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=== The Other Half of My Soul === by Trismegistus Shandy This story is set, with Morpheus's permission, in his Travel Agency universe. It is a sequel to my earlier Travel Agency story "The Family that Plays Together". Thanks to Morpheus for his feedback on the rough draft. This story is released under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. You may repost it on other sites, for instance, or write new stories based on it, as long as you give me credit and release your own stories under the same license. ----- Serenikha and I had met in a dreamscape modeled on Muir Woods, which both of us had gone hiking in though not at the same time. We were sitting side-by-side on a sequoia log, my feet dangling in the air and her tail trailing along the ground for several feet. "So what else is new?" she asked, after she'd updated me on the gossip circulating in the Dragon Emperor's palace. "Not much," I said; "I finalized my plans for Spring Break with Josh and Omar. We're splitting the rent on a beach house down at Pacific Grove. I'm not sure what the magic level is there, so we might not share any dreams next week." "It's just a week, though, right?" "Yeah -- uhh. I feel like I'm waking up. Something's *waking* me up..." There was a weird noise coming from nowhere and everywhere. For some reason I couldn't identify it at first, until Serenikha said: "It sounds like your phone's ringing. Talk to you later, if you can't sleep through it?" "It just might be important," I said. "Bye," and woke up already groping on the bedside table for my phone. "Who's this?" I mumbled. "It's Taylor. Were you still asleep?" I glanced at the clock: 8:39. "I don't have any morning classes this semester, remember?" I tried to sleep late so I could overlap my sleep hours more with Serenikha's. It was around midnight in the Dragon Emperor's palace. "Sorry! I can call back tomorrow --" "No, I'm already awake. What is it?" "Next week is your Spring Break, right?" "Yes." I started to tell her about the beach house plan, but she interrupted: "Tell them you've got to cancel. Make up whatever family emergency excuse you need --" "What's wrong?" "Nothing. But I've got something better." "This had better be good." "Oh, it is. You remember what I told you at Christmas, about the portal Mr. G. made back in October...?" ----- I hadn't seen Taylor since we'd both been at Mom and Dad's house for Christmas. She was super busy these days with a double major in International Studies and Magic. Of course, only the International Studies part would appear on her diploma or her resum?, but her magical skills were at least equally real, and they were a big part of how she planned to earn her living. During our first trip to Mr. G.'s world, which was also my last, we'd run into some trouble, getting our souls magically entangled with our hosts in Mr. G.'s world. Taylor and Mom and Dad got sorted out within a few months, but my soul was still entangled with Serenikha, the naga princess I'd swapped bodies with for a few days when I was fourteen. While he was working on getting our souls untangled, Mr. G. noticed that Taylor had a talent for magic. When he offered to start teaching her, he told us that there were apparently a couple of dozen young people like her -- children of parents who'd visited Mr. G.'s world multiple times, and particularly while the mother was pregnant. He gave her private lessons every couple of weeks while she was in high school, and arranged a scholarship for her to Kinnison College, a small liberal-arts school in Oregon where he was a visiting professor -- under a variety of names and faces, a different one every semester to hear Taylor tell it. How he managed to give lectures and seminars in Spores Ferry, Oregon every weekday, and also run at least seven Travel Agency branches around the world, I don't know and I'm not convinced Taylor knew either, though she made mysterious, knowing comments about it sometimes. Last Christmas, she'd told us about a field trip she and the other magic students had taken with Professor G. to a state park in southern Idaho. Our world doesn't have nearly as much magic as Mr. G.'s world, and what it has tends to concentrate or clump up in certain places. And those places shift around -- which explains why the various Travel Agency branches have to keep moving their offices from one place in a given city to another, and sometimes to abandon some cities entirely. On a particular weekend in October, a really high concentration of magic was building up in this particular park, and Professor G. wanted to demonstrate a spell that, until now, hadn't even been possible in our world except on a very small scale. He'd opened a direct portal to his native world, and led his students through it for a brief excursion before they returned a few hours later. I'd been there before, of course, and Mom and Dad had been there dozens of times, and at first what Taylor told us hadn't seemed so extraordinary -- until we realized that *she'd been in that world in her own body*. Not borrowing the body of another person, a native of that world, but physically traveling there with her own body, clothes and luggage. She showed us the photos from her trip: a castle by a waterfall, a couple of elves, a herd of unicorns -- even a distant, blurry photo of a dragon in flight. "That day you took me and Leslie to the other world for the first time, Mr. G. had just started opening physical portals, but they were tiny and only stayed open for a second or two. Just enough to bring a pixie like Maella through or send her home again. But now, when we have a big buildup like the one in Idaho back in October, we can open portals eight or ten feet wide and keep them open for hours. She promised she'd teach us the theory behind those portals next semester, and maybe we'd be able to open them ourselves by the next time a big magic buildup occurs somewhere in North America." ----- And now, apparently, it was happening again. "How'd you like to visit Serenikha in person?" "That," I said, "would be the awesomest thing since awesome was invented." "Next Monday, in Yosemite Park, there's going to be a big buildup. I should be able to open a portal to some secluded place near the capital of the Dragon Empire -- I can use your link with Serenikha to help focus it -- and we can go through, go into the city, and call on Serenikha at the palace. We'll need to be back at the portal within a day, but I calculate I ought to be able to keep it open at least that long, and make it invisible to anybody else when we aren't using it." "I'll tell her we're coming, next time I see her." Hopefully that night, but almost certainly sometime before Monday, I'd share another dream with Serenikha; I usually did so five or six times a week, these days. "You do that, and tell her to arrange some code phrase we can give to the guards on duty outside the palace, so they know we're Serenikha's friends and not some random peasants come to gawk at royalty." I thought of something. "How are we going to talk to people? When you visit Mr. G.'s world normally, he gives you the language skills of the person you're swapping bodies with..." "I can work that spell myself, now. And you've got your link with Serenikha; you can speak her languages in dreams, and with just a little nudge from me you should be able to do it waking as well." "All right," I said. "I'll pack tonight, and leave right after my last class on Friday. Where do you want to meet?" ----- I'd seen Taylor demonstrate a few small tricks during her last couple of years in high school and her first years in college -- levitating a gold bracelet, summoning hundreds of squirrels to our back yard, making our neighbor's mean dog fall asleep in mid-bark. But the first thing she did that really impressed me was right after my first semester in college, when she'd been at Kinnison College for a couple of years. My link with Serenikha had held steady all through high school, growing no stronger but no weaker, ever since my first trip to her world. I still shared dreams with her, and I still had occasional moments of aphasia, where I couldn't think of a word in English, only in one of Serenikha's languages. And then, my first semester in college, it suddenly seemed to get a lot weaker -- I shared no dreams at all with her, and had much less aphasia than usual, which was nice in terms of favorably impressing my professors and the new friends I was making. But I was saddened, too: Serenikha had become my best friend over the last few years, we were almost as close as I was to Taylor -- or even closer, in the last couple of years since Taylor had gone off to college and her magic studies, which I couldn't share. And though I was hopeful that if our link broke, I'd be able to swap bodies with people in her world again, and visit her sometime, it still wouldn't be the same as the psychic link we'd shared for so long. And then, when I went home for Christmas, I shared a dream with Serenikha the very first night. She was frantic with worry, having not heard from me in three months, and I told her I didn't know why. The next morning at breakfast, I told Mom, Dad and Taylor about it, and Taylor figured out what was going on. "I'll come with you, your first day back -- you start back a couple of days before I do, anyway -- and I'll see if my idea is correct." It was. The freshman boys' dorm was smack in the middle of a dead-magic area that covered the whole southeast part of campus. Taylor was able to spot that right away, and what was even better, she used her magic to talk the administrators into letting me move into another dorm, one that lay comfortably inside the live-magic area that also included the administration building. After that, she'd visited my campus at the beginning of each semester to survey the latest configuration of magic areas and figure out which dorm I should be in, and if necessary sweet-talk the administrators into letting me live there. Right now I was sleeping in the highest-magic area on campus, and though it was nice to share dreams with Serenikha almost every night, it also made my aphasia worse when I was in the dorm or the nearest classroom buildings. (I was a better or worse class participant depending on which building a classroom was in and whether I could count on my command of English when I spoke up. "Why are you so quiet this semester?" Professor Avery had asked me a couple of weeks ago. "I know you have ideas about this stuff, you had such incisive questions last semester." I couldn't give him the real answer.) Predictably, I dreamed with Serenikha that night after my phone conversation with Taylor. "I've got great news," I told her when I found myself on the foot-bridge over the West Garden in the Dragon Emperor's palace, seeing her slither up the foot-path toward me. "Taylor says she can open a physical portal and I can come see you in person." "When?" She clapped her hands eagerly. "Three days from now. She says she'll open a portal outside the city, and we'll walk to the palace -- you'll need to tell the guards we're coming, so they're expecting us and will let us in to see you." "I'll make arrangements as soon as I wake up. Oh, this will be wonderful! You've seen the palace gardens in Autumn, but never in Spring. And you can finally meet little Osalikha!" I'd seen dream-images of her baby daughter, but it would be wonderful to see the real Osalikha, and maybe even hold her in my arms. I remembered the whole year and more Serenikha was pregnant or incubating her egg, how her anxiety and excitement had been so infectious, and how I'd been just as interested in the mothers and their little children I happened to see at the grocery store or on the bus as any pregnant woman; I still took more interest in babies than most guys my age, and I thought that was due as much to my link with Serenikha as to Mom and Dad's gender-neutral parenting. We talked for a subjective hour or more before I woke up. I showered and got ready for class; in just a few hours I'd be on the road. ----- First, I drove to Mom and Dad's house, to spend the night and to borrow their camping equipment. (And incidentally do a couple of loads of laundry.) It was on the way to Yosemite for me, but out of the way for Taylor, so I'd meet her near the park entrance Saturday afternoon. "I thought you were going in on a beach house with Josh and Omar?" Dad asked. "Change of plans," I said. "I'll still pitch in my part of the rent if they can't find somebody else at the last minute, I don't want to leave them hanging, but I'm going camping in Yosemite with Taylor." "Aha," Mom said. "And when was Taylor going to tell us about this?" "Probably sometime today," I said. "She said she'd be busy and wouldn't get away until tomorrow morning..." "Is this something to do with her magic studies?" Dad asked. I'd just started to explain when Taylor called Mom's cell phone. "Good evening... Yes, Leslie was just starting to tell us about that... Uh huh... Is Professor G. going to be there?... Hmm... Are you sure this is a good idea?... Well, yes, I know you can handle that, but -- have you thought about the language aspect? Good, of course... And what about clothes?... I guess that will work, even if it's not an exact match... Yes, I'll send them with him... Sure, it's a cosmopolitan city, they're used to seeing people in all kinds of clothes... And money?... You seem to have thought of everything... Well, be safe! You too. Bye." Mom hung up. "I'll just go dig through Taylor's closet," she said, "there are a couple of kimonos that she wants me to send with you. Your dad can help you get the camping equipment loaded in the car." "I guess now would be better than tomorrow morning," Dad said. "Just let me get dressed." I still hadn't undressed yet, just taken off my shoes at the door as was usual even when we were having guests over who weren't naturists. After being at school all semester, where everybody wore clothes all the time and you had to wear at least a towel even on the way to and from the shower, it felt slightly odd seeing Mom and Dad naked, though not for long before it started feeling homelike instead. Once Dad and I got the camping equipment into my trunk, and Mom handed me a couple of kimonos to hang up in the back seat, Dad and I undressed and we sat down to supper. "I'm a little concerned about this trip," Mom said. "Taylor said Mr. G. isn't providing a local guide as he does for his normal vacation packages." "But we'll be going to a city where we know people," I argued. "Just from the one time I've been there, I know Serenikha and Pientao, and Lady Hanuseri and Kinuko. And Taylor's been to that area a couple more times, and she's also been local guide for visitors from there coming to California; she knows several other people we can ask for help if we run into trouble." (Taylor had worked for Mr. G.'s travel agency every summer since she was seventeen.) "I know. Just be careful, okay?" "We will." ----- Next morning, I loaded up my clean clothes and a few more things Mom and Dad thought of that we might need -- a first-aid kit, a GPS, some of Mom's jewelry that we could sell for more draconic currency if we ran out, insect repellent and sunblock -- and drove out. "I wish we could go with you," Dad said, "but we can't take time off work on such short notice. Tell Taylor to give us more warning next time, if she can." I made good time and was in Yosemite by early afternoon. I sat at one of the picnic tables near the lot where I'd parked, and texted Taylor to tell her where I was, then ate the burrito I'd bought at a drive-through while I waited for her. She got there about an hour later. "The peak magic area is over here," she said, spreading out a map of the park on the picnic table. "I think the closest camping area is *here*, and this is the access road for it..." A few minutes later we were at the park office reserving a camping spot in that area, and we had our camp set up by nightfall. "Why come in today rather than tomorrow?" I asked, nailing in a tent stake. "You said the, um... *suavikh*? I mean, the magic surge -- that it would be on Monday...?" "I can't be sure exactly when," she amended. She might have mentioned that earlier. "Monday afternoon is most likely, but it could be a few hours earlier or later, maybe even tomorrow or Tuesday. I wanted to be here early so I could feel it when it begins. Last October we got there a little late, past the peak of the surge, and Professor G. could only keep the portal open for a few hours. If I catch this one on the upswing, I should be able to keep it open for over a day, enough time for a good visit." "I'll let Serenikha know tonight, if I see her while... um... *uleri*?" "Uleri means dreaming, right?" She had a good memory for my aphasic moments. "Oh, you will, unless she's suffering insomnia. Even here we've got more ambient magic than than you've probably ever spent a night with, as you can tell by how bad your aphasia is. I bet you'll probably get some spillover from Serenikha's emotions, and she'll get some from you, but I don't know how we can test for that... hmm, maybe if you keep a log book and compare notes with her when we see her..." We lay out on blankets looking at the stars for a while before we crawled into our tents to sleep. ----- "I think our link is getting stronger," Serenikha told me that night. We'd met in a dreamscape based on _The Dying Earth_, which I'd just been reading. "I keep forgetting the real words I was trying to say and saying stuff in English instead." "Me too, in reverse. I think our link is the same as ever, but it affects us more when I'm in a high-magic area. And Taylor says this park I'm sleeping in is one of the highest-magic areas she's ever seen." "I wonder if it will get even stronger when we meet in person?" she said, suddenly looking doubtful. "Perhaps we should seek the Gray One's advice before you come." "Taylor has him on speed-dial," I said, "but who knows if he'll answer..." ----- Sunday after breakfast, Taylor wanted to go hiking into the highest-magic area. "During the surge there might even be enough magic for a portal spell here at our campsite, but it'll last longer if we find the highest-magic spot we can." So we rubbed on more insect repellent and sunblock, secured our campsite against bears, and set out. We stuck to the trails at first, as long as they were taking us toward the high-magic area, but when the trail curved around away from it, Taylor insisted we leave it; I followed her cautiously, hoping we wouldn't run into any park rangers. We hadn't been able to get reception on our phones, but Taylor said she could contact Mr. G. by magic once we got into the magic-rich area. "Or here at the campsite, too, but I want seclusion to cast the spell." When we stopped to rest in a clearing ten or fifteen minutes from the trail, she declared she was ready to try that. She hefted the mage's staff she'd made in her sophomore year, which she'd been using as a walking-stick on our hike, and tapped several points around a circle. I sat on a fallen log and watched. After a few minutes of her muttering mystic incantations, she suddenly got a look of surprise on her face, and said: "Professor, this is Taylor Kendricks... I wanted to ask you something about Leslie's link with Serenikha... Yes... Sorry if this is a bad time... Thank you. Well, it's this: what do you think would happen if Leslie and Serenikha meet in person?... I mean, through a portal like the one you made last October... Yes, we've got a big magic surge here in Yosemite... That's why I'm using magic, because my cell doesn't get reception here... No, sir, I calculated it myself. I haven't done a precise measurement yet but it feels like eight or nine hundred thaums per square meter, almost enough for a portal spell... Yes, sir, of course I'll make sure... Oh... That's good to know... We'll keep that in mind... Thank you, professor. Good day." Her eyes lost the distant look they'd taken on during the conversation, and she focused on me again. "She says it should be safe for you to visit Serenikha, but you probably shouldn't sleep within a couple of hundred yards of each other, since your link gets stronger when you dream. And she wants me to make a series of measurements of the magic levels here and back off on making the portal if they don't show the trend I calculated for them back in Spores Ferry." "*Lao*," I said. She took it as the affirmative it was without inquiring as to its exact meaning, and I didn't realize until later that I hadn't spoken in English. "So I'm not sure this is the best site for the portal, but I'm going to make my first measurement here, and then we'll move on a little way and make another one. You can log the measurements on the map." That kept us busy for the rest of the day. We returned to our campsite exhausted and ate a little more before crawling into our tents just after sunset. But Taylor was confident that we'd found an ideal spot for the portal, one where it would last a day and a half at least based on the rate of changes in magic levels. I told Serenikha about that during our dream that night. "I so look forward to seeing you!" she said. "I've spoken with the captain of the guard. They are expecting you, but you should know the passwords as well: tomorrow it is 'Light of the thunder-stone' and the next day it will be 'Where the carp hid himself'." I repeated them until I was sure of them. "We'll probably be there tomorrow." Monday morning, we hiked into the woods not long after breakfast, and reached the clearing Taylor had selected an hour later. "This is it," she exclaimed, after casting a measurement spell. "The magic level's almost high enough for me to start opening the portal." We changed from our hiking clothes into the kimonos; Taylor's old kimono was a little small on me, but she worked an enchantment to make it fit. She worked another measurement spell every twenty or thirty minutes for the next few hours, and seemed satisfied with the results. We ate the snacks we'd brought with us and made short excursions here and there between measurements. Finally she looked around and said: "Okay, I think *this* is the best spot for the portal. Sit over there somewhere and give me room to work." I did as I was told, sitting down on a stump and opening my pack to take out a bag of trail mix. I watched Taylor work, clearing the leaves and needles from the ground in a small space, and then pouring a thin line of powdered chalk in a circle, and walking around it clockwise and counterclockwise, tapping her staff at its edge, again and again. The short shadows of midday were lengthening as Taylor spoke her incantations, gathering and shaping the power all around us. The portal still wasn't visible when I felt a sudden wave of amusement and burst out laughing, for no obvious reason; moments later I realized that Serenikha had just heard something funny. Taylor shot me an annoyed glance, and returned to concentrating on the portal. And then it became visible, a swirling darkness at the center of the chalk circle, growing gradually more coherent: a circle or, I soon realized, a sphere hanging in the air and not quite touching the ground. It seemed like the entrance to a long tunnel, and at the far end I could barely make out a spot of light. Even though I was expecting it, I felt surprise and shock, and wondered if that was spillover from Serenikha too; I'd have to ask her later if she'd seen or heard something surprising about now. "That's it," Taylor said, striking the edge of the circle with her staff one more time. "Let's go." And she stepped into the chalk circle, and another step took her into the tunnel; she seemed to grow rapidly smaller until I could barely see her. I picked up both our bags and followed her. ----- How long it took us to pass through the tunnel, I don't know. I say "tunnel" but there weren't exactly walls around us; it was only that I had a sense of motion, though I wasn't walking. The spaces around us were open and in the distance, in various directions, I could see dimly-lit images of myself and Taylor, distorted as in funhouse mirrors. The real Taylor, or at least an image of her that was correctly proportioned, was far ahead of me, and beyond her was a point of brighter light; that was what I seemed to be heading toward. Part of the reason I can't remember the passage very well might be that I was distracted by a numb, empty feeling, like something was missing. I was still trying to analyze that feeling when I caught sight of clearer, sharper images up ahead; moments later I found myself stepping forward, completing the motion I had begun in the clearing in Yosemite. I stepped onto a mosaic-tile floor under a high roof. The empty feeling was gone. Taylor was right in front of me and I had to sidestep to avoid running into her. We were surrounded by women, young and old, nagini, kitsune, human, elf and others -- most of them naked and immersed in pools of water, and the others apparently in the process of getting dressed or undressed. Several were screaming. But all that was background noise, because my attention was immediately and inescapably drawn to a young nagini with blue and green banded scales, coiled up near the edge of one of the pools: Serenikha. Her attention was no less fixed on me. "Leslie!" she called out over the noise of the other women screaming, "I didn't expect you quite so early." I would have asked Taylor why she'd opened the portal directly into the women's baths in the Dragon Emperor's palace, instead of to a secluded place on the outskirts of the capital as she'd planned, but she was uttering frantic incantations and I didn't want to interrupt her. "I didn't expect this either," I said. "I'm sure Taylor can explain, but --" Just then one of the larger human women, who was mostly dressed, grappled me and locked my arms behind my back, twisting me so I faced toward a wall, away from Serenikha and most of the other women. She started frog-marching me toward the door, but Serenikha yelled: "No, leave him alone -- well, you can blindfold him, I suppose, if it makes you feel any better..." "Sorry," I said to my captor, "we really didn't mean to intrude this way." She didn't reply, but held me while a kitsune in a green nightgown approached me and tied a large piece of cloth around my eyes. It wasn't designed as a blindfold, I think, because it covered not only my eyes but almost my whole face. Then Taylor's incantation suddenly ceased, and she spoke up in Draconic: "I apologize for the intrusion, Your Highness, ladies of the court. I am the Tenacious One, a wizard of that other world all of you have heard of and some of you have visited, and this is Leslie Kendricks, the Princess Serenikha's soul-twin. She has been expecting us." "Yes, that's right, everybody calm down," Serenikha said. "Sienpai, let him go!" "He's a man, Your Highness, he's not supposed to be here," my captor, apparently named Sienpai, replied. "Shall I go and turn him over to the guard? Or castrate him myself?" "Take him somewhere else first," one of the other women pleaded. "I can't stand the sight of blood." "There'll be no castrating anybody," Serenikha said firmly. "Let him go. That's an order. -- But Leslie, you'd better keep your blindfold on until I tell you." "Sure thing," I said, and belatedly added "Your Highness." Sienpai let go of my arms and muttered close to my ear, "I'll be watching you close, boy." "Tay-- ah, Tenacious One," Serenikha said, "could you lead your brother over to the bench there and help him sit down? We can talk while I dry off and get dressed, and then I'll take you to the guest rooms I've had prepared. You look tired from your journey. -- And you, Michiko, stop that screaming. One would think you'd never seen a man before." (In retrospect, I think Serenikha had been infected by my own casual attitude toward nudity, from being raised by Mom and Dad. It wasn't something she learned back home in her father's kingdom, still less since she'd moved here.) The last of the screams gave way to intermittent sobs as Taylor took me by the hand and helped me find a seat. Serenikha spoke again in a more normal tone, but between the makeshift blindfold that completely covered my ears, and the background noise, I couldn't hear everything she or Taylor said. I sat quietly and tried to look inoffensive. A couple of minutes later Serenikha said, "Come -- I'll show you to your rooms." Taylor took my hand and I stood up, following her until Serenikha said, "You can take off the blindfold now." I removed it, realizing it was actually one of those sari-camisoles that nagini wear to cover their breasts. We were in a hallway outside the baths, one that seemed familiar from the dreams I'd shared with Serenikha if not from my previous visit to the palace five years ago. Serenikha led the way, and several other ladies of the court walked with us, including Sienpai and a young kitsune. "Tenacious One, you'll be in the women's quarters, down this way, not far from my own chambers. Leslie, I arranged a room for you in the men's guest quarters -- it should be quite far enough from mine, according to what the Gray One said." "Are you not going to punish him in any way for intruding in the women's baths?" Sienpai said. "Or this mage?" "I'm sure it was an honest mistake," Serenikha said, and Taylor added: "I thought I had the portal focused on Kinuko's garden on Chrysanthemum Street. But I guess Leslie's link with you was so strong, there in that high-magic area, that it influenced the spell and made the portal open up right where you were." "See?" Serenikha said. "Nothing to worry about. Besides, Leslie used to be me, I mean he borrowed my body for a while, so you haven't got anything he hasn't had before." "I'm truly sorry to have intruded," I said to Sienpai and the other women. "I'd like to make amends if I may... Taylor, you said that --" She gave me a brief glare, and I remembered she was calling herself the Tenacious One here. I gave her an apologetic look and went on: "-- ah, when you came here in the body of a young mage in the Gray One's homeland last semester, you learned to cast a transformation spell...?" "Yes...? Oh. I see what you're getting at." "Would it satisfy you, Sienpai, if I were to take the form of a nagini for the duration of my visit?" She looked flummoxed. "I... I suppose so." "I can do that," Taylor confirmed. "Just give us a quiet place to work and a quarter of an hour." "I know just the place," Serenikha said. I had more than one reason for asking Taylor to transform me. One, as a man I wouldn't be allowed to hang out with Serenikha as much or go to all the places she normally went; we'd only be allowed to meet in certain places in the palace. Two -- since I'd arrived here, my legs had started to feel weird, like they ought to be a snake-tail. It wasn't nearly as bad as when I'd temporarily wound up in my own body while still having Serenikha's body-image, while the Patient One was meddling with the Gray One's spell, but I feared it might get that bad if I spent much time near Serenikha. And three, of course, I hoped it might mollify Serenikha's friends whom I'd offended. Serenikha showed us to a small room off the next hallway. "Will this be acceptable?" Taylor nodded. "We'll be out again in a few minutes." I followed her in, and she shut the door behind us. "You'd better take your shoes and socks and underwear off," she said, "or they'll get torn up when your legs transform." "I'll just take all this off," I said. "The kimono would hang way down my tail and get in the way." I still had the sari-camisole they'd used as a blindfold. While I was undressing, Taylor took off her own shoes, socks and panties, but left her kimono on for the moment. She had me stand in the center of the room, and she poured out more chalk-dust in a circle around us. Then she started tapping her staff at various points around the circle and uttering incantations. In a pause between incantations, she said: "This is going to feel weird. Don't freak out, okay?" "Okay." When she resumed her incantations, and touched each of my feet in turn with the tip of her staff, my flesh started to melt and flow. It did feel weird, weirder in a way than it had felt to wake up in Serenikha's body five years ago, but it also felt strangely right; that nagging feeling of a split tail went away and I didn't even lose my balance for a moment as my tail merged and extended further behind me. "Don't mess with the chalk circle!" Taylor warned me, and I coiled my tail under me. The changes spread up my torso from there, my hips widening, my waist narrowing, belly-button disappearing, skin darkening, breasts forming... I couldn't see my face changing, but I felt it. "There," Taylor said, "now my turn." I'd guessed what she was going to do from the way she'd taken off her shoes and so forth; she repeated the process with herself, and made herself into another nagini. She still looked almost the same from the waist up, except that her skin and hair were darker. Our scales had the same pattern, alternating coral-pink, yellow and teal. "I thought it would be odd to introduce ourselves as sisters if I were a human and you were a nagini," she explained as she broke the chalk circle with her staff. "It would raise a few eyebrows, maybe," I said, working on winding the sari-camisole around my breasts and over my shoulders. "Just one question before we go face the world in our hot new nagini bodies." "Yes?" "The Tenacious One?" I raised my own eyebrow curiously. "The other magic students gave me that name," she said proudly. "Do you like it?" "It fits well enough. A lot better than 'The Patient One', anyway." We shared a bitter laugh over that; the naga mage's *impatience* was primarily responsible for mine and Serenikha's tangled souls. We picked up our luggage and slithered out into the hall. There was a young kitsune girl there; she bowed to us and said: "I am Michiko. Her Highness asked me to show you to your room, when you were finished..." "Lead on," I said. She led us down a couple of hallways to a large bedroom, with a bed large enough for three or four humans or at least two naga, as well as a couple of low sofas and a lot of cushions along the floor next to a couple of low tables. There was an open archway to another parlor or sitting room beyond. "This is to be your room, O Tenacious One," Michiko said, bowing again. "Leslie Kendricks, since you have graciously agreed to sacrifice your manhood to express your anguish at violating the maidenly modesty of Her Highness' ladies-in-waiting, Her Highness has given orders that another room in the women's quarters is to be prepared for you. However, it will not be ready for an hour or so. In the meanwhile, she begs that you will deign to share your sister's chamber for the moment." Taylor and I glanced at each other. "It's fine with me if you want to share," Taylor said, "now that we're both girls. This is a huge room; I'd feel kind of lost in it..." "I know what you mean," I said, "but I have a feeling you'll be sharing it with several servants a lot of the time." I'd spent several days in a suite this big at the naga embassy during my first ill-fated trip to this world, and I'd had a couple of servants and a chaperon assigned to me in my guise as Serenikha. "Can you let Serenikha -- I mean, Her Highness -- know that we're okay with sharing?" "I shall tell her of your wishes, Leslie Kendricks." She bowed again and withdrew. Taylor rummaged through the wardrobe and cabinets, and found another sari-camisole; she changed out of her kimono into that, or tried to. She got mixed up with it, and I had to help her wind it and tuck it in. "I can't believe I need my little brother to show me how to put on a bra," Taylor muttered, and then, looking at me curiously, "I can't believe you still remember how to put one of these on after five years." "I don't think I'm remembering from my last trip, exactly. It's probably my link with Serenikha, giving me access to her grooming skills the way I can speak her languages." She nodded. "Now that you're close together, I'd like to study your link some more. Professor G., I mean the Gray One, she taught us about you last semester -- she didn't use your names, of course, but I knew who she was talking about. She said there's never been anybody else quite like you, though a bunch of mages have tried forging psychic links between people and had varying degrees of success." "Feel free to look all you want, but don't touch. It works okay how it is, I don't want us to start randomly swapping bodies again or something." ----- We were tired from our long hike, and Taylor was especially tired after casting several spells, so she laid down on the bed to take a nap. Though there was room for me there as well, I sprawled out on the sofa instead and relaxed, but didn't fall asleep. A little while later, a servant tiptoed in and seemed to hesitate, wondering if we were awake. I sat up and looked at her. "My lady," she said, "do you or your sister require any refreshment?" "My sister's asleep," I said. "I'd like some tea, if you don't mind." "I shall bring it at once, my lady. Her Highness bid me to say that when you and your sister are rested, she will receive you in her chambers." "All right," I said, "or if you get me some paper so I can leave my sister a note, I'll slither along and see Serenikha now." She returned with a pot of tea and paper, ink, inkstone, water, brushes, sand -- all the stuff you needed to write before pencils or ballpoint pens were invented. I hadn't had occasion to use them during my brief earlier visit, but I found, on picking up the block of ink and the inkstone and looking at them, that I remembered how to use them -- another skill I'd unconsciously picked up from Serenikha. I wasn't sure if Taylor had given herself knowledge of written Draconic as well as spoken, so I wrote my message both in Draconic and in English, and left it on the little table by the bed, along with the pot of tea. I followed the servant down more long, twisty hallways to a large room brightly lit by skylights. Serenikha uncoiled and slithered toward me as I entered. "Leslie," she said, "you look lovely. But where is the Tenacious One?" "Taking a nap," I said. "I expect she'll be along later, when she's rested from casting all those spells." I didn't ask her how she'd recognized me; it was obvious after a moment's thought. Several of the women I'd seen for a moment in the baths were there with Serenikha, along with a couple of others I recognized: Bhavalikha, an older nagini who had been my chaperon during my previous visit, and Shiyama, the bonsai kodama my Dad had swapped bodies with during that trip. She and Serenikha had become friends while they were visiting my world in mine and my Dad's bodies, and Serenikha had kept me posted about her during our dreams over the years. Sienpai, the tall woman who'd wanted to castrate me, was staring at me now. "Is this the man who intruded on us in the baths?" "Isn't it obvious?" Serenikha said acerbically. I didn't mention that for someone without our link it might not be. Sienpai just smiled and nodded briefly. "This satisfies honor," she said. Serenikha ignored that. "You can only stay for about a day, is that right? I've got everything planned -- you're here earlier than I expected, so we'll have more time to visit as you don't have to travel halfway across the city to get here from your portal. Would you like to see Osalikha?" "Would I!" I'd seen Serenikha's dream-image of her any number of times since she was hatched, but I'd never thought I could see her in person. Standing this close to Serenikha, I could feel the overflow of her maternal feelings toward her baby daughter stronger than ever. "Tiaopai, go to the nursery and see if Osalikha is awake. If so, inform Dhamarikha that I would like to see her." The servant -- one I'd met when she was working at the naga embassy years ago -- nodded and went out. Serenikha gestured me toward one of the empty seats, and we coiled our tails and relaxed. "I'd like to ask you about something," she said. "Yes?" "Just about the time you arrived here, I started having strange feelings in my tail... you recall how it was when the Patient One put us back in our own bodies but did not undo the spell that made us comfortable in the other one's body?" "Do I ever! Yes, I had it too -- just after I got here, I started feeling like my legs ought to be a tail. Not as bad as it was back then, not enough to keep me from walking, but I think it made me a little clumsier, so I had to walk more carefully." "Ah. Yes, it was like that for me too -- until an hour or so ago." "About the time when -- uh, the Tenacious One transformed me?" "I think so, yes. The feeling suddenly went away not long after we left you in that alcove so she could work her magic." I nodded. "And my tail stopped feeling wrong once it was, well, a tail." I didn't ask her if she'd had a sensation of a phantom penis, or mention my momentary sensation of phantom breasts; maybe if we'd been alone, but she hadn't sent away all the other ladies-in-waiting and servants, and anyway the worst part of the dysphoria I'd suffered was in my tail. I mean, my legs. "I remember that feeling," Shiyama said, "or something like it, when the meddling mage pulled me back into my own body for a few intermittent moments... When I first arrived in your father's body, I felt crippled to not have the link to my tree. But I quickly grew used to it, and pleased with my new stature and strength; and then I felt wrong when I returned to my own body out of season, my tree feeling like a hugely diseased limb and my mobile body small and distorted." I nodded. "What about, um, Tisicho and Altimeth?" They were the kitsune and sea-elf that Taylor and Mom had swapped with that time. "Have you heard from them recently?" "I invited them to my wedding," Serenikha said, "and Tisicho came, though Altimeth was at sea at the time. Altimeth paid his respects at the palace when he returned from that voyage, a few months later; but I have not seen them since." I wasn't surprised, since I hadn't heard her talk about them during our dreams. But what Shiyama had said reminded me about them and made me curious. Just then another nagini slithered in, older than Serenikha but younger than Bhavalikha, and holding a squirming naga baby. Her torso was about the size of a human baby at four or five months old, but her tail was as long as my arm; she wore a simple white satin sari-camisole on her chest and a diaper wrapped around the end of her tail. My heart melted at the sight of her. The nurse or nanny brought her over to where we were coiling and held her out; she looked around and reached out for her mommy. Serenikha took her, and she gurgled happily. "O, Mommy's little Sakhi is in a good mood today! This is a very exciting day, little Sakhi. This is your uncle Leslie, whom I have told you all about." Shiyama smiled at that, but I was barely aware of it, my attention focused on the tiny form in Serenikha's arms. She was coiling her tail around her mommy's right arm, and with her right fist she dug into her mommy's sari-camisole and untucked the end, so it came loose on that side. "What," Serenikha said in mock indignation, "are you hungry again already? Did nursie Dhamarikha not have enough for you? Oh, very well, if you must..." She loosened the sari the rest of the way and let Sakhi nurse. I sat close to Serenikha, watching her nurse her baby, vaguely aware of the ladies-in-waiting chatting about something. When Sakhi had had enough milk to satisfy her, Serenikha asked, "Would you like to hold her?" I held out my arms. "Come see Uncle Leslie?" Sakhi looked at me curiously for a few moments, then held out her arms and uncoiled her tail from around Serenikha's arm. I took her gingerly and held her in my arms, her head lying against my right breast; her tail coiled around my left arm. She watched my face intently for a little while, and then grabbed hold of my sari and tugged at it. Serenikha laughed, and so did I; I wasn't sure how much of my amusement was directly from watching Sakhi and how much was spillover from Serenikha, nor did I care. "Sorry, little one, there's no milk in these breasts. You've had two breakfasts today already, isn't that enough for you?" She remained hopeful, however, and kept tugging clumsily at my sari until it came loose. I decided to let her find out for herself that my breasts were empty; I might not able to really nurse her, but I was curious about what it felt like, and I figured this would be the next closest thing. That was how Taylor found us when she came in, escorted by Tiaopai. "This is my sister," I said, remembering that nobody here had seen her since she transformed, "the Tenacious One." "Sakhi, stop being so greedy and say hello to your aunt," Serenikha said. Sakhi gave up in disappointment about then, and looked up at the sound of her mother's voice. Taylor slithered over next to us. "This is your baby girl? Um, Osalikha?" "That's her nagini-name," Serenikha confided. "She also has a passel of dragon and kitsune names given by her father and paternal aunts and godmothers. If you hear Pientao talking about Satien, he means Osalikha." Taylor looked around the room, and then back at Sakhi resting in my arms and looking back at her. She said gravely to Sakhi, "It is good to meet you, little princess." Then, to Serenikha: "Would you introduce me to the other ladies of your court, Highness?" "Oh, yes -- I am remiss today, everything has happened so fast. Everyone, this is Leslie Kendricks, who has the other half of my soul. This is his sister, the Tenacious One, who has transformed herself and her brother into nagini to do honor to my court. Honored visitors, you already know Bhavalikha, who came with me from my homeland when I first arrived at the embassy. This is Lady Sienpai, a cousin of my husband, Prince Pientao. Lady Michiko is a cousin of Lady Hanuseri, whom you know..." She introduced us to all the ladies present, including some who hadn't been in the baths when we arrived. There were some women she didn't introduce, and I inferred they were servants -- it wasn't always obvious, though on average the ladies had fancier clothes and hairdos than the servants. After that we all went out to one of the many gardens around the palace, and ate lunch. After looking alertly around for a while, and babbling earnestly at intervals, Sakhi fell asleep in my arms, and I surrendered her to Dhamarikha to take back to the nursery. "I planned a dinner in your honor for tonight," Serenikha said, "though I wasn't quite sure you'd be here in time. You should return to your room a couple of hours ahead of time to refresh yourselves and dress for dinner; I'll send servants to help you." "Thank you." "Are you sure you don't want me to give you another room?" "No, we'd rather share a room," Taylor said, putting a hand on mine. "It's been five years since I had a sister, and I was a man at the time. So I'm looking forward to some girl talk." "We used to share a room, when we were little," I added. That was when we lived in the apartment on San Salvador Avenue, before Mom and Dad bought the house they lived in now, when I was seven and Taylor was nine. "If you wish to use the baths before dinner, you should probably go now," Serenikha said. "I'll join you... my bath this morning was kind of interrupted." She smiled, as if to show there were no hard feelings about that. "Oh!" Taylor gasped, "I forgot all about the portal... it's still open there in the baths!" "I've had eunuchs posted at the door since everyone cleared out," Serenikha said. "No one should have disturbed it." "I'll work on it, make it dormant so nobody can stumble into it by accident." ----- Since Serenikha wasn't the only one who hadn't gotten as clean as they wanted before our sudden arrival, several others returned to the baths with us. Taylor went in alone, first, to work on the portal and make it safe so nobody could wander into it by accident. She was in there what seemed like a long time, though I hadn't any clock -- I'd left my cellphone in my luggage in our room. Serenikha, Shiyama and I chatted about palace gossip, but after a while I grew distracted and didn't contribute much to the conversation, thinking about how long a time Taylor was taking with the portal. Then she slithered out, wearing what I was sure was a fake smile. "All done," she said. "Come on in, the water's fine." I followed her, seeing that the portal was gone or at least invisible. "You hid it so nobody can stumble into it?" I asked. "Yep!" Again, too forcibly cheerful to be real. I waited until we were undressed and in the bath, and made sure I was closer to Taylor than anybody else. All the other women wanted to be close to Serenikha, it seemed, so it wasn't hard to let some of them get between me and her. "What gives?" I whispered to Taylor, our voices covered, I hoped, by the louder conversation from the other end of the bath. "Something's wrong with the portal," she said, "it's too small." "What?" "When I came in here it had already shrunk down to about eight inches in diameter. And it was still shrinking... I tried to enlarge it, but I only got it up to about two feet wide before it shrank again. I think the magic level on the other side is fluctuating more than I expected -- it might fall so low the portal collapses entirely, or it might increase enough that I can get us home through it..." "Shit." "So I closed it down to a couple of *nanometers*," (that word was in English), "and hopefully that will avoid depleting the local level of magic over there so it has a chance to build up again. But we'll need to leave as soon as I can get it working again." "*If* you can get it working again." I realized I was breathing too fast, and willed myself to calm down. "Don't panic," she said. "We might miss the rest of the semester, but we're not going to be stuck here for the rest of our lives. The worlds are getting closer together and there's one of those magic surges in North America every few months, one somewhere in the world almost every month... if this portal collapses, I can get the Gray One or some of my fellow students to help me open another one somewhere else." "Good... I guess." Shiyama swam over and splashed us. "What is so interesting that it cannot be shared?" she teased. "Oh, nothing much," Taylor said with another fake smile. "I was reminding her how Dad used to give us baths when we were small." "A boy and a girl together?" She sounded interested, not shocked. "It was when we were very small," I said. "I barely remember it." I'd seen photos of us in the bath, me at two and Taylor almost four, but the photo-images had replaced the real memories by now. We scrubbed each other's backs, and chatted about inconsequential things. Gradually other women started getting out of the baths and drying off, and Taylor and I followed. Shiyama showed us where there were wraps and robes we could wear back to our room, and Serenikha said she had assigned servants to lay out our clothes for dinner on the bed. "And they'll help you do your hair and so forth, too -- just ring the bell when you are ready." "We will," Taylor said. "But I shall linger here for a few moments to check on the portal spell. And -- if possible, Your Highness, I would like to speak with you privately before dinner, or perhaps after." "Before dinner, then. I'll come to your room when I've finished dressing." I stayed with Taylor while everyone else put on their wraps or robes and left. She took up her staff and pointed it at a spot in the middle of the air, roughly where the portal had been, and started chanting. A minute later a tiny sphere of darkness appeared and expanded, then a dim greenish light appeared in the center of the sphere. But it got no bigger than a foot across before she withdrew her staff and let it shrink to almost nothing again. "It's not recovered yet," she sighed. "Well, we might as well eat something." ----- The servants were still braiding our hair and plaiting ivory rods into it when Serenikha called. Another servant came in and said, "My ladies, Her Highness the Princess Serenikha is here." "Send her in," I said, and a moment later she slithered in. "You said you wished to speak with me privately, O Tenacious One?" she asked. "Yes," Taylor said. She told Serenikha what she'd told me about the portal; she switched to English, probably so the servants wouldn't understand. "Oh, no! Then you'll be unable to go home?" "For a little while, perhaps -- but I hope the portal will recover enough for us to pass through it by the time dinner is over. And if not, I should be able to open another portal to somewhere in our world within a month or two." "You are welcome to stay at the palace as long as you need to, of course. And if you need anything, any materials for your spells or a large space to work, it is yours for the asking. Or I could ask one of the other mages at court to assist you." "I'll just need access to the women's baths later in the evening and maybe during the night. I hope the portal will be recovered enough to dilate fully within two or three hours, after dinner, but if not I will get up several times during the night to check on it; and we will have to leave quickly when the opportunity arises, without taking time for goodbyes." "I wish you could stay as long as you'd planned," Serenikha said after a moment's thought, "but I hope you will not be forced to stay longer. In any case, you are welcome... Is there anything else?" "I think that's it." The nagini hairdressers kept working on our hair; they were almost done when Serenikha remarked: "I see that you've changed Leslie's scales... are you going to change your own to match?" "What?" I asked, and Taylor looked startled. She twisted her head around to look at my tail, causing Talarikha to pull her hair; I, being perhaps more at home in a nagini body, moved my tail instead so I could look at it without moving my head. Sure enough, there at the end the last few bands were green and blue, like Serenikha's, instead of the coral-pink, yellow and teal pattern that Taylor had given us when she cast the transformation spell. "Hmm," Taylor said, peering close at me, and then, with a glance at Serenikha: "Aha." "What is it?" I asked. "I'm not sure yet... Let's keep an eye on it and see if your scales keep changing." "You know something," I said; "spit it out!" "Well... I think the transformation spell is interacting with your link with Serenikha. It's making you look more like her." "Can you stop it?" Serenikha asked, and I added: "What part of *look don't touch* don't you understand?" "Sorry! I didn't think it would... I mean, even the Gray One doesn't fully understand how your link works, how am I supposed to figure it out with less than a hundredth of his experience?" "For now, you can avoid casting any more spells on me," I said, forgetting that I was the one who'd asked her to transform me. "Is this going to turn me into Serenikha's twin?" "If we wind up staying here until I have a chance to open another portal... probably so. But I can break it and recast it more carefully, so it doesn't get tangled with your link next time. And it would wear off by itself anyway, it's not permanent." "I don't mind having Leslie be my twin," Serenikha said, "but we'll need to tell people about it, and ensure that we dress distinctly so people don't get us mixed up." "And if you break it, Sienpai and her friends will be upset about me being the man who spied on them in their bath," I added. "I guess we can leave it alone... but you'd better talk to the Gray One about it before long." "I'll contact him this evening, if we aren't home by then." ----- Dinner that night was not the huge, elaborate event I'd attended during my previous visit, when Serenikha's uncle Ravadh had made me impersonate her at several public functions (including the first half of her betrothal with Pientao). There were *only* a couple of dozen people present, several of the ladies we'd seen in Serenikha's chamber or in the baths, plus Pientao and a matching number of men, most of whom I vaguely recognized from images in our shared dreams but hadn't met during my previous visit. We were seated alternately man and woman, with Pientao at the head of the table and Serenikha to his right, then a mage who was introduced as the Knowing One between Serenikha and Taylor, one of Pientao's cousins between Taylor and me, and so on around the table. When Serenikha introduced us to Pientao just before dinner, he said: "Leslie? Oh, yes, Serenikha's told me to expect you. I told the guards to let me know when you arrived, though, right after they showed you to your rooms." "We, ah, didn't arrive at the main entrance of the palace," Taylor said, and Serenikha explained how the portal had opened up in the wrong place because of our link interfering with Taylor's spell. She didn't mention the little detail that we'd appeared in the baths while she and most of her ladies were naked, though. "Oh. Well, it's good to meet you again. Somehow I thought you were a human man, though?" He glanced at Serenikha. "I usually am; my sister transformed me so I could visit with Her Highness without any suspicion of impropriety." "Good. I mean, I trust her, but you know what the palace is like: it produces more gossip than imperial edicts." I suspected some of that gossip would sooner or later reach him with some garbled version of our arrival in the middle of Serenikha's bath; hopefully we'd be gone by then. During dinner itself I didn't have much chance to talk to Serenikha or Pientao; I talked some with my neighbors on either side, Pientao's cousin and a naga nobleman whose name I've since forgotten, and some with Michiko and her fianc? Teruyama, across the table. Musicians were playing at the other end of the room, which was nice in a way, but the music kept me from hearing anyone who wasn't right next to me. I tried to be a good conversational partner, answering a lot of questions from the naga nobleman about America and Earth, and finding unexpected support from Teruyama, who said he'd visited our world twice. But I was more than a little distracted, thinking about the portal and whether Taylor would be able to get it open again. The Knowing One wanted to come with us to the baths to see the portal. The guards wouldn't let him in to the women's quarters, though, until he transformed himself into a woman, or maybe put on an illusion of being a woman; I had a suspicion it was the latter, given how fast the change was effected and the way "she" walked. She, or he, followed me and Taylor to the baths, talking shop with Taylor in terms that were mostly over my head, though I'd picked up a few things from listening to the Gray One and Taylor over the years. "I think the problem is that the magic level on the other side of the portal has dropped a lot faster than I expected," Taylor said. "What was it when you opened the portal?" "Fourteen hundred thaums per square meter, and still rising. I needed at least eleven hundred thaums to open a basic minimal portal, but more to get it to open usefully wide and stay open long enough for a decent visit..." By this time my tail was completely banded with blue and green, but I hadn't said anything to Taylor about it; she needed to concentrate on the portal. If we could get home to a lower-magic area, that should break the transformation by itself. Taylor pointed with her staff to the spot in midair where the portal had been, and the Knowing One peered closely at it and nodded. "Let's see you try to dilate it," she said, and Taylor started working, while the Knowing One and I backed up to give her room. She chanted and waved her staff in complex spiraling motions, and the portal began to open again. But it didn't get very far, maybe eight or ten inches, before it narrowed almost to invisibility again. She kept working, a determined expression on her face, and got it to open a couple of feet wider this time, only to have it close down. "I think I see," the Knowing One said. "Shall I give it a try?" "Go ahead," Taylor said. She didn't use a staff, but I think the large pearl she took from around her neck might have served the same purpose; she waved it in the air in patterns similar to the ones Taylor had used, but she chanted something different. (I'd heard Taylor do that portal-chant three times now and though I didn't understand it, I could recognize it by now.) But this time the portal didn't even open two inches before it closed again. "It's still there," she said, "but probably we've used up the ambient magic in the region on the other side, trying to get it open. We'll need to let it build up again... we should try again tomorrow at dawn." "There's plenty of magic here, right?" I asked. "Is there maybe a way to send some of that magic through the portal, to make up for the lack of it over there?" Taylor looked startled, and the Knowing One said, "I don't know. I've heard of these portals but never seen one, and I'm not sure how they work... but it's worth a try. We'll have to wait at least a few hours before we can even open it enough to send power through, though." "Let's meet back here at midnight," Taylor proposed, and the Knowing One agreed. We started back to the dining hall, where most of the other guests at Serenikha and Pientao's dinner were watching the after-dinner puppet show. "Weren't you going to contact the Gray One next, if you couldn't get it open?" I asked. "You could ask him if sending magic through the portal would work." "I will," Taylor said, "after I rest a few minutes." We caught the tail end of the puppet show, and then the party broke up. Some of the women who didn't live in the palace went home with their husbands or brothers; others returned to the women's quarters with us, and we wound up in Serenikha's parlor, all except Taylor who said she was going to our room to contact the Gray One. I'd offered to come with her, but she said she wanted to be alone; I was afraid that meant she'd be bluntly talking with him about bad news she didn't want me to hear, but I tried to put those fears aside and focus on hanging out with my best friend. My resemblance to Serenikha was getting pretty noticeable now; I'd had to loosen and refasten my sari to accommodate my slightly larger breasts, and not long after we settled down onto couches and cushions in Serenikha's parlor, Bhavalikha said: "What did you do to your scales, Leslie?" "It's a spell Taylor worked -- it's making me more like Serenikha." She looked closely at me. "Yes, I can see it in your face now too; you look like her cousin Radhena, but I didn't notice any resemblance earlier." "She does, doesn't she?" Serenikha said. "The Tenacious One said that her spell to turn Leslie into a nagini was doing that because Leslie's soul and mine are coiled together." "It's not doing anything to you, my dear, is it?" Bhavalikha looked apprehensively at Serenikha, who laughed. "Oh, no, and I suppose it won't do Leslie any harm after she goes home. You don't have enough magic to tra