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“Where am I?”
“Princess, you’ve found your way into the mirror realm, but it’s been broken by the nothingness. We thought it had been completely destroyed and were just memories of what had once been, but if you’re here it must still exist!”
My vague hopes that had started to build collapsed. “I got trapped in a storm. It Nightmare Castle while we were trying to escape.”
Bloody Mary’s shoulders slumped.
“Maybe I can let you out? Maybe the storms don’t erase us, maybe it’s just sucking us all into another realm that we’ve never experienced?”
She a deep breath and nodded. “If nothing else, it’s cramped in this mirror. Fix the arch, let us out.”
I noticed one single crack through the center that I hadn’t seen before.
There was also enough dream energy in this current version of reality that I could shape it, push it into the mirror, and repair the crack. It didn’t take much more effort to repair the arch pathway itself and let the mirror dwellers out of their prison.
They flowed out, expressing their gratitude. I tried not to dwell on the types of nightmares they represented from ghost stories I’d read as a child and instead kept in mind how much Bloody Mary and The Lady in White had helped me in the past.
“What will you do now?” Bloody Mary asked.
I reached into my pocket and held out the bit of Baz’s essence that I held. “I’ve been following this. I was hoping it would lead me home.”
Mary reached out, her skeletal fingers hovering just over the gem as she studied it.
“There is a pathway. It twists and turns, but I believe I can follow it. It will take both of us to get you out of here.”
“What about you?”
She eyes softened at my concern. “We dwell in the mirrors. Once you save the realm, our pathways will be restored.”
Her desiccated lips pulled back and showed her teeth, all the way to the top of the roots. I shuddered despite how much I liked the creature standing in front of me.
“Come, Princess. Let’s get you home.”
She took my hand and led me back to the mirror I’d repaired.
“Lend me the stuff of dreams and we’ll get you back to the unconscious realm.”
I funneled essence into her through our connected hands. We both followed the thread that connected the gem I held to Baz and forced open a pathway.
It wasn’t stable and the stone arch looked crumbly, held together only by dead, thorny vines, and a defiance of gravity, but it was big enough for me to pass through.
“Thank you, Bloody Mary.”
“My pleasure, princess.”
Without looking back, I stepped through.
Ember
I stepped out of the mirror realm into Baz’s bedroom in Dream Palace. Frantically, I glanced around for fractures in my reality, but everything seemed quite normal. Or as normal as the Unconscious Realm ever got anyway.
Ash looked up from the book she was reading. Her eyes were red, and she scrubbed at her face, but her expression lightened when she saw me. I rushed over and wrapped my arms around her.
“Ash, I’m so sorry.” I’d never forgive myself for dragging her into this.
“Ember, it’s okay. Really.” She sniffed and leaned against me for a moment before straightening back in her seat. “I’m surprised to see you and coming out of a mirror. What happened?”
“So much.” I held my own tears for now. She had enough on her plate. “I need to see if this fixes Baz.” I held up the gem. In retrospect, I was glad I’d kept hold of it. It had at least partially saved me.
