The Beginning After The End novel Chapter 290

Chapter 290

Chapter 290: The Mirror Room

My mind reeled in confusion as I stepped through the portal and into the next zone. A figure lunged from my left and I jerked my hands up to deflect the blow, but nothing happened. Movement from the corner of my eye caused me to turn sharply, expecting a flanking attack, but no attack came from that direction either.

‘Jumping at shadows now, eh Princess?’ Regis chuckled in my mind. ‘Look.’

“Who—who are they?”

All around, people looked back at me through rectangular windows, each wearing a look of anguish, their faces wet with tears, twisted with rage, or contorted into soundless screams. Some sat still, though most were in the midst of manic fits, gesticulating wildly, striking and scratching at themselves or the ground, like wards in an asylum.

Before I could investigate further, Kalon and Ezra were stumbling into me, Riah between them.

“What the hell?” Ezra said, flinching back from me and from the figures within the windows.

At the center of the room there was a square fountain, six feet to a side and surrounded by benches. “There,” I said, pointing to a bench. “Set her down there.”

The brothers carried their family friend across the room, a steady stream of her blood running from the severed wreckage of her foot, spattering darkly across the marble floor.

Ada came next, her steps halting, her eyes glassy. “Is—is this the sanctuary?” She gazed at one of the nearby figures, her brows knitting in confusion. She actually leaned toward it and squinted to try and focus on it, as if she didn’t quite believe her own eyes.

The figure, a very portly man who wore only linen pants, a pair of steel boots, and spiked gauntlets, didn’t look back, but kneeled on all fours, hammering one massive gauntlet into the ground again and again and again.

Haedrig, the last in, set a hand gently on her shoulder and guided her past me, toward the fountain at the center of the room. “No, this isn’t a sanctuary room,” he said, his voice low and ominous.

Kalon was wrapping Riah’s stub with bandages from his dimension ring while Ezra looked on, helplessly fidgeting with his spear. He snapped around when Haedrig spoke.

“What do you mean this isn’t the sanctuary room? It”—he glanced around and flinched again, as if seeing the room for the first time—“has to be...”

Haedrig guided Ada to the benches and encouraged her to sit down before turning back to Ezra. “It clearly isn’t, and after that first zone you’d have to be a fool to think that we’d end up anywhere so expected as a sanctuary room.”

Ezra glared petulantly at Haedrig, but the mossy-haired veteran seemed entirely unconcerned. They held one another’s eyes for a long moment before Ezra huffed and turned away, this time looking to his sister.

I turned my attention back to the room. It was only about fifteen feet wide and eight feet tall, making it feel very low and claustrophobic after the enormity of the last zone.

Though the area near the fountain was brightly lit by orbs of light that hung down over the running water, the room faded into shadow beyond the light’s edge, making it difficult to tell how long the room was. The light reflecting off the many windows showing us the tortured figures made it feel as though the room stretched on forever.

‘Not windows,’ Regis thought, ‘mirrors. Look.’

Regis was right. As I approached the nearest mirror, I could see the room reflected within it, though, of course, the man in the mirror was not me, nor did he exist outside of that reflection. He was an older man with a thick gray beard. He sat cross legged, staring unblinkingly back out at me, his lips moving ceaselessly.

I leaned forward, cocking my head so my ear was nearly pressed against the mirror, and I realized I could hear the faint whisper of a voice, though I could not make out the words.

“Well,” Kalon said, drawing my attention back to the others, “Riah is sleeping. She’s lost a lot of blood, but that poultice you gave her saved her life, Ada. If we can get out of here quick enough, she’ll be okay.”

Kalon stepped up to a mirror near the fountain. The man within it wore a helm topped by sharp, onyx-black horns like scimitars, giving him the appearance of a Vritra. He stood with his arms crossed and a haughty sneer smeared across his face. Based on his armor—black leather and blackened steel plates with jet runes inlaid throughout—he was an ascender, and a wealthy one at that.

“They’re all ascenders,” Haedrig said, as if he’d read my mind. _{fɾēewebnσveℓ.com}

“Look at the design and material of their clothes and armor,” Kalon pointed out. “Especially the horns. It’s been out of favor to wear horned helms for, what, several decades? They’ve been trapped here for quite awhile, haven’t they?”

No one answered, though a collective chill ran through the group as we all considered being trapped in this room for eternity.

“Why in Vritra’s name are we here?” Ezra said, moving to stand by Kalon. “This is a prelim. It’s supposed to be over!” The broad-shouldered young man turned toward me. “You! I don’t know how, but this is your fault, isn’t it?!”

“Enough,” Kalon said quietly. “Whyever we’re here, it’s just another test. This is a puzzle zone. We need to start looking for clues that’ll help us solve the room and move on.”

Ada’s discouraged expression disappeared as she got up to her feet, forcing a smile for us to see. “That’s right! We can do this! For—” Ada glanced at the sleeping Riah, her bandages already spotted through with blood. “For Riah!”

The first-time ascender’s bravery seemed to douse Ezra’s hot head, and he gave his sister a side-hug, wincing as he did so.

“What about you?” I asked him. “How badly were you hurt?”

“It’s nothing,” he said, his chin up, his gaze haughty. “I’ll be fine.”

Shaking my head, I turned away and began examining the mirrors, one by one, for any hint or clue about how to proceed.

Kalon stepped up beside me. “That was an impressive spell you used to teleport back there.”

“Thanks,” I said simply.

“I’ll admit, I wasn’t the best student at academy,” Kalon went on, “and I was particularly bad at ancient runes—I just never really understood the point, you know? I always knew I was going to be an ascender, and ascenders don’t fight each other.”

I turned to Kalon, meeting his eye. “What are you getting at?”

He raised his hands and smiled warmly, but I could see the tension in the way he held himself and the way his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. “Just making conversation, Grey—and, thinking about that spell. I’ve never seen anything like it. We studied all kinds of runes at the academy—making it more difficult increases the prestige, I guess.

“I was curious”—he paused, glancing up the hall toward his brother and sister—“if I could see your...What is it you have? An emblem? It seems too powerful for a crest.” When I didn’t immediately answer, Kalon broke into a surprised grin. “It’s not a regalia, surely? Is that why you don’t have your runes displayed? Who are you?”

“Listen,” I said, “there’ll be plenty of time for war stories when we’re out of here, okay? For now, let’s just figure out this puzzle room.”

Kalon shook his head and patted me on the shoulder. “I’ll figure you out yet, Grey.” He turned to walk up the hall, following his siblings, then stopped. “Oh, and sorry about Ezra. Don’t mind him, he’s just protective of the girls.”

‘And an imbecile,’ Regis said in my mind.

I smiled and turned back to the mirrors, focusing again on the task at hand.

‘Guesses here?’ Regis asked after we’d looked over a dozen or more of the reflections. ‘What are we looking for, Arthur?’

If everyone here is an ascender, then they’ve presumably been trapped somehow. Maybe by touching the mirrors?

‘Okay, so don’t touch the mirrors, check. But how do we get out of here?’

I stopped when one of the figures we passed by waved wildly with both arms, clearly trying to get my attention. He was a bearded man who also had a horned helm with locks of wavy brown hair that flowed down past his chin. His eyes were deeply sunken and ringed with shadows, but he perked up when I stopped.

They can see us, I thought, realization washing over me.

The trapped ascender pressed his hand to the inside of the mirror, gesturing for me to do the same. When I didn’t immediately respond, he grinned and nodded, then gestured again more urgently.

‘It’s a trap, you know it is. What if you get sucked in after touching that mirror? What if he gets loose and tries to kill everyone else?’

“Can you hear me?” I asked out loud, pointing at the mirror. The man shook his head and gestured again at his hand pressed against the inside of the pane. I shook my head back.

The man’s face fell, and when he looked back up there was such a pure and malevolent hatred in his eyes that I took a step back from the mirror. He began shouting, even going as far as taking off his helmet and using it as a pickaxe to try and break his way out.

‘Sheesh...someone woke up on the wrong side of the mirror,’ Regis said, laughing at his own joke.

Ignoring Regis, I moved on from the enraged ascender.

After a few more minutes of fruitlessly examining the mirrors, now conscious that the inhabitants were watching me as closely as I was them, Ada called out.

“It’s...it’s me!” Ada said, her voice carrying down the hall, which seemed to be much longer than it had at first appeared. Ada was standing in front of a mirror perhaps twenty feet away, and from where I stood I could just see the figure within.

The mirror-Ada waved and smiled warmly, a gesture the real Ada immediately returned. Then, moving identically so it was almost as if one was genuinely a reflection of the other, both raised their hands and made as if to press them against the glassy pane.

“Ada,” I shouted, “stop! Don’t touch the—” Ada’s right hand pressed against the mirror, as did the reflection’s, and purple energy—aetheric essence—rose like steam from Ada’s skin, then moved like wind-blown mist along her body until it was absorbed into the mirror.