Legend has it, if you stand in front of a mirror, shuffling an enchanted deck of cards, you can open a doorway between dimensions.
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Prince Teodric of Springport remembers the promise he made his father: to *not* try to reenact the legend of dimen...
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I watched them leave—Ysac and the foreign Prince Teodric, atop their clubbers, all their magical gear strapped around their bodies. Ysac was confident, as always, strutting along without an ounce of worry on display. But deep down I sensed something nervous about him. Something not as effervescent, something hidden too far beneath the surface for me to perceive.
And Teodric was...
Actually, I couldn't quite read Teodric. From his demeanor, his wincing, the obvious flutter of thoughts through his head, I deduced he was confused. Terrified. Thrust into a situation he hadn't asked for, a world he didn't know, still absorbing the fact that magic existed. And now he had to go on a mission to retrieve princesses from their castles and had no idea what to expect.
I observed them in my crystal—a jagged, smooth-surfaced, purple-hued device that allowed me to see beyond the castle. Their faces and movement registered across the crystal as they rode through Acewood, through the plains, through Knave Valley. It was only the two of them, with no protection except for Ysac's swordsman skills, and his impeccable charm. And whatever Teodric knew how to do, which remained unclear at the moment.
I should have insisted that we spare a few soldiers to go with them. The notion of them venturing up into the mountains, crossing the Diamond Drops, and navigating into Astrida's blisteringly cold territory without help perturbed me. I didn't doubt Ysac knew the way and would have no issue entering the area since everyone knew him. But Teodric? Would he survive such a trek in so little time? The clubbers were enchanted to go fast, to never rest until they reached their destination—would Teodric be able to keep up with that?
Worst of all—did I care if he did?
I shuddered at the negative thought creeping up my spine, past my neck, lodging into my head. I didn't want it there, didn't want to think it, but I couldn't help it. Was Teodric innocent as Sym and Ossenna believed? Infatuated with Ysac like Otho implied? I wasn't one to analyze emotions, but I did sense energies in the air, shifts, ominous sparks.
Though the earthquake I'd experienced had been debunked as not threatening, Teodric's arrival was still too foreboding. Too sudden. Too coincidental with all the issues our kingdom was going through. His arrival caused sparks. He came through a mirror and exchanged places with Jack. That was wrong, all kinds of wrong.
How did the mirror do that? Did it have a twin of some kind in another realm? And was it charmed in a way to draw people through it when prompted by a deck of cards? Why a deck of cards?
Why?
No matter how Ossenna downplayed it all, I knew she'd felt it too—something off, something misleading about this foreign prince. I only wished I could figure out if this bad feeling was as nefarious as I feared.
I'd read about arrivals into our world; transfers between realms, a sort of teleportation that defied space and time. It wasn't impossible, but it took immense skill and patience to create such portals. And while I was quite adept with magic—dark, light, and anything in between—this was something I'd never come across. Something I'd never had the option to learn.
