When Alice came to Earth, she did not arrive like the other witches did.
Many witches started out their time among the Earthers by finding a crack in the ground and crawling out of it, dirty and struggling, while others used lakes or ponds to begin soaked and disoriented. Some daring ones came flying, scorched, from firepits, and a few even stumbled from mirrors.
As for Alice, she dropped from the sky. The path to the ground from the hole in the sky was a vortex of clouds, furious with wind and webbed with brilliant yellow lightning. With such a friendly welcome, it was no wonder she was grinning all the way down.
She landed on her toes. The clouds all drifted apart immediately, but the wind took longer to release her, rustling her cloak and gusting across all the grass and shrubs before it properly departed. The grass and shrubs were living on hills, some sharp and some gently rolling.
She was not far from her destination - she could see the city from here, in fact, beyond one of the sudden drops. Alice’s aim had been good. This was not exactly shocking, but Alice chose to see it as a sign of good things to come.
Bouncing on her feet, Alice began to walk towards the city called Coral Meadows, in search of a man who wanted nothing less than for her to find him.
In every collection of people all across the world, there is one person with a secret job. Almost always, they also have an extra, not-secret job, because the secret one doesn’t pay especially well.
These people have called themselves many things over their time, but their original name has stuck. Probably this is because it’s the simplest, or maybe it’s only because those who named them don’t see any reason to call them anything else.
These people with the secret jobs are called The Knowers, because the secret job is to Know. They Know the thing that most of us have forgotten, or that we refuse to acknowledge. A very long time ago, they even reminded us of it from time to time, but now they mostly only tell those in charge of their particular community.
In one of those collections of people, one Knower was shuffling up and down the hall to his boss’s office. His name was Joseph Slatts, and he was hoping vaguely that waiting would somehow make the whole business less terrible as he completed his slow circuits. Knowers did not choose to be such – the Knowledge just sang in their brain, true and pure and undeniable by even the best psychiatrist. Joseph had tried every reasonable method he could cook up (which was not that many, really) to try and shut up that song of Knowledge, but now here he was, thinking that if there was such a thing as an Unknower, he would have been that, instead.
There was not, though, and therefore he was not, and instead he was knocking on his boss’s door, stepping in, explaining the situation. Joseph Slatts was a tall, soft man who tried to carry himself as if he were neither of these, with muddled hair that was probably grey and eyes that were somehow dingy, as if he planned to shine them up when he thought someone might look into them. His boss did end up peeking in towards his face with a frown, eventually, as Joseph Slatts haltingly spilled his news, but the boss knew that Joseph was not whimsical enough to make up something so fantastic. Anyway, Joseph Slatts had his job for a reason, and it seemed that the reason was upon them.
“I see,” the boss said finally. “Well, welcome her, then. I’ll let Mayor Buxley know as soon as she comes back from her vacation.”
“Oh…are you…sure, sir? This is – ahem – you have the authority to, erm, turn her away, if you’re concerned…”
“No, no, nothing to be concerned about, is there?” He sipped his coffee briskly. “This sort of thing happens all the time, eh? If other cities can manage, we certainly can too. Just make sure she won’t be disruptive. Go on, then.”
He nodded to the door, and though Joseph Slatts was not convinced the boss was fully comprehending just how grave the situation was, he wandered morosely back to his own office and waited. Just as Joseph Knew of their new guest, their guest would Know of him.
He waited in his pictureless room, fiddling with his fingernails. He considered clenching and unclenching his fists, but tried it once, and found it made his tendons ache, and proceeded with twiddling with his fingernails again. Shuffling papers off to their proper departments and sorting emails was just so much more rewarding than…having to really do something. He rearranged some paperclips and sent them flying from his desk when the knock came at the door.
“Come in!” He called, hoping the door would disguise the crack in his voice. He battled his tallness again, so the wide window at his back framed him in light, and he waited, and the doorknob turned.
The door opened, and Joseph Slatts held his breath, and in stepped…
…a small girl.
The girl could have at least tried to appear as though she fit in, Joseph Slatts thought with sinking shoulders, but in all fairness, it probably wouldn’t have helped much.
The girl’s short hair looked like it was trying to be a nice, average dark color, but instead of black or brown, it had only managed something purplish. Her skin was shockingly pale, and her eyes might generously be called brown, or less generously amber, or honestly yellow. The boots, cloak, and gloves she wore were leathery and oversized, and though her hat was just as leathery, it was so large on the child that even ‘oversized’ didn’t do it justice. Also, it seemed rather stomped on, so the tall point flopped over to one side.
“Hello, sir,” the girl announced, with her shoulders back and head held high.
“Hello,” he said warily. The girl waited, and Joseph Slatts remembered the rules, and introduced himself first.
“I’m Alice Inkling,” she said cheerily, with a quick and polite curtsey, “and I’ve come to Serve your town as a witch.”
Joseph Slatts smiled, not quite as politely. “Yes.” He coughed. “Yes, well, you would be the first witch in Coral Meadows, you know.”
“I do know that, sir,” she said brightly.
“Ah. Well, good, then…” His fingers fluttered at the edges of the desk. “Well, Miss Inkling, what – what are you planning to…that is, you’ll be Serving as…?”
“I’ll be a private investigator, sir. According to your records, Coral Meadows doesn’t have any others right now.”
Joseph Slatts nodded. So he couldn’t refuse her on the claim that the need was already filled, then. “Our city doesn’t get a lot of crime,” he tried.
“Oh, that’s true, but an awful lot of your cases are left unsolved,” the little girl chirped away.
“Don’t you worry that it will be dangerous?”
Alice only raised her eyebrows at him. “I think I’m prepared pretty well for that. Sir.”
“Right…well…” Joseph drew himself up suddenly. “Did you come alone? Without supervision?”
“We always do… Sir.”
“Ah, yes - yes, well, you see, here in Coral Meadows, documentation is very important – and rules – and in order to run your own business here, you’d need to be an adult, or have one doing business with you.” He smiled again, and this time it was a tidy thing of victory.
Alice stood quite still. What this sallow office-man had failed to realize was that Alice actually had given great care to her appearance. Her fluffy hair had been tucked as best it could into her hat, and she wore a common dress, as girls were known to do, and she had even chosen yellow for it, to fight the depiction of a warty woman in black she had seen in her studies. It was just good sense to wear sturdy boot and gloves, and there was nothing to be done about the shape of the hat – it was a representation of who she was.
What the Knower also did not know was that Alice was from the Kingdom of Little, so named to reflect the size of its denizens. So when Joseph Slatts continued eagerly, “You do seem awfully young for spending your Serve in such a difficult position,” thinking that she was nine or maybe ten, Alice was not ruffled any further. Alice knew how young she appeared to be, after all, when she was actually quite firmly thirteen. To be perfectly fair, that was still young to begin her Serve, but Alice hadn’t graduated early for no reason.
So she was bright when she laughed. “You’re so kind, sir! And my teachers told me that some people would be unfriendly, so I’m very glad that you’re so concerned for me. I didn’t know about that rule, about needing an adult, in this city.” They would never have such a silly rule back home. “So, no, I don’t have my own adult, and I don’t know where to find one.”
This man, this Joseph Slatts, this Earther, was trying to impede her, and acting as if she would never realize. As if a witch on her Serve might not know every rule Knowers were bound by. So Alice hid her relish and satisfaction when she continued, in her most innocent voice, with the magic words: “Since I have no adult of my own, I will need to be provided with one.” And her polite smile remained politely in place when Joseph Slatts’ little color drained from his face.
Should a witch require an additional mundane resource upon arrival, read the rule, the Knower shall provide this resource, within reasonable limits, if requested. Just like they knew of magic, the Knowers knew this rule, deep in their heart and bones.
“Well – yes, then,” he mumbled. “I…er…” Joseph Slatts didn’t know many people well enough to ask them for favors, but that would not be enough to clear Joseph Slatts from his responsibility. “Oh! Actually – I know just the person.”
Alice didn’t bother listening in while Joseph Slatts fiddled with an Earther gadget on his desk and began speaking into it (hardly worth her attention if he wasn’t trying to be secretive), and instead peered around the room. The carpet was flat and starchy under her boots, and the walls were a lazy sludge color. For a Knower, somehow it all seemed very drab and boring. Perhaps that was just because it was Earth. Witches and wizards who had performed their Serve often complained that things were too brown and dull here. They said those things to the Queen, though, so Alice had rather thought it was mostly to please her.
“Your adult is on her way,” Joseph Slatts said as he sunk again into his chair.
“Thank you, sir.”
“You’ll also need a building to operate from,” he said weakly, as if even he were unconvinced of his challenge. “I can’t provide you that.”
“Oh, that’s alright,” Alice said as her grin unrestrained itself. “I’ve brought my own building.”