Mirror

Avril's Paxili

Almost immediately, the scent of hay assaulted my nose and I opened my eyes to find myself back in Mirror in the little hay house in the city of Wheat.

It was still early, but small streams of light were beginning to find the cracks in the door and clay walls. I scanned the room without getting up. Danny was sitting up against the wall near the door. His arm was resting on one knee. The other hand rested on the ground. His head was bowed almost like he was asleep, but I was fairly certain that should something move on the other side of the door he would be on his feet and ready to attack in an instant. That was the impression I got. My little Danny was a trained warrior.

I moved my head just enough to see the pile of hay beside me. May was sleeping soundly. We hadn't been able to find better clothes for her yet, so she was still wearing the skirt Kylee had given her while her other clothes dried. May hadn't been lying about the healing properties of the water. Her shoulder where she'd been stabbed showed no sign of damage. I sighed. It was a good thing too. I had made her walk a long way yesterday.

"Litty, are you awake?" Danny asked.

I sat up. "Yes," I replied and flashed him a quick smile.

Danny was on his feet faster than I could blink. "Litty, what happened to your face?" he cried.

I flinched. I had forgotten about the four long gashes on my face since Terr hadn't mentioned them and I was sure they looked much worse in Mirror then on Earth. Remembering caused them to hurt again. "I fell out of bed," I joked.

"What?" he said with obvious annoyance. I knew he wouldn't get it, but I thought it was kind of funny anyway. "Litty did something happen earlier before you woke me up?"

"No?" I said, because I thought it was obvious that something had, in fact, happened, but I was still in the early stages of inventing a lie and not yet willing to tell the truth. Danny looked halfway between crying and hitting me, so I rested my chin on my hand and waited for him to figure it out.

"I want to buy food and clothes and other things we might need for the next part of our journey," Danny said after a long silence. "Do you want to stay here until May wakes up or should we all go together?" I smiled. He was so cute. I couldn't tell, however, if he had let it go or if he was just hoping to catch me off guard later. Before I could reply he added, "Keeping in mind that your face looks terrible and I'd be embarrassed to go in public with you."

I felt my chin drop, but I couldn't help laughing. "Well, in that case, let's all go together."

Danny growled quietly, but he too was smiling. A little.

I picked Tery up off the ground and Danny woke May. We waited for her to finish finger-combing her hair and then made our way- looking dirty, lost, injured, and all together just strange- to what we thought would be the busiest part of the city.

The city was all clay and wood. The houses were close together, separated by a dirt path just wide enough for a cart to squeeze through. The doors and window shutters were all wood. A garden was laid out on the flat top of each house and building. The hay house we stayed in was on the line between city and farmland. From what I could see from the ground it appeared as if the wheat fields stretched all to the west of the city. We had walked through the eastern most field the day before and only a small part of it.