her numbly as she led the way back to the caravans. They seemed to be an entire mobile village. A cluster of women were lighting fires and boiling water, while the menfolk fed their horses and the children ran and played. I stayed close to Jasmine, doing my level best to ignore the stares. They didn’t feel hostile – I’d been in war zones, I knew the difference – but they didn’t seem very friendly either. It wasn’t uncommon, in isolated communities. A newcomer couldn’t walk up and demand admittance. He would have to work long and hard to earn their trust.

  And I’m the newcomer here, I thought, sourly. They don’t know me.

  Jasmine motioned for me to sit by the fire. I sat, watching the travellers

  watching me. They were a very diverse group, far more than I’d realised. And yet, there was something about them that made them look alike. I studied them, drawing on my years of experience. The men and women seemed separate, but equal. There was no sense the men were automatically superior or vice versa.

  The children were certainly playing together without any sense of separate worlds.

  “Drink this,” Jasmine said. “It’s safe.”

  “Thank you,” I said. The mug looked like something out of a bygone age. The liquid inside looked like soup. I sipped it carefully, tasting hints of chicken and vegetables. My stomach growled, reminding me that it had been a long time since I’d eaten. Thousands of years, perhaps. I couldn’t help smiling at the thought, even though it was a grim reminder I’d never see home again. “I … I don’t know anything about being here.”

  “I understand.” Jasmine’s eyes darkened, as if she was remembering something unpleasant. “I had to go away too, for a while. It’s never easy.”

  “No,” I agreed. “Where did you go?”

  “Whitehall School,” Jasmine said. She held out a hand. A spark of light danced over her palm. “It was very different. Being in a room … ugh.”

  I had
to smile. “What did you study there?”

  “Magic,” Jasmine said. She sounded wistful. “I have to go back at the end of the summer.”

  My head spun again. A school for magicians? A real-life Hogwarts? It wasn’t a pleasant thought. I’d read the books to my kids and I’d been unable to look past the multitude of unfortunate implications. Jasmine seemed nice enough, but

  … for all I knew, pureblood supremacism was a very real thing. If there were people dumb enough to think they were superior, just because their skin was lighter than mine, I was sure there were people who thought magic made them superior. My skin crawled. What could magic do? What could it not do? The teenage girl sitting next to me might have the powers of a minor god.

  And without her, you couldn’t talk to anyone here, I thought. You need her.

  I forced myself to think. “The spell you put on me, how long will it last?”

  “I’m not sure,” Jasmine confessed. “I can keep renewing it, you see. Without renewal” – she frowned – “it’ll last around six months, at best. It also has its limits. Focus on learning the language before it wears off.”

  “I’m good at learning languages,” I said, although I wasn’t sure it was true here. There’d been teachers who’d taught me how to speak and write a handful of different languages. I’d had multilingual friends who’d helped me to develop my skills. “I’ll do my best to learn.”

  Jasmine nodded. We fell into a companionable silence as we drank our soup. I couldn’t help noticing that Jasmine seemed as isolated as I, although she was one of them. I’d wondered if I was treading on someone’s toes, if Jasmine had a partner or admirer amongst the travellers, but … she seemed too isolated for it.

  I didn’t understand it. In my experience, beauty made up for a lot of things.

  Maybe she was just too closely related to the rest of the clan. There’d been tribal societies with strict rules to prevent inbreeding.

  “I need to pay my way,” I said, as the travellers started to pack up. “What can I do to help?”

  “You can help us set up the campsite when we reach the crossing point,” Jasmine said, mischievously. “There’s a lot of fetching and carrying for all of us to

  do, when we arrive.”

  I smiled. If there was one good way to integrate yourself, it was through being helpful. And I did want to pay my way, even if I didn’t have the slightest idea what I was doing. Jasmine stood and escorted me towards a small caravan, so small it looked like a children’s toy. I glanced inside, half-expecting it to be bigger on the inside. It wasn’t. There was barely enough room for a single person. I had the feeling I’d break my bones if I tried to sleep inside. I’d probably be sleeping under the caravan. The horse – no, donkey – gave me a bored look as Jasmine scrambled up and took the reins. I sat next to her, put my bag in the rear and watched as the traveller convoy lurched back into life.

  “You have magic,” I said. I tried to keep my voice casual, but it was hard.

  “Does everyone have magic?”

  “No.” Jasmine looked pensive. “A lot of us” – she waved a hand at the caravans

  – “have a spark of magic and know a few simple spells, but most people don’t.

  The really talented magicians go to school and learn how to do far more advanced magics. They don’t always come back.”

  I winced, inwardly, at the pain in her voice. It was never easy for someone to leave a traditional community, learn something very different and then come home and try to fit in once again. I’d seen it happen back home, to kids who might have been great if they hadn’t been dragged down by their peers; I’d seen it happen in Iraq and Afghanistan, where religious fanatics had no qualms about murdering educated women and blowing up schools for girls. Jasmine might not be facing death – I had the feeling she was still part of the clan – but she didn’t quite fit in any longer.

  “Magic,” I repeated. “How does it work?”

  Jasmine launched into a long and complicated explanation I couldn’t even begin to understand. There were too many things that didn’t make sense, too many words I didn’t know … I lacked too many concepts, I guessed, for the translation spell to work properly. I wasn’t even sure how it worked. The military had messed around with universal translators, but they’d never been particularly useful. They’d been too many dialects and too little time.

  I shivered, again, as she talked about her schooling. The students were dangerous … I recalled my earlier thoughts about pureblood supremacism and cursed under my breath. It was impossible to believe magicians didn’t have a superiority complex. There was no real difference between whites and blacks, but magicians and muggles? I didn’t want to know what they called muggles in this universe. It was probably something just as insulting.

  “I don’t know what I’m going to do here,” I said. “This place is so …

  different.”

  “You’ll get used to it,” Jasmine assured me. “It’ll take us two weeks to reach the city. After that, if you want to stay with us, you’ll be welcome. Or you can strike out on your own.”

  I hoped she was right, as the sky started to darken. The caravans came to a halt in a clearing, Grandfather Lembu snapping out orders to hew wood and fetch water. I jumped to the ground and helped, carrying water from the stream to the campsite. The young men said little to me as I worked, although I caught them giving my clothes sidelong glances. I made a mental note to find new clothes as soon as possible. I looked like a stranger, someone who didn’t fit in. And yet

  … I thought I saw glimmerings of respect as I helped set up the fire and a dozen other tasks. Perhaps being here wouldn’t be so bad after all. And yet …

  “Don’t go out of the clearing after dark,” Jasmine advised, after dinner. The food had been surprisingly tasty, following by singing and a dance. I’d sat and watched. “You don’t know what might be out there.”

  “No,” I agreed. “I … where do I sleep?”

  Jasmine pointed me to the space beside the caravan and tossed me a blanket.

  “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  I lay back on the ground and stared into the dark sky. It wasn’t the first time I’d slept out of doors, but … this time, the constellations were different. I swallowed, hard. Wherever I was, it wasn’t Earth. I was a very long way from home. I was never going to see Cleo and the boys again. Cleo I could do without, after everything, but the boys … I tried not to sob openly as I realised they were gone forever. They might be as well be dead.

  It was a very long time before I fell asleep.

  Chapter Three

  I would have gone mad, if it hadn’t been for Jasmine.

  She understood, to some extent, what I was feeling. She was always happy to chat, even when she was doing her bit for the clan. She explained what I was seeing, told me how the clan worked and, often, answered questions I hadn’t thought to ask. We might not be close friends – we were just too different –

  but she was, in her way, as isolated from the rest of the caravan as me. The rest of the clan kept their distance. It was hard not to feel a little offended, even though I knew I should be grateful. I’d had enough of that back home.

  Jasmine explained it, when I asked. “They’re not sure if you’re going to be hanging around for much longer,” she said. “They don’t want to get close to you if there’s still a chance you might leave.”

  I frowned. “Where would I go?”

  “You’re not the first person to come stumbling out of the Greenwood,” Jasmine said, as we sat on the edge of the campsite. “Some try to make their way back home, even though hundreds of years might have passed since they were lost.

  Others find new homes and wave goodbye to us. It happens. We don’t open our hearts to newcomers unless they’re committed.”

  “They don’t seem to like you either,” I said. “I thought you were one of them.”

  Jasmine’s mouth twisted, as if she’d bitten into something sour. “I w
ent to school,” she said, softly. “They don’t know if I’ll come back, after I graduate, or make my life elsewhere. If I don’t … my parents won’t disown me or kick me out, but I won’t be one of them anymore. A friend, perhaps, yet … an outsider.”

  I winced in sympathy. I understood the feeling. “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know,” Jasmine said. She smiled, rather wanly. “I haven’t decided yet.”

  She waved a hand at the caravans. “There are two circles,” she said. “The inner circle consists of those who are committed to our lives, who would sooner die rather than surrender the freedom of the open road. The outer circle consists of those who travel with us for a time and then go on to make their lives elsewhere. They’re welcome, in a way, but they’re not truly us.”

  “I see,” I said. “What should I do?”

  Jasmine looked me in the eye. “Follow your heart.”

  I changed the subject and tossed question after question at her, trying to get

  the lay of the land. Or the lie of the land, as my old sergeant had put it.

  Jasmine didn’t know that much, although I had a feeling she knew more than the average peasant. I’d met tribesmen in Central Asia who hadn’t known anything beyond their villages. They neither knew nor cared who ruled their country, let alone what side they were supposed to be on in the forever war. I had the feeling the Diddakoi paid as little attention as they could to such details. It left me feeling more than a little frustrated. How was I supposed to decide where to go, let alone what to do, when I didn’t know what the options were?

  We kept moving, never staying in one place for more than a day or two. I slowly grew used to the limits of my new home, to the simple absence of everything I’d taken for granted. We cooked dinner on a fire, not in a microwave; we washed in streams, when we could, rather than fancy showers. I’d hoped to impress them with my knowledge of ‘little devils’ in water – and the importance of boiling the water before drinking it – but it turned out they already knew it. Martin Padway had known enough tech to ensure that darkness never fell on the Roman Empire … he’d come from a less advanced world. I knew a lot, but I didn’t know how to build crap I’d taken for granted a few short weeks ago. If I’d known …