2

  THE PRICE OF POWER

  Princess vs. Archmage

  Spieglein, spieglein an der Wand…

  A melodious sound arrived ahead of sight or touch, unplaceable, resembling a fable once known in another life or perhaps never meant to cross into this one.

  Eydis couldn’t tell whether she was falling or floating. It wasn’t a sensation so much as the absence of one. Pure, unending weightlessness that reminded her of the time she was swallowed by the abyss.

  What… What was happening?

  Who |

  Princess, do you…

  Another voice trailed after the first. Much clearer. Much deeper and older. It carried the salty spray and crashing roar of an ocean she'd only imagined.

  And imagination had always been her gift.

  She could create places far beyond the eternally grey sky of her kingdom, her cage. In this, she was but a wounded canary, aching for sky, for wind, for flight.

  The voices drew nearer, like waves piling atop one another toward a desolate cliff.

  Who is the f—|

  "Do you understand power? What you are capable of?"

  Whose voice was that? Who? A… man?

  Gidion?

  Memory returned in a single, brutal, foaming crash.

  How had she forgotten him in the first place? What had taken those memories?

  The world around her began to unravel. Space twisted. Blue waves drained into grey sky. She remembered that grey, that shade, that tone.

  Then something solid met her feet.

  She looked down. Her legs were shorter. Her hands smaller. She wasn’t twenty-two anymore.

  The study took shape around her. Timber-clad walls rose and formed high ceilings that curved like a dome, and tall, stained-glass windows brightened the ebony furniture inside. She knew this room. She had spent hours every day here, long ago.

  She was a child again.

  Her new tutor smiled politely. It was warm enough to pass as kind, but the warmth didn’t reach his brown eyes.

  Did the Queen of Shadows threaten him to teach her?

  Her handmaidens told her he was one of the most powerful mages in the realm. Eydis wasn’t impressed, having no patience for the predictable, long-winded lectures about arcane theory.

  Magic wasn’t meant to be studied, but to be pushed, broken, reshaped.

  This was the third arcane tutor in a month. The last two had left after a single session. They couldn't teach her anything she didn't already know.

  And frankly, she wasn't a fan of Her Majesty’s spies.

  "Please, call me Gidion, Your Highness," he said, "though, I do need to touch your hand to assess your ability."

  "Archmage Swan, I believe my potential is documented thoroughly in the reports Her Majesty no doubt shared with you."

  Gidion’s surprise, if genuine, was quickly upturned by his polite smile. The wrinkles around his eyes crinkled. “I don’t rely on reports, Your Highness. I prefer to see for myself. Your familiar, Envy.”

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Eydis clenched her jaw but complied. She snapped her fingers, and a swirling mass of violet mist materialised beside her, coalescing into the form of a beautiful serpent.

  Envy.

  “A serpent,” Gideon mused. “Elegant, dangerous, patient. Yes, I can see why Envy would choose that shape. Or perhaps why you chose it for her.”

  “Her? Most wouldn’t call it elegant,” she corrected him. “Or ask so many questions.”

  “And most wouldn’t bind a primal Sin at nine. That’s not something even the most gifted archmagi manage.”

  Her eyes narrowed at the bluntness. Few ever spoke to her so directly. But Gideon, as a Bearer of another Primal Sin, wasn’t likely to flinch in her presence.

  “Envy is a pedestrian emotion,” she scoffed. “Only those who pathetically covet what they can’t have harbour such pettiness.”

  "Envy is the catalyst for resentment and malice," Gideon countered patiently, "And it’s one of the most corrosive forces in existence, eating kingdoms from the inside out if you let it.”

  "Or maybe it’s just what happens when people realise they’re not enough.” She lifted one shoulder. “I don’t pine. I take. Envy and I were never going to get along.”

  "You think about the Sins differently than most. If you could go back… would you bind something else?”

  “No.”

  “No? But you just said—“

  "I do like Pride though. My mother's Sin." Eydis tilted her head.

  Gidion furrowed his brows. "Pride, yes. Ego is powerful. Some say it’s the source of all darkness. The first Sin. Wouldn’t you agree?”

  "Root of all evil, perhaps. But I'm not convinced it's the most destructive."

  "How so?"

  She smirked. “Some would argue Greed. But I’m not sold on that either.”

  “Then what’s your take?”

  "That, Gidion, depends on you. Information for information.”

  Gidion, taken aback by the young princess's blunt addresses and audacity, blinked once, twice, and burst out laughing.

  “What do you want to know, little Princess?”

  Eydis couldn’t deny how warm and infectious his laugh was, and she overlooked the fact that he spoke to her with such affection. Brushing it off, she asked, “Can you bind more than one Sin?”

  Gideon’s amusement evaporated. “You can bind multiple lesser evils. But multiple primal Sins… that’s just — Why would you want such a burden?”

  Indeed, why?

  The older Eydis wanted to ask the same question. Even she couldn’t remember why she had hungered for power so badly, so young. Her twelve-year-old self’s eyes burned with a fire of conviction that startled even the woman she had become.

  The younger girl allowed herself a half-smile, as if toying with a thought no one else could hope to guess. “You’re the only one who’s ever told me the truth.”

  Gideon's eyes widened. "The truth?"

  "That it's possible.”

  His lips moved as if to speak. As if. The memory splintered suddenly, breaking into shards of mirror. Eydis saw her own stunned golden eyes staring back from every broken piece before the darkness claimed her again.

  Again? She groaned. Three times a charm, they say.

  Except this time she felt her palm burned and her body ached. She opened her mouth but the silence swallowed her voice, her fingers stretching toward a final shard of mirror. When she gripped it, blood leaking from her palm, her lips moved on their own, shaping words both known and unknown.

  Spieglein (Mirror),

  Spieglein an der Wand (On the wall),

  Wer ist die Sch?nste im ganzen Land?

  (Who is the fairest of them all?)

  The voice was clearer now. And she recognised it — her own. There was a tremor of controlled anger in it, and it repeated, repeated, repeated.

  “Fuck off!”

  Eydis jolted awake, her heart battering furiously, questions slamming and tangling into one another.

  It was definitely a memory. One she had inexplicably lost. Why were they coming back now? Did it have something to do with binding Cerberus?

  And her younger self seemed convinced that there was a stronger Sin than Pride, who was unequivocally known to be the strongest. What could it be?

  And then there was the voice, the mirror, the fragments…

  She clenched the sheets and forced her eyes open. Blurry. Right. My eyesight.

  Her vision no longer belonged to a princess, nor to a queen, but to a respectable teen Eydis—a broken, feverish girl who felt oddly comforted by the simplicity of it.

  Until the burning registered. Skin. Veins. The wound on her palm throbbed, thanks to Cerberus. Sinking into the pillow, she gave a sour smile, feeling drained and exhausted.

  The lamplight flickered as a figure moved past.

  Startled, Eydis fumbled for her glasses and blinked until Astra stood sharp in front of her, wearing a midnight-blue robe that glinted violet under the amber light.

  Astra’s crimson eyes soft with worry that she didn’t bother to hide. She offered a steaming cup of fragrant chamomile tea. “Drink.”

  “Thanks.” Eydis sat up and drained it. Heat sank into her chest like medicine.

  Astra laid the back of her hand against Eydis’s forehead without asking. “You’re burning up.”

  “A night’s sleep and I’ll be my unbearably charming self by dawn.” Even Eydis’s voice sounded off-balance.

  Astra’s concerned gaze narrowed almost… playfully. "If thrashing around in those soaked pyjamas counts as sleep, you’re going to need more than one night.”

  Eydis didn’t reply straight away, thrown by the subtle tenderness beneath the banter.

  “What, is the Ice Princess finally going use her aura to cool me off? I could use it. My nights have been… pretty violent lately.”

  She waited for the predictable flush or sharp comeback.

  Instead Astra’s gaze slid downward, lingering on the ridiculous purple bunnies stitched on damp fabric. “Did you break into a toddler’s wardrobe?”

  Too easy.

  Eydis flashed a teasing grin, tugging provocatively at the loose collar. “Do I look like one?”

  Astra’s gaze followed the motion, to the sheen of sweat tracing Eydis’s throat.

  “You really do need to cool down…” Something briefly ignited in Astra’s eyes. “Undress.”

  Eydis’s brows shot up.

  Astra — St Kevin’s Senior Student