Well well well! Last time in Chapter one, we met the odd-but-darling Emil Lockhart, a 19 year old college student who was allowed into the Sanctum Sanctorum to begin training under the Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Strange. Only Emil isn't like any apprentice that Strange has had before! She refuses to learn to read cards, cast spells, or make elixirs, and not even Wong trusts her -- for good reason, perhaps?
I woke up the next morning, and looked around to see that I was in a room decorated in a cream and crimson color scheme, with bursts of flowers all over the bedspread, the wallpaper, the upholstery on the chairs, all of it. The furniture was all a dark wood, oak? Cherry? It was still ugly.
Maybe this was the closest they could get to a girly pink room.
There was a light tap on the door, and I heard, “miss Lockhart?”
I threw off the covers and rushed, tripping and falling down the dias to the main floor of the room, and then opening the door. “Good morning Mr. Wong!” I smiled.
“Erm, good morning. The Doctor prefers to eat breakfast at around 7 o'clock, and you will join him.”
“Yes sir,” I answered.
Rushing to get dressed, showered, and pretty, I pulled on a pair of black pants, a blue shirt with roll-up sleeves and a button up front, and a pair of boots with pretty little heels, the kind I loved. My shoes were my one real vanity – anything else didn't matter as much. I wound a ribbon through my hair, tying it as I darted down the stairs, then slid into a chair just as the grandfather clock in the parlor rang out for seven o'clock.
“Safe!” I hissed.
Strange had just walked into the room as I folded my hands in my lap. He looked tidier, and his beard had been trimmed much thinner, his hair still raked back a bit lazily, but he smelled like expensive cologne and he looked like a walking cover for Sexy Ex-Neurosurgeon Monthly (which in turn sounded like something I should have been reading).
“Well well, look who's awake.”
“Wong told me that you wanted to see me?” I asked, standing up. He walked down the dining room to the chair that faced away from windows that showed sunlight even though it was nearly 60 degrees out.
“You do eat, don't you?” he asked snippily.
I didn't answer (he didn't expect one), and I sat back in my seat at the other end of the table. “So. . . how was your night?” I asked, trying to be polite. The Doctor looked up as he unfolded his newspaper. “Fine,” he replied.
“Awesome,” I muttered. Great.
It occurred to me that he was wearing a white button up shirt with roll up sleeves and black slacks, and I facepalmed. Again, great, he probably thought I was insane for real this time.
“Tell me, do you have a lot of experience getting ready at the last minute?”
“Uh . . .sorry, I don't usually get up early, and --”
“That is not what I asked.”
“Right, of course it's not. Yes, unfortunately I do.”
“That can be good. It can mean that you aren't vain. Except for your boots.”
“I think it's safe to say that,” I chuckled.
“But you've found time to wash, put on makeup, brush your teeth, and do your hair.”
“Yes sir.”
This was going to end in me getting insulted in some way, I knew it.
“But you didn't find time to iron your shirt or your jeans, shine your shoes, or trim your nails.”
“You didn't ask me to do those things, for one, and for two, my appearance has nothing to do with my attitude or how hard I work. You didn't iron your shirt either – I'll bet Wong did it. And as for how you're apparently better than me, you didn't put anything in your hair, you didn't shine your shoes, and your nails are looking pretty undertrimmed themselves, Doctor.”
He actually dropped his newspaper and stared at me. Glancing at his nails, he smiled and said, “very good.”
I smiled widely and blushed a little as I realized that I'd passed a test!
Wong brought in a tray with plates on it, then placed them in front of me and Strange, then disappeared.
Eggs, sunny side up, toast in a wire rack thingy, jam, bacon, strawberries, coffee, orange juice, and milk were all set out already.
“Jeez, sir, that is a metric butt-ton of food.”
“Eat it.”
“Kay.”
“You'll want a full stomach later. Right after breakfast we'll begin.”
“Ow!”
“Quit complaining. This will help me to fine tune your training. So I can work on the precise areas you need help in.”
I glared at the doctor as I held the same glass ball as yesterday. Only now, I had to squeeze it between my hands, and it put the room in shadows. “Hmmm. . .” murmured the Doctor. “That's enough, you may be finished.”
I loosened my grip on the ball and set it on the table, stopping it to make sure it didn't roll. “You may be dismissed from training. Go find Wong, he'll have work for you.”
I nodded and left the room, watching Doctor Strange as I did so. “Um. . . Doctor?”
“Yes?”
“Nevermind.”
He nodded once, and I hurried off, nearly bumping into Wong. “Good, you're here. I must finish work here in the Sanctum, but we're out of milk,” he said in his slightly accented speech. “Go get more.”
“Um, okay,” I said, feeling a bit like a magical errand girl, but still being fine with that. “Whole milk or skim?” I asked hesitantly.
“A gallon of both. And hurry it up!”
“Yes sir!” I cried, and I hurried down the hall, grabbing my coat on the way out. I heard Strange and Wong talking, then paused to button the two neat rows of shiny silver buttons. “Emil, wait,” I heard, and Strange grabbed my shoulder.
“Put this on,” he said as he handed me a little silver ring. It had a simple mother-of-pearl stone in a silver setting surrounded by delicate etching.
“What is it?” I asked, not taking it until I had an answer.
“It's a tracking ring. So I know where you are.”
“You don't trust me?” I asked.
“I have enemies that would be very interested in knowing who you are and why you've been in the Sanctum Sanctorum all night. If you are attacked, then this ring will help me find you.”
“You think I need you to protect me?” I asked. It wasn't a sarcastic question, but a straight up one that demanded an honest answer.
“I don't know. But you're my apprentice and I am your master, and you will do as I say,” he ordered, and his hand started to shake. His fingers were pale, long and thin and made for the delicate work of a surgeon. I took the ring, my fingers brushing his. They weren't shaking from cold, but if it wasn't the temperature then what was it?
“Yes sir,” I said, and I took the ring, slipping it on my right ring finger. “I'll be back in a while.”
“Don't take forever.”
I almost wondered if the proximity to the grocery store was why the Sanctum was where it was. I literally had to walk a block and there it was. I grabbed what I was sent for, but as I was walking through the aisles, I was joined by a tall, scrawny blond man with bright red spectacles on. “Hiya,” he said with a grin.
Power rolled off of him in waves, but it was the kind of power that made me sick to my stomach and made my head scream “bad news!”
“Hi,” I snapped.
“Need a hand?” he asked, and when he held out his hand, I jumped back, seeing his face. “McNee!?”
“Long time no see, Locked Hart.”
“Get the hell away from me,” I snarled, feeling spare energy surge through my fingers, and I gasped as the milk cartons exploded all over my legs, the floor, and my little black boots with the solid little heels.
I cried out, then turned and ran from McNee, turning and slipping down the laundry aisle. I landed on my right leg, my hip slamming into the ground, but I jumped up and kept running.
McNee wasn't supposed to find me. His accursed shop was a million miles away from here. He made me sick, made me scared, and I wished I could run faster so I could get farther away, as futile an effort it may have been.
I turned into the main aisle, darting in between carts and looking like a weird version of an action movie heroine, only running from nothing.
Every aisle I looked down had McNee at the end of it, but since I wasn't paying attention, and I slammed into a solid wall of wool-coat-clad Doctor Strange. He grabbed me and held me to his side under his arm, then pushed his hand forward and forced an approaching McNee back and into a stacked tower of canned peaches.
I was surrounded on all sides, Doctor Strange on the one side, his red cloak at my back and other side, and McNee dashing towards us at my front. The Doctor pulled his cloak around us as a shield, then threw up a portal and threw me through it, and I landed on the sidewalk outside the store, beside a very angry Doctor Strange. I looked up at him as the rain fell down, and as I expected, he was angry.
“You have a lot of explaining to do.”
What's this!? Could there be a snake in Strange's path? Why is McNee so interested in Emil? What is the Cloak of Levitation made of!? (I'd wager it's a silk/cotton/yak fur blend)
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