Book One – Chapter 11

“Can you get rid of the gateway key?” asked Twig.

“See?” challenged Mushroombird. “These are the important things we really need to address.”

Yves attempted to deliberately black out.

“Do you think it’s shrinking, though?” asked Twig.

“I don’t know.” The presence of the Vicha was overwhelmingly dark. It was far too intense to discern any subtle changes that might have occurred in just over three weeks. Through the cliff behemoth, it had gained size and energy that would take years rather than months to diminish. And that was before the Vicha had absorbed so much of his energy in the Mirror Dimension. Yves could not predict to what extent the Vicha lost energy in this dimensional plane — or even if it diminished at all; he could not simply equate the occurrences there with his own plane. All he knew was that it felt horrible. It was horror encapsulated and compressed  into the shape of a 4 km sphere. This was his life now; a sickening existence cursed by witchcraft and elfin touch, destined to succumb to darkness at the vile center of what was likely the most twisted Vicha the continent had ever seen.

Yves tried really hard to black out, and the unconscious started to backtrack and do some filtering.

“What about your transformation?” asked Mushroombird.

“Just how weird was that?” exhaled Twig.

“Could you do that again?” asked Mushroombird.

“What was that?” asked Twig.

Yves said nothing.

“Can you not seek someone’s help?” suggested Mushroombird.

“Even some explanations could shift your entire perspective,” emphasised Twig.

Yves’ first thought was of a Lightshifter luminary at Emery Thurm, a potent glass wizard who could likely learn to traverse the mirror plane faster than Yves had done. However, Abarius Fermeah was one of Yves’ former teachers, a master deeply devoted to the academy. Consulting him would entail surrendering his ethereal mirrors and would certainly lead to severe punishment for appropriating forbidden arcane knowledge. Seeking counsel from any academy master would entail rigorous interrogations about the very many things Yves should not have done. If he chose that path, his arrangement with the witch mother would crumble. He might as well forfeit his life right here and now. “Where forbidden magic appears,” as Master Blackmoor had once warned, “wizards disappear.”