The Four Possibilities

As well as Fredwina saying she had never heard of a country called Aqualaria, there was her claim that Emry must have died over two years ago, given that she said that she had been on the island that long. Unless Fred had somehow lost two years of his life, then as far as he was concerned that was impossible. However he could not detect any discrepancies in her account of the history of the D'Honaires.

Eventually Fred summed up: "There seem to be four possibilities here. First, that Fredwina is suffering from a delusion. Second, that Astra and I - and probably Velus as well - are the deluded ones. Third, that none of us is deluded, and that some sort of transfer between realities has occurred."

"That's only three possibilities," Fredwina pointed out.

"But that last one is actually two possibilities. We might have been sent into your world, or you might have been drawn into ours."

"So how can we find out which of these four possibilities is the right one?" Astra asked. "I find two of them rather disturbing, where either I believe I am from a country that does not actually exist or else I'm in a reality where it does not exist."

"I don't see how we can find out unless we can get off the island," Fred said. "And if Winnie has really been here for two years without being to get off it, then it doesn't bode well for our managing to escape."

"The mainland only looks about ten miles away," Astra observed. [3424]

"It might as well be a hundred," Fredwina replied. "The wind seems to be relentlessly away from it. I suppose I could have built a raft even so, and trusted to fortune, but for all I knew the ocean might extend hundreds or even thousands of miles downwind."

1. Lacking any good alternative, they decided to build a raft, even though it could mean a very long and perilous journey.
2. Then something unexpected happened.

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