“You aren’t thinking through the implications, Alex,” Arachne said. “While in Elsewhere, you are subject to its laws. All of its laws. Just as you can be injured, you can also be changed.”
“So someone can . . . change me into someone else?”
“Or you can change you into someone else.”
I had to stop and think about that. “How would that even work?”
“You know that Elsewhere is fluid,” Arachne said. “While you are there, your mind and body can, to a certain extent, be reshaped just as the dream-constructs of Elsewhere can.”
I sat thinking. It was a big enough idea that it was hard to grapple with. “Healing?”
“Feasible but dangerous. Altering yourself in Elsewhere requires you to draw back the shield protecting you and allow the realm to touch you directly, which means you are walking a fine line between change and dissolution. I would consider it a last resort.”
“Shapeshifting?”
“Again, possible but dangerous. Bear in mind that the ability to create a body does not imply the ability to create a working body. While in Elsewhere, you can hold things together by force of will. Once you return to our world, any mistakes will make themselves felt very quickly.”
“Maybe body modification?” I said. I was thinking aloud now. “That’d be easier than creating a new form from scratch. Reinforcement or enhancement or . . . hm.” I remembered a conversation I’d had with Anne. She’d explained that the problem with those kinds of life magic changes wasn’t creating them, it was maintaining them. “Would I need to understand bodies as well as a shapeshifter or a life mage?”
“In all likelihood, yes.”
Arachne was still watching me, as if she was waiting for me to come to the right conclusion. “Wait,” I said. “You said mind and body. Does that include everything relating to your mind?”
“Yes.”
“Including your magic?”
“Yes.”
I sat back.
“It is the primary reason mages have travelled to Elsewhere,” Arachne said. “Enhancing their own power, deepening their command over their magic. Adding completely new capabilities, gaining the power of multiple mages. All the power of Harvesting, without the side effects.”
“And it works?”
“There’s no reason it shouldn’t.”
I looked sharply at Arachne. “In theory or in practice?”
“Yes, that’s the issue.”
“Mages know about this?”
“It’s not widely shared knowledge, but yes.”
“Okay, then that doesn’t make sense,” I said. “Let’s say it works, and you really can use Elsewhere to add on powers as you like. Then where are the mages who’ve done it? There should be a whole bunch of immortal invincible archmages running around. I’ve seen the mages at the head of the Council and the Dark leaders like Morden and Richard. They’re powerful, but they’re not gods.”
Arachne nodded. “I only know of a few cases where mages have attempted a transformation such as you describe. In every case, nothing was heard of them thereafter. It is possible that their transformation was a success, and in the process they chose to create a new identity. But as you say, one would expect beings of that kind to make their presence felt. In my judgement, the most likely probability is that they ceased to exist.”
“Because it’s impossible?”
“The opposite. Magic is an intrinsic part of its user. The kind of person you are determines the type of magic you can employ. So to change one’s magic . . .” Arachne shrugged. “I suspect it runs into the same issue. The ability to imagine is not the same as the ability to create a working model.”
I sat thinking for a minute. “It sounds like a trap,” I said at last. “Something that’s just appealing enough that no one can resist looking at it and which you can’t back out of once you start.”
“That’s probably accurate,” Arachne said. “A less sweeping but more feasible use of Elsewhere is in conjunction with imbued items. Since they’re alive, they can be brought into Elsewhere, at least temporarily. While there, they can be changed or shaped just as a person can.”
“So you could do . . . what?” I said. “Enhance them . . . No, that’d run into the same problems. Change them? Make them accept you as a master?”
“You’ve told me several times that you’ve always run up against the same problem with imbued items. You can resist their control, but you can’t make them do what you want them to. Elsewhere would give you the power to affect them directly.”
“And it works?”
“After a fashion. It’s been attempted, and survived. However, there is the obvious drawback.”
I sighed. “Of course there is.”
“As I said, imbued items function in Elsewhere just as a person does. Which means that any item you bring there is placed on the same footing as you.”
“Oh Jesus. So it could try to change or control me.”
“Weaker imbued items would probably not have enough strength of self to be a significant danger,” Arachne said. “On the other hand, the ones you would most likely be interested in are unlikely to be the weaker ones.”
I thought of the most powerful item I owned, the monkey’s paw. I’d got a look at what was inside it, just once. I imagined confronting that thing in Elsewhere and shuddered. “With some of the imbued items I’ve seen, that might actually be worse than the wiping-yourself-out-of-existence thing.”
“Quite possibly.”
“The more you tell me about this, the more it sounds like a trap,” I said. “You’ve just basically told me that if you go to Elsewhere, you can get literally anything you wish for. Except that when you look more closely, it’s got somewhere between a high chance and a one hundred percent chance of getting you killed.”
“If it were easy, everyone would have done it.”
I sat thinking for a little while. “So what’s your advice?”
“I’m sorry, Alex,” Arachne said. “I don’t have any.”
“But you’ve just told me—”
“This is not a choice I can make for you,” Arachne said. “If you take this path, it will lead you beyond the point where I can guide you. But there is one thing I can do. Here.”
Arachne reached behind her and picked something off one of her tables, manipulating it delicately with one foreleg. She handed it to me and I took it, looking at it curiously. It was a small wrapped package, about the size of a hardback book. “What is it?”
“If you ever reach the point where your situation is truly dire, open that,” Arachne said. “It may be of some help.”
I hefted the package. It wasn’t heavy—maybe the weight of an orange. “A new item?”
“You’ll see.”
“You could just tell me.”
“Should you ever open it, you will understand why I am not telling you.”
I eyed the package. It was neatly wrapped in red paper, tied with a ribbon.
“Yes, Alex, I know you can divine its contents. Please don’t.”
“Fine.” I set it down. There aren’t many people from whom I’d take that on faith, but Arachne is one of them. We talked for another half an hour, then I left. Once I was back in the Hollow, I put the parcel in a drawer.
The Saturday after my conversation with Arachne found me, Variam, Luna, and Anne all together in the Hollow. Officially it was a birthday party for Luna—she’d turned twenty-eight three days ago, but Anne and I had been called in all day to the War Rooms. But at last we’d been able to take a break, and it had been an enormous relief to finally relax. We’d spent the day under the spreading branches, laughing and telling stories. Anne had cooked on a barbecue, and we’d eaten and drunk as the afternoon turned into twilight, stars coming out above one by one as the sky faded from blue and green to purple and gold. At last Variam and Luna had left, Luna stifling her yawns and holding Vari’s hand, and the gate had closed behind them, leaving Anne and me alone.