Sharon Shinn - Gateway

She smiled as she took it from his hands. “I’ll probably be all tangled up in it by morning. Thank you, though.”

He lingered in the doorway as if he wanted to say something else. She raised her eyebrows in inquiry. “I just-I don’t want you to be afraid, ”he said. “Here in such a strange place. Is there something I can do to make you feel better?”

Bring me that talisman that will send me straight home, she thought. “I don’t think so.”

He pointed toward the main room. “I’ll be sleeping right out there. If you wake up in the middle of the night and you need something-or you hear a sound that frightens you-come get me. Or just call my name. I’ll hear you. I’ll be there in a second.”

His sweet earnestness made her smile again. “I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Good night.”

Twenty minutes later, she was clean, wrapped in the oversized shirt, and stretched out on a thick mattress on the floor of a tiny room. The mat was surprisingly comfortable, especially since it was augmented with piles of pillows. The window was open, and some of the scents coming through were familiar and reassuring, while others were utterly strange.

Daiyu snuggled her head on one of the pillows and thought, I will wake up in the morning and I will be in my own bed. And I will call my father and say, “Daddy, I have just had the strangest dream.” Everything will be fine in the morning. I’ll be home.

THE SMELL OF cooking tickled her nose, and Daiyu turned over in bed, trying to figure out what her father was making for breakfast. Something flavorful, maybe sausages. She was starving.

She opened her eyes and immediately lost her appetite.

She was on the low mattress in the small room in the white stone building where she had arrived the previous night. If she was still dreaming, it was the longest and most detailed dream she had ever had.

Clothes had been laid out for her across a stool-a red top and wide-legged black pants, as well as a pair of black cloth ballet flats that didn’t look all that different from her Skechers. She scooped them up and scooted into the bathroom before anyone could see her. Once she had dressed and combed out her hair, she felt a little more prepared to face the day. There didn’t seem to be a proper mirror in this place, but a shiny chrome square hanging on the bathroom wall gave her a wavering reflection. Her chin-length black hair seemed lustrous as always, her dark eyes thoughtful and measuring. Her face was deceptively serene, belying her inner disquiet.

She took a deep breath. If she could make her interior match her exterior, she might yet sail through this adventure without a total meltdown.

She stepped out into the main room of the house. “What’s for breakfast?” she asked.

Kalen was the only other person home, and he turned from the kitchen to give her a hopeful smile. “How did you sleep? How are you feeling?”

“I slept wonderfully and I feel pretty good,” Daiyu said, settling at the table. “But I’m still… well, it’s all pretty weird, youknow.”

“I know,” he said. “Or, at least, I guess. It must be even stranger for you than it was for me.” He brought over a casserole pan holding what looked like potatoes and eggs and crumbled bits of meat. “Are you hungry?”

“Starving,” she said. “Do I eat with my fingers or what?”

He laughed and fetched flat wooden boards that served as plates and large spoons that appeared to be the only eating utensils. Juice completed the meal-definitely not orange juice, but something pulpy and sweet, and Daiyu gulped it down-and for a few moments they ate in companionable silence.

Then Daiyu remembered what he’d just said. “What do you mean about things being strange for you, too?” she asked. “Aren’t you one of them? A servant to the gods and all that?”

He laughed. “Me? Hardly. I’m just a cangbai workingman.”

She gestured around the room. “So this is your world? Jia?” When he nodded, she said, “How did you meet up with Ombri and his friend?”

“Ombri and I were both stonepickers on the river, and we talked now and then while we were working. One day he said he and his wife wanted to buy a house, but they’d have to rent out a room to be able to afford it. Did I want to be a boarder? I was living in a tent at the time, and winter was coming, so I didn’t even think about it. I just said yes.”

Daiyu filed away the question about what a stonepicker was. “How did you know they wouldn’t steal your stuff?”

He shrugged. “I don’t have any stuff. I wasn’t risking much.”

Daiyu propped her chin on her hand and looked him over. She had originally thought he just had a slim build, but now that she paid more attention, she could see that his was the slenderness of lifelong hunger. His face was bony, his wrists thin; his eyes were kind because they had looked upon a lot of misery and empathized with pain.

“What’s your story? ”she said presently. “Where’s your fam- ily?”

He shrugged again. “My father was never around. My mother died when I was little,” he said. “I’ve been on my own most of my life.” He grinned. “Meeting Ombri and Aurora is about the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“Well, it’s certainly been exciting for me so far too,” Daiyu said dryly. She hesitated and then said, “I have to admit, even after this morning, when I woke up and I was still here, I’m having a hard time believing that anything Ombri said was true.”

“This is where I’ve lived my whole life, so I can’t really judge,” Kalen said. “But you seem to think you’re somewhere that you didn’t expect to be. So you tell me. Is this a different world?”

“Going by what I saw last night, yes,” she said. “But I just don’t know how that could be possible. ”She gave him a straight look. “What did they tell you to make you believe that they were from another universe?”

“To tell you the truth,” he said, “at first I didn’t believe them. But I didn’t care. They were generous and they were thoughtful and they made sure I had enough to eat. If they wanted to pretend they were sent here by the gods, it didn’t matter to me.”

“What changed your mind?”

He tapped his flat wooden plate with the bowl of his spoon. “Little things. Ombri can see in the dark. Aurora knows when the weather is going to change. And-like he told you last night-they’re both able to read people as if they can see the thoughts in their heads. It’s like nothing in this world is mysterious to them. I find that pretty convincing.”

“So what did they tell you about why they came here?”

“Pretty much what Ombri told you last night. That they wanted to find a way to send Chenglei back to his own iteration.”

She toyed with her spoon. “And did that make you-curious? Uneasy? Did you wonder why they should have the right to decide who gets to live here and who has to go home?”

Kalen just looked at her, his expressions tartled. “Not really,” he said at last. “I’ve come to trust them, so I believe they have good reasons for what they want to do.”

Daiyu nodded and let it drop, though her own uneasiness remained. She glanced around. “So where is Ombri now? And Aurora?”

“I don’t know, but I think they’ll both be back by dinner tonight.” He gave her a tentative smile. “So what would you like to do today? If you’re feeling rested enough to leave the house-”

Rested and deeply curious.“Iam,”she said.“Why don’t you show me your world?”

By daylight, Kalen’s neighborhood didn’t look any more impressive than it had by twilight. Daiyu followed him to a rundownintersection, where they hailed another of those clattering trolleys. This one held riders who were mostly whites and blacks- cangbai and heiren -and was even more crowded thant he one the night before. When the trolley made a ninety- degree turn, Daiyu realized that they were on a broad avenue that was parallel to the river. If this had been the Mississippi, they would be heading north away from Soulard, a district that had been built a century ago to house the working poor…