Chapter 10: Going Home

I'd started out wanting to experience some fantasies that I never believed could happen - and have done exactly that. I started out believing I would return home afterwards. Who, after all, gives up their home?

But along the way I've changed. I wasn't the person who had arrived here weeks - or is it months ago now? Here I now have a family, job, friends, and new roots.

I guess somehow those Zansasi know even more than we give them credit for. My map back home remained blank long enough for me to realize this, and I'm glad it did.

I finally picked it one day, intending to throw it away for good. I had just officially accepted Toymaker's offer to become his apprentice. Some day I'll be running the whole operation. But when I glanced at the map I realized that for the first time since my arrival it had gone active again. There is a countdown timer for a date several months in the future. But the route appears to lead me onwards, not back.

I'm happy to know my adventuring days aren't completely over yet. I'd already made plans for some excursions with the girls over the next few weeks, visiting the spots they liked best during their journey around Toyland. But wherever I go now, we'll all travel together. And I know we'll always return to my new home.

As for the girls, they can barely wait for our first really big vacation together, as soon as The Map gives us the word to go.