The new quarters were resplendent.

I’d been expecting a room and what I got felt like an entire house. There was a bedroom which had its own bathroom instead of a bucket, and a small study with a bookcase filled with old looking books, and a desk with reams of coarse paper set to one side, a bottle of ink and cannister filled with feathers beside it. There were two eating areas, one a dining room to serve a small crowd and the other was more intimate, looking through the balcony towards the City of Altheer.

These were only in one section of my quarters and beyond were the room and board of the guards and my staff.

As Cicero had promised, the balcony that looked towards the City of Altheer. A line of colourful buildings which hugged the lakeside, rising up like spires and then spreading out along the coast. There were levels to the city, with the tallest and broadest buildings connected to each other by massive bridges which were no doubt living areas themselves.

After the mess with the prince and princes I’d spent most of yesterday decompressing. I still felt on edge, but some of that had been sucked up by watching the sunset, then the light as it sprouted in the city. Brighter in the lower levels and so dark it was black on the lowest level.

Now I stood watching a sedate looking city, a breeze hitting the side of the building and riding up, the sound of birds sometimes fluttering up. It was quiet and I couldn’t help but think on the citizens of Altheer.

How was it to walk beneath those tall buildings? Did the sun even reach the lower levels when the middle levels looked so congested? How did technology and magic mix to support a city like that? What were the people like? What were their lives like?

And if I asked, would I be allowed to visit or would I only ever see it in the distance?

I pushed the thought aside, choosing to focus on the good.

The quarters and that they were mine did wonders in lowering my sense of dread. There were guards standings on the other side of the doors and they infringed on the walls of my delusion, but no one had come in after I’d asked for space from my staff and that was a welcomed relief.

Clothes had been put out for me and between the fit, the style and how complicated they were to wear, it left me feeling bad. The pants were loose in all the wrong places – a waste that needed to be tied, hips that were too wide and then drawing in for the legs; the shirts were too blousy and the collars too frilly for my tastes, with excess material that I didn’t know what to do with; and the shoes were just uncomfortable.

I wasn’t a fashionable person, but as I looked at myself in the mirror it felt like a hit to my façade. The person in the mirror just wasn’t me, the style wasn’t mine and it felt like looking at someone else.

“Priorities,” I muttered to myself. Survival and getting home were the most important points of consideration, but that didn’t make the feeling disappear.

As I returned through the common area, it was to see that food had appeared on the smaller table in front of the balcony. The assortment was eerily still and lifeless, appetising but unsettling in ways I couldn’t quantify. When I sat, it was to be assaulted by the scent of freshly cooked food.

Last night I hadn’t had the mental energy for curiosity, which meant I hadn’t thought to check out how the table worked. But now, eve as my stomach groaned, I couldn’t hold my feelings back.

The table wasn’t made out of magic gems, but it was run over by lines, painted so they weren’t visible unless searched for. The same was true for the floor – lines went from the table to the floor, branching out to connect to circles at the centre of which were the chairs; the chair also had overlapping shapes starting from the seat, running down its legs onto the floor.

I stood and the smells stopped. At a squint I saw there were swirls of pale blue light around the food, wrapping over bowls and seeping into the meal.

A mix of time and space magic, I thought, because I hadn’t felt anyone come in.

I sat again and the smell of the food filled the air. Curiosity sated, it was the hunger’s turn.

At a certain point I started to concentrate on the extra sense in my head.

The power of the marble extended in a half-kilometre radius around me, which meant I had a spatial awareness of the entirety of my quarters as well as parts of the floors above and below. My floor was the most densely populated, but there were a few guards on patrol on and keeping track of them was a welcomed distraction.

I was sure that given enough time, I might be able to use the extra sense and movements to draw a map – something that would need me to be patient.

Punching Odysseus and trying to run had been a mistake, one I hopefully wouldn’t make again. Right now, the smartest thing to do would be to play along as much as I could, waiting until there was a perfect opportunity to escape.

If escape is even the smartest thing to do, the thought came, but I quickly shrugged it aside.

These people expected me to fight for them – in a war – and getting killed was something in the cards. I didn’t want that at all, even if they told me it would get me home.

It was better, at least for now, to make escape the ultimate goal.

Which meant playing along.

Which meant politics.

Everything was political in a way. In every context of my life there were lines I had needed to be attuned to. Whether they be within the family – traversing grudges that older than the oldest of my cousins – or outside of it – in my village and how they interacted with me, fellow students at school or teachers. It wasn’t easy sometimes, but I had learned to walk those paths intuitively, something that I had to replicate on this world.

It wasn’t true experience, but it would be a starting point and that was all I had. I had to keep to the lessons I’d learnt – like listening being the most important skill and keeping track of a lot of information in the off chance that it might be useful, or how sometimes the best thing to do to get information was getting someone drunk.

I just hoped that since I was doing it now with some intentionality, it would work more often than not.

After eating I opened the door and peeked. A man stood there, about my age but with hard eyes. He had a sword hanging at his side, and his hand moved over the hilt as he saw me.

“My…lord?” he said, voice low.

“Uh, yeah,” I said, because the title felt strange. “I don’t know if I can do this or not, but can you get Odysseus for me? I’d like to talk…when he isn’t too busy.”

The man nodded. “I will pass the message along, my lord,” he said and walked off.

The only people who seemed to be on my side right now were Odysseus and Cicero. One had lied to me and the other had given me a magic marble, but the mages were in trouble right now and keeping close company to them wouldn’t help me in the long run. It was better to seek favour with the prince, someone who would more easily get me in his father’s good graces.

Prince Odysseus didn’t arrive immediately, so I used the time to go through the books I’d been allowed. Most were stories about heroes and mage – people on heroic journeys to help save a village or a princess; while there were a few history books scattered about. The continent I had found myself in was a collection of eight countries called the Commonality. Althor sat at the centre, bordered by Washerton to the west, Susserton to the north, the Sunward Empire to the east, Connelly and Kent to south, and the Sky Courts in the skies; Araknas and the Blighted Lands closed things off, with the former laying far south and the latter far north beyond a series of mountains.

As useful as history would be, it felt like magic would be the greatest asset to my escape. The stone was already a major help and I could imagine if I could teleport things at will. It sucked that I didn’t have any way of learning more about the art.

So the only option before me was reading a really dry history book that had my eyes glazed over. The style of writing was something I didn’t like – entire pages of paragraphs and dense sentences; the only information that got through was that at some point there were Mandans before the Mandarons.

The speculation on the Blighted Lands was the most interesting – a kingdom that had been ahead of its time magically before a calamity had befallen them and wiped out a lot of the land’s population.

You’re going to have to be able to learn all this stuff if you’re going to get back home, I thought as my eyes slid over the text and my mind drifted, refocusing on the impressions of people ambling about in my head.

When Odysseus and Surefoot arrived, I’d given up my quest for historical knowledge. As with the last time I’d met him, I felt myself start to stare and made a conscious effort to look instead, at the prince.

He smiled. “A good day to you, Champion,” said Odysseus, his tone hearty. My gaze strayed to his jaw and there wasn’t even a mark after my punch.

“Yes,” said Surefoot. “A good day.”

Shivers ran up and down my spine but I made sure not to stare.

“Um…hello,” I said.

“It is customary that one stands when those of higher social standing enter or exit a room,” said Odysseus.

“Oh, right,” I said standing. “A good day.”

“Title,” he said, not an order but the words grated all the same.

I cleared my throat and stood straighter. “A good morrow to you, Prince Odysseus, and to you, Lord Surefoot.”

“There is much you do not know,” he said with an easy smile, “but for now that will do.” They both came to the table, Odysseus finding a seat while Surefoot jumped onto the table. Odysseus was the first to seat before Surefoot followed. I did the same with a bit of hesitation. “You were to wait until granted leave to sit, but for now we should forget such trivialities. How are you liking your new quarters?”

“They’re good,” I said, the words slow as I mulled his words over.

Social hierarchies weren’t anything new. There were distinctions in my culture between boys, young men and men, and rules about how the groups interacted with one another, but it was never to this degree. I’d met my village’s chief and it hadn’t had as much pomp as this.

“Better than the Mourning Tower,” I joked. Odysseus smiled and it didn’t reach his eyes. “Listen, I’m sorry about yesterday. To both of you,” I added, glancing at Surefoot and looking away again so I wouldn’t stare. “For punching you, and for offending you, Surefoot.”

“I said before that I had accepted your apology,” said Surefoot. He scowled. “Unless you think my word to be fickle?”

“Uh…” I looked at Odysseus for help. He didn’t say anything, looking at me with interest. Why does this feel like some sort of test? “I don’t…I don’t understand.”

“Surefoot’s people do not abide lies,” Odysseus explained. “Their word is their word – no more and no less. To call them liars is to call upon them the greatest dishonour.”

“I didn’t know,” I said. “Sorry.”

Surefoot huffed out a breath. “I supposed I should make an attempt at understanding you,” he said. “If indeed my people do not exist in your realm as you say. Though I would appreciate it if you looked at me as I spoke,” he said, irritated.

“Oh. Right. Sorry,” I said, looking at him again.

Surefoot had changed his jewellery from yesterday, the metals weren’t gold but silver, etched with a diagrams and stones set within them made of a pink-purple stones; his earrings were a similar metal, connected to each other by a thin chain that had charms of different shapes hanging off them.

“You called me here today,” said Odysseus, keeping me from staring. I appreciated it. “I hope it was not solely to apologise. If so it was a waste of a walk.”

“Oh. Okay, no. I was actually thinking about my part in the castle – in the whole ecosystem – and…I want to know what I can do to make things work.”

Odysseus had treated our talk as a secret between us, so it made the most sense to play along and keep it up with Surefoot in the room.

“Have you changed your mind from yesterday?” Odysseus asked, lightly surprised. “You seemed quite set on running, futile though it was.”

“That was me being stupid,” I said. “I was panicked—”

“I think I recall that you mentioned that this wasn’t your war,” he interrupted. “That you did not want to die for people you did not know. Why the sudden change of heart?”

I swallowed, looking from him to Surefoot. Why was he doing this when before he’d been the one to give me hope? Was this a plot? A plan I didn’t realise? Or had I read things wrong and I was just a plaything of a bored prince?

“I didn’t have a change of heart,” I said. “I…I still don’t want to die for people that I don’t know. But after your sister showed me her powers, I don’t think I’ll be able to escape. Cicero—Grand Mage Cicero, mentioned a way that I could get home and that needed me to help Althor. I guess I’m just willing to do that if I get what I want.”

“Your motivations are selfish?” Surefoot. After a look at Odysseus — getting nothing — I shrugged. “I have to wonder what would occur if someone were to offer you a better deal, perhaps our enemy.”

I wouldn’t take it, I wanted to say, but I bit my tongue. Surefoot’s people didn’t like lies and that one would be obvious.

This feels stupid, I thought as I said, “If I trusted them, then I’d take it, I think.”

“That does not make you a good ally,” said Surefoot.

“Can we truly expect him to be an ally?” Odysseus asked. “Especially when it is we who took him from his home and are now keeping him against his will?”

“No,” said Surefoot and he went no further.

How was I supposed to take that? I still didn’t know enough about these people to know what was working and what wasn’t.

“Was my answer good?” I asked, embarrassed at my own desperation.

“It was honest,” said Surefoot, and again he said nothing else.

“If you seek to be of use to Father,” said Odysseus, “it would be ideal if you were a warrior.” My stomach sank and it must have shown because he asked, “Does that not appeal to you?”

“Like I told Grand Mage Cicero, I’m not a fighter. He said I could learn magic from any school I wanted. Can’t I do that?”

“You may,” said Odysseus, “but you asked how to better serve the kingdom and being a warrior would do the most good. Magic as an art takes years to study to be of any value – perhaps if you were to become a mage technician the process might be quicker, but there is no glory there unless you were an artisan. Which again would take quite some time to accomplish and a master willing to teach one as old as you.”

“What is a technician? And what’s different from a general mage?” I asked.

“Technicians are those mages who use lines, circles and other shapes to augment the power within gems,” he said. “More than mages, they are reason much of the infrastructure in our kingdom is able to function. But their art is boring and methodical – where a greater mage might be able to speak a word to call on a magical effect, they would have to talk of redundant structures, charting power flows and other such minutia.”

“And an artisan?”

“Artisans are technicians with great skill in their magical craft as well as an ability to work with either wood, metals, glass or stone. My pendant was made by an artisan and it is a great deal more complex than the work of most technicians. They might be able to work the average celestial gem, but gold is delicate and requires a defter hand. Or so I have been told.”

“You should have prepared food,” said Surefoot, sounding bored. “I hunger and there seems to be nothing for me to do in this engagement.”

I frowned. “I didn’t think of that, sorry.”

“A note for the future,” he said.

I nodded, though I wasn’t focused on the words. There were other things to worry about. “Can I ask, what’s going to be expected of me? What is a Champion? What do they do?”

“A Champion is an extraordinary being,” said Odysseus.

“The first Champions were extraordinary,” Surefoot corrected. “The most recent in our histories have been people with inflated egos, hence why they have died young.”

Again my stomach fell and my heart picked up. I wanted to run again and my body reacted, foot bouncing under the table and my hand opening and closing. Odysseus saw it and his hands came to sit on the table. I stopped, taking in a deep breath, holding it and then letting out.

The emotions weren’t gone, but I felt slightly in more control.

“I—” My voice caught and I cleared my throat. “I don’t want that to be me. I want to survive, to go home.”

“And the path of the warrior might be the easiest path towards said goal,” said Odysseus.

“Though all your options are filled with risk,” said Surefoot.

Frank and honest. I wasn’t sure if I appreciated it or not.

Odysseus pursed his lips. “You are important, Champion, and no doubt if you were trained in combat, you would be outfitted with the most powerful artefacts.”

“Something like your sister’s swords?” I asked. He nodded. “Okay,” I said, “but…if I take up training today, how will that make me better than someone who’s been training for years? I can’t imagine ever getting stronger than your sister.”

“Few can call themselves stronger than my sister,” Odysseus said with a smile, irritating when I felt close to another panic. My hands shifted and I noticed the same from Odysseus, his fingers starting to curl. There were a few seconds where we both waited for the other to make a move.

“The hands of the Fates made it so you were chosen for this journey, and they must have done so for a reason,” he said carefully. “You have to trust that they would only put trials before you that you will be able to overcome.”

You don’t really believe that, do you? I wanted to ask, but when religion was concerned, that was often a mistake. It was important that I didn’t challenge him, it was important that I played along, even as every part of me felt like poking holes at his very weak arguments.

Another, more useful, direction, then. My summon was about politics, King Orpheus wanting to keep alliances and stop his kingdom from breaking apart. He wouldn’t want an investment of years, he would want to see quick progress. But…

“I have a question, and Surefoot maybe you’d be the best person to answer it.”

“I will answer at my own discretion,” he said.

I shrugged. “What I want to ask is…me. I’m black and I don’t think there are any black people in this world.”

“Your people exist,” said Odysseus. “You are not the first of your kind, though not many come this far inland.”

I bristled. “Okay, but that. Your kind. It makes me think that you’re not used to people like me. When I first appeared here…a lot of stuff happened. I couldn’t understand any of it, not the words, but the tone and the look in people’s eyes, that was clear. They fought because of me and I have a very strong feeling it’s because of how I look.”

“I am unsure of the nature of your question,” said Surefoot, but I could see that Odysseus understood. He didn’t give me anything to work with.

“I’m gonna spitball,” I said, “and I hope you’ll correct me if I’m wrong, but…this can’t work. Even if I’m Champion I don’t think I can stop a war on my own, especially not with everything I’ve already heard. Cicero said there was going to be a healer that was going to authenticate if I’m really a Champion, and that doesn’t make sense unless there’s a reason why that would be important.”

Odysseus smiled. “Politics,” he said.

“Ja. Politics. Relationship building, that sort of thing.”

Odysseus’ words, resaid to seem like my own so Surefoot would have a better impression of me. Not a lie, but an untruth all the same. I didn’t think he would appreciate it if he ever found out.

“I think the King wants to build relationships,” I said. “Get more people on his side, which is why he summoned me and why it’s important that I be a warrior. It’s just that…I’m black and there might be prejudices or biases that people have against me. I just wanna know if that’s true. If that’s what’s going to happen.”

“It will,” Surefoot said.

I’d known it would, but it was disconcerting to hear it said so matter-of-factly.

But why was I surprised? Especially when it was something I had grown up with?

All in all, I’d been lucky. My mother had had the forethought of both a life policy and a will. She had an idea of how she wanted that money to be spent and because of her I’d gone to a largely in Port Richard, a town an hour’s drive from my village.

In many ways I had been ostracized because of it. The kids in my village had thought me a snob when my interests had deviated too far, my fellow black students had constantly reminded me of how I was from a village when they were from town and then there’d been the racial divides.

In a just world, I should have had a lot of help in dealing with the challenges. Instead I’d been met by people unable to make allowances. Teachers telling me I should wake up earlier when I was late, instead of considering that I’d started to hitchhike to school when and didn’t have control on when a car picked me up; or the incident with the muddy shoes, where I’d been berated instead of the realisation that I’d had to trek through mud while trying to get to school; and following that being teased for having another pair of shoes so my school shoes wouldn’t be dirtied.

Inconvenience and hardship at every step.

I managed to get through years of that, I told myself. I can get through this too.

“If that’s the case, I’ll need every advantage I can get,” I said. Things had gotten easier at school when I’d made friends, that had also been hard, with some people being dicks. But I’d been able to pick better until I’d found my people. Odysseus and Surefoot were a first step, which meant being vulnerable. “Do you have anything? Anything at all?”

“I might have something,” said Odysseus. “A weapon that is on the easier side to learn, though many will look down on you for using it.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“It is an invention called a pistol,” he said. “Relatively new, primarily used by pirates.”

“What’s the stigma against it?”

“It is the weapon of a thief and coward,” he said. “Pirates are a crafty folk with an odd sort of honour. Why, the woman who sold me the pistol tried valiantly to steal it from me once more. Of course my guard is top-notch and she was stopped without trouble.”

“I don’t care,” I said.

“Take care what you disregard, Champion,” said Surefoot. “If you choose the weapon of a thief and coward, you will be known as one.”

He was right, but, “A gun is easier to shoot and it’s a distance weapon. If I have to fight, then I think that’s better for me. Can you show it to me?”

“I can,” said Odysseus.

***

Odysseus’ quarters were more lavish than mine, starting from the exterior façade inside the castle. It reminded me of TV sets of castles, with pillars rising up from the floor to the ceiling, etched with thing lines, and an arched with gems at regular positions, giving the room sun even though there weren’t any windows. The walls were covered with paintings and instead of suits of armour there were either statues or busts, all painted which was strange – they were usually white in movies.

His quarters were also livelier. There were workers in the halls sweeping or dusting off the busts — they stopped and bowed when we got close, with neither Odysseus nor Surefoot paying them any mind.

All of which felt odd.

“My armoury,” said Odysseus as we walked towards a set of stone doors. They opened without him touching them. “Though I don’t use the weapons here.”

“How does that work?” I asked. “The door?”

Odysseus brightened as Surefoot sighed.

Don’t stare, I thought, stopping myself.

“I am not enthused that there are now two of you,” Surefoot muttered.

“Well I am very enthused,” said Odysseus, the sense that he was playing me disappearing. “They are well hidden, however I have searched through histories of the building of Malnor Castle. It took a bit of doing since this part of the castle was added later, after the union between Althor and the Sky Courts—”

“You have yet to answer his question,” said Surefoot, tone short.

“Gravity magic,” Odysseus said with a sigh. “There are gems on each of the doors and on the floor. As we step on the floor, it activates other parts of the greater diagram which turns how gravity affects the does, thus opening them.”

“That’s really cool,” I said. “But doesn’t that mean anyone can just walk in? They can’t lock.”

“The castle is safe and every servant was appraised before their employment,” said Odysseus. “There has been no recorded theft in the castle for fifty years.”

I shrugged.

The armoury was darker than the rest of Odysseus’ quarters, smaller with weapons and trinkets placed in positions of importance. Most were weapons: swords of different shapes and sizes, spears and halberds, and hammers, maces and morning stars; there were a few suits of armour, as well as leather boots or arm guards painted with intricate lines; but my eyes stopped as I caught sight of a row of staffs, all topped with different gems.

“A man of taste, I see,” said Odysseus. “You are interested in the staves?”

“I like the look of them,” I said. “Magic only exists in books where I’m from, and powerful wizards use staffs or wands. Does the bigger stone mean more power?”

“The larger the gem, the more intricate the diagram that can be drawn,” he said. “Though they are harder to work. This way,” he said, “the pistol.”

It was in a cupboard at the back, a pistol that reminded me of guns from Pirates of the Caribbean. Not metal, blocky and black like guns on my world, but a mixture of bone, wood and metal. The handle was the bone, with two brown gems around which bloomed a simple diagram, riding up and through the god; it had three barrels made of metal, with lines criss-crossing along them, under which was a polished brown wood that I thought served as support for the barrels.

The gun was heavy and the bone was smooth against my hand.

“How does it work?” I asked.

“For the longest time I have dithered on whether to have the castle’s technicians open it for study, but who knows when I will ever meet another pirate who would not be trying to kill or capture me for ransom?”

“That’s a thing?”

“I am a prince of one of the wealthier kingdoms,” he said, affronted.

“Where are the bullets?” I asked, sidestepping that entire conversation. “How do you…I don’t know, slot them in?”

“It shoots balls of fire,” he said.

A chuckle left me. “You’re fucking kidding me.”

His expression twisted. “It amazes me how easily oaths leave you. Especially in the company of people so above you in station.”

My smile and mirth disappeared. The reminder was stark, that I was a peasant compared to these people. No matter how friendly Odysseus seemed, I couldn’t forget myself.

“He will have to learn the customs,” said Surefoot.

Odysseus hummed, nodding. “If you are to make a good impression, Champion, then it is not only combat in which you will have to be taught, but how to speak to certain members of the nobility, how to carry yourself, and other such minutia.”

“Right,” I said. “Your Majesty.”

“Father and Mother are referred to as such,” he said. “Myself and my siblings are referred to as Your Highness.”

I nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind, Your Highness,” I said.

“And I will do my best not to hold it against you if you do forget, Champion.”

I looked down at Surefoot, still getting a feel of the gun’s weight. “What about you, Surefoot,” I said. “Do you have a title?”

“By human measures I am the heir of a Duke,” he said. “Within the court I would be referred to as, Your Grace.”

“Within the court?” I asked. “Is that what you like being referred to as?”

“I am heir to the Grand Guardsman,” he said, “and thus my style would be Protectorship or simply Protector. Though the humans are discomforted by that title and its history.”

A look at Odysseus confirmed that he looked more uncomfortable, his usual lazy smile gone and his shoulders straightened. I made a mental note to ask Surefoot about that when we were alone, right now.

“So can I practice with this?” I asked. “I’ve never shot a gun before.”

“Yes,” he said. “But not here and not now. If it please you, I would like to make a request. Agree to my sister and myself tutoring you in the ways of Althor. Mother has shared to me the people Father has chosen and…trust me, Champion, you will not be happy by them.”

“Your sister doesn’t like me,” I said.

“Allycea learned her surliness from her teacher, Sir Dean Longreen,” he said. “A man who would be your teacher were Father to have his way, and he usually does.”

“Isn’t this going to cause problems?” I asked.

“Think nothing of it on your end,” he said with a wave of the hand. “I will speak to Father and no doubt he will see reason. But I would have to have your agreement first.”

I sighed. “Fine. Okay. I think I’d like that more than talking to strangers.”

“Excellent,” said Odysseus. “I will have a guard escort you back to your quarters as I go at once to speak to Father. I hope to have an answer to you by evening today at the earliest, though it might take longer.”

“Okay,” I said and I handed the gun over.

“Keep it,” he said. “It is yours now. Though I would beg you, do not shoot anyone with it.”

He said it as a joke, but some distant part of me was already considering how I’d have to at some point.