The modified beetle chirps in her hand. Its carapace pulses orange and its head sways from side to side, seeking magic. It is a Circuitbreaker bug and it searches for the largest source of magic in an area to eat it, and that Should be a moving bookstore.
She is wearing her paint stained academy robes and her hair in one thick, long ponytail, and a grey cloak bought with the pay she got this morning. The back streets of the district are tight and close together, and the heat dispersing off the organic walls has the tight alleys warm and oppressive, given the early autumn of it all.
The sounds of insects come from everywhere, including in her hand, as Thalia hears the forest and city enjoy the humidity still left from last night's rain, and she has to strain to concentrate to work out which way the Circuitbreaker is taking her. She wiggles her body past a group of boxes that take up much of the lane, feeling the packed soil beneath her bare feet shift as she gets her footing.
She can hear someone moving in the building beside her and she hopes they do not think she is skulking, she does not want the risk of a public service time cluttering up her day should they think her a nuisance.
Eventually the beetle starts to go rabid, and Thalia returns the creature to the box in her backpack, turning the corner to see Decadencey, pushing forwards with grit and determination to confront the witch.
The membrane lay open, waiting and she steps inside the the cramped and dark walls and shelves, eyes adjusting from bright light as she keeps moving, hand outstretched to stop her bumping into something in her refusal to be kept out.
"Hello?" She calls, finally accustomed to the dark of the shop, even as small devices spring to light with the barest of light. Her toe bumps a binding bound in animal skin, and she stops, looking down to see the small stack wobble, which she stops with a press of her hand.
"Hello?" She says again after a pause, looking up and around for the witch. Her eyes rest briefly on a corvid, and it opens one blind white eye to watch her lazily, before closing it again like she is a pain it is not ready to deal with yet. Its beak sparkles with speckles of glittery texture, as it lazes a tongue out to sweep over a beak to make sure it is clean. She keeps watching it even as a voice says.
"You have caution, little mage, which is unique in one of your craft. But you still have the ambition that sweeps your academy."
"Is it ambition to want to be treated better? To be better?" Thalia impulsively retorts even as she's cut off with a
"That is by nature of words, the very definition."
"And witches do not want more for themselves?" Thalia decides to try to be bold, this woman had given a warning and so had opened the dialogue.
"Oh some witches have ambition, but mostly we just wish for the freedom to be what we are."
She spins to meet the eyes of the witch and is forced to look down into them. "And you don't think I wish the same? You must know a little about me to give me the warning, or do you only know me as the techno-mage who is working on the communications case?"
The dark haired, sandalwood skinned witch watches Thalia with a dark smile. "I do not need to know you to know the danger of the path you walk. You would bring connection between the realms all for a touch of respect from people who would abandon you the moment you stop bringing Them glory. The realms were severed so they could heal, and bringing them back will just rip open fresh wounds."
"I just need to see this through to the end, to find a way to salvage my life before it becomes yet another footnote in someone else's story." Thalia says through gritted teeth. "I now know of the rot-filled desires of the human realm, I know to be careful."
"And what of the rot within Infernus? Or the rot within Parnathum? There are more than one realm and you do not even know what you risk just to taste being on the page of the binding." The woman's face is hawkish with anger, tight ringlets bouncing as she draws the shadows around her.
Thalia pushes the sleeve up her arm and reveals a circuit layered there. She presses her palm to it, casting a light spell as her own face contorts with anger. "You would suggest stopping, as if the existence of the human means that anyone can stop? WOULD stop."
Spells of light and shadow battle inside the store, while outside is a constantly shifting penumbra casting confusion and fear among the neighbours. The walls of the shop grow heavy in response, rooting the witch's shop to the spot, even as Thalia can see her considering casting herself away and leaving Thalia behind with her warning, anger and confusion.
"The denizens of the academy do not understand the concept of Do Not Enter. Go to the Gnarled Grove - see what dangers letting the realms back has already wrought on ours. You'll see what me and my kind are trying to protect this realm from." The witch's face has softened into regret, mixed with fear. "Not all the wild women were there when we trusted humans the first time - but I was, and I did not speak up then, I will not be so silent now."
"Guide me then, show me how You would do this safely." Thalia says with a sigh, lowering the light to let the darkness take her over. "There is always going to be someone wanting to bring a link between realms now that we know it can be done."
The darkness eases, and the witch steps towards her. "Go to the grove and prove to me that you know the stakes, prove you know what we must keep safe from, then I will consider it."
