Vacant Throne

Yora was gone. Alyssa had watched from Illuna’s walls as the entourage disappeared over the horizon, the tips of their banners being the last thing to go. It had made Alyssa wonder whether the bannermen were supposed to carry their banners the entire way back to Yora—a location roughly two weeks out from Illuna—or if they could be collapsed and attached to their horses in some manner. Regardless, after ensuring through Kasita that they hadn’t caused any incidents on their way out, she got some sleep.

After waking in the early evening, Alyssa started off with the usual morning rituals despite the time of day. She started a meal, ate, and considered going out to the bathhouse for some much needed relaxation before what surely was going to be another night of testing and failure with Irulon.

But just as she was finishing her food, a heavy thud shook the entire building. Alyssa tensed, fearing the worst. To her surprise, however, nobody else in the guild of mercenaries seemed all that alarmed. Silence came over the other tables, of course, as should be expected with any loud noise interrupting their meals. But none of them grabbed their weapons or rallied for a fight. A few shot exasperated glances at the ceiling.

Alyssa looked around, but none of her crew were around to offer any explanation. Since her eyes had started glowing again, most others tended to avoid eye contact unless absolutely necessary.

Which was basically never unless she was the one addressing them.

So she leaned over to an adjacent table to ask, but was interrupted by another heavy thud. This time, slightly more prepared and with a little hint from all the other patrons looking upward, she identified its source. Somewhere up above, unsurprisingly enough.

“It’s that princess.” The man she had been about to ask answered her unasked question of his own volition. “It’s been happening all day.”

“All day?” Alyssa scowled as she glanced upward again. Irulon was supposed to have gone to bed. Not only that, but… Alyssa wouldn’t have slept through that. She wasn’t Irulon, after all.

Maybe she had been more exhausted than she had thought.

Standing from her table, Alyssa marched straight toward the stairs.

She found herself at the door to Irulon’s room. The door had been wide open upon her arrival. When she woke up, she had feared that she would have to wake Irulon, but that obviously turned out to not be the case. The sleeping beauty was wide awake with her back to the door, staring while her hand pinched her chin between her thumb and index finger.

The room had changed a bit since Alyssa had last seen it.

Every wall, once planks of roughly cut wood, were now smooth and glossy mirrors. The same kind of mirrors created by various Fractal spells. There were only seams at the corners of the room where one wall met the next. The bed, desk, and Irulon were all reflected in the otherwise seamless surfaces. With some of the mirrors set up opposing each other, it created the infinite tunnel illusion. It looked like there were thousands of Irulons in the room, all just staring.

“Is something… wrong?” Alyssa asked.

Irulon didn’t turn. But her violet eyes did move, reflected in the mirror a thousand times over, to spot Alyssa. “You’re awake. Good.”

“Yes. I’m awake. Why are you awake? I thought you were getting some rest.”

“I slept for a few hours. More than enough,” she said, finally turning around. “I considered going straight to you, but decided to experiment with a little unrelated project while I waited.”

“The guy downstairs said you’ve been up to something all day. That doesn’t sound like more than enough sleep.”

“All day?” Irulon scoffed. “I’ve been at this for an hour. If that.”

Alyssa stepped into the room, looking around a little better. Her first step just about broke her neck when she slipped over a marble on the ground. Reaching down and picking it up, she immediately recognized it. One of her many marbles she had created for Irulon to examine. There were more marbles strewn about the room. One of the metal ones was split clean in two, revealing that it indeed was a solid ball of metal with no glass core. Though the glass ones were lying about as well, most in multiple pieces. “Unrelated?” she said with a raised eyebrow, glad she had her boots on at the moment. The glass should really be cleaned up before someone less prepared stepped on it.

Irulon dismissed the question with a wave of her hand. “Tools of convenience, nothing more.”

Picking up the split metal marble, Alyssa looked it over. When she had created it, it had been a perfect sphere. Now, however, even aside from half of it being missing, she noticed that a chunk of it had been flattened. Looking around the room at the mirrored Fractal surfaces, Alyssa put two and two together.

“You were trying to break the mirrors?”

“Hm. Indeed.”

“It didn’t work?”

Irulon gave her a flat look before waving a hand around the room.

“Right. Obviously not.”

“No matter how much force I put behind a physical object, it doesn’t seem to do anything to the spell. I could escalate further, but it would likely become dangerous.”

“You’re already causing the building to shake,” Alyssa said, glad that she hadn’t gone overboard yet. “Maybe we should go out in the middle of nowhere to try more.”

“From your testimony of the events with the Astral Authority, I do not believe such a force would be required. Not if the true demon and the sword acted as proper physical objects. If I raise the power of the marbles much further, the shockwave produced could rupture my internal organs. Such a fate did not befall you, so…”

“I was under the effects of Accelero, the time slowing spell? That probably had something to do with it.”

“It doesn’t slow time. It accelerates your personal speed on the arrow of time, enhancing your perception to the point where the world around you appears slower than normal.”

“Yeah, time slowing spell. Not only that, but those monsters were moving incredibly quickly even with that spell active.”

“I believe I’ve taken that into account in my calculations. But perhaps you are correct. I did not see their speed for myself, so I can’t estimate such things. You are also correct in that we would have to move locations if I wish to escalate further. Though,” Irulon turned away from Alyssa, considering the mirrored walls again. “It would be a shame to tear this down before trying one last thing.”

“Am I going to like this last thing?”

“I don’t see why not.” Irulon turned back to Alyssa. “Would you mind retrieving the staff?”

“Staff? Adrael’s staff? You’re going to try to look into the Endless Expanse?”

“If it works. We can also have you attempt to damage the spells using marbles, just to see if there is anything you can do about it that I cannot.”

Alyssa sighed, wondering if it was really a good idea to try to spy into the Endless Expanse. At the same time, she felt a giddy sort of excitement. Irulon hadn’t had a chance to really examine the fractured dome. The Justice and Astral Authority had them distracted, then exhaustion and a need to leave the ash-filled snow globe had taken precedence. A more controlled experiment would give Irulon a much better idea of just what they were dealing with.

Fracturing the mirror to the point where Earth was visible might just be her way home. She couldn’t leave just yet. Not until she had a sure-fire way of dealing with angels. But simply having the option open to her would do wonders for her morale. And looking into the Endless Expanse, spying on the angels, just might help in dealing with them. Even if it didn’t… well, Lumen had said that looking into where a spell came from could help in using it.

Having convinced herself thoroughly, Alyssa gave Irulon a curt nod. “I’ll be right back.”

The staff was down in her room. Given that she had lost the custom holster for it during the excursion out to Owlcroft, it was too unwieldy to carry around everywhere. With her mother, Lumen, Fela, Kasita, and occasionally Oz and Catal going in and out of the room on the regular, she wasn’t too worried about it being stolen like Irulon’s notebook had been. Besides that, Irulon had offered a trap spell to assist in protecting it. According to her, the only people capable of retrieving it should be Irulon, Alyssa, and Kasita. Everyone else would suffer… some unspecified and likely unpleasant punishment.

With her mother and the rest of the Lyria guild members leaving soon, Alyssa would probably change rooms. Irulon could probably make arrangements for her to stay, but taking up such a large room with only herself and Fela really needing the space would feel… awkward. The guild dormitories were intended for traveling members of the guild, which Alyssa was not a part of. Perhaps Irulon would be willing to move into Martin’s guest house. She hadn’t wanted to, not wanting to get drawn into large communal meals or other ‘social activities’ expected of a princess interacting with a member of the great houses, but it had looked comfortable.

As for the staff, she might have to find a way to carry it around with her if there weren’t going to be people in and out of the room it was kept in on the regular. A makeshift sling made from cloth, maybe. Or just higher security from Irulon’s spell tome.

Regardless, for the time being, the staff was right where Alyssa had left it. Tucked away in a long box beneath her bed with some other gear of hers. Feeling its warmth as she grabbed hold of its haft, Alyssa marched back to Irulon’s room with renewed vigor, excited to see if they could do something with it.

Arriving, Alyssa found the room shifted around again. The table had been upended on the bed and the desk shoved right up next to it as well, leaving one clear wall. Presumably to stand and swing the staff like it was a baseball bat. The marbles, whether thrown or launched with magic, wouldn’t have needed all the extra space.

Irulon backed up as far as she could, standing right next to the door. She was really only technically inside the room. A definition that could change by leaning one way or the other. “If you wouldn’t mind putting those muscles of yours to good use,” she said, gesturing to the far wall. “Please try to avoid damaging the other walls. They are meant to act as a control.”

Although everything had been shoved aside, Alyssa took a quick glance around the room just to ensure that she wasn’t about to destroy a priceless decoration. Satisfied, she gripped the haft like a baseball bat. It was a lot longer than a real bat. Much heavier at the end as well, in part because of its length, mostly because of the large ruby attached to the end. She did hesitate for a moment. If the staff did end up damaged… it was definitely an irreplaceable object. Even if Tenebrael could get Adrael’s shield and hand it over, it still wouldn’t be the same.

But her hesitation vanished as she remembered what Iosefael had said. The staff could only be destroyed in the fires of Mount Doom. That in mind, Alyssa wound up, held the pose for just a moment, and slammed the bat down as hard as she could.

Vibrations ran all up Alyssa’s arms, stunning her momentarily. It felt like she had… well, like she had just struck a brick wall. Except a brick wall might have had a bit more give to it.

The wall was completely unblemished. Not even a scratch marred the smooth mirrored surface of the Fractal spell. Given how fast the demon and the sword had to have been moving when they struck the dome, Alyssa couldn’t find it in herself to be surprised. Still, she couldn’t help but feel disappointment. Like she should have been able to shatter it simply because she was… special?

She didn’t like being called anything but a regular human most of the time, but it would have been advantageous here.

“You alright?” Irulon asked.

“Might have a few aches later, but yeah.” Alyssa rolled her neck as she spoke. “Shall I try again?”

“If you wish, but after watching that, I don’t hold much hope for a change in the outcome.”

Alyssa’s grip tightened on the staff’s haft as she looked it up and down. Like the mirrored surface, it looked entirely undamaged. Gold was an extremely soft metal, but even the smallest and finest decorative carvings hadn’t been harmed by the sudden impact with a solid wall. The ruby was similarly unmarred. “I assume you have another plan?” Alyssa asked, loosening her grip. Irulon was probably right. No need to injure herself trying to damage the wall.

“I have a magical way of launching an object. I believe it will produce much more force than your swing.”

Alyssa held out the staff, letting Irulon take it from her. The princess stepped into the room, but didn’t get much closer to the wall than the doorway.

“You might want to step out,” Irulon said, looking down at the staff as she turned it over in her hands. “Some of those marbles were bouncing all over the place. I would hate for this to strike you by accident.”

“What about you? Will you be alright?” Irulon had been the one originally skewered by the thing after all. Having it fly around the room at high speeds sounded like a bad way to repeat that incident.

“I can keep myself safe,” Irulon said, dismissing Alyssa’s fears. “Just stand back… and you may wish to cover your ears.”

Alyssa was pretty sure that she was half deaf from firing a few too many gunshots without ear protection, but the advice didn’t go unheeded. If little marbles had been able to shake the building and make a noise that could be heard all the way downstairs, she wasn’t too interested in finding out just how loud a sound the staff might make.

Hands over her ears, Alyssa watched as Irulon pulled out a few spell cards. She couldn’t actually hear what the spell was, but it was definitely a Fractal spell as a curtain of glass shards appeared between Irulon and the target wall. Holding the staff out, poking the bottom side through the curtain aimed toward the wall, Irulon raised a spell card in her other hand. The card burned up with another unheard spell.

Irulon removed her hand from the staff.

It clattered to the ground. Judging by the expression on Irulon’s face, that clearly wasn’t the intended effect.

“Something wrong?” Alyssa asked, removing her hands from her ears for a moment.

“Magic doesn’t work on this.”

“Ah… yeah. You knew that, didn’t you?”

“I thought I could get around it,” Irulon said, bending to pick it back up. She waved it through the curtain of Fractal glass in front of her, frowning as it passed through without any resistance. “If it had worked, this would have been dangerous for me… Good to know. Though odd that it doesn’t just dissolve the mirror.”

“The mirrors are strange. I don’t imagine that showing the Endless Expanse is a very typical thing. An abnormal spell has abnormal reactions. Maybe?”

“Hm.”

“Any way of getting around the magic nullification?”

“Perhaps. Attaching something that we can affect with magic may work… In fact, yes.” Irulon nodded to herself, looking around the room. She immediately grabbed the wooden chair that was pushed underneath the desk. She simply set the staff on the chair, then lifted both and pushed them through the curtain. Or tried to. While the staff penetrated it easily enough, the back of the chair got caught on it. Parts of the seat, where the staff was resting, made it through, but even that was only a small section of it. “This will work. Would you mind fetching some rope from the stables?”

“Sure.”

It was a rather straightforward request that Alyssa completed in a straightforward manner. Despite only taking about as long as it took to go down a flight of stairs and back up, Irulon had managed to accomplish a lot in the time that it had taken. The chair no longer looked like a chair at all, but rather a wooden sled with the staff resting on top, all of which had been placed on the desk, aimed right toward the mirrored wall.

Irulon wasted no time in lashing the staff to her sled. It looked quite haphazard. Brakkt could probably have done a much better job of it. But, after she was finished, Irulon tugged and pulled on the staff and it didn’t come loose, so it was probably good enough for their little experiment.

Instead of standing right next to it, Irulon backed out into the hall along with Alyssa. She motioned for Alyssa to cover her ears once again before pulling out a spell card.

Alyssa felt the staff slam into the mirror through the building. It was an earthquake far larger than any she had felt, though she wasn’t sure if that came from the proximity to the spell or because the staff was just that much more massive than marbles.

Regardless, Irulon stood frozen in the doorway, just staring. Alyssa knew it worked before she even leaned around the corner.

The formerly smooth and rectangular mirror had a spiderweb of cracks running from the center to the edges. Much like the dome, each fracture showed off a different view. All of the iridescent city filled with spires and shifting dimensions. Once again, despite them all showing off different locations, Alyssa could still see the Throne in all of them.

The golden staff was lying on the floor, completely unharmed. The wooden sled that had propelled it into the wall was lying on the floor as well, but in splinters.

Irulon took a step forward. Alyssa stopped her with a hand on her shoulder.

“Be careful,” Alyssa said. “Kasita managed to put her arm through like it was a portal. It alerted at least one angel to our presence. Something we should avoid. Besides that, multiple angels have told me in no uncertain words that a mortal cannot survive in that world.”

“Observe only,” Irulon said, confirming that she got the message. “I understand… What wonders,” she mumbled, more to herself as she slowly entered the room. She stopped a full three feet from the fractured mirror, crossing her arms as her eyes shifted to black and white. “Fascinating.”