Chapter 2 Reflection from afar
Chapter 2 Reflection from afar
The sun came up and reflected a light in her standing mirror. She gazed at it and then closed her eyes again. It was not yet time to rise from the bed, it was not yet time to accept that time had moved on without her and that she had to face a new tomorrow. Too much had happened recently to make her want to face it all now, the soft silk sheet lay crumpled at the end of the bed, her feet resting on it as she watched the light change in the mirror. “How reflection can be so different from the true image,” she mused and then decided it was time to rise after all. The creamy skin of her bare legs was soon covered as she pulled a fresh white gown over her head. The layers of thin fabric made her body look almost like a fading image, the soft white hardly clashed with the creamy color of her skin but as she looked at her reflection, the hard ice blue stare made her look away from her own image. “I am but a reflection,” she said and finished brushing her hair after a few strokes. The long dark strands had soft curls in them, curls she knew would fade and then return like the tides in the ocean did. Her feet slipped into a pair of white shoes with a slight heel that elevated her just a bit. Where would she go now, fully dressed and ready to take on the world. Or what was left of it.
Mierin Eronaile as only few still knew her moved her way down the steps of the stairs and found herself in an empty kitchen. She had no more servants left, the mansion was abandoned, as empty as she had found it just a few days before. After the last of the battles had ended and the full power of what they had done had washed over them, she had chosen her own path. She had left the others to think, talk or cry and if she could be so lucky, kill each other in fits of rage, she had left them to be alone and by herself. But now that she was, truly alone here, it was not easy. She had found her one weakness, now that He had left her she had found it, faced it and hidden from it in her bed. With nothing but the mirror to reflect on her memories and the story that lay hidden in their pact. The pact she had sworn to uphold, for there was nothing left but that pact. She scratched her nails over the wooden table and found the skin under her nails burn, a sensation of pain ran up her hands. She hardly allowed herself to feel it, there was a greater pain to conquer. The pain of loss was far greater and would outweigh even the pain of death. “I will welcome death, I welcome it in the night in its true form, in the dark.” She spoke to no one in particular, for there was nobody there to listen. Alone in the dark kitchen, waiting for death and reminiscing time past she sat down on one of the chairs and stared at the wall. Then rose once more to make some tea, she did not take in any food as her stomach could not adapt to the sensation of food, it brought back too much of life. Rather did she sip her tea and stare into oblivion, waiting for the emptiness to envelop her. Her power, once so great it kept children awake, scared to go to sleep for she would visit them. The Daughter of the Night shivered at what her power had made her do in the end.
The rest of the day was spent in solitude; silence filled the air as there was no one who knew she was there. No one who wanted to know, or who would be left alive long enough to realize it was her. Finally she rose up to meet her daily trial, placing the cold and empty cup on the table she rose and walked back up the steps of her stairs. The room was light now, the sun had found its way in and she stared out the window for a moment. Then started to walk again until she faced the mirror and stepped out of the gown she had chosen to wear that day. Her bare feet touched the cold stones on the floor and her ice blue eyes met their mirrored match in the glass impression. “Face me, for I will do it again if I have to, I will not step down from my choice. I will not back away from the consequences and I will face what has to be faced. I am Lanfear, Daughter of the Night and queen of those who believe in the true nature of darkness.” As the words rolled over lips, she felt the power return to her. Finally, after performing this same ritual every day since she had arrived here she could feel its sweet power. Underneath the mask you’ve buried yourself into, it’s coal-black. Black as darkness itself, her mask she had thrown off and now she came to see herself as she was. “I have not changed, I have shed off the skin that was buried under a mask and I see myself now,” her mask had hidden so much.
The grief from realizing what had to be done, what could not be undone once it was over. The mask that they had all placed over their faces, their emotions and their doubt, they had buried their faces in it and the result was death. They had not followed the one power that they all believed in and after it was done, the spider had crawled back into her web. Lillen had been the first to leave the scene, trying to do it off as a nightmare the others had pulled her into. Not willing to accept what she had done and thus finding her web to hide in and to hide from the mask she had thrown off after it lost its use. “I will find you Lillen, I will cut through the threads of your web and hold up the mirror in front of you, to face yourself. Like I have every day since, every single day. And I will not pay alone, for it is all of us, but you stepped out first and thus you sealed your fate. The weakling who snuck off at first light when the creatures of the night licked their wounds and waited for the end to come and swallow them whole.” Meaningless words, uttered in a voice void from persistence and strength. Lanfear pulled on her dress and made a decision. She would visit each of them and ask them why, why had they chosen to follow him and in the end she would ask herself that same question. She would have to kill them before they answered her truthfully, it had to be so. Then she realized that she would probably have to kill herself before finding the answer she sought, but not before they had spoken. She smiled a voiceless smile and bared her teeth, the white shining back in her reflection. “They will speak to me, for they have no other choice,” and with a single hand gesture she took a dark blue cloak from a chair and placed it over her shoulders. The night would fall and the moon would guide her into the web.
