Page 38 of Skalterra By Nightmare
“Maybe.” Ferrin shrugged, then looked away from the window to smile at me. “Help us get Fana to safety, and perhaps we can bring you back to campaign for Nightmares’ rights across the Seven Provinces.”
“Seven Provinces?” I repeated. Ferrin settled back on his bench with a coy smile and dragged his finger in a circle on the table between us. A thin stream of green flame danced in his finger’s wake until he’d drawn out the rough outline of a continent.
“There’s Skalterra.” He drew criss-crossing lines through his picture. “You’ve got the New Kingdom, where we currently are, the Grand Barony, which is where we’ll be by morning, then the Breachriver Prefecture, the Wisting Wilds, the Royal Shogunate, the Skalterran Highlands, and finally, the Frozen God Saergrim’s domain in the north.”
I studied the map as it flickered and burned in front of me.
“And where is the Second Sentinel?” I asked.
Ferrin drew a zig-zagging mountain range across the north end of the continent.
“In the Skalterran Highlands, hiding in the highest peak.”
“Mountains?” I leaned over the drawing now, holding my blue hair away from the flames. “What kind?”
Ferrin laughed.
“The tall kind?”
“I mean are they volcanic?” I couldn’t help it. I wondered if the magma and lava here would be as magical as the water my new comrades kept in flasks at their hips.
“The First and Third Sentinel have been known to kick ash into the sky, but not within my lifetime. Why do you ask?”
“Geology is cool.” I shrugged.
Ferrin made room for Orla on his bench. She slid in next to him with a platter of flakey pastries, each decorated in white drizzle and peach slices. Ferrin’s map of green dissipated, leaving behind an untarnished tabletop.
“So!” Orla beamed at me. “Steamcarts! Amazing, right?”
I laughed and felt my cheeks warm.
“They are, but I meant to tell you, we have these in Keldori.”
Orla’s face fell.
“Why didn’t you say so last night?”
“I tried to,” I admitted. “We don’t call them steamcarts. In Keldori, we say ‘trains’.”
I frowned as a new question clouded my thoughts. I looked to Ferrin.
“Yes?” He smiled as if he knew the question I was about to ask.
“If I’m from a different reality, why do we speak the same language? Even if some of our names for things, like steamcarts, are different?”
“A very astute observation, Just-Wren.”
“It’s—”
“Wren. Just Wren. We know.” His smile quirked. “I’m afraid Just-Wren has stuck. But your question, it’s a good one. Do you have any theories?”
I felt like I was back in class, being asked to find the answer before being handed it. It was a familiar feeling, and I suddenly wanted very much to impress Ferrin. As much as Galahad seemed to enjoy pretending his age made him the group leader, and even if Tiernan claimed his guard-status over Fana meant he outranked everyone, I could tell Ferrin held an authority that neither Galahad nor Tiernan could compete with.
“We were all one world at one point,” I said slowly. “Our language bases would still be the same, but that doesn’t explain how easily we communicate after centuries apart.”
Something clicked in my brain.
“And?” Ferrin prompted, folding his hands together neatly in front of him.
