The Serpent's Shadow

Now the Mirror slept in the basket beside her throne, swathed in a shroud of black silk, waiting only until she was ready to make use of her newest servant.

She had made use of him already, in several smaller trials—ordering him to show her where her thugees were at work, or having him find the strongholds of other practitioners of magic, who could presumably see her as a rival or as a threat. She knew now where the strongest resided, and had added them to her long-term plans, but now it was time to put her servant to work on something nearer to home.

She sprinkled powder- of a different kind on the charcoal in the brazier at her feet, breathed in the drug-laden air, and felt at last the moment of disorientation that she had been waiting for. She did not drift off, she merely felt as if she hovered just a little above her body.

That was all she wanted. Any more, and she would lose her grip on her awareness and drift free. That could be useful, but it was not what she wanted to do at this moment; she needed only to be relieved of the distractions of a physical form, not to escape altogether. Her hand reached, seemingly of its own volition, into the basket beside her, and brought out the little, round mirror of black glass.

She cradled it in her lap, staring into depths that did not reflect the lazy swirls of smoke, nor her own face, but held a restless, glowing, featureless shape that swam within the glass like a furtive fish among water weeds.

'Mirror-servant in my hand,' she murmured languorously to it, 'Answer thou to my command.'

The glowing presence moved to the foreground, fogging the mirror with sickly light. Release me! the prisoner wailed soundlessly. Let me go!

'I thought you wanted to live forever?' she replied with a smile, aloud, although her servant understood her well enough if she only thought what she wanted to say at it. 'You begged, you pleaded for magic and immortality, for the ability to understand the Unseen world, for the knowledge to move bodiless through this world and go into the realm of spirits. I gave you immortality, did I not? So long as a single grain of this glass remains intact, you are bound to it; surely you will live forever! I gave you all the rest as well!' Then she laughed, throatily. 'You understand the Unseen as no other of your acquaintance, you go into the realm of the spirits, and though you move through the Unseen at my will, and not yours, I never told you that you would have freedom therein. But—still! You show your ingratitude, and how little you deserve any kind of freedom!'

You didn't tell me what you meant! the shape howled in protest. You didn't tell me I'd die! You deceived me!

'You deceived yourself,' she retorted severely. 'I told you, and promised you exactly the truth. That you put your own interpretation on that truth is hardly my fault. Now, enough of this nonsense. Obey me, else I will force you, and you have had a taste of what I can do to you. Show me the traitor to my people and my land!'

For a fleeting moment, before she lashed it with a spark of pain and punishment, so that the thing trapped within the glass cried out in anguish, the mirror showed her own face.

'No more of that!' she snapped, before regaining control and composure. 'Show me the treacherous daughter of my traitoress sister! Show me the thing that claims the power that is mine by right of blood!'

But there was nothing forthcoming. Shivani frowned, and prodded the mirror-servant again with the sharp and punishing goad of her will. I can't! the servant wailed. I cannot show you!

'Cannot, or will not?' she asked, furious. 'You will do what I command!'

Cannot! She is here, somewhere, she is near to you, within the bounds of the city but I cannot find her! There are signs of her everywhere, but not one leads to her!

Shivani cursed her pawn for being a fool, weak, and useless—but did not curse him as a liar. She could command the truth if she wished, but she already knew that her unwilling servant had told the truth in the first place. She had already tried every means at her disposal to find the girl, and had come to the same end as her servant. Surya's daughter was nowhere to be found, yet traces of her were everywhere. The only possible explanation for this was that she had somehow managed the magic that enabled holy men to walk amid crowds and yet remain unseen—or to be precise, completely ignored and isolated among them. That should not have been possible, with no one to teach her the secrets that Surya had learned in her own temple, but there was no denying the facts. The girl knew, was using her knowledge, and even a mirror-servant, who should have been able to eel his way past any common protections, could not find her.

Shivani ground her teeth and forbore to smash the mirror to pieces there and then. The mirror-servant was still useful, though clearly limited. She confined herself to punishing it with pain until nothing emerged from the depths of the black glass but incoherent whimpers.

Anger temporarily assuaged, she dropped the black mirror back into the cushioning swaths of black silk, and carelessly dropped a fold over the top of it. Let it rest and recover from its punishment. At least next time it would be more eager to placate and serve her.

Magic had failed her; no matter. Those who lived by magic often neglected to guard themselves in other ways. The girl could not possibly hide herself forever. Shivani grew stronger every day, and as she grew stronger,