Once upon a time in the forest, Zoe became separated from the pack of dogs she called family. The pines grew tall and were all much the same and she lost her way. While it was daytime, she didn’t think much of it, but then darkness came, and the cold stars glinted like the tips of spears. Chilled, trembling, she continued walking, hoping to return to familiar landmarks and the warm fur of her companions. The firm ground gave way to softer, swampier territory. Grasses grew long, reeds hissed and slithered in the wind. They towered over her head. Her steps were lost in long, tired blinks. The ground beneath her step was damp and the reeds extended over her head and swallowed the stars.
It was one of many such memories, for the forest is not a welcoming place to a young girl, and though she grew older, she had found herself in a new place of growing grass that did not welcome her.
Inside Oriz’s spell, she moved as though it were a dream. A world of tunnels where fibers stretched from the floor to the sky: vibrant greens of emerald, jade, and malachite extended in all directions like a webbed funnel. They grew like tall reeds, but sprouted in all directions, hanging low, growing from the sides, wherever she turned, they swayed and bristled. She knew the cavern where she entered was not too large, but she had been walking far longer than expected. Time, and space, lost meaning as she progressed.
Mirror coated her skin, and the grasses disintegrated when they brushed against her. Wisps floated about her with the faint perfume of dried grass. At first, she thought the disruptions of her armor would assist her, but she quickly found the haze of shattered grass to be more of a hindrance than anything else. The cloud obscured her visions, and the eddying flow only confused her sense of direction. Was there any wind blowing here that wasn’t hers?
She continued, testing the ground ahead of her lest she fall between the floating rocks, and pushing through the long reeds trying to find a cocoon, trying to find Bella, trying to find anything. The heat of her rage burned as a low simmer, but she was losing the instinct that made her charge inside.
Though she knew she couldn’t lose it completely, for on the edge of her hearing came a skittering. Faint, almost too faint, but the delicate plucking sounds like a spider creeping across a web.
Zoe stopped and looked around. She had counted out about an hour of her time. Walking was getting her nowhere. The echo of footsteps played across the reeds, and she wasn’t sure if it was her own. The time for playing it cautious was gone.
[Manifestaion of the Hound]
Three hounds spilled from her flesh. They yawned and stretched and shook themselves out. The pain of having them dissipated remained like a faint scar, but she needed them now. Rubbing her hands behind their ears, stroking their backs, smiling despite herself, she sent them silent instructions.
Find Bella.
The hounds looked at her with confusion.
“Go,” she whispered.
The hounds walked in a circle, widening as Zoe urged them, but they stopped after a few paces. One by one they tapped the ground.
“No,” Zoe said pointing out into the tunnels of reeds that stretched as far as her eye could see. “Find her!”
The hounds tapped the ground and lay down. One of them whined, the note full of confusion. Zoe glanced down. Woven grass formed the floor like an evergreen basket. She crouched.
Could it be that simple?
She lifted a hand of Mirror and formed claws of [Mind’s Eye Incision]. With a swing, she dug into the false floor of the cocoon.
###
Oriz moved through the cocoon like liquid through a pipe. Her mind turned, roiling ever inward, as she focused on a dozen things at once -- managing the outward construct of grasses, the inner dreamlike reality that kept Bella so carefully contained, her own body reduced to a pattern of thought within the greater spell, and all the little details that go into such a thing -- yet still she smiled at the joy of swimming through herself.
Glancing in one direction, she observed Bella in the kitchen cooking the split pea soup. The house was a curious amalgamation of Bella’s memories, and Oriz wasn’t sure about half of the decorations, but Bella drew a sense of comfort from them so they could remain. Her beautiful beloved devoted herself to a meal worthy of Oriz’s return. This was the seventh loop in which Bella slaved away, and Oriz was happy to see that she was growing ever more at home in the space.
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Now, of course, was the chance for Bella to prove her love. For in the center of the kitchen stood an apparition of grass rendered in flesh. A false-Zoe. A test of faith.
A trial of love.
Keeping one eye fixed on Bella as she toyed with her apron and stared at the black-skinned stranger, Oriz glanced in the other direction. Her mind split as she observed two things and saw how the real Zoe dug into her cocoon with all the savagery Oriz had come to expect. Strange that someone who manipulated Mirror could be so blind to their own shortcomings. How did she act like such a mindless animal? How was she alright with interrupting something as fated as the love between Bella and Oriz? With a sigh that rippled through the grasses of both worlds, Oriz told herself to let it go. Hurt people hurt people, it was as simple as that. Zoe would never get anywhere digging into the grasses, but it was helpful to let her think she might. So, Oriz loosened the weave beneath those Mirrored claws and let Zoe dig. Better she thought she was making progress, that would give Oriz more time to focus on what truly mattered.
She turned her attention to her precious doll in the kitchen.
###
Bella’s fingers gripped and kneaded her apron. She could feel spatters of dried soup, some soft, some crusty, and all as real as ever as she stared at the vision of the black-skinned woman before her.
“Zoe…” she said, her eyes burned but no tears came, and she shook her head. “I know you’re not really here.”
Zoe grinned and her scarred lips twisted into shapes almost like runes.
“I feel like I’m here,” she said. “It wasn’t easy fighting through Oriz’s cocoon. She really has you wrapped up here good.”
Bella shook her head as she wrung out her apron.
“Oriz wouldn’t do that. There is no cocoon. You’re just a figment of my imagination.”
Zoe dipped a Mirrored finger into the soup. She pulled out her finger coated in green and licked it clean.
“Could a figment of your imagination do that?” she asked as she stepped around Bella. “Come on, there isn’t much time. Don’t you want to escape?”
The walls seemed to contract around Bella as the question hung. She felt the whole house -- the whole world -- watching her and waiting for her to answer.
Did she want to escape? The smell of the cigarette still clung to her, a faint note of smoke amongst the overwhelming aroma of the split pea soup. The cauldron bubbled.
“I need to stir the soup,” she said. “If I don’t stir, it’ll stick to the bottom and burn.”
She walked toward the stove, but Zoe stepped in her way.
“The soup isn’t real,” she said. “I know you want to throw it away. I know you want to throw all this away because you don’t love Oriz. Do you? You’re in love with me, you have been all along, and that’s why I’m here, Bella.” Zoe’s Mirrored hands gripped Bella’s. They were as cold as ice. “I love you and I want you to run away with me.”
Bella looked into Zoe’s eyes. Her heart fluttered under the winds of deja vu. Were these words true? She felt as though she had heard them before, as though she had been in this very situation before, but if that were true, and she was still here, then it must all be a lie. Either Zoe, or this world, was a lie, but which?
She pulled her hands from Zoe’s.
“You don’t love me,” she said as she reached for the wooden spoon. “And if you don’t love me, then you can’t be here to take me away. Why are you here, Zoe?”
She stirred the soup as she waited for an answer. The soup was reducing fine, and so she lowered the heat and stepped away to let it simmer. It would take time, but it would be fine.
“Zoe?” she said. “You haven’t answered.”
A cold hand landed on her shoulder and spun her around. Zoe stood so close Bella could feel the heat radiating from her skin. From her lips.
“Who says I don’t love you?” Zoe whispered.
“I… I…” Bella gripped the wooden spoon so tight she worried it might snap. “I’m with Oriz. You need to leave. Please, don’t do this…”
“Don’t do what?”
Zoe’s lips lowered. Closer. So close.
Bella’s heart ached as she struggled. What was she supposed to do? What did she want to do?
###
Oriz watched Bella turn her head from the false Zoe. With a deep sigh, she relaxed her vision, and the house around Bella retreated from around her, no more would the walls close in, for her lover had passed the test. This time, but this was not the last test. They had fought in the past, and their trust was not as strong as it once was. It needed to be repaired.
To think this all happened because Oriz attacked someone as inconsequential as Skidmark. The woman’s name was a very affront, and Oriz was supposed to take lessons in morality from her? Her veins trembled with anger and the construct shuddered.
Humans…
She turned her attention back toward the real Zoe. She continued to dig, and Oriz let her descend into a pit. Her hounds joined her in the digging. It was all so futile, yet that savage grin never wavered. How like a dog she was, but now she had dug her own grave.
Oriz extended her senses through the grass, extended her veins, her reach, and drew the strings of the trap tight around Zoe. In an instant, the open pit closed, and Oriz now held Zoe in a cocoon of her very own.
Everything was going her way, and the grasses trembled as she smiled. She was so overcome with her joy, that she didn’t feel the slip of fingers upon her shoulder until it was too late.
[You are doing well]
The voice sent a shudder of pleasure down her spine like a stick dragging through a muddy puddle.
[Allow me the pleasure of watching from a better vantage]
Oriz’s eyes bulged as something climbed inside them. She wanted to scream, to fight, to flee, but she couldn’t move. Time teetered on a razor’s edge. Unable to act, she could only think.
[You want to know why?]
The voice smiled across Oriz’s mind.
[Consider this an audition. Now, please continue, I believe you had everyone in the palm of your hand?]