Mirror Mirror

Mirror Mirror

           I should have listened to my sister when she said not to try to transference spell, but she was always right and I hated it.

I was frantically tearing apart the house looking for the portal. It had to be around here somewhere. After all the spell couldn’t have gone that wrong. I couldn’t have ended up that far off target. I pulled open a closet door and a sad looking inflatable duck pool toy flew at me.

I wished I had my bow. My hand instinctively reached up, but it wasn’t there. I cursed under my breath. Damn transference spell.

…

When my husband told me we should take a vacation, I don’t think this is what he meant. One second I had been standing in front of my kitchen sink washing last night’s dinner dishes watching as my neighbor filled her birdfeeder that only attracted squirrels and the next I was standing in front of a wide field of grass so tall that a horse could have been swallowed by it.

Also I was wearing a bow and quiver of arrows.

Which I did not know how to use.

...

The husband came home too soon. He saw me and froze.

“Is everything alright Mavis?” He asked setting down his keys in the dish besides the door with exaggerated slowness. My eyes flicked over his form.

“I don’t suppose you know where the portal is?” I asked him and his brows came together.

“Portal? Like on the internet?”

“What is internet? Is it magic?” I returned tucking a lock of brown hair behind my ear.

“Mavis?”

…

A woman came bounding towards me from behind and I turned. My breath caught in my chest. She was fantastical, her hair was so blonde it shimmered white in the blinding sunlight. Her eyes were wide and even from this distance I could see that they were an impossible shade of blue. The thing that was perhaps most striking about her was the fact that she had elven ears.

I reached up and touched my own.

Oh no.

…

“I am not Mavis.” I told the man and he regarded me doubtfully.

“Have you been drinking?”

I felt my hand clench into a fist at his patronizing tone, as if being drunk would somehow explain what I should do about being stuck in the wrong body. I didn’t need a lecture, I needed to find the portal.

“No.” I said sourly, “Listen mortal I must find the portal. This body does not have any magic. I need the portal to contact my…my sister.” My lips puckered and I grimaced.

“Mortal? What is going on with you Mavis?” the husband continued and I was starting to realize why humans didn’t have any magic. If they did they would be sure to blast their thick husbands into dust on a daily basis.

…

The woman stopped short when she saw me. “You aren’t Anaka are you?”

I just shook my head, who was Anaka?

The woman sighed a melodic sigh. The sound filled my chest with dread.

“What is going on?” I asked her and she arched a delicate eyebrow.

“Before you came here what were you thinking about? The last thing you remember?” her eyes saw right though me.

“I…” I faltered, “I was thinking about taking a vacation. I mean it’s stupid because well you know…with everything going on. It’s not like I’m actually going to be going anywhere.” I tried to stuff my hands in my pocket only to find that the tunic I was wearing didn’t have any. My hands hung limply at my side instead.

…

“Okay I am going to explain this very slowly so your small mortal mind might understand. My name is Anaka Greenfellow I was practicing a transference spell and something…messed up. I ended up here in your mortal wife’s body. I need to find the portal that is in this house in order to contact my sister who can use my body’s magic to send me back. Do you understand?”

The husband just shook his head and I rubbed my temples.

“What part don’t you understand? Is it the transference spell or the portal?”

He just shook his head again, his mouth agape like some mindless ape.

“Okay, let’s focus on the portal shall we?”

…

The elven woman introduced herself as Maiara and she led me back inside her house where she poured me a cup of slightly bitter tea and bid me to sit on her sofa while she glided around the kitchen throwing a few small glass bottles into a white sack. They clinked together as she set the sack down in front of me. She folded herself into the chair across from me, her eyes regarded me thoughtfully.

“What is your name?”

“Mavis.” I told her and she smiled disarmingly.

“I understand this must be quite the shock for you Mavis.”

I glanced to the bow that now hung by the door. I had slung it off my shoulder when we’d come in. “I really have no idea what is going on.”

“Ah yes, you see what happened is really more of an accident than anything else, you were just thinking of the wrong thing at the wrong time. When my sister cast the transference spell, you must have switched bodies.” Maiara explained and I just felt more confused.

“Transference spell?” I asked and Maiara’s eyes brightened.

“Of course, my sister…Anaka, thought that she was ready from something more advanced. Don’t get me wrong she is a talented spell caster, but she is impatient and impulsive sometimes. The transference spell is meant to do exactly what it did, but you aren’t supposed to leave your body entirely. You are just supposed to form a connection so that you can talk to someone far away.”

“Couldn’t you just call them? Like on the phone?”

Maiara’s eyes widened, “Are you mortal? I mean a human?”

“Yes.” I answered cautiously and Maiara stood up suddenly. I flinched.

…

“It would be old, something that reflected light.” I told the husband and for a moment he stared at me blankly and I honestly wondered if we were speaking the same language.

“Like a mirror?” he asked slowly testing the words around his mouth, I saw him run his tounge over his teeth.

“Yes. A mirror, a window, my father had one that was a shield.”

“There is a mirror in the bedroom that you…I mean Mavis got at a yard sale two weeks ago.” The words darted from his mouth and his eyes glanced to a staircase. I flicked my eyes towards it. The carpet runner was cream colored with little brass stair rods. I took a step towards it and the husband took a step back. I just shook my head. Foolish mortal, this body could not hurt him even if I wanted too.

“Come on. If you want your Mavis back show me this mirror.”

He swallowed hard and nodded tightly.

…

Maiara muttered something so low I didn’t couldn’t make out the words.

“Come with me.” She said sharply and for the first time I was afraid of her. She held out her hand and I felt compelled to take it. The elf pulled me deeper into the brightly lit house. The light felt cold now.

Maiara pushed open a door at the end of the hall and I gasped.

I was standing in front of my mirror. I guess they must have been twins because the mirror looked exactly like the one I had gotten two weeks ago at a yard sale. It hung on the wall in a gilded frame carved with the likenesses of birds and vines. Very art nouveau. It was round and about two feet in diameter.

“I have a mirror just like that.” My voice shook.

…

“Yes this is it.” I said somberly looking into the portal and seeing only my new reflection there. The husband just stood in the doorway as far as he could get from me as I stared into the glass and willed it to open.

Nothing happened.

Mavis was an average looking woman, with brown hair and brown eyes. She had a smattering of freckles across her nose and her eyebrows looked like she had plucked them just a little too much on the underside giving her resting face a surprised look. I chewed my lip and Mavis did the same.

“How do you open a magical portal with no magic?” I mused aloud and the husband issued a sound that was something like a seal barking and a goat choking. “It was a rhetorical question.”

…

I came to stand in front of the mirror and my hand reached up to touch a face that was every bit as lovely as her sister’s, but in a darker sort of way. Her hair was so black it was almost purple and her eyes were green like emeralds. I could see the family resemblance in the ears.

It felt like a dream. Like this wasn’t real and I was just wearing some costume.

“Your body doesn’t have magic does it?” Maiara asked and the trance broke between me and the mirror.

“No…I mean I don’t think so.” I looked down at my body and frowned at my long delicate fingers. I had always wanted to play the piano, but I never had been any good at it.

“Anaka’s body has magic.” Maiara clarified, “Your body, your mortal body does not.”

I just shook my head as Maiara pressed her lips together, “And I don’t suppose you know the words Anaka used to establish this connection in the first place?”

I shook my head again.

...

“In absentia lucis, Tenebrae vincunt!” I shouted at the portal for the eighth time and nothing happened. The husband was now openly cowering beside the doorway looking like it was taking all his will not to run through it. I strode to the mirror and got in its reflecting surface.

“You will open for me. You will show me what I wish to see. If you do not I will smash you into shards.” I threatened.

Nothing happened.

I screamed in frustration and spat some elven curses at it.

…

           “She had to have left some notes around here somewhere.” Maiara was now sorting through piles of paper laying all around the room written in an elegant scrawl of symbols that meant nothing to me.

“Can’t you…just open the portal?” I asked and Maiara faltered.

“I don’t have any magic. Our mother was an accomplished spell caster. Everyone expects great things out of Anaka because of that and she tries so hard, but she is so young. I however, did not inherit my mother’s talent, and as such…” Maiara spread out her hands and then turned back to the papers.

…

           I was going to be stuck here forever. I was going to be stuck in the body of a middle aged mortal woman with a husband who was afraid of his own shadow for the all of eternity. No that wasn’t right humans died naturally. They did not endure like the world around them, their bodies grew old and frail. They all crumbled into dust eventually.

At least there would only be a few more years of this torment then.

I wondered now if this is how Maiara felt without magic, empty and weak.

Perhaps I had taken it for granted as she had always told me and now I was being punished for my arrogance. I sat down on the bed dejectly and the husband ventured a step closer.

“Mavis?” he asked timidly and I just shook my head.

“Still me.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” I rubbed my eyes and realized I was crying.

…

“I got it!” Maiara shouted, making me jump. I had been half dozing slumped into a chair in the corner. In the oil lamp light the elf’s face looked ghoulish. She held up a piece of paper in triumph.

“What does it say?” I asked rubbing the sleep from my eyes. Maiara scanned the document again.

“It says that Anaka had been working on the transference spell using the portal as a conduit for long distance communication. It says that she had been trying to contact our brother who lives beyond the sea, but she had been having trouble making it connect to anything, but an empty bedroom…oh god Anaka what did you do?” Maiara put her hand over her mouth.

“What? What is it?”

Maiara took a shaking breath, “her notes say that she tried to break the link between the portals. That your portal and our, were twins and perfectly synchronized. They only opened to each other, but Anaka was trying to use the transference spell on the mirror not herself. She wanted to make it contact another portal. If she succeeded…” Maiara didn’t have the heart to finish, but I understood her meaning.

If Anaka had broken the connection with my mirror then I would not be going home.

…

I stared into the reflecting glass sullenly. Please Maiara…do something please. All you had to do was say the words on that end. The portals were still connected, I was stupid to think I could break a link that strong. I mean just look what happened, I transferred my whole consciousness instead of breaking the link.

Please Maiara.

I’m sorry, you were right. You were right the whole time.

Suddenly the glass shimmered and I was looking into my right reflection. I jumped up as my actual face opened in surprise. I cry tore free from my borrowed throat as Maiara crowded in next to my body.

“Maiara.” I rushed forward and placed my hand on the portal. The husband edged forward.

“Mavis?” he asked again like it was the only word he knew. I was about to snap at him when my body answered.

“Brandon?” Mavis in my body surged forward and I heard a glass beaker break in the background.

“You need to control your emotions.” I snapped as Maiara cried out. Mavis stopped short, her eyes widened as she turned to look at me.

“Are you Anaka?” My own name sounded strange coming from my body.

“Of course I’m Anaka. Who else have you swapped bodies with recently?”

…

I was used to staring at myself in the mirror, but not like this.

“What do we have to do to switch back?” I asked and Anaka pushed out the inside of my cheek with my tounge.

“You have to focus on the portal and send my magic through it. You have to recite the spell and focus on switching back.” She said.

“How do I use magic?” I asked looking down at my hands as if a wand or something would suddenly appear there.

“It’s natural, like breathing.” Anaka pulled her fingers through her hair and then took a deep breath. I noticed the red around her eyes like she had been crying. I remembered Maiara had called her young, but I couldn’t actually tell how old she was, her body was timeless. The girl drew in a long breath and let it out between her teeth. “You can feel it here.” She touched her hand to her chest, over her heart.

“You need to believe that it is possible and let the magic flow through you. Let it be alive.”

I frowned and pressed my lips together. “Alright I’ll give it a go.”

Anaka closed her eyes as she nodded. I did the same, trying to draw on the magic within. I could feel my desire to be home, to be me again growing inside me. I thought about sending myself back and pulling Anaka here. The mirror was a portal. All I had to do was believe.

…

I opened my eyes to stare at Mavis again. She cracked open her eyes and smiled.

“Let’s not do that again.” She said and I nodded seriously.

Maiara half tackled me and for once I indulged her with a hug back.

“I’m sorry that I…well you know.” I said to Mavis and her brown eyes were kind as she regarded me.

“It’s nice to get out of the house once in a while.”