But in general, take my advice. When you meet anything that is going to be Human and isn't yet, or used to be Human once and isn't now, or ought to be Human and isn't, you keep your eyes on it and feel for your hatchet. -- C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

It was an unfortunate coincidence that led to Riyome finding the mirror. Or rather, the other side of the mirror. In a place as vast as the Land of the Dead the odds were stacked against anyone ever finding the portal, or being able to recognise it for what it was if they did. That only meant it was much more likely someone would find and use it than if it was in plain view of everyone. Hiding something was the easiest way to ensure it was discovered. Thinking it was safe was the best way to find out it was dangerous.

Riyome's residence was far away from most other souls'. Even in death mortal souls liked to cluster around each other. She wanted nothing more than to avoid them. It was impossible to avoid them completely, but she did her best. She built her house in the middle of an ever-changing maze. Most souls never dared go into the maze. Things lived in it. Things that looked human but moved like puppets. Things that wore pretty smiles to hide gaping jaws and deadly teeth. Things that chittered and things that howled, things that crawled and things that galloped. No one knew where they'd come from, or how they got into the Land of the Dead.

No one but Riyome. She had stayed here for so long that she had seen how the things came to be. They were mortal souls. Souls that had been dead so long they had been forgotten about even by Death. Souls that had lost even their own knowledge of being souls. They had no hope of leaving, no hope of being reincarnated, not even the dreaded fate of being sent to the World Beneath.

Riyome had watched them. Year in, year out. She saw how gradually they forgot details of their lives. Then they forgot their names, and their nearest and dearest became strangers to them. Soon they forgot they had ever lived. Next to go was their memory of what they actually were. And finally their appearance and their very nature changed.

She had seen it happen to people she had know. Her greatest fear was that it would happen to her.

Those strange creatures lurked all around her house. She wasn't stupid enough to think she was safe from them. She never went anywhere without her sword at her side. It wasn't Nilien, the sword she had wielded in life, but it was the best copy she could make of it. Her house was a near-perfect replica of her childhood home. Small things like that made her feel more confident she wouldn't become one of the creatures in the maze, yet another soul forgotten and feared by everyone.

The day she found the mirror was the day she set off to speak to the few friends she had. Today the maze decided to turn itself into a long road lined with mirrors.

Now, the thing about mirrors in the Land of the Dead was that they never reflected what was actually in front of them. They reflected something behind them, or something upstairs, or even something eight hundred miles away. It all depended on their own whims. And no self-respecting mirror would ever show the same reflection for a minute at a time. Oh no. They constantly changed to show something completely different, until it was a form of mild entertainment to sit and watch one for hours at a time.

Riyome ignored most of the mirrors. Until she came to one that actually reflected her.

She'd walked several steps past it before her mind registered what she'd seen. She stopped in her tracks and looked back. The mirror still reflected what was right in front of it. And its surface didn't change no matter how long she stared at it.

This was a Mystery with a capital M. It defied all the illogical laws of logic in the Land of the Dead. True, those laws were only guidelines to be ignored at will, but most objects at the very least pretended to obey them.

Riyome blinked and rubbed her eyes. It had been years since she was so thoroughly befuddled.

She tapped the mirror's surface with the point of her sword. Not hard enough to crack it, but hard enough to let it know she could and would crack it if she wanted to. It probably wasn't about to come to life and try to eat her. But in this place, "better safe than sorry" was often the only way to avoid a horrible fate.

The mirror's surface flickered, like a pool of water when a stone was dropped in it. For a moment her reflection vanished and she caught a glimpse of something white pulled over it. Then the mirror returned to normal.

She tapped it again. This time the glass moved. It swung backwards at the touch, far enough to let her see there was something on the other side. Something that looked like... cloth?

~~~~

Life in Nirne did not quite suit Rualnim's taste. She was watched everywhere she went. She was tacitly barred from entering the main royal palace or following Losradan to certain palaces. Official events, for example. The problem was that Losradan had a tendency to make a fool of herself without Rualnim to keep her under control.

The only bright side was that she had free rein over the newspaper. She chose what stories to write about, what perspective to put on everything, who to ask about each event. Officially Losradan oversaw it all. But in practice she was so busy drinking and partying she never cared anything for the paper.

She was in luck recently. These last few weeks had been full of events to gossip about. The strange case of the cursed palace was selling newspapers left, right and centre. None of the royal family could complain about Losradan's paper making the most of it. She was one of them, after all, and had a perfect right to talk about such a dramatic event in her family.

Of course neither she nor Rualnim had witnessed it in person. They had been out in the city's bars on the night it happened, deep in their cups. But like all newspaper editors, they were never going to let the facts get in the way of a good story. And that was what led to the current awkward situation.

Losradan had decided the story would be more dramatic if she claimed the palace had been cursed. It was already whispered about among some of the servants. But it turned out that this was the last straw for the royal family.

"Don't be ridiculous," Princess Kiroshnoy said primly. She sat up perfectly straight and looked down her long, pointed nose at Rualnim. "There is no such thing as a curse."

It turned out that Losradan was not the only Nirnian royal who made Rualnim long to strangle her. Perhaps being an infernal pest ran in the family.

"Maybe there is, maybe there isn't," Rualnim said in a placating tone -- the sort of tone one would use towards a small and rather stupid child.

Kiroshnoy sat up even straighter and held her head even higher. She looked at Rualnim with great scorn, as if she knew all about her and didn't think much of her. Her expression and posture reminded Rualnim sharply of all the fine, noble ladies and gentlemen back in Carann. They had smiled politely, patronised her every time they spoke to her, and made it clear she would never be anything more than a bastard. A bastard who by some freak of circumstances had climbed out of the gutter she belonged in, and who -- if there was any justice in the world -- would soon disappear back into that gutter.

Rualnim hated them with savage, murderous hatred. Now she transferred some of that hatred to this arrogant little girl, more than ten years younger than her, who dared to treat her as an inferior. If she had the slightest hope she could have gotten away with it, Rualnim would have murdered Kiroshnoy there and then. She hid her thoughts behind a bland, patronising smile. She had so often been on the receiving end of that sort of smile. Oh, how the tables turned. They would turn even further, before she was through.

"The palace is not cursed," Kiroshnoy said with authority. If Rualnim had hated her less she would have wondered how she could be so sure. Her hatred blinded her, and so she only thought the brat was pretending certainty she didn't feel. "You will publish a retraction in your paper tomorrow."

She thought she was so important, using fancy words she surely couldn't understand. She thought her family made her someone worthy of notice. She sat there in her silk dress dyed bright orange, with her jewelled sovirov[1] on her head, and thought all her finery made her better than Rualnim.

Rualnim stared at Kiroshnoy's throat, bare except for a small gold necklace, and thought of slicing it wide open. See how superior she thought she was as she drowned in her own blood, as it turned her oh-so-expensive dress bright red.

"I can do nothing without your sister's permission," Rualnim said with a sickly-sweet smile. Years ago she had learnt to hide her murderous fantasies behind a veneer of politeness. It was a skill she used almost every minute of her life. "Why don't you tell her about it?"

Kiroshnoy snorted. She looked at Rualnim with great scorn. "Everyone knows you're the one really in control."

Alarm bells went off in the older woman's head. How much did she know? Was the little brat more perceptive than she appeared?

"Do they indeed," she said in a neutral tone. "Was there anything else you wanted to say?"

Kiroshnoy didn't dignify that with a response. She got up and swept out with as much self-importance as a teenager could manage. As soon as she was gone Rualnim picked up a penknife and viciously stabbed it into the desk, imagining it was the princess.

~~~~

Fields. Rivers. Fields. Trees. More trees. An occasional house. Oh, there was a town. First one he'd seen for a while. Hailanyu leaned over the rail surrounding the airship's deck. Below him the transparent safety net stretched around and under the vehicle's main body. The wind pulled his hair out of its ponytail, tossing it across his face. The metal rail was cold beneath his hands.

This was the first time he had been on an airship for any journey longer than going to see his father's parents. They lived only forty miles away from home. A trip to their house was over before he had time to see much from the airship. Now he finally got to look down on parts of the empire he had never seen before. Only problem was, they were travelling over some of the most rural parts of Carann. The most interesting thing he'd seen for miles was a herd of baziy swimming across a lake.

It was all quite dull. Not at all what he expected the first part of their journey would be like.

They were on their way to Istogu. From there they would cross into Malish. That was when the difficulties would truly begin. Yet Hailanyu could hardly believe there would be any difficulties. Here and now everything seemed peaceful.

He could almost forget the serious task that lay ahead of them. Then Nimetath called him and the others back into the main seating area to look over the map again.

"Everyone take notes," she said. A few people obediently took out notepads. "No, not actual notes! I want you to keep all this in your heads. We've been through it so many times you should remember by now. We're going to cross this mountain range. Tell me how we're going to do it."

Hailanyu dutifully joined in the chorus of answers. Almost everyone remembered the plan. That boded well. At least, he hoped it did. Nothing could go wrong if they stuck to the plan, right?

An unpleasant, cold feeling of foreboding filled him at that thought.

Chapter Footnotes:

[1] sovirov = A headdress worn by upper-class Nirnian women, similar in shape to a French hood. Jewels are usually sewn onto it.