"I mean, English has a lot of words, and it will have more, but, yes, probably not one for specifically the contemplation of an idea in gestalt.  Unless it stole one from your native tongue.  As far as whether that would work...  I think so.  And I can probably rig something up if it doesn't cohere."

"Oh! If you can just steal words, let's all do a za'aman!"

There's a feeling like if a brain had a dialtone, and it becomes possible for everyone other than Red Tornado to feel what the others are feeling and align themselves toward it — a kind of hyper-empathy, or an emotional scratchpad sketched out in the space between the group's minds.

:This is what the compass feels like to me—:

        :The world is a cycle and nature is a cycle and people are a cycle and nature belongs inside the world and people belong inside the world and the world is inside nature. A stationary stone in a lively river — a metaphor and a place and an object of worship — the beauty of nature reflected in the beauty of people reflected in the beauty of the world. A tree and the love of the tree and the idea of the tree, a pattern that occurs over and over and over and— The world is a cycle and nature is a cycle and—:

"Words are all, eventually, made up."

The tail end of her musing about there being a (at least one Mars can have multiple cultures that's like saying Earth would only have one language) Martian language being interesting because they're a species of telepaths and one wouldn't necessarily think that they'd need to have fixed concept-referents when the live ones as transmitted over psychic communication would certainly have fidelity enough to not necessarily require fixity slips through to the link for a moment, but she's promptly caught up in the magic.  Because it makes sense.  It makes so much sense that she thinks this is how she'd reverse-engineer druidic transformations (or forward-engineer, technically) -

Alicia Thorn's thoughts are a whirlwind, but she thinks she's found something to hold up as the key to the lock.  Not only this, but even her own efforts at...

(The thought fades out of the link before it finishes, but she thinks she could spin constructing Villarosa as a work of the same principles as this.)

Oh, and also: "...Red Tornado.  It may be possible for us to syllogism you into the telepathic link; what I do not know is whether you would consider it preferable or wise."

"Given that my primary purpose here is to not be vulnerable to telepathic intrusion, I think it is probably not a good idea for you to attempt to make my mind telepathically accessible," Red Tornado notes. "Hopefully I will be able to enter Jarhanpur by following you, but if I cannot, I will stay with the bioship and provide you with a secured fallback point."

She nods.  "That works."

Now.  To load the dice of fate in their favor as best they can, as they wheel around for another go.

This might be complicated.

She knows what she knows, and feels what she feels.  And she's pretty sure M'gann has it, too.  But the others aren't her, and cross-'sidekick' cooperation is all new enough that it's unlikely many, if any, of the away team are going to do anything but fumble at this.  Hell, she's fumbling at this, despite having histories with mind powers.  So she should probably work out a way to bind the group together, for the purpose of passage - probably something with Order like she was thinking could work for Red Tornado - and they ought to backstop the emotional state with...

Meditative practices, shall we say, to ease the uptake.

She can contribute that, at least.  She knows the feeling of receptive trances well enough.

(There are other things she will be bringing to the table, but this is the one that requires the most time to sink in properly, and therefore what she starts with.)

It's odd, to stand behind yourself like this.  But someone needs to steer this, if it's happening - and it can't be Alicia Thorn.  It would break her focus, and her focus is exactly what they want to use to hopefully synchronize everyone.  So the Fatebinder steps in, to nudge a self that she could be, in other lives.  To handle the remaining parts of their wild hopes that require actual thought.

And because she is a better poet, though the linguistic sleight of hand they intend to play here is not, strictly speaking, a matter of specifically poetry.

"We come now to the test of the borders of Jarhanpur; it is a test of understanding.  We come to this test as a group, united in purpose, having shared our understanding of the task ahead with one another.  For if we share our understanding of the task, then if even but one of us understands what is asked, we shall all surely pass onwards - for the understanding of the task is shared among us.  Thus I declare and thus it shall be."

And now, for their next trick.

A simple construct, born of the need to open the way.  A 'lock' - a simple slitted bar - and a 'key', held in her hand yet encompassing the za'aman's gestalt understanding, that is neatly slid through and turned, in a symbolic action.  As below, so above.

(It should be noted, for the record, that the completed construct is in the shape of an ankh.)

Once, twice, thrice, and done.  Shall they pass?

A shimmering fold of space on the border between India and Pakistan, between what is and what is not, shakes, and parts, and reveals beyond it a rich green field. The field is bisected by a road, flat and straight, paved with worn yellow stone. The road leads up to an opulent gate, decorated in many bright colors, past which an enormous city can be seen — towers of old stone, covered over with vines and greenery, yet still showing their red and orange decorations through the leaves.

...The unfurling of Jarhanpur feels like a disconcertingly familiar homecoming that she has nevertheless never felt before, because, as she is still listening, still attuning herself to the world - she can feel that the land beneath them is alive.  The surprise knocks her right out of her trance, but she can hardly miss it now.

"...It's alive."

...One doesn't do world-saving adventures with a shaman without picking up the basics of Spirit, no matter that her preference is Arcane with a dash of Void.

And with Jarhanpur, the land itself, most likely to be what is most impacted by this...

She focuses, in that paradoxical way, and reaches out.

It is not, truly, words that she lets drift from her into the eddying currents of magic.  But words are what the author has to convey what she does say, so a degree of translation will be provided.

<Greetings and apologies, o living land of Jarhanpur.>  <I bear with me ill tidings, of Chaos and its Lords (of this one in particular), meddling with what they should not be permitted to endanger.>  <I bear with me the hope of a solution, to restore what they have set askew.>  <I bear a duty to set right what I have let be wronged, in my haste to secure an escape for a land beseiged by Chaos from worse torments.>  <I ask of you that <we: the people of the Justice League, and those of Atlantis whose aid we may have need of if your people are unable or unwilling to help us with this matter> may be allowed to do so.>  <I ask of you that you share knowledge of the wrong that has been done to you by the Witch Boy, so that we may more readily remedy it.>  <I ask of you that what help you would permit us will be given.>  <I cannot promise that there will be success, or that what has been done is truly known to be possible to fix, but promise I do, if you would have my word, that my first priority, should no greater threat reveal itself, will be to fix this.>  <Greetings and apologies, o living land of Jarhanpur.>

<Greetings to one who has traveled far.> <You come to a place of peace, and of balance.> <You come to a place that has been upset by the arrival of a foreign land and a foreign people, yes, but a place that will return to its center in time, as all things must.> <You come to that place as, perhaps, the manifestation of Nature's restoring force — the means by which peace and balance might once again be known.> <You come to a place where the gates of the Great City of Man stand, separating what is within from what is without.> <You come to this place as seekers of Justice, and of Knowledge; welcome, so long as you respect the laws of this place.> <You come to a place that may act as a bridge, to take you to where you want to be, and to where the foreign land is.> <You come to Jarhanpur.> <Greetings to one who has traveled far.>

Right.  Right.  Okay.

<I thank you, spirit of Jarhanpur.>

She shakes herself loose from the currents of the world, pulling herself back into her body, and opens her mouth to speak.

It takes a few tries.

"Okay.  Okay.  Okay.  So.  A) The Witch Boy did, indeed, let-qua-make Bialya land here.  Not that I think he'd bother to have lied about his whims in the middle of having them, but now we have external corroboration of where Bialya went.

"B) Jarhanpur has a genius loci, or a land spirit, or...  Take your pick of relevant terminology.

"C) I was able to - make contact, with said genuis loci.  Don't ask me how, I'll try to tell you and then we'll get lost on a weird magic tangent."

She finds herself looking at Kid Flash's reaction to this one.

"D) So long as we don't go breaking laws - I didn't get a specific sense that there was necessarily anything that wasn't in line with Earthling, eh, common sense, about what sorts of things you shouldn't do, but considering the thematics here, don't go littering - we are welcome here by the land's spirit.

"E) I believe it implied we should head for the city?  Which is, on the one hand, straightforward, but on the other hand wandering into hidden lands seems to halfway always turn into a fight that we would not have needed.  Either that, or it offered to point me in the direction of Bialya on its own recognizance.  I didn't get as clear a sense of the specific meaning of the two - eh....  Phrases, in their conjunction, as I'd have liked.  But we probably should speak to the local authorities - because it's polite, on the one hand, and they're presumably not supervillains, but also because they might know who could and would help put Bialya back where it ought to be.

"...And, uh, F), Jarhanpur does indeed want us to put Bialya back where it should be, I think.

"...I don't think it sensed the Witch Boy taking an active interest in preserving the present state of affairs, no matter how out-of-character preserving anything would be for the sort of thing the Witch Boy is - or surely it would have mentioned a -- Lord of Chaos," she says, barely catching the expletive before it escapes into the wild, "but I'll.  Try to keep an eye out for him anyway.  Who knows if he's decided to literally haunt the narrative instead of pinning himself to a physical location."  She shudders, and hopes she hasn't given him ideas.

"So.  Follow the yellow brick road, please, Miss Martian."

She does not entirely manage to stifle her amusement at having said the line.

One of the lesser known benefits of super-speed: it lets you roll your eyes very quickly and still look perfectly attentive.

"... right! Here we go, then."

Miss Martian floats through the tear in space, and waits until the others have crossed before floating up to the gate. From the other side of the portal, the view is inverted: luscious green fields and jungles, backed by towering white mountains, and a ragged tear leading back to the scrubby badlands in which the bioship is parked.

"I guess we ... knock?"

She builds up a charge of telekinesis and casts Knock knocks politely on the gate.

A slot in the gate pulls back, revealing a guard in a red plumed helmet.

"State your names and purpose."

Miss Martian glances back at Wildcard. On the one hand, she has the compass still, which is presumably why she's in the lead. But on the other hand, she's only forty eight, and Wildcard seems to have a better handle on what's going on.

...She's like a couple decades younger than you but okay you know what sure.

Uh.

One second.

Intro...ductions?

aaaaaaaa.  Alicia Thorn why could this not be your problem.  It all seemed so simple from in there.

Okay we know why - she doesn't have a superhero name and would not take to one if it were offered - but still.

Okay.  Rule one of Introductions In Magical Lands: Don't lie.

"I'm known as Wildcard, traveling with members of the Justice League; we're here because Jarhanpur just had a country dropped on it by means of chaos magic and we want to put it back where it came from."

Well, given that most of the other guards have been called away to deal with the country that was just dropped on them, that's a compelling answer.

"Our lord Rama Khan is currently deciding on a response to that very matter. If you have information relevant to his decision, I would invite you to present yourselves at the palace."

He unbars the gate — at which point directions to the palace become unnecessary, because it is very clearly that tall structure at the center of the city, the highest tower of which is painted with ruddy gold to catch the sun.

"We at least do know who did it.  And some things about the country, depending on how much news of the outside world you get."

Onward!

...Speaking of outside contact: comms check?

As they approach the castle, it is the Fatebinder who is brought to the fore, though Alicia Thorn lurks in the wings for the moment magic is discussed.