5: Kaori Shimomura
Phantasia’s next day at school wasn’t as eventful as the first. Her lessons passed by in much the same manner: Maths was new and difficult to her, but she thrived in Culture and Nature Studies, as she had in History. During her breaks, Joel and Kaori gave her directions on when to meet them that evening, marking the point on a map of the town she kept crumbled up in her back pocket. When she had time, she would get it out and stare at the roads and markings, and her eyes would always be drawn back to the old industrial zone to the west, where she would be meeting her friends later. It took all her willpower to stop herself going there straight after school.
Once she was home at the church, she distracted herself with some books, and then began preparations for a magick ritual to speak with Queen Thetis. Sitting cross-legged in a circle she had drawn with a piece of old stone, she focused on sending her thoughts to the Innerworld.
“It is good that you are making connections so quickly,” said the Queen, her thoughts reaching Phantasia via an ethereal projection of her totem, a majestic whale.
“Everything is so loud,” said Phantasia, thinking of all the things her senses were picking up on, “How did you manage in this world?”
She felt the warmth of the Queen reaching out to her. “For me, and all my water kindred, all there was to see were the thoughts of people. But you are overwhelmed. You must learn to focus on what is before you,”
That evening, after musing over the confusing array of figures that constituted her Maths homework, and breezing through the answers on a test about water pollution, Phantasia began to prepare for the night ahead. Joel and Kaori had called this ‘clubbing’ and it sounded like something she’d experienced in the Wind Queendom. There wasn’t a time in those lands where the music of nature or laughter of faeries couldn’t be heard.
As twilight fell upon the old church, Phantasia stowed away her possessions in the remains of a wooden cabinet she had salvaged and began walking towards the meeting point. It was on the opposite side of town to the school, and after passing through a familiar road of renovated houses, she turned into a street where windows were smashed and walls crumbled under the slightest touch. The darkening sky covered the long-dead ruins in night, though Phantasia could still see several rough figures who scavenged for whatever scraps they could find. Small animals skittered about the dusty roads, and shadows watched from the cracks of collapsed windows. Only in a few small places did pure life bloom, and such small amounts gave little comfort to the faerie. The gloom reminded her of the Underworld, and she shivered.
She found Joel and Kaori waiting for her in a circle of light, cast down by a single swinging street lamp above. Alongside them stood Doyle, Lyra and Byron, all five of them wrapped in big, thick coats. When they saw Phantasia, dressed in a pale cotton dress she thought would be appropriate for the occasion, they stared.
