Bereft: Foretold

40 | A Willing Death

It was not yet noon when we passed through Lucian's mirror and entered the cold, unlit hall of the quiet manor.

Pillars of black marble stretched inexorably into the dark above, balancing the vaulted ceiling painted with visions of a cloudy evening sky. Two staircases curled from the foyer to the upper balcony, long runners of lavender damask pinned to each step with careful precision. Vases of preserved irises were set at even intervals about the room, their petals a mixture of violet and pink, the colors soft for such a male dominated space. 

The symbol I'd seen many times upon Cage's palm encumbered the floor, and it was surrounded by several unadorned circles—large, basic constructs carved and paved into shallow grooves. Lucian touched a switch located at the mirror's side and the silver lamps attached to the walls glowed with clean, white light.

I immediately noticed there was no door marking an exit. Only the mirror.

"How does one enter this place if they are not a mage capable of spelling the looking glass?" I asked the black mage as he licked a spot of blood from his pricked finger and urged us into the room proper. A few mages had appeared at various doorways or at the above balcony to survey our group. They were well-groomed young men with plain, unscarred faces, all dressed in the syndicate coats with black lining. They were the kind of boys one would never expect to be capable of criminal activity, but appearances were often deceiving.

"They don't," Lucian replied, his answer short though not curt. He gestured for two of his underlings to come forward, and they divested themselves of their tasks in silent acquiescence. "The exterior shell of the building appears as a boarded up, condemned warehouse. Any hooligans who've attempted to enter in the past have paid severely."

The two younger mages approached, one a freckled teen and the other a bespectacled, sloe-eyed man in his late twenties. They greeted Lucian and spared the rest of us a few curious glances before their leader issued his commands. "Assist Master Cage in setting up a Standard Twelve construct with forty-three deviations. Factor it to a scale of...."

Cage piped up. "One-ten, I would say." 

"One-ten, then."

The younger black mages set to work, having understood the technical jargon that'd come spewing out of Lucian's mouth. Cage stood at Lucian's side with his hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels, and leaned toward the other mage. "It's forty-four non-dimentionary deviations, Lucky Luke, with two bi-planetary systems consisting of three deviations each."

Exhaling, Lucian repeated the information to his lackeys, and they adjusted themselves accordingly. One disappeared into a side room to gather supplies as the other quickly began to scribble runes along the outer rim of the circle paved into the foyer's floor.

The two Mistresses, Saule, her mutt, and one of Stavros's witches had followed us through the transposing mirror. They stood off to the side and watched with uncertain curiosity as the mages worked. Saule looked ill, but she hadn't balked yet. She was here and willing to help.

As the mages continued their preparations, I paced the length of the foyer, my footsteps consistently avoiding the unformed construct's depression as I came to the far wall. The room was nearly forty feet in width and possibly twice that in length. The construct consumed most of that space. I pondered what spells the Black Iris Syndicate used to require such a large tool.

I passed through an open door and came upon what I assumed was a meeting room. Initially, I thought it a dining room, but the leather chairs pushed to the long mahogany table were wheeled, and there were far too many shelves and concealed cabinets. A sideboard beneath a charmed window held decanters of various spirits and a crystal carafe containing a shining, smudged-blue liquid.