“Mirror,” Venarra said, and colors began to shift and swirl across the glass. A moment later, a beautiful, disembodied Fey face appeared in the glass. A Fey man’s face, silvery pale and glowing, with blazing emerald eyes and hair the color of polished fireoak. The long strands of his fiery hair flowed around his face like billowing clouds of flame and smoke.
“This is the Mirror of Inquiry. Ask it to find a particular text or information about a particular subject, and if it exists in the hall, the Mirror will locate it.”
“Why does it wear someone’s face?”
“All the Mirrors do. No doubt the makers thought it would be easier to ask questions of a person than a blank sheet of glass.” Her tone became brisk. “Which scrolls would you like to see first?”
“Perhaps you could recommend a good place to start.”
Venarra hesitated as if surprised that Ellysetta had asked her for guidance, then said, “The kitlings are dying. Healing seems the obvious place to begin.”
“I would agree, but neither Marissya nor I could sense any sort of physical ailment in the kitlings. They are healthy, yet they are dying.”
“There are types of ailments that do not manifest themselves as obvious physical abnormalities. Even the best healer might easily overlook them.”
“Then let’s start there.” Ellysetta offered a smile that went unreturned.
Venarra turned back to the shimmering oval glass. “Mirror, find all records in the hall regarding illnesses that cannot be detected by a healing weave, and bring them here to an available reading table.”
The Mirror, which had been waiting patiently without a hint of expression on the face within, now shimmered with renewed life. The blazing emerald eyes of the disembodied visage slowly shut. The flame-kissed hair blew back as if on a sudden gust of wind, then began to billow gently again. When the Mirror’s eyes reopened, they were filled with myriad sparkling green lights.
Ellysetta stepped back in surprise as the sparks streamed out, escaping the glass to swirl above the Mirror like a swarm of tiny fairy-flies before shooting off in every direction, leaving trails of shimmering green light in their wakes.
She spun around, trying to follow the paths of as many as she could. Dozens shot up to race around the upper levels of the atrium, performing a series of aerial acrobatics before zooming with guided precision towards specific scrolls and books inside the numerous bookcases. Each book and scroll the lights landed upon blazed with a sudden, electric green glow.
Venarra stepped out of the circle and walked towards the closest table. She’d taken only a few steps when the green lights came zipping back and splashed down in tiny bursts of bright color. First on the table, then on the floor beside the table, the explosions of color coalesced into rapidly growing piles of scrolls and books, all glowing with a green aura.
“There are so many.”
“My request was very general,” Venarra explained. “Once you decide which topics seem the most promising, you can use the Mirror to narrow the search.”
Theshei’dalinreached for one of the scrolls at the top of the first stack just as Ellysetta reached for one nearby. Their hands brushed. Venarra jerked back as if she’d been burned—or, rather, as if Ellysetta’s Mage Marks were a contagion that could be spread by simple contact.
“Sieks’ta.”Venarra clasped her hand tightly at her side. Ellysetta could see her fighting to cover her emotions, to hide her revulsion behind a mask of studied politeness. “As I was saying...”She cleared her throat. “You needn’t worry about putting the documents back. When you leave, the Mirror will automatically return everything to its proper place.”
“Venarra...”
Theshei’dalincontinued as if Ellie hadn’t spoken. “The hall is warded to prevent any of the original texts from leaving the grounds, so if you find a document you want to take with you, ask the Mirror to make a copy.”
“Venarra...” She started to reach out to the other woman, then caught herself as theshei’dalinflinched away. “Please. Don’t shut me out. Talk to me. I need your help.”
“There’s nothing to say. If you don’t have any other questions, I’ll leave you to your reading.”
Ellysetta persisted. “I know that what happened with the Eye was very upsetting. I understand how you must feel.” She could put herself in Venarra’s shoes all too easily. She’d felt exactly the same when Gaelen first revealed the truth of her Mage Marks. “Even Rain fled from me in revulsion when he first learned the truth. He loathes the Eld—almost more than he now loves me—and when he learned I was Mage Marked, he was ready to choose death rather than risk the safety of the Fey by bringing me back to the Fading Lands.”
Venarra’s black eyes, shuttered and suspicious, fixed on Ellysetta. “Why are you telling me this?”
“Because you need to know. In truth, part of me is relieved the Eye revealed what it did. As Rain and Steli have told me, the tairen do not keep secrets from their pride. Rain could have left me in Celieria after learning about my Mage Marks. He wanted to at first. He feared what the Mages would do if they successfully completed their claiming—he still fears it, as do I—but the tairen stopped him. They believe Iamthe one who can save them—the only one who can.”
Venarra looked down at her own tightly clasped hands. “That may be, Feyreisa—and I do pray it is so—but I saw the vision inthe Eye. I saw the future it foretold. I saw the heads on the pikes behind your throne.” Venarra’s voice began to shake. Not with fear, Ellysetta realized, but with an almost tairen fierceness. “Myshei’tan’s was among them.” Her eyes flashed up. The black irises had turned to fiery gold suns, and the piles of books and scrolls on the desk began to quake and rattle. “I’ll call for your death myself before I let you harm him.”
Ellysetta’s mouth went dry.
The stack of documents toppled and scrolls clattered to the floor.
The sound seemed to snap Venarra out of the fury that had gripped her. She spun away, putting distance between them, and bent over as if in pain.
Ellysetta knelt and, with shaking hands, began to pick up the scattered scrolls.
