“Don’t be silly,” Liliane said. “It’s under our complete control. With it, our power will beamplified.”
Show your power,the mirror whispered.Give it to me, and the world will bow toyou.
“It’s not something that can be controlled,” Evariste said. “It willkillyou.”
Liliane shook her head in bemusement. “You’re not going to frighten us, Lord Enchanter. And no matter what, I’m not about to let our most powerful weapon go. No, instead I will haveyoustrengthen it.” She shifted her gaze to the smallest of her minions—the one who had spent the past few minutes shuffling around. “Are the preparationscomplete?”
“Yes.” The mage dropped a handful of red powder, then said a word in the language of magic and flicked a spark of her magic at thepowder.
The powder ignited with a purple-hued flame that jumped from the scant mound to the intricate patterns the mage had traced out with additional powder on theground.
Purple and red magic arose from the wisps of smoke the burning powder created. The magic rolled across the ground like tiny waves, closing in on Evariste’smirror.
Evariste ran as far back into the mirror as he could reach and mentally grabbed at hismagic.
The wall was still there, cutting him off, but Evariste mentally threw himself at it again andagain.
Come on—react! My magic was able to reach Angelique, can’t it do somethingnow?
The foreign magic wafted through the glass pane of the mirror and crawled towardEvariste.
He wrestled more for his magic, but the wall between it and himself was immovable andunfeeling.
Evariste growled as the red-purple magic latched around his ankles and yanked him off his feet, dragging him toward the mirror’s surface. He tried to dig his fingers into the hazy gray ground, but the smooth surface offered noresistance.
“Prepare the mirrors!” Liliane shouted. “He must go straight from one to the next—wecannotgive him the opportunity toflee!”
Inside the mirror, gray spun as the mages picked up Evariste’s mirror and placed it pane-to-pane against the vileartifact.
The purple-red magic tried to drag him through the two layers of glass, but Evariste managed to grab the frame of his mirror. His fingers turned white with strain as he desperately clung to the mirror, resisting the pull of thespell.
Come,the mirrorcalled.
“Not a chance.” Evariste wedged his feet behind the frame and growled in pain when his torso started to ache as the purple-red magic wrapped around his chest and pulledharder.
“Why hasn’t he made the transfer?” Lilianeasked.
“It seems he’sresisting.”
“Wellstophim! Shake the mirror! Smack it! Do whatever isnecessary!”
The pain dug into Evariste’s chest, knifing through his heart. His head fell back with agony, but he stubbornly held on until the magic of the spell almost completely enveloped him and savagely wrenched himout.
Passing through the glass layers was discombobulating, but he felt it the second his feet touched the inside of the ancientmirror.
It was colder, and instead of being surrounded by a gray mist, things were more of a rust brown—the color of long-driedblood.
“No!” Evariste threw himself at the mirror’s surface, slamming into it with a painful thump. Before he could back up and try again, he was unwillingly dragged back, deeper into the shadowy brown-red depths of themirror.
A cloudy black haze separated him from the mirror’s surface. He couldn’t see much beyond distant shapes and forms, and no matter how he struggled, he couldn’tmove.
Liliane’s voice pierced the mist. “Good luck, Lord Enchanter,” she called to him. “I doubt you’ll last the season, but despite thepainyou’ve been, I hope your death isn’t tooterrible!”
“You won’t win whatever war you have planned, Liliane!” Evaristeshouted.
She laughed. “Your apprentice is presently the greatest threat. Do you really think she alone could stop us—when we have the mirror withus?”
“No,” Evariste said. “I think you’ll be crushed by your own ambition andgreed.”
