The Mirror Guard (chapter 5)

Five: Seven Days in the Stark

MRS. SHIMMYSHANKS LOOKED LIKE A SKELETON WITH SKIN STRETCHED OVER HER BONES. She laid draped over the unicorn’s back, clearly looking uncomfortable, but too sick to care. Eva couldn’t stand to look at her. She thought Eke felt similarly, as he charged ahead of them all, pressing through the knee-high snow. He moved with an angry determination that wasn’t going to spawn anything good. Eva knew this, but wasn’t sure how to comfort him. Nothing she could say would make this situation better. She held onto the false hope that getting to the bunker would get Mrs. Shimmyshanks the help that she needed. The faster the better.

“Is Mrs. Shimmyshanks going to die?” Jono asked. He was clutching his stuffed bear, a comfort that he’d forgotten that he’d packed in his survival bag. If Eva knew that it was there she would have replaced it with something more practical.

“No, no little brother. She’s going to be fine.” It was the most blatant lie that Eva has ever told her little brother. She took one of Jono’s gloved hands and they continued to trudge through the snow.

Ono stamped up beside Eva and her little brother. “I’m going to go ahead.”

“You’re not going up there to start anything with Eke,” Eva warned.

“No. I’m going to hunt us some food. I’m out of jerky.”

“Mrs. Shimmyshanks needs your unicorn.”

“I don’t need Fawn for hunting.” Eva looked at him quizzically. Ono smiled and stepped a little bit a-ways from them. She watched as Ono lifted his black and white starka over his head — and it seemed to expand, or grow. When Ono lowered his starka back over his shoulders, it seemed to form together where a regular starka had a zipper. It knit together and by the time the seam zipped up his neck and covered his face in a norwotter muzzle, Ono was on all fours, a fluke-ending tail whipping back and forth behind him. His transformation was nearly instant! She’d never seen a Guardian do that before.

<Can the matrons do that? Or just the blades?> Eva wondered silently. Ono, as a norwotter, which was just a giant black and white otter, bounded through the snow, half-frolicking, half-sliding his body over the ice. Before she knew it, Ono had disappeared into the endless white.

The wind had picked up and the sun was hidden behind a thick haze of clouds. “Those are snow-bearing clouds,” Benjamin had warned when Eva asked. They had been traveling for hours. Eke was far ahead of them, trudging through the snow with the same ferocity as this morning. The snow had yet to fall, but the clouds seemed fuller than earlier. Eva needed to tell Eke that he needed to slow down. She could tell that Jono was near the end of his energy, his short legs made for poor walking in the deep drifts. There were a few minutes where she entertained the idea of carrying him on her shoulders, but she couldn’t carry him far. Benjamin took up the rear, behind Fawn the unicorn and the draped, weak Mrs. Shimmyshanks.

“Hold onto Fawn’s reins.” Eva told her brother. Jono got a good grip on the unicorn’s leathers. He blinked the tired from his eyes. She wasn’t sure how much longer Jono could continue. Then Eva moved through the drift as fast as she could to catch up to Eke. He grunted as a way of greeting. “Hello to you too.” Eva said.

“Your boyfriend still gone?” He grumbled.

“Who? Ono!? Eke, he’s like a brother to me.”

“I see the way you look at him.”

“Yea, he’s a Mirror Guardian.”

“So.”

“You know how bad I want to be in the Guard.” Eva said.

“I can get you in the Guard.” Eke promised.

“How do you figure?”

“I have connections,” Eke smiled.

Eva frowned, “You mean your mother.”

“Perhaps.” Eke licked his lips, “But she’s not my only lifeline. Some connections I’ve acquired myself.”

“And how would I get access to these connections?” Eva asked. Eke simply showed Eva his hand to showcase the bare ring finger. “Shards, are you serious!?” Eva slapped his hand aside.

“The Divine Doctrine decrees that the woman chooses. You choose me and I can promise you a spot on the Guard. I can even make sure that you are safe and hardly ever see real battle. You’ll get that mirrorblade you’re always dreaming about.”

Eva had removed her glove and balled her fist to punch Eke in the face! When had he become so bold!? <What an insufferable! Rich! Prick!>

Then the earth shook beneath them. Two rolling mounds of snow moved towards them impossibly fast. Norwotters were known to be able to burrow through the snow, but they weren’t that fast and they weren’t that big. “Benjamin!” Eva called. The pair, woman and artificial, produced their technikal blade. Eva snapped into the most defensive pose: Fearstance.

“What the shards is that going to do!?” Eke asked. He knew as well as Eva did, what was coming.

“Better than nothing.” Eva said. “Jono! Get on Fawn’s back with Mrs. Shimmyshanks. Whatever happens, don’t let go and keep running!”

“But…!”

“No! Jono, I need you to be brave now. Can you do that?”

“What’s happening!?” Jono cried.

“We’re being attacked by snow wyrms,” Eva said, mostly to herself.

The twin mounds rumbled towards them. As they drew closer the sound of shattering and crunching ice and snow could be heard as the wyrms’ razor teeth drilled through. Eva scanned around for any type of cover, trees, a cave — anything. But they were out in the middle of a vast whiteness. A snowflake fell, so gently, and landed on Eva’s nose. <Ono,> she thought into the aether.

The first snow wyrm surfaced and shrieked. Its tusks and pincers opening and closing in excitement. The wyrms were so big, they’d devour all of them whole. Not that it would be much of a meal. The wyrms were probably more used to filling their stomachs with reindeer or giant ox that frolicked in the snowy mountains. But snow wyrms were not picky.

The snow wyrm raised the upper-half of its body from the snow. It lunged at them as a whole. “Eva!” Eke screamed. Eva stood her ground, brandishing her technikal blade. It was massive and sharp. In fearstance, the flat of the blade was facing out to provide the most defense that she could possibly get from the wyrm’s assault. Her wrist was poised, ready to switch the blade to offensive in a twirl that allowed her shoulder to block her vitals from a counter-assualt as she sliced. She slashed and jumped aside just before the wyrm was going to close its beaked mouth on her. It dove into the snow and permafrost as if it were liquid water. The earth rumbled and rippled beneath them.

Water was a known anathema to snow wyrms, but all the water around them was frozen, or would freeze quickly if Eva had any way of wielding it. She got up, covered in snow. She went to guard herself with her giant blade when she realized it was bent and chipped on the tip. It had served its purpose though, because Eva had green oozy goop all over her hand and arm. The blade was smeared with the snow wyrm’s blood. “Hang on Benjamin.” She knew once the fight was over, the artificial would immediately attempt to find materials to repair himself.

With the first snow wyrm dealt with for the moment, Eva took her focus onto the second wyrm — which she hadn’t seen resurface. She scanned the whiteness around them. The first wyrm’s green oozy blood marked a trail from where Eva was standing to where it’d dived into the ground. Then she saw the second wyrm — well, part of it.

Jono was reaching towards a strange red figure. Fawn, the unicorn, seemed uneasy around the red thing that was growing up from the snow. It waved back and forth like a sea creature’s tongue, that waves it like a snagged fish to ambush prey. Except this tongue — because it was a tongue — seemed to be made of a gummy shapeable material. It formed into a rough humanoid shape.

“Jono. No!” Eva tried to scream, but the cold caught her voice in her throat.

The snow wyrm’s tongue was slowly pulling into focus as details became more and more defined. It was so red and pink against the white backdrop. The human form cleared into… <Mom?> Eva gasped. She quickly closed her eyes. “Jono! Close your eyes!” Eva desperately moved towards her brother. She looked towards Eke, as if to silently ask for help, but Eke was dazed too, whispering something about his father. <Shards!> Eva cursed.

The wyrm’s tongue began vibrating. The effect was so jarring that Eva had two trains of thought, one controlled by the vision of her mother, luring her closer to the wyrm’s trap; the other her rational mind telling her that she shouldn’t stare at the tongue. But this rational mind could not grasp control. “Jono! Look at me!” She screamed. Jono was leaning towards the disguised tongue. His hand was out — he even dropped his teddybear in the snow. “JONO!!!”

“Eva it’s Mom…”

Green blood splattered all over Jono. The boy began screaming as an orca made purely from water literally ate its way through the snow wyrm. A wave of water, being surfed by Ono, came tearing through the white silence of the Stark. He willed the wave of water to tackle over the first wyrm that Eva had already cut. The water caused the wyrms to scream and begin to melt like slugs when sprinkled with salt.

“Eva! Get everyone behind me.” Ono called up a wall water, formed easily from the drifts of snow around them. The snow wyrms, small for their species, Eva noticed now that she could truly focus, reared up on their upper-halves and roar-shrieked as wyrms do. Eva figured they must have been juveniles. There was no way that she would have been a match for an adult wyrm armed only with Benjamin as a technikal blade.

Ono raised the wall of water at the wyrms. He held no blade, but his movements were suspiciously like angerstance. He pressed, his arms, hands splayed out, pressing forward forcefully. The water rushed forward with a roar and parts of it shapeshifted into giant killer whales that gnashed and tore through the bodies of the young wyrms. When the waves crashed on the other side, the ground was bare of snow, but covered in green wyrm ichor — and it began to snow. Ono had transformed all of the residual water into snowflakes.

Once the rumbling of Ono’s water quieted, a scream-shriek sounded from behind them. “Have you ever fought an adult before?” Eke asked Ono.

“Only from the top of the wall,” Ono replied. He held his arm out as if that was going to be enough protection.

“What are we going to do, Guardian?” Eke pipped.

“We can’t outrun it. I’m going to have to slay it like I did the others.”

“You don’t even have a mirrorblade!” Eke said.

“Can you call up another wave?” Eva asked.

“I — I don’t think so.”

“Run!” Eke shouted.

Without thinking, they all ran. Luckily, Fawn was pretty fast, even with Jono and Mrs. Shimmyshanks on her back. The same couldn’t be said for the others. Ono stopped and turned towards the giant wyrm, taking fearstance without a blade. The snow wyrm moved with an incredible speed that Eva wouldn’t have believed possible if she hadn’t seen it herself. Eke was ahead of them, but Ono wasn’t going to make it!

Brandishing Benjamin in blade mode, Eva ran towards Ono.

“Eva!” Eke screamed.

“Go!” Ono told her.

The snow wyrm’s strike was like a snake’s. It was backed with muscle and the primal desire to kill. Eva grabbed onto Ono’s hand. Darkness wrapped around them as they were both trapped in the wyrm’s mouth. …Then, the wyrm started to grind its teeth.