Summoning the Lucent Taper only confirmed what Helie's light Memory had revealed.
Reflective glass filled Noble's vision for as far as she could see. She had once visited a place called a fun house with Rain before the twins were born. The place had been filled with mirrors that needed to be navigated around to reach an exit. At the time, she had been disoriented as the little girl slipped easily through the disguised passages, but this?
This was a thousand times worse.
Staring back at her were countless images of herself—of the entire cohort and Syrce.
The images replicated both horizontally and vertically. Looking up, there seemed to be no end to the number of blonde Masters alternating between upside down and right side up. Noble noted that the bottoms of her boots in all he images were almost touching, but not quite. Even her Flaw was reflected in the glass.
The world extended in every direction, blurring up from down and left from right.
'And I thought being lost on the surface was bad.' Noble felt her head spin.
"So many mirrors," Helie marveled while Flint healed her foot. She watched thousands of his reflected hands mend the swollen ankle until it was normal once more.
"Too many mirrors," he responded with a frown. "I was just getting used to looking at one of all of you, but this many? It's enough to make a man go mad…"
He wasn't exactly wrong. The longer Noble tried to get her bearings, the more adrift she felt. They needed to do something before she lost her sanity entirely.
"What's the plan, My Lady?" Roan tried not to focus on the endless images.
Letting go of the amulet, Syrce smiled widely. "What else? We keep going!"
"Is it far?" Aether raised his arm slowly, eyeing his bloodied forehead warily in the mirror.
"We won't know until we try!" The Saint tapped her fingers idly against her amulet. "Shall we?"
"Perhaps you'd better lead the way?" Noble suggested. "You have the best idea of what to expect down here. The rest of us will follow you."
"Right after I fix up Star Boy. He seems to have gotten a bit of a concussion when he was thrown from the Prince." Flint grabbed the young man's head, causing him to wince.
"Is that why I can't clear the twinkles in my vision?" Aether blinked.
"Unless your head is normally cracked open like an egg, I would say yes." Flint finished his work. "You are lucky I didn't use all my essence making that fancy light catcher. Any of the rest of you need anything?"
Roan shook his head. "I am fine."
"I don't think there is anything you can do for me," Syrce shrugged. "My Transcendent form will replenish itself in a day or two."
"I'll be fine as well." Noble waved off the healer's help. 'My damage is all to my soul.'
With everyone in the best shape they could be, the group headed down the hall of mirrors. Noble followed directly after Syrce, sometimes bumping into her by following too closely. Due to the reflective glass, the halls seemed both narrow and, at the same time, enormously spacious.
The floating Master was reluctant to let the commander get more than an arm's length away for fear of getting lost. If that happened, Noble knew that she would never be able to escape. Keeping close was key.
That meant mentally blocking out all of the motion around her, both by her reflections and by the other members of her team. That was easier said than done.
Child of Promise remained vigilant as they navigated a myriad of twists and turns. After a while, they lost all track of time. There was nothing but the mirror world and those walking through it. Nothing else seemed to exist.
As they turned a blind corner, Noble's eyes went wide.
Around them, the infinity of reflections disappeared, giving way to just one copy of herself inside the glass.
Confused by the development, Child of Promise leaned toward the reflection. She raised her fingers.
"Don't touch the glass!" Syrce caught her friend's fingers a moment before they met the wall.
Noble blinked, coming out of her daze. She looked at the Saint holding her wrist. Syrce's eyes were full of intensity.
"You're hurting my hand." Noble pulled her arm out of the Saint's grasp and shook it.
"None of you touch the glass!" The Transcendent warned. "No matter how tempted you are, stay back. Our mission depends on it."
Were the mirrors some sort of trap? It wouldn't surprise Noble if they were.
'I guess Mirage really liked looking at herself.' Flint's voice filtered into her head. 'Typical woman...'
Noble rolled her eyes. 'If that was her only goal, then I give her a lot of respect. She went all out to see herself from every angle.'
Only a divine being would find that prospect appealing. Noble had no such desire, but she was subjected to the view just the same.
The reflective glass was flawless and seamless. Even where it should have met the floor, the mirror seemed to continue downward in an endless line.
'It's stunning.' As they walked through the eternal line of mirrors, Noble studied her visage.
Her face had changed considerably since she was first infected with the Nightmare Spell and even more since becoming a Master. She looked much younger than her age, without a wrinkle on her face. It would have felt strange if not for the fact that most of her close friends were fellow Awakened.
And no matter how much Fort changed, he only got handsomer in her eyes, so that was an unfair comparison as well.
Noble wondered how much she would change when she became a Saint.
Would people mistake Rain and her for friends when they walked down the street together?
Maybe people would think they were sisters. That would be very strange indeed.
No, she couldn't change that much, or people would catch on to the fact that she had entered another Nightmare. If it happened, Noble would have to add makeup to look older, flying in the face of every woman who had ever lived before the Nightmare Spell descended.
If she took the path of Ascension high enough, would she look young enough to be confused with a child?
The time she had seen Lord Anvil, he had looked distinguished and not juvenile at all. And in the vision of Mirage that Noble had in Wonder Woods, the Daemon of Imagination's figure had been very shapely and not girlish at all.
'There is a stopping point then. Hopefully, I have gotten as youthful looking as I am going to get.'
While looking young sounded nice in theory, it posed many problems. She had once heard of a professor at the Academy who had been confused for a student.
'Whatever happened to him, I wonder?' Noble felt her mind drift. What was she talking about?
She furrowed her brow, feeling the muddled state of her brain. She studied her reflection, trying to get back to her train of thought.
But as she frowned, her reflection looked back at her with two round, violet eyes…
And smiled.