Getting there actually wasn’t that difficult. The Atlas’ maps were very good, updated with satellite information with feeds from both Russia and the Tribes, and even had ground-views where permitted.

Kenya wasn’t one of the most civilized of countries, even with Wakanda fairly close by, and like most such nations there were some ancient tribal conflicts over borders, and sometimes inside the borders, too.

Still, compared to many of the countries who had suffered under European colonialism, it had come out of it fairly stable and well. The borders of its lands were not arbitrary lines imposed by gun-toting white men, but actually mostly following the existing territories acknowledged by the natives.

Wakandan influence was around, too. Although the landlocked country hadn’t shared its higher technology, it had clearly suppressed and eliminated European influence on its own lands by means of appearing poor at the borders and disposing of aggressive Europeans who tried to take command of them and exploit them.

The Rain Queens of Balobedu, named after their ancestral Sorceress Supreme, lived in a small village out in the savannah. Even the macho and gun-happy warriors of the tribes didn’t mess with the Rain Queens, as their powers were the difference between drought and survival for many, many tribes.

Although they didn’t play politics as it was, with a word from them, chiefs could be thrown down and entire families be outcast... or a warlord shot by his own soldiers after his men’s families demanded his death.

Getting there wasn’t that hard, either. One Ride the Lightning up into orbit, towing my unwilling captive with the card in her forehead, brought us far above the clouds.

Despite herself, she stared wide-eyed at the whole blue and white world below her, her eyes glowing and seeing the whole world as she had probably never imagined possible, and then she looked around at the impossible brilliance of the stars and moon all around her.

I flinched despite myself. It seemed le Fey had been high above the world before, probably attuning herself to the whole world by one means or another, and it felt like my inherited power was a glass plate that had just suffered millions of cracks from the actions of mankind upon it.

“Blargh!” I spat out more blood, and I’m sure my eyes and nose were looking ghastly as blood streamed down. I cleaned them up with a flicker of a 2 of Hearts, staring at the globe below and ignoring Ororo’s sudden opportunistic attempt to struggle free, sensing weakness. “Well, wasn’t that fun? It seems I have to do more conditioning.”

I centered my view on Africa, brought up The Atlas’ locator off of Master Wong’s description, and centered where I needed to go.

Lightning boomed in the silence of space, and we were out of there.

-------

We materialized about a mile above the ground. The air was still cool at this height, but nowhere near what it had been in England.

I scanned the landscape below me, specifically for signs of ley lines and broader magical effects, and naturally enough the presence of man and how it threw off the natural energies here.

And that there was a village, about five miles off that way.

I wasn’t in a hurry, so I started flying that way, while Ms. Munroe still tried to struggle and call on her power, looking at the world around with glowing eyes flicking on and off as she shifted between the real world and the one of natural energies.

Lots of gold grass interrupted by the green of the flat-topped trees of the savannah. The forced presence of herded cattle versus the natural migrating herds was magically apparent, throwing off different kinds of energies in quiet conflict. Fields were blocks of influence breaking up the smooth flow of the landscape magically, realigning the elements into a different kind of strained productivity.

The swirl of truly woven magic over there was totally visible on this level. Not true Wards like I’d put around Mr. Hill’s place, and definitely not at the level of the Sanctum Sanctorum, but certainly able to deflect the thoughts and attention of those weak of mind and vicious intent easily enough.

Not a low Caster Level, either, although mono-line and pretty focused. Casters who’d not gone out into the broader world and expanded their gifts.

I tweaked the lines of magic, a polite announcement that I was here. I saw Munroe’s eyes twitch as she followed the gesture, and she watched as the Wards ahead pulsed and unwound slightly, inviting entry.

I wound an illusion around us to hide us from prying eyes, not really invisibility... okay, fine, totally a type of invisibility, replacing our presence with a 3 of Clubs washing the image of the wind over us as I descended towards the small collection of huts and homes clustered at the edge of the village.

They came out to meet me as I came down from the sky; all of them women, white-haired and blue-eyed, and all of them older than both of us.

Ororo’s eyes widened as she recognized two of them from the lineage check I’d done of her.

I set down calmly, looking quite out of place in a high-end croupier’s outfit and mask, pale skin, and dark hair in this collection of traditional robes and sandals, dark skin and pale hair, virtually a complete opposite of them.

“Lady Muva?” I picked out the great-grandmother, tall and unbowed by age, if wrinkled by a love of the sun and the environment. She had the strongest Aura here, if faltering with age somewhat. “I am The Dealer. I trust Master Wong called ahead?” I bowed formally in greeting to her.

“A strange name, young lady.” I made no reply to that as she bowed her head warily back at me, clearly able to feel my power, and if I had no great reputation, at least she wasn’t going to be rude to me. Her old eyes turned on the young woman wrapped up next to me, who stared back at her mutely. “Ah,” she said sadly. “N’Dare’s child finally returns to us.” She started to raise her hand, then hesitated, glancing at me. “Please release her from her bonds.”

I snapped my fingers, and the cocoon of silken strings unwound into strings of Clubs and dissipated. As she stretched out slowly, I set her down on her feet.

There in her Askari uniform. I could see the flinching on the faces of all the women at the sight of it, and Ororo realized it, too.

“The card?” Lady Muva asked, looking at the 10 of Spades still stuck in her forehead.

I was silent as I contemplated Ororo narrowly, and a swirl of various Hearts and Clubs danced around my hand, converged on the Card, and as she tensed, pushed it fully into her head as she cried out and stumbled back from me.

That clearly unsettled the women here, but they did not interfere.

“Her emotional state is unstable. Her natural powers will return when she lets go of the hate in her heart.” I glanced at her. “The Askari are going to come looking for their latest magnificent weapon. Indoctrinating a Rain Queen was quite a coup for them, and they will not want to give her up.

“They can likely track her by her garb... and her mother’s stone.” Eyes suddenly lit up all around me, looking at those things.

A 5 of Diamonds came up in my fingers, and I swept it at her coolly. A flight of emerald colors tore past her as she froze at the terrifying deadliness inherent in the attack... and then she was standing there stark naked, even her braid unwound and floating freely, and her two rubies fell to the ground at her feet.

I pulled a small case out of my Masspack, ignoring her nudity, and the two rubies zipped over to me. I put them in the plumbum ring case and tossed it to her grandmother, who caught it smoothly, barely flicking an eye.

“This young woman possesses a far greater power than any of you, and all of you,” I stated firmly. “In modern parlance, she is a mutant with the power to control the weather.” I flicked up a card-holo, displaying the satellite view of the hurricane she’d hurled against Europe. “She sustained this all the way across the Atlantic and smashed it against Europe. By my count, she’s responsible for at least four hundred dead and rising, and a billion dollars of damage or more.

“By any civilized standards, I should just chop off her head and be done with her, and I would have, if the true villains wouldn’t just laugh at her ending.”

Lady Muwa didn’t need to be told twice. “The Askari?” she asked with knowing scorn.

“If at all possible, I would like to perform a Divination with your help, ascertaining what exactly happened regarding the death of her parents. The Askari seem to have forged evidence that the Crux were behind the deaths for her benefit, and being a young fool, she didn’t think to question what they allowed her to discover.”

“And how would they know of what evidence needed to be forged?” her grandmother, Jamila, scoffed, staring at her nervous and ashamed granddaughter. “Come with me, Ororo.”

“Yes, Bibi!” she agreed hastily, following after the older woman who looked so much like her mother. She did not look at me as she passed me, her hands clenched in rage and embarrassment.

“We thank you for bringing her home to us, Dealer,” Lady Muwa said, as the other women turned back to their own tasks, a cousin or something following after Jamila. “We can teach her of her heritage, and to release the hatred in her heart. Is there something else you are here for?”

She was fishing for a chance at a subtle dismissal. Instead, I flicked up Ororo’s lineage chart for her. She blinked at it, keeping her face expressionless as she could as she saw her own face there, and those of her parents and daughter, and they began to stretch back into antiquity as I followed her bloodline back through hundreds of generations of her family, and the matrilineal line of white hair, blue eyes, and dark skin unbroken.

It ended at a certain woman, slamming into a wall there, and she stared at the face there in fascination, startled and awed despite herself.

“Balobedu?” she breathed out, stepping forward despite herself to gaze upon her ancestor’s face.

“The start of your true Bloodline,” I noted to her, and then I went up the other side of Ororo’s heritage.

Her lips thinned despite herself when she saw the Caucasian bloodlines come into their own, and blinked when both men’s patrilineal bloodlines surged out behind them, also crossing scores of generations, and then converged on a single face, a noble face of blue eyes and golden hair, whose image also crackled with a power all its uniquely own.

Her expression faltered. “This is?” she asked uncertainly.

“In the legends, he is called Siegfried. You would most likely know this mortal incarnation by another name... Thor Odinson.”

She flinched, and stared at me in shock. “She... is the descendant of a god of thunder?” she could not help blurting out.

“Two great Bloodlines crossed, and amusingly enough, Thor’s lineage didn’t care about skin color. They met, and lo, what they have wrought together.” I turned my eyes on her calmly. “She has the potential to be a true goddess of the elements because of it. Perhaps you should not look down on the white in her bloodline, eh?”

She realized she was being rebuked, and sighed, inclining her head gracefully at the admonishment. “The heritage of a god truly transcends all things,” she acceded, taking the point.