by John Corwin
Max nearly fell off his broom. "She's chasing us with plants?"
Galfandor didn't answer, but angled his broom up to a high window in the central tower of the keep. We followed him inside, landing on the spiral staircase, then looked outside for the queen. Seconds later, the wave of vines reached the base of the keep. The queen stepped from the vines and stood on the walkway next to the wishing pool.
"What if she sends the vines inside?" I asked.
Galfandor took out a short but thick rod and snapped it out into a full-length staff. "I will fight her to the best of my abilities."
"Do not expect your buildings to protect you," Naeve shouted. "What good is stone against the power of nature?" She thrust her hands into the air, and suddenly trees from the nearby forest uprooted themselves and lumbered over to the keep. Thick branches pounded against the doors.
A group of children walking down the path from the university toward the keeps abruptly burst into screams and shouts when they saw the trees. Naeve turned toward them, and my heart stopped with fear. The rage contorting her face ripped away her resemblance to my dear Cora. This woman was bent by madness and evil. I had to stop her.
The headmaster hopped on his broom and dove toward the queen, a bright blast of light already leaving his staff.
"I've got to help," I said, jumping on my broom and flying out the window before the others could stop me. I took out my wand and aimed it at the queen. The only offensive spell I could easily cast was also not a powerful one, but I had to do what I could.
Galfandor's first strike splintered a twisting mass of vines as they snaked toward the other children. I used the diversion to hit the queen with a spell.
"Ignitus!" Fire flickered at the tip of Naeve's hair.
She screeched and quickly doused the flame before it could do more than singe her. A vine whipped from the side. I rolled left and looped. The creeper tied itself in a knot trying to catch me. Another coil attacked. I dodged it, but ran right into the grasp of another. Before I could react, it plucked me out of the air and whipped me toward the queen.
Though my arms were pinned, I kept my legs wrapped tightly around the broom. I looked to Galfandor for help, but he was busy fending off two large spruce trees whipping their branches at the other children.
The vine brought me face-to-face with the queen's leering face. Insanity shone in her eyes, and her lips trembled with unbridled emotions. Around her neck she wore a chain with a large green anchor stone fragment.
"I have waited too long," she hissed. "Finally, I am alive!"
"I promise I wasn't trying to trick you." I tried to wriggle free, but the vine wrapped painfully tight around my arms. "I had to find a piece of the anchor stone first."
Naeve giggled like a little girl, then clenched her teeth in a spasm of anger. She pressed a hand to her chest. "The other part of my soul still loves you, child—still wants you to live." Her eyes flared. "But me, the part that counts, knows you should die. This place will become mine. Then I will decide where to go next." She looked away. "Do I kill the Sirens? Yes, that would be wise and oh, so fulfilling." She burst into deep-throated laughter, then abruptly rambled incoherently for a moment. As if suddenly realizing I was still there, she blinked in surprise. "Why are you still alive?"
"What about the part of you that loves me?" I shouted, not understanding how any part of her could love me since she'd never had emotions before.
Naeve bit her lower lip hard. Blood trickled down her chin. "Cora is in me now." She burst into a fit of laughter and suddenly began to cry.
"Your sister is in you?" I didn't understand. "You love me because of her?"
"Sister?" the queen's lips curled up, then down, as if they didn't know which way to go. "I have no sister."
I heard shouts and saw Galfandor shielding the other students as a tall pine toppled toward them. I forced my attention back to Naeve, realizing I would have to keep her talking to stay alive long enough for the headmaster to come to my aid.
"Because she's dead," I said. "Your sister is dead."
Naeve shook her head. "Cora wanted to leave the Glimmer. She discovered how the anchor stone could take her into the reflected world. From there she safely crossed the rift." Her eyes grew unfocused. "On her third time through, I caught her." A manic smile lit the queen's face. "I caught Queen Naeve."
My mind whirled and tumbled as I realized the terrible truth.
Chapter 36
"Cora is actually Naeve," I said in a harsh whisper. "You were her reflection."
The queen waved her arm and three more trees uprooted themselves and charged Galfandor as he and the other students retreated. She turned back to me. "Yes. I caught her and took part of her soul. When she tried to escape, she took me back with her to the Glimmer."
I suddenly understood what she meant about part of her loving me. "When Cora died, did the rest of her soul come to you?"
"For a time, I felt everything she had, but the Glimmer drained it from me." The queen's eyes widened. "Cora had to keep her travels to Eden a secret. She convinced me to stand in for her while she was gone so her people wouldn't know."
"What people?" I asked. "I never saw anyone else there but you and Evadora."
"They sleep," the queen replied. "I found them unnecessary and burdensome." The insanity faded from her voice, though a twitch in her eye hinted at madness beneath the surface.
"Why did you let Evadora stay awake?" I asked.
"The girl did not bother me." Her unsettling eyes regarded me. "Before I put the people to sleep, before I realized my powers, I posed as the queen and took people into Eden using a piece of the anchor stone. I left them there and visited to see if they remained unchanged, or died."
"But only Cora lived on since she had a piece of the stone," I said.
"Indeed." Naeve's eyes twitched, but the attacks from her tree minions against Galfandor did not relent.
"I soon realized my true powers and no longer needed Cora. I banished her from the Glimmer and put the Glimmer folk to sleep. For centuries, Cora lived in Eden with her fragment of the anchor stone, and I thought it was the answer to immortality. Only once did I let Cora return, and that was for her to leave Evadora with me. Her long time away from the Glimmer had weakened her powers significantly."
Keep her talking. "Who was Evadora's father?"
"A worthless mortal." The queen's lips curled in disgust. "Not long after, Cora found you and died. Though I was pleased to have an entire soul to myself, the new flood of emotions made me realize how terribly sad I was that the anchor stone fragments did not grant immortality."
"It was my curse that killed her," I said. "If she'd had a larger piece of the anchor stone, she might have survived." I looked toward Galfandor and saw the two spruces were down—only a large pine, badly burnt and smoking, remained standing.
"You killed Queen Naeve with your curse. Now I am Queen Naeve. Now I am real." The queen smiled. "And now, I will kill you."
The vines squeezed tighter and tighter until I could hardly breathe. I tried to speak, but the world began to fade away.
Without warning, the vine went slack. I tumbled to the ground and landed next to my broom. I shook my head, trying to register what had happened and saw Esma Emoora twisting her wand and firing bolts of sizzling electricity at the queen.
Naeve shrieked and hurled a wave of snaking vines toward the professor. Esma chanted and a shimmering shield absorbed the attack.
"Run, Conrad!" Esma shouted. "I can't hold her off forever!"
I tried to run, but a vine wrapped around my ankle and jerked me off my feet. I flailed with my wand and shouted, "Torsius!"
The spell slammed the queen and knocked her to the ground.
"Die, you worthless betrayer!" Naeve flung her arm toward me and a swarm of spiky black vines rushed for my face.
For a heartbeat, I imagined them rending me to ground meat, but a blue bolt of ice hit Naeve in the chest and froze her in place. The vines fell lifel
essly to the ground and I thudded next to them.
Max zipped past on his broom. "I used a freeze wand on her!" He waved two blue wands—the ones we used in Kabash. "Get out of there, I only have one charge left!"
Still dizzy from the fall, I stumbled upright just as the queen thawed.
"Stop standing there!" Max shouted. He flicked the other blue wand and froze the queen before she could block the spell. "You've got ten seconds, Conrad! Run!"
Esma wriggled free of the vines that had fallen all around her and shouted, "There is nowhere to run, Conrad. Sometimes you have to face your enemies and finish them."
The queen was completely helpless for several more seconds, but what could I do to her? I didn't know any spells that would disable or kill her.
The anchor stone fragment on the fine chain around her neck caught my eye, and behind her, the sparkling waters of the wishing pool. Suddenly, I knew what to do. I ran to the queen, gripped the stone at her neck, and jerked hard. The necklace snapped free. I backed up several feet, gripping the stone and shouting, "As above, so below!" Then I raced at the queen and slammed into her. We fell toward the rippling water.
An instant later, we flew from the pool on the other side and landed hard on the cobblestones in the reflected world. I rolled off the queen just as she thawed.
"Give me the stone, boy!" She lunged for me.
I ran around the pool, the queen chasing me in a deadly game of keep away.
"As below, so above," I panted.
"No!" the queen screamed. "Give me the stone!"
She lunged toward me, running through the shallow pool. I leapt into the water as she dove the final feet toward me, red-faced and screaming. Her fingers missed me by inches. I flew from the other side, back in the normal world and tumbled to the cobblestones. For once, I welcomed the pain. It meant I was still alive to feel it. I pushed up and looked into the pool. My normal reflection stared back. Staring up at me from the middle of the pool, the fake Queen Naeve knelt on all fours, her mouth open in a silent scream, fists pounding the water.
The glimpse into the reflected world faded away and the queen with it.
Esma looked at me from across the pool. "I believe the queen would have preferred death to such a fate." She tilted her head slightly and looked at me. "You are young and inexperienced, but you have potential, child."
"Thank you, professor," I told her. "You saved my life."
She nodded. "Perhaps one day you will save mine." Esma glanced back toward the university. "I should go check on the other students to make sure they escaped unharmed." She tucked her wand into a holster at her side and walked away.
Max landed his broom next to me. Evadora and Ambria ran from the keep doors a moment later.
"Whoa, did you trap her in the reflected world?" Max leaned over the edge and stared into the water.
I sat down as the weight of what had happened dropped onto my shoulders. "If you hadn't frozen her when you did, I'd be mincemeat."
"Are you just going to leave her in there?" Ambria shuddered. "What if her reflection gets her?"
Galfandor flew back into view and looked at the piles of lifeless vines and fallen trees. He spotted us and approached. "Esma said you handled things." His eyes wandered the ground as if looking for a body. "What happened?"
I still hardly believed what Naeve told me. No matter the truth, Cora would always be Cora to me, and Naeve, the queen with a heart of ice.
Max put a hand on my shoulder. "I saw her talking to you when she had you earlier, Conrad. What was she saying?"
"Cora had no sister." I squeezed shut my eyes and tried to untangle the lies. "Cora was the real Naeve. She went through the reflected world to Eden, but her reflection caught her and took a piece of her soul." The thought sent shivers through me.
"The queen was a reflection?" Evadora stared at me. "She looked so real, Conrad. But I told you she was dead inside."
Ambria looked at Galfandor. "Did the piece of Cora's soul make her real?"
The headmaster looked up from the waters, his eyes pensive. "What makes any of us real, Miss Rax?" He shook his head slowly. "All I can say with certainty is that I must go back into the Glimmer and secure the other anchor stone fragments in the palace, and hide the silverwood so Serena cannot build another divining rod."
"What about the Glimmer folk?" I asked. "Naeve said she put them to sleep."
"She put up a wall of vines to keep me from going to the lands north of the mountain," Evadora said. "They are probably there."
"Maybe her spell will wear off now that she's gone." Ambria knelt and touched one of the vines. "I wonder how long they've been asleep."
"Centuries," I said. "Naeve said Cora lived in Eden for hundreds of years until she met me and died." At least now I understood why Cora avoided mirrors. Was she afraid she had no more reflection, or was it a reminder of what she'd unleashed on her people?
Galfandor stroked his beard. "I know you don't want to hear this, Conrad, but Cora's death protected Eden. Naeve remained in the Glimmer because she thought the anchor stone didn't grant immortality." He waved a hand at the heaps of dead vegetation all around. "What we witnessed today was only a sample of what Naeve might have done if fully unleashed upon the world."
My heart tightened, but what he said was true. "Even after death, Cora protected me."
"True," Galfandor said. "Had the queen not imbibed Evadora's bottle of tears and gone mad, she probably would have killed us all." He motioned toward the Dark Forest. "The queen demonstrated an ability to control nature itself. If her mind had been unclouded, she might have unleashed the monsters lurking in the forest upon us."
Ambria looked up at the old man. "Are you trying to say everything worked out for the best?"
Galfandor locked eyes with me for an instant. "I believe everything happens for a reason. I believe Cora loved Conrad, but also knew she would die if she stayed with him. Why she let that happen, I cannot say."
"She let herself die." The words threatened to choke me and tears blurred my vision.
"Perhaps." Galfandor put a hand on my back. "I must go attend to important details."
I gave him the stone I'd taken from around Naeve's neck. "You might need this."
He smiled kindly. "Thank you, Conrad."
"Wait, isn't it risky going back into the reflected world with the queen there?" Ambria said.
"The queen is most likely in this very spot on the other side," the headmaster replied. "I will return to the Fairy Garden and use the water there. That should grant me some distance from her." He climbed back on his broom and flew toward the Fairy Garden.
"Where will I go now?" Evadora said plaintively. "I have no home."
"Stay with us," Ambria said. "We have a home in the city you might like."
"Really?" The girl jumped up and down and hugged Ambria. "Happy times!"
Max kicked a bundle of vines. "I don't know about you, but I'm ready to go back to Queens Gate. I'll bet if we stay, Galfandor will have us cleaning up this mess."
I glanced into the wishing pool and wondered if Naeve was still just on the other side. If she had truly gotten the rest of Cora's soul, why wasn't she my mum? Why was she cruel and evil? Galfandor had said that some things simply didn't make logical sense, but I planned to find out all I could about reflections and souls.
Ambria squeezed my hand. "Let's go pack, Conrad."
I tore my eyes from the water and nodded. "Let's go home."
"Oh my god, they're back!" Sonia threw up her hands when we walked into the door that night. "Why can't I have peace and quiet?" She glared at Evadora. "And is that a new little brat?"
Desmond smiled. "How's school treating you?"
"You wouldn't believe what we've been through." Max took a step back from Sonia as she stomped upstairs to get ready for a night out.
"Love to hear," Desmond said. He checked the time. "I've got a few minutes."
"You want to tell him, Conrad?" Max asked.
I
shook my head. "You go ahead." I took my suitcases upstairs and into my room. When I got there, I found a note on my bed. I opened it and read it.
Conrad, I'm sorry for telling Harris your secret. I liked you way too much and it made me do something mean when I thought you didn't like me. I don't expect you to forgive me, but I just wanted you to know that I feel awful and I'm terribly sorry.
-Blue
I crumpled up the note. With a flick of my wand, I set it on fire and watched it burn to black ash. What Blue had done seemed so minor now. She'd proven herself untrustworthy. While I might act friendly with her again, she would never be a true friend I could trust.
I went to the bathroom to brush my teeth and found myself staring into the mirror, wondering if it looked into the reflected world. I felt immensely sad thinking about Cora's soul bound up in the fake queen and wondered if killing the reflection would free her.
For now, the threat to Queens Gate was contained. My parents wouldn't have access to the anchor stone fragments, and Naeve was trapped in another world. Maybe Victus and Delectra would go away and leave me alone for a while.
It was probably too much to hope for.
Chapter 37
The holidays lingered for a while and then we returned to school. The remains of the fight with the Glimmer Queen had been cleared away and when I finally tracked down Galfandor and spoke with him, he assured me my parents would not have any reasons to return to the Glimmer.
Evadora did not stay with us long and vanished. When she reappeared a few months later, she told us she'd been in the Glimmer.
"The vines are still there and the people are still asleep," she told us as we walked toward the Fairy Garden.
"Can you do anything about it?" Ambria asked.
"I don't want to." Evadora giggled. "I don't like people. Your vampire friend helped me realize that."
"Sonia?" Max said. "She's an awful person who doesn't like anyone."
Ambria looked at me. "Maybe we should find a way to help the Glimmer people, Conrad."
