by Melody Rose
“Myrcedes,” he said calmly. “Be prepared. The Floor will show you what it thinks you need to know, and that may not always be what you want.”
“What are you telling me?” I frowned as we neared the top.
“Nothing,” he shook his head. “I have no idea what you will see once you enter. I just want you to prepare for the possibility that not everything will be answered how you want…”
I frowned but continued to climb, unsure of what he meant. I tried to imagine what could happen and how to prepare for it, but it felt like trying to decipher a language I’d never heard before. I had no ideas and a million questions, so I tried to keep in mind the ones that mattered most to me. I wanted to know who was responsible, how to take revenge, and most importantly, I wanted to know more about my parents.
We reached the door that led to the hallway on the fifth floor, and Syrion stopped. “Since you’re going to seek answers, I won’t go with you. You need to be alone to communicate clearly with the Source.”
I stared at him with a hint of fear. “What? I have to go alone?”
“Yes,” he took my hand. “But you have nothing to be afraid of. I’ll be right here until you’re finished. I won’t move. You’ll be tired, but nothing you see will hurt you.”
I looked into his eyes, mirror reflections of my own, though that was where our resemblance stopped, and braced myself. “So… what do I do when I walk in?”
“You’ll know.”
I paused. We stood there for what felt like an eternity. Finally, I took a deep breath and reached for the doorknob.
Entering the hallway was almost anticlimactic, given my nerves. I looked at Syrion before shutting the door behind me and looked around. It was just as I remembered it from a few months ago, only this time I didn’t feel quite so overwhelmed. My first visit had resulted in complete intoxication from the power of the Source, the unknown force that provided my Kings and me with our magic.
At first glance, the Floor of Dreams appeared to be simply a long hallway with a few doors on both sides. It almost looked like a fog drifted around the floor, only it wasn’t fog. It resembled the magic that emanated from Daath, Syrion, and me, and it churned over the stone floor, billowing in my direction. There was no physical sensation to it, but somehow I still felt it hit me like waves on a beach, rushing toward me the moment I entered.
I took a few steps forward, so that I was in the center of the hall, stirring the energy in the room. It seemed to vibrate around me. The moonstone on the walls glinted, and I could see my reflection in it between two doors. I stared at the purple hair, silver eyes, and quizzical expression in front of me.
“I have questions,” I said to the reflection of myself, nearly flinching when she didn’t open her mouth to speak along with me. “Can you answer them?”
The reflection tilted its head. Her demeanor looked serene, much calmer than I felt, but it did help me to relax.
“What do you want to ask?” The voice seemed to come from nowhere. I couldn’t narrow down a direction, just that it echoed through the hall around me and rang out in tandem with the mouth on the reflection speaking the same words.
“I want to know who’s responsible for hurting my family, and who helped Minerva.”
The reflection paused. I watched as she turned to the side so that I was looking at my profile; she began to walk in the direction of the door to her left and continued until she disappeared through the door frame. Without even considering it, I followed her. I didn’t hesitate to twist the doorknob and pull open the door. The doors seemed to be a darker moonstone, one that didn’t reflect figures as well.
When I opened the door, it looked like a solid wall was directly behind it. The moonstone seemed solid and unmoving, yet in the reflection, I could see myself, turned away so I was looking at my back, and she was walking away. Instinctively, I followed her. I made it about fifteen steps before I realized that I’d never hit the wall I thought I’d seen. The wall seemed nowhere in sight, but the figure before me somehow still appeared to be a stony reflection. Light glinted off her the way it did against moonstone.
The surrounding area seemed to shift. What had seemed to be a mostly white light began to fade to a light gray. I couldn’t explain why, but I began to feel uneasy and stopped walking. She stopped at the exact same time, as though she could see me, even though she still faced away from me.
The space around me felt infinite, but at the same time, I had the feeling I was nearing a ledge. “Are you going to show me?”
“I can’t,” she said, still turned away from me.
I felt my face contort into an expression of anger. The purple flames flared around me. “Why not?”
“It’s not your destiny.” The figure slowly shifted to turn, and I felt my pulse quicken. “You came to me to ask about a triviality.” This was the slowest rotation I’d ever seen, but I was thankful for it. It gave me time to prepare myself. “You have more important things to worry about.”
When her face was finally in view, I flinched. My skin was no longer normal, but instead, it was a sickly gray that matched the surrounding space. My eyes weren’t silver; they were white all the way through. I watched as the purple seemed to drip from my hair and melt into the air, giving way to the silver color I never let my hair have, which seemed to dull even further. My face was not only a different color; it was hollow, like what I assumed a corpse would look like.
“You fear me,” she said, the voice echoing in the space around me. I turned around quickly, trying to place where it came from, but I was unsuccessful. When I wheeled back around, she was a foot away from me. I stumbled backward and fell. She slowly knelt before me, offering a hand. “It’s not me you should fear. I am nothing bad.” It was almost… comforting. I took her hand, and she helped me up.
“Then what am I here for?”
Quite suddenly, she stepped to the side and yanked my arm, pulling me past her. The edge that I’d sensed earlier was there; though I couldn’t see exactly where the floor ended, I began to fall through it. The gray gave way to a red, and when I landed on the ground a moment later, I looked up to see Seattle, my home… almost.
I was in the parking lot of my apartment complex, but the complex itself wasn’t there anymore. Not entirely, at least. It looked as though it had collapsed in sections and been hit with a wrecking ball in others. My eyes immediately searched for my and Lindsay’s apartment, and my stomach sank when I saw it wasn’t there. It looked like someone had dropped a meteor right on it. I could look right through where my bedroom should have been. Behind what was left of the apartment complex, the sky looked orange. Actually, the whole world looked orange. I’d never seen anything like this before. I looked around and saw it everywhere. My reflection looked around, too. The light that reflected on her matched the surrounding colors.
“Why is everything…”
“The fires.”
I stared at her in horror before standing to my feet to look around. I didn’t see any fire.
“You can’t see the fire here. Seattle is safe for now.” I frowned. Had I spoken out loud? “But so much of the surrounding area is burning. The sky has been red for weeks.”
“I… didn’t know that was possible,” I muttered, taking a step to look around. In the distance, I spotted a figure that I could tell was a spirit. She paced along the fence, and at first, I assumed it was the same woman I’d seen along that street dozens of times. After a second, the figure clarified in my vision, and I felt my blood turn cold.
“Lindsay.”
I shouted her name and began sprinting for her, but as I got closer, she didn’t notice me.
“Lindsay!” I called, reaching for her. My hand passed right through her. At that, she paused to look around, but it was like she couldn’t see me, so she kept pacing.
“She can’t see you. We aren’t here.”
“What do you mean?” I turned to face the reflection. She looked like she was on fire herself the way she was r
eflecting the orange light. I frowned. “This… this isn’t real?”
“Not yet,” she said calmly, walking past me, silently bidding me to follow her as I had before. My eyes trailed on Lindsay’s translucent figure as I followed behind my reflection.
“Where are Daath and Syrion?”
“They’re not of consequence at the moment,” she said coolly. This angered me. How could they not be important? Since the moment we’d met, they’d been some of the most important people in my life. I couldn’t imagine living without them, and I wanted to know what had become of them in this hellish world.
“This.” She stopped walking as we reached a lot where a small grocery store used to be. “This should be your concern.” I knew this place well; Lindsay and I did all our shopping there. The ground had been ripped up and now was just dirt. On top of the dirt rested about two dozen bodies. I reached for the arm of my reflection and grabbed onto her for support, feeling as though I was going to faint as I recognized some of the cold faces. In the distance, I heard shouting, someone begging for help. I looked around but couldn’t pinpoint where it came from.
“What happened? We stopped Minerva!” I felt my eyes fill with tears and my face grew hot. “I don’t understand. Why is this happening?”
The gray figure shook her head. “Nothing has happened yet. This is a vision.”
I felt a wave of relief. “A vision? Why? What causes this?”
“Minerva had already knocked the scale out of balance,” she explained, looking back into my eyes. I locked mine into hers, trying to process what she said. “This is what she intended to cause. Even with her death, the world is still on a path to end up like this.”
“So, how do I stop it?” I felt hot tears slip from my eyes. As I wiped them away, I noticed that things had changed. The sky was no longer orange, and my reflection no longer looked like she was on fire. We were standing in the same spot, in front of the grocery store, just as I remembered it. No, it was better, actually. The sky was a clear blue, the lawns around the area were green, and the grocery store had expanded like they’d wanted to do for years. I watched the door as Lindsay exited the store, carrying bags of groceries to her car. I gasped and held my chest, overwhelmed by the relief at seeing her and all her vivid coloring. I looked back at my reflection, who had returned to her original state as well, purple hair and all.
“I didn’t need to tell you it’s your job to stop that future,” she said as she examined me. “You just knew.”
“I… I just couldn’t imagine letting that happen and not doing something to stop it.”
“Exactly,” she nodded. “That is what was meant to be. Minerva wanted chaos. You stopped her, but her actions still have consequences. You know you are Queen. Just as Daath keeps order in the Underworld, you must restore order in this one.”
“How do I do that?” I stared at her.
“I don’t know. But you must.”
I frowned, the purple fire around me flaring once again. “It’s your job to tell me.”
“No,” she shook her head calmly. “It’s your job to figure it out.”
I felt a frustration bubble within me, but I wasn’t sure if it was at her stubborn reply or my own fear about this situation. I was about to argue further when out of the corner of my eyes, I noticed a door that I hadn’t seen before. It was freestanding in the middle of the parking lot and made of that darker color moonstone from the door I’d seen before. “What’s that?”
My ghastly reflection nodded at the door, and that was the extent of her answer. I rolled my eyes in frustration and went to open it.
I had never seen anything as horrifying as what the Floor had shown me about Earth. However, that was mere child’s play compared to what I saw when I stepped through the black door. I wasn’t familiar with the area I was in, but I recognized the royal palace of the fae realm a few miles away. Surrounding me were small homes that I would classify as cottages: all made of wood, small and simple, very natural in terms of the materials. That was where the whimsy of this world stopped.
A few yards away, I could see a large dais with a guillotine sitting atop the stage. There was a mob in the street chanting something in a fae language as two of the royal guards clad in golden armor ascended to the dais. They were dragging someone along with them that I didn’t recognize, but I knew from the scythe attached to her back that she was a reaper. She looked like an elf as well. It hit me quickly that this must be Serriah, the elven reaper Daath had assigned to assist in ruling the fae realm.
The pale soldier with blonde hair was next to the guillotine waiting for the guards with their prisoner. His beautiful armor was splattered with blood, just as the blade of the guillotine was. As I took in this sight, I felt as though I was going to throw up, and I knelt to the ground to steady myself.
My reflection knelt with me. “They are working their way through those they feel unfairly treated by. They have already executed some council members. Now it’s her turn.”
“What happened to Kalian?” I asked quickly, holding back the bile that was trying to come up my throat.
“Kalian was the first.” Her words hit me like a brick. My mind flooded with images of him at the guillotine, punished once again for his actions of doing the right thing.
“Why are you showing me this?” As horrified as I was, it also confused me. This seemed to have more to do with Daath and Syrion’s actions than mine. “Am I supposed to stop this too? Is it my fault?”
Instead of answering, my reflection stood. “Remember these images, Myrcedes.”
I managed to stand to my feet. “Can you tell me anything else?”
“Not right now, Spirit.”
I felt the voice echo around me once again and turned to find its source, only to see another door that seemed to appear from nowhere. I turned back to my reflection, but she had gone. The chanting from the mob grew louder, and on the stage, Serriah was forced to her knees before the massive weapon. I grabbed the handle and ran through the door as fast as I could, only to realize I was back in the original moonstone hall of the Floor of Dreams. The door I’d just come through swung shut behind me.
“Hello?” I called. “Come back!”
No answer. I tried to open the doors, but all that I was met with were walls of moonstone. In the corner of my eyes, I thought I saw the back of my reflection walking away in between two doors.
“I need to know-” I began to walk toward myself in the reflection, but hit the wall. I cringed, holding my nose where it had slammed into the stone. “Shit…” I looked around until I recognized the door that led out to the rest of the castle and opened it to find Syrion. He turned to see me and stared as I still held my nose.
I expected this King of mine to comfort me, ask what had happened, perhaps take me in his arms. Instead, he only laughed.
I glared at him. “What the hell is funny to you?”
“You…” he struggled to speak between laughing. “You walked into the wall, didn’t you?”
I sneered. “Yes.”
He held his hand over his mouth, trying to stifle his amusement. “It’s… It’s just… Daath and I did the same thing,” he laughed. “It had been so long, I forgot… I should have warned you, my love.”
“Yes!” I growled. “You should have!” I pushed past him and began to descend the stairs.
He followed me, grabbing my arm and pulling me close. “No!” He was still struggling to stifle laughter. “Yes, you’re right. I should have. I am so sorry I forgot, dearest.” As he spoke, he wrapped one arm around me and brushed through my hair, trying to quell my anger. “Please, forgive me. Tell me what happened before that?”
I frowned, calming down but still frustrated at him. Suddenly, a wave of exhaustion hit me. “I… I need to lie down.”
All amusement disappeared from his face, and concern took its place. He nodded. In a second, we were back in my room. He picked me up and laid me on the bed before sitting next to me. He stroked my hair as a
glass of water materialized on the nightstand. “What happened, little one?” he asked as he handed me the glass. “Did you find what you were looking for?”
I took a drink and shivered as the cold washed through my body.
“N-no,” I sighed. “She wouldn’t tell me… but what I saw was more important.”
Syrion stared at me in concern and confusion. “What did you see?”
8
Myrcedes
“Hiiiiiiiii!” Lindsay squealed, throwing her arms around my neck as I walked in the door. “Ah! I have been waiting for this for so long!”
“Lower the frequency, Linds! You’re scaring the dolphins,” I laughed, hugging her tight. I’d been dying to see her ever since I’d visited the Floor of Dreams a few days ago. It was such a relief to see her so lively.
For decades, I’d known Lindsay as a beautiful girl with waves of red curls, creamy skin, bright, beautiful eyes, and a nice figure. That was the best friend I’d known for years. Once I met Daath and Syrion, however, and they’d given me true sight to remove most of the glamours that non-human creatures used to disguise their true forms, I’d seen her for what she truly was. Now, I knew her to have gray skin the color of charcoal dust, sharp ears and sharper canine teeth, pupils shaped like a cat’s, and even more drastic and sexy curves than she’d had before. It was a bit shocking at first, but it had only taken me minutes to get past my shock and remember that no matter how she looked, she was the same person I’d always loved and who had always loved me, succubus or not.
Lindsay picked up my hair and gasped. “You really do need a re-dye. Don’t worry. I’ve got everything all ready to go!”
A moment later, Siena poked her head in the doorframe from the hallway. “Hope you don’t mind the extra company, kitten.”
Lindsay squealed again and finally separated from me to hug Siena. “I didn’t know you were coming!”
Siena and Lindsay got along very naturally, which made sense. Siena was a much older sex demon, not that her age had any impact on her appearance. Her skin was red like a fire truck, a sharp contrast to her long, luscious, black hair. Out of her temples poked two horns that seemed to glow with white light at the curled tips. Her figure was just as alluring as my best friend’s, but unlike Lindsay, her features were exaggerated by her piercings. She had gold hoops hanging from the pointed tips of her ears and the septum of her nose, as well as two gold studs on either side of her bottom lip. Her jewelry matched her clothes: two strips of gold fabric, one that hung across her chest just barely hiding her nipples, and one that hung over her crotch.