Flashback [The Mirror] Pushing the Envelope (Baldy)

[Zandelia]

Spring 25th, 505 AV – The Mirror of Tanroa

The city of Nyka was a strangely comforting place, a trap for wanderers in the remote wilderness. She considered it to be the true Venus fly trap of Mizahar, the other cities merely pretenders to the title. Nyka was truly oxy-moronic, tranquility in violence and democracy within a dictatorship all rolled into the fact that it was built upon a much old city, from an older time. Or, at least, that was what rumor and hearsay had whispered to her. Drunken revelers were more than happy to regale her with tales that were supposed to prove Nyka’s supremacy in a world where a place without animal dung was considered the height of luxury. There was an allure to the streets she could admit, their layout and composition both elegant and logical. However, each time she passed a grouping of runes, symbols and protective charms she couldn’t help but ponder how superstition was a dangerous form of zealotry.

Sunberth had blood upon its stones aplenty, but at least it didn’t pretend it was a protective addition. No, violence was not as integrated and regimental than it is here. Here, it is a part of live that is allowed – not just tolerated she mused as she made her way towards the Celestial Square.

“Let us see if drunken words are worth any merit at all” she muttered to herself as she stalked towards one of the stockier, unobtrusive buildings in the square. Of course, that merely meant it was less gaudy to her sight, more graceful in its construction.

She had done her research of course, her single eye and ears good enough still to pick up on the more important facets of necessity. Her purse had been lightened a little, the bought alcohol making her words far more charming to her informants mind than they could ever have been through actual effort – ease of drunkenness had been far more profitable. She had found she required permission to enter for an audience with the famed Mirror. It was whispered of, eyes averted and heads cast downwards temporarily, as if it were a cursed object beyond mentioning. Yet, others she had asked seemed to hold high regard for the artifact – or she assumed it was an artifact from bygone times. It had intrigued her and she needed to see it for herself, her heart fluttering with the very thought of touching it, adrenaline spurting through her veins slightly.

Permission was easy enough to barter, though we went through a lot of parchment before his sluggish hand had managed a proper sentence or two she recalled as she approached the large, ornate doors in front of her.

She could see now, closer as she was, that the building was under guard by members of all four monk factions. This surprised her and gave her a little more regard for that which she sought. The monks rarely allied so intensely over trivialities – that much she had learnt observing the various brawls and insult bouts in the Nykan darkness. She paused briefly and took a deep breath, her gaze flicking from guard to guard, monk to monk, with some worry. She forged onwards until she was stopped by an outstretched arm and a seriously dark scowl.

“Permission?” the guard asked her, the tone of their word promising retribution for anything not on the level.

She pulled the slightly crumpled piece of parchment that supposedly gave her free entrance to the building from inside her jacket and passed it to the warden in silence.

[Balderdash]

After scanning the wrinkled parchment for signs of forgery and finding none, Nicholas nodded to the monks and pocketed the slip. Dark oaken doors that seemed more appropriate on a fortress than a government building groaned open, and Zandelia was beckoned inside the Mirror's chamber. Inside were no benches, candles, torch sconces, or paintings. The entire building was a single, very large room made of purely white marble, gleaming under the sunlight that streamed through wide mirrors set far into the ceiling. The doors swung shut behind Zandelia, revealing a duo of monks stationed on either side of the entrance. Even inside, the building was guarded. On the opposite side of the chamber stood the artifact that required such obsessive security, and the only thing in the room. It was a mirror whose frame was made of sculpted gold and turquoise, the size and shape of a rather ornate doorway. If there was no glass, Zandelia could easily have stepped through it. There was none. The Mirror was not empty, but whatever its surface was made of, it was most certainly not glass. It rippled and shimmered like water in a crystal clear pond, and it showed no reflection. If Zandelia looked too long at it, the chamber would start to shrink and stretch, as if it were turning into a tunnel leading to the Mirror, and she would begin to feel a sense of vertigo. As if the Mirror was pulling her towards it. Urging her to fall in.

[Zandelia]

The threshold was all encompassing, a deadly trap perhaps that seemed to edge closed through an infinite span of time. Strong doors with rivets of metal, the wood thick boards of oak she thought, large enough to dwarf her body entirely, slammed shut behind her with what felt like a death knell. Guards abounded within as well as without and she found herself taking a few minutes to compose herself as her gaze darted from side to side, flicking from monk to monk. What she had expected she could no longer recall, isolation driving thought from her mind –all apart from those dedicated to pure self-preservation. She was in dangerous territory and had no way out. She knew she could ask to leave but it would ingrain suspicion she could not afford.

No, I have to see this through. Curiosity be damned, I will have to smash my head against a wall afterwards for this foolishness she told herself wryly.

It was as she cast her gaze around the large, vaulted room that it came to settle upon the artifact – ot could be nothing else she was sure. Blazing mirrors hat reflected the light of body the sun and torch were forgotten, the dazzling white marble that was carved into intricate patterns – a testament to worship through architecture – were meaningless to her. Her only focus, her end destination, was all encompassing to her senses. She had imagined a flimsy mirror but it was nothing of the sort. It was almost ethereal to her senses. She did not even dare to use her aurist’s sight in case she collapsed from the viewing. The mirror was nothing but a rough rectangle, though large to be sure, with a space inside the stone frame she could never have conjured without seeing it. Glistening purity rippled there, attraction incarnate.

Beautiful was all she could think as her feet took her towards the nexus of power, unbidden.

The room had grown, stretching and distorting in her vision. Length became pointless as a means of measurement, depth and breadth shattered as if they did not even exist. Time seemed to trickle for her, the passing chimes sinking through the hourglass one grain of sand at a time. Illusion or not, she could not comprehend it. She only knew that her one goal, her one desire, was to offer herself to the shimmer – to unravel its secrets and keep them all for herself. She steps were firm, her pace a gentle stride, her arm was outstretched before she even made it half way to the thing.

“Tell me your secrets,” she whispered to herself, “show me the truth of it. Give me knowledge others can merely wish for. Encompass me and spit me back out the grander” she finished as she was now within touching distance.

For a few painful seconds her resolve wavered, the spell breaking as if offering her the chance to turn back. She growled at her cowardice and pushed her hand to the surface, feeling the chill of icy water spread up her arm and infiltrate her bones.

Own more than you show, speak less than you know she thought, not truly understanding how true the phrase could be.

[Balderdash]

If the Mirror could understand Zandelia, it showed no sign of it. Nothing happened when she spoke. It simply continued to exist as it always did. The instant her flesh touched its surface, however, a change came over the artifact. The surface of the mirror suddenly ceased rippling, and Zandelia would feel a sharp chill, as if she had suddenly grabbed something incredibly cold, starting at her palm and radiating outward. If she tried to remove her hand, she would find it stuck to the Mirror as if by adhesive. The Mirror appeared to be freezing. Tentrils of crystal extended across the point of contact and grazed the edges of the frame. Tendrils that quickly turned into a lattice of what appeared to be very clear ice. In two more ticks, the gaps in the "ice" filled, the Mirror had a single solid surface, and Zandelia could take her hand off again. There was a reflection now. But it wasn't of her. There was another touching the Mirror, their hand appearing to rest atop hers, but separated by its flimsy glass. It was a man, but not like any Zandelia had ever seen. He was tall, pushing on seven feet, with huge, corded muscles and a hand that was almost the size of her face. Loose fitting pants made of animal skin covered his lower body, and his torso was bare. His eyes were iron grey, as was the close cropped beard that stretched across his chin and lower cheeks, and the hair that fell in wild, unkempt locks to his shoulders. He had coarse, tan skin. The skin of one who had labored all his life. His face was harsh and angular. He was a man, and yet he seemed like so much more. Like the larger than life figures that populated the fairy tales Zandelia had likely heard when she was a child. Of course, he looked less like a knight in shining armor, and more like a foreign chieftain. His surroundings were shrouded in darkness; the only reason he was visible was because of a torch he held in his free hand. The man raised an eyebrow at Zandelia, and said, "Daeq canochat."

[Zandelia]

Zandelia could not move her right hand as the chill infused her, dripping through her arm at first before rushing through her in a torrent, for once the images of a river of time acutely emblazoned upon her consciousness. It was as if a river had smashed through her, leaving her chilled and shaking in its passing. Her skin pimpled as a shiver tore through her with a vengeance. She tried to pull; away, fear infecting her like a plague as the surface before her eye shifted into pointed ice crystals, beautiful yet deadly. She could not appreciate the wonder at that time but she was sure to look back with awe upon seeing divine magic woven before her very eye. It all happened in a matter of seconds, the aftermath leaving her breathing deeply as the mirror smoothed and coalesced.

What in the name of Tanroa is this?! was her first thought, raging inside her skull, rampant as the cruel trickery made itself apparent. She could see someone, a man, but his words meant little to her. Time had a sense of humor it seemed, but she had never accounted it with a lack of purpose – she was meant to see this, whatever it was.

The man she saw was a giant, rippling muscle covering his body as if he had never seen a single day of comfort in his entire life. Her vision tore into him, not out of attraction but out of assimilation. If she were meant to see him then she would do her damndest to remember every inch of him, every strand of his impossibly unkempt form. He towered over her by a good two feet, his hand pressed to hers at the boundary of time large enough to break her in two she was sure. Her mind worked furiously and came to the quick conclusion she was staring into the abyss of the past – a rare prize indeed. Bewildered defeat began to shift towards a small semblance of triumph. She held his gaze definitely, refusing to let it budge as she tried to understand his words. She kept her hand pressed to him, his only bridge into the future. Or she assumed she was his future.

You’re like a warrior beyond belief my grizzled friend. If only I could take you back to Sunberth I’d be able to do great things she mused.

"Daeq canochat?” she let the phrase slip out of her mouth, testing it tentatively as she tried to assess his face, the face and eyes often gave more meaning than words. He looked troubled, confused perhaps, as his eyes swept across her form. He must have been as confused as she was, she realised.

Ancient tongue? What does it mean...what would I say in his position? she pondered.

“Talk? Do I talk?” she asked him, stepping closer to the mirror so that she was barely an inch from its surface and gesturing her free hand from her mouth as she talked, “petch! What do I say?” she asked the world in general as she kept her single eye focused upon his two, grey in colour she now noted.

“Yes, I speak,” she told him, again repeating the gesture from her mouth, “Zandelia. I am Zandelia!” she told him, pointing at her chest with her free hand, trying to get at least that meaning across to her partner in unknowable conversation. She gestured her hand to his chest then. “You? Tu? Du!” she tried in exasperation.

“Damn this Djed!” she let her free hand slap against the stone frame of the mirror with rather more force than she had intended, wincing a little.

She let her mind roam free, stalking through all of the knowledge that she had gathered. She did not know the Ancient Tongue, if that was indeed what the giant spoke. Still, she had work around at her disposal. She knew something of Nykan history and she presumed, possibly completely falsely she was willing to admit, that the man she spoke to was an ancient Nykan. The monk had told her the name of the old city, crafted by the ancients so many centuries ago now. The torch in his hand illuminated little else than his own person but she fancied that she could see rough stone work on the fringes of the light, it rippled against something solid at the very least – a few paces behind him. Logic set in as she noted she had to touch the mirror to communicate, therefore he had to too. If it had never been moved...

No, the artefacts of the deities never get defamed. Never. Surely? she told herself, trying to get a handle upon what little she could.

“Nyka!” she told him forcefully, trying to communicate with strength now as she swept her hand behind her to show him where she stood, “Nykalia?” she asked him, this time gesturing around him, towards the frame.

[Balderdash]

Zandelia's repetition of the Nader-Canoch phrase netted her a slow nod. When she switched to Common, however, the man stared at her with a cocked as if she was speaking macaque. "Djas nader-canoch rarurit." he said with a grimace, though he humored the mystery woman by squatting slightly and leaning forward. He took a step back with widened eyes and a wrinkled nose when she swore, however. "Djas gligisikai pechit!" Her babbling didn't help her case much, as a furrowed brow became quirked, and a large head slowly tilted to the side again as the man stared at Zandelia with an open mouth. Confusion soon turned to laughter as she continued desperately attempting to speak, the man nearly doubling over in mirth towards the end, slapping his thighs all the while. After about a chime, he calmed down enough to draw himself up to his full height again, though he was still grinning widely. The man tilted the torch in the direction of his abdomen and said, "Gregor. Djed Radjuds? Nen heat." In response to her inquiry about Nykalia, Gregor nodded and made a sort of sweeping gesture in her direction, with a quirked eyebrow and genial smile. "Djas Nykalias. Djas sutla? Djas sutla ruwe, furugu, vaknui, cha?"

[Zandelia]

The conversation was not going well at all, in fact she envisioned that it was in some way a cruel trick of the goddess Tanroa for her own pleasure, puppeteer strings forcing her into a path of self-degradation in front of a bear of a man who was long dead. She could not help but smile and shake her head as he laughed at her, a small ripple of melodic laughter bubbling from her own throat. The absurdity of the moment was acute and she had no doubt that after they were done with their time together a group of drunken males hundreds of years dead would have the last laugh – or first, depending upon the perspective attributed to it. She sighed as she tried to bring a semblance of order into a chaos that not even Rhysol could conjure, with all his imagination.

Am I meant to see this? Or am I meant to be a story of foolishness for tribes of bastards? she asked herself, truly having no answer for the musing.

She noted that he was not afraid of her despite her strangeness. If anything he was amused and growing more intrigued in the comical figure before her. Zandelia, the Goddess of Idiots. It was a moniker that brought a sour taste to her tongue. She tried to interpret what he was saying, gauging his body language and his gestures. Gestures seemed to work well enough to bring some small understanding between them. She understood the motion of his torch well enough, she was having the same thought as he was no doubt – what lurked beyond the mirror? She needed a way to continue the conversation, to get some usable knowledge at least. She doubted he would understand much but she would try. Mystery beguiled her after all and there was surely some purpose to this beyond a smile.

“Gregor,” she understood that was his name at least, “Nyka is…large” she tried to mime to him that word, her hand circling the mirror and her finger and thumb making the gesture for small before she expanded the gap and swept her arm from her side trying to get the point across.

“It is wealthy too” she told him, seeing his brow furrow once more and wondering how to express such a complex concept. An idea stole upon her and he took a golden coin from the pouch at her belt and flipped it, end over end, from the top of her thumb. She caught it and brought it close to the mirror for inspection. It shone purely in the light of the room, speaking in a language all of its own. She put it back into her pouch and then pulled the pouch from her belt, hefting it so he could see its size and nodded t him before putting it back.

It’s like speaking with a child. A giant, muscled and fierce child to be sure but a child nonetheless. Tanroa you absolute cur she thought to herself.

“We have nice clothing?” she stated, pulling at her tunic and giving a thumbs up sign, he must have at least understood that.

“And the walls are made of stone, surrounding everything. Surround Nykalias” she tried to mime that and gods it was terrible.

She swept her arm out again to indicate Nyka as she spoke, following with a circular motion and making a fist again before beating it upon her chest to try and indicate the concept of strength to him. She bowed her head and sighed, her forehead almost touching the mirror then, she cared not for the consequences then she just wanted to gain something from the meeting.

“And metal, we have metal” she made it and afterthought, pulling her dagger out and showing him the gleaming metal. “And whores too” she made the universal mime for buxom women and threw all caution to the wind, blowing him a kiss to see if he could understand.

“You Gregor?” she pointed at him then, then shifted her pointing so that it was now beyond him, “what is your land like?” she asked him, her expectations of learning anything of note rapidly disintegrating.

For the first time in many a year a small trickle of a tear leaked from her good eye, the dead one too useless even for that. Disappointment flooded her with a shudder. The tear came to stop at her chin before dropping to the floor.

“What am I doing here? Why show this to me Tanroa? Akajia never gave me anything, but you have brought nothing but false hope”

She drew in breath then, determined to see the meeting to its ending at least. She looked up into his grey eyes and awaited him to laugh at her once more.

[Balderdash]

For almost a chime, there was silence. Gregor simply stared blankly, showing neither understanding or a lack thereof. If Zandelia cared to look, as the tear broke free from her chin and started its descent to the floor, it seemed to stop in midair for the briefest moment, suspended by an unknown force. But it was over as soon as it began, and it was back to falling in the blink of an eye. Gregor blinked at her once. Twice. Three times. Finally, he said slowly, and with no small amount of caution, "When did you start speaking our word."

[Zandelia]

All seemed to have been lost, she was even filled with self-loathing at her own weaknesses as the singular tear dripped from her chin and fell to the floor. It was embarrassing really, she had to admit that to herself. She spent her life seeking things – people, information, answers – yet she never really found anything, nothing of substance or note. Oh she had made a few contacts perhaps, turned a few heads and slit a few hamstrings. However she had seen the Mirror as a chance for her own attempt at true greatness, had imagined the secrets that were held within something that essentially made time immaterial. Yet now, as always, she found herself lacking anything beyond the credulous and pointless. She wondered if she were ever destined to do anything of note before her last spark was snuffed out.

Or am I just not strong enough to force it? she asked herself morosely, wondering why she even held fast to the Mirror of Tanroa any longer. Surely it was better to leave than to torment herself?

“When did you start speaking our word?" came the words she never expected to hear.

What the..? No? NO! Tanroa you petching harlot! the thoughts tumbled through her skull in short order, confusion spreading immediately before being replaced with that tiniest of things – hope.

Her head snapped up to look at Gregor anew, free forearms scrubbing her cheek dry as her mouth opened and closed a few time as she tried to understand what had just happened. It was hard enough to stop the palm touching the mirror, bridging the connection between them both, from coming away and shattering everything. She wiped her damp palm against her tunic and pulled it tight almost nervously – she did not know what to do now if truth be told, whatever miracle had been worked in her favour she was still talking to a Protohuman with no knowledge of the future as far as she could discern. She decided words were better than silence, she needed to keep him talking as long as possible to get whatever mysteries he had from him.

“I didn’t, you started talking mine!” she told him as her singular green eye would tell him she was just as surprised as he was, “but you can understand me? It must be the mirror!...The...the doorway! It must be helping us understand what we are each saying” she speculated as she let her gaze take in the frame and found a new level of respect for the creation.

“But then...why did it take so long? Wait, never mind that! Gregor, what do you know of this place? The place you are standing? Has it always been there, the mirror? What are your people called? What do you do? What is going on at the moment?” she asked him, realizing she was asking him too many questions at once and biting back her tongue quickly to cut off her diatribe.

“I...need to know. I was meant to talk to you, for whatever reason. I could have been shown anything at any time but I was showed you. There must be a reason!” she finished, the sheer belief behind her words – whether true or imagined for the sake of her sanity – would clearly be noticeable to the giant of a man.

[Balderdash]

Gregor blinked thrice at Zandelia's sudden outpouring of questions before slowly nodding and saying, "This is our vault, where our precious things are kept against the wickedness outside. The Mirror has slept here for many moons, since Nykalia was first made. We are humans, and what I do, as every human does, is fight." He paused then, his eyes turning downcast. If Zandelia paid close attention, she would see his left hand clench into a fist. "Right now, we are under siege. The sun has not shone in two moons, and frost is beginning to touch our children. The darkness is crafty, and hides from-" The Protohuman was cut off by the voice of another man, albeit breathier and higher pitched. "Gregor! We found her!" Gregor whipped in the direction of the noise before turning back to Zandelia with a grin. "It wasn't crafty enough. We found its queen." As he began to step away, Gregor looked behind him and said, "Perhaps it was to give us hope here. I hope you have purged the devils from Mizahar in your time. Good bye, Zandelia." And with that, he took his hand off the Mirror, and its surface melted into a fluid again.