The Mirror

shaleeri

((This is an IC thread, feel free to participate. Am making it for a friend, it relates to an in game storyline.))

noctiluca42

The western winds flowed through the buildings of the Renaissance Center as if they were gargantuan trees of steel and glass. Pamphlets rustled and curled like autumn leaves as they drifted over the pavement, still stained with last night’s revelries; it was early morning, and the sun had only just started to gild the sky in layers of gold and cream.

At first silent and deserted, the center began to reverberate with the sound of the wind. The night was clear and crisp, but the aerial currents tore past the trees and buildings, slipping ethereal fingers into cracks and crevices, howling loudly to the empty skies. In a matter of seconds the phenomenon became perplexing, then downright worrying; branches whipped and curled in the storm as mites of dust and leaves blew in frenzied scurries.

There was no lightning, but a peal of thunder resonated through the air as a smoky column formed in front of the luridly exotic Caprice Club. It paused, thrumming, twisting in and around itself, as a twister is wont to do, but never moving. It coiled like a serpent, the needlepoint tip brushing against the pavement while the howling crown scraped against the heavens, frothing white and grey like sea foam. The small tornado suddenly pulsed and filled with a fiery green light that collected in its heart and slammed into the concrete below, dispersing into wafts of sulfurous black smoke and glittering sparks of emerald.

The impressive phenomenon lasted no more than five minutes. Within seconds the winds dispersed, the whirlwind faded away into nothing, the clouds cleared and vanished once more. All that was left was the circle on the ground, the faint powdery ash from which drifted wafts and curls of arcane energy, and the three items left in the wake of the storm.

The first was the largest and possibly the most enigmatic; a handheld brass mirror, face down in the dust. An intricately sculpted dragon curled from the back, membranous wings supporting the reflective glass, claws clenched tightly on the sides of the frame. The tail wrapped around the handle, serpentine, scales glittering despite the worn nature of the metal below. The dragon was made of empty glass; attached to the mirror like an intricately shaped vial, hollowed and delicate. Its canine face snarled, glittering fangs surprisingly sharp in the opening of its maw, as if ready to drink a river of blood to fill the empty space within. Ruby eyes glowed with a dull light in its crystalline sockets.

Next to it, nestled by a fold of the dragon’s wing, a small marble of shiny black metal glimmered darkly, as if the glossy sheen of the night sky had fallen as a drop of celestial ink. It rested by a feather that was not quite fuchsia but definitely a bright, lurid pink; the edges of the quills were tipped with dark blood, dried into a crust of black and green. The same blood formed a circle around the incantation, sharp lines piercing into the structure within, bisecting and meeting in a dried glyph that was once a liquid flow. One would expect with such an incantation for it to be a pentacle, an intricate diagram, but the sign was nothing but a single shape wrought in blood under the three items. It glistened in the morning light, a plea and a message in the heart of the circle, a straight line met with an inverted V.

K

noctiluca42

“Malkin, please... do we have to turn this into a fight?”

His green fingers clenched tightly around the small and gilded metal cylinder, watching his father approach with a steely glint in his gold-flecked eyes.

“We can’t use these. You know that. They’re too… the risk is too great, especially now,” the sorcerer admonished, his voice surprisingly confident given his fear and the howling of the winds. Outside another storm was ripping through the poppy fields, with the perplexity that the rain appeared to be falling upwards, parching the grounds and plants underneath. Another arcane anomaly, one of several hundred that had been manifesting for months, turning all four provinces of Oz into a wasteland of dust and rampant magical energy.

“Now is the best of times. They can be used to fix this,” Fiyero said calmly, trying to reassure his son. Malkin felt the object in his hands pulse again and shook his head.

“No.”

The gold-haired man frowned, crossing his arms.

“So you’ll send them away? Sweep them out of Oz like they never existed, and allow them to corrupt Dorothy’s world?”

“What choice do I have?! People are already killing each other over sources of fresh water. Animals are being eaten like cattle. The Emerald City is a pile of rubble.”

“They are just as dangerous in any realm, Malkin. Dorothy’s world has just as many people keen to abuse their power,” Fiyero started. “And K is just as fallible as anything with a human heart. Are you sure you want to put him in danger like this?”

Malkin winced and the flagstones around him fissured with cracks, echoing the uncertainty that plagued him. But if he could trust someone to resist the temptation, it was K… wasn't it? His green fingers, long and spider-like, wrapped tightly around the weapon in his hands, the knuckles paling to a light, sickly color under the pressure. His father watched them with greedy eyes, echoing slightly with the madness that had once owed him the title of scarecrow.

shirobara111

A small crowd of gaudy youngsters in tight costumes had gathered outside the otherwise unchanged entrance to Club Caprice, talking animatedly amongst themselves as one man waved about what he claimed to be 'an angel's hand-mirror'.

"-There was like this huge tornado thingy! And then like this awesome green light and a BOOM! CRASH! And all of a sudden it all went away and this thing was here!"

The group expressed gasps of wonder at this, looking about at each other eagerly. Could this be their chance to be a part of the excitement in the city? Their chance to be real superheroes?

The laughter and excitement begin to attract the attention of a certain individual, walking along with a shopping packet held loosely in one hand. He was a tall man, or perhaps an elf, considering his narrow tipped ears, and had an untameable shock of blonde hair, cut into a mohawk down the center of his head, with close-cut hair across the rest. He had five piercings. A ring in each of the top corners of his ears and a stud in the left lobe, a chain connecting it to a ring pierced through his bottom lip. There was another ring alongside this one, and his top lip appeared to be stained almost black.

He paused, turning his head towards the group curiously, appearing to be listening a while before slowly making his way toward them, a clip-clopping sound coming from the wooden sandals he wore. Despite this, the outer members of the group did not notice him until he was directly behind them, looking down at the man with the mirror. "Angel's 'and-mirror, ya say?"

The man startled, turning to look to the elf, his face half hidden behind a blue mask. "Yeah, an angel's hand-mirror."

"Wha' makes ya think tha'?" The elf asked casually, his slanted, jade green eyes calm and friendly.

"It came with this." The man help up the pink feather, the marble nestled in his palm with it. "This is obviously a feather from an angel's wing. How many of those bird people do you see with pink wings?"

"Ash rose."

"What?"

The elf cocked his head, but he was no longer looking at the man. His eyes were fixed on the symbol slicked onto the pavement beneath the man's feet. He paused, seeming to consider something a moment before he turned back to the man, smiling amiably. "I think ya shou' give tha' mirror ta me, bud. I know where i' was s'posed ta go."

The man blinked, seeming taken aback, before quickly withdrawing his hand. "No. It's mine." The group around him began whispering and muttering, frowning upon the situation.

The elf just continued to smile. "Someone obviously sent tha' mirror ta someone in th' city, an' I know who. Met 'im once an' 'aven't seen someone wi' tha' exact colourin' an' ability ta draw trouble since." He very delicately slid a hand out through the crowd, uncurling long, slender fingers with black painted nails. "Ya need to give tha' ta me."

The man just stared at him, seemingly thinking he was some sort of moron.

"Please?" There was a brief glint across the elf's eyes as he asked this time, though his smile did not slip, and, with gasps of surprise from the crowd, the man immediately handed the three items over.

The elf closed his hand around them, pulling them back to himself and slipping the mirror and marble into the front fold of his royal blue yakata, smoothing out the jade green trimming as he nodded to the people and promptly turned on his heels and clip-clopped away. "Thank ya!"

The crowd was silent, seeming confused. By the time one of them woke up and shouted after the elf, he had already turned a corner and was gone. They didn't find him again after that.

*

Down in Westside, outside a seemingly common-place pet store, the elf clip-clopped into view, twirling the pink feather between his fingers, eyeing the blood-stains. "Now, wonder wha' K's up to this time."