Chapter One

Sylvester

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I’d had a few months to get used toand still it got to me.My left fistThe skin was scratched and remnants of blood were stark against my pale hand; my lip was busted, throbbing at the split, and the swelling was such that my mouth was slightly agape; then there was myso swollen that I couldn’t see through it.Sister Magdalena tsked and it was a little surprising. I hadn’tbecause it was easier now to keep track of my thoughts for longer, but I’d slipped, focusing in another direction while I’d let everything else fall to the wayside.Sister Magdalena was adressed largely in black with a white hat-like thing I’d slipped and called ridiculous one time, something I largely blame on being suddenly thrust into a religious world. She was a long woman, tall and thin, with a face that seemed too long and sharp, it was made worse because her lips were continually pursed, making it was hard to like her from first impressions. Even so, she was one of the better people that ran the orphanage.“Honestly, Sylvester,” she said, getting low and dipping cotton in alcohol. “I don’t know what to do with you anymore.”“They were picking on Benjy,” I said, hissing a little as she started with my lip, a burn sprouting as she dabbed it with the cotton. The pain was sharper than I remembered, but then that was supposed to be true, right? The memory of pain often dwarfed theof it.Even so, it was a reminder of the past, when I’d lived a more exciting life on a different world, instead of this fever dream.Sister Magdalena stopped, giving me a look. “You know,” she said, “that excuse would fly better if you didn’t get into fightsIf we didn’t keep findingin your room.”I shrugged. “Gotta be able to protect myself,” I said, smiling what I hoped was a roguish smile. She didn't buy it.“You’reSylvester,” she said. “You shouldn’t need a knife to protect yourself.”I gave her a long look andwanting the pieces to slot into place but they didn’t. A pang of loss ran through me because I’dit. In one fell swoop I’d lostThe other Lambs were gone or maybe I was gone and sent here; and the quirk provided by Wyvern, the only thing that might have been able to get me out of this, had disappeared.I wasand it grated.Sister Magdalena sighed, dabbing more of the blood away from my lip. She pulled back, holding my chin up and forcing my head this way and that.“I don’t think you’ll need stitches,” she said. “The split isn’t too wide. Hand.”I handed it over, hissing again as she dabbed alcohol, wiping away the blood.Lillian would have stitched it or maybe not stitched but pulled something out of her bag that would have closed the split. If she’d been here, then I wouldn’t have gotten the swelling in the first place and maybe my knuckles would be better.If Mary were here then I wouldn’t have even needed to fight. She would have taken the lead, beaten the guy down and maybe I would have rubbed it in. The guy, Charlie McNamara, was big and burly, more fat than muscle, and being beaten by a girl would have been a hit at his ego. I wasn’t surebut I could see a situation where I would have used that to needle him, find some chink that would eventually get me all I wanted from him.But I couldn’t, because I’d lost it.“There was a letter for you,” said Sister Magdalena, interrupting me from my brooding. “It’s why I’ve been looking for you for most of the day.”“Who’s it from?” I asked.“Some school I’ve never heard of,” she said. “Apparently, you’ve been accepted into their ranks.”I frowned. “That sounds suspicious,” I said.She shrugged. “Apparently it had something to do with your parents,” she said. “It’s all…ratherBut a representative is expected to arrive in the next few hours to talk to you about it. This will be a bad showing, if we’re being honest.”An excitement bubbled inside me and all at once it deflated. I’d thought that this might be a mystery, that I could treat all of this under the lens of a mission as a Lamb, but Ia Lamb anymore. I just wouldn’t be able to connect the dots the same way. I’d lost my edge.“Whatever happens, happens,” I said with a shrug.Sister Magdalena stroked my face, something that made shivers run up and down my spine. She gave me a long look. “I’ll pray that this goes well for you, Sylvester, because youa good boy.”I snorted but didn’t say anything, letting her wrap bandages over my hand and thinking back to the timeWe’d succeeded in the end, achieved all we wanted and reached something of a truce between the Crown and our little patch of home. Everything should have beenI should have been able to run the country without trouble and instead there wasMy mind was incredibly slow. I could focus nowchoose a thought stream and stick with it, even remember things past a few days and I didn’t have the hallucinations any more, but I was left all the weaker for it.Within that slowness, the dullness of my mind, it was easy for time to pass; I let one of the other Sisters prepare some clean clothes for me, even fuss over my hair because they wanted me out of theirsIt took three hours before the woman arrived.“I’ll be leaving you alone,” said Sister Agnes, and old woman built like a bull. I was surprised at how she didn’t react to the old woman wearing deep green robes with a crooked green hat.I thought. But it didn’t help my brain move any faster.I knew the stuff, but it waswithin my mind, covered in mud and debris, all stuff I had to sift through to piece things together.The woman gave me a long look, expression placid as she took me in. There was a way she was looking at me, how her eyes moved from my face to my hands that said she was taking in the injuries but I had no ideashe thought. She didn’t show anything, her posture was regal,and it wasn’t faltering as she looked at me, none of the quiver of disappointment I often saw in adults.I wasn’t gettingwhen I would have been able to read her like a book if I’d still been a Lamb.She walked into the room, going to Mother Margret’s chair behind her desk. She sat, let out a breath, digging within the folds of her robes and pulling out an envelope. I frowned because I hadn’t seen any pockets, but I hadn’t been looking closely enough to be sure.There was that pang again, leaving me hollow as I remembered everything I’d lost. I closed my fist and hid the pain as my skin stretched, opening the scrapes a little wider. The pain gave me focus, pulling my attention away from everything else. It also made me aware that if I’d had Wyvern in my system I would have re-prioritised so that everything was pushed back, closed off that part of myself.“Mr Lambsbridge,” the woman said and I started a little. I’d been in my head so much that I’d partially forgotten about her.“I am Deputy Headmistress Minerva McGonagall, and I am proud to tell you, you have been accepted to Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry.”“Witchcraft and wizardry?” I said.“Yes, Mr Lambsbridge,” she said. “I am a witch andare a wizard.”I let out a short laugh. “Magic isn’t real,” I said.“It is,” she said and with that she handed over the envelope. There was too much distance between us, I hadn’t moved since she’d come into the office, but she did nonetheless. The envelope fell out of her grasp, sliding through the air to me. I didn’t catch it so much as pluck it out of the air.My first thought was wires. Mary could turn thrown knives. But the letter had been moving too slow and I would have seen them. My second thought was that it might be strands of translucent muscle, sending the letter to me, but this place’s technology had diverged from my history. It wasn’t bio-science that had taken off, but the hard sciences, feats of engineering that hadn’t been imagined where and when I came from.My third thought…“Okay,” I said with a shrug.“Okay?” said McGonagall, there was a flicker of confusion, colour bleeding into her impassive expression, a little bit easier to read.“Okay,” I said. “I’m a wizard, now what?”“…you understood what I said, correct, Mr Lambsbridge?” she said.“I’m a wizard. Yes,” I said, paying less attention to her and more the letter. I ripped the envelope open and pulled out the letter, scanning over. It talked about my entrance to Hogwarts just as she’d said and there was another piece of paper,that had a list of all my school supplies. “I won’t be able to afford all of this. Not to mention where I’ll get them.”“There’s a fund to help muggle-born students in your position,” said Minerva, and I had the sense that she was distracted.“Where?”“Where,she said.I gave her a look, unable to hide my frown. She noticed, stopping herself from having too big a reaction. I would have been able to pin it down before, get a sense of what she was feeling, what she was thinking, but there was none of that.Over and over I felt empty, untethered, and I didn’t like it.Maybe something in this world would make me whole again? Give me the sense of purpose that came with being a Lamb?Until then, I’d have to play along.“My apologies,I said.It was a few weeks before I found myself outside a dingy old pub. Not the type of place an eleven-year-old was supposed to be alone, but I loved it. It reminded me of thewhen it had just been me and Gordon. He’d been learning the ropes, wanting more than just the training he got at the Academy, and I’d thought I couldskill. I’d been disappointed, but Gordon had been in his element.a part of me thought. I still wasn’t the best fighter. I was scrawny and weak, more than not, I thought I could out-think my way through a fight, but at least I wasSo much so that Ibe able to take Jamie in a fight.What I’d always wanted in a sense, but it was tainted by everything else.I pushed the feelings back, focusing onI’d spent the last few weeks going through London and trying to find anything connected to magic and I’d been lucky a few times, seeing strange people wearing robes or seeing a dog that fit more into my world than this world. But I still hadn’t connected it all and I wasn’t brave enough to just go talking to random people when I couldn’t read them.So I’d had no choice but to wait until today to get a better sense of this world.I went in, stopping and taking everything in. It was day, reasonably good London weather, with shafts of light peeking through an overcast sky. It had been darkbut not overly so, but going into the pub it felt as if it was out of phase with everything outside, giving the feel of a room with boarded up windows.There were people, all of them dressed unabashedly in strange robes in a variety of colours. One man wore a cloak that had the night’s sky and a few planets on it, watching it, the planets moved. There were also other things: People who were too short, their features too sharp, with pointed ears and pointy teeth; a group of people who wore black, their skin so pale it almost glowed and their section of the room darker than the dingy ambiance of the place; and an old woman with a nose that was too big, moles growing out of her face, almost all of them hairy, and a back so bent she was shaped like a cane.I couldn’t help but smile,because it was a step towards what I was used to. I wasn’t a Lamb, but maybe I could trick myself into believing that this place could be like home.Looking past everything and I saw her, Professor McGonagall. She’d changed her robes, now wearing black with red and gold trimming in the arms and bottom; she wore a black hat, crooked, but it was less wrinkly than the one she’d worn before. She stood with three families and had just looked up from glancing at her watch when she saw me.I started towards them.“Ah, Mr Lambsbridge,” said Professor McGonagall. “You’re very nearly late.”“This place was harder to find than I thought, Professor,” I said with a shrug. It was a lie, the real reason was because it had been hard to get up, to give myself that drive.She hummed and I had the sense that she didn’t believe me, even if I couldn’t figure outI thought that. It was grating.“I’d like to introduce you to your year-mates,” she said. “Hermione Granger.”Said girl smiled. She was short and thin, but everything about her was attention grabbing, her bushy brown hair and too large front teeth. She likely didn’t feel self-conscious about them because her smile was unadulterated, not holding anything back.“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” said Hermione Granger, standing between her parents. They smiled as well, giving small nods.“Dean Thomas,” she said, and this time it was a black boy standing beside his mother. The boy was tall and weedy, his hair cut so short it was almost a buzz cut. Dean smiled and gave a wave, while his mother said hello.“And Taylor Hebert,” said Professor McGonagall, pointing to the last girl.The girl was tall and thin, taking the features of both her parents; facial features from her father, probably the bad eyes too because they were both wearing glasses; and her hair from her mother. The girl gave a bored wave, paying less attention to me and more everything around her.I couldn’t help but get the sense she was on her guard, that she was“Hey,” I said.“Since this is all of us,” said the Professor. “We should be on our way. Follow me.”“Where areparents?” Dean asked, their parents had moved so they were around all of us, something of a shield and meaning we could walk as a group.“Dean,” his mother chastised.“It’s okay,” I said, giving a shrug. “I’m an orphan.”“Oh?” said Hermione, while Taylor only gave me a look. “Sorry.”I shrugged again. “Never really knew them so it doesn’t matter.”It was supposed to ease the sense of awkwardness, people trying to fumble past that, but it didn’t work. Instead it left something larger. I frowned, clenching my fists and anchoring myself in the pain.“How’s the other guy?” Taylor asked. The question had been directed at me. I raised a brow. She gestured at my fists. They were bandaged, a new set of scrapes, this time on both hands. At least this time I hadn’t been punched in the face.I grinned. “He’ll never fight me again,” I said. I looked at the parents and I caught the sense of disapproval, but none of them said anything, too focused around us. We’d walked through the pub and out a back door into a closed off alley. Professor McGonagall pulled out a thin, ornate stick, her wand, and tapped a set of bricks. The wall closing off the alley started to shift, bricks vibrating before they pulled back in a sequence and revealing anI wasn’t the only one who stopped, wasn’t the only one who gaped becauseI closed my eyes, trying to get a sense of how things had looked outside while going into the Leaky Cauldron. There hadn’t beennot so much that these buildings could fit in. For that matter, there were buildings so tall that I should have been able to see them from the main street. Yet I hadn’t, because…magic?On either side of the street were buildings, almost all of them were old and almost all of them lookedIt was the clearest thing that they’d been built by magic because there wasn’t a sense to them. Some buildings had bases that were too small, getting larger the more they stretched up; otherstilting forward like they were about break and fall; while another was in a space so thin no one should have been able to use its door, and yet as I watched, a woman stepped out of the door without trouble.Then there wereBrooms were the first thing I saw, one of them even suspended in the air; there was a puppet show except the puppets didn’t have strings and they were going through a full-length play, a crowd in front of that particular show and watching; there was a shop that bent how space worked, looking like a cathedral with open windows and owls perching there, watching the world beneath us. It was all too much atand it was“Cor,” Dean muttered and I appreciated the sentiment.“All of this?” said Mrs Hebert. “Done through magic?”“An extraordinary network of spells, yes,” said Professor McGonagall. “One of the larger concentrations of magic to exist without the area affected sputtering into life. Which speaks to the degree ofthat was taken into putting everything together.”“Things can just come to life?” said Taylor.“Yes,” said the Professor. “For that matter, Hogwarts is alive.”“Because it wasn’t built right?” I asked.“No, Mr Lambsbridge,” she said, tone reproachful. “But because of the degree of young and mischievous magic that call its walls home. Magic, in often case, reflects those who cast it.”“Incredible,” said Mrs Hebert.“All of this is,” said Taylor. “Makes me suspicious.”I gave her a glance, smiling a little because she was my sort of girl.Mrs Hebert sighed. “You’ve rubbed off too much on our daughter, Danny,” she said, though she wasn’t really looking at her husband. I could see it, though it felt different. Both Taylor and her father were on their guard, but for the former it felt like she was primed to move, while the latter was just waiting, scared of what might happen. The general sentiment, though, was true.“Let’s be off,” said Professor McGonagall. “Our first stop will be Gringotts where you’ll exchange muggle money into ours.”Something I didn’t really want to do. “Can I just explore?” I said. “I don’t really feel like going to a bank.”“No, Mr Lambsbridge,” she said. “I don’t trust that you won’t add more bruises to yourself.”“Not to mention you’re only eleven or twelve,” Mrs Granger said.“I’m an orphan,” I said absently. “I’m used to being on my own.”That seemed to be a slap to the face for Mrs Granger. She gaped, thinking of what to say and then stopping. It felt good, to earn the reaction, but it rang hollow because I hadn’t been trying to manipulate, that’d been my tamper working. There was nothing to feel excited about in the move because I hadn’tmade it.“Be that as it may,” said Professor McGonagall. “Come along.”I was frowning as I followed, until I reminded myself that I could just come back. I still wouldn’t have money, I didn’t have money now, but I’d have unadulterated access to all of this.“Where do you live?” Taylor asked. She was looking at me. Reading her there was the sense that she was reading me, even if I couldn’t parseshe’d gleaned. “Which orphanage?”“Saint Augusta,” I said. “You know it?”She shook her head. “But I could find out. Maybe we meet or something?”“Yes!” said Hermione. “We could have like a play-date, where we get to know each other before going to school.”“That’d be cool,” said Dean. “Having people to talk with about magic.” He glanced at his mom before he whispered, “My sisters don’t like it when I talk about magic. They’re a little jealous.”“I get that,” I said. “It’s something to watch extraordinary people from a distance.”“Careful there, or you might sound elitist,” said Taylor.“Aren’t we though? Being wizards?”Professor McGonagall glanced back but didn’t say anything.“If you feel like that a second after finding out, I wonder if something like that’s already happened here?” said Taylor, looking around, still on her guard. “There’s nothing easier for humans to do than hate.”“You’re a bleak lot, aren’t you?” said Dean, a little distaste in his tone.“Or realist,” said Taylor with a shrug. The doors of the bank were open and we stepped in. I shouldn’t have been surprised that the building was larger on the inside than out and yet I was; it had an open space feel, with podiums stretching up at points and short men with pointed ears, long noses and sharp teeth standing on the other side.“Goblins,” Professor McGonagall explained. “Go to a teller and they’ll help you exchange your money. Mr Lambsbridge, stay with me while I withdraw money for your supplies.”I nodded and followed, chafing at all of this but having no choice. There was another world just out of those walls and I wasn’t exploring it, seeing how it worked and trying to figure it out.It sucked, but it was true. If I went out there then I’d likely be caught or I’d catch myself in a bad situation and wouldn’t be able to get out. Better now to justnot try to do anything I couldn’t pull myself out of.The trip through the bank went longer than I thought it would. Professor McGonagall, Ms Thomas and the Grangers were relatively quick, opting to exchange money and nothing else. The Heberts were the ones who made us stall. At some point they’d been offered the option to open a bank account with Gringotts, and they’d taken to askingof questions about how the bank was run, what affected the price of muggle money relative to wizard money, the rates for different accounts and the rate to exchange money.In the end, they’d opted to open an account at Mrs Hebert’s urging, which was itself a process that took a bit to get done.I muttered when we could travel again, but that relief dropped again because the rest of the trip was incredibly boring.First our robes, a practise that was only exciting because there was magical tape involved; then it was getting supplies. The others got brass scales—I got those too because Hogwarts didn’t have any second-hand ones—telescopes, cauldrons, dragon-hide gloves and other things that felt miscellaneous. Then books, another long stay because Mrs Hebert and Hermione made a point of cataloguing some books they thought were interesting, stretching out the experience. I would be getting my own books at Hogwarts, there were more than a few second-hand books on-hand.All of it made worse because we were passing so many other exciting stuff.We reached something of a high point when I got into the Ollivander’s Wand Shop.“Who’ll go first then?” the old man said, an excited gleam to him. “Taking the first step to truly conquering magic.”“Me,” I said and the excitement was back, the sense of purpose. Maybe there was a spell out there that might recreate the effects of the Wyvern formula, or maybeform of magic. It was exciting to think about, that I might be the Sylvester I’d always been instead of this facsimile.Ollivander chuckled. “Let’s begin, then,” he said and the process started. He pulled out his own wand and started waving it; a tape measure floated, measuring my arms as Ollivander asked me questions. He muttered under his breath all throughout while waving his wand and pulling out certain boxes from wall. Each box had a wand and each wand would be foisted into my grasp before being quickly pulled away before I could even really hold the things.Finally, on touching one wand I felt something, a sudden spark running through me, and that spark ran forward, letting lose a plume of shimmering green dust that faded before it hit the ground.“Dogwood,” said Ollivander with a smile. “Dragon heartstring, thirteen inches, very flexible. One of my personal favourite wand woods. It’s mischievous, very good for charms and jinxes.”I made the mental note, hoping I’d remember, but more than anything looking at the thin, knobby stick that would give me the power to bend space if I applied myself.“Wait,” I said. “What happens if I break or lose it?”“Another wand may choose you,” said Ollivander. “But it won’t be as good a fit as that one. The wand chooses the wizard and not all of them might choose you.”“Try not to lose it, Mr Lambsbridge,” said Professor McGonagall, as if it was that easy.Hermione volunteered next. It didn’t take too long before she got hers: Vine, dragon heartstring core, ten and three-quarter inches. Taylor followed: Aspen, dragon heartstring, ten and a quarter inch. Then Dean: Rowan, phoenix tail-feather, eleven inches.“And that,” said Professor McGonagall, “marks the end of our day. Mr Lambsbridge,” she said and she pulled out a rucksack from a pocket—which didn’t even surprise me at this point. “This has been enchanted to keep your magical belongings and hide them from the others in your orphanage. Iyou’ll remember that the Statute of Secrecy exists and if you break it, you might be expelled from Hogwarts and your wand snapped.”“I understand, Professor,” I said, taking the rucksack.“Good,” she said. “Have a safe trip back home, all of you, and I’ll see you on your first day at Hogwarts.”With that she turned and disappeared with a soft“Mum,” said Hermione, “Can I get a pet?”Just as Mrs Hebert was saying. “I think I saw a library. Let’s pop in, see about getting a card.”“Yes,” said Hermione, “that too?”With Dean saying, “Ice cream!”Finally, some room to breathe.Magic, I learnt, was split into branches: Charms, which were generally spells that gave something an effect; Transfiguration, which gave or changed the form of something; and Potions which were drink that could have charm-like or transfiguration-like effects. Charms were generally short lasting; Transfiguration was incredibly hard to learn and the people most proficient in it could be counted on one hand; which made Potions the easiest route.I pulled my rucksack closer and kept an eye out on my surroundings. I wasn’t as adept as I’d been with Wyvern, but I still had my prey instinct and it usually went off even if I couldn’t parse the pieces. It was early evening, the streets had mostly cleared and shops were starting to close their doors, their patrons already gone.I found an apothecary and got in, looking through their potion sets for anything that might help me. I didn’t find anything in the first potion shop, they seemed to care about medicinal properties and that wasn’t what I wanted. The next place was general purpose and I moved through its stocks. There was Invigoration Draught, but that only brought with it a surge of energy and took away the effects of fatigue than alter how I thought; there was a draught that caused temporary amnesia; one that could make a person speak only the truth; one that was a hallucinogenic; one that brought about synaesthesia; another that could push certain senses so they were more perceptive while dulling others.“I’m closing up soon,” said a woman and I started. She was old, maybe in her late eighties and she wore the brightest of blue robes. She had a tired air about her, made worse by the heavy wrinkles and sagging face. “Want help with what you’re looking for?”“Um…it’s…sort of…I don’t know what its name is or if it actually exists,” I said, putting on a smile. She gave me a bored look.“You know what it does?”I nodded. “It’s supposed to make you smarter,” I said. “Or at least more pliable.”“Wyvern?”My heart jumped. What were the odds that something like that existed and it was named as it had been named before?“Yeah. Yes,” I said, because I didn’t really care. I could be me again.“That’s restricted,” the woman said. “Ministry clamped down on it because it destroyed the brain. The woman who made the stuff got bored and didn’t perfect it after that. Not to mention she didn’t give out the recipe.”“That mean you don’t sell it?” I asked.“Selling it would be illegal,” she said. Which I noticed wasn’t a no. “What’s your name?”My prey instinct went off and I took a step back, trying to figure out what it was that was setting it off. I had the impulse to run, to hide, but this woman was a witch and there was no telling what she could do. Maybe I could jump her, she was old and would be frail. I could push her and run, not giving her time to get her wand.“Simon,” I said. “Simon Ewesmont.”“Sylvester Lambsbridge,” she said. I started forward and suddenly stopped, my arms hitting my sides and my legs slamming together. I fell face first, hitting the groundI felt something stabbing at my back before I felt weightless, even if I couldn’t move, instead being guided through the air.I caught sight of the woman as she pointed her wand, at once everything shifted, shutters and doors closing, and windows without shutters darkening. Candles all throughout the place lit, bathing it in a low red light.She walked forward, guiding me with a point of the wand. We went to a back door, up a narrow flight of stairs and into a room above. She flicked her wand one direction and my body jerked to follow. Whatever spell she’d put on me faded and I could move for the barest second, but it was only enough so I could sit on a large chair and not be able to move again.I could do nothing but watch as she went to a fireplace, light it with her wand, grabbed some powder and threw it into the fire. The flame flared, going green and she knelt into the fire. I hoped that she would burn, hoped that she would catch aflame and the spell would be undone, but that didn’t happen.She talked even if I couldn’t hear the words, a long conversation before she pulled back, coming to a rise. The flame flared again, burning hotter and towering higher before a frame stepped through. I didn’t know her, too much had changed even if she had the same general features, it was that prey instinct again, telling me things without showing meit believed those things: Genevieve Fray.“Sylvester,” she said and there was a smile to her that made alarm bells at the back of my head ring. But I couldn’t do anything, I wasmore than useless. “I’m genuinely excited to see you, even with the risk that it might be Sylvester the Noble.”“No,” I said. “It isn’t.”“No,” she agreed. She’d been stylish before and she was still stylish now. She wore a black and red dress, with a lace frill at her neck; above the dress was a cloak, long enough that it might have hidden her dress, but moving so it showed beneath. She was the only witch I’d seen wearing heels. She reached into a slit in the cloak and pulled out a long brown stick, waving it around with poise.She took three minutes before she was done, after which she pointed her wand at me, giving it a flick. The spell holding me in place unravelled and I could move.“You’reSylvester,” she said.I frowned, because itbecause it was“Not even a Lamb anymore,” I admitted.Fray sighed. “You killed me,” she said. “That’s the last thing I remember.”I frowned, searching and not finding it. “That isn’t true.”Fray waved a hand. “You gave me Wyvern while leaving me in theshe said. “As goodwhen we’d been dealing with…”“I wasn’t me,” I said. “Too much damage from the Wyvern.”She nodded. “You were a heavy thought in my mind when I was reinterpreting Wyvern,” she said. “The kind of break that formed in your mind. I wanted safeguards, put limiters in the formula, it was fortuitous thathappened and I was part of a world of magic. You were a heavy thought in other things I’ve been doing.”“Do you know what this is?” She shook her head. I sighed. “I don’t like it. Things were good, all things considered, even subsumed I was still with them.”“I don’t think we’ll be able to go back,” she said. “I’ve set out feelers, given people names to pay attention to and you’re the first one that’s popped up. I think we’re alone, Sylvester.”She reached into her pocket, pulling out a vial with green liquid.“But perhaps we can be alone together?”