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netherworld of which you speak.”
    Alesia sighed deeply. “Please, sir, tell me that is not true or my heart will surely break.”
    “Come closer where I can get a better look at you. You have no reason to fear me. I cannot touch you from my present location.”
    Alesia looked him up and down. He could have been in the same room with her or somewhere far away in another realm of existence. The way he wavered behind the fog was completely unnatural. “You’re standing right in front of me.”
    He chuckled slightly. “So it would appear, but that’s not the case.”
    She dropped the shovel handle and approached the shimmering aberration. “You are not easier to see up close.”
    He tapped his fingers on his device again and huffed loudly. “This doesn’t have the processing power required to clear up our connection. I had hoped moving closer would help. We’ll have to live with this level of interference, I’m afraid. Now, what is this nonsense about dying? I can see you well enough to tell that you’re far too young and beautiful to die for no good reason.”
    Alesia could feel the blush forming in her cheeks from the strange, ghostly man’s compliment. “If I were old and ugly, would it be acceptable for me to die for no reason?”
    “That’s not what—well, no, you’ve misunderstood. I only meant that you...” He puffed out a heavy sigh.
    Alesia giggled at his inability to formulate an answer. “There is a man in my village that I must wed, should I ever return. Given the choice, I’d rather die. I came to the castle hoping the legends of my village were true, that the spirits that live here take away those who enter. But you are the first spirit I’ve seen.”
    “I assure you I am not a spirit. I am very much alive.”
    “Is it light where you are? My oil lamp has burned out, but the corridor is no longer dark.”
    “Yes, my interior lighting is translating through the Window. I don’t believe it is actually passing, but instead causing the Window on your side to produce a duplicate of the photons that strike it on this side. Just to be clear, you’re in a castle as well? An ancient stone structure?”
    “Yes, can you not see it for yourself?” Alesia motioned to her surroundings.
    “Curious. Of all the Realities that intersect here, there are three which lie inside a castle. Yours, mine, and one other, which I have been unable to locate since this morning.”
    His unusual language made little sense to her. “What ever are you speaking of?”
    “This fortress houses a junction point between universes or times or dimensions, perhaps all three. My colleagues and I were never able to determine with certainty all the different things that merge in this location. I call them realities simply for convenience. The place where you exist and the place where I exist are inaccessible to each other in the whole of space-time, but for some reason no one has been able to determine, they come together here. The fabric of my Reality is very near to the fabric of yours. Almost touching, but not quite.”
    Alesia moved her face closer to the mist, trying to see him clearly. “So, are you saying that if I reach out I cannot touch you?”
    “Unfortunately not, but give it a try if you like so you’ll know that I truly cannot harm you.” He raised his hand and extended his palm toward her.
    She brought her hand to his, and they came together with a clap. A ripple like someone had dropped a pebble into a pond spread out vertically through the air. “I don’t know, you feel awfully solid to me. Far more solid than you look.”
    He raised his gaze to their hands and stared wide-eyed as if totally bewildered. “No, this is not possible. There’s no Doorway here, there never has been, only a Window, and two Realities cannot touch through a Window. It’s impossible.” He interlaced his fingers with hers.
    Alesia sighed and gripped his hand tightly. “You said fabric separates our Realities. Perhaps we pushed