Author's Note: Thank you for MithLuin for beta-reading the story. :)

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Part 1
The Fairy Land

The hovercraft splashed through the gentle waves of the lake with a steady drone. Overhead, water birds circled and cried at each other. Dawn had just broken over the mountain range through the morning fog.

Nine-year-old Raine had woken up early to greet the sunrise on her beloved amphibious vehicle. Given the fact that it was midsummer, it was an accomplishment; and given that also, her parents were still fast asleep in their summer cottage by the lake. Before daybreak, she had stuffed her pack full with drawing and writing equipment, her reed flute and several other things; then she snuck down to the kitchen to pack a breakfast and lunch for herself – plus some snacks, a water canteen, two water bottles, and some bottled juices for reinforcements. She left a note on the kitchen counter, kept in place by a small jar of butter, telling her parents that she would like to go to the little wooded islet on the middle of the lake for some play and brainstorming. She had gone there thrice – twice with her parents and once by herself – anyway, so no one ought to be worried.

  Even though riding her hovercraft in and around the lake was an everyday occurrence these past two weeks, the joy of riding the waves and slipping between them never became old. She still laughed at various little things she found too, from the sudden glint of the newly-rising sun on one side of the waves, the dark and silvery fishes darting away or around or riding the current of the waves, to the bits and pieces of water plants drifting just under the surface, as if waving at her. But a small pang of thirst brought her away from them, and she looked at the monitors on the steering bar as her hand automatically reached under it for the water bottle stashed in a nook there.

  Her hand froze on the cap of the water bottle. Her thirst was forgotten for the moment. Her eyes, wide with shock and disbelief and denial, were fixed on the panel showing the content of her fuel tank. The needle had retreated a bar from the green-coloured F on the right corner of the panel. It had never done so in her previous trips to the islet, the return journey counted. What had happened?  Was something wrong with the hovercraft?  Was it leaking? Not even a trip to the opposite shore would have required such an amount of fuel! The hovercraft had been just fine yesterday evening, and nothing had seemed wrong when she had launched it into the water this morning.  How long had she been out here, by the way?

  Her eyes quickly scanned the cluster of monitors.  Rather than reassurance, her denial was scattered and blown away on the sudden gust of damp and salty wind. The needle magnet in the compass perched above the gauges spun round and round like a mad thing, never ceasing.  What had happened?  Where… where was she?

  She hunched over the steering bar and cried silently, her body shaking with fright of the unknown and childish insecurity. But the hovercraft never ceased its droning, and it ploughed and jerked forward obstinately against the rougher, salty waves. Overhead, the sea gulls wailed as if mourning her tears.

  After awhile, the front wheels of the vehicle struck a semi-solid obstacle, and Raine was jerked awake – literally and figuratively.

  “Where?” she whispered weakly, wild-eyed and trying to look at everything around her at once. The strong waves, almost unnatural in how measured they felt, pushed her farther and farther away from the water. The engine of the hovercraft did the rest of the job.

  It was certainly not the wooded islet she had aimed for. And when she finally came to the realisation of what she saw, just before the hovercraft ploughed through the fine white sand, she was convinced she had been somehow transported to heaven… or fairy land as in the story books her mother had sometimes read to her when she had been much smaller. It was not a comforting notion, although she did not yet know why.

  But everything glowed and was clean – in a sense beyond what the words usually meant – and… alive. The occasional inland breeze was sweet, and the tangy wind from the sea was somehow fresh and freeing. They were in accord with her young and innocent soul, and before long she was lulled into a state of quiescent tranquility. She turned off the engine of the hovercraft when the wheels were stuck on the deep sand, but stayed perched on it with a blissful smile, absorbing the environment with wide – but no longer wild – eyes.

  A wall of jagged cliffs ran opposite the beach, white and creamy and grey and brown. Deep green lines flanked the span of white sand on each end, and Raine was sure they were woods. Clumps of sea grass dotted the beach, making it look more beautiful instead of marring it, and beds of it grew close to the cliffs.

  She frowned with thought on the second inspection of the cliffs. Those were marble, if her sight and memory of her father’s lectures about stones did not betray her. Marble came from limestone, did they not? And limestone was mostly white or creamy…

  She looked down and coiled into herself, balancing on the seat of the hovercraft, fighting back new tears. Could she go back to her own world, to her parents? Or had she somehow died? But she did not remember dying, and she had not remembered going through some sort of portal at all. The changes had been so seamless, too seamless for her to find a crack through which she could return. Those stories – they always returned in the end. They came through a visible border between the two worlds, or died in a world and lived again in the other. They were not like she was, stranded here without hope of returning.

  Her surroundings no longer looked so beatific, but she could not bring herself to scorn all the untainted, indifferent beauty around her. They did no harm to her. They did not mock her. They… welcomed her, somehow.

  With an effort, she pulled herself together and uncoiled herself, returning to her earlier observation. This time, though, she did it not to admire the scenery, but to find an immediate shelter for her to take a rest. Lessons about survival skills from her parents came tumbling into her mind, but nothing fitted the description of this kind of environment. She wished she had paid more attention and asked questions when her mother and father had explained things during their camp-outs. But she felt vulnerable sitting there alone in the open, and she was so tired… She had woken up much earlier than usual for this excursion.

  There was a low, strong-looking overhanging ledge on one of the more prominent cliffs. Short but soft-looking grass thrived in its shadow, seeming like a good bedding to lie upon for a while. Raine drew a brief, shaky smile. She had not sought any adventure. Adventure had found her instead. But she would not call herself a Scottish lass or a Welsh maid if she shirked from it or started bawling like a toddler. She would make her Ata and Mama proud—

  Even when they were not there, and would never know because she could never come back to them?

  She balled her hands into fists and clenched her teeth. No, she would not cry again this time. And she must not pity herself either. Not now, not when she was already tired from all that had been happening to her. She would make a nice shelter, eat her breakfast, and lie down for a short nap. That sounded like a better plan than moping around. After all, there was no one in sight, so she had to work alone, and working alone took time.

  With a combination of strategy, strength and sheer will, she dragged and pulled her hovercraft through the deep sand to the natural sanctuary under the ledge. By the time she got to the spot she had seen from afar, the sun – somehow clearer and brighter but not scorching here – had reached its zenith, and she was coated in sweat and sand from pony-tailed head to rubber-booted feet. She fetched scattered rocks to pile for the walls of her shelter by sheer will only, and when the little cave was formed at last, she could only sit behind her hovercraft – which walled her from the beach and the sea beyond – and weep with exhaustion.

  She had never exercised her body to this level, and her parents had always let her have some respite when she grew too tired in their trekking or mountain climbing. But here she had no one to ask help from, and she was not sure if she would have asked anyway if there were anyone around, given the strangeness of the place. She felt quite wretched now, and the sand glued to her skin and clothing and hair and face by her pouring sweat did not help her mood at all. She went into a tired half-sleep sitting sprawled on the grass, leaning against the smooth cool surface of the cliff under the ledge.

  What would Ata or Mama do in this situation?

  Ata would almost instantaneously attempt to see if their campsite was safe and secure from any rock-related disaster like landslide, and perhaps get to know if there was any rock or soil formation to examine. Mama would fortify their campsite from possible hostile intrusion from the wildlife, and see how near they were from a source of clean water, and check around for venomous or bothersome plantlife and herbs – to eradicate one and collect the other.

  But this was not a forested area or archeological or geological site, was it? And there was clearly no clean water source around as far as she could see or hear.

  Her brittle frustration, having been fended off by the merest hint of rest, returned like a slamming wave. At length, unable to return to her not-quite-so-restful half-sleep, she huff-sighed and crawled to the hovercraft, searching for her breakfast package among the tarp-covered pile of things tied to the back half of the seat and the end of the vehicle. At least, she thought, she had to eat and drink some in order to prepare herself for anything ahead. She had already felt faint from a vigorous half day without food and water and sufficient rest. And maybe the orange juice could clear her mind a bit? It usually worked…

  She washed her hands just outside the overhang with a bit of water from the bottle under the steering bar, then went into preparing a big bacon-cheese-tomato sandwich to sate her appetite. She catalogued all the food, beverage, kindling and fuel she had in her mind while nibbling at the sandwich, then began to rearrange her pile of belongings and retie them to the hovercraft as soon as she finished it and washed it with some gulps from her orange-juice bottle. Mama would have worried off her ears with her fretful haranguing if she were being careless with the few things she had for surviving in this place. Well, plus, it must do her good in the long run, right? If not, Mama and Ata would not have drilled all those steps and principles into her mind whenever an occasion showed itself – and sometimes even in the absence of it.

  Handling those plastics and tins, though, felt weird to her; it happened also when she had to check the heater and cooler boxes attached to the storage battery set in the hovercraft. They did not feel… right. They did not belong here. It was like when she and her family had to use them in the wilderness, but this time the feeling was stronger. It made her rather uncomfortable, and she felt misplaced. Well, more misplaced than she had been so far, as if she was the only hare in the vicinity, and an eagle had spotted her. It was a very unnerving and discomfiting state to be in, as she was finding out now. There was no way she would forsake them, though – sadly. They were her only hope to survive in the present, as ironic as it might sound. Plus, there was no hostile response yet from anything in the beach or beyond it.

  No, no. She did not want to jinx herself.

  And they were her only tie to her own world.

  Angry with herself for bringing her lonesomeness to the fore of her mind and confused with the tangles of her own emotions and thoughts, she clenched her fingers into tight fists and snarled at the rough underside of the ledge above her. Usually she had worked herself into a fine rage by now, but her energy was too depleted for that.

  Perhaps… just perhaps… sleep would make it all go away? But what would she dream in this strange place, this strange world? Would she dream of angels, given how heavenlike it all looked and felt? Or would she have nightmare after nightmare, because she would never—

  No, no. Not that again! Just sleep… Just sleep…

  With her lips still set in a snarl, she went to fetch the picnic blanket, intending to use it as bedding. She wanted to get the earlier peaceful oblivion back, now that she had lost it. How silly it was.

  But Mama said something about only appreciating something when it was lost…

  She stamped her foot on the ground, regretting it afterward. “Sorry,” she murmured to the flattened grass, gloomy and chagrined. “Shouldn’t have taken it on you, eh?” Mama had taught her better than this. Everything had its own spirit, however lifeless it looked. A thanksgiving prayer to nature had been the first thing Raine learnt from her mother, even before she learned to talk properly or walk, and she had never forgotten it before.

  With a sigh half choked by a sob, she dragged the plaid cloth to the spot where the grass grew the thickest, then spread it over the place, her hands trembling slightly with the effort of forcing the memories back. She went to the edge of the makeshift little cave and tried her best to remove the offending filth from her skin and clothing, but soon considered it a lost battle and returned to her picnic blanket.

  The sun was still high in the sky, and the afternoon air was still warm and humid, promising a light storm in the least. Trying to sleep in such an atmosphere would not be a desirable prospect for most people, but Raine fell asleep just some moments after she had found a comfortable position to lie on her scanty bedroll – curled sideways, with her arms pillowing her head. Her rubber boots and pouch belt lay nearby, and she had a dagger slipped just under the edge of the blanket close to her head. It was usually only used for cutting and shaping wood, but good enough for defense, and she felt safer sleeping in this foreign and unknown environment knowing that she had a weapon handy.