The innermost reaches of my mind were… well, desolate came to mind at first. It appeared to be a an island in the middle of a bleak sea; rock, mostly, granite, with some heather and the occasional bit of grass here and there. There was an ancient tower up on a hill off to the left, and a stone cottage and a lighthouse on my right. Warm light spilled form the cottage, and I knew that Liriel would be waiting inside, almost definitely in her favorite form; the one with the long dark hair, the old-fashioned night dress, and the purple eyes.

Well, maybe not. She might be Liriel the Cylon, now. I never could tell, any more.

It wasn’t a real place, of course. This was just a reflection of my mind and soul. I wondered if the color of the dirt and stone (a sort of pale gray, fading to volcanic black in places) actually symbolized anything, or if was just a suitable color for the Islands of Skellig, which is what I imagined this place resembled. I had always liked the name. Skellig. Had a ring to it.

Everything, however, was symbolic. It was obvious, for starters, that this island symbolized my conscious mind, what Fraud- Freud, sorry, never can keep that straight- would call the Ego, the I. The tower was my knowledge of magic. A real sorcerer’s tower. The cottage was my personality, what I was really like. It was solidly built if not elegant, and it was quirky. There was a Victorian style tower off to one side, and all the windows were stained glass, filled with images of myself and Liriel triumphing over all sorts of foes and situations that had never happened. My hopes, aspirations, and dreams. There was me fighting a dragon, and winning. There was me again, this time accepting a Warden’s grey cloak from a dignified fellow in a robe of ebon samite and a purple silk stole that I realized was Harry. Harry, on the Senior Council? Did I really see him as being that wise, dignified, powerful?

Guess so. He’d make a kick-ass Merlin, I do know that.

There was Liriel and me in Hell, apparently cracking wise at the Recording Demon; I was sitting on his desk with one hand doing bunny-ears behind his head, and Liriel was rolling her eyes fondly.

And, finally, there was a scene of Liriel and I sitting on the porch of a small cottage in a field of flowers, watching the sun set.

The windowsills and decorative molding (which would not generally be found on a stone cottage, buts it’s my soul and I’ll damn well decorate it as I want to) were all carved in fanciful scenes from folktales and mythology. All in all, it’s what you’d get if you tossed a Victorian, a Tudor-style, and a stone cottage into a Cusinart, and let ‘er rip.

There was a weathervane, too. It was a sword that I recognized as my blade, Stormbringer. A denarius was embedded in the pommel.

Wow. We’re certainly not short of symbolism here, aren’t we?

It was three stories, too. I didn’t know they made cottages in three stories. The probably don’t, off of Planet Cranium.

We often came here, Liriel and I, when I was sleeping. It was a nice place to relax and talk about whatever occurred to us. Quite a way to know thyself, too.

Wouldn’t Greek philosophers and Zen masters love to able to do this.

I knew, although we couldn’t see it from here, that there were even stranger things in the mainland. Since this was all in my mind, I could wish myself there in a twinkling, but that would keep ‘till later. There on the mainland was the circle of standing stones that represented my faith in… whatever. I wasn’t even sure what I believed in yet, but apparently I believed in it pretty strongly. The whole place thrummed with the quiet energy that emanated from holy artifact like the Swords of the Cross.

There was also the… ah, waddya call it? One of those geological things, when the ocean gouges a well in the rock that’s cut off from the ocean except for a thin crevice, which makes the water in it heave and boil and hiss. I can never remember the technical term, but there was one in the real world that was called the Devil’s Cauldron. The thingy represented my power. The water writhed and boiled like a living thing, and one could hardly hear oneself think over the noise.

I found it rather soothing, actually. Knowing that one had that much power in a world full of people who wanted to kill you was quite comforting.

I sighed, tore myself away from my thoughts, and walked up to the cottage.

“Cairo,” I said, as soon as I walked through the door.

“Beg pardon, sweet?” Liriel murmured, looking up from her place at the table and the large book that sat in front of her.

“We should go to Cairo. The one in Egypt, of course, the real one. We could see the pyramids, go to the Abu Simbel, and maybe see Tutanhkamun’s tomb. You know, have fun. A vacation.”

“We’re on a vacation,” she said mildly. “London, remember?”

“Liriel, we’re in a city. A big, sprawling modern city. The charms are wearing off and I’m just so tempted to smack the Limeys so hard their eyes switch sockets that it’s almost not funny. We are in serious need of much leaving, yuh?”

“Well, you do have a point,” she conceded. “The hotel is fabulous, but the food is…”

“English?”

“Mediocre.”

“Besides the tea, that’s pretty much a given. And tea is a drink, anyway.”