JК
A Kiss Of Shadows :: Гамильтон Лорел
Страница: 122 из 338There was nothing dark in the room except my slacks and bra, and that wasn't what I was seeing.
I turned back to the mirror and it was still there. It was like a dark shadowy figure walking down some crystal hall, coming closer, growing minutely larger. I didn't instantly think it was the sidhe that had tried to kill me at Alistair Norton's, because a lot of sidhe can do mirror magic. For all I knew it was the sluagh coming through the mirror to spill over me. I couldn't ward the mirror—it wasn't a door or a window, not as I understood it. To come through the mirror meant they had better magic than I did, and I couldn't stop them.
The door opened, and my heart almost stopped beating, but it was just two women. Two ordinary, human women, who couldn't have been the least bit sensitive or they would never have been willing to come through the door. They came in laughing, gave me some strange looks, but went into adjoining stalls still laughing and talking. They saw me dressed and not bleeding, because it was the image I'd projected. Good to know something was working.
I didn't know what to do. Then I noticed something new in the mirror. There was a tiny spider crawling over it. No, not over it—inside it. The spider was inside the mirror, crawling on the other side of the glass. It was just like the spiders that had helped save me at Norton's house. It was the fey who had saved me. He, or she, had saved me once. If I ever needed saving again, this was it.
I tore off a piece of paper towel and wrote in blood: HELP ME. I waited until the blood had dried a little then I crumbled the paper into a hard, tight ball. The toilet flushed behind me. I was running out of time.
I passed my fingertips just above the surface of the mirror, careful not to touch it. I didn't want to touch the mirror directly until I had a sense of exactly what spell it was. I could feel the trembling line of power where the magic pulled like a string against the solidness of it. The magic was like a weak spot, a metaphysical crack. Whether the practitioner had found a weakness in the mirror and exploited it, or made the weakness, I didn't know. I pressed my fingers against the cool glass and thought of the heat that had forged the mirror. I spread my fingers apart and the glass fell to pieces like cotton candy on a summer day. A hole opened in the mirror, and a line of white, dazzling light spilled out of it like a distant flash of diamonds.
I threw the ball of paper into that melted hole. I smoothed the mirror back into place like molding clay. I spread it even with my bare hand. The door opened behind me.
I turned back to the mirror and it was still there. It was like a dark shadowy figure walking down some crystal hall, coming closer, growing minutely larger. I didn't instantly think it was the sidhe that had tried to kill me at Alistair Norton's, because a lot of sidhe can do mirror magic. For all I knew it was the sluagh coming through the mirror to spill over me. I couldn't ward the mirror—it wasn't a door or a window, not as I understood it. To come through the mirror meant they had better magic than I did, and I couldn't stop them.
The door opened, and my heart almost stopped beating, but it was just two women. Two ordinary, human women, who couldn't have been the least bit sensitive or they would never have been willing to come through the door. They came in laughing, gave me some strange looks, but went into adjoining stalls still laughing and talking. They saw me dressed and not bleeding, because it was the image I'd projected. Good to know something was working.
I didn't know what to do. Then I noticed something new in the mirror. There was a tiny spider crawling over it. No, not over it—inside it. The spider was inside the mirror, crawling on the other side of the glass. It was just like the spiders that had helped save me at Norton's house. It was the fey who had saved me. He, or she, had saved me once. If I ever needed saving again, this was it.
I tore off a piece of paper towel and wrote in blood: HELP ME. I waited until the blood had dried a little then I crumbled the paper into a hard, tight ball. The toilet flushed behind me. I was running out of time.
I passed my fingertips just above the surface of the mirror, careful not to touch it. I didn't want to touch the mirror directly until I had a sense of exactly what spell it was. I could feel the trembling line of power where the magic pulled like a string against the solidness of it. The magic was like a weak spot, a metaphysical crack. Whether the practitioner had found a weakness in the mirror and exploited it, or made the weakness, I didn't know. I pressed my fingers against the cool glass and thought of the heat that had forged the mirror. I spread my fingers apart and the glass fell to pieces like cotton candy on a summer day. A hole opened in the mirror, and a line of white, dazzling light spilled out of it like a distant flash of diamonds.
I threw the ball of paper into that melted hole. I smoothed the mirror back into place like molding clay. I spread it even with my bare hand. The door opened behind me.