Lawrence Watt-Evans - The Spriggan Mirror

“And if it did…” Gresh blinked. “If it did, maybe we could send all the spriggans back where they came from! Maybe that’s what they actually want it for!”

“And maybe it’s not,” Karanissa said. “Maybe instead it’ll dump another half-million spriggans on us all at once!”

“I’ll have Javan’s Restorative handy,” Gresh said.

“The Spell of Reversal,” Tobas grumbled. “Use that, and save the Restorative!”

“Maybe I will,” Gresh said, as he pulled the jar of blue powder from the box. “Let’s just see what it does…”

“I don’t know if this is a good idea,” Karanissa said, backing away.

“She may have a point,” Tobas said. “What if it releases an infinite quantity of spriggans, and we’re smothered to death before you can use a counterspell?”

“That would be unfortunate,” Gresh said, as he sprinkled blue powder on the mirror. He had come this far, and did not want to give up. Besides, he had just cast three high-order spells that had done exactly nothing, and was beginning to think wizardry simply didn’t work on the mirror. He wanted to find something that would affect the glass.

“It would be unfortunate,” he repeated. “But I don’t think it’ll happen. Why would it? What power would that reveal? Esku!”

There was a golden flash, and the man, woman, and dragon stared down at the little mirror.

It remained a mirror, a round piece of silvered glass about the size of a man’s hand. It did not transform into a gateway, portal, dragon, spriggan, or monster of any sort.

“It would appear,” Karanissa said, staring at it, “that it has never mastered anything more powerful than itself.”

“How annoying,” Gresh said.

A spriggan suddenly popped up out of the mirror, jumped to a nearby rock, teetered on its edge for a moment, then scampered away. It looked just like any number of the other spriggans. The Spell of the Revealed Power had apparently not changed a thing.

“How very annoying,” Gresh said.

“You know,” Tobas said, “you’d make a terrible wizard, Gresh-assuming you survived your apprenticeship. You have a habit of throwing magic around much too carelessly. That spell really might have killed us all. Turning me into a dragon, and all the rest-you really ought to use a little more caution.”

This admonishment, especially coming from Tobas, whose carelessness with magic had created the spriggan mirror in the first place, stung more than Gresh cared to admit-but he could not completely deny that there was some justice in it. “I take some risks, yes,” he said. “I don’t think they’re excessive. I have a box of counterspells right here, after all, and this is what the Guild gave me these spells for. I brought them here to use.”

“But none of them have done anything useful to the mirror,” Karanissa said.

“I know. But there’s one more to try,” Gresh replied.

“The Spell of Reversal? What can that do?” Tobas asked.

“Maybe Karanissa’s right, and it really will suck spriggans back in,” Gresh said.

“Even if it does, it will only work for half an hour,” Tobas pointed out.

“That’s surely better than nothing,” Gresh said. “Perhaps we can find a way to keep on casting it, over and over?” He looked up, and even on a dragon’s face the dubious expression Tobas wore was easy to recognize.

“Well, let’s see what it does,” Gresh said, stubbornly. “We might as well.”

“I admit I don’t see what harm that one can do,” Tobas said. “Unless it breaks the mirror into four pieces again.”

“I hadn’t thought of that,” Gresh said, with a tug at his beard. “It might, mightn’t it?”

“We could wait until it’s more than half an hour since the mirror was repaired,” Karanissa suggested.

Gresh looked out across the meadow, past Tobas in the draconic form he did not want to keep, at Alorria, who was sitting on the carpet, holding Alris in one arm and tugging at Tobas’s ruined clothes with the other. He looked at the hordes of spriggans milling about, some of them clearly looking for ways to get at the mirror.

“I don’t think we should wait,” he said. “I have the Restorative, or I could even just use the Spell of Reversal again.” He pulled the final unopened jar from his box, wiggled the cork free, then sprinkled a little purple powder over the mirror, and said, “Esku!”

The flash was bluish this time, but after it had faded away the mirror lay on the cave floor just as before and still in one piece. Relieved that it was intact and disappointed that it was not doing anything obvious to reduce the spriggan population, Gresh leaned over and looked into it. He saw only his own reflection looking back at him.

“Nothing,” he said.

Karanissa suddenly reached out and grabbed a spriggan before it had time to react. She held it with one hand around its legs, the other pinning one arm to its body.

The other arm waved wildly about as it squealed, “No no! No hurt! No hurt!”

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Karanissa told it. “I’m going to see if I can send you back where you belong.” She tossed the creature onto the mirror.

It landed on the glass with a soggy thump, got up, brushed itself off, and scampered away unhurt, giggling hysterically.

“I’d say it isn’t exactly sucking them back in,” Gresh remarked.

Karanissa leaned over and peered down into the mirror, holding her long hair back out of the way with one hand. “It would seem not,” she agreed.

“So that didn’t work, and we have no other spells to try, so we’re back to trying to figure out some way to get it out of here and across the valley to the no-wizardry zone,” Gresh said.

“Maybe,” Karanissa said, still staring into the mirror. “Or maybe not.”

Gresh looked at her. “Maybe not?” He looked down at the mirror. “Why maybe not?”

“Well, look at it,” the witch said. “Maybe the spriggan didn’t get sucked in, but have you seen anything come out of it since you cast that spell?”

Gresh blinked. He stared at the mirror. No spriggans were climbing out of it-but it had only been a couple of minutes. He felt a twinge of hope, but quickly suppressed it.

“Not yet,” he said. “But that may not mean anything.”

“It feels different,” Karanissa said. “It’s still magical, still enchanted, it hasn’t gotten any weaker or stronger, but it feels different.”

“Can you tell how?”

Karanissa turned up an empty palm. “No,” she said.

“Tobas?” a distant voice called.

“Ali?” The dragon had been watching the events in the cave with interest, but now he lifted his scaly head and turned to look at Alorria. Gresh, too, glanced in her direction.

“What’s going on?” Alorria asked, the words barely intelligible over the intervening distance. “How long are these spriggans going to keep us here? The sun’s going down. Are we going to be stuck here all night?”

The dragon’s head swung back to the cave for a moment. “Excuse me,” Tobas said, “but I’ve been neglecting Ali.” He started to turn away-this time not just by bending his neck, but by turning his entire body.

“Wait a moment,” Gresh called. “If you leave, we’ll be overrun by spriggans, and they’ll take the mirror.”

“If you get too close to the carpet you may panic them into doing something unfortunate,” Karanissa said. “Or you may do something unfortunate, without meaning to.”

The dragon hesitated, then said, “I’ll just turn around and talk to Ali from a safe distance.”

Karanissa and Gresh exchanged glances. “That should work,” Gresh acknowledged.

“Good.” With that, and with much scraping of scale on rock and rustling of gigantic wings, the dragon turned around, sending spriggans running in various directions squeaking madly, until at last the very tip of his tail slithered across the rocks he had ripped out of the mountainside and curled into the mouth of the cave.