Closed Creature from Beyond (Clyde)

[Sayana]

Winter 32, 516 AV - Testing Grounds, Prairies

The hot dry air whipping at her face, the vast yet barren prairies extending out almost as far as the eye could see, and Syna hanging high above it all. Her heart pounded with a rhythm to match the thundering hooves and despite the wasteland, the powerful feeling of freedom radiated from her and into the white horse that carried her recklessly across the land.

Freedom, strength, unity and loyalty. All emotions that she pressed upon her mount with subtle djed use, and all feelings that bound them tighter together. At last Sayana leaned back in her saddle and pulled softly at the reins to slow down their reckless ride. The hot rays were like luxury on her skin. She had been expecting a colder winter but even though there was the occasional cool morning, neither snow nor ice graced the ground of this island.

As Stardust trotted along the edges of the prairie seeking out small shrubs to munch on, Sayana allowed her mount to roam. She carried with her a waterskin and some simple rations, along with a rope and halter should she need it. Plus extra daggers in the saddle bags. Clyde had mentioned he wanted to do some sort of magical experimentation. Of course, that’s what the prairies were meant for. A big open space where blasts of magic wouldn’t devastate the land. Sayana had offered it as a possibility. After attempting to describe a landmark, she had simply given up and promised she’d find the mage at noon. By the looks of Syna, that time had nearly come.

She found a streambed that was mostly dried out, but there was just enough water for Stardust to get a drink in. “Let’s go track down a mage.” She spoke gleefully to her horse, then dug her knees in to set off at a quick canter. Compared to the first few days on the island which had seen the land as a muddy grassland with some actual vegetation due to all the rain, it was now dry and coarse. Egging her horse on, she came to a completely dried out streambed and Stardust leapt the short distance to the other side.

Sayana kept her eyes on the horizon, scanning this way and that as she made a large zigzag pattern across the land. So long as he actually decided to come, eventually she would come across… Aha! At first she hadn’t been sure, but as she neared, the black speck was more than just a trick of the eye. It was definitely a figure. Maybe even one that held a large stick. She grinned inwardly to herself and guided her horse towards the figure.

“I told you I’d be able to find you Clyde.” Sayana spoke smugly as she dismounted. “So what’s the experiment you wanted to try, or whatever you called it? Or are you going to keep me in suspense and leave it as a surprise?” She smiled brightly before reaching for her waterskin to take a long swig.

[Clyde Sullins]

32 Winter 516

Clyde had been away from Sahova for quite some time. After living in a place with water, reasonable amounts of food, and in a state of being... Livable. Going from that back to Sahova was always a bit difficult.

However it did have its perks. For one, magic was everywhere, with far more opportunities to learn and develop his skills than in other places. He doubted he could stick around long term without an occasional foray to somewhere more bearable, but it did give him many chances to do things he couldn't elsewhere.

As he walked across the semi-barren wastes of the island, this one a particularly sandy and bone riddled waste, he recalled the first time he'd come to Sahova. The first time he'd explored, learned, fought, and roamed its barren lands.

As always Cha was in his hand, his pack lighter than usual as it only contained his common glyphing supplies, his dagger, waterskin, and his book on Summoning.

The nature of the island was ever odder for the fact that it was winter, normally a bleak and cold season on Sahova.

It had rained recently, and so there was a small amount of water in the desolate landscape, a few half dry creeks an abundance of water compared to its normal state. From experience he knew it'd soon be gone, the ground hungrily devouring the available water till little or none was left on the surface.

Looking about, Clyde headed away from the Citadel more or less in a straight line, going deeper into the prairie. He'd left Rye behind today, as he knew it was no place for a dog, particularly in the middle of the day.

As he passed what appeared to be the remains of a mouse, stripped down to the bone of all meat, the bones themselves snapped in half perhaps to gain access to the marrow within, he wondered why any beast would come out here. Clearly some did, not all but some, but compared to some parts of the island this part was unusually unwelcoming. Of course, none of the island was pleasant, but some at least were less harsh to the living.

He heard her before he saw her, approaching on horseback at a steady pace.

Turning to see the source of the noise, Clyde watched as Sayana came upon him, tracing the last dozen feet or so with his eyes before she came to a stop.

As the hypnotist hopped off her horse and took a drink, Clyde turned about, staring off into the distance where the Citadel was vaguely visible.

“Experiment? Who said experiment? Experiment implies I don't know what'll happen, or I've never done it before. I have. I just wouldn't mind some help in the... Endeavor. Can't be too safe.”

A small smile coming across his lips for a moment at the word endeavor, Clyde turned back and stared at Sayana, meeting her eyes.

Once his smile faded he turned back, choosing a nice open patch of flat sandy ground. After making the choice in his head Clyde began to use his staff to draw a large circle in the sand, dragging the staff along to make the line of the circle. Once he was done it would be of a size that a person could lay down in it, perhaps with their toes touching one side and their head on the opposite.

“Besides, I don't like being interupted, and the last thing I need is some mage spawned thing wandering by and breaking my concentration while I have to deal with it. And I know how much you like seeing new things.”

His mind falling back a few seasons, Clyde recalled when he'd first shown Sayana voiding, and her reaction. This time when he turned to meet her eyes, the smile that came to his lips was much more natural.

[Sayana]

“Experiment, endeavor. This is the Testing Grounds, Clyde. You’re not the first wizard to have experimented here.” The Eypharian answered, but didn’t press further upon his choice of wording. She assumed that if nothing else, he referred to the endeavors mentioned in her Grand Oath. But he didn’t really need to call upon that today. She was curious to see what he had in store.

As she dismounted from the white mare, Sayana watched the mage start tracing a line in the sand. Now and then she still marvelled at the brilliant blue wood of his staff, and she paused for a few ticks to watch, before she started looking around for a place to tie up Stardust. Right. She was in the Prairies. Almost as dry as southern Cyphrus with hardly anything sturdy in terms of vegetation.

The Eypharian glanced back at the mage’s work in the sand and saw that he had traced out a full circle. With a smile, she used it as a point of concentration, relaxing her mind to external thoughts and focusing inwards. Pulling at her djed gently, she turned her gaze to her horse and spoke soft words infused with hypnotism. “Stay close to me, Stardust. I will keep you safe. Stay out of the circle on the ground.”

She repeated the words again. The simple suggestion flowing easily off her tongue. Her horse was also well versed in obeying commands issued in this manner, as hardly a day passed without some sort of hypnotic conditioning.

Sayana perked up at the sound of Clyde’s voice. A smile flitted across her face as she considered one of the strange creatures or creations of the island disturbing them. There had been times when she had been so certain that she had been alone, only to find a creature springing out from the meager vegetation to startle her into action. Clyde seemed to be smiling almost smugly at his last comment but she couldn’t quite tell why.

The skittish Eypharian during their trip to Alvadas had changed dramatically since then, and she was now being exposed to new magical phenomenon almost every day on this island. Of course, being a warden initiate had something to do with that. With that thought, she was reminded of the pangs of hunger from her fast. Soon it would be over and soon she would be able to prove herself.

“So other than keeping you safe from the… local wildlife,” Sayana began with a momentary smile. “Is there anything else that I can do? And is that a glyph you’re making?” She asked pointing to the sand. “Are you going to do something involving Reimancy? Or voiding?”

There was a definite eagerness to her voice at the idea of some fantastic display of the elements, and a much less enthused tone regarding the voiding. But either way, she hoped to get a sense of what might be coming.

[Clyde Sullins]

As Clyde spoke he continued his work, listening and talking in turn as he made his summoning circle. He wasn't overly skilled at summoning, and so far had not managed anything more than a simple minimal circle. He had done a bit of research, and even knew about some higher level ones, but he didn't doubt that he'd fail if he tried such a circle at his current skill.

Still, he didn't expect to control what he would summon, not if past experience was anything to go by.

“Words have meaning, meaning we give them. I say as I mean, and mean as I say, and mean the difference here from one word to the other.”

In truth he hadn't been thinking of the endeavors mentioned in the hypnotists oath, but simply felt a stronger connection in the moment to the one word over the other.

Picking a spot, Clyde began to draw a small circle with one edge touching the circle he had first drawn. Once he had it completed he'd do an additional three evenly spaced, so he'd have four "compass point" circles within. Next he'd add four more circles, each halfway between two of the original circles, all with an edge touching the main outer circle.

“And I know I'm not the first here. Petch, its not even the first time I've practiced here.”

After that he'd add another 8 circles, up to a total of 16, with a new circle placed between each of the other pairs.

As he worked he felt the prick upon his aura, the touch of djed on the air which hadn't been there so noticeably before. By instinct he reached out, willing a tendril of his attention out of Cha, splitting and latching them on to the horse and Sayana. He let a portion of his mind focus on slowly rubbing onto the peripheries of their auras, but didn't doubt it was simply Sayana using some magic.

“And I'm assuming that was you, but could you warn me next time before you use magic while I am working magic? Your lucky I'm not doing anything yet directly magical. Did you ever consider that using magic while another does so might have repercussions? If I had been actively using one magic I know, and you'd done what you'd just done as you did, it could have ruined the entire thing. Or blown us both up... Be glad I'm not doing said magic. Either way, don't go making your own stew without asking the head chef first!”

Not pausing in his work, the main extent of his focus was on drawing his summoning circle. Both Auristics and arguing were things Clyde was quite skilled at, and doing them both didn't take up too much concentration for the mage. At least, not while he was doing the more straightforward aspect of summoning, making the circle in such a simple manner.

Once the main outer circle was done, and the 16 inner circles touching along its inner edges, Clyde began another circle. This one was a line cutting through the middle of each of the 16 inner circles he'd drawn, bisecting each in a single curving line and in so doing making another circle.

“No, this isn't a glyph. Not everything drawn is a glyph. A circle is simply a common image used in world magics. I'm not using Reimancy or Voiding. I'm doing something you've not seen before. I'm making a window, if you must know.”

With that Clyde proceeded on in his work, not bothering to clarify what he meant. After all, she'd be seeing soon enough, and he didn't doubt she'd soon ask what he meant and question him on it.

The last bit of his work was one final circle, this one smack in the middle of all of the other ones. Cutting it into quarters he drew a pair of lines through it. Each line ended upon the secondary inner circle which bisected all of the 16 smaller circles. It also ended at one of the four compass points Clyde had first drawn in the sand, so that it made one large cross or X across the entire thing.

Turning from his work Clyde dug through his bag, digging out his summoning book. The final step before he'd be able to begin would be to put in the numbers, the astral coordinates. However he didn't trust himself to do so by memory, and so he leafed through the book to find the proper page on the proper world with the correct coordinates.

[Sayana]

“Clyde.” Sayana answered sharply to his chastising. “I make a conscious effort not to do magic on you. What I do between me and my horse… But what does it matter? I’ve done reimancy while you were doing reimancy. And surely some sort of magic when you were doing auristics. And…”

Suddenly she bit her tongue and kept herself from continuing as an unexpected realization hit her. She didn’t truly believe that her hypnotism could disrupt his magic, but if it was causing distraction for something particularly hard, or just something he wasn’t as proficient at… It was a strange idea, one that she wasn’t even sure if it could be true. In her mind she felt more at ease thinking it was just a more complicated sort of magic and hence required his full attention. Thus she settled upon that as the reasoning.

“Alright. I’ll warn you if I’m about to do hypnotism next time. But if there’s immediate danger, it might be a very quick warning before I go ahead with it. If you’re that susceptible to distraction, you might want to learn a way to turn your auristics off.”

She watched the drawing of the circles with mild curiosity. After a time, she even took a seat several paces away from the mage and his work, and began tracing out her own small circles in the sand. It was idle doodling with the tip of her dagger to ease her creeping boredom, and when he spoke next, she wiped away with her low hands.

He was doing something new. Neither reimancy nor voiding. He was making a window. The Eypharian puzzled over the idea. Something to see through? Something to walk through? She recalled the creepy way the void had snatched a piece of his hair, like a wind into nothingness. But if that wasn’t a window, then this was a different sort of window.

As he seemed to finish up, Sayana stood and walked around the series of circles, keeping a wide distance as she walked. Her horse stayed a couple paces behind and she stared at the series of symbols to try to give it meaning. “So it’s not a glyph.” She repeated in a skeptical voice, despite it being rather unnecessary. She gave a slow look to the mage, unsure as to whether he was baiting her to ask more or if he was going to hold back till the moment he did whatever magic this was.

With feigned disinterest, she instead looked over the vast wasteland. Dry and inhospitable. Scanning the flat terrain there was no sign of predatory creatures except for a solitary black bird circling high above the land and off in the distance.

“Tell me when you’re about to begin and I’ll refrain from using magic.” Sayana spoke at last. She held two daggers loosely in her low hands at her sides, unsure of what to come and too proud to ask the mage to elaborate further.

[Clyde Sullins]

After a short time flipping through the book Clyde settled on the proper page. Shoyden was the heading, with the planet described below. Its astral coordinates were written out in a string of numbers across the page.

Clyde knew from another chapter that he had to write them out within the smaller circles counterclockwise. Once he did that he simply had to cut himself, and press the bleeding wound against the outer circle. Then it would activate, assuming he'd done the process correctly.

However before he began writing the coordinates out in the sand he had to pause once more, glaring at Sayana with a serious expression for once.

“Personal magic is just that, personal magic. Its only affected by what affects your person, for the most part. But there is also world magics. World magics are affected by things that affect... Any guess? The world.”

“You can use magic whenever I'm doing personal magic, I don't care and its not going to distract me for the most part. You can cast spells till your fingers fall off, and your horse thinks he's a cow. I don't care.”

“But not all world magics are like that. I wasn't kidding, I wasn't joking, and I was being quite serious. Don't go messing about with magic without permission while I'm doing a world magic, except perhaps glyphing. You could quite literally ruin my magic, or get us both blown up so hard there'll be nothing left but a bit of soot, depending on which it is and what it does.”

Taking a deep breath, and assuming to himself he'd made himself quite clear, Clyde turned back to his book and the circle to continue on with his work.

“Don't go assuming all things are the same. You don't go around holding squirrels underwater because you've seen a fish and assume all things have gills and can breath underwater, do you? Well making generalizations about magic is just as bad. Personal magics tend to be similar as a whole, and overall world magics are similar to other world magics, but the two branches work as differently as that fish and squirrel. You'll be lucky if all you end up with is a few drowned squirrels.”

One by one, counterclockwise around the circle starting at the one he'd designated in his mind the north compass point of them, he began filling in the astral coordinates. 0012926672185630.

“Once I begin, you can use magic as you like, alright. Just don't disturb the circle. Thats the rule for this magic, alright? Understand? Don't touch it, don't mess it up, don't mar it, or the window closes. Unless we need it to close, and then do so posthaste. But otherwise, don't touch it.”

Done with his work, Clyde put away his book and took out his dagger. Unsheathing it he held it in his right hand, while he held Cha under the crook of said right arm. Using just the point he pricked the middle finger on his left hand, just enough for a single drop of blood to well up. A small cut, a probing poke just barely breaking the surface.

Wiping the blade clean he re-sheathed it and set it and his bag aside, before reaching down his his bloody finger and touching the outer ring of the summoning circle.

The inside of the circle began to swirl in reaction to the blood, bright light rising out of it for several moments and obscuring its contents. Once the light settled down it had returned to its swirling nature, but something began to become visible within or through it.

After a few more moments it began to clear a bit, and appear a bit more like the window Clyde had mentioned. Through it could be seen a small viewpoint of a grassy field that wouldn't look odd in Cyphrus.

Then they would both be in for a long wait, as it would be nearly a quarter of a bell before anything wandered by or tried to traverse the summoning gateway. During the wait Clyde would take a step back and simply stand there watching the circle, no longer needing contact as he was connected by his blood to it.

[Sayana]

It took significant effort to maintain a calm and composed look as Clyde berated her. Yes magic was dangerous. Yes there are different types. But he hadn’t said anything about “don’t do magic when I do world magic”, just “don’t do magic when I do magic”. She was starting to wonder if he was purposefully being misleading so he could get a chance to tell her off. It wouldn’t surprise her if that’s one reason he enjoyed putting on his “Clyde teacher” role.

As she listened to him, she found herself pacing around the circle, always keeping a good distance away and her horse following along after her every so often. If she ended up with a couple of drowned squirrels it might be something to cook in this miserable land.

She did actually roll her eyes when he finally said that she could do magic once he had begun. Then what was the point of this whole discussion?? “Yes I understand. I won’t mess up your circle. That’s what I was telling my lovely friend Stardust here. That she wasn’t to mess up your circle.” Sayana elaborated in a pointed and emphasized manner.

However, when he took out his dagger her demeanor changed drastically. For a tick she wondered if the magic had somehow gotten to his head and was about to do something exceedingly stupid or dangerous. She watched him intently, trying to gauge his mental state and ready to spring to action if something was not right. But he was calm, as if it was all planned and he merely nicked his middle finger.

Sayana watched with skeptical eyes as he brought the bloodied finger to the outermost circle and suddenly the magic began to activate. Instinctively, she took hold of Stardust’s reins to keep the horse close. As she watched, the ground seemed to swirl before her, eventually settling upon a scenic view of an open plain.

But it was sideways, or upside down, or right side up depending upon how she viewed it. It didn’t make sense. The window was on the ground whereas it was showing something that was not the ground. Window. Yes, that was a good word for it. She couldn’t help but take a few cautious steps around the circle to look at it from different angles.

Clyde, on the other hand, seemed unphased. He had clearly done it before. “You said it’s a window?” Sayana asked tentatively. “Is it a window with glass or without glass?” It would most certainly make a difference although she didn’t think it would literally have glass. But maybe something stopping or blocking it. For half a tick she was tempted to look at it with her auristics, but then thought better of it. He had after all just lectured her about using magic on world magic. And she had no idea if the auristics might disrupt his circle in some way. Additionally, he had brought her out here for a reason and it seemed like more than just a show and tell opportunity. She needed to keep aware and alert, and spending needless djed wasn’t going to help with that.

At last she dared to ask, “Is that Cyphrus? And does it have anything to do with the stories of the Watch Towers? You know, the ones they tell children about traveling miles and miles in a single step?”

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde had only summoned to the particular world he did today once before, but he'd used summoning several times. And so he wasn't surprised when it began its opening sequence. Instead he simply calmly watched the summoning gateway open, peering through to another world.

He didn't pay too much attention to Sayana or her horse, just enough to make sure they didn't near the circle too close. His focus was on the summoning gateway and its contents.

Summoning something wasn't a sure thing, he might get nothing at all. Or he might get a glassbeak, the thing Shoyden was best known for. The chance of successfully pulling through such a beast was why he'd asked Sayana to come. An extra hand wouldn't hurt, not someone to stand between him and a charging monster while he prepared his reaction.

However his attention did break to the hypnotist when she asked him a question which puzzled him, something he didn't know about but she clearly did.

“Whats a Cyphrus? Or a Watchtower?”

He wasn't familiar with either term, but then Clyde tended to be a bit narrowly focused and didn't often go out in search of things outside his main purpose of the moment. He was interested however in her noting information about whatever a watchtower was, letting people step miles upon miles at a time... It sounded interesting, but was something he'd never heard of, or didn't recall hearing of.

But then his childhood, during which he'd grown up quite close to a watchtower in Syliras, was a bit confusing. His memories were at times not complete, likely in part to the incident when he was a child and ran into a hypnotist.

Perhaps he'd heard of both, and forgotten, or heard of them and not been interested at the time. Now though, moving long distances at will, seemed quite interesting.

Clyde would give Sayana time to answer, hearing whatever she had to say on the subject, before explaining what the window truly was.

“This... Window... Properly termed a summoning gateway, by the way. Anyways, it leads to Shoyden. Which is another world. ”

Soon after he finished explaining, a bit of motion was to be seen within the gateway. The motion caught Clyde's attention, and he turned to inspect it once more. At first nothing happened, and then... Movement, motion, something moving through the gateway. Clyde could feel something piercing the window between worlds, moving along the pathway and being summoned to Mizahar.

As it began to emerge like a dolphin rising from the surf, Clyde's body tensed, holding Cha up defensively. It rose a few inches, then a few more, its hairy length with short brownish fur began to rise, more of its body thrusting upward... And then all too soon coming to a stop.

Clyde had been expecting a dangerous predator, a large creature that ripped and tore and rended flesh. Perhaps a glassbeak, or one of the other animals to habit the world.

Instead, popping out of the summoning gateway, Clyde was faced with... A rabbit. Or something similar enough to a Mizahar equivalent to be called as such.

“What the petch?”

Due to his connection by blood to the gateway, Clyde could see a silvery line reaching up from the gatway and connecting to the creature.

[Sayana]

At Clyde’s questions, Sayana paused a moment with a surprised expression. It wasn’t often that she knew something he did not. Even if she did, it was rarer still for him to ask about it.

“Cyphrus is a place. Vast plains to the south with tall grasses. Sometimes there are trees but not many. It’s dangerous too. With creatures like zith and other fearsome things. It’s not as far as Ahnatep in Eyktol. It’s between Ahnatep and Syliras.” She gave a pause, not sure whether he had heard of the city she had grown up in. Still, she had said it was to the south and that should be sufficient.

“As for the Watchtowers…” Sayana hesitated, suddenly feeling unsure of herself against the knowledge of the mage. “There was one in Ahnatep. My aunt showed it to me when I was young. She told me that if I learned to dance well enough, I could dance around the giant pillar and it would take me to a faraway city… Just like the Pressorah could. That was how she became so powerful. But she didn’t have to dance, she could just step through…”

The Eypharian found herself shifting awkwardly as the story seemed to unravel as she tried to tell it. But it was a children’s story, after all. It didn’t have to make much sense. She was about to explain further that it was probably just a legend or a story spread by high ranking officials of Ahnatep to secure the Pressorah’s credibility, but in her hesitation the mage more fully explained the window he had created.

Suddenly her story didn’t seem quite so far-fetched. “But Clyde, what do you mean by a different world? Like an illusionary world like Alvadas has? Or do you mean that Shoy-den is a distant distant land on Mizahar? Is it also to the south like Cyphrus is?” She clearly struggled with the concept of an entirely different world that she could not walk to, even if it took many many miles to get there.

However, the mage was soon distracted by motion within the window and she jumped to attention, leaving her earlier queries forgotten. As he took up a defensive stance, she found herself responding in kind and moved decidedly in front of her horse with slightly raised daggers.

The window seemed to shimmer strangely to accommodate the movement of the creature and when it finally emerged, Sayana looked wide-eyed at the rabbit. “It- it came from that Cyphrus place.” She spoke, stating the obvious. However, after the moment or two of disbelief she turned her attention to Clyde.

“Were you not expecting it to come through? Or were you expecting something else to come through?” She asked as she began putting the pieces together.

There was a snort behind her from Stardust. Clearly the horse wasn’t so comfortable about the magic. That, or it didn’t like rabbits. Meanwhile the small furry animal took several hops away from the pair of them.

[Clyde Sullins]

From Sayana's explanation, it appeared that Cyphrus was similar to Shoyden where he'd opened the summoning gateway. His mind immediately went to other worlds, wondering if there weren't perhaps other ones dominated by a single landmass or type as this one was.

So far he'd only used the coordinates for a few worlds, three he believed, though he supposed there would be more worlds with other attributes to them.

He was more interested in hearing of the Watchtowers, which if true appeared to have some element of magic to them. What that magic was Clyde couldn't say, as he knew better than most that there were many things and magics he'd not heard of, things lost or hidden or kept secret. Or things he'd simply not learned of yet.

As she went on Clyde was once more reminded of her somewhat closed minded nature when dealing with new things. She seemed to make the assumption things newly met where like things she'd met before, or a variation on them. Something far outside them were foreign and not easily grasped.

It was one thing Clyde was perhaps a bit better at than others due to his training as a Chaon, and his time spent grasping at understanding Chaon logic. One didn't understand the interconnectedness and meaning of the actions of a God like Rhysol, or even make an attempt at doing so with the slightest bit of success, without a deep understanding of said logic.

Perhaps it had another term, and was used by non-Chaon, but as of yet he'd not met many who understood it. Perhaps a few in Alvadas, but in a different way.

“I mean a different world, just as I said. World. Not land. World. Sylira is a land. This Cyphrus you mentioned, is surely a land. Both on this world. Mizahar is one world. Somewhere else, somewhere not Mizahar no more than the moon is Mizahar, is Shoyden. Away. Another world. One of many, some reachable by Summoning.”

As he spoke Clyde stared at the rabbit, unsure of it. In retrospect, he guessed glassbeaks couldn't be the only thing on the world of Shoyden. They did, after all, have to eat something... His assumption that it was the only thing to summon was his own failing, his own lack of grasping of Chaon logic and forcing himself into the logic of the things he'd done and seen before. The same problem Sayana had.

He however refused to stay with that mistake, and was already moving on and grasping the new fact and incorporating it into his system of logic.

Worlds didn't just have the things on them you could summon from them. It might be the main thing, or what it was best known for, but it wasn't the only thing. The other worlds, he supposed, were as whole and intact as his own, if foreign. Things would eat things, and greater things would need lesser to dominate and eat. In that way he supposed it wasn't so different.

“Honestly, I wasn't expecting that. I figured I'd summon another Glassbeak, like last time. I guess this time I managed to summon some of its food... Nothing to do about it now.”

The rabbit continued to move about within the circle, slowly hopping about. However it did so slowly, as if it was weighed down. Clyde after a few moments understood it had to do with the leash. The former glassbeak he'd summoned had broken free of its leash and come at him. It had moved about quite freely. This rabbit however was still held by its leash, and so seemed... Lessened. Or suppressed. Something new he'd learned about summoning which he'd not known before about the leashes.

“BUt we learn, and we do. I'll know for next time... I guess I won't be needing you after all, at least not to safeguard from a rabbit.”

Reaching out mentally, Clyde focused on the silver leash connecting the rabbit to the summoning circle. Its last few motions had taken it half off of the circle, jutting off.

Focusing his will Clyde imagined the rabbit freezing, and then being pulled back to the center of the circle. Clyde willed this to happen through the leash, willing it to pull the rabbit back in.

Instead of something dramatic, the pull on the leash was only enough to reduce the rabbits hop from a full one to half of a hop further off the gateway.

Of course, Clyde reminded himself, it was only his first try.