Robin Owens - Enchanted Ever After

“In the Air Realm, yes.” His voice remained cool. Ah, well.

“How big are they? Bitty like Santa’s elves or big and—” sexy, no, she wouldn’t say that “—hunky like Tolkien’s elves in the movies?”

“They are usually taller than regular humans, but more slender,” Lathyr said austerely. Kiri guessed her “hunky” irritated him as much as “sexy” might have.

“Oh. And airsprites?”

“They might be considered your elves—though I believe airsprites appear as described more often in huma—literature and art depicting fairies.”

“Oh, small then?”

“Yes, they are humanoid-looking when they care to be.”

“All right. You’ve already done a lot of work on this game.”

“Yes,” Jenni said in her ear again, in a slightly choked voice, like she was laughing? “Though not so much on the opening.”

Kiri winced again.

“And we will have eight races, and only eight,” Lathyr said.

“Oh, no humans?”

“Not at this time,” Jenni said. “Thirty-second warning, Lathyr and Kiri.”

“Oh.” Scanning the Air Realm, Kiri didn’t see any great detail. She could definitely make a contribution there, if it really was only sketched in.

She turned to the red-yellow Fire Realm. This appeared very detailed, as if it might be the best developed realm—red and sandy rock formations, desert, sand dunes of white and brown. Multicolored hot flames dancing in the air, even forming into sheets of heat waves distorting the rest of the picture. “Wow, Jenni, Fire Realm is great. You must have worked hard on it.”

“Thank you!” Pleasure radiated in Jenni’s voice.

“Fire Realm has djinns—” Lathyr began.

“Djinns like genies?” Kiri asked.

“Yes, djinnmen and djinnfems as the major race,” Lathyr finished.

Kiri imagined herself in a turban, maybe a metallic golden one. Gold lamé with a big ruby. Tacky but wonderful. “What kind of costumes do you have?” she asked. And did djinn manifest from smoke? Did they have lamp domiciles? Did they fly? Or have flying carpets?

“Not nearly as good a range of costumes as our game Fairies and Dragons,” Jenni said with regret.

“Oh.” Kiri cleared her throat. “Yet. Not as good a wardrobe yet. I can help with that.”

“I like your attitude,” Jenni said. “And what I’ve seen of your costumes in our times playing together in Fairies and Dragons, you’ll be a great help.”

Kiri was glad she’d already deleted all hideous fashion mistakes.

“The minor folk are firesprites,” Lathyr continued. “Like airsprites, they are significantly smaller than humans, perhaps as tall as eighteen inches as the maximum. Again, they tend to be less substantial than the major folk, the djinns.”

“Time,” Jenni said. “Logging Kiri Palger and Lathyr Tricurrent out of the opening to the prologue of Transformation.”

Chapter 8

KIRI BECAME AWARE of the mesh chair under her butt. Her nose missed the scent of magic, and tears nearly squeezed from her eyes at being back in the real world. Stupid! She swallowed hard, made sure her eyes were dry before she pulled off her visor. Her monitor had gone into sleep mode. She wanted to jiggle the mouse to see if she might recapture the view from the hill.

“Well, Kiri, what do you think?” Jenni was right there, staring down at her. Kiri pulled off her gloves harder than she’d anticipated because her palms were sticky. Looking up at Jenni, Kiri had to blink a bit because the woman actually looked a little red, like she’d gotten a sunburn.

Kiri rubbed her eyes, her fingers definitely smelled like her own sweat, and said the first thing that came to her mind in response to Jenni’s question. “I’m starving.”

“Hmm.” Jenni’s brows dipped. “Maybe I’d better talk to my kitchen staff.”

Kitchen staff, in an office? Jenni sauntered to the door.

“No, no!” Kiri amended. “Don’t worry about it.”

On her way out, Jenni tossed over her shoulder. “Sounds like the virtual reality might burn some energy.”

Lose weight while game playing. Oh, yeah, a win-win situation. “If that’s true, the marketing possibilities are incredible,” she said to Lathyr. He looked just the same. “Are you hungry?”

His smile was slow and male. His eyes didn’t really linger on her. Not really. “For food? No.” He sat in the last chair, his trousers still with knife creases. Kiri felt a little wrung out, glanced down to see if the slight dampness between her breasts showed. No. Good.

“I am more accustomed to the...ah, game, than you.” He swiveled until he faced her and set his arm along the edge of the desk. The keyboard platform was still tucked under it.

“More accustomed to the game? You don’t strike me as a gamer.”

His smile frosted. “Not often in this alternate reality.”

“Huh.”

His gaze turned considering. “Perhaps I should say that I am more accustomed to a magical atmosphere.”

Like that made sense.

Jenni walked in with a steaming omelet. “Here’s a mushroom, spinach and cheese omelet for you, and an English muffin.”

Kiri stared. “I love mushrooms, spinach and cheese.” She always stocked all three items. Amazing that the kitchen here had something like that.

Jenni’s smile was close to a smirk. She set the plate, a paper napkin and a fork down on the desk beyond Kiri’s monitor. “Eat up. We’ll have to, um, generally keep track of the physical energy drain with regard to the virtual reality of the game.”

Scooting over to the meal, Kiri dug in, but only ate a scrumptious bite before replying. “Like I told Lathyr, losing weight while gaming is one hell of a marketing point.”

“Ah, hmm.” Jenni frowned as she returned to her own seat. Like Lathyr, she faced Kiri and put her arm on the desk. Unlike him, her fingers drummed on the polished wood. “Well, the hardware is very expensive. I’m not sure how widespread we’ll be disseminating the game.”

Kiri stopped midbite. This was her game, her career, her future. “What? It’s not going to be an online massive multiplayer game like Fairies and Dragons?”

Jenni’s brown eyes widened. “Yes, of course, the general software...and available in stores, too, to lead people online to Transformation. But the gloves and visors are currently quite proprietary intellectual property items.”

“Oh.”

“We may allow only some players to buy into the virtual reality aspect of the game,” Lathyr said.

Discrimination. For the rich? Kiri chewed the omelet. The flavor should have stayed the same, but it hadn’t. Bitterness on her own taste buds maybe. “Like who?” she asked.

Again Jenni answered smoothly. “Like those who do extremely well in the general game. This isn’t the only game to have tiers of players, according to who wants to pay and who wants it free,” Jenni pointed out.

“Oh,” Kiri repeated. She drank some raspberry fizzy water—it went unexpectedly well with the eggs. Her taste buds had perked up. “That’s all right then.”

Lathyr snorted.

Jenni chuckled. “I sense a discrimination by skill level, here.”

Kiri nodded. “Choice and skill. You make the choice as to how long and involved you want to be with the game, and develop your skill.”

“Meritocracy,” Lathyr said.

He actually sounded dubious.

“Americans believe in that, even though it isn’t true,” Jenni said, her accent British. And Kiri belatedly remembered that Jenni lived in Denver, but had grown up in England.

Kiri stuffed egg in her mouth, drank and hurriedly finished her meal. “I’m so sorry for this, eating on the job.”

Jenni shrugged. “Not a problem.” She glanced at Lathyr. “We’re easy enough on this project, and have some wiggle room.”