Welcome, you’ve stumbled onto part 4 of The Tori Story Series. If this is the first time you have visited this realm you might want to get caught up.

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A deafening crack exploded in the Peddler’s ears, leaving him astonished and confused.

Worse yet, vulnerable.

What the hell? The ringing in his ears made it impossible to collect his bearings. For a few moments as he traveled through the void, he was lost. He couldn’t remember where he was going.

When he materialized, he found himself crouched down in a forest. Why he was there he couldn’t recall and to add even more to his confusion, he stared directly into a sterile control room. For a fraction of a second, he locked eyes with Daniel.

Daniel? Region 5, Dimension Lain, Andor, Tori… it all flooded back to him.

“Shit.” He cursed, then stumbled off down the path and out of view of the lens. Hoping beyond hope Daniel was too preoccupied with the explosion to make any connections.

What now? What now? He repeated to himself as he ran.

Borrow something.

The Peddler took off down the well-worn path at full speed, focusing his entire attention on the space around him. He glided over the rocks that littered the trail, and gracefully avoided contact with the myriad of low hanging branches.

Were the trees offering him easy passage? Or did his mere presence command subservience?

Whatever the case, it was a spectacular dance of man and nature. Well, it was until a thorny locust grabbed at the long pony tail that hung at the base of his neck. Was it curiosity or defiance? I really can’t say.

At any rate, the thorny locust wanted more than a fleeting glance of this handsome stranger, who perhaps, she sensed, didn’t quite belong. The Peddler’s head jerked back causing his mind to waver. Distracted.

And that’s when the rest of the forest caught on.

No, this stranger doesn’t belong.

A root wrapped around the Peddler’s foot and he crashed to the ground. His forehead slammed into the corner of a jagged rock. A gash opened above his right eye. Deep and wide.

Blood flowed.

With might and main, the Peddler scrambled back to his feet and pressed on. So much more difficult now that he lost his influence over the forest. In addition, the steady flow of blood obscured his vision. Now, he was stuck wrestling limbs and branches as he sprinted along the trail.

How on earth does Tori do this? He wondered. Then remembered she doesn’t.

He stood an entire foot above Tori, who stood eye to eye with perhaps the tallest Andor had to offer. Indeed, these weren’t low hanging limbs at all.

Here in this dimension, the Peddler was a giant. Feared but tolerated, and that only because he brought curious, albeit invaluable, treasures from faraway lands.

At once, the Peddler shot out of the forest into the small clearing directly behind the cabin.

This close? I landed this close? The unexpected explosion, he realized, threw him entirely off course and now both he and Tori were in dire straights.

Exposed.

With the sleeve of his shirt, he wiped the blood from his right eye, desperate to locate something – anything a borrower might feasibly take.

In that moment he heard footfall, and the familiar intoxicating hum of the woman he adored.

Tori. She couldn’t know he was here. Not yet.

Panicked, he grabbed the first thing he laid eyes on, a spade, and dashed around the other side of the cabin.

While he fled, he chanted an ancient mantra of pseudo creation. An old trick designed to shift space. It took time, as all creation does, and by the time the alternate void emerged, he had raced for nearly four minutes, clearing what he hoped was at least a mile.

Not ideal, but it would have to do.

He jumped. His foot, however, caught on a large root. As a result he fell just shy of the void’s entrance.

This is not my day.

Unquestionably it was, because in that exact moment the purpose of his visit to Andor dawned on him.

Penicillin.

The penicillin he brought for Tori from Belton was the only thing in his pack that he’d never smuggled into Andor before. Without a doubt, it didn’t belong. An Incompatible. If he carried it back into the void there would be yet another explosion, one he might not survive.

The Peddler unzipped his pack, and fished through its contents. His frantic search yielded nothing. Frustrated, for truly he didn’t have time for this, he dumped all the contents of his pack out on the forest floor.

There.

He wrapped his over sized hand around the amber bottle.

“Think, Peddler,” He voiced aloud as he focused his attention on the task at hand.

It was comical, if you had been there to see it. For in one hand the Peddler held the spade and the other the bottle. His next step obvious, yet still, it took a moment to register.

The spade.

He dug between the roots of the nearest tree and buried the penicillin. Yes, it was a shallow grave but he had precious little time for anything else.

This is too risky, he thought, but really what choice did he have? He shoveled the rest of his gadgets and wares back into his pack.

Glancing about he tried to find a landmark, something to help him recognize this spot when he returned. A felled tree, a boulder? No use, he was surrounded by trees. Only trees. All the same color, height and thickness.

Not a good sign – this forest was entirely too uniform. Too perfect. And the Peddler had been too preoccupied with the penicillin to notice.

Had he stumbled into Keeper Andor’s realm? His control center? Impossible. When he first brought Tori here, he made sure to place her as far away from Andor as possible.

He had to – Tori was irresistible.

And yet, here it was.

Had Andor fallen under Tori’s spell and shifted space in order to be near her? A cloud of jealous rage descended over the Peddler.

Perhaps, he had left Tori alone for too long.

He pulled off his shirt and draped it over a nearby tree. Not the one he buried the penicillin under. Just to throw off… who? He didn’t know, but he always had to consider the unlikely scenario. It was his minute attention to each and every detail that kept him alive.

He grabbed his pack and slung it over his broad back. And if I may, I will tell you that if the thorny locust had seen his bare, perfectly chiseled chest, she may never have let him go.

The Peddler offered up a song of obscurity, just to be safe. He wouldn’t be gone long, just long enough to convince Daniel he was, in fact, a borrower.

At last, he stepped into the void and focused his attention on the spade. He chanted the song of lost things found.

Immediately, the void shifted and reemerged behind the cabin. The Peddler returned the spade and reentered the void. Then commenced the song of destruction.

Gradually, the void began to wain and at the very last moment when it had all but disappeared, the peddler skimmed back into Andor.

This time, unnoticed.

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