by Edward Cox
‘The Way of the Blind Maze,’ Marney said.
Denton’s smile became a grin.
Marney sighed. ‘I assume Lady Amilee has shown you how to navigate it?’
Denton nodded. ‘Think of our journey as the combination to a lock, Marney. First and most importantly, you need to know which hidden realm you wish to find – in this case, the Library of Glass and Mirrors. Then, if you travel through particular Aelfirian Houses in a particular order, using particular portals along the way, the entrance to the secret realm will appear to you at a particular location.’
‘That’s a lot of particulars.’
‘Yes. Exactly.’
Marney sighed. ‘I don’t suppose you could’ve told me all this at the beginning.’
‘I understand your frustration, Marney – and yes, there might just be more to this mission than discovering information on the Icicle Forest – but I need you to trust me. The less you know, the less dangerous this is for everyone. I really can’t be sure what we’ll discover at the Library of Glass and Mirrors.’ He ruffled the grey hair on his head. ‘But if the worst should happen, everything you need to know about the Way of the Blind Maze is in that envelope I gave you. You still have it, I trust?’
Marney patted the leg pocket on her fatigues. ‘Safe and sound.’ She gave her mentor an appreciative smile. ‘I do trust you, Denton. Completely.’
‘Glad to hear it,’ Denton replied with a wink. ‘And when this is over, Marney, we two will find a quiet moment in which to raise a glass to Lieutenant Morren’s memory. I promise you.’
Though saddened, Marney accepted this. Honouring Morren’s memory was the only thing she could do for him now.
‘Of course,’ Denton continued, ‘You and I are going nowhere if we can’t figure out what’s happened on this mountain.’
Putting on his hat, Denton arose and walked to the hut door. He continued talking as he peered through the gaps in the wooden slats, trying to see the world outside.
‘The magic of Ghost Mist Veldt is a little like the magic of the Nightshade,’ he said. ‘It’s almost sentient, and will protect its House as it deems necessary. But why it needs to protect itself now, I don’t know, Marney. However, I’m hoping the magic will recognise us as friends not foes, and show us a way through that fog.’
‘Perhaps it already has recognised friends,’ Marney replied. ‘Maybe Ghost Mist Veldt is protecting us.’
‘That’s a very good point – hold on …’ Denton adjusted his position at the door. ‘Yes, I think the fog is clearing. Let’s take a look.’
Bracing himself, Denton unlatched the door and opened it. A fierce breeze blew into the stone hut, bringing with it the unmistakable, almost emotional, presence of magic. But before either empath could do or say anything, the pressure of the magic grew oppressively heavy, and thick tendrils of fog surged into the room. Denton yelled as the tendrils wrapped around his body and dragged him outside. The door slammed shut behind him.
Marney jumped to her feet, shouting Denton’s name. She heard a gasp from behind her, and wheeled around. Marney only had time to acknowledge that four Aelfirian soldiers had magically appeared in the hut with her, before one of them rammed the butt of a rifle into her face.
Chapter Ten
Reflections
Clara dreamed of a graveyard. But it was no ordinary graveyard.
She found herself on an island cemetery of rough, grey stone that drifted through the endless void of space. The only source of light came from the dim and distant glow of stars filling the darkness in clusters of dot-to-dot configurations that seemed to spell out Clara’s name, and tell the story of her life. The graves filled the island as far as she could see, simple mounds of small, heaped rocks, similar in size; but instead of a headstone, each grave was marked with a jagged shard of mirror, like a shattered fragment of some monstrous looking-glass.
Clara might have been in human form wandering among the graves, but she was stalking like a wolf, cautious and painfully alert. She wasn’t sure why she was there, but the secrets of her magic, an innate memory locked tight within her blood, told her that this island cemetery was the final resting place of every magicker who had ever lived and died in service to the Relic Guild.
And she wasn’t alone.
Every now and then, Clara would catch a glimpse of blurred movement in the looking-glass shards. At first, she had spun around, thinking that the movement came from behind her, expecting to find a lurking presence trying to creep up on her. But when she found nothing, she realised the blurs were passing in front of her own reflection. With closer scrutiny, she came to understand that, in the reflections, she was watching a woman who was fleeing through the graveyard by jumping from mirror-headstone to mirror-headstone.
Although Clara saw little of this woman, she soon realised whom she was watching.
The woman’s passing was quick and blurred, but it caused a flickering effect that left behind an image of her, imprinted upon the surface of the mirrors. The effect didn’t last long, blazing from the shards then quickly fading – like the after-glare of a lightning strike. But enough detail was imparted for Clara’s heightened sense of sight to recognise the empath caught in fast, frozen moments.
At times Marney appeared as an older woman of around sixty, at others a young woman, closer to Clara’s age, but her dress never changed. Clad in black leggings, jumper and ankle length boots, the empath wore a leather baldric around her torso like a waistcoat. It held a set of slender and sharp silver throwing daggers. Her long, light brown hair pulled back from a handsome face into a tail, revealed eyes wide and full of fear. In every frozen image that Clara saw, Marney was looking back over her shoulder at the nightmare that hunted her.
Clara caught fleeting glimpses of the pursuing demon in the same flickering lightning that exposed the empath, but the changeling could never quite see it clearly.
Marney was losing the race, only just managing to stay one mirror ahead of her demonic pursuer. Clara understood then that her purpose on this drifting island cemetery was to save Marney – just as the empath had once saved her.
As the stars above told the story of Clara’s childhood, she struggled to keep track of the random path Marney took through the mirrors, trying to throw off the demon. But the honed instincts of the wolf prevailed, and Clara managed to keep pace with the empath’s flight. Eventually, she was led to a structure that stood unique and conspicuous at the centre of this graveyard of dead Relic Guild agents. It was a grand mausoleum of luminous moonstone, its pallid glow seeming bright against the huge shard of obsidian perched upon its roof.
The shard was black and neatly cut into a perfect diamond. Though highly polished, its surface supported no reflection; instead, the obsidian absorbed any light that hit it from the tale-telling stars above. Marney’s image appeared in the diamond, three quick frozen ghosts, brightly silver, descending the length of the black glass, falling down into the moonstone mausoleum beneath. The smoky nightmare was not far behind her.
The heavy stone doors parted for Clara like curtains as she ran into the mausoleum. She found a young version of Marney crouched against the far wall of the chamber inside. The chamber was otherwise empty, made from smooth cream stone that was decorated with tiny square maze patterns, hundreds of them, like a room in the Nightshade. The empath was sobbing, covering her face with her hands, fearful eyes peeking through splayed fingers.
Clara rushed to her, but stopped halfway across the mausoleum floor as Marney spoke.
‘Please,’ she whimpered. ‘Not yet.’
At a strange, high-pitched gurgling noise that sounded almost like shattering glass, Clara wheeled around. Where the mausoleum doors had once been, but now was only a smooth, cream-coloured wall covered in tiny maze patterns, stood Marney’s nightmare.
A thing that carried a human shape but little humanity, withered and spind
ly, it was wrapped in strips of black cloth from neck to foot. The nightmare-demon’s head was bald, its skin decaying and the colour of death. Its eyelids had been sewn closed with twine; its thin, grey lips were fused around a glass tube, and a second tube sprouted from a crude puncture in one temple. Both the glassy lengths connected to a diamond-shaped box of obsidian in the nightmare’s gnarly-fingered hands. Upon the box’s black stone, symbols glowed with the purple light of thaumaturgy.
‘Tell me!’ the nightmare hissed, and its voice came from all places at once.
‘No,’ Marney pleaded. ‘The time isn’t right.’
Fluid gurgled along the glass tubes. ‘Then I’ll make it right.’ Its omnipresent voice was full of spite and desire; the thaumaturgic symbols on the box flared.
Marney moaned and hunkered down against the wall as the nightmare stepped forwards menacingly. Clara stepped protectively before the empath and raised her hands – palms out – in a warning gesture. The monster halted, seeming to notice the changeling for the first time. Fluid sang along the tubes like stardust telling stories.
It was only then that Clara realised she could see her face in the backs of her hands. Her skin had changed to the smooth, reflective surface of mirrors.
‘Whatever you’re thinking of doing,’ the nightmare said from everywhere, ‘don’t!’
A quirked smile came to Clara’s lips. She turned her back on the monstrosity and strode over to Marney. The empath looked up as the changeling approached. An older woman now, her faced lined with age, but the crow’s feet surrounded eyes tinged with hope.
‘Here,’ Clara said kindly. ‘Take my hands.’
Marney didn’t hesitate. As soon as she slipped her fingers into Clara’s cool, mirrored grasp, her physical form turned into wispy incandescence that was drawn into Clara’s hands like inhaled smoke – until she was entirely absorbed into the changeling’s body.
Have patience, Marney’s voice whispered in her mind. All things are known in the end.
In control, feeling strong, ready to battle whatever foe was placed in her way, Clara turned to the nightmare.
But the nightmare had no interest in fighting. It shook its head, apparently disappointed with the changeling, and made an angry noise that was more from frustration than rage. ‘Brilliant!’ it snapped from all places at once.
To Clara’s surprise, the nightmare yanked the diamond-shaped box away from its body, shattering the glass tubes that connected it to its temple and mouth. Throwing the box to the floor, where it landed with a stony thud and the symbols lost their thaumaturgic glow, the monster began ripping the stitches from its eyelids with long, gnarled fingers. It spat out broken glass as it glared at Clara with strangely familiar, mad brown eyes.
‘I hope you’re satisfied, child.’ The nightmare’s voice was no longer an omnipresent hiss but a laconic drawl that Clara recognised all too clearly. ‘Do you have any idea how close I was?’
Clara cocked her head to one side. ‘Gideon?’
‘Yes, Clara, and thank you so much for making this exercise a complete waste of bloody time.’
All anger deflating within her, Clara looked at her hands. They were no longer mirrors but covered in short silver hair.
‘Am … Am I dreaming of you?’ she asked Gideon. ‘Or are you dreaming of me?’ She turned her gaze to where the empath had been a moment before. ‘Maybe Marney was dreaming of both of us?’ She rubbed her temples, confused. ‘Is this even a dream?’
Gideon angrily spat out a final shard of glass and sent it tinkling across the floor. ‘For the love of the Timewatcher, child, order your thoughts before your head caves in!’
The image of the withered ghoul wrapped in strips of black cloth morphed and changed into a tall and thin man as human as Clara. His hair was short, streaked with grey. The olive skin of his gaunt face was shaded with stubble, and his sunken eyes were full of menace. He was wearing black trousers and a roll-neck jumper; his hands were covered in scars. This was how the man remembered in Labrys Town as Gideon the Selfless must have appeared in life.
Clara pointed a silver-haired finger at him. ‘You were searching my mind for the information Marney planted there,’ she accused.
‘As always, you’re as sharp as a razor, Clara,’ he replied cruelly. ‘But actually, I found where that information was. Unfortunately, you decided to get in my way before Marney could spill the beans.’
Again, Clara stared at the empty space where Marney had cowered against the wall. ‘I-I can’t explain what happened,’ she said. ‘I had to protect her. I needed to.’
‘It doesn’t surprise me,’ Gideon said, as though his reasoning was to do with Clara being an idiot. ‘You women do like to stick together.’
Ignoring the jibe, Clara marshalled her confusion. ‘If you wanted Marney to cooperate, why frighten her as a nightmare with tubes in its face and carrying that thing?’ She gestured to the box of obsidian still lying on the floor.
A laconic, lopsided grin spread across Gideon’s face. ‘What, you think Marney would’ve been less frightened had I appeared to her as myself?’ He wagged a finger in the air. ‘Yet you have a point, child. I certainly didn’t conjure the image of such an ugly creature. It must’ve been a projection from Marney’s memory.’ His eyes became shrewd as he looked at the diamond-shaped box. ‘An aspect of whatever she planted in your head.’
‘What does it mean?’ Clara whispered.
Gideon gave her a sour look. ‘If you hadn’t interfered, I might’ve found out.’
‘And if you had told me what you were doing before you did it, I might’ve been more cooperative.’
‘Fair enough.’ That unsettling grin returned to Gideon’s face. ‘Next time we’ll search your mind together.’
Clara nodded at him confidently, though she wasn’t exactly sure she had just entered into an entirely agreeable pact.
She flinched and darted her gaze around the room as whispering voices suddenly filled her ears. She couldn’t understand what the voices were saying, and they soon faded to silence. She looked at Gideon and he was looking back at her curiously.
‘What’s the last thing you remember, Clara?’
‘I … remember taking human form again.’ She shuddered at the memory. ‘There was an old Aelf. He gave me a cloak to wear.’
‘That’ll be Councillor Tal,’ Gideon said. ‘He seems to be on our side, but it’s difficult to tell with Aelfirian politicians.’
‘I don’t remember anything after that.’ Clara shook her head. ‘What happened to me, Gideon?’
He smirked. ‘You’ve been unconscious ever since you reverted to human form. But that’s another story.’
Again the whispering voices filled Clara’s ears and her eyes searched the room that looked like a chamber in the Nightshade. Was she dreaming now?
‘Are we still in Sunflower?’ she asked. ‘Are we still in our cells?’
‘No, we’re in transit,’ Gideon replied, clearly amused. ‘Funny story, actually. Van Bam ran into an old friend of his.’
‘An old friend? Who?’
‘Perhaps I should start from the beginning,’ Gideon said happily. He rubbed his hands together. ‘Once again, Clara, the Relic Guild is in a whole world of shit …’
Samuel felt hungry, and his parched throat craved a drink.
If not for the green illumination shed by Van Bam’s illusionist’s cane, the interior of the cargo container would have been pitch black. Not that there was much to see inside. A few meat hooks hung from the ceiling, jingling together now and then when the journey got a little bumpy; and at the back of the container, two large trunks rested against the indented metal wall.
Van Bam sat cross-legged on the floor with his glowing cane resting upon his knees. Beside him, Clara lay in her healing slumber, still wrapped in Councillor Tal’s cloak. Samuel stood behind Van Bam, leaning a
gainst the container wall. Both men faced Hillem, who sat with his back to the wall opposite.
Far from being the fool that he had first appeared to be, Hillem was clearly a fine actor – his performance had duped even Van Bam. He had been maintaining the role of Supervisor Marca’s idiot lackey for a long time in Sunflower, waiting for the Relic Guild’s arrival, or so he had said.
‘The avatar told us you were coming,’ he had explained earlier. ‘But it couldn’t be sure when exactly you’d arrive. Apparently there are variables hard to factor into its predictions.’
Which Samuel had decided was an understatement, but he had continued to listen to Hillem as he had explained how the Aelfirian Relic Guild, working in secret, had known for a little over six months that the human Relic Guild would be coming; and that their arrival would also signify the return of the Genii.
As Hillem talked, it became clear to Samuel that he knew nothing about what had passed in the Labyrinth in the last four decades. It seemed the Aelfir knew as much about what became of the Labyrinth’s denizens after the war as the denizens knew about the Aelfir. Although the Timewatcher left the inter-House portals in place, she had removed all the Aelfirian doorways that led to the Labyrinth – with the exception of the doorway in Sunflower, of course. Hillem claimed that the Aelfir had been warned about the Retrospective, the nightmare land of wild demons that existed between Labrys Town and the Houses, and the certain death awaiting anyone who tried to reach the humans.
The young Aelf was in possession of a strange device: a red crystal, flat and round, strapped to his wrist like a watch. Earlier, he had extracted a small needle from the device’s surround, which he had used to prick Clara’s finger so as to feed a drop of her blood into the crystal. He had repeated the process with Samuel and Van Bam, explaining, ‘Now the crystal recognises you, it won’t react to your presence. But if there’s anyone close by that it doesn’t know, it’ll start to glow. It’s not much good in crowded places, but for this stage of the journey, it’s a handy device to have around.’
