by Karen Frost
~*~
Mary Jane was immediately struck by the sumptuous beauty of the castle’s interior. It looked exactly as she imagined a castle should look. The door had opened into a wide reception hall and she stood there now, spellbound, as the heavy door closed behind her. The hall's high, solid gray walls were lit by a row of torches that illuminated large, ornate tapestries showing scenes of ancient battles and surreal creatures. As far as she could see, the hall continued deep into the castle. Yet as awe inspiring as the castle was, Mary Jane couldn't shake the feeling that it was also full of sadness. It was only after she thought for a minute that she realized it was completely empty. She and Mirrin were the only living things in it.
Mirrin had given her no instructions other than to enter Morlach, so Mary Jane wandered down the hall and through the castle, peering into different rooms as she passed. In one, the armory, perhaps, she saw fierce weapons of war: sharp daggers and shining broadswords, heavy double-bladed axes and long halberds, spiked maces and plumed helmets. They sat on tables and hung on pegs and hooks from the wall, deadly and beautiful. Mary Jane had the unsettling impression of activity and life in this as in the other rooms, as though the weapons had but a moment earlier been set down and would in a minute more be picked up again by soldiers leaving for battle. The bowls in the kitchen were arrayed in a row and all that was needed was for the cooks to return from the pantry and pick up where they had left off making dinner.
In the library, Mary Jane found books and scrolls innumerable that stretched from the floor to the ceiling in huge wooden bookcases. Though nothing in the room had been touched in years, there wasn’t a speck of dust upon anywhere. The room was spotless. And then Mary Jane saw it. It was such a small thing, really, sitting on a mantle above the fireplace. She might not have seen it at all had it not caught the reflection of the torch lighting the room just so.
She walked over to the fireplace and picked up the small hourglass. Half of the white grains of sand had fallen through to the bottom of the hourglass while the other half remained in the top part. A single grain was caught midway between the two sides, suspended in mid-air. Mary Jane watched, expecting to see it finish falling through to the bottom, but it didn't move. She heard a bitter laugh and turned, the hourglass still in her hand, to see Mirrin watching her from across the room. Mirrin leaned against the door frame, her arms crossed over her chest.
“Time,” the sorceress spat, “does not exist in Morlach.”
"Doesn't exist?" Mary Jane asked, confused.
Then she added, unable to stop herself, “Because of the flame?”
Mirrin swept forward faster than Mary Jane anticipated and snatched the hourglass with long, claw-like fingers, flinging it to the ground where it shattered, the white sand spilling across the floor. Mary Jane flinched.
Mirrin glared at her and snarled, “The flame, yes. Whatever lies within an eternal flame when the spell is cast never ages, never feels hunger or fatigue, never dies. An eternal flame is strong enough to stop even time itself."
"A hundred years," Mary Jane said thoughtfully. "That's why you're still alive."
Mirrin's nostrils flared angrily and her jaw twitched, but the rest of her face betrayed no emotion. Mary Jane felt nervous and took an imperceptible step backward, the way prey would a predator. Mirrin did not notice. She grabbed Mary Jane's wrist and held so hard that Mary Jane felt tears of pain and terror spring to her eyes.
Mirrin hissed, "A hundred years of imprisonment. A hundred years all alone. But time has run out for this flame; it will not hold much longer. Then…”
She did not finish. Instead, she let go of Mary Jane and snapped her fingers. The pieces of the hourglass flew together again in her palm. Though Mary Jane could not see how it was done, all the pieces knit together, leaving the hourglass intact as though Mirrin had never broken it. Not even a single grain of sand was left on the floor, and the grain was once again trapped between the two halves. Mirrin handed it back to Mary Jane and Mary Jane felt her hands shake.
"Why me?" Mary Jane asked.
"You will help me," Mirrin said.
"No," Mary Jane said.
She said it so quietly that even her own ears couldn't hear the words. Her body shook like a leaf during a wind storm. She had never been so scared in her life.
"What did you say?" Mirrin asked, her eyes narrowing.
“Whatever you're trying to do, I won’t help you,” Mary Jane said bravely, her voice trembling.
As scared as she was, something inside her told her that whatever Mirrin's plans, they would not be good. Mirrin pressed her lips together firmly into a tight line. Mary Jane had expected her to explode angrily and yell, and probably even threaten, but instead the sorceress had the same blank expression as always.
Mirrin said, “We will see about that. Now, I have much work to do. Go and on the second floor of this castle you will find many bedrooms—choose whichever one you like and bathe. When I desire to see you again, I will call you. Otherwise, you are not to disturb me in any way.”
She added with a sneer, looking disapprovingly at Mary Jane’s stained and dirty nightgown, “I will send you something else to wear. See that you remove the twigs from your hair.”
Mirrin left. Mary Jane stood unmoving as a rock, holding the whole hourglass, shell-shocked. A cold dread filled her up from the inside and threatened to brim over as hysterical tears. She set the hourglass down on the mantle where she had found it and picked her way back to the stairs that she had seen earlier in her wanderings and which would take her to the second floor. Her body felt unbearably weary. When she looked, she saw that her feet were grass-stained and covered in mud. She knew that by now Jack and Maude must have noticed her missing, and she hoped, though she knew the terrible consequence of her wish, that they had smashed the mirror to stop Mirrin from entering their world. Mirrin was far, far too dangerous to risk not immediately destroying the gateway into their world. Mary Jane opened the door to the first room that she found and fell onto the bed, immediately falling into a deep sleep.
