I.

She was afraid now. She was weighed down by the presence of all the
things she couldn't see. But she knew if she ran and turned back, she'd
only get further lost in Faerie. All she could do was move forward,
follow the path, wherever it led her.

At least, she told herself, I'm safer from the Chaos Flows here, in an
already chaotic environment, and I'm safe from ARCHONET.

She walked on. Sometimes she saw a rabbit running by and she felt a
sharp shiver. She remembered the prophecy of the creepy librarian, but
then again, it probably didn't mean real hares but something
infuriatingly symbolic.

II.

Jenny heard the creaking of wind in the branches, a sound in the
distance that was almost like moaning. As she grew closer to it, she
thought she heard a voice, groaning:

"Jenny, Jenny..."

She followed the voice, turning on the flashlight that had somehow ended
up in her hand. It was night now. (A few minutes ago, it had been
noonday.) The stars shone bright in the moonless sky.

Up ahead of her was a huge, barren, gnarled tree in the center of a
clearing. On the side of the twisted trunk was something almost like a
human figure, its face frozen in a cry of pain.

"Jenny," she heard the distant voice, "turn back, now..."

It was Glendalf.

III.

"I helped the orcs escape," said Glendalf, "they went through a portal, somewhere safe, but the Queen got to me. You have to turn back before she--"

But the moment Jenny turned around, she saw her. A tall, lovely, awful
figure, lit by a small floating green light behind her, a light softer
than the harsh light of Typhaon but no less unnerving and alien. It
showed her auburn hair, her green dress of velvet which matched her lips
and nails, her golden crown, her eyes of deep gemlike green, magnificent eyeshadow of green and flamelike gold.

"Ill met by witchlight, proud Jenny Everywhere," said the Queen of Faerie.

"Oh, hi," said Jenny. "It's been a while."

IV.

"Leave now," said the Queen of Faerie, "If you know what's good for you.
That man is a trespasser in my land. I cannot allow anyone to transgress
my laws unpunished, even you." The laws of Faerie, of course, were
always changing and unpredictable.

"Yeah, I'll leave," said Jenny, "and I'm taking Glendalf with me." She
stood strong and firm.

The Queen of Faerie met her in the eye. "I loved you once, Jenny. But no
one may defy my will and live."


"If you know me, Queenie, you know that I never leave my friends
behind." That felt good, saying that. It felt like something Jenny
Everywhere would say.

"Then I shall call the Wild Hunt."

V.

Jenny pressed a button on her flashlight and it hummed and vibrated in
her hand. The beam of light extended and hardened into a glowing blade.
It was godtech, gifted to her by the Abstract of Illumination. She
plunged the blade into the tree and the tree, Glendalf, and the Queen of
Faerie all screamed as one.

Jenny was having a hard time concentrating, with the god-machine buzzing
in her hand. She felt herself slipping out of the bounds of her life,
touching other lives that once were: fighting a ray-gun duel with the
Emperor of Mars, a mecha dogfight in the skies above Utopia Planitia,
taking on a super-alien blazing with power in the Cross-Dimensional
Martial Arts Tournament. But she had to stay in this one, to stay with Glendalf. She looked him in the eyes, closed in by a tree bark, and
pressed in the light-knife.

The tree twisted itself, branches twining together, the bark parted from Glendalf and he fell out of the tree, covered in muck like a newborn child.

"Oh dear," he said, "my dress is ruined." He smiled and chucked weakly
to himself.

VI.

They were somewhere else now, though Jenny knew from the scent of the
air and the tint of the light that they were still in Faerie. It was a
city, a crumbling concrete ruin overgrown by vines. Faerie could be a
city; it could be any space which was marked by wonder and danger,
though there was always something of the Green in it.

"Whew," said Jenny, wiping her brow. "Looks like we made it. Got away
from the Queen, anyway."

Glendalf coughed and rose unsteadily to his feet, holding himself up on
his staff. "I wouldn't celebrate just yet, my dear," he said.

There was a roaring in the distance, and a cloud of smoke. It was a
sound like that of a huge animal, but it was engines. A pack of
motorcycles were headed their way.

"No one escapes the Wild Hunt," said Glendalf.

VII.

The riders closing in on them were burning skeletons in post-apocalyptic leather bondage gear. Their hollow eyes were set on Glendalf.

"Jenny, be careful. I don't have enough power yet to--" said Glendalf.

"Relax," said Jenny. "I can handle them." She cracked her knuckles.

Taking on a gang of flaming skeleton bikers was, somehow, one of the
least stressful things she'd been through lately. She stowed the
light-knife in her pack and took out her telescoped staff, pressing her
button on the side and extending it. She whirled it over her head and
launched into battle with the Wild Huntsmen, knocking one of them off
its mount and tripping up the motorcycle to the other one, sending the
burning pieces of it scattered over the ground.

But another rider slammed into her side. Jenny vaulted away just in time
with her staff, and landed on her feet, but it had hurt. She heard
laughter that crackled like fire. These things were fast and they were
strong. It would take something special to defeat them.

VIII.

These were creatures of deep magic and could not be destroyed by merely
human power. There were worlds where she knew magic, but she couldn't
reach that knowledge now. Not all her knowledge was equally available to
her at all times, especially in the state of chaos and collapse the
hypercosmos was in now.

But Jenny remembered, in a place like this, facing enemies like this,
learning a style of martial arts which let her attack her enemies by
striking their pressure points and using their own energy against them.
These creatures were undead, so it wouldn't work in quite the same way,
but the principle was the same. If she could destroy them with their own infernal power...

As the Rider closed in on her, she struck out at it with a barrage of
punches.

"Ha!" said the Rider in its dry, crackling voice. "That didn't even hurt."

Jenny smirked. "You are already dead."

"Duh, I knew that. I'm a skeleton!"

It revved its engines and charged in on her. And then the skeleton
exploded, scattering burning pieces over the ruins.

IX.

The other Riders shrieked and chittered and drove off into the night.

"We're not safe yet," warned Glendalf. "When the Wild Hunt has been
called, they will follow their quarry to the ends of the hypercosmos if
need be. They will pursue them as long as it takes. We must find another
way to banish the Riders."

"Yeah," said Jenny. "First of all, we should get the heck out of Faerie."

"But where do we go?" said Glendalf.

The ruined city seemed to stretch on forever. The grey buildings all
seemed the same. There was no life here other than the vines.

Then, Jenny saw a sign hanging in front of one of the long-decayed
buildings. An old-timey pub sign, in its gothic blackletter font, it read:

THE RED LION

[CONTINUED...]

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