Liv led her friends into the great hall of the Tomb of Celris – for it was a great hall, a grand entrance way that must once have welcomed visiting gods and goddesses, before the Vædim were overthrown.

Whereas the tower of the Lady of Thorns had felt dedicated to turning away intruders and creating a private place, where a mother could raise her daughter away from the cares of the world, Celris’ home was clearly designed to impress.

While the floor was of finely polished stone – albeit cracked, likely from the same battle that had slain the ancient Lord of Cold – the walls, where the globe of light cast by Keri’s spell reached them, were entirely of ice. Cel, which prowled insistently at the back of Liv’s mind, told her at a glance that the entire place was crafted of something like adamant ice, if not even more dense.

Great pillars, nearly as thick as the trees of Al’Fenthia, rose from the floor to some distant, vaulted ceiling Liv could only half glimpse. They had been carved beautifully – or, perhaps, simply created by Celris himself, fully formed into the fantastic shapes that remained even after twelve hundred years.

Liv recognized scenes of snowy owls and gyrfalcons, wings spread and talons extended as they dove down at their prey. She saw packs of wolves, heads thrown back and jaws open to howl at the night, and the immense mass of a mother bear, shadowed by a smaller cub. All of these, against the backdrop of jagged mountain crests, ice floes tossed by waves, and the boreal forests found to the south, near Mountain Home.

Blue sigils pulsed dimly, along the tops and bottoms of the pillars, and the edges where walls of ice met stone floors – and even along the arcing lines of the vaulted ceiling, glowing faintly in the darkness above. There was nothing random about the pulsing: in fact, every sigil in the entire room brightened at the same time, and then dimmed again. It reminded Liv of a heartbeat.

“We’re in the depths, now,” Arjun said quietly, but his voice still echoed throughout the hall. “Can everyone handle the mana density?”

“Working on it,” Rose admitted. “This is worse than the Garden of Thorns.”

“It’s more than I’ve felt before,” Keri said. “But I’ll be fine.”

“Liv?” Arjun pressed.

“It doesn’t bother me,” she answered, with a shrug. “It’s easier to deal with than the Well of Bones, actually.” Liv felt Arjun’s gaze upon her, and turned to meet his gaze. “What?”

“This is most certainly a more dense concentration of anywhere but the final room in the Well,” Arjun said. “You don’t feel that?”

Liv looked away, admiring the beautiful carvings. She wondered whether she could make something that looked half as good. “It’s dense, but it doesn’t bother me,” she explained. “Nothing here is fighting me. The mana is easy to handle.”

“Perhaps the house of Celris recognizes one of his descendents,” Keri suggested. “If so, that is likely a good thing for us. Perhaps this will be easier.”

“My aunt had the blood of Celris in her, as well,” Liv pointed out. “And we all know how that ended. Let’s see if we can pick up her trail; she probably had a better idea of where to go than we do.”

“It’s been decades, hasn’t it?” Rose pointed out. “You really think there will still be traces?”

“I doubt anyone else has come here since then,” Keri said. “Most Houses only cull the shoals. And I don’t think those doors would have opened for just anyone.”

Liv strode forward, straight down the center of the hall through the aisle formed by the two lines of pillars, to her right and her left. An aisle large enough to drive a wagon down, but an aisle nonetheless. Her companions followed her, but they all stopped when a great grinding once again filled the room.

“We should have expected that,” Rose grumbled. Behind them, even the dim light of the bottom of the crevasse disappeared, only a rapidly thinning line visible as the great outer doors closed.

“It won’t matter,” Liv said. “Once I have the crown, I can open or close the doors whenever I like.”

“The key, you mean?” Arjun asked.

“Yes,” Liv told him. “The key. Come along.” She continued her path through the great hall, drawing her friends along in her wake, until finally three corridors became visible. The light from Keri’s spell didn’t show much, but one corridor opened ahead of them, while two others led off to the right and the left.

“What is that?” Arjun pointed to an object in the otherwise empty hall, off to one side just before the entrance to the corridor before them. Once he’d pointed it out, they all turned to look, and approached.

“It’s an archmage spell,” Liv said. “A combination of Cel and Dā.”

“It’s a body,” Rose corrected her.

Sunlight fell upon a bier, or perhaps a closed casket, made entirely of ice. At waist level, an Elden woman rested on her back. Her hair was nearly as white as Liv’s, with the barest tint of pale lavender to it, and of a color with her skin. Even her lips were more purple than pink. Her eyes were closed, and her gauntletted hands were crossed over her chest. A kite shield had been placed at her feet, and the hilt of a warhammer lay within both her hands, the head resting down between her armored legs. She was clothed all in enchanted plate, which looked to be of an even heavier make than that produced by Ker’s family.

The armor had not saved her.

Liv could see blood, still as fresh and bright as if it had been spilled only a moment ago, staining the gaps in her armor – at the armpits, for instance. Her helm had been set aside, down by her feet with her shield, and if not for the wounds, she might have been sleeping.

“Arjun?” Liv asked.

“She’s certainly dead,” her friend confirmed, leaning down so that his breath fogged the surface of the ice, and he was then forced to wipe it away. “Not for long, though. Or at least, not for long when the spell was cast.”

“Do you recognize her, Keri?” Liv turned to the only one of them who’d been raised in Elden lands from birth.

“I recognize her house,” Keri answered, with certainty. “The Unconquered House of Asuris. She must have had a good deal of Vædic heritage, to look like that. She’s an even better example than that bartender in Calder’s Landing.”

“Why’s she here, though?” Rose wondered. “And for how long? Is this someone who died during the war, or did she come along later?”

“My aunt wouldn’t have come here alone,” Liv pointed out. “I never got the details from my father – which was a mistake,” she grumbled. “But she would have had a culling team. And this is exactly the kind of magic my family uses in the enchantments that preserve food. I saw enough of those barrels at Kelthelis, when I visited every summer. If I had to guess, I’d say she died in this room, and they wanted to preserve her body to bring back with them when they left. For a proper funeral.”

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

“That makes sense,” Keri admitted. “If that’s the case, she’s been here for nearly forty years.”

“What killed her, though?” Rose asked, turning about and peering into the dark corners of the hall. “I don’t see any signs of a battle.”

“And she wasn’t killed at the entrance,” Arjun pointed out. “If she had been, why haul her all the way back here?”

“You’re saying if there’s a trap, we’re just now coming up on it,” Liv concluded. “But I don’t see anything that could have done this. At the Well of Bones, we found all those broken Antrian war machines, you remember? But here there’s nothing.” She cast about, and noticed that Rose was walking up to the wall, just to the right of where the corridor opened.

“Rose?” she called.

The dark-haired girl didn’t answer: she seemed to be staring at the wall of ice, where her own reflection was illuminated by Keri’s spell.

“Don’t let her touch anything,” Keri cautioned.

He was right; until they found whatever hidden trap had killed this woman, no one should be touching anything. “Rose, come back over here!” Liv called. When her friend didn’t answer, Liv hurried over to her and placed a hand on the other woman’s pauldron, giving her shoulder a shake.

The reflection in the mirror didn’t reflect the jostle, and that was the only warning Liv had.

Ice bulged outward, like a raindrop hitting a puddle, only in reverse, and Rose’s reflection emerged from the wall, drawing her rapier as she came. In a single, practiced motion, she lunged at Rose, point extended.

With a scream in spite of herself, Liv tackled Rose out of the way, and the two women tumbled across the stone floor together. The violent motion finally seemed to snap Rose out of whatever trance she’d fallen into, and she cried out in shock, as well.

“Liv?” Rose frowned, once they’d come to a stop. “Why’d you grab me?”

“Watch out!” Liv coalesced a blade of ice in her left hand and rolled to her feet, parrying a second lunge from Rose’s reflection. The mirror-monster backed off just long enough to settle into a new guard, her eyes glowing with the same cold, blue light as the sigils all around the chamber.

“Don’t look at the walls!” Liv shouted, but the warning was too late to help. She saw a reflection of Keri, complete with his enchanted spear, come out of the wall, and then one of Arjun. The third mirror-monster, rather than draw his wand, simply rushed forward with outstretched arms to grapple its opposite. Then, Liv had no time to keep track of anything, because she was desperately trying to fend off the monstrous reflection of one of her best friends.

Rosamund had always been a better fencer than Liv; they’d spent enough time sparring at Coral Bay for that to have been made clear long since. In one sense, it had been a good thing – because the other woman had helped her improve, and test into the advanced combat course. But even after all Rose’s tutelage, Liv had known that she’d never be her friend’s equal.

Liv parried the first thrust, attempted a riposte, and left herself open for a flick of the reflection’s point that caught her under the armpit, slicing through gambeson and shirt alike to draw blood. She couldn’t help but let out a hiss of pain, but she held her sword steady in her left hand.

That was the other problem – Liv was right handed. She’d only developed the habit of conjuring a blade in her left hand for parrying, while leaving her wand hand free. She wasn’t ready for any kind of extended duel using her off hand, however.

The reflection lunged again, and Liv only realized it was a feint a moment after she’d fallen for the trap. She was left out of position, then disarmed, and it was all Liv could do to scramble back in a retreat. If she could just get a moment to cast without the monster right up in her face –

Somewhere behind her, there was the sound of something shattering. “Let me take care of this one for you, Liv,” Rose said, stepping out to face the blue-eyed reflection. Her sword was already extended, making a perfectly matched pair.

Liv stumbled back, grateful to finally have a moment to see what was happening. A broken woman of ice, with Liv’s own face, was lying in pieces on the stone floor. That, she realized, must have been what Rose fought. Thankfully, mirror-Liv wasn’t any better a swordswoman than real Liv. She’d long since recognized that her strength was her magic, not skill with a weapon.

The thought ground everything else to a halt.

“My sister’s first love was blades, not magic,” her father had told her. A mirror reflection of Livara of the Five Blades would have been a terror, wouldn’t it? Precisely the sort of thing to put a sword-thrust right through the weak points of her companion’s armor.

Liv looked around the hall. Rose was perfectly matched with her reflection, and the two of them moved as if they were fencing masters demonstrating for a class of students. Liv had always thought it was stupid when people compared fighting to a dance - dance’s didn’t have that desperate, scrambling energy of two people fighting to survive. But this time it was true: Rose and her mirror-image matched parry for riposte, thrust for counter thrust, in a constant stream of motion that was positively hypnotic to watch.

Keri’s fight was far more brutal: less a master-class on technique, and more a contest of strength, stamina, and raw tenacity. Sweeps of the two long spears were interspersed with kicks, punches, and strikes with the spear-butts that left the living man spitting blood.

Arjun, on the other hand, was rolling across the floor with his opposite number, the reflection’s grasp on his wrist keeping him from drawing his wand. Even if he did get it out of the sheath, these mirror monsters didn’t have bones for him to target. Instead, they seemed to have been created entirely from living, magical ice.

Like Keri and Rose, Liv guessed that her aunt’s first instinct would have been to match her reflection blade to blade – and that would have been a mistake. The mirror monsters didn’t tire, didn’t bleed, didn’t have bones to break. What she should have done was use her magic. Perhaps she had – but only after losing one of her companions.

Liv pushed her Authority out to encompass the entire battle, took hold of the hostile magic, and ended it. All three remaining mirror-monsters crumbled into piles of ice shards and frozen dust. She felt a few wisps of mana lingering where the duplicates had been, and took them for her own, just as she’d been taught to do by Master Jurian.

Her friends panted for breath, and the sigils on the walls and pillars of the room pulsed, like the beat of some ancient, evil heart.

“Next time, could you do that a little sooner?” Arjun complained. The healer remained sprawled out on his back, clearly exhausted.

“Speak for yourself,” Rose said. “I haven’t had a match like that in – well, ever. It’s giving me all sorts of ideas.” She sheathed her blade, and kicked at the pile of frozen detritus that had been her reflection.

“How did you figure it out?” Keri asked, leaning on his spear.

“I never knew my aunt,” Liv began, “but my father told me that her first love was the sword. If she’d been faced with a reflection of herself, I figured her first instinct would have been to fight it, just like you and Rose did – and her reflection would have been really, really dangerous. I think that’s how that woman over there died. But fighting with a sword has never been my strength.”

“That’s true enough,” Rose teased her, with a grin and a wink.

“Which actually means this trap was easier for us, doesn’t it?” Arjun reasoned, finally sitting up. “It almost reminds me of Professor Jurian’s archmage spell, you know? The one that took someone’s nightmares and brought them to life?”

“Similar.” Liv nodded. “They were made out of ice instead of mana, but I think it's the same idea. If Sidonie was here, she’d be tearing this entire place apart to get at the sigils so she could write it all down.”

“Well, let’s get moving, before we freeze to death,” Rosamund said, giving an exaggerated shiver. “Which way?”

Liv frowned. “You shouldn’t be cold yet. Let me send you a bit of waste heat –” she reached for the heat that should have been produced by summoning her sword, but couldn’t find it. “That’s odd.”

“What is it?” Keri asked, walking over to her.

“Whenever Cel is used, it produces waste heat,” Liv explained. “I’ve been using it to keep us all warm since we came in on the waystone. But it's all gone, before I could use it.”

“Let me handle it, then,” Keri said. He raised his hand to the orb of sunlight hovering over his shoulder, and it strengthened. Light pushed the shadows to the very edges of the room, and back into all three corridors, and Liv felt the warmth of a summer sun on her face, wherever her skin was exposed by her helm.

“Thanks,” Rose said. “How long can you keep that up?”

“Not as long,” he admitted. “Call it four hours, if I don’t cast any other spells.”

“We may need more than that,” Arjun pointed out. “Look.” He pointed into the corridor nearest them, the one that ran straight ahead rather than off to either side. Now that Keri had made his light brighter, when they turned to look they could all see a jumbled mass of rock and ice blocking the entire corridor.

“It’s collapsed,” Keri said. “If that is the way your aunt went, we won’t be able to follow her trail.”

“Left or right, then?” Rose asked.

“We need to find one of those pieces of glass,” Liv decided. “The ones that show a map of the entire rift. That should be our first goal, and then we can use it to plot a course to where we’re going.” For just a moment, she considered splitting the group up to scout each passage, but this place was clearly too dangerous for her to be comfortable putting them in pairs.

“I guess it doesn’t matter,” Liv said. “Right it is.” She started forward, leading the way into the ancient passage.