We were just a day or so away from Elba's village, and had settled far off the road for the evening. Errod was supervising the kid as she searched for twigs to get the fire going - Katrin could light even a wet log on fire at this point with her magic but for cooking purposes the campfire turned out better if you made it the old fashioned way - and I was pacing back and forth staring at nothing like a crazy person.

"Callie?" Katrin said, gently, "Are you okay?"

"I'm. I'm an idiot, and I'm just realizing that."

She laughed, and snagged my wrist so I would stop marching back and forth. "You're not an idiot. What's wrong?"

What was wrong was that I'd been in this world for months - about two and a half months of Earth time - and I'd been so busy bouncing from one place to another and chalking everything odd I saw to it being some strange fantasy world that I hadn't really made any effort to learn anything. "I should have taken the scholar gift. Or, I don't know. I should have put off this trip and just... just spent time with little kids learning about the world. Do you have kindergarten here? No, that translated funny. But you see? I don't know! I don't know anything! I should know more by now!"

My moment of revelation had come as a result of Katrin making a very smart suggestion. She'd pointed out that since we knew I had been picking up a bit of the language anyway it might be good to have her wear the translation band while we were out in the wilderness. It worked both ways, so I could practice speaking common without magical assistance with Errod while Katrin chatted with me in English - her scholar gift would mean she learned it rapidly, and then we would have a secret language we could use. I told her that was fine, since I'd had my allergies removed anyway, and told her it would also keep her from having her period. And Katrin said, offhand, "oh it's not my time of the year anyway". Of the year. Had people on this world always only had one period per year? Did everyone get adjusted at some point by enhancement magic? Or maybe at some point in the past they'd all had an adjustment that was designed to be passed on to their kids. None of that was the point, though - the point was that I knew so little about the most basic ways the world worked and sooner or later I would need to stop just shrugging and saying "well, it's a wacky fantasy world!" as if that meant anything.

"What do you want to know?" Katrin asked, and I gestured vaguely all around me.

"I don't know! That's the thing! Look, I have - had, before the bracelet - my period every twenty-eight days."

"Ugh. That seems silly. It's not like you need to get pregnant with so little notice. Why did you have that... or, no. Is that everyone on Earth?"

"Yeah. I mean basically, anyway. But that's the thing, I live here now and I didn't even know that wasn't the normal way it worked! I don't know what I don't know. Like... okay, here's one. That last city we were in, Sentortzi? They had taller buildings than the other places we've been to, and the city as a whole was bigger too," Well, other than the Necropolis but that didn't really count; a big chunk of that city wasn't really functional in terms of people living and working there, "and I've been so wrapped up in my... my preconceived ideas of what a world with magic would look like based on Earth stories that I didn't stop to question that. But you have materials that are stronger than anything on my planet, and thousands of years of knowledge working with them. There's no reason you shouldn't have buildings literally ten times the size of those, or cities with millions of people in them! I noticed your farms are all smaller than I had expected, but is that because you use magic? Or did you use enhancement to engineer the plants? Either way, why wouldn't there just be bigger cities if you can easily feed everyone? And I get why you don't have some things, it makes sense you never developed the internet or whatever, but now that I'm thinking about it you should have... I don't know, some post-Industrial Revolution stuff. And yes, I know you don't know what that is. Oh! Okay, here's another - it's a little strange you don't have photography. We had photographs ages ago and it's all just chemistry stuff that I'm sure you could do. Or radio, we've had that for a long time I think - though I guess that one has some magic equivalents that might distract people from figuring it out. But it's ridiculously strange you don't have assembly lines and mass transit. If you can make magic items that just turn endlessly you could have all sorts of stuff."

I finally wound down and collapsed onto the log we'd made the fire pit next to. I took a deep breath, and continued a little slower and calmer. "And I don't know politics; I know about Halenvar and some of the allied kingdoms because of the war, but I don't really know how anything works or how many countries there are or... man, we talk about things being on this side or the other side of the continent but I don't actually know how many continents there are. You know? Just this basic shit that I would have learned in third grade on Earth - I'm not going to explain what third grade is, don't worry about that part. I guess I'm just realizing this place is my home now, and I've been just focused on magic and stories and quests to the point I've totally neglected the boring but important stuff."

Katrin put a hand on my shoulder. "It's fine. We're going to have lots of time to ourselves. We can take turns, I'll tell you things about this world and you tell me things about Earth. We've done that somewhat already, we just need to be more... methodical about it. And some of that stuff... well, I don't really know the answer either because I just take it for granted. Cities aren't larger because that's just how big cities are. But you wanted to stop back at the university in Sentortzi after our training time, so we'll make a list of things and we'll just look them all up."

"Ugh, you're doing it again. That thing where you're more mature and patient than me even though you're younger. It's infuriating."

"I'll work on it. Maybe later I'll throw something at you, or have a temper tantrum about you getting a bigger bowl of soup than me."

Errod returned with Elba, and they got the fire set up. I had already gotten the soup pot filled with ingredients and clean water, so it was just a matter of waiting for things to heat up. While we did that Elba showed off a stone that she'd used reinforcement magic on, moving all the different mineral components into distinct bands.

"Very cool, kiddo. You know I don't think I ever asked, why did you pick reinforcement? It's a good one, lots of great uses, but I guess it's just not one that I had expected any of you to take."

She shrugged. "I remember... I remember my daddy complaining about metal not being pure. I'm going to help him make things."

"I thought it was Yasna whose father was a blacksmith."

Elba nodded. "Tig's mom, too."

"Wait seriously? Why... I mean that can't be a coincidence."

Elba just shrugged. "Maybe it was all of us. Roran wouldn't talk about what he remembered, or what he saw when the Sahrger made him imagine his family."

"Wait. Back up. They did what?"

"The Sahrger made us... think... about being home. I saw my parents. And I saw like I was there, being mean to them. I poured out daddy's oil barrel everywhere. Threw his best hammer in the well and blamed it on the man that brings the milk."

"Sounds about right," I muttered, but immediately regretted it. She had heard me, and looked down at her feet like she was ashamed. "I mean. Shit. Um, here, let's not talk about that. Let's check on the soup together, okay? You can stir while I toss in some more spices."

I got her up and helping, but even though she'd literally just been looking embarrassed about being called out for wrecking stuff she "accidentally" dropped the whole salt cellar into the pot.

"Fuckfuckfuckfuck," I sputtered as I tried frantically to fish it out without tipping it over. At the last second it flipped off the spoon and every last bit of already ruined salt poured out into the soup. "God damn it!" I yelled, and spun to face Elba. She flinched, little shoulders hunching up, but on her face there was an expression I didn't expect - relief? Oh. Oh, no. In an instant my anger drained away and I was a kid again. I remembered provoking my mom, making things worse if she was already mad at me, so that she would blow up and scream because it was better than the silence. I remembered Cheryl, the abusive staff member at my second group home and how she would get nervous about being caught after she hit kids - which just meant it was some sort of sick silver lining, you'd be gasping on the floor and think hey, cool, now she'll be nice to me for a day or so and maybe even bribe me with something.

"Elba. The Sahrger... they beat the shit out of you when you didn't do something the way you wanted. Didn't they?"

She shrugged, a casual gesture that said 'yeah, sure, so what?'

"And you were really good for us at first, and then... yeah. Then you screwed up and came out of the wagon and almost got eaten by an invisible cat thing. And we didn't yell at you or break a finger or anything. Shit."

Errod put a hand on my arm. "Um, Callie? You're not suggesting we should have... hurt her?"

"No. No, of course not. But she thought we should have. She's learned that, for years. So since then she's just been... waiting for it. She wants to get it over with. Is that right?"

Elba tried to shrug again, but then she just started bawling and nodded her head.

"Fuck me. Elba we're... we're not them. I'm not a Sahrger. I would never hurt you. You don't need to push, to find out where the line is. There's no line. There's nothing you can do that will make me hurt you. And if I tried? I mean I wouldn't, ever, but if I did? Errod would kick my ass. In a heartbeat."

She sniffled, then looked at Errod. "Could he?"

Errod started laughing, and swept Elba up in a hug. "Maybe not, but Katrin would be on my side."

"Elba, you don't need to..." and a memory hit me, but it was foggy as if it had been a hundred years ago. I was in that room, the one from my memory palace that I was sure I'd never seen in real life, and someone was squeezing me in a hug. I was pressed into their shoulder, and they were saying... what was it? 'Callie, you don't need to push me away. There's nothing you could do that would make me abandon you...'

Katrin nudged me with an elbow. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Yeah. Just... another one of those memories that don't fit. We can talk about it later. Let's finish talking to the kid for now, it's nothing urgent. Hey, Elba? Listen." Errod sat down, still holding her, and we circled around. "I don't know anything about your parents. Probably sometimes they'll get mad, and... you know, people screw up and say things that... um. Well, you'll argue and you'll hurt each others' feelings and they'll punish you but if they hurt you, actually hurt you... well, we're going to come back and check on you. Okay? And when we do you can let us know how it's going and we'll just... we'll take care of it. You hear?"

She nodded, and sniffled. "Sorry. About the soup."

"We can flush out some of the water, the soup will be okay - and we can borrow some salt from your parents tomorrow. But let's not do it again. Deal?"

"I'll get water," Elba said, seeming to will herself to stop crying. She hurried off, and I felt some sort of pressure lift off of me. That conversation had drained me somehow, maybe it had hit too close to home in some ways.

Katrin watched Elba go, and then turned to me. "Callie, we need to talk about this."

"She'll be fine. Or did you mean my memory thing? It was nothing big, just a snippet of something."

"No. I mean... before she dumped the salt in, she said the Sahrger made her imagine her parents. Some of the other kids mentioned having visions of their families too, I didn't think much of it but... is it possible they were being used as spies?"

"Spies? Who would they be spying on? Some random blacksmiths?"

"No, on... well, think about it. If Elba saw herself doing things, maybe they... maybe they put someone there in her place. There could be a Sahrger disguised as Elba waiting for us in that town."

"Shit. Do you think - I mean, if you're right - do you think they can communicate with it now that we have Elba? What if it knows what we did, stealing the children back?"

"I don't know. But let's get moving first thing in the morning tomorrow, and when we get there... we should keep Elba in the wagon until we get it figured out."

We didn't talk about it again, especially since Elba was right underfoot the rest of the evening and as soon as we woke in the morning. It seemed like she was trying to make up for all her pranks, being as helpful as possible to the point that she was actually just getting in the way. But we got on the road without incident, and shortly after lunch the village came into view. It was roughly circular, with palisade walls all around. At a glance, from the last hill before we went down into the valley, I guessed they had maybe a thousand people living there. Elba wasn't thrilled to hear she was going to have to wait in the wagon, but after our heart to heart the night before she was once more eager to please - this time not just out of fear. We asked the first person we saw for directions to the blacksmith, and when we got a hundred or so feet away we parked and Errod took up a position by the door where he could grab Elba if she ran out but also keep an eye on us as we approached the smithy. There was a large man sitting out front, carving something out of wood rather than working at the forge but still looking very much like a stereotypical blacksmith. He looked up once we were almost to him and smiled, placing his knife and the wooden shaft he'd been working on down and offering a hand.

"Greetings! Fel Batlen, at your service."

"Hi! Um. Do you have a daughter named Elba?"

Immediately his face fell, and his shoulders slumped. "What has she done this time? I'm so sorry, I don't deal in coin but if she broke something or stole from you I can try to make it right."

"No! Nothing like that. This is... well. This is awkward. Is Elba here?"

Fel's eyes narrowed. "She's in the house, I believe. What is this about?"

"Right. Okay. So the thing is... don't freak out, okay? We were passing through Xeyul and encountered the Sahrger and they had a little girl enslaved who said her name was Elba."

He shook his head. "No. No, no, no. It couldn't... I would know. I... oh, gods. Oh, gods, no."

"She's with us, in our wagon back there. But we didn't want to bring her closer until we could... uh... well, can we see the... shit, there's no good way to have this conversation. Can you call the other Elba out? We just need to see if it's... her."

He looked like he was in shock. Eyes unfocused, he nodded slightly and took a few steps towards the house that was right by the semi-enclosed blacksmith shop.

"Elba? Dear? Come... come out please."

And Elba came out. It was the same child, unmistakably, but also clearly different. Her hair was longer and in a beautiful braid, her cheeks were plump and rosy instead of the somewhat sunken face our version had, and she was - for whatever reason - a few inches taller. She looked at us quizzically, and then at her father. Or, not her father. He, in turn, looked at me. I nodded.

"Elba. These people say they have a girl with them that goes by your same name. They found her in the lands of the Sahrger."

The other Elba ran.

Fel just stood there for a moment, then began running after her. "Creature!" he yelled, "Stop! How dare you! HOW DARE YOU!"

I charged after him, and saw that not-Elba was heading not just into a copse of trees as I had assumed, but towards a small ring of mushrooms - just like the one we had left Xeyul through. She was almost there when the fairy-ring burst into flames, mushrooms instantly turning to ash. I spun to look at Katrin but she looked as surprised as I was, so I tried to scan around for the source of the magic - it didn't take me long. There, leaning out from behind Elba's house, was a figure with wild green hair and a wooden mask covering her face. The mage that had been hunting us. I put my hands up, and took a few steps towards her - behind me I heard a squawk as Fel snatched not-Elba.

"Listen. I know you want to kill me, but this is not the time. You stopped before, when there were kids in the way. Well one of them is with us in our wagon, and we just want to give her back to her family. Alright? These people have gone through enough, they don't need their house being burnt down in a fight. So just... fuck off. Okay? We can do this another time. Let them have their reunion. Got it?"

And much to my surprise, she nodded and just... walked away. Katrin came up alongside me and stared, then looked at me questioningly. "Do we... should I attack her?"

"No. No, I mean... if she's leaving... Fuck, I really don't want her to just come out of the shadows later. But I meant what I said. I guess just let her go."

There was yelling, and I turned to see a woman I presumed to be Elba's mother arguing with Fel. She didn't understand why he had her by the wrists and was dragging her back towards the forge. Katrin waved to Errod, and he disappeared around the back of the wagon to get Elba.

"What will... what will you do with her?"

"It," he said. "And I... I don't know. We should... should kill it but..." he shook his head. "I can't. Not looking like my Elba, still. How long? You vicious little creature, how long have you been in my home?"

Not-Elba stopped struggling, and looked up at Fel with tears in her eyes. "Daddy. Please. It's me. These people are crazy, they're... aw, fuck," she said as she spotted the real Elba approaching with Errod. "Fine. How long have I been here? Most of my life, you miserable sack of shit. I hated every minute of it. Your stupid, ugly wife crying herself to sleep was the only thing that made it bearable. I was going to leave soon, you know. We don't stay past our twelfth birthday. But now... what, you'll kill me? Chain me in iron? My family will come for me, human. They will curse this whole town - your crops will wither, your livestock will become sick, and within a year this land will be empty except for the corpses. Or. You could let me go. Let me go back to my family and break the bond I have with your daughter. Once that is done, I swear my family will leave yours alone."

Katrin narrowed her eyes at not-Elba. "And how, precisely, would you break that bond?"

"I can't tell you that. There are some secrets I will not share with humans."

"That probably means the bond would be broken by her killing Elba. And she said she would leave your family alone after that, not before, so it wouldn't be breaking her word."

"Goat fucker."

"That's not a denial. Callie, get the anti-curse charm we pulled off the soldier in Zistarne and pay attention to your enchantment sense. Fel... I suppose get some iron, if that will even work. I presume that's why they put you with a blacksmith, isn't it? To build up some resistance? I know it's about intent... an iron knife on the doorframe keeps the Sahrger out, because you want it to. So what were you after? Someone who loves iron? Someone that would surround you with iron devoid of harmful intent?"

"Clever goat fucker, at least. Something like that. You're smart. My family could teach you things, things you could never learn here. Magical secrets. Rituals of binding. Ways to scry across worlds. Paths to the places of power, where the ancient rune-stones still stand. Free me, and I will grant you knowledge."

As she spoke, Fel dragged her into the smithy and up to the forge. She struggled as she maintained eye contact with Katrin, but Fel's massive hands were more than strong enough. Meanwhile Elba's mother - whose name I still hadn't gotten in the confusion - had rushed up to her and crushed her in a hug before falling to the ground, the two of them in a heap crying while Errod stood by awkwardly. I ran to him and asked for the charm, which he handed me, and then turned as I heard screaming. Not-Elba was being wrapped in iron chains, and her skin was already turning red at their touch. I walked closer and could feel some sort of enchantment wrapping around Fel, but I dropped the necklace over his head and it broke away into wisps of mana.

"I won't kill her," he said, "I can't. Even knowing what she is. Nor can we keep her like this, in agony. I'll... I'll send to the university, see if they know what to do. And in the meantime, well. There's an old storage shed, we can surround it with iron spikes. Bar the doors and windows. I have enough metal here, and can add more as I get it. She won't be going anywhere, but maybe we can make her comfortable enough inside. You hear that, creature? I'm giving you a chance for mercy. What's your name? And if my daughter's name leaves your mouth just know it will be the last word you speak."

Not-Elba hesitated, then grimaced as she shifted in her chains. "Fine. My name is Mossbloom. And I will... I will take imprisonment over death, so long as it removes me from your horrible stench."

By now others were gathering, and Errod was doing his best to explain. Some men came and hauled Mossbloom away, but Fel still didn't go to his daughter.

"I should have known," he said, "I should have known somehow. I could have... gone looking for her. Loaded up with iron and taken her back, years ago. She'll never forgive me."

"Fel. I... you would have died. And then where would you be? Elba is okay. She's going to need some help, and maybe she'll never get entirely over it. But she loves you, and I know she doesn't blame you for any of this. Just be patient with her. Oh, and. Uh. Look, the Sahrger weren't exactly subtle with punishments, so you can't hit her. Ever. I mean you shouldn't hit kids regardless, but for her it would be... it would take her back there, in her head. So you hit her and... well, I promised her I'd kick your teeth in."

He was looming over me, a solid two feet taller and three times as wide, and he just nodded. There was a look in his eyes that said he believed me.

"Good. Okay. Just had to put that out there. Um. Well, I guess we'll say our goodbyes and let you start to... figure this mess out. But before we do, just one quick thing - do you have a bag of salt we could borrow?"