Fairest (26 page)

In a stationer's stall, I saw just the thing for zhamM: a clothbound notebook. The cloth appeared a dull black. Gold thread ran through it, but there were no gems.

“?htun” I asked, pointing at it.

The vendor nodded. “.htun”

The pages were lined. I could write songs in it. If there was time, perhaps I could find someone to help me translate them into Gnomic. zhamM would love it.

“?otz ymmaD” One of the few phrases I knew. It meant, How much? I opened my purse.

The vendor took out a dozen gems. We made the exchange.

I turned away from the stall clutching my booty. I found myself facing another peddler, a gnome maiden who smiled eagerly. Along with combs and laces, her tray contained things I'd yearned for—a bun studded with pecans, a wedge of cheese, a bunch of grapes. And an apple.

“Just for you,” she said in heavily accented Ayorthaian.

Was it really human food, or root candy disguised as human food? I touched the bun. It gave way, and root candy was hard. The bun had to be real.

I had reached a crossroad, but I didn't recognize it.

The peddler pulled off a grape and gave it to me. A few gnomes stopped to watch. I popped the grape into my mouth. My observers grimaced, but the grape was heaven, juicy and sweet, the best grape I'd ever eaten. The peddler pointed at my purse. I took out a diamond pebble and held it out to her. She held up two fingers.

Two diamonds for a few morsels! She was robbing me! But I had to have the food. I was salivating. I was probably drooling. I shook out another diamond. She took the jewels. I took the provisions.

It would have been decorous to take everything with me and eat in the privacy of zhamM's parlor. But I couldn't wait that long. While the gnomes watched with expressions of fascinated revulsion, I bit into the cheese.

It was hard and salty and full of flavor. I chewed it, sucked on it, almost swooned from pleasure. Then I gobbled up the grapes and the bun.

I hesitated over the apple, but it was human food, and I couldn't resist. I bit into it.

It wasn't bad, sweet and not mealy. I began to swallow, then tasted something under the sweetness, something bitter and searingly sharp. I tried to cough the morsel out, but it wedged in my windpipe. I clutched my throat to squeeze it out. It didn't budge. I tried again to cough. I tried to breathe. I staggered and fell.

The peddler bent over me, her expression a mix of remorse and gloating—just as zhamM had predicted.

Oh, Ijori! She'd poisoned me!

My essence was wrenched away from my body. I floated toward the cavern ceiling. I wanted to get back to my body, but my essence had no strength. I could feel my body. It seemed unmoving, but it was breathing, oh so shallowly, a wisp of air finding its way past the chunk of poisoned apple.

My essence reached the ceiling and passed into the rock itself. Rock felt no different from air. I emerged into open space and flew, gaining speed, above the ridge Uju and I had followed. I could still feel my body in Gnome Caverns, could still feel that thin dribble of breath go in and out.

High above the caverns, the trek that had taken days was accomplished in seconds. Mount Ormallo rose ahead, and there was Ontio Castle.

I was in the castle, hurtling over the Great Hall, through a corridor, through a door—Ivi's door—into Ivi's apartments, to the dressing table, into the hand mirror. Into the mirror!

I
SCREAMED AND SCREAMED
. I hid my head in my hands. I stopped screaming and moaned. I crouched and rocked.

A voice said, “Welcome—”

I drowned out the voice.

Oh, Ijori. Oh, zhamM.

Gradually, thoughts filtered in. Was I dead? How had I been transported here? Why?

I was still aware of my body in Gnome Caverns. It was as if a string, thin as an eyelash, connected me to that body. I sensed my body was cold, but it still breathed. I tried to get back to it. I couldn't.

I heard Skulni's voice over my moans.

“Look at me, Aza. There are things you must know before I may leave.”

Ugh! That oily spider's voice.

“Everyone dies. You needn't go on about it so.”

Did everyone go into a mirror after dying? Was this the afterlife?

But I wasn't dead if I could still feel my body breathe.

I continued to rock and moan. I don't know how long it was before I heard Skulni's voice again.

“You're fortunate to be here.”

I raised my head. I was in a small beige chamber, just big enough for Skulni and me and the room's few furnishings: a dressing table, dressing table mirror, and a chair, where Skulni sat. The mirror was split, really only half mirror. The other half was a window, the two side by side.

Light and sound came in the window half. Through it I saw Ivi's ceiling with its fresco of a shepherd and his flock of sheep. I heard birds chirping in the distance and someone singing.

Oh, to be there! In the heaven of the world.

Skulni said, “I shan't be with you long.”

I wouldn't be with
him
long. Thank heaven, there was a door. I went to it and grasped the knob, but I couldn't turn it, although I tried repeatedly.

I whimpered. Skulni laughed.

I grasped my overskirt. I was dressed in the gown I'd worn that last night in Ontio Castle. It was good as new, unsullied by prison or my brush with ogres. I pinched the cloth between my fingers and lifted it an inch. Easy as ever.

I tried again to turn the doorknob and failed again.

Why could I move one and not the other?

Because my gown wasn't real. My body—this one inside the mirror—wasn't real. I was an apparition. I looked down. The carpet pile stood straight up at the edge of my feet. I had no weight.

“Where am I?” My voice was hoarse.

“You know where you are. This is your last home.”

A spider's web!

He had something of a spider's body: not much neck, a round belly in a tight-fitting blue doublet, round buttocks in blue hose, and spindly arms and legs, also garbed in blue.

I blurted out, “Are you human?”

He laughed again. “I should say not. I am the master of the mirror. There is none other like me.”

Perhaps I had to destroy him in order to leave. I remembered the library keeper's words.
The mirror may be destroyed under certain unspecified circumstances
.

“But I appear human. Outside the mirror, I'm as large as anyone else, and I keep this face.
I
don't drink potions to make myself beautiful.

“Now you must learn about the mirror so I may leave. We have time before your queen returns from killing you.”

I stared at him. “What had Queen Ivi to do with it?”

“She was the gnome who sold you the poisoned apple.”

“But Ivi is human.”

“The Disguises potion is very powerful. Under its influence, in many ways Ivi
was
a gnome.”

I swayed and reached out to the wall to steady myself.

“Come, Aza. You know Her High High Highness's character.” He said the words
High High Highness
with utter contempt.

Even Ivi couldn't be so bad!

“Comfort yourself with this: My powers will be yours when you sit in my chair. Come closer.”

I hung back.

He drummed his fingers on the dressing table. They made no sound. He had no weight either.

“Don't you want to see?” He touched the mirror-window. “This is Ivi's hand mirror. You were curious enough about it when you were alive.”

I was still alive. I approached the mirror and saw my former ugly face over his shoulder. “Did I change back?” I heard the alarm in my voice. I still cared.

He laughed. “Humans and beauty.” My beautiful face returned. “That is your reflection.” My original face replaced it. “That is my doing.”

“Stop!”

He left my ugly face there. “When you sit in my seat, you dictate what appears. You can view moments in your life, your whole life if you like.”

The scene changed. There was the Featherbed kitchen. It seemed small and cramped compared to the kitchen at Ontio Castle, but it looked cozy. Oh to be there! Ettime stood at the stove. Father came in from the tavern, carrying a tray of dirty glasses. His face was clean-shaven. It was his year without a mustache!

I saw myself, sitting on a stool, chopping celery, singing as I worked. I had never seen myself sing. I was concentrating on my song, and I looked happy. At that moment, at least, I wasn't thinking about being ugly.

“Enough!” Skulni said. “You can indulge yourself later. Observe how Her High High Highness came to own me.”

Now I saw a richly furnished room, not so lavish as the queen's apartments, but lavish enough. A nightingale perched on the fireplace mantel. I heard a peep. The room had to be in Ontio Castle.

There was Ivi in her bridal finery, admiring herself in an oval mirror—Ivi, but a diminished version of the woman I knew, shorter and not so thin. Tiny frown lines were etched between her eyebrows, and her chin was weak. Her cheeks were marked by the scars of pimples, but her face was still appealing. Even then she was pretty.

A woman appeared behind her—appeared out of nothing.

“The fairy Lucinda,” Skulni said, “who commands the mirror and thinks she commands me.”

Lucinda was tall and stately, with long auburn hair, peacock-blue eyes, and generous full lips, far fairer than either Ivi or I in our beautified states.

Ivi saw the fairy reflected in the oval mirror. She turned and cowered.

Lucinda's lips moved, and miracle of miracles, I could hear her. “I am the fairy Lucinda. I adore weddings.”

Ivi curtsied unsteadily.

“Darling,” Lucinda said, “no need to be afraid. I'm here to give you a gift. This gift—”

“I wish you would make me as beautiful as you are.” Ivi drew back, as if scared by her own audacity.

Lucinda smiled. “Darling, everyone is beautiful in her own way, and I am a fairy.” She paused, then nodded. “I'll give you what you desire. My gift will make you as exquisite as you may be.” She held out her hand, palm up. The magic mirror appeared atop her palm, and atop the mirror, the two vials of potion materialized. “Take it all.”

Ivi accepted the gift in trembling hands.

“The potion bottles will refill themselves after they've been drained. You may make your betrothed as handsome as he can be, too, if you like, and anyone else, if your nature is generous.”

I saw Ivi read the potion labels. She placed the mirror and the Disguises potion carefully on her washstand. Then she unstoppered the beauty-potion vial and drank.

The scene changed again.

Lucinda's face filled the mirror and beamed at Skulni and me. “Drinker of my potion,” she said, “you have lived a happy life, beautiful into your old age.”

“Fairy Lucinda,” I said, my heart pounding, “I did not grow old.”

Skulni said, “It's the fairy's speech to new arrivals. She can't hear you.” He laughed. “She rarely listens even when she can. She spoke this to the first to die after owning me, the only one to live to a great age.” He paused. “I was inexperienced then.”

“Now you will enjoy the last benefit of the potions,” Lucinda said. “Your existence will be extended in the mirror while Skulni has his much-deserved holiday. You shall remain here until I give the gift again. Then Skulni will return, and you will go to your final death. If you were generous with my gift, you will not be alone for long. The other potion drinkers will join you when they die.”

Lucinda's face vanished, and the mirror's surface became blank. Skulni said, “The beautified reflection is my most useful power. It was my bait with you.”

And I had taken it. “What did you want with me?”