The Mirror Maze

Chapter 4 - The "Magic" Palace ✨

AN. Hey guys! Thanks for reading 😎. So this chapter explains a lot of stuff that is need to know before we get to the main action. Sorry it's a bit of a filler chapter, but it is necessary, I promise! And after this we might find out what happens to Grace...

So please show support or just tell me what you think by commenting, voting and fanning!
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I sat in the car leaning my head against the window. They had put me in iron bracelets. My power wasn't usable. I could feel the buzzing zipping around my body, but I couldn't let it out.

It was giving me one hell of a headache.

The bracelets were old and tarnished. The symbols carved into them were faded, but sadly, still did the job. The bracelets burned like ice on my bare wrists.

"So," I said, trying to be friendly, "Where am I going?"

My number one rule: Get into kidnapper's good books so they don't try to kill me.

One of the buffoons who captured me, snorted. "To see the ice queen!'

The other one laughed, "Nice one dude!" They knuckle punched.

I banged my head against the window. Just my luck. Of course my kidnappers have to be bumbling buffoons who don't have a brain cell between them. Why don't I get a really suave kidnapper with a really cool moustache? Sometimes life just isn't fair.

"No, seriously," the guy driving said, "You are meeting a queen."

I started to snort, but then we turned a corner and there it was.

Well, technically it was a huge grey, silvery wall stretching as far as the eye could see.

But I knew what was behind that wall.

Sorcerers

Sorcerers were hated by buzzers all over the world. Actually, they were hated by anyone with a brain. Especially newts who never had eyesight problems before sorcerers existed. Being taken to see a bunch of them wasn't my cup of tea.

So here's the deal with sorcerers. The version you probably don't get in your history text book. Are you all seated comfortably? Do you have a snack and a nice foot stall to rest your tired tootsies? Good. Then I shall begin.

Once upon a time there was magick, wild, free untamed. The only ones who could use this magick were buzzers. As babies they would be chosen by the magick. It would creep into the strongest, the most able, as they could host magick the easiest. To be chosen was an honour and on the first night a baby was born it would be nursed in somewhere special, close to nature, where the magick would be strongest.

But as the years passed humans learned how to trick magick. The richest could brew up a potion that would force magick to take a child. Most children lived with the magick with only one side effect, scarring where the magick took hold. Glowing lines that showed how much magick you had. Most children only had small lines as long as a needle, but the strongest had more. If a weak child was chosen by force, though, the side effects were horrendous. The magick would overload and eat at the child's soul.

However, with magick such a symbol of status, it irked the aristocrats that peasants children could also posess magick. So they banned the tradition nursing of children outside. However people found ways around this. They picked flowers, kept pets and left windows open. They managed to find ways to keep their child close to nature.

Then one very rich man called William Cutworth had an idea. Why not capture all magick? That way it could only be dished out to the rich and powerful. It was the perfect solution. Cutworth manufactured a beautiful crystal to capture magick called the Myrra. It did it's job very well. Magick was tamed and became magic. Now a child could only receive one type of magic. Magick people were no longer jacks of all trades.

Not everyone agreed with this ideal though. The people rebelled. They wanted magick back. In a great battle the Myrra was cracked. The rich could no longer could control who was chosen. For some strange reason at that point magick didn't come back, magic was dominant.

There were no buzzers. People with magic where known as sorcerers and generally despised. They gradually faded into the shadows and people without magic forgot they existed. The concept of magic was remembered, however magick was all but forgotten.

Until about a hundred years ago when a mortal discovered the history of magick. He thought if he destroyed the Myrra magick would return. He invented a starrna, a sort of magic sucker. He managed to find the Myrra and suck out some of the magic in it. When this magic was released it became magick. Sadly, just after he had done this he was caught and arrested. A few days later the first buzzer for centuries was born. The magick was different though. Wilder. It scarred, left long glowing lines. Mine spiral down my arms to the tips of my fingers. They only appeared a year ago, when my magick awakened. I'm still getting used to it.

Magick isn't like magic. It multiplies. With magic there can only be a certain number of sorcerers. Whenever one dies the magic returns back to the crystal until it finds another child.

Anyway sorcerers didn't want the crystal destroyed and all their magic gone. So they placed the Myrra in an impenetrable maze.

The Mirror Maze.

The sorcerers have a whole community unlike buzzers.they have a hirachy/monarchy thing going. On the contrary, buzzers just hang out in a pack. Hunt together. Fight each other. Like wolves a lower member of the pack can challenge the leader. I winced remembering my last debacle.

We drove right up to the silvery, pearl grey wall, where an unidentifiable guard seemingly guards nothing. The uniform looked intimidating. A tight silver armoured bodysuit with a silver fencing helmet. A silver long distance rifle is slung over one shoulder. I shivered.

The guards nodded at us and a portion of the immense wall slowly slid open. I must admit, I was impressed. That's some first class engineering. We drove through.

I'd never seen anything like it. Rows of grey rendered boxes with shuttered windows lined the streets. A few sparse trees grew that looked out of place. This city seemed to have no character. Except for one thing...

At the top of a tall hill, that rose above the flat featureless landscape, sat a fairy tail palace made out of frosted glass that glowed different colours in the fading light. The hill was equally colourful, flooded with flowers. Roses and marigolds, violets and snapdragons and hundreds of other flowers I couldn't identify. A clear blue stream trickled down the hill with a steep waterfall at the bottom that fell into a perfect lagoon surrounded by weeping willows.

The place felt like a ghost town. I had not seen a single soul since we arrived.

The car rolled to a halt as man no. 1 pulled into a parking lot? Yes, even sorcerers have parking lots. They dragged me out of the car but I shoved them off.

"It's okay, I'll cooperate." I told them. I followed them meekly to an orangey red rock that was behind the waterfall. Why wasn't I fighting them and escaping? Well, to be honest, I was curious. And they also had guns.

Man no. 2 pressed a hand to the rock and a section slid open! Again! revealing a glass elevator.

"Ladies first," he gestured with a vicious smile.