“You want me to summon you in the morning then? Usual time?” Damien asked Antefalken. Antefalken looked to Edwyrd.
“Hopefully that will be enough time for me to find Rupert and to get the rest done. If needed, we can split up while you do things in the Courts. We can then join up to investigate Ramses’ place. If I still haven’t found Rupert, we can make other arrangements.” Antefalken nodded at Edwyrd’s suggestion.
“So, time to go then?” Damien asked them.
Edwyrd smiled at Gastropé who was looking at him. “Care to come along?” he asked, grinning.
“Uh, thanks, but I’ve been there enough in the last month or so.” Gastropé grinned back, rather uncomfortably though.
“It ain’t exactly Pismo Beach.” Edwyrd said, referencing some line from a childhood memory. The others just looked at him curiously. “Never mind.” He looked to Damien.
“Mind if I just leave my clothes here, since I’d guess we’ll leave from here and arrive here again?” He asked the wizard.
Damien gestured with his hand, “Fine with me.”
“Clothes?” Gastropé asked.
“I kind of get tired of having to buy new ones all the time, so I take off my old ones before changing.” Edwyrd told him.
“Kind of a pain, I guess?” Gastropé said, trying to be casual.
“Only when I rip them.” Edwyrd said with a smile. He’d do this quickly so as not to give Gastropé time to think. He decided to try something he’d thought practiced in the storeroom.
Edwyrd grasped the flame in his mind. He carefully adjusted it so as not to burn anything and then assumed the form of fire. Before Gastropé could even blink, Edwyrd’s entire body was made of flame. His robe and clothes fell through the insubstantial fire to the ground. He was careful not burn them as they fell. As he stepped away from them, he let his form change.
The Edwyrd-shaped flame suddenly grew to touch the ceiling. As suddenly as the flame had appeared, it was gone. In its place stood Tom, the demon. All in all, it had taken about five to ten seconds. Definitely faster than the old way, and a very fast undressing.
Gastropé was staring in open mouth surprise. Tom hoped not having time to contemplate things would make it easier for the wizard. Damien just shook his head in surprise. Antefalken was just smiling, obviously somewhat impressed by the demonstration. Tom reached down and carefully picked up his clothes. He gingerly began to fold them.
As he did so, he commented on it, as casually as he could, trying to put Gastropé at ease. “You never think, but it’s the simple tasks, like folding your clothes without shredding them, that are a real pain when you let your nails grow too long.” He waved his hand slowly and minutely to punctuate his point. He was staring at Gastropé the entire time. He was also smiling, although with his mouth closed so as not to show any fangs.
Gastropé, looking his typically pale self in Tom’s presence, smiled weakly. Obviously trying to relax under the circumstances. Tom looked to Antefalken. “How about my cave first?” Antefalken simply nodded.
“Fine with me,” the bard told Tom.
Placing his clothes on a small table, Edwyrd visualized his cave and a thin wall in the air between him and it. Having done so, he proceeded to produce a flame at the thinnest point. The flame ate away at the membranous layer. Eating a circle in the air. To observers it appeared that Tom had produced a ball of fire that had spread into a ring shape. The flaming ring looked like a window into Tom’s cave.
As it got wider, Tom sighed in frustration. He didn’t see any Rupert on the other side. He’d hoped this would be easy. He hoped the boy was still alive, even if it wasn’t going to be easy. “After you,” he gestured to Antefalken. Antefalken stepped through the ring. Tom nodded to the two wizards and followed. The ring contracted behind him and closed off the hole between worlds.
Gastropé breathed a sigh of relief as the hole closed behind the demons. Tom was gone. He’d tried to maintain his calm as best he could, but it had been difficult. It had been really hard to accept what Edwyrd had told him and do so in a way that he could rationalize intellectually. When Edwyrd had suddenly became Tom though, that had brought the whole thing home. That had made it real, not just a theoretical exercise.
“Had you any idea?” Gastropé asked Damien.
“What? That Edwyrd and the demon Tom were the same person?” Gastropé nodded. “No, actually I didn’t. I hadn’t heard enough of your adventure to put it together. And this demons changing shape is new to me.”
Gastropé shrugged at the implicit mild reprimand. “Well, I was there for most of it, and I didn’t get it. It all makes sense now: how Edwyrd just showed up. That had seemed strange at the time. But who knew demons could shape change?” Gastropé looked at his hands.
“I don’t know,” Gastropé continued, “like I said, Edwyrd was just such a reasonable person; it’s hard to imagine him and Tom as the same being.”
