The World Walkers: Quiar: The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments (part 9, 109th continuation)

[k_a_webb]

Part 1

Part 9, 108th continuation

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‘Tell me about one of them,’ Peric said, wanting to know more about the Quiarans who ended up on other worlds. ‘Someone I might have known if they hadn’t been taken to another world.’

‘Okay.’ Quiar sounded like she was smiling. ‘It’s thanks to the other worlds that I’ve been able to keep track of them and what they’ve been doing, because they weren’t happy with the choices that their races made either. Unfortunately, as I said, we made the decision that we weren’t going to control them, otherwise I’m certain that they would have been stopped. That might have changed the future, but there are times when the thought of that doesn’t bother us as much as it probably should.

‘I’m sure it will come as no surprise to you that when they arrived they found themselves in Larnach. That’s where almost all the doors that come here lead to, although I know of one that goes to Fasach, three to Mothar, and one to Inish. So, at least count, there are eight that lead to Larnach, but the door they used doesn’t exist any longer. Even though we know no one from Siaral actually took part in the raid it’s simpler not to have it where it was, because it was in a place that no one went, really, as the door was very rarely used. We’re not actually entirely certain which world the slavers were from and it’s likely that they were from a number of different worlds.

‘Within the village they found was a number of mice. Now, as a mouse yourself, I’m certain you have some idea of what they would have done in order to protect themselves, but nothing they did was enough. The slavers simply had better magic, so they took the mice with them, knowing that they would make useful cleaning slaves, with a collar around their necks that held three different charms. One stopped them from being able to use their magic, the second caused them pain if they didn’t follow an order they were given, and the third gave them the ability to step through the doors. Once they were wherever they were going that charm was removed, so they couldn’t escape, although at least three of them were natural Moonjumpers. Sadly they didn’t know that.

‘The mouse I’m going to tell you about was called Juniper. She had just come of age when she was taken, along with a group of her friends, and she ended up on Saethera. The known races there would never have accepted slaves, but the slavers knew more about the hidden places than anyone before, so I think they might have come from one of them. On Saethera there are three hidden continents that I know about and I don’t doubt there are more than I don’t. You’ve had several conversations about how magic evolves, so it won’t come as a surprise to you that the worlds do as well, sometimes due to the choices that we’ve made or due to the choices that the races who inhabit us have made. Someone looking for a sanctuary might well end up creating it.

‘So Juniper was on Saethera, working for a household that treated her, and the three other mice they owned, surprisingly well. When the grandfather died she was passed onto the father, becoming the personal maid for one of his three daughters. It was a good position to find herself in. Most of the others weren’t as lucky, but I think you need to hear a happy story rather than a sad one after everything you’ve been through. Leona was five when she was given Juniper, so it would have been easy enough for her to mistreat the little mouse if she hadn’t been taught to appreciate everything that Juniper did for her, because it wasn’t every girl who had her very own helper. Most days Juniper would braid Leona’s hair before school, then help the girl with whatever work she had to do at home, and it wasn’t long before Juniper’s charmed collar was replaced with a normal one.

‘As Juniper believed she would never be able to get back to Quiar she made the most of the life she had. I’m glad that she did, as there are mice who spent their entire lives fighting the people who’d bought them. The time came when Juniper died and she could have left Saethera then, if she’d wanted to, because souls aren’t trapped anywhere. They can go wherever they want whenever they want, but she chose to wait for Leona to die too. From what Saethera said it seems very much like Juniper fell in love with her and Leona felt the same way, so they made the decision to live their next lives together.’

‘That’s what they were meant to do.’

‘Yes, it was. They were supposed to be together for their next lives and we were glad things worked out as well as they had, although their next lives were nowhere near as simple. Juniper was born male, because she wanted to see what it was like, while Leona was born female again. As you can tell the plan was for them to end up together, but they didn’t. Even though their souls were still very much in love their meeting was affected by the decisions they made. Juniper realised that she was a Moonjumper and she decided to explore the Web with her newfound ability, which meant that she didn’t meet the woman she was meant to. Instead she ended up being executed on Athare and then going back to Saethera to wait once more, so they could attempt the same thing again, without knowing that Leona had fallen in love with someone else, someone she wanted to live her next life with, rather than Juniper.

‘Juniper wasn’t certain what to do next. She knew she’d made a mistake by choosing to travel the worlds, but it’s hard. When you plan certain things during the times between your lives there is always a chance they might be affected by the choices you make in life. Unfortunately her choice had lost her someone she cared very much for, because Leona resented Juniper for walking away, even though it hadn’t been because of Leona herself. Juniper finding out about her abilities had been a total accident and she tried to explain that. Sometimes, though, the other person just won’t listen, so Juniper made the decision that it was time to find another world to live on, one where she could start again with someone new, and after some time she found herself on Kniroch.

‘She wasn’t supposed to end up there, but as I’ve said before things often don’t work out the way we hope they will. Normally they turn into disasters, so what happened when she found herself confronted with the soul of one of the slavers, who’d also lived another life, was a nice surprise. Instead of reacting the way some souls had she thought about what her options were and asked Ilya if he wanted to live a life with her, on Kniroch, for them to learn more about each other. He could not have agreed, but I think he appreciated being given a chance, so they chose that time to incarnate as siblings. As they weren’t soul siblings it’s a different kind of relationship. If you aren’t soul siblings you might, under certain circumstances, end up falling in love, even though it is something that’s frowned upon on Kniroch.

‘When they chose their family they made one mistake. Ilya was born several years earlier than she was, to a mother who wasn’t ready for a child, so she had him adopted by her sister, who was already a mother to one boy and was happy to take on another, and Juniper grew up thinking of him as a cousin. It wasn’t until her aunt found them in bed together that they found out the truth, but by then they were very much in love. Juniper could still Moonjump, while the slaver, as penance for the choices he’d made, had promised the worlds that he wouldn’t Moonjump for five lives. However, if he had of made that choice, for Juniper, we probably would have let him.

‘They didn’t though. Moving to another world meant they could have been happy together, but they chose to walk away from each other, which was the hardest thing they could have done. Juniper found out that she could travel the worlds when she stepped through a door that took her to Labyrinth, so she took on the job of being a freelance crystal buyer, while he moved to another town. Every so often they came across each other, and a couple of times they almost kissed as they were still madly in love with each other, so it was a relief for everyone when Ilya died in an accident. Once that happened he decided that in their next life they were going to be together, no matter what.’

Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.

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