Osric slowly, slowly opened one eye and found himself staring into a mirror. He tried to scream and scramble back, but all that came out was a croaking noise and a desperate struggle against the leather straps that held him down. He wasn't screaming and struggling because of what he saw, although that was horrifying enough. To start with, last he remembered he'd had two eyes.

Osric Pennington had been the perfect image of a palace squire. Boyish cheeks, sandy hair, a fit build from hours spent practicing the sword to one day become a knight, and of course the traditional sky blue eyes. Now one of those eyes was under a bandage soaked with blood, and he could only imagine the gory mess he would find under there if he lifted the bandage. His hair was matted with dried blood, though it looked like someone had tried to wash it. The part of his face that could be seen under the bandages was covered in bruises. His arms and legs were both tightly bandaged, and he could feel pain shooting through him. Broken bones, in all four of them.

He thought back to what had happened to him earlier that day. It was a wonder he was alive. But as terrible as his injuries were, what made him stare in terror was the mirror.

It was silver backed, the glass clear and bright. The frame was ornamented with a design of curving spikes, pointed inwards. Osric had once heard someone say the design reminded them of the waves at sea, as if you were on the prow of a ship rushing across the water towards your own reflection. To Osric, they'd always looked like teeth.

He heard the door cracked open and flinched. Ally or enemy? He was a lot less sure about that kind of thing now, after what had happened to him. And he didn't want to be in the room with this mirror. But the face that filled his vision wasn't the face of a new threat, but one he associated only with warmth and friendship.

“Osric!” Polly said. “You're awake!”

Polly was the daughter of one of the palace clerks. She had a round, ruddy face and shocking red hair. She worked as a higher ranked servant girl in the palace. Her body was thick and broad, not overweight or fat but built stronger than the usual vision of beauty. Osric had never minded, she'd always looked beautiful enough to him. Besides, her relatively stocky build had come from the dwarven ancestry on her grandmother's side and her work around the palace, both of which she'd come by honestly.

Besides, she needed it if she was going to be carrying around those magnificent...no. No. Now was not the time to be having filthy thoughts.

“Polly,” Osric said. “How am I alive?”

“The other squires despaired for you,” Polly said. “But Sir Reginault came upon you after the brigands attacked, and he said you could still be saved.”

“Brigands,” Osric almost laughed. So that was the story they were telling. By now it would be well entrenched in the palace, there would be no point in telling them all the truth. He'd have to deal with that, sometime soon. But before that he had other problems. “Polly, please....I can't stay in this room.”

“The doctors say you can't be moved!” Polly said sternly. “I know, Osric, I know about you and that mirror, but the way things are...”

“It killed my mother,” Osric said.

He could still remember it, watching her legs disappear kicking through the mirror frame, that frame that looked so much like hungry, curving teeth...

“That was fifteen years ago,” Polly said. “You were three, you can't really know what you saw. No one's seen a spark or a flicker of magic from this mirror before or since.”

Osric sighed. No one ever believed him.

“I can't stay in here,” He said.

“And I'm telling you you can't move!” Polly said. “It's going to be bad enough...Osric, there's no way to save your eye. Not with the best magic we have in the kingdom.”

“There's lots outside the kingdom,” Osric pointed out.

“Not arguing that,” Polly said. “But Osric, you can't get there. The doctors said you mustn't be moved, no matter what. As it is you might not...Osric, your arms and legs might not heal right. You might not be able to use a sword anymore.”

Osric nodded. He'd been afraid of that. Not as much as he was afraid of the mirror, but it had been a concern. It didn't matter. He'd find a way to fight again. The sword was what he lived for. But the mirror...he couldn't stay in here with that mirror.”

The door kicked open, and Polly and Osric both flinched.

“There he is!” The big man with dark hair and heavy, muscular gut said as he walked through the door. “The myth, legend! And my fiancé. A man might get jealous, Polly.”

“I've known Osric since we were little,” Polly said. “And I'm just in here changing his bandages.”

Osric did his best to look up as Squire Baldrin came into the room. He and Baldrin had become squires at about the same time, but they had never been friends. That wasn't one of Osric's gifts, making friends. It wasn't really Baldrin's talent either, but as the squire for the wealthiest and highest born family people tended to crowd around him. Including Polly's father, who had arranged their marriage about a year ago. The wedding day was in a few months.

It suddenly occurred to him that life hadn't been going very well lately. And the sudden arrival of Baldrin by his sick bed did not make things better.

“I suppose I've got nothing to complain about,” Baldrin said, throwing his hand over Polly's shoulder. “I mean with his arms like that he's not gonna be groping you anytime soon!”

“Baldrin that's mean,” Polly said.

“I'm just funnin around,” Baldrin said. “I know you're not gonna let anybody else do this but me.”

Baldrin's and reached up to cup her breast, but she shoved him off.

“Not even you,” she said. “Not until the wedding night.”

“Yeah fair enough, fair enough,” Bladrin said. “That's what I love about you, Polly.”

Polly rolled her eyes and walked over to a table where more bandages were. Baldrin, meanwhile, lowered his face inches from Osric's and glared.

“Like your room? When I realized they were gonna try and save your useless ass I made sure this was where they put you.” His eyes flicked over to the mirror, and then over to Polly. “Didn't try and tell her what happened, huh?”

“I'm still going to get you back,” Osric croaked.

“Yeah really?” Baldrin said, putting his weight on Osric's arm. “Really, you think so? Didn't learn a damn thing from your lesson, did you?”

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“I did...actually...” Osric said, fighting to ignore the pain. And he had. He'd learned Squire Colfort favored his left foot too much, that Squire Pedrin had a tendency to overreach. He'd learned he could probably have taken six out of the twelve of them by himself, if he'd been allowed to fight them one on one.

“Not enough,” Baldrin snarled. “Go away, Osric. Go live on a farm somewhere. Or go beg in the streets of some village. Just get the hell out of the castle. Stay away from the real warriors, and stay away from my bride. You got it?”

“Hey man she came...to me...” Osric croaked.

Baldrin glared at him, but Polly was back by then so he stepped away. Polly went back to changing Osric's bandages. Baldrin stepped back to the door of the room where he met up with a reedy, hyena-looking squire with too-big teeth. Squire Valgos. One of the ones Osric wouldn't have been able to beat one on one.

It suddenly occurred to Osric Baldrin and Valgos had come there to kill him.

Those bastards. He'd trained his body to fight, obviously. And he'd formed an Ether Kingdom within his soul, like anyone who sought to become a serious warrior, and cultivate their body into the realms of the demigods. But like most of the squires he had only just laid his Foundation Stone, the most basic step in cultivation. The next step was to build a Motte and a Bailey, the simplest form of Castle. Each step of building upon his soul would greatly, greatly grow his power.

They hadn't even had the honor to attack him with a dozen warriors on his own level. Baldrin and Valgos had both built their Motte.

“Hey Osric,” Vargos leered from the doorway. “F-f-feeling good?”

Valgos didn't have a stutter. One of the reasons he brought hyenas to mind was because he had a tendency to start giggling in the middle of words. Osric glared back at him from the bed, but there wasn't much he could do.

“We should go,” Baldrin said. “Polly, lovely to see you as always my dear. And Osric, I'm sure we'll see you...later.”

“Y-y-yeah,” Baldrin giggled. “Later!”

Polly sighed, and went back to changing his bandages.

“Polly,” Osric said. “The bandages...”

He was ready to fight anyone, all twelve of the other squires again if he had to. But he didn't want to stay in the room with that mirror.

“I told you,” Polly scolded him. “You can't be moved.”

So as the sky grew dark outside the window, he lay in bed and stared at the mirror in what he didn't want to admit to himself was terror. Dammit, didn't everyone have things they were afraid of? Osric had gone into the wilds with the knights and squires and fought monsters, he'd faced down warriors with twice his cultivation, wasn't he allowed one? And he was terrified of this mirror.

And as the fear of the mirror seeped into his mind, other worries crept in. How was he going to get his revenge? One eye was useless, but there were plenty of one eyed warriors. But what about his arms and legs? Would they ever be right again? And if someone attacked him before he was healed, how would he fight back?

Somehow. SOMEHOW. No, he didn't have any ideas right now, but he would come up with one. Find a way. He would walk off this bed someday, and the cowards who had put him here would pay. And nothing, not even this mirror, would stop him. He glared at his own reflection, cast in eerie tones by the moonlight through the window.

“Oh yes! Yes, I approve, I approve of this thoughts! The first worthy thoughts I have heard in fifteen years.”

Osric tried to sit bolt upright in bed, but instantly regretted it. Where had that voice come from? It sounded like inside his own head.

“Yes, it's telepathy. That's a concept you have in this universe, right? I've been to so many lately....”

“Who are you?” Would have been the logical question, but Osric didn't need to ask. Instead what he said was:

“You're the mirror.”

“I am, young knight,” the mirror said.

“You killed my mother.”

“Yes. No. Not...exactly. What you saw that night was real, but things are much more complicated than you would even believe right now. She was worthy. So are you. You share her will. True warriors will.”

“Do you intend to kill me?”

“That depends on you. At the moment, I'm not too impressed with your observational skills.”

Osric looked around. His reflection mirrored his movements. Only the bed he lay on...wasn't in his bedroom anymore. It rested on a floor of solid glass, and all around him a jagged labyrinth of odd shaped mirrors expanded out into the distance. He looked into the mirror again, and saw himself lying on the bed in his bedroom, staring right back.

“I'm inside the mirror,” he said, jumping up out of the bed. “You already ate me!”

“You were inside me to begin with. What is a reflection, except a little piece of you? I've changed the part you were controlling. I have so much to teach you, and very little time. It's so frustrating, to see all the possibilities and only have a moment to decide.”

Osric looked down at himself. He was standing beside the bed now. Through the mirror, his other self was standing too. There was no pain, but blood was seeping from the bandages. In the real world, he had leaped from the bed and injured himself further. He just couldn't feel it in here.

“I don't understand what you're saying,” Osric said. Fear had given away to confusion now.

“Mirrors are powerful and complicated things. I will teach you the way of mirrors, knight. There will be a cost. But it will give you great power. The power to take revenge. To reach above the heavens, among the greatest warriors of your world. Above them, if you have the luck and skill and willpower.”

“Is this the same deal you offered my mother?”

“Hah! No no no no no. She was attempting to use me for a different purpose. One you cannot even fathom at your stage of cultivation.”

Osric thought for a moment, and then realized there was nothing to think about.

This was everything he'd ever wanted. A chance to get back at his enemies. A chance to progress in his cultivation as a warrior. And a chance for answers on the mystery that had haunted him his entire life, what had happened to his mother.

“Alright,” Osric said. “I agree.”

“And I have already begun. We had best finish quickly though. They've come to kill you.”

And then the pain in his skull was bursting, like someone had dropped a burning hot ember into his eye, and Osric fell to the ground clutching his face.

Squire Valgos slipped into the room, suppressing a chuckle. He was happy to kill Osric. He was happy to kill most people. It was knowing who not to kill he wasn't very good at. He drew the two swords at his waist. He would have to burn the body afterwards, but he was going to have some fun chopping Osric to pieces while he was helpless. He was looking forward to it.

What he saw when he entered the room was...impossible.

Osric was sitting up in bed, pulling the bandages off his arms. They were already taken off of his legs. When Valgos entered the room, Osric looked up at him with two eyes.

No, not quite.

The right side of Osric's face was horribly scarred, where blades had dug out his eye. That was surprising enough, since it should still be a bloody mess. But something like an eye rested in the socket, glinting in the moonlight.

Not an eye. A mirror. There was a ball shaped mirror where Osric's eye should be.

“Valgos!” Osric smiled. “I thought it would be Baldrin.”

“H-h-he doesn't need to waste his time with you,” Valgos sneered.

“But he decided to have twelve squires all stab me in the back at once,” Osric sneered. “Why, Valgos? I know he never liked me, but why? I wasn't a threat to him in the squire rankings, my family has no feud with his. What was the point? Or did he even bother to tell his dog?”

Valgos snarled. Both at Osric's arrogance, and because he'd brought up a worrying thought. Why hadn't Baldrin told him the reason? He hadn't thought to ask before because he just liked killing people in general. But now that Osric mentioned it he was right, it was weird.

“I didn't think so,” Osric said. “Are you still honorable enough to toss me a sword?”

“D-don't be an idiot!” Valgos said. “Have you forgotten I've already built my Motte, Osric? Ou couldn't take me even if you had a s-s-sword! I don't know how you got up, but it won't do you any good!”

Valgos charged at Osric with his swords raised. He was blinded for a moment by a flash of light coming from Osric's reflective eye, but Valgos shook it off easily and swung his swords at Osric's gut But instead, he met metal.

“But what?” Valgos gaped. “How? Those...those are my swords!”

In Osric's hands were two perfect duplicates of the weapons Valgos wielded.

“Still not my favorite,” Osric said. “I prefer long swords. But this will have to do.”

Valgos snarlked and charged for Osric, blades swinging, but Osric met his every move.

“Left shoulder right hip,” Osric said. “Right side left thigh, left arm right calf...”

He's saying my moves, Valgos realized. He's saying my moves BEFORE I MAKE THEM.

“Left and right side of the neck,” Osric said.

No, that's not what I was....

Valgos' thoughts cut off as the swords cut through his neck and clicked against each other inside his flesh.

Osric watched Valgos collapse to the floor and felt triumph surge inside of him. He'd done it. Beaten a warrior half a stage stronger than he was. He would have to learn how to control this power. The duplicate swords he'd created were already fading away into specks of light. He looked up at the moon and clenched his empty fists.

His revenge had only just begun.