He tossed caution behind him and charged forward. The Conductor was a trickster, already trying to get in his head with the whole rat-in-the-wheel nonsense. Jesstin fully expected to be put through the paces, and fear would slow him down. So would wasting time trying to make sense of the Conductor’s attempts to confound him.
Before long, he heard the gentle roar of a river, and he saw peeks of it through the trees. The path didn’t veer there, but to his left was a partly worn stretch where others had trampled.
Jesstin approached a steep embankment leading to the water. He used roots to guide himself down, half tumbling, half running the rest of the way. A mirror, twice as tall as he was, hovered above the middle of the river. The morning light hit the reflection in a blinding display. He raised a hand over his eyes, but a monolithic shadow soon made it unnecessary.
A person.
Creature.
The Conductor, judging from the strange pinstriped suit that no one in their right mind would ever wear. She was a woman again, tall and lithe, with golden hair cropped sharply at chin level and gleaming violet eyes, icy yet disarming.
“You slept well,” she remarked.
“Funny, I don’t remember sleeping at all.”
Her mouth turned up at a corner. “It’s the wheel, isn’t it? It’s unusual, but it does its job for a weary traveler.”
“I could sleep in mud if I was tired enough, but I wasn’t tired at all when I signed your contract. You’re not the first to play games with my memory, so if you’re expecting fear and obedience, well...”
“Undisturbed rest was a favor. It’s less cleverness you’ll need for this, Jesstin, and more stamina.” The Conductor gestured toward the mirror with a spindly, outstretched arm. “Time is indiscernible in the trials, and attempting to understand it is a waste of precious energy. You will not be the same man when you emerge, if you emerge, on the other side. Some who face the especular get what they want only to find it was not worth what they gave up. But I see in your eyes you don’t care, do you?”
Jesstin didn’t indulge her rhetorical bullshit.
The Conductor withdrew a scroll from inside her tailored jacket. It unfurled from her hand. “Would you like to see the contract again?”
“You barely let me read it the first time.”
The scroll snapped back. “Then allow me the honor of instructing you.” She tucked it away. “There will be three challenges. Once you enter, there will be no turning back; however, you will be offered a momentary reprieve between each experience to catch your breath and reorganize your thoughts. If at any point you fail to go on, you will not be offered a second chance. Your soul, in its entirety, will belong to the especular forevermore.”
“To you, you mean.”
“I am but a conductor,” she said with a humble bow.
Jesstin held out his palms. “There some magic words I need to chant, spin three times, face west, what?”
The Conductor lightened in surprise. “No, dear, you merely step through.”
“And when I pass all three challenges?—”
“If—”
“When I pass all three challenges, I’ll emerge at the Magna Annalis? The library?”
“As promised.”
“What happens if it’s dark when I get there?”
“Then you will have to be swift about finding safety, won’t you?”
He crossed his arms and squinted at the mirror. “You get nothing unless I fail. That’s your payment. Yesterday you said you get more if I win, but I don’t believe it. You use this... especular, not the other way around.”
“Nothing I say will satisfy your scrutiny.” The Conductor’s arm remained extended, as stiff and still as a wooden rod. “I have already collected the fragment of your soul as payment. There are no refunds. Squandering time seems ill-advised if you’re to come out ahead in the bargain, but you know best.”
Jesstin contemplated the river and the mirror. He couldn’t measure the water’s depth underneath, but judging by the nearby rocks, it was likely shallow enough to walk through. Removing his boots might be easier, but he’d need them on the other side.
It could still be a trap. It was a trap. Any questions he had wouldn’t be answered by the creature whose integrity was a scythe. But she wouldn’t have a business if all she did was swindle desperate travelers out of their souls. The odds were stacked against him but not insurmountable. He’d beat the maze. He’d beat the fucking mirror too.
He flicked her a sly smile and trudged into the river without even rolling up his trousers. The light prisms vivified as he stepped sideways, half-blind and dodging rocks, until he was right in front of it.
