Page 22 of Search for the Lost

The marble square stopped abruptly, sending everyone tumbling onto their asses and shutting Aspin up. A door-size hole opened in the tower, too brightly backlit for Leo to see anything, and the square slid up against the opening. It gave an impatient little jerk, as if to tell them to get the hell off, so they did. The door closed behind them.

They were in the back of a room that looked remarkably like the theater in one of the high schools that Leo had attended. It smelled the same too: dust, sweat, old paint, wood, peanut butter, and Axe body spray.

Leo inhaled deeply and felt a sense of calm settle over him. Shortly after transferring to that school, he’d been recruited into the drama club by Miss Ramos, a dynamic young teacher who had a good eye for misfits who were desperate for a safe space. The school was putting on a production of Little Shop of Horrors that year, and at first Miss Ramos had thought that Leo should be trained to work the light board. Which he loved, but after two short-circuits and one almost-disastrous fire, she’d moved him to props instead, where at least mishaps were less likely to be lethal. He’d made friends. He was happy.

And then, two weeks before the performance, he’d been transferred to a different foster family in a different district and had to change schools.

“Are you all right?” Crispin whispered in Leo’s currently pointy ear.

Leo sniffed. “Yeah, I’m good.”

“What do you think will happen⁠—”

A fanfare erupted via hidden speakers, the red stage curtains parted, and the stage flooded with light. A robed and hatted figure appeared from stage left.

The figure strode quickly across the boards, stopped center stage, and looked out at the seating. A male voice boomed loudly enough to hurt. “You’re supposed to make an appointment.”

7

Crispin

Crispin had had it up to here—if here was a good three meters above his head. The last day had been a nightmare: a visit from his not so beloved brother, a mysteriously missing mother, a body swap, his assistant hitting on his partner right in front of him, the whole lot of them being sent to an unconnected world by a rheumy-eyed old squirrel, and finally suffering the indignity of having to walk both forward and backward until he was so tired that he could no longer feel his feet.

Don’t even get me started on the endless staircase to nowhere. Which was exactly what this place was to him. Green farking nowhere.

And now this strange, pointy-hatted little man with the hook nose, lime-colored eyes and bushy green eyebrows, dressed in emerald robes so bright that his eyes hurt to look at them, had the temerity to say, “You’re supposed to make an appointment.”

Every fae is born with a certain amount of patience—some have less, some more—which he/she/they carefully dole out during the entirety of their unusually long lives. His mother was fond of saying that Crispin had been gifted with a nearly infinite supply.

Which had just run out at the most inopportune time possible.

“We’re… supposed… to… make… an… appointment?” With each word, he felt himself literally growing larger and larger, his chest puffing out like an offended gamjeebeast who has just been told that it is not the most beautiful creature in all the Connected Worlds.

Leo put a hand on his rising waist. “Um. Crispy?”

“For the last elfing time, it’s CRISPIN!” His hair exploded into flames as he roared it so loudly that the entire tower shook and streams of dust sifted down through the air onto the green floor tiles. “Why does everyone keep messing with my name?”

“Um, sorry?” Probably in an attempt to calm Crispin down, Leo petted the back of his thigh, which was as high as he could reach on Crispin’s enlarged form. “But maybe we should ask this nice wizard for help in our inside voices?”

Crispin blinked and then looked down at the wizard. The poor fellow cowered against the wall with a green-cloaked arm over his face, shaking like a leaf in a tempest. “Oh.” Crispin bit his lip. “Quite right. Please forgive me.” He took a deep breath and sighed, and finally began to shrink back toward his normal size. It felt like the room was growing larger around him. How did I even do that?

“Well, that was… interesting.” Crispin’s own eyes blinked back at him.

Cypher helped the little wizard up off the floor. “It’s all right,” the faun told him. “I think he’s gotten it out of his system now.” He cast a worried look at Crispin and said, “Maybe we should all just go back home before we cause any more harm.”

Crispin blushed so hard that his toes turned red… which was an easy assessment because his gianting had practically exploded the clothing off his body, including his boots, and had busted the straps of his backpack. “I’m so sorry. I’m not usually like this. I’m… not myself today.” He pulled what was left of his clothing to cover himself as best he could.

Aspin snickered. “That’s an understatement.”

The wizard dusted himself off. “Ah, erm, ahem… yes, I am sorry to have added to your, urm, significant amount of stress, Crispin Eladrin Moss’caladin.” And then he bowed in front of Crispin, so low that his head almost touched the floor.

“Well, that’s very kind of… wait, you know that I’m me?” Crispin furrowed his Leo brow.

“Of course. We’ve been expecting you. Though we really did hope you’d make an appointment before just barging in like this.” He sighed, a put-upon sound so heavy that it might have contained an entire elephant. “Nevertheless, here we are, and we must deal with the situation as we find it, I suppose. Welcome to Ous. I am the High King Wizard Sourman⁠—”

“Did he just say Saruman?” Leo blinked rapidly. “Like Lord of the Rings Saruman?”

Aspin shook his head. “I heard Sawyer-man.”