Keon had been running for a full half-hour since his Mirror keeled over. At least now he knew. Every time he ate, he was literally feeding it, which meant starving himself of food starved it of power. He could use that to his advantage. It didn’t look like he’d be eating anytime soon anyway. Wherever he was, it wasn’t the Eastern Monument. They’d travelled hundreds—no—thousands of miles from where he first encountered the Mirror, which meant he could be anywhere between here and there.

Skidding to a stop, he leaned his elbow against a tree, panting. The forest was finally thinning out. There, through the wooden pillars, he could begin to see a clearing in the trees.

For what was probably the third time in the last thirty minutes, his fingers hovered restlessly over the harness to his Codex. He just wanted a peek; to be sure it wasn’t following him. Surely if that thing starved to death, it could only be a good thing, right? On the other hand, they were clearly connected. What if killing it also meant killing him too? Shaking the thoughts away, he continued at a steady jog towards the edge of the forest. One thing he couldn’t do without was water. He only had a few drops left in his canteen and he hadn’t stopped to search for a stream. For all he knew, he could have passed one already.

When he finally broke through the trees, he was standing at the edge of a terrace overlooking a wide dell. A glistening river wove between the arcs and contours of undulating hills, running into the distance. And there, silhouetted against the luminous nebulae, stood a mist shrouded dragonblood tree. He exhaled in relief. It was miles away, but at least he had a destination. If he could reach the tree and somehow make contact with the Encampment there, maybe they could send word to Wellworn and the others. Wellworn. He hadn’t thought about that since he was dragged half-way across the world by his Mirror.

He stuck to a path that kept him on the slopes of the hills, halfway between the surrounding forests and the river trailing through the valley. The way he saw it, if he was attacked from the forest, he could leg it down the hill and cross the river. If something came from the other side of the river, he could run for the forest. Those distant, ear-splitting shrieks told him that Mysts were somewhere in the vicinity. If they showed themselves, he would plonk himself in the water. They wouldn’t cross it.  

He wove his way stealth-like across the hills, leaving a slithering trail of disturbed grass in his wake. He was quite exposed but that couldn’t be helped. As he passed over the hills, he eyed the river with longing. He was parched but he didn’t want to stop for a drink until he was sure he was safe.

Suddenly, a glowing, blue apparition materialised a few feet in front of him; a man sat on the grass, leaning back with his eyes closed. As quickly as he appeared, the man vanished. Keon slammed both hands across his mouth and almost fell backwards. The bloody hell was that?!

He waited. Took a few steps to the side and carefully trod around the spot where the man had been sitting, eyeing the grass with wary suspicion. Dammit. Was that a TnT? Clearly, someone didn’t want him to make it to this dragonblood tree. Everyone was out tonight it seemed!

As he made his way over the hills, he saw several more of the apparitions—appearing and disappearing—throughout the valley. Some lingered for several minutes. Others, only for a few seconds. Mercifully, most of them were far away, and none of them had spotted him. Either they couldn’t see him (which meant they were Travellers) or he just wasn’t of any interest to them (which seemed like a good thing, but what did he know?). Whichever way you cut it; it was freaky. Like walking through a valley of the undead. There were times he wanted to stop and stare. If they were dreaming, could he get some kind of insight into who they were and what they were thinking? Was that how mind-reading worked (if such a thing existed)? Did people swoop into Underland and read people like books?

The river had turned a bend towards the left. Keon bounded over the hill’s edge and froze. He’d reached the end of the road, so to speak. The forest loomed thick around a rocky waterfall that fed the river. There was only a single, stony path leading up alongside it into the forest. And there, stood right in the middle of it, was a glowing apparition.

This one was a girl. Maybe his age, maybe older. He couldn’t quite tell from where he was standing. She was turning this way and that as though looking for something. If she was a Traveller, he could slip right past her, and she’d be none the wiser. But if she was a Trespasser…well, no one ever explained that part. Either way, he wouldn’t know what he was dealing with until he got a little bit closer. There was no other way around it.

He shrugged, shook his hands, exhaled, then clenched and unclenched his fists. Bouncing on the soles of his feet, he willed himself forward. Carefully. Slowly. He dared not make a sound.

As he drew near, he could see that her hair hung past her shoulders and down her back. She was dressed in an oversized, hanging gown which revealed much more of her than he’d expected to see. Her hair was auburn. At least—he thought it was. Everything was tinted blue. She was barefooted—various beads, bracelets and necklaces dangling from almost every place they could dangle—and seemed quite taken by her surroundings.

He was practically crawling on the ground, half crouched as he made his way up the incline, avoiding stones and dry-looking twigs. Just a few metres to go.

Suddenly she turned and headed into the forest. Keon stopped, straightening in surprise. He huffed in delight. Well, that was lucky! He waited a few more seconds to be sure, then scuttled up the rest of the hill towards the opening in the forest.

“Hello!”

“AAAAGH!!”

He tripped on his own foot and bashed into the adjacent tree trunk. There she stood! Right in front of him! Had she tricked him? Did she know he was coming, or had he rushed in like a fool and exposed himself? One thing was for certain: she was staring right at him, which meant she was a Trespasser.

She clasped her hands behind her back and leaned in towards him, almost at a bow; her inquisitively wide, sapphire eyes scanning him with intrigue.

“I have never seen one like you before. Not up close,” she said in a syrupy-thick, flowery accent, cocking her head to one side.

“That makes two of us…” he muttered, his stare unmoving.

“What is that you are wearing?” she chuckled.

“Why, do you want it? You must be cold,” he said, his eyes glancing up and down her form.

She matched his stare, examining her garments, then twirled with glee.

“Not at all! I am a lot warmer than I look, even out here.”

“Yeah?” he said, an idea rapidly forming in his mind, “Where are you exactly? You’re kinda like—not fully here.”

“To the normal eye, I am sitting in the middle of a forest in Parc de Parilly.”

That explained the accent. She was French.

“But here?…” she closed her eyes as she spun slowly, breathing in deeply. “I am in paradise.”

“And what are you supposed to be exactly?” he asked with a bent eyebrow.

“I am one of the Wise,” she said, pacing and looking up at the canopy.

“The wise?”

“One of the learned. One who knows.”

He eased his back off the rough tree trunk.

“Oh yeah? And what is it you know?”

She stopped, cocking her head to the other side in patronising pity.

“More than you do it would seem.”

He rolled his eyes. It wasn’t too late to slip past her and try make a run for it. The question was, would she let him? He didn’t know what Trespassers were capable of, and the others seemed to avoid them for a reason. They were always looking for something. Information. Codices. The currency of Underland.

“Even still, I suspect you might be of use to me,” she said, turning away.

He shook his head.

“I doubt it.”

She frowned, amused.

“Why else would you be here?”

“Kinda lost…”

Idiot! Stop talking!

“Really?” she said, her eyes suddenly brightening as she took a step towards him. “Where are you going?”

He shook his head again.

“Doesn’t matter.”

She chuckled, straightening back up.

“Everything here matters,” she said, matter-of-factly. “And nothing is without consequence. So, if you are here, it is because you are meant to be here, and if you are going somewhere, it must be important.”

“Is it?” he said, eyeing her warily. “So why are you here then?”

She seemed to falter for a second, almost unsure of how to answer. A confused fragility flashed between her brows, crinkling her nose as she scanned the floor. Then, her ethereal features smoothed.

“If there is something you want to change—but can’t—you have to do it here—at the source.”

He could think of a few things he wouldn’t mind changing.

“How do you do that?” he asked.

Her eyes locked onto his.

“It starts with a name.”

And there it was. His back bristled, skin drawing taught. He wanted to swallow but didn’t want her to notice.

“Why’s everyone so obsessed with names here?” he said, growing shifty.

His question was met with bemusement. It seemed to her the most obvious thing in the world.

“Names are keys to power,” she said, candidly. She began to pace again, walking in a circle around him. He mirrored her steps. “Legend says that the first man chose names for all the first creatures. In doing so, he gained power over them. To name a thing is to control a thing. A father names his daughter and so has power over her until she leaves his home or takes the name of another. Likewise, a son until he names a child of his own. Others say that to invoke a name is to call upon the power of that name.”

“So, you’re here to find a name?” He said, eyes narrowed.

“Not just any name. The right name for the right cause.”

She bent over and began tracing something onto the ground. Keon marvelled as the dirt and dust seemed to shift by itself through her translucent fingers. Then, his eyes were drawn to what she was drawing. First came a circle, then letters inside the circle. The letters surrounded another, smaller circle in which she scrawled several abstract, geometric shapes.

“What is that?” he said, leaning over.

“A sigil.”

He looked up.

“A what?”

“A signet. A seal. Think of it like a signature.”

“A name,” he said, ominous.

She smiled up at him beneath her brows and nodded slowly.

“If you want to change the world, sometimes you need help; and to know the name of a thing is to have a measure of control over a thing.”

Keon scoffed, shaking his head.

“This is loopy. I don’t believe any of that.”

“But look at where you are,” she said, perplexed. “And is that not a sigil you wear on your back?”

He tugged at the shawl, straining to see the insignia over his shoulder.

“Listen, I didn’t put that there.”

“Then who gave it to you?”

“That part, I’m still tryna figure out,” he said with a roll of his eyes.

She huffed a chuckle in fascination.

“Maybe you did.”

He let go of the shawl.

“Huh?”

She crouched down low to the ground and began to write next to the sigil, scrawling several letters on top of each other.

“There are many among the Wise who can bring their desires to life. Like seed planted in the ground, those desires can grow and take on a life of their own, acting independently of their author. We call them Servants.”

This time, Keon couldn’t hide his visible gulp. She slowly rose, her eyes fixed on the symbol she’d scrawled onto the ground.

“Entities made of pure thought.”

Mynds.

She broke her gaze and returned to look at him.

“I suspect that is how you are here as you are now. This form is not really you, but a Servant; created to carry out your will independently of your conscious mind.”

He scoffed a chuckle, glancing around to see if anyone else was hearing this crap.

“Come on! If that was real, wouldn’t I know about it?”

She shook her head.

“For it to fully work, you must repress all memory of ever having forged it. For example, I won’t remember this conversation tomorrow,” which—he thought—was a relief. “But my will will live on; growing here at the source until I need it.”

“Listen,” he said, palms up, “I ain’t a wizard and I don’t believe in magic…”

She stepped towards him.

“And what do you think ‘magic’ is exactly? What is a ‘spell’ if not ‘spelling’, words and ideas? Words have power.”

“Just like names?” he offered.

She nodded.

“Words can change the course of human history. A great orator can stir the masses to action! A news article can inflame the passions of a nation! Mankind has used words to control the world since the dawn of time. Where do you think the Powers came from?”

His eyes narrowed.

“The Powers?”

“Once upon a time, we called them ‘gods.’ But the Wise see them for what they really are: entities that arose from the collective thoughts and desires of families or tribes. It is why they were always territorial. They were Servants that grew so powerful they came to exist independent of their makers, exerting their will over many. Now, we the Wise can harness that power and invoke their names.”

Was she talking about Morningstars?

Her eyes flashed with intensity, exhilaration rushing through her ethereal form.

“Most people live as though the Powers are gone or just figments of the imagination, but they persist, exerting the will of their makers over the world. Their sigils are everywhere, we just call them different things. Logos. Brands. Corporations. Hashtags. Think about it. A group of people will come together and focus all their will, intentions and desires into a symbol. A brand. Through that brand, they can control the masses. Like magic.”

Suddenly, he felt uneasy about his obsession with Converses.

“It is the human imagination gone wild. Servants who became masters because we made them too powerful, feeding them our thoughts.”

He paused, his eyes searching.

“That’s not what I heard,” he said under his breath.

She gasped.

“I knew it! I knew there was a reason you are here! You know something!”

She couldn’t see it, of course (at least—he hoped she couldn’t), but he was smiling inwardly. He knew exactly how he was getting out of here.

“We didn’t make them,” he began, “but someone did. And you’re right about one thing; they were meant to serve us, but instead they wanted to rule. At least, that’s what I heard. And so, they did. They enslaved our minds to believe whatever the hell they wanted. Until…”

“Until what…?” she whispered.

He stared straight into those swirling, sapphire eyes.

“Until someone came who was more powerful than the Powers. Someone who could set everyone free.”

She lurched forward, her head sticking out farther than the rest of her body as though she could wrench the answers from him with her eyes.

“Who?! What is his name?” she hissed, inexplicably loud. “Tell me!”

He waited, scanning her translucent form.

“Wellworn.”

That same look of fragile confusion wracked her face as if he’d spoken in a foreign language. She backed away, her eyes seeing nothing in particular. Her form grew wispy, blowing away like steam. Her hands and feet vanished, followed closely by her limbs, her torso rapidly following until the only thing left hanging in mid-air was her shaking head.

“I don’t know that name…” was the last thing she spoke before she vanished. It wasn’t so much a sigh of incomprehension, but rather—Keon thought—a gasp of apprehension.

She was gone.

The path into the forest was wide open. He took a few steps forward, stopped, then turned back to the sigils she’d drawn on the ground.

“Low it,” he said.

He stomped over and kicked the shapes away until there was nothing left.

 

* * *

 

Logic said he should probably rest; that he couldn’t go on like this all night, but he didn’t dare shut his eyes; not when there were Mysts, Mynds and Trespassers all over the place. Who’s to say where he’d wake up? He doubted he could sleep even if he wanted to. Sure, he was putting on a brave face, but he couldn’t hide the trembling in his fingertips or ignore the rollercoaster in the pit of his stomach. He’d thought fast on his feet, but what that Trespasser said had freaked him out. People summoning Morningstars to try and use their power back home. Could they really do that?

On the upside, he was getting closer to the dragonblood tree. Every now and then he caught a hint of the glow from the nebulous heavens, framing the opaque outline of the tree through the canopy. The dull midnight mist had started to roll in along the forest floor, its oddly refreshing moisture bathing his feet as he ran.

The ground started to incline upwards. It wasn’t long before the angle got so steep that it forced him into a crawl. As he continued, a humongous, moss-covered root emerged from the ground beside him like a wall. He’d reached the roots of the tree! On the other side, he could hear the sound of trickling water. This time, he wouldn’t resist. He ran and scrambled onto the top of the wide root. The river ran between two of them with small banks on either side. Sliding down, he skipped over to the water’s edge and filled his canteen, careful to avoid his reflection in the river. When it felt as though the canteen had gotten its fill, he lifted it out and took his own. His loud gulps throbbed through his skull like a pulse. In seconds, the canteen was empty, and he was holding it beneath the surface for another refill, gasping.

Suddenly he lurched forward, nausea flooding his insides as a violent surge of pain wracked through his stomach. He clutched it in agony, choking on the water. The canteen slipped from his grasp, quickly swept away by the current as he dropped to his knees. What was this? What was going on?

His head snapped to one side and his jaw instantly flashed red-hot. Feeling his lip with the back of his hand, he saw drops of blood trickling between his knuckles. Then came the flash of pain in his stomach again and he doubled over. He tried crawling away, but nausea restrained him. He felt himself tipping, about to keel over.

In the instant before he hit the water, a terrifying realisation gripped him.

There was no mistaking it.

Something was attacking his Mirror.