As soon as the inquisitor’s words left his mouth, everyone drew their weapons. But before anyone moved, a smokepowder grenade sailed through the air, fuse ignited from a timely cast of prestidigitation. It landed just beyond the wall of githyanki warriors, bounced twice, and exploded. And then all hell broke loose.

  The githyanki nearest the explosion fell to the ground, knocked off their feet and bloodied from shrapnel. Alex and Gale took off and ran after Astarion as smoke filled the room. A guard intercepted their path, longsword drawn, but suffered a firebolt to the face and collapsed to his knees, hands flying to his burns. Alex slashed at the side of his head as he and Gale ran by, drawing blood but barely registering the fact that this was the first time he ever swung a real sword at another being.

  Ahead of them, Astarion pushed at a narrow section of the wall, rotating it on a concealed hinge and creating a gap barely wide enough for a person to squeeze through. He turned towards them, knife in hand, and threw it over Alex’s shoulder. Alex turned his head in time to see a pursuing guard fall to the ground, clutching at the knife embedded in her throat.

  Astarion disappeared through the opening, followed by Gale. Before Alex could enter, another guard charged at him, longsword raised. Panicking, Alex held up his sword to parry, remembering how easily Lae’zel had trounced him in their sparring. The githyanki’s sword clanged against his, making his arms shake and sending a jolt of pain up to his shoulder.

  The guard pulled back for another wide swing, only to be thrown against the wall by an eldritch blast as Wyll and Shadowheart ran up, bloodied but alive. Alex slipped through the gap and ran down the connecting narrow hallway. Behind him, he heard Karlach roaring as her greataxe collided with githyanki armor and tore through flesh, and the echoes of Wyll and Shadowheart’s footsteps chasing after him.

  At the end of the hallway, he rounded the corner and found himself in the treasure room that Astarion mentioned, just in time to see him grab an ornate, gilded mace off of a central stone pedestal. The Blood of Lathander? But that means-

  A low rumble sounded somewhere above them. The room shook, sending vases and goblets to the floor, shattering into a million expensive pieces. Alex nearly fell over but steadied himself and kept moving, Gale waving him over to the winding staircase that led up to the monastery.

  “What? I thought it would help!” exclaimed Astarion as he took off ahead of Alex and started sprinting up the staircase with Gale. The room shook again, forcing Alex to grab the wall for stability. He shot a glance behind him and saw Shadowheart and Wyll do the same, the whole place shaking like an earthquake as choking dust cascaded from the ceiling and treasures fell off shelves to an untimely demise on the stone floor.

  The shaking stopped and Alex ran up the stairs, which thankfully were partially illuminated by daylight, coming from somewhere far above. Between heavy breaths, he hoarsely shouted for the others to hurry and follow, hoping that they heard him.

  The rumbles and shaking increased in frequency and intensity as he sprinted up the stairs, panting from the exertion and sucking in dust. He heard footsteps flying up the stairs after him and hoped that it was his companions and not the githyanki. His lungs and legs burned and his throat was caked with dust, but adrenaline and the fear of being buried alive or captured by the inquisitor drove him forward. Finally, he burst through the exit, just as the shaking became continuous and seemed to vibrate the whole building. He emerged from the staircase and had to raise his hands to shield his eyes from the bright sunlight, which shone directly overhead.

  Wait… sun?

  After taking a second for his eyes to adjust, he realized that he must be standing on the roof of the monastery, next to some sort of rooftop garden. Invasive vines and overgrown vegetation from untended flowerbeds snaked across cracked stone and wrapped around eroded statues.

  The sky is clear and the roof is dry-

  He didn’t have time to think about it any more, as his gaze swept to the source of the rumbling: a large, pointed metal lance glowing with radiant light and vibrating with divine power, held in a complex mechanical assembly that resembled a giant gyroscope. It stood directly in the center of the rooftop and pointed down, right into the heart of the monastery. Where the hell are we?

  Across the rooftop, Gale and Astarion waved him over. He ran over to them as fast as his exhausted body would let him, giving a wide berth to the glowing lance and occasionally stumbling as its vibrations grew stronger and stronger. With a start, he saw that they stood on the edge of the roof, facing a four-story drop with no obvious way down. He slowly backed away from the edge, heart rate spiking.

  “So, what’s the plan now?” asked Astarion, this time without his usual biting tone.

  We have rope, but it’s packed away in the bag of holding and we don’t have time to dig it out and rappel down. That thing is going to explode at any moment. “Got any useful spells, Gale?”

  “I could cast feather fall, but I’d rather wait for everyone to get here first…” answered Gale, nervously eying the glowing lance.

  Astarion looked like he wanted to protest, but then Shadowheart and Wyll appeared on the roof, followed a couple seconds later by Karlach. And to Alex’s relief, Lae’zel emerged a few seconds afterwards, very bloody but alive. They all sprinted over and Gale started chanting. A flash of pale blue light enveloped them and Alex felt… lighter.

  As soon as the light faded, Astarion jumped over the edge of the roof, followed by Shadowheart and Wyll. They fell down slowly, like leaves or feathers drifting on the breeze. Alex gulped, seeing how far away the ground was. I’ve always been afraid of heights… but there’s no reason to be afraid with this feather fall enchantment, right? My antimagic seems to have no effect on healing magic, so why would it be any different with this?

  The rumbling behind them reached a crescendo and Alex jumped off the roof before Karlach or Lae’zel could push him. He fell slowly… but not slowly enough, and he accelerated downward with each passing millisecond. He passed Astarion, Shadowheart, and Wyll, the three of them yelling and futilely trying to grab him as the ground rushed up to meet him.

  People have fallen from greater heights and survived, he thought, desperately trying to comfort himself as his mind raced for a nonexistent solution, making it seem like he was falling in slow motion. This is nothing, right? There are stories of World War Two bomber crews who-

  Pain lanced up his legs as his feet impacted the ground, his joints popping and bones snapping like toothpicks. Before he could process the pain, the back of his head struck the cobblestones and his vision filled with black.

  “Here’s your oatmeal, toast, and juice,” said Alex, placing Melanie’s breakfast on the placemat in front of her. “And here’s a bib, too, since you love to get crumbs everywhere.”

  He had barely strapped the bib around his daughter's neck before she grabbed her spoon and started to dig in, shoveling oatmeal in her mouth like she hadn’t eaten in days. As expected, globs of stray oatmeal began to dot the placemat.

  He went back to the kitchen and reached for the coffee pot, only to be struck by a belated realization: yesterday, when grocery shopping, he had forgotten to buy more milk. There had barely been enough in the jug to make Melanie’s oatmeal, and Elena probably wanted cereal for breakfast.

  He peeked around the corner and saw Melanie munching happily on her toast, then Elena come down the stairs, hair still wet from a shower. Steeling himself for the inevitable berating, he walked over and leaned in for a quick kiss. “Good morning, honey. You’re looking pretty cute today, as usual.”

  Elena smiled knowingly as she pulled back. “Thanks. So, what do you want?”

  “Please don’t kill me… but I forgot to buy more milk yesterday.”

  Elena paused for a second, contemplating his fate. “I considered it, but we need you,” she teased. “Right, Melanie?”

  Melanie didn’t respond, only making exaggerated munching noises as she devoured her toast. Elena walked over to fix her long, messy hair.

  “And you don’t get the life insurance payout if you’re the one who kills me,” reminded Alex as he reached for his wallet and keys. “I’ll go to the grocery store.”

  “Just be careful, please,” called Elena from across the room, pulling Melanie’s hair into a ponytail. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too. And I love you, Melanie.”

  “I love you, daddy,” mumbled Melanie around a mouthful of toast.

  “Be back soon,” he said as he closed the door behind him.

  He woke up to the murmur of nearby voices, the crackle of a campfire, and a canvas of stars stretching out to infinity, with a moon that seemed impossibly large as its centerpiece.

  “He’s awake!” yelled Karlach with audible relief, pulling him into a tight but gentle hug. “Thank the gods, we thought you were a goner.” She let go before his clothing could singe and Alex looked around, completely bewildered.

  “Uh, thanks,” he murmured, slowly taking in his surroundings. He sat in his bedroll, having been pulled up by Karlach. His armor, weapons, and satchel were piled haphazardly beside him, leaving him in his cloth underclothes. He sat a few steps away from a bright campfire, close enough to stay warm but far enough to be unbothered by the light. A pot of stew simmered over the fire, casting a savory aroma of beef and vegetables around the campsite. His companions’ tents, and thankfully his, were set up in a circle just outside the radius of the campfire’s light. And his companions themselves, previously sitting on logs around the fire, now rushed over to check on him.

  “Thank the Triad that you’re alright,” said Wyll, relief evident in his voice. “I thought you were dead for sure.”

  “Next time, maybe do a little more thinking before you commit to throwing yourself off a building,” added Astarion. “But I’m glad you’re alive.”

  Shadowheart crouched and fussed over him, checking his pulse, peering into his eyes, feeling his forehead temperature, and even peeling back his bedroll to gently prod his legs. “Does it hurt? Can you move alright?”

  He wiggled his toes and gingerly lifted each leg, feeling no pain or difficulty moving. “I think I’m okay…”

  “Dark Lady’s blessings,” she sighed, briefly bowing her head in a silent prayer of thanks. “I had to use up all of my healing magic just to stabilize you.”

  “Stabilize me?” repeated Alex, still lost. “What happened? And where are we? The last thing I remember is jumping off the roof of the monastery.”

  “You jumped, alright, and almost fell to your death. It seems that your antimagic partially nullified Gale’s feather fall spell. Which he definitely should have considered when casting it,” she said loudly, pointedly looking over her shoulder at Gale sitting by the campfire. “But thankfully, we all jumped off just in time, right before that divine lance made the whole building explode. I healed your head and stopped the bleeding, then Karlach picked you up.”

  “We stayed on the run for a few hours,” explained Karlach, continuing the story, “just to make sure those githyanki weren’t chasing us. We had a quick scare when we ran into one, but he seemed nice enough.”

  “That was Kith’rak Voss,” said Lae’zel quietly, emerging from her tent. She looked solemn and kept her eyes trained on the ground. “He… confirmed what we learned in the Astral Prism.” She flicked her eyes over to him, looking very uncertain. “I’m greatly relieved that you survived. But right now, I need time to think.” Without another word, she turned and retreated back into her tent.

  “And then we ran into this guy, who looks like he could be Gale’s grandad,” continued Karlach, nodding at a figure that remained seated by the campfire. “Lucky for you, he had plenty of magic available to fix you right up.”

  Gale approached with a pained smile. “Again, he’s not my grandad. Thank the Weave that you’re alright. This is the second time you’ve almost been killed because of me, and I’m truly sorry.” He hung his head in shame.

  “Gale, it’s not your fault. There’s nothing you could have done to counter my antimagic. I’m just glad that it didn’t seem to completely nullify the enchantment,” said Alex, trying to sound as reassuring as he could, then addressed the rest of the group. “And thank you, all of you. I know this will sound weird, but it doesn’t even feel like I almost died. Somehow, I’m not even in shock, just confused about where I am. It feels like I just woke up from an unexpected nap.”

  Karlach shared a nervous glance with Wyll. “Well… about that. The crèche and the monastery exploded because of that magical lance thing, right?”

  “Right…” repeated Alex, not sure where she was headed. Then realized with a start: the tieflings. “What happened to the tieflings? Did they make it out?”

  “They did, thankfully,” answered Wyll. “We didn’t see them, but we spotted footprints and wagon tracks leaving the monastery, headed for the Shadow-Cursed Lands. That’s the good news.”

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  “Good news?” he echoed, confused. “What’s the bad news?”

  Everyone looked at each other, uncertain of who would deliver the news. Finally, Shadowheart spoke up. “The bad news is that we were in that Astral Prism for a few days.”

  His brain short-circuited, unable to process. “What? A few days? But we were only in there for a couple hours, at most.”

  Gale cleared his throat. “Well, time passes differently in the Astral Plane. Much slower than out here in the Prime Material Plane. And in a pocket dimension within the Astral, it can be quite unpredictable. I did some rough calculations, and I estimate that three days passed out here while we were in the prism.”

  Three days? he thought, jaw almost dropping open before he caught himself. “So that explains why it wasn’t raining when we got onto the roof. But does that mean the tieflings are already in the Shadow-Cursed Lands?”

  “Looks that way,” said Astarion. “I scouted ahead and saw their tracks disappear into the black void of the Shadow Curse. And based on what Halsin has told us about it, I am definitely not going in there alone to try to find them.”

  Alex’s head spun. Are they okay? In the game, the tieflings were killed almost as soon as they entered the Shadow-Cursed Lands. But I can’t rely on the game anymore. Maybe they’re still alive? After all, they have Halsin with them, right?

  Wait a minute. Who is the person who healed me? Don’t tell me it’s-

  “I know you’ve got a lot to think about right now, but there’s a friend of mine who wants to meet you. And if you don’t come soon, he’s going to eat through our food stocks,” said Gale, extending a hand to help Alex to his feet. Thankfully, he stood up with no issues, without even any residual soreness, like the feeling of his legs breaking underneath him was just a bad dream.

  He looked past Gale and saw a wizened old man with a long beard sitting by the campfire, wearing gray robes and a conical hat, puffing patiently on a pipe next to an empty bowl. “Gale,” he whispered. “Is that… Elminster?”

  Gale nodded. “Did he say anything about your…” continued Alex, glancing down at Gale’s chest and the cursed Netherese orb within.

  “...I will tell you about it later,” said Gale in a low voice with a frown. He led Alex over to the campfire.

  Elminster must have updated him about his orb by now. Of his ‘mission’ to blow himself up. But does any of that matter? If I’m lucky, I’m about to be sent home.

  “Ah, so this is the young man with the antimagic,” said the old wizard, pulling the pipe from his lips and releasing it to float magically in midair. “My good friend Gale was telling me all about you. My name is Elminster Aumar. May I?” He extended a wrinkled hand in greeting.

  With trepidation, Alex reached forward and shook it. “Nice to meet you. My name is Alexander Bannister. But please just call me Alex.” After a second, he withdrew his hand, and Elminster looked at him contemplatively.

  “I see. I would like to speak with you in private, if you don’t mind,” he said, with a knowing look at the companions that crowded around them, everyone trying and failing to hide their eavesdropping.

  “Sure, I don’t mind.” He followed Elminster away from the fire to a secluded corner of the campsite, the wizard’s staff casting a warm glow to light the way. They sat down opposite each other on a pair of fallen logs, his staff standing up on its own to provide light and his pipe hovering nearby, puffs of colored smoke occasionally emerging. Elminster muttered an incantation and a curtain of silence fell around them, isolating them from the outside world.

  “So, young man. You are from Earth, are you not?” said Elminster, cutting to the chase.

  Alex hesitated for a moment, caught off guard by Elminster’s directness. But seeing no hostility in the old man’s eyes, he relented. “Yes, I am. How did you know?”

  Elminster offered a friendly smile. “There are very few peoples in the known universe with inherent antimagic. Fewer still humanoids, and with antimagic that behaves in the way our mutual friend Mr. Dekarios explained to me, or in the way I felt when I shook your hand. Combine that with your accent, which sounds suspiciously like that of my former friends from Earth, and that really narrows it down.”

  Alex raised his hands, caught in the act. “Okay, you got me. But it sounds like you just confirmed that there is a way to travel from here to Earth. So please, send me home. I don’t belong here.”

  Elminster stared at him pensively, then released a heavy, exhausted sigh. “First, I need to explain something. What do you know of cosmology? Do you know of crystal spheres?”

  “I know a little,” he said, puzzled but playing along. “I’ve read some of The Great Realms in the Stars, if that counts for anything.”

  “That counts for a lot, actually. Jhevven Dree did a remarkably good job with that book. So then, I presume you know the basics?”

  Alex looked up, seeing the canvas of the night sky stretching out, hundreds of stars winking at him. “I know that everything we can see in the night sky is actually enclosed in a giant, crystalline sphere. Within each sphere are stars, planets, nebulas, maybe even multiple galaxies, depending on the sphere’s size. And every crystal sphere is essentially floating in an ocean, made of a material called phlogiston. Floating alongside an endless number of other crystal spheres, like bubbles in the sea. And that is the universe.”

  “I would like to clarify that this is only applicable to the Prime Material Plane, but otherwise that is a good summary,” said Eliminster. “And I suppose you know that travel between crystal spheres is possible, yes?”

  “According to the book, spelljammers can pass through openings in the surface of a crystal sphere and enter the phlogiston. And then, they can use its currents to sail to other crystal spheres,” recalled Alex.

  Elminster nodded. “Yes, by taking advantage of currents in the phlogiston, one can travel between crystal spheres via spelljammer. Or in my case, via magic portals, which essentially use shortcuts in the phlogiston to make travel near instantaneous.”

  “So, can you send me home?” he asked, reduced to almost pleading with the elderly wizard. “I’ve been here for almost a month now and I’d really like to get back home. My family probably misses me very much.”

  Elminster gave him a look of unfiltered melancholy and his heart dropped into his stomach. “I’m sorry, young man, I truly am. But I cannot, and I doubt anyone or anything could.”

  Desperation crept into his voice as nausea roiled his stomach and a cloud of overwhelming dread settled over his mind. “But… I thought you had friends on Earth? How do you see them?”

  “Former friends. Good friends that I miss very much, but I can never see again,” said Elminster, staring into the ground. “Unfortunately, Earth is relatively unique in its isolation from the rest of the universe. The currents of the phlogiston around its crystal sphere, Earthspace, are wild and effectively unnavigable, and grow more unpredictable with each passing day, leaving it impassable to spelljammers. And Earthspace itself is very, very far from any other crystal sphere, rendering the journey perilous from the start due to the sheer distance involved.”

  “What about a magic portal?” asked Alex, talking fast and scrabbling for any possibility. “You said that’s how you traveled to Earth.”

  “The answer is in your antimagic. Or more precisely, your race’s collective antimagic. Once, numerous magic portals connected Earth to Toril, and I believe were the source of all the magical, mythical beasts that roamed your world. But the humans of Earth evolved antimagic in response, culling these beasts at the cost of your world’s magic. And thus, these portals started to slowly fade. I used the last of these portals to visit my Earth friends until it, too, faded away. Sometime around the year 2000, on your planet.”

  His mind raced, processing Elminster’s words and refusing to accept that there was no way home. “But there has to be a way back. After all, I was brought here, right?”

  “And that is what I was hoping to ask you. It should be impossible for you to be here.” Elminster leaned forward and spoke quietly, as if wary of being overheard despite the bubble of silence around them. “I am concerned that you are wrapped up in things far beyond your understanding. Terrible, evil things.”

  Alex paused to think before responding. I don’t know much about Elminster, except that he is a Chosen of Mystra. He is probably compelled to serve her and will likely tell her everything that I say. But while she did order Gale to blow himself up… she’s not exactly evil, at least. She’s trying to stop the Absolute, albeit in a twisted way. And Elminster doesn’t seem evil, either. From what I know, he’s basically the Forgotten Realms version of Gandalf. “What brought me here was… a Great Old One. An Elder Evil. Its name is-”

  “Do not tell me its name!” interrupted Elminster sternly, hand raised. Alex stopped out of alarm and Elminster lowered his hand. “I apologize, but please do not tell me its name, lest it cast its gaze in my direction. And I advise you to not share its name with anyone else, either.”

  Elminster released a heavy sigh before continuing. “It is as I thought, then. You should know from your reading that gods have no influence outside of their home crystal sphere. A simplification, but largely true. In fact, there is a theory that the crystal spheres were created as a means to contain the gods. Which means that the only thing with the power to bring you here, overcoming your planet’s collective antimagic, must be something that is even greater than a god. And most of those beings are not exactly friendly.”

  “They are not exactly friendly, and yet here I am. They talk to me, mostly in my sleep, but sometimes during the day, at the edge of my consciousness. Two of them, watching me.” Alex looked up at the night sky and for a moment, the giant moon was gone, replaced by the swirling void of Bolothamogg. He blinked and the moon returned. Always watching.

  “They say that they hold themselves back to preserve my sanity,” he continued morosely. “And that I am here for the sake of their amusement.”

  “Amusement? Elder Evils do not particularly care for anyone, let alone individual, insignificant mortals. We are less than insects to them, I’m afraid. Hearing that you seem to be somewhat familiar with one, let alone two of them, is disconcerting, to say the least,” said Elminster, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “And yet you are still alive, and seemingly still of sound mind. Do you know what they want with you?”

  Alex thought for a moment, then gave in. He told Elminster everything. How he woke up on the beach, discovered his antimagic, and somehow protected his companions with it. How he is an Elder Evil’s ‘little lanceboard piece’, tasked with defeating the Absolute and stopping the Grand Design, in a twisted game initiated by another Elder Evil. And finally, how he had some foreknowledge of events, due to his experience playing Baldur's Gate 3.

  After half an hour, he finally finished, the elderly wizard patiently listening without interruption, puffing stoically on this pipe the whole time. And to his surprise, Elminster did not seem shocked at all.

  “Young man, I have lived for over a thousand years, traveled the planes and the cosmos, and seen this world threatened more times than you can count,” he explained with a kind smile. “There is little that can surprise me anymore. This is definitely unusual, but not the worst thing to threaten Toril, even in just the last few centuries.”

  “So, just another day at work for you?” said Alex with a smile of his own, relieved that he could finally share all this with somebody.

  “I suppose you could call it that. ‘Just another day at the office’, as they say on Earth, right?” replied Elminster, a twinkle in his eye. “But, now there is something that I must share with you, about how that game may have come to be. And how it relates to the events happening here.” Elminster offered his pipe to Alex, who politely waved it away. Then, he launched into it, like a grandpa telling a story from his youth.

  Elminster explained that he visited Earth many times, starting in Earth year 1965, befriending multiple humans in the ensuing decades. Friends who would go on to release Dungeons & Dragons, based on the stories relayed by him. Everything - the official settings of the game, and the various novels, films, and video games taking place within them - was based on stories, maps, and diagrams provided by him. But as the decades passed, the magic of the portal finally began to fizzle out, just as Earth entered its digital age in a final rejection of magic. Wishing to provide a final parting gift to his friends, he gave them a book of detailed prophecies, recorded from the god of divination, that they may use to create more games and adventures.

  “And that, I believe, is how this game of yours came to be,” finished Elminster. “Pulled from a massive encyclopedia of things that will eventually come to pass.”

  Alex stared up at the night sky, processing everything Elminster just said, almost overwhelmed. “So, is everything preordained? Even the whole bit about me being pulled here? Do you already know how this ends?”

  Elminster sighed, a weary sigh that reflected his age. “If there is one thing I know about prophecies, it is that they are usually vague enough to be read however you want. You already explained some of the differences between this game and the reality you now face; that is proof enough that fate is not fixed.” He took a pensive puff of his pipe. “And that’s also why I did not read that book before gifting it. Lest I find myself chasing a future that seems predetermined, but is actually far more malleable than meets the eye.”

  “So, do you think there’s a chance, then? Of me defeating the Absolute? And somehow going home?”

  Another tired sigh from Eliminster. “I think there is a chance of victory. Your Elder Evil conversation partner seems to think so. And your antimagic gives you an advantage that many here could only dream of. You just have to learn how to control it. I suspect that as the inverse of magic, it can be channeled, as a sorcerer channels the Weave directly or a monk taps into Ki. But that is something you will have to learn on your own.”

  “And what about going home?” repeated Alex. “I know you said that the portals are gone and a spelljammer couldn’t take me. But surely a being like an Elder Evil would be able to send me back, right?”

  Elminster wagged his finger. “You would do well to not put so much faith in their abilities or promises. They are capricious, inscrutable beings who care little for anyone but themselves. But that being said, they are probably the only ones capable of doing so.”

  “I hope you did not believe everything that sage said,” rumbled Bolothamogg, once again interrupting Alex’s sleep. After his long discussion with Elminster, he had headed straight for his tent, deflecting questions from his companions, still coming to terms with what he had been told. Eventually, his mind stopped racing long enough to fall asleep, only to be greeted by Bolothamogg’s field of stars.

  He stood undaunted and defiant. “I thought he was nice enough. Nicer than you, anyway. It’s been some time since our last chat. I thought you had forgotten about me.”

  Bolothamogg’s familiar chuckle shook the plane, but he didn’t even flinch this time. “How could I forget about you, my little lanceboard piece? I’m sure you know that I’ve been watching. I just haven’t had anything noteworthy to discuss.”

  “How nice of you, to give me a break,” he said, sarcasm oozing from every word. “Anyway, since you’ve been listening the whole time: what did Elminster lie about? And why?”

  “Isn’t it obvious? He lied to protect you. To safeguard both your sanity and your motivation to continue with your task,” rumbled Bolothamogg, sounding a little more devious than usual.

  “And what did he lie about?” asked Alex, trying to keep his face calm despite his rising anxiety.

  “About my ability to send you home, of course,” rumbled Bolothamogg, with barely concealed smugness.

  For a moment, time stood still, the galaxies pausing their dance across the plane. “Sorry, can you repeat what you just said?”

  “I said, even an eminent Elder Evil such as myself cannot send you home. It is impossible.” Bolothamogg seemed to take satisfaction in his shock, mercilessly delving into the details. “Powerful though I may be, sending you to Realmspace was only possible because of a once-in-a-millenia celestial event. Not anything significant, at least in the minds of most mortal cosmologists. Just a precise moment when the currents of the phlogiston, the orbits of countless stars and planets, the pull of innumerable black holes, and the blurry boundaries of the planes all perfectly aligned in a way visible only to me. And like a player of one of your planet’s pinball machines, I was able to claim your soul and send it ricocheting across space, to precisely where I needed it.”

  Alex only caught half of what Bolothamogg said, his mind a whirlwind of thoughts. Elena, Melanie, his home, his entire life. Everything was slipping away from him. I can’t go home.

  I will never see them again.

  “Now you may wonder, why did I say ‘soul’?” continued Bolothamogg, reveling in seeing its toy suffer. “Because that was all I took. Transporting a physical body across the universe would have been an impossible endeavor. The metaphysical calculations alone would have been difficult, even for me. So I simply released your soul from its physical tether and reconstructed a body for you on Toril. A near-perfect match, but I took the opportunity to add my enhancements, of course. Fixing your vision and springtime allergies. Adding the skill to read and write Common. Giving your body learned immunity to the normal diseases of Faer?n. Just the basics, to make your challenge not totally insurmountable.”

  Alex broke through his reverie to ask a question in a low, barely audible voice, fearing the answer. “...What happened to my body? On Earth?”

  Bolothamogg’s corona pulsed. “Ah yes, your old body. Your wife found it lying next to her in bed. Lifeless, of course, for what good is a body without a soul? She respected your wishes and gave you a natural burial. Your corpse is currently decomposing, fertilizing some wildflowers.”

  Elena thinks I’m dead. No, Elena knows I’m dead, and buried me herself.

  “There is one more thing the wizard neglected to mention,” concluded Bolothamogg, exuding a halo of malevolent satisfaction in anticipation of its parting words. “Time passes differently on Toril than on Earth. Time dilation and all that, you know. You’ve been on Toril for about one month. But on Earth, it’s been five years. And as you may have expected, your wife has remarried. She seems to be living quite happily without you.”

  The name ‘Forgotten Realms’ comes from the fact that the fantasy world of the Realms is linked to our Earth of today… [I]n the past, there was much travel between these parallel ‘worlds’ (hence, our legends here on Earth of vampires, dragons, unicorns, et al) but today, most on Earth have forgotten the Realms and the ways to them, hence the name.

  Ed Greenwood Presents Elminster’s Forgotten Realms