Welcome to Gaia! ::

The rose garden had been left to grow wild for far too long. So long, in fact, that Teide could barely recognize it for what it had once been. The bushes were choked with brambles and dead foliage - only a few flowers, white as starlight, turned their pale petals to the stars. Her arrival had generated a soft wind that set the weed stalks waving - but now they were still once more, and the squire looked around, wide-eyed.

She was standing on a path, the paving stones choked with weeds. Behind where she’d arrived, the land sloped down steeply, dropping off into starry void below. Looking down made her feel faintly dizzy - so she resolved not to. What would happen to someone who fell off her wonder? Would they just float forever? She shivered at the thought and turned her attention back to the rose garden.

The path meandered this way and that, and though it had clearly been neat and well-tended once, it almost seemed beyond repair now. Did I do this? wondered Teide, stepping carefully over the uneven stones. When I was corrupt, was Chaos breaking my wonder? No one had ever told her about Chaos reaching all the way out into space, and…

No, she thought, her eyes drifting shut. She could feel her Wonder resonating with every atom in her body, starlight and rose petals and gold and glass tinkling against glass. Chaos had never touched this place. It was simply very, very old. Teide opened her eyes again and, for a moment, felt the weight of a pair of pruning shears resting in her hand, opposite her crystal ball.

And then it was gone.

She unclenched a fist she hadn’t realized she’d formed, and looked up past the top of the garden. There was a low wall corralling the roses, old river stones (where from?) and the occasional large chunk of crystal all piled together to about waist height. There was an old gate at the center - wrought iron, curlicues and stars. It was clearly meant to be more decorative than anything, because if she’d seen fit she could have climbed over it with no trouble at all, but that seemed improper.

After all, this was her Wonder, not a jungle gym.

Teide gave it a tug, which failed to move it, and then gave it a much harder yank. The gate swung open with a terrible shrieking noise, but it remained on its hinges. For a moment she’d been worried that she might have pulled it off altogether, and the last thing that she wanted to do was break her wonder. She’d only just gotten here!

She laughed nervously and let go of the gate. The rusting iron had flaked off onto her gloves and left red stains pressed into the palms. “This is real,” Teide told herself, crossing through the gate. The path was a bit smoother up ahead - there were no bushes to choke it - and it ran straight to the top of the hill, ending at the front porch of a victorian mansion painted in sky blue and gold leaf and navy. The tower had a curious rounded dome at its top - a telescope.

Teide stepped carefully.

Hallowed ground, she thought.

Continuing in from the vestibule, Teide came across a sitting room. Someone had thoughtfully laid down dust covers over all the furniture - she peeked under one and found a chesterfield upholstered in dark, star-studded fabric. The Dowager did this, Teide thought unquestioningly, straightening the cover back out. The sitting room was pristine, and she didn’t want to be the one to ruin that - at least without cause. Perhaps later she would feel more settled here and she would uncover all the couches and chairs and polish the wood and then - what? Have a tea party?

She snorted to imagine Hvergelmir and Colchis and Camlann all sitting around drinking tea and eating little shortbread cookies here. Hvergelmir and Colchis fit the image perfectly. Camlann did not - but she would force him to come. He was her older brother, after all.

Past the sitting room, she found a set of rooms that proved to be living quarters. There was a kitchen that was surprisingly modern in design, although it determinedly lacked a microwave, and the refrigerator was strange. There were bedrooms as well - one that Teide did not think served as anything more than a guest room, and one that she opened and realized quickly must have been the Dowager’s and closed again (it made her nervous to think about intruding on the older woman’s space, even if she was long gone).

The last room was her own. Teide knew this, despite having never set foot in it before in her life. The shelves were heavy with books and figurines and models of star systems, cast in gold and still gently orbiting, held together by some long-gone magic. The bed was made with a multicolored quilt - a patchwork nebula - and a doll wearing an outfit similar to the one Teide herself wore rested against the pillow.

The Dowager cleaned the room, she thought, and made the bed. She must have known I would be back one day.

There were so many trinkets here waiting to be touched and picked up and toyed with and claimed, but Teide stepped backwards and closed the door. Everything here was hers she thought, holding tight to the doorknob to stable herself. She didn’t need to take it because it already belonged to her from the get-go and if she went taking things away, she would just lose it and what if some of this stuff was important? She couldn’t risk messing things up for her future stuff just because she felt grabby right now.

She turned and left the living quarters behind. The stairs ascended four flights up the tower before hitting a locked door. It had the same sort of crystalline doorknob as the front door, and Teide expected it to open at her touch. She tried the knob.

Locked.

She bit her lip and tried it again. Still locked. But this was her wonder! she thought desparingly. It was hers! It should open itself for her! She tried the knob again and again, and then started to try to be more creative. She leaned against the door. She kicked it. She rammed it with her shoulder. She threw herself at it until she was all tired out and collapsed panting to the floor.

”It opens for the knight,” said the Dowager gently. Teide looked up.

“But I am the knight,” she said. The Dowager’s expression was soft. Kind.

“It will be of no use to you without training,” she said. “Teide doesn’t know you yet. It seals itself against the unfamiliar. You’ll have to earn its trust before it lets you into the sanctum.”

The Dowager offered her a pair of garden shears.

Teide took them.

Teide had no garden shears, and she was tired, and someone was going to notice she was gone soon. It seemed wisest to return to Earth.

At least for now.