Dana Ilic and the Shadow Door (Lightwielder Chronicles #1) | ✔️

Stupid House of Mirrors (Max)

"You have been in that bathtub for almost an hour now, Maksim, dragi moi."

Even when fully submerged, I could still hear that annoying sickle tap on the bathroom door.

Pulling me out of my thoughts.

Demanding I leave my only refuge.

I let out a sigh and watched the tiny transparent bubbles float up, up and away. Like little dust motes in the light.

It was so peaceful being surrounded by water. Becoming water. Clean, non-tainted by my mother's presence.

A place where I could think of Dana.

Its gentle waves calmed me, and washed away the past. All the way to an ever-peaceful oblivion.

All of a sudden, red blisters started popping on my arms, and I was hot, unbearably hot.

Fiddlesticks! The water temperature was rising.

If I don't get out of the tub, I'm gonna be cooked like a lobster!

Unless...

I pushed back with all my might, forcing the jet streams to cool down to an at least lukewarm acceptable version of what once was my bath.

Mommy dearest and I were having a downright temperature war. Her powers were formidable, if she could affect the water temp from meters away!

My skin was becoming redder and redder by the second, no matter how much I focused. Beads of sweat ran down my face, when I finally surrendered and pounced out of what turned into a boiling pot.

"Good boy," Morana purred on the other side of the door.

I wrapped a towel around my waist and came to stand before the bathroom mirror.

Jesus, I looked like crap. Not too far from how I felt.

My cheeks--red and swollen. There were bags under my ice blue foreigner eyes-- just another hard fact to accept.

The mirror image changed to a ten-year old, brown-eyed me, wearing a Husky jersey, beaming at my dad sitting in the stands.

Yeah. Those were the days.

I closed my eyes and imagined D again.

Last time I did that, I saw her cute pale dimpled face staring down at me. An unknown house loomed in the background, and a porch. She was happy. Out of peril. She'd been holding a tea cup.

A tea cup I used to message her.

Perhaps now, if I focused enough, I could do it again.

I opened my eyes. Nothing there. Just the same ole dude, same ole tired dumb ass face.

A face of someone reconciled with destiny.

The mirror froze over. Like every single morning for the past five days.

"It doesn't work anymore, Maksim, dragi moi, and you know it," I heard my mother say. "That little... excursion of yours was the first and only transgression you've committed in my home," her voice scraped the inside of my ears like Mr. Nabir's chalk on the blackboard. "Now come out of there and get dressed. Time for dinner."

I slow-walked towards the door, listlessly. A boy marionette whose goddess mother tugged on his strings, non-stop. Would I ever be free of her control?

She awaited on the other side, as deadly, as beautiful as always. A top-model in her long-tight, glittering white dress and crystal high heels.

"The Maras made your favorite. Grilled chicken with veggies on the side." She pecked my forehead, her lips leaving an embedded snowflake there.

A heart of eternal winter.

"Not hungry." More like, I didn't wanna eat anything the Maras made, no matter how yummy.

The fair-maidens-by-day-toothed-and-clawed-monsters-by-night thing they had going on just creeped me out so much.

I walked over to the castle window. I couldn't bear standing so close to Morana.

The same, familiar landscape greeted me.

A boiling river of lava. A fire dragon circling it. A bridge connecting its two banks.

And a perpetual snowstorm raging everywhere else my eye could reach.

I clasped the window sill and bit into my lower lip to stop the vertigo vortex in my head from spreading to my legs and turning them into jell-o.

It wasn't as bad as being on the Bloomington light elevator to Chardak, skateboarding on cloud ponies or...

I gulped.

Riding Simargl.

But still, here, wherever here was, was bloody high.

That was another thing.

Dana would know all about this place.

Dimwit Max Martinez didn't have an idea where he was. To me, it was just a stupid, big house, full of stupid mirrors.

Why did Morana need all of them, anyway?

Who knew mommy dearest was so self-centered?

"Nothing wrong about being self-centered, Maksim. You should try it sometimes." She cackled, placing her hands on my shoulders.

Oh, great. I forgot the goddess of death and winter was an excellent mind reader, too.

"When I focus, I am." Morana ran her fingers through my hair. "And the Mirror Palace is not 'stupid'. It is one of the most marvelous god domains. And the most beautiful one, from an architectural point of view, if I may say so. My mirrors show what is, what came to pass, and what may be. The fate of all mankind--yesterday, today and tomorrow, on the palm on my hand."

She then moved her palms across my back once-twice in a soothing motion.

An immaculate glittering ivory suit, a crystal tie and alabaster shoes materialized on my body out of nowhere.

Mother and son with matching jet black hair, ice blue eyes and white outfits mocked me from the window reflection.

The longer I stared, the more the image changed.

I saw myself shift from baby through toddler, teen, adult and to an old man, while Morana stayed the same. Implacable. Beautiful. Deadly. Her cold, unshakable bony fingers ever-squeezing my shoulder.

I wished to feel Dana's warm hands around me, hugging me just like she did the day we defeated Chernobog.

Squealing at me with glee, her golden eyes running over and over my face in thrilled disbelief. So happy that I was alive.

Dana. The only source of genuine light in my stupid fake popular life.

A single droplet slid down my cheek.

Yep. Forgot that was another reason why I liked being underwater so much.

Underwater, you could cry all you liked. And no one could ever see you do it.

"Oh, would you snap out of it already!" My mother growled and let go of me.

She paced around the room like a caged she-wolf. "Dana this, Dana that. I'm sick and tired of hearing of that little Belobog's plaything. She doesn't care about you anymore." Morana pointed her sickle at the mirror wall, and a scene played out for me.

D stood in the center of our old school gym, wearing the most beautiful dress I'd ever seen on her. Even prettier than that dress she conjured for herself in Radogost's cabin.

Thousands of tiny stars blinked at me amicably from its fabric and I had to shield my eyes, so bright was their twinkle.

Was she at the 8th grade formal dance? I had a feeling she made that extra special effect on her own.

As if mesmerized by her visage, I came closer to the wall, eager to see more of Dana.

Opposite her, stood Blake. My older brother, looking slick in his dark suit. His eyes fixated on D, as he bowed, stretched out his hand and smiled.

"Would you do me the honor of this dance, Dana Ilic?" I heard him say.

Dana smiled back.

A claw mauled at my heart.

The image vanished.

"What more proof do you need? Forget about her. You have everything here. I made sure of it." My mother waved her hand around my bedroom.

"All those materialistic thingamajigs you love so much. The same ones you inquired from that puny ant god. Your iPhone 14 Pro Max. Your Apple Watch. That Nintendo Switch Animal Crossing Design you spend all day with. Everything. I even turned the dining room into a hockey rink for you."

I sat on my bed, holding my head in my hands.

What was having all that stuff...

Having all those objects surround me, the richness and the luxury of the Mirror Palace...

In comparison to having my freedom?

To having this true, deep and human connection with Dana and her companionship?

"And all I asked for was one thing in return." The sentence dropped ominously between us like a fallen ice stalactite.

"To join powers with you." I spelled the familiar sentence word for word, tired of listening to her daily tirade. I already knew what she was going to say by heart.

"And? What is your answer?" Morana's eager eyes bore into mine.

"No," I whispered and looked away from her. "Never."

"Fine. I tried to play nice, Maksim, dragi moi. But you wanted to do this the hard way. And I am running out of time."

She lifted her sickle in the air and my body whooshed upwards.

Marionette boy.

I conjured a water shield.

It took a single touch of her long forefinger nail for my feeble defense to disappear with a "plop" sound.

Morana then pinned me against the glass mirror wall, her sickle at my throat. I wheezed for air, clasping at my gullet. My legs flailed around, useless.

Helpless. Like a little fly caught in the spider web.

The goddess of death raised her other hand.

A skull rested on its palm.

I shook my head, trying my darnedest to look away from the twirling depths in its sockets, where the eyes used to be.

And failed.