Godly Goodbye, Into God's Know What

The night passed without any other noticeable events however when we woke up we didn't see any further evidence of our little gray mouse friend. What little packing was needed had been done as soon as we all woke up. I went out into the living space and was handed a steaming cup of coffee already mixed with sugar and milk. "Thank you for packing us some cups and coffee." I said to my sister as she handed me my cup. "I didn't, I assumed one of you did, they were here when I got up." She looked as surprised as I did. I noticed a basket of muffins with a tub of butter and a jar of jam. "I thought you might want these while you were all gone." Read the note but I didn't recognize the handwriting, looking at it closer the words seemed stamped instead of written. It was my mug and our favorite coffee and tea along with butter made from our own cows and muffins with a berry native to the only hinkelberry bush in existence. "Who do you think sent these, Pogs?" I asked, looking around but we all knew what Pogs' handwriting looks like and to our knowledge he didn't have the ability to travel between worlds without a gate, and the little gray mouse could only travel with what he could carry. We left the cottage behind stuffing the cups and extra muffins into our bags and went back up the trail to the palace. "I could have sworn that there was a rock outcropping right here." Robbie said as we passed the place he had met Persephone. He ran his hands over the cliff face as we walked by. "Must have been the moonlight." He finished before carrying on with the rest of us. The purple light of the moon did change the depth of shadows last night so it made sense and with that none of us gave it a second thought. When we approached the palace the normal hustle of the day was picked up, somewhere off in the distance I could hear the unmistakable hammer striking hot metal as it rang into the morning air. "Thank you for your hospitality everyone, we had a wonderful time." I said when I saw Zues walking down the steps from the palace. "I'm sorry we didn't have any answers for you, long lived seven." His voice was as full and bright as the night before. His locks of hair took on a halo in the daytime light. If possible he was even more beautiful then he was the night before. Hera was absent, as to be expected she was associated with the night and the moon. I only imagine that those aspects combined to make a Goddess who was not interested in early mornings. Zeus seemed to have noticed and made an excuse for her. "Sorry Hera isn't here to see you off, she is not a morning being." Confirming what I had assumed about the Goddess.

We said our goodbyes and thanked everyone for the night again as we made our way to the end of the path leading down the mountain side. Hermes had made arrangements to get us to Earth. As the God messenger of the Gods he is one of a handful of beings able to create jump portals between the realms. "You're looking for a stone with a horse on it." He said to us as he waved from his place in the air above all the other beings. His winged sandals held him in the air while he waved and raised him higher into the sky, making his way to deliver messages to one place or another. With that we made it past the point of the glamor we had entered in the night before, with a ripple the palace and all the beings disappeared from behind us, leaving us with the expanse of clouds and the tall pillars of stones. At the base of the mountain just before the cliff face that fell down further and further, we found a large boulder with a white and yellow horse painted on its side. When we were all ready we put our hands on the stone and vanished as the horse started to glow, the edges and lines of the painting lost definition. The light enveloped us and suddenly we were standing on the New Jersey turnpike. "Figures the Gods would think this is where humans would want to come to on Earth. We're in Jersey." Mathew was laughing and commenting on how the Gods must get cable up in their realm. So we walked across the grassy field and found a donut shop. We stopped to have coffee and donuts, sitting around everyone was silent. I know that they would have all rather spent more time with the Gods. They were the most like us of all magical beings in any of the realms. The Gods were true immortals like we are, they have access to magics that no one else has access to like we do and they live a communal life like we do, not only as a family but as an ecosystem in a local community of beings and creatures. Unlike us, most of the Gods and Goddesses had never been born human. We were all born human until the spell took over and aged us up into the adults we are now and the oldest two were living as humans before the spell was cast. After our coffee and snacks, we made our way to the nearest layline convergence and portaled home. "Nothing like realm travel jet lag." Steven said brightly as we came out from behind the stables. House was there to greet us as were a number of beings and creatures who looked afraid to enter our home. Robbie was dumb struck, while we looked at House, Robbie was looking at the greenhouse. House looked relatively the same with the exception of an amazing display of lights coming from the windows, music from the nineteen eighties was billowing out of open doors and open windows in time with the lights strobing like a nightclub. I turned around to look at Robbie and that's when I noticed the greenhouse for the first time.

It was the tower of glass and metal it has always been but two branches seemed to be born out of the glass. Instead of simply branching out into new rooms it looked like the glass and metal twisted and bent reaching out into the world with arms and fingers. There was nothing about the new growth that could be liveable, it couldn't support any life even if it was a magical plant. The supporting structures grew at odd angles and in geometric patterns not natural to any practical growth system. In addition to the strange growth the new glass didn't let any light through, it wasn't black or tinted glass there was an organic color in each cell of glass. Robbie headed straight for the entry point of the greenhouse while I went up to the group gathered around the outside of House. I heard Robbie scream before he would have had time to make it through the portal through the protective charm.

"What's wrong Robbie, are you ok?" I was yelling out to him. I made it to the bend in the trail then I noticed a wave running through the rock and soil. It was a tremor but localized to the trail, and it fed its way to the center of the greenhouse where Robbie was trapped half in and half out of the portal. The charm was designed to only allow matter in and not out, it was pulling on the half of my brother stuck inside while the tremor had him by the feet and was pulling at him. The force was so great that his clothes tore, had he been human the power of the two forces would have broken him in two. "What is happening here?" I screamed while I grabbed at my brother's legs and used my essence to try to sueth out what was happening. I felt the two powers at play pulling on my brother. The ward inside the greenhouse was trying to do its job and prevent anything from getting out, fueled by the changes the indoor garden was going through, the charm searched for a balance, a normality. I also felt the awareness of House reaching out through the ground. Sensing danger, House was doing its best to prevent Robbie from entering the greenhouse. I couldn't tell what the danger was but I trust House. I put a fail safe into the charm that would deactivate it for a split second, just long enough to pull him free from the trap he was currently in.