Snow Queen

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All magic, all power comes with a cost. Shards of this mirror? They twist your reality. Distort the truth to what it thinks you want to see. Promises fucking futures and places that will never be.

The icy forest is silent. Its only sound the freezing winds that blow among the thin-trunked pines. Minutes, hours, days tick past before the silence is shattered by the appearance of a humming doorway made of light. Into the snow and freezing cold step Carissa Decimus and Medea of Colchis, dressed in winter garb, immediately clutching their coats tighter in the frigid weather.

Carissa lowers the hood of her jacket, catching her reflection in the icy body of a frozen pool nearby. A mane of maroon hair, large fur-tufted feline ears, and yellow catslit eyes. Her tail, a long, thick sinewy thing whips back and forth impatiently, ending in a bushy brush of maroon fur.

"Fuck, these portals always make me nauseous." Her attention drifts back to Medea.

"Perhaps it’s time to learn dimensional displacement without exact coordinate calculation?" Medea lowers her hood, sylvan ears emerging from a sheet of long brown hair ending in purple dyed tips. Her lavender pupils survey the surrounding terrain. "If Abigail can manage it, then I'm sure you can as well."

"Prick of a Beast of Nature," Carissa growls under her breath.

Medea's lips twitch in amusement and she squeezes Carissa slightly. "Oh, dear, are you jealous?"

"Jealous?" Carissa's ears flick, and she fluffs her tail fur out into a mild frizz. "Hell fucking no," she grumbles. "Jealous of Abigail? Fucking never. I could learn her methodology if I wanted to."

"You know, I think you enjoy the competition," Medea says, conjuring an optics glyph to look through, surveying the environment. Lilac lights dance along what little bits of her skin are exposed to the air. "Keeps your edge."

"Ha, competition." Carissa's ears pivot in quarter-turn arcs. She's wound like a string and ready to snap into action at the first sign of trouble. "There is no competition in the art of temporal-spatial displacement. There's me, and then there's everybody else."

"Hubris, lover," Medea lightly chides Carissa. She lowers the optics glyph, steps in to lightly squeeze Carissa's fingers with a gloved hand and kisses her cheek. "You are profoundly skilled but never tempt fate."

Carissa shivers, heart fluttering in her chest. Her muscles relax at the brush of affection washing across her cheek. Her hand instinctively wraps around Medea's waist and finds the small of her back, pulling her in.

"Careful," she growls playfully in a low tone, "Or I might have to show the gods and you just how skilled I am."

Medea laughs lightly, cheeks burning with hot pink fire. "Afterwards my love. Let it dangle in front of you as incentive." Medea strokes Carissa's cheek, tracing an all too familiar grove through the flesh.

"Tease," Carissa snorts, leaning into the gloved hand.

"A tease I may be, but you quite adore being bullied." Medea pulls her hand away and wriggles out of Carissa's grasp like a cat who has somewhere to be.

Carissa exhales in exasperation but lets her go, cheeks burning with the warmth of 5000 years of love.

"I'm not even going to dignify that with a response. Let’s go get this mirror from the Snow Queen, and get out of this frozen turdstack. I can feel my teeth chattering in my toes." She strides forward into the trees with an unassailable pep in her step.

"We should be careful, the Hermeneutic could put us anywhere within the progression of the story." Medea follows Carissa, pulling a thick tome of fairytales from her robes to consult as they walk, only really missing moon shaped spectacles needed to complete the scholarly look.

Before they get far, Carissa's ears perk up.

Quicker than the wind, a spear, clear as ice, emerges from the woods and pierces Carissa's heart. Carissa is yanked by the spear straight back like a rubber band. She's slammed into a tree, blood splattering on the ground and the wood in an explosion of maroon. Chasing after the spear is a blur of black, white, blue and purple, imposingly large. It— no, she, moves impossibly fast on her skiis straight for them.

Medea yells, "Carissa!" She drops the book, it crashes into the snow, drifts, sinks into their depths like quicksand and vanishes. She pivots in place to bring her magic to bear. Power surges in her robe-turned deep winter coat.

Slowly.

Too slowly.

Dread blossoms in Medea's eyes. The Beast of Nature, this Snow Queen's impossibly bright web of ontokinetic strings writhe all around them in a blizzard of unending presence.

Their failure is imminent.

She grasps at the strands of time to slow the assault, give her moments to think. But it’s fruitless, the Snow Queen is too strong.

But then, something else. They both feel it, a thread felt rippling elsewhere. The fluttering image of a black crown with gold trim drilling through the fabric of reality. In the seconds before the giant is on them, Medea grasps and pulls at this new crackling threadwork, diverting all her energy and resistance.

The very snow seems to turn against Medea, frost stinging her like a swarm of angry bees. Though she struggles valiantly, the sheer cold forces her to her knees, shivering. Then, the skier elegantly halts, surrounded by a light mist, and approaches Medea.

Motherfucker no! Carissa mentally screams. She rips at the ice, grasp weakening from the blood loss. Completely powerless in this moment.

Furious tears of frustration streak down her cheeks, from the pain lancing through her torso. Abject failure that gnaws at her like the cold piercing her through. Desperately trying to lift an arm, finding it practically tied to lead weights, she reaches out as if Medea is close enough to grasp.

She's too far away.

Too powerless.

Too weak to stop the giant. The Snow Queen.

The skier bends down, blowing white dust into Medea's face. In one last desperate burst of exertion, Carissa fights to get free. But it’s too late. Her muscles fail, falling limply to her sides. She can only watch as Medea's eyes drain of warmth, her arms wrap around the Beast's waist, and they kiss in an icy embrace.

The last thing Carissa sees before the black of lost consciousness takes her, is the Beast of this cursed pocket space skiing off from whence she came.

In the wake of this swift abduction, the forest falls silent once more.

A reindeer treks timidly across a frozen river, its ears perking up at the sound of howling wolves. Her hooves lightly tap against the surface of the frozen river, ready to bolt at a moments notice. Suddenly, she is surprised by a far different sound: a thunderous CRACK reverberating through the forest, as she gallops off into the woods.

A break appears in the ice, first small, then increasing, as the frozen river bulges upwards and glacial water geysers skywards.

A black gloved hand emerges from the fracture, then another, and finally the fabric covered face and body of a young woman dragging herself limply onto the ice. Panting and cursing, she's a dark smudge marring the otherwise pristine landscape.

"Discordia's tits, that's cold!" Alex proclaims as she exits the hole, rubbing her palms and clattering her teeth, taking a moment to lay down her pack.

Shivering fiercely, she looks left and right, taking stock of the location. The young woman draws out a shattered hand mirror, lovingly swaddled in black cloth.

She pricks her finger on one of the shards, a drop of blood falling upon its face, eyes fixed upon its fragmented contours with increasing focus.

"That way it is."

As she treks on through the woods, she keeps counsel with herself. Takes note of the topography and wildlife. Discusses her plan of action, bewailing the choice to enter this realm.

"Look, I'm just saying, could have done with the Mirror taking us closer to our destination."

Her expression changes, an imperious smile replacing the frown of a moment hence. Her body relaxes into a more leisurely pace. Her hands cast forth a small magical flame that floats in the air just in front of her chest.

"Don't whinge darling, it's unbecoming," Aleison adds.

Her expression changes again, back to one of frustration. Her shoulders tense up.

"Oh come on! I thought we'd pop right out through another mirror, not in some stupid forest."

"Well our looking glass is rather shattered, dear. Spot of luck we were able to use it at all, finnicky as sympathetic magic is."

Her eyes dart around. Then they cast downwards with a solemn expression, staring at the oscillating shard of black glass.

"Sorry," Alice whispers.

"I don't even know why I agreed to come, that stupid mirror caused us more than enough grief last time. More of it won't do us any good."

"Pish posh. The Mirror of Reason is a potent artifact; past indiscretions are no cause to throw in the towel. Now quit flogging a dead horse, you were outvoted," the young woman mutters under her breath, ceasing her spell and crossing her arms for warmth.

"Bitch." Allison shivers.

"Maybe the hermeneutic changed our destination? We are here to steal."

"Not this shit."

"So we'd be in the part of… whatsername, the little thief girl or something?"

"Maybe?"

"Well we sure as shit aren't here to save anybody or be saved."

"It's possible that Til-"

"Absolutely fucking not. Drop it. Let's just head for the castle get that stupid mirror and be done with it."

The Black Queen is momentarily tempted to press her own shard of the mirror for information; to glance across the threads, to see how other, more competent versions of her would do this. It tickles against the back of her throat, squirms in her chest and mind. Her hands shake, starting to look down; black threads worm under her skin. As the snow crunches underfoot, her itch is interrupted by a cry of pain somewhere to her left. It's faint and distorted, but recognizably human.

She gingerly tucks the mirror in a pocket and turns quickly towards the sound. Fast, light footsteps carry her through the snow to find the source.

It doesn't take long, even the most unobservant fool would see the starkly contrasted painting against the white. A red stain on the winter landscape, pinned to a tree with an icicle.

Alex curses under her breath as she pulls out a strange medical kit and cautiously approaches the injured stranger. Her eyes widen as recognition dawns over the crinkling of lips and eyebrows.

"Carissa?"

She hadn't known the cat woman, except at a distance; as a colleague in the Serpent's Hand. Someone Tilda had mentioned a few times, in passing reference to ongoing initiatives. A tool in some greater part of Tilda's schemes.

What in the worlds was she doing here?

Flashes of Tilda burn in her mind. Scenes of hushed conversations with Carissa and another when Allison had been searching for them. A sorceress, someone more on Tilda's level in a way she could never hope to be. The mirror flickers coldly in her pocket, sparking sour pangs of jealousy, electric fear, cool anger.

Can't be trusted, we need to go.

I-she'll just take and take and take until everyone's gone.

Can't trust her, can't trust anybody.

Y-yeah, she'll just hurt us again.

She takes a deep breath, heartbeat slowing.

Calm. We are clearly being affected by the mirror being in such close proximity to its origin. We must not let it control us.

O-oh. Yeah. Not again.

This fuckin thing.

Alex approaches and explores Carissa's wounds, checking for a pulse.

Weak, yet impossibly there. This is a feat that medical journals would surely salivate over given the ice spear right through her heart.

Still alive. Welp, here goes nothing.

Alex is no medic and doesn't really know anything about Carissa's physiology. Human with some feline traits? But she does know that she needs to act fast… and she knows combat drugs. Alex removes a syringe of angry looking liquid from the kit and stabs the catgirl with it, near to the heart as possible.

A bit — unorthodox, but there's nothing like a demon in a bottle to get the heart pumping, wounds healing.

Though drugs infused with wrath demons do tend to…. get people's blood up.

Alex steps back a bit warily.

The ice spear steams and then rapidly melts at the edges. Carissa’s eyes tear open, reddening with bulging capillaries. They dart back and forth rapidly. She grabs the spear with one hand, screaming, as she breaks the ice off and promptly tears herself off.

For a normal person this would be guaranteed death. Blood splatters into the snow as it squirts from her exposed heart. She collapses onto her hands and knees, the wound rapidly stitching together before Alex’s eyes.

Alex takes a few additional steps back to observe and give her space.

"Take it easy, drugs I gave you should help you heal up pretty quick."

Carissa is up in an instant and turns on Alex. Her bow is drawn fully, arrow nocked, eyes wild and irrational. “Where is she?!” It's practically a scream. Tail and ear fur fully frizzed out, teeth bared in a clear threat display.

"You're the only one I saw here. Who do you mean?"

Demon drugs may not have been the best idea.

Possibly the sorceress from the library? The one who had so much of T— Erasmus starts to think and is cut off by Allison.

Don't.

"Don't play word games with me, you've been after us since the Library." She breathes heavy, traces of blood still leaking from her lips. "Think I'm stupid huh? Set this up to look like the fucking hero while you torture her for fucking information. WHERE IS SHE?!"

Alex's uneasy smirk becomes a harsh frown as she unholsters a glock. "Fuck off. Just saved your ass and already regretting it. Chill the fuck out."

See, I knew this would be a waste.

Carissa slightly lowers the bow, ripples of crinkled lines working across her face. "The fuck did you just say asswipe?"

"I said I just saved your ass, moron. I know you're hopped up on wrath dust but don't fucking test me or you'll end up in a worst state then you were."

Carissa snorts and then laughs. It's the dangerous sort of laugh of someone who's on the edge of losing it. Or worse, someone who already has.

"As if you could fucking do worse than a god damn icicle through my heart. Make my day Hand scum, so I can beat the location of my wife out of your pretty fucking skull."

"Your wife, hm? A lover's quarrel, is it?" Aleison looks the cat woman up and down languidly "That's a shame."

Carissa snarls, and raises the bow again. "I'm not fucking around! What did you do with her?!"

Allison raises her pistol.

"Oh my fucking god, I don't know where she is, and I couldn't care less. Now if you're going to pick a fight, either shit or get off the pot, pussy."

The bow drops, string limp. Carissa fluidly steps forward, knocks aside the pistol and punches Allison in the nose. This knocks Allison on her ass with a meaty thump. Carissa has the audacity to walk past like she’s forgotten Allison is there.

"MEDEA!" Carissa shouts into the woods.

Allison, nose bloodied, sits back for just a moment, stunned. Her hand reaches towards her mirror on instinct, grasping it. Tendrils of cold magic squirming under her skin.

That would do us more harm than good, Allison.

What's even the point then?!

Silently, fuming with rage, Allison wipes her nose and stands. She smears the blood on her gun.

She fires at Carissa. The bullet travels faster than it should, hotter, burning red hot with the rage of its wielder.

Carissa's ears pivot at the moment of firing. The bullet vanishes mid-flight in a gesture of impotence. It reappears slamming into a distant tree as Carissa rounds on Allison. Claws whip out and grab BQ by the throat. She's lifted into the air.

"When I punch you down motherfucker, you stay down if you don't want to fucking die. WHERE IS MY WIFE!?"

Desperation burns in the light gleaming behind her yellow cat-slit pupils, animalistic fear a roaring flame.

Allison kicks her in the face with her steel-toed boots for her trouble.

Carissa drops The Black Queen. She reels backwards as blood flecks through the air.

"For the last fucking time I don't know what you're talking about." Immediately back on her feet, Allison adds insult to injury by kicking Carissa in the leg.

Carissa snarls impotently as the kick lands, knocking her down into a kneel. Her hand lashes out to catch the resetting foot, trying to rip Allison’s feet out from under her. "Bullshit! There's no way you just fucking show up here!"

Surprise wriggles across Carissa's opening lips and widening eyes as Allison snatches her foot away and steps back.

"I didn't mean to!" Allison rants angrily, disengaging. "Tried to aim for the Snow Queen's castle, not the middle of buttfuck nowhere. Stupid fucking sympathetic magic, stupid fucking mirror. Didn't even want to get the fucking thing."

Shaking off the surprise, Carissa recovers. Having not learned her lesson, she lunges for Allison's throat. "Liar!"

The Black Queen sidesteps and dodges the feeble lunge.

"This is pathetic. You just got stabbed in the fucking heart. If I wanted to take you out I'd have just left you there, moron."

"I didn't need you; I would have gotten out on my own, fuckstick." Carissa throws another punch, weaker and slower than the first. Allison ducks under the arm, the Wrath Drug visibly starting to wear off.

Allison punches her in the face, a sick and meaty pop-crunch echoing.

"Yeah, whatever."

And then Carissa crumples to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

”Ah shit.”

Carissa

Panes of stained glass shatter a thousand-fold as you fall into darkness, reality clawing at your skin, threatening to swallow you.

What the fuck. Is—is she not the one who took Medea? Fuck. FUCK.

Chest constricted and tight, feet pounding against the forest floor. Sprinting through a thick-bodied forest, laughs swirling all around.

Dammit what happened?

Names roll off your lips, desperately crying out for something as you burst into sunbeam lit clearing.

You smashed your brain on the back of a tree, were jacked up on Demon Drugs, and got into a fight you were in no condition to win. Gotta work on your impulses. You’ll remember most of it when you come back, healing factor will see to that. Afraid the short term is gone though.

Your mother's brown fur rising and falling slowly. Arrows embedded in her side. Leaking crimson that bleeds into the dirt and soil. Hunters turn to you, bows not drawn. You roar at them, but it sounds less a roar, more the squeal of a stuck pig. They laugh. Laugh as chains wrap around your neck and wrists, dragging you away as they deliver the killing blow.

The stained-glass panes shatter beneath you, plunging you again into the cold dark.

Arty?

I’m here.

“Did—did you see it?

Useless. The word burns like a crimson pyre in the void, rushing towards you. You try to shield your face from its hateful light, but flesh offers no respite.

I did, you got speared through by the Beast, the Snow Queen, and died, just for a moment.

She falls with you, green silhouette tumbling through shadow.

Medea?

Powerless.

Catnapped.

Unable to stop it.

FUCK.

Feet pounding dirt, older, stronger, rushing through the dim light of the forest. Tree lines thin into the olive orchard, your steps silent as the huntress you've become.

Fuck how am I— we had a fucking plan. Your anguish tinges the forest to a sickly green light, the glass crackling beneath calloused feet.

It's not enough. Your first love, limp on the ground. The bullies of the village stand over her, laughing at her.

Carissa, I know I give you lots of shit, but this isn’t your fault.

You snap a twig underfoot. He hears. He turns. It's too late. You reappear before him with that talent you've so carefully hidden. The rage takes your mind and heart, vision filling with crimson.

Shut up. Shut the fuck up. I—I can never protect them. Why can I never fucking protect them? What’s wrong with me?

The knife goes through his throat, up through the roof of his mouth fifteen times. He dies, gurgling in a pool of his own fucking blood.

You’re spiraling. You can’t always prot—

His friend smashed to the ground with three knives to the spine. You drag him backwards into the dirt. He screams for mercy; pleads it wasn't his idea.

You don't care.

I SAID SHUT UP ARTY. Your breaths echo, screams burning in your lungs as you stab. Drag bodies through the dirt. Fuck, after everything, how could she slip through my fingers so easily? I was right, fucking, there and again I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t protect her. I couldn’t even protect myself. Why? Artemis’s Bow, why am I so damned useless!

You yell at them. You kick their lifeless bodies. Stab them again and again. Your first friend, the only one who truly understood the early life you lived, the first girl you ever loved, is dead in the grass. They broke her neck with a club and didn't even notice. They didn’t even bother to fucking check.

Why?! First her, now this.

You were too slow to stop it, too weak to be there when it counted most. The glass shatters beneath your feet plunging you into the deepening dark. To that horrible night.

I gotta wake up. I gotta move.

Jason drags you from the depths of the Argo’s decks. Ties you to a rock. Laughs at you.

She'll use her against you; you won’t survive in this—

"Look at how fucking weak you are. They call you the Lion of Arcadia in song and tale, but here you are, a kitten bound in my grasp. I bet you don't even know why I've dragged you to die."

SHUT UP, WHAT DON'T YOU UNDERSTAND ABOUT THAT!?

“You’ll pay for this you yellow eyed, snake bellied bastard,” you sneer at Jason with all the fire and machismo you can muster.

No.

“Oh no, I won’t. Hera, my dear Atalante, is on my side. Medea is mine, and I simply can’t keep you around with her constantly making lovey dovey eyes at you. Oh, chin up and stop looking so red in the face.” He grabs your chin, sneering. You want to rip his guts out, stuff his head up his own ass. "I will take care of her like you never could. Well, at least until I find a civilized woman of heritage to solidify my legacy. Blood witches are savages after all."

Wake up.

“Fuck you. I’m going to survive this; I’m going to find you when I get back to shore. Skin you alive, slowly but surely, tie you up, and display you where the whole world can see what a fucking coward you are.”

Wake up!

Jason pats your cheek, his horrific sin burning against your flesh as the wood of the boat creaks beneath his sandals. You, of course, in true Carissa fashion, bite his finger, nearly tearing it off. Or that's what would have happened if he weren’t wearing a fleece Medea fucking worked to steal for him.

Please no. Please, please wake up! Fear burns in your belly, gnawing at you.

“I hate to be the one to tell you this, but no one survives Scylla.” He kicks you off the edge, tumbling through the air like a sack of lumpy potatoes.

No!!

You're too weak to stop him, black abyss of the ocean swirling rapidly towards you. The splash mutes beneath the sloshing surf. It reaches you now, the roar of what you're destined to die by as the rock sinks with your corpse to be. From the shadows, the aching black, comes the many headed shape. Gnashing, powerful teeth come to carry you to your end—

Carissa

Carissa bursts back into wakefulness like a cat who’s tail has just been stepped on. Screaming, an apple flies off somewhere deep into the woods with a thunk, flung by Carissa’s shaking fingers.

Alex, sitting on the other side of a small fire, startles, nearly dropping a shard of frosted glass she's looking intently at.

"Discordia's fucking tits!"

“I gotta go! I gotta go right now.” Carissa attempts to lever herself off the back of the tree to stand, sweating bullets and gasping for breath.

The Black Queen is around the fire in a moment’s notice, steadying Carissa’s attempt to rise.

"You're not going anywhere like this."

"Don't fucking touch me. I can't… I need to go after her!" She struggles against Alex’s grip, but it doesn’t work. She slides back down against the tree, winded.

Alex returns to her sitting position shaking her head. "Just… Just sit down for a second, rest for a bit, and you can tell me all about your gal problems."

It takes a moment to recover and compose herself, slipping into a smug smirk.

"Now did you have a nice catnap?"

Carissa's tail fur frizzes out. Her eyes are wide. Ears standing straight up and swiveling constantly as she processes, returning to lucidity. "Fuck. FUCK. How long was I out?!"

Alex shrugs.

"I dunno, like an hour or two? Seems like you needed it."

Alex gives her a once over.

"Quick healer, huh?"

"Healin—" Carissa stops mid-sentence. "Wait. Wait you're…" A storm of flashing memories wash across her mind. "Oh, fuck. Dammit." She puts her face in her hands. "No, no no."

"Pft, what, you thought I was a dream or something? No such luck, I'm afraid."

"No asshole." She removes her hands, looking at them as they shake. "I'm fucking processing that I just let my fucking wife get scooped away by a stupid shit ass icebitch cause I let my guard down for two motherfucking seconds, and now our whole damn plan is up in smoke, and I'm stuck with a glorified wiccan who punches like a five year old; looks like she's perpetually stuck in the body of a 22 year NEET, dresses like some sorority girl dropout who's having a midlife crisis but can't admit it so she's doing this to keep in touch with her youth, and thinks she knows everything there is to know about running a goddamn magic insurgency." She pauses taking a shaky breath. "And here I fucking am trying to figure out how I'm going to unfuck my fuckup and rescue my wife. Again."

Carissa falls into brooding silence. "What the hell was in that shit you jabbed into me?!" she asks in a much quieter, tired tone.

Alex stares at Carissa a moment.

"Wow you sure are being catty for someone whose life I just saved. How's about a 'thank you' before jumping to insults?" Alex's face shifts, a slow burst of recognition washing across her lips.

Carissa stumbles up slowly and walks the few steps over to the sorceress. Her lips draw back, ears pressed to her head and tail frizzing out. “I don’t care what you fucking did, you make one more catty joke I’m going to break every limb in your body and then at the end when you’re begging for release, I’ll leave you to die slowly to the fucking elements," she hisses in a low dangerous tone, really and truly pushing her luck over the edge.

Alex rolls her eyes and stands up, beginning to pack her bag.

"Yeah, yeah you're real tough, got it."

Carissa watches, mixed emotions flirting across her features.

Alex finishes packing, minus the mirror shard which she keeps on hand, and turns to Carissa.

"Welp, good luck with whatever, I guess." She turns away and begins walking due north, muttering quietly under her breath.

Standing there awkwardly, Carissa watches Alex walk away into the distance. One hand clasps her own right shoulder, the other hanging at her side, ears sagging and tail drooping.

Good job Cari, were you big bad and tough enough hmmm? Think you got your point across? Think you can take on the Beast all by yourself now? What's the plan now?

I— fuck. FUCK. Apollo's fucking chariot.

That's not a plan kitty. You just gonna let her walk off? She did save you you know, didn't have to do that. Sure, it may have made you pass out for a bit, sure you're definitely going to need to sleep here for the night, but that was going to be true even if you pulled it out on your own.

Fuck. I know. I know!

Well, we both know I didn't choose you for being a hapless kitten in the face of adversity. Are you going to pout, or are you going to figure out how to make this right?

Carissa bites her lip and goes to follow BQ. She winces as her leg wobbles, threatening to give out, and stops. "Wait," she says halfheartedly.

Really. Really, wait? That's the best you got. Narcissus's pool, we have to work on your social skills.

B. Q.
Goddamn pain in the ass, as if she could speak to us like that, should beat her ass again for good measure.

Mm, she does have a rather comely bottom.

Don't be fucking gross.

Oh please, she was clearly lashing out due to the abduction of her wife. Quite romantic actually.

She didn't want our help, not our problem. That'll teach me to help a stray.

I think she still needs help. And, we might need her. Hermeneutics have a way of-

Who fucking cares. After how she acted? She doesn't deserve—

"Wait."

Alex stops in her tracks, hand tightening around the mirror shard.

No, no, what did we just fucking say.

She needs our help, and the hermeneutic-

BQ turns around and smirks, shaking her head.

God fucking damn it.

"Well come on then." She gestures with one hand, indicating for Carissa to go on.

"Sheesh, like herding cats."

Carissa's eye twitches. She inhales deeply, and looks down, spotting something in the snow. "Look… thanks for the… help." Each word is agonized over, drawn out like it's the hardest thing this woman has ever had to say. Which isn’t too far off from the truth.

"I'm having the…" She pauses, uncurling fingers on her fist as she counts. "The fourth worst day of my life."

Another awkward pause as she takes a breath, pressing one hand to her head.

"We had a whole plan and it's in fucking tatters because I lost focus for two motherfucking seconds and couldn't protect us both. And you, admittedly, did not deserve any of what I just said."

She leans down as the flakes of snow arc down around her, sticking in her hair before melting. She picks something out of the drift.

BQ's easy smirk wipes off her face, and she returns to the fire at a steady pace.

"I…'m sorry to hear that. I know what it's like to lash out at someone trying to help."

"What happened?"

"I don't have a clear memory of it; we were talking about how weird travel by portal was and all of the sudden I was waking up kneeling on the ground. Should have heard her, should have fucking known the damn Beast would be on us as soon as we stepped through. Dammit all." She slams her fist into a nearby tree, but it's a weak punch and her knuckles come away bloody as she shakes them out. "Threw the fucking spear, pinned me to the tree and mashed my skull against the back I guess… and then took Medea." She doesn't look at Alice, just at the hand with the chain in it. "Fucking dammit." She drops back onto a log by the fire.

"It-its ok. I'll help you get your wife back. "

Why the fuck would we do that? We're here for the mirror, not some sob story!

Alice visibly grimaces at the thought.

"Can you tell me more about this beast?"

"We're not sure about her name, but she's driving the pocket dimension. Or I suppose you can call it a Hermeneutic."

"The Snow Queen… Oh. Oh, of course."

"That's just a moniker. Not her true name." Carissa pauses and her eyes narrow, unfocused and not looking at Alice. "Well you could have said that fucking sooner, dammit."

"I'm sorry?"

"Nothing, don't worry about it. I just," Beat as she presses a hand to the side of her head. "Remembered something before I lost consciousness." She rubs her face with her hand. "Skis, fucking skis. Who rides around on Skis?"

"Assholes?"

She means who specifically.

"Um, ski and spear, and snow… Skadi, maybe?"

Carissa snorts and then grunts in acknowledgement of 'Assholes'. "Skadi… that sounds right."

"Then I'm sure it is so."

"In either case she's a Beast, and that's a problem." Her shoulders sag. "Fuck. Medea had a book… I don't know what happened to it."

"Yeah, no shit she's a problem, I didn't think this was going to be a goddamned walk in the park when I came here."

"I'm not some moron. I came with a plan to get that stupid fucking mirror, and while I didn't intend to fight the Snow Bitch, or play her story game, I know how to take her down, and I know how the story goes."

Carissa looks at BQ for a long moment, before back to the hand with the chain. She visibly chews on her lip and closes her eyes. "What can you do exactly?"

"Darling, what can't I do? I'm a practitioner of Thelemic magick, an expert in the Erisian mysteries, I'll fuck a bitch up with blood magic, I'm pretty knowledgeable about hermeneutics, I guess? Not to mention I'll beat the crap out of anyone I need to or make a custom weapon and blow them the heck up! I am quite knowledgeable regarding multiversal transversal."

Memory of a dozen different Tildas trickle back into her mind. Fish magicians, Feline wizards, cervitaur tricksters, and in at least one universe… they an actual moose.

Aleison pauses and smirks "I've also been told I'm an excellent lover."

You trying to fuck our problems away, is that it? Fill the void left by Tilda? With this bitch of all people? What the fuck is wrong with you?

You're projecting darling. Dear Tilda has nothing to do with this, nor is it this lovely creature's fault that things ended poorly.

Carissa's face twists through several expressions ranging from dramatic to subtle as Aleison speaks. "Not interested in that last one." A pause, and she closes her eyes again. "It's better than nothing but, against a Beast?"

Aleison scans Carissa head to toe with an appraising eye. "Mm, your loss. As for whether my talents are sufficient? You'll note, darling, that I came alone."

Alex quietly chuckles to herself, palming the mirror. Then she continues languidly.

"I'm quite confident I can retrieve the Snow Queen's mirror on my own. With your help? Perhaps we can retrieve your beloved as well."

"Well, I'm glad one of us is confident," the sarcasm stings, rolling off Carissa's tongue. "Cause right now I'm convinced that we're going to get skewered the moment we step into the heart of her lair." She drags the free hand over her forehead down to her chin. "Do you have a plan in mind?" she asks with a sigh.

"A plan? Of course not! I've got several. With room for improvisation, of course! They're the 'cat's meow' if I do say so myself."

Carissa's eye twitches. "You're really really pushing it with the cat jokes."

Alex only grins harder "Oh, don't be such a sourpuss."

"Now I think that's enough pussyfooting around. I would like to head out before I freeze my tits off."

The huntress looks down, breaking eye contact. She stares at her hands with a wash of shame in the frown and crinkling lines on her face. "As much as I would love to get moving, if we go right now, we will be fucked. I can't walk more than a few feet and the healing factor's off."

"Whatever you injected me with, it did not agree with my nature."

Mm, this is the perfect time to see what power Tilda saw in them.

"Oh, hey! Speaking of. I showed you mine, now show me yours. What can you do Ms. Puss in Boots?"

Carissa snorts and then starts to laugh, dry and pained. "Well judging by how today has fucking gone, take a spear to the chest, and once again prove completely inept at protecting anything I love."

"You were ambushed by a god on their home turf, it could happen to anybody, don't beat yourself up about it."

"Too late for that," Carissa says sarcastically. "Teleportation."

"Ooooh, handy. Local? Universal? Multiversal?"

"Universal, though Moose and Medea suspect it could be pushed to Multiversal." She reaches down in the snow, and brushes away several inches, pulling out a flask. "Myself, anything I'm touching, projectiles in midair. There's the healing factor, and a spatial disruption aura, part of the teleporting, I think. Not sure."

Their chest burns with a licking flame of anger and hurt. She grasps the mirror shard tighter looking at it. The itch flickers in her chest and she gives in, letting the magic flow through to see those threads of Tilda across many possibilities.

"Tt, fuckin Moose. They don't know shit about the multiverse that we didn't teach them." Allison grumbles, "Fucking traitor."

"Yeah, I know. Black Queen this, Black Queen that whenever it came to magic or operational stuff. Wouldn't fucking shut up about you." Carissa turns the flask over in her hand. "Was even worse when Medea was around."

"They did?" Alex's chest flutters and aches with longing.

Of course they did, we're wonderful.

Who fucking cares what they think?

You care more than you put on, darling.

Shut up.

"Of course they did. I'm known to leave quite an impression."

"What did they say?"

God fucking dammit, WHO CARES?!

"As our connection point to the Hand? It was almost always from a professional perspective. Medea was always closer to Moose, so you could as—" Carissa pauses and falters. "No actually… I…" She abruptly stops and stares at her hand. It closes around the chain necklace in one hand, nose lingering over the flask.

Carissa takes a far too long swig from the flask. "I'm not the best person to ask."

"Oh, so they never-? Oh. That's probably for the best."

Alice's chest tightens, the mirror's magic twisting against her skin. Shoots of icy jealousy wrapping around her heart. It begs her to look for realities where Medea and Tilda never met. Maybe that was it, maybe that was the key. It wasn't Carissa who betrayed them, it was Medea.

Allison looks at their mirror shard frowning, then tosses it into their bag.

"Pass me the fucking flask."

Carissa obliges.

Allison takes a big swig and hands it back.

"Have you eaten?" Carissa asks, wiping residual moisture off her lips.

"Nuts and berries, that kind of shit."

"Right so, minimal." Carissa sets aside the flask and extends one hand, taking in a breath as a sheen of silver spreads along where her fingertips touch the air. Her hand and then a good bit of her arm slide inside. She pulls it back out again with a large satchel bag that immediately drops into the snow along with her arm. She curses, has to let go and shake out her arm.

"More teleportation?"

"Portals more than teleportation, but same general principle. Extraplanar space. Or connection points to our home."

"Fancy teleportation, got it."

She unclicks the clasps of the pack and pulls out a fair-sized box which she tosses across to Allison.

Allison examines the box with scrutiny for several moments before popping it open.

A fully prepared meal wafts with residual warmth as if it just came off the stove. Carissa pulls out a second box for herself. "Eat up, and then we sleep. We'll need it."

"… Thanks. Maybe you're not so bad."

Carissa grunts in acknowledgement, already digging into the food. "We'll see how you feel about it when we have to face whatever's been done to Medea."

B. Q.

Alice wakes up, as she often does, feeling like she's had a heart attack.

Her surroundings swirl in a dance of snow and early morning light, memory of the previous night returning like a slow leaking sieve, out of order and in increasing intensity.

Her eyes dart around checking for danger. No alarm wards triggered, and her stuff hasn't been tampered with.

Good. They're safe. Or well, as safe as one can be in this icy nightmare dimension.

Its not long before she's by the fire, on a log, on guard but enjoying the brisk morning air.

Carissa sits bolt upright in her tent. She's covered in sweat. She's a shadow with the light gleaming into her tent and she lets out a howl.

Alice rushes over to Carissa's tent.

"Everything, uh, alright?" she loudly asks.

The zipper desperately opens, and Carissa spills out into the snow, soaked with sweat. She squirms and is up kneeling before Alice can do anything. Carissa grips her own shoulders, rocking back and forth as she breathes fast, shallow and ragged. "Not real, not real, not real."

"Hey, um, you're alright. Take some deep breaths?" Alice stares on, brow and nose wrinkled. She half reaches as if to touch Carissa but pulls back.

"Give her a minute," an unfamiliar voice pours out of Carissa's mouth. It's possessed of a sharply different intonation and a bit of layering, as if multiple people are speaking at once.

Carissa rocks back and forth, shivering as she squeezes her eyes shut. "Shit. Medea, shit." She presses her hands to her face.

Alice retreats, leaving her to her rocking for a moment to sort through her pack. Pocketing the mirror shard again, she retrieves a container, filling it with water. She then returns and sets the water down within arm’s reach. She hovers close, fidgeting with the mirror shard and focusing her gaze on anything but Carissa.

Dammit, I knew she was a liability.

Carissa curls forward, head pressing to the ground as she shudders. Sharp inhales of breath break up the shudders of her body as she sobs silently into the snow. Broken sobs that stretch on for the next fifteen minutes.

Eventually her breathing slows to a steady heavy pace.

She lays still for another minute or so. Her hand snakes out and feels around, finding the container of water.

She pulls it over and dunks her whole head into the liquid for around thirty seconds. She rips back out of it, gasping down air, fur and hair soaked.

She sits there staring blankly out into the forest ahead.

"Would you please hand me a towel?" she asks in a very small, very quiet voice.

Alice's heart slams in her chest like a drum, but she silently grabs a towel from her pack, and hands it to Carissa.

Carissa takes it and presses her face into it, wiping down, and then curling her hair up in it. After a minute of kneeling in the snow like this, she gets up unsteadily and sits on a log at the fire across from Alice. Alice watches her carefully out of the periphery, but Carissa avoids the Black Queen's gaze.

"Need anything else?"

"Do you have a knife? I misplaced my machete."

Alice frowns. "For?"

"Just… a knife please."

Allison tuts and hands her a Swiss army knife.

Carissa takes the knife, turns it over, and inspects it.

She promptly stabs herself in the chest, away from the heart, on the left side of her body.

Allison glares at her and moves to take her knife back, sparks of irritation trickling down her spine.

"Fuck off, not cool."

Oh god, I knew we shouldn't have given her the knife Oh god oh god.

"Chill, I'm not doing this for shits and giggles," Carissa says with a bit of strain as she tears the knife out of her chest. She grits her teeth. After several seconds, the wound stitches itself together, closing up and not leaving a mark.

Carissa watches the flesh pulse with green light. She sighs with relief. "Ok, we're back on."

"Don't fucking tell me to chill when you stab yourself in the chest with my knife with no warning after having some fucking kind of panic attack." Allison fumes with anger.

I knew we couldn't trust her!

"Give me back my knife."

Carissa wipes the knife off on her suit, and hands Allison back the knife. "Look, I'm sorry. We both needed to know, and a good deep stab is the only way to tell that it's fully back on. Last thing we fucking want is to get in there and it sputters out." She reaches into her suit-top, and pulls out a pipe and a roll of tobbacco. She taps the tobacco into it. Her hands shake, visibly suppressing chattering teeth, signature of a horrible habit and addiction that can’t kill her.

Allison continues to glare at Carissa, sparks of irritation becoming furious flames.

"With all the shit you were giving yesterday about whether we would be fine taking on the Snow Queen, are you going to be fine?"

"Not to be a bitch, but whatever this" Allison gestures vaguely "is, you've got to tell me if that's liable to happen in combat. "

You should give her a second first.

Bullshit, if she's coming with us, we need to know. If she's going to turn tail and run, and leave us on our own, might as well just dump her now.

Carissa snaps her fingers several time over the pipe. A spark of flame lights on the end of her pointer finger, less than a quarter inch from the skin. She takes a deep inhale, focusing on the little trails of smoke.

"I'll be fine. There are exactly three things that would make me not fine in a fight, one of them we might have to face, the other two being impossibilities." She pauses growing quiet again. "Don't tell anyone about that."

"Tell them what? You still haven't actually told me anything." Allison's eye twitches in irritation. "'Oh, I have weaknesses', yeah, no shit! So does everyone else." She rolls her eyes, palming the mirror shard. "You've barely told me what you can do, you haven't told me what this is about, and you haven't actually told me what might be an issue for you! Don't act like you're imparting some kind of big secret. You're really getting on my nerves here."

Carissa snarls, ears pin back, and the tail frizzes out. She snaps. "I'm fucked up ok! Is that what you want to hear? That I'm fucking damaged goods riding around in an immortal body? I can teleport anywhere on the goddamned planet; I'm the best fucking marksman maybe ever because I can cheat physics and fucking reality by teleporting my bullets in mid fucking air! If I really want to, I can bend reality itself to my will with the help of a tiny fucking piece of a goddess who yipyaps in my skull all motherfucking day long." She taps the side of her skull for emphasis, almost punching herself in the temple.

"And none of that fucking matters because I can't even protect the one person in the whole universe who sees past what I can do. I can't fucking protect anyone!" She pounds a fist into the snow, agitation rippling through every inch of her musculature.

The chords of anguish in her voice ripple through Alice, sinking into the momentary memory of being the source of all her own problems. The mirror twists against her fingers, attempting to focus that source away, towards Medea.

"I'm sorry I used your fucking knife to check if one of the last few things of worth about me is actually fucking working right! That's just the necessity to check all the levels of the fucking healing factor this bitch in my skull gave me when she decided to fuse her fucking soul to mine to fix the bullshit Zeus did, and I fucking forgot that it freaks regular people out because they're not walking, talking, fucking bio generators. Happy?!"

Alex takes on an air of mock seriousness, shoving the mirror's attempted manipulations aside and holding up a hand. "You forgot something."

"Yeah, what did I fucking forget?!"

"You have cat ears."

"Fuck you!" Carissa growls, and then totally deflates. "Fuck you."

Alex laughs quietly. She softens with the pursuing of her lips and hooding of her eyes.

"Sorry, sorry, couldn't resist."

Carissa doesn't react to the apology, staring distantly into the fire like a soldier who’s been at war for far too long.

"Thanks for letting me know, genuinely."

"And hey don't worry about it, I'm sure your wife is fine, we'll get her back."

Why would we rescue the person who fucking turned Tilda against us.

Alice looks down a bit timidly "I can relate on a lot of levels, unfortunately."

"To which part, because you definitely didn't get turned into a lion by a bastard god? Pretty sure he fucking bit it a long ass time ago," Carissa scoffs.

Alex strokes her chin and cocks an eyebrow.

"Uhhhhh, let's see. Fucked up, damaged goods, unaging (well, slow aging), backseating in the ol' noggin, daddy issues, freaking people out." With each thing she lists she counts on her fingers. Each acknowledgement cuts deeper into her core despite her grin, even deeper with the twists of the Mirror promising to show her better futures.

Smoke leaks from Carissa's lips, wreathing her like a distant mountain on a foggy morning. "Great, look at us, trauma dumping. Trauma kids."

Alex shrugs and wears a shit eating grin. "You know, it's the usual."

Her face falls moments later, as she looks at the mirror, pressing her fingers into the edges. The itch of addiction burns, asking to be fulfilled.

Alisson glares. "Now, are we done braiding each other's goddamn hair or whatever the fuck? We've got shit to do."

Carissa snorts smoke out of her nostrils. "You're real fucking mercurial."

Carissa groans as she pushes off the log into standing.

"Let’s go before I have second thoughts."

Allison mutters "Too late for that."

"I can hear you asshole," she says over her shoulder, as she waits for BQ to catch up, pointing to her ears.

Allison assembles her gear and starts moving. She glares at a held mirror shard with unfiltered hate. It stares back with whispers of what might be and what could have been. "I'm sure you fucking can."

“Where to oh master of the accursed bloody mirror?” the sarcasm drips from Carissa's lips.

"Mm, I prefer mistress." Aleison smiles. "Due north, of course." Aleison saunters forth looking down occasionally at the mirror, watching as the magic squirms beneath her skin, seeing the best paths forward.

Carissa follows, her bow teleporting into her hand as they walk. “Yeah, no, I'm not calling you that. Put that to bed right now.” Carissa glances at the Black Queen's mirror. "Da'hell is with the Mirror shard anyways? How did you get ahold of that?"

Alex frowns, the vision twisting to show them worlds where they and Tilda are happy.

"You know, I'm not entirely sure. When I first found it, I thought it was just some piece of glass, a normal mirror, you know?"

"But then I started to use it for magic. Maybe it was a curse or fate or whatever— well, no that's not quite right, it was my own mistake however you slice it, but things- didn't end well. I lost someone important to me."

Carissa raises an eyebrow and looks up at the sky for several seconds. "Oh…That explains some things. You're still using the fucking thing?"

"I guess so, yeah. It's a powerful focus, and I can't bear to part with it."

Alex exhales sadly, and continues bitterly, staring at the dancing images swirling across the reflection.

"It's just too damn useful."

"Sounds like you don't actually want it." Carissa's hand settles over the top of the reflective surface, blocking Alex's view. She looks up, a knot forming in her stomach.

Alice shakes her head.

"I don't. But I do need it."

"Piece of advice, all magic, all power comes with a cost. If there's one thing I remember from Medea's lessons, it's that shards of this fucking mirror? They twist your reality. Distort the truth to what it thinks you want to see. Promises fucking futures and places that will never be for you." Carissa grows quiet, before continuing. "We make our own path. Our own fate. This, this costs too much and promises power in exchange for your happiness. It's not worth it." She pauses and takes her hand off the mirror, starting to walk ahead. "It seems like you're already paying the extended costs…I'd consider stopping while you're ahead. That's what Medea would say."

Alice watches as Carissa walks forward, the words burning themselves into her brain. Stacked upon that fateful promise she had made to Tilda and broken.

Promise me. I can't bear to see you like that again. Just promise me you won’t use that mirror again. For my sake and for yours.

She sighs and rubs the shard before wrapping it and placing it in her pocket, speaking under her breath.

"I know what it is."

The next several hours trekking through the boreal forest are traveled in silence. Nary a creature is in sight aside from the occasional deer, they emerge onto a beach of fine white sand, next to a frozen ocean.

In the distance a floating castle of ice gleams with reflected sunlight on the horizon, sharp and terrible upon their eyes.

Alex pulls the shard out, keeping it wrapped in cloth, and squints. "Welp, that looks to be the place!" She points at the castle.

"Hope you don't mind a bit of water!"

Carissa freezes at the treeline. Stone still as she stares straight ahead.

Carissa
Fuck fuck fuck fucking fuck! What the fuck!

"She's in my head. She's gotta be in my fucking head."

Alex tilts her head and arches an eyebrow.

She looks at Carissa, then the ocean, then looks back.

"… You're kidding. You're a cat…. scared of the water…." Alex tries to hold back a laugh. She half chokes instead, coughing lightly. "I, uh, I should probably have seen that coming."

Concern washes across her face like the icy tides.

"Do you need anything?"

Carissa swallows. She grabs one hand with the other to stop them both shaking. "No. no it's just water, right? Just icy, cold, very deep water." She laughs dryly, pain seeping into her voice. "It's just a coincidence, that's all."

"I need to get as far away from a fucking ocean as possible, but since that's not fucking happening— Fuck of all the things in the goddamned world…" She shudders, head to the tip of her tail. "Please tell me, somewhere in your magic, you have a way to fly?"

For a moment she watches as the Black Queen's fingers move to touch the shard. It feels as though the temperature has dropped several degrees.

"I could try to make a portal with-"

"No. We're not using the mirror." Carissa's shifts her voice to firmness. Or well, as close as she can manage while her hands visibly tremble.

Why do I care if she uses it or not? It's not my life.

Because you're starting to grow fond of her. Duh.

Fuck off. I hate that you're right.

"Then, no luck, I'm afraid."

Carissa swallows. She unhooks the binoculars from her belt and walks out onto the beach. "Ok. It's fine, we'll have to improvise."

"Your teleportation trick?"

She puts the optical device up to her eyes before handing them over to Alice. "Do you know how to use one of these?"

Confusion ripples across the crinkles in Alex's lips and eyes. "…Binoculars? Of course."

"I need you to spot the distance and tell me how far based on the numbers."

"Are you going to teleport us blind?!"

"Sort of." Carissa fidgets with the string of her bow. "I don't know the precise range and/or other factors and variables for this pocket space, and that's a problem at this distance. We get the range to the farthest point where I can fire my bow, then I can get us part way there and hopefully that's close enough to get us all the way in two fucking jumps, without becoming a solid centerpiece of the castle walls, or overshooting.

The Black Queen smiles. "Fun! Let's do it!"

“Math is the fun part. The rest, less so on this occasion. You know, the difference between us becoming soaked popsicles and fused to a wall."

Alex looks through the binoculars and starts reading out numbers.

Carissa steps into a narrow profile. She pulls back the string of her bow. Thaumic energy flares around her, a fat green arrow bursting into life against the strings. She aims up into an arc that will go the farthest and fires. The arrow shrieks out into the sky, trailing green fire.

It comes down in the water around a mile away.

The Black Queen looks a bit perplexed. "Targeting?"

"I just need to know how far out that went."

Alex looks through the binoculars again, finding the tracing burn of the fire in the ice flows. "Oh! About 1.61 kilometers."

"Ok, uhhhhh, so there's no tilt or sign of a curved horizon so that makes it difficult to guesstimate how far it is to the castle. If I had to hazard a guess…" She grabs a stick and starts to do math in the sand, branch moving rapidly. "Based on coordinates, and position— if I double the distance assuming, uhm, ok." She takes a deep breath.

Fuck this. Fuck doing this all to hell and back.

"Do you have any idea what we're going to find when we get… in there?"

Alice's expression shifts, lips trembling, eyes darting back and forth. She taps the tips of her fingers together.

"I don't know for sure. But I can make an educated guess, given the hermeneutic. So, um we already know this is the Snow Queen. We… know who that is. Given your wife got abducted, I think it's fair to say she's Kai, and you're Gerda. Fairly sure that makes me the Thief or the uh, Finn Woman. I… guess those fit. Neither usually sticks around this long though? Um, if that's all the case…"

Alice trails off. Her eyes flick briefly to Carissa before looking away.

"Are you, um, how are you doing?"

“Fucking peachy, on top of the world,” Carissa intonates deadpan, chest tight with agitation. “So, in the original story… Kai is mind controlled?” She breathes in slowly and out again to keep her cool. If Medea is mind controlled, very bad.

Alice exhales slowly. "Ok, good, you already know. Yes. Her mirror…" Alice glances at her own shard of the mirror. "It changes people, how they see things, how they feel things…. like you said earlier…" Alice trails off then hastily adds. "There's a cure! Of course there's a cure. And once the shards are out, if they're even in her in the first place? She should be fine."

"They're in her… I saw her face change when…" Carissa trails off, pain twisting in her stomach.

"Just, are you sure you'll be okay to do this? The Queen will use her against you. And with how you reacted when you lost her… I don't. Well, are you sure you'll be okay?"

Carissa bites her lip and chews on it, drawing a bit of blood before it heals on its own. "No, no I'm not sure I'll be okay, but I— we don't have the luxury for me to be okay before going in there. I'm not sending you in there to deal with a beast and Medea on your fucking own. You'd last five seconds before Medea extracted all of the blood out of your body and either drew and quartered you or treated you like a marionette flesh puppet." Carissa presses a hand to her face. "Fucking gods dammit. Why did they send us? Why not Abigail, or Aleah, or even that fucking Demon of a woman Emily." She breathes in deep several times before out again.

Alice stands there awkwardly and quietly, staring with pursed lips and wrinkled brows.

If you need my help Kitten, you know what you have to do.

You're a last resort after what you did with the fucking train in Switzerland.

Owch, almost 60 years and you still haven't let that go?

"Don't look at me like I'm a basket case. I don't need pity," Carissa says sharply. "I need you on your A game if we're to have a shot at this."

Alice's expression shifts to a blend of worry and annoyance.

"I'll be fine. Ok, aside from the mind control…. I don't really know what we'll find. She's cold. And clearly a lot more violent than the tale says. If she's really Skadi, it's all the worse."

"Skadi is…. Darkness, harm, cold, scathing. A hunter, a frost giant, a queen of the underworld. She went to war with the gods and… She's still here."

"She's dangerous and sadistic. I don't know what will be in there for sure, but she'll try to make it hurt. Um, look out for snow bees, I guess? That's the only other thing I know for sure."

Carissa nods, and hesitates, before forcing out "Sorry, I'm trying to keep myself together. The more you worry, the harder it is to compartmentalize."

She takes a deep breath. "Sadistic is definitely on point." She rubs the spot on her chest where the spear went through her torso. "She seems to be targeting me specifically; which means you'll probably have an opportunity."

She tries to banish that icy pit in her gullet, but it’s not working. Just one more thing to deal with.

"Ok… I'm ready when you are."

The Black Queen breathes in "Okay, let's go."

"You're going to need to touch me for this next part, and don't be fucking cute about it."

Alex rolls her eyes dramatically. "Pft, I'm always cute."

She grabs one of Carissa's hands.

Fucking smartass.

What happens next is bizarre, unnerving, and disorienting. Piece by piece in rapid succession, their molecules flay apart, dissolving as they jerk out of time and space. Consciousness floating in a vacuum of multi-colored streaming starlights, and then as if in reverse, every atom piecing itself back together as they blink back into reality. For a fraction of a second, they are operating on cartoon logic, suspended above the freezing ocean.

Don't look down, don't look down, there, the math makes sense I can make it on a second jum—

Without warning, from the icy mist below emerges a great crack. A giant icy maw emerges from the frozen sea, providing a crucial distraction.

Carissa's head jerks down at the noise, and she freezes midair. Every nerve in her body runs cold. Terror burns in her stomach, eyes widening as her tail fluffs all the way out. A single night of terrible memory bursting across her vision all over again.

"Artemis's bow, no," she whimpers in a small voice.

They plummet.

B. Q.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

SHUT THE FUCK UP AND LET ME THINK

Alice's fingers go for the mirror, the reflective ice below—

Carissa's voice rings in her head. "This, this costs too much and promises power in exchange for your happiness. It's not worth it." She flicks her hands away from the pocket and presses them together.

Alex mutters a short prayer under her breath, air streaking around them. Dark abyss of icy water rushes rapidly towards her.

"Chaos and order are mere illusions, reality is the original Rorschach, there is no Goddess but Goddess and She is My Goddess…"

Imaginations and images of avoiding death on giant sheets of ice swirl in her mind at the strokes of oil paints. Acrylics swathe across the tapestry, depicting safe, deep water for her destination.

She won't fall and die, nope. She doesn't have to worry about it, not at all. She's not looking. Not looking not looking… Not because she's scared this won't work. She knows she's the Sacred Chao and that she has nothing to worry about and she laughs in the face of this false danger.

Normally prayer would do jack shit in this sort of situation but here and now, well.

Alex twists her body into a triple reverse somersault, diving straight into a safe and clear portion of the ocean.

And so that's exactly what happens, and what a wonderful splash she makes.

Breaching the icy ocean like a whale, Alex climbs out of the water and bows theatrically to nobody in particular.

When she has finished her performance, she shifts into movement, head swiveling to look for the sourpuss.

Thick mist spouts from the ocean around Alex, obscuring all vision. In fact, it’s so thick that Alex briefly considers if she can cut it with a knife and eat it. Something in the menacing, yet curiously culinarily viable fog roars. A head whips out at her.

fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuckkkk biiiiig monster

Sinking into instinct, she grabs a Greek Fire grenade from her pack and throws it in the direction of the head.

Cmon Alice, what is this thing?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

The grenade bursts in a bright scintillating flash that momentarily clears the fog, a rain of screeching fire pouring down against the icy monster. It shrieks and writhes before dissolving into steam. But as the saying goes, cut off the hydras head and two more take its place, so here and now more zip from the fog. Maws filled with razor sharp teeth snap at Alex's heels. She barely rolls out of the way, low friction of the ice enabling an ungraceful skid out of range.

Goddamnit, okay, uh, ocean monster, multiple heads. Hydra? No that doesn't make sense. Fuckfuckfuck Alice get it together!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Shit fine okay.

Two pistols pop out of their holsters, twirl, and aim. Would have made Jessie James proud. She's too late to catch the two heads that assaulted her, they've already vanished back into the mist. With nothing clear to shoot at, she fires blindly, as if that will do anything but tell them exactly where she is. Rat-tat-tat-tat cuts through the chaotic auditory maelstrom flurrying around her.

"Pspspsps, Carissa, where are you?! Got a monster to slay here!"

Gnashing teeth from a head snaking out of the mist forces Allison to stumble away.

Fuck this.

Dropping a pistol, Allison snatches a syringe from an easily reached compartment of her pack. Straight into the thigh it goes. Demon-narcotics pulse in her arteries and veins, lines of orange heat rippling across her body. She screams in rage, having elected to embrace the power of a raging sun.

Rolls, picks up the pistol, reloads, aims, and fires. Crimson hellfire flares in her eyes, muzzles glowing, bullets like superheated plasma tearing through the air.

"Fuck you fuck you fuck you fuck you!"

They rip out of the smoke at her like a fucked-up game of whack-a-mole. Single bullets shatter icy maws into columns of dissipating steam. In defiance of her stream of plasma, and in pure animalistic stupidity, they keep coming into her fiery buzzsaw. The onslaught is endless; for every one that she hits, two more come whipping out of the mist. Snap, bite at dancing heels in a jig that would make the muses fucking proud.

"What the FUCK. Stay dead you bitch," she roars, demon-narcotics fueling her rampant anger.

Over the roars, distant, terrified yells and screams reach her. Fog burns with a ferocious dance of phosphorescent green lights. 180-degree spin to intercept the next wave.

"And you, shut up!" she screams in that direction, already turning to sprint that way.

We should probably head over there.

Fuck you, she claims she can take care of herself. If she can't that's her problem.

BUT WE CAN'T!

Wouldn't you like to see her fight, darling?

"God, fine."

Allison legs it towards the yells. She spins out of the way of a head that snaps out of the thick mist. Smashes the butt of a superheated pistol into it, shattering the abomination into a thousand fragmenting mirrors. Shoots another. Cusses the whole way.

The fog is thick, and sound is behaving strangely. Each scream comes from a different point in space. Every step, every shot more heads seem to appear, snapping, biting, roaring. Spiked teeth threaten to snag, tear, rip her apart with one misstep, one missed shot.

Screams become increasingly more incoherent. Then they aren't screams at all, but sobs. Will-o-wisp like green lights flickering and bursting all around Allison.

Fuck this.

Allison screams like a banshee, impulse shoved to the forefront. Veins and arteries bulge across her body, glowing phosphorescent orange as the ice beneath her feet begins to melt. She leaps, trailing fire behind her in a fantastic light display. Hands rising in the air as she arcs to clasp into a fist. She brings the fist down, body with it.

CRACK.

BOOM.

Fire races outwards in an explosion of light and sound. The fog rips apart beneath this assault, multiple inbound monstrous heads shattering beneath the maelstrom of her literal and metaphorical consumption by demonic rage.

Kneeling on the ice, breathing hard and fast, she fights to recover before the waves can continue. She’s of course ignoring the fact that she, for a very brief moment, decided to steal a sun-god’s power.

With a clear field of vision, she finds her hapless companion. Carissa leaps between snapping heads in a fucked-up dance like they’re springs in a retro platformer. Arrows, swords, spears, and thick flaming thaumic projectiles tear from the bow clutched tightly in her fingers. She's fighting for her life, eyes large, wild, and panicked.

Stunned by the pure display of athleticism, Allison can only watch as the huntress lashes out with furious claws, rending through icy flesh again and again to very little effect.

Allison yells, "WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS THING?!"

Carissa
"Scylla!" Carissa screeches. Gods why the fuck! Fucking fucking fuck! It doesn't stop. IT DOESN'T FUCKING STOP.

Air surges and pulses around her as she blinks. She reappears meters away getting a picturesque view of five heads slamming into each other where she had been seconds before. A scything hailstorm rains from her bow like burning confetti, leaving nothing but evaporating fragments behind. In other circumstances where the thing of her nightmares wasn’t trying to tear her apart, the constant twang and hum of the string would be sweet music to her ears. But not now.

She gets a little too content in that moment of reprieve and is slammed from the side, tumbling back onto the ice. Of course, there is no time to recover as she's flung again by another roaring head.

"SHIT! How the fuck do we kill it?!"

Kill it!? KILL IT!? She's fucking insane!

"You don't kill Scylla; you fight to survive and you fucking run!" Carissa picks herself up off the ice. Pants hard, limps, jogs, and then bursts into a dead sprint like a bat out of hell.

Flaming swords streak from her bow. Hop, land, roll all to avoid a single head that whips by overhead. Springs up again like a rabbit who's been fed far too many amphetamines. It's trivial to slice its belly and cut it into pieces with an outstretched burning blade. The next jump is less trivial, smashing the heel of her boot into the snout of an oncoming head to piledrive it into the ice. Jump, land, twirl like a ballerina on the snout of yet another. The weight and downward momentum drive the desperate firing of multiple barrages leaving yet another cloud of drifting steam.

But fucking hells is it not enough.

The head hits her like a hurricane, shattering ribs as she's smashed aside, a direct hit to the stomach and chest that sends her flying and skidding along the ice. Only her scrabbling claws biting into the ice cold sheet stop her tumbling into the frigid water. To make matters worse, here come multiple cat-hungry heads as she struggles to recover.

"Fuckin pussy."

Deus ex machinas be damned, nothing compares to the fireballs that whip and roar through the air, tearing apart enough of the heads for her to dodge the rest and buy some gods-damned breathing room.

"Can't you teleport us out then?!"

"Teleport?" Carissa asks, momentarily distracted. Like an idiot, she eats a head to the chest for her troubles. Deservedly, something cracks in her ribcage with a cry of pain. She tumbles, skids even, to an indignant and ungraceful landing next to Allison.

"Motherfucker!" she yells at the clouds as if her bastard father could hear her.

Oh, good Elysium, Kitten.

Yes, she can teleport." Carissa's voice shifts to that same layered, altered tone that spoke through her the previous night.

"Don't do that! Fucking not right now!" Carissa snarls, shaking off some unseen effect. Verdant flames leap with an arrow from the bow, shearing straight through a line of approaching heads.

Then try to get ahold of yourself for long enough to get all of us out of here please.

Allison moves between Carissa and Scylla, eyes flaming, smoke pouring off her like a steam engine that's about to blow. Rippling infernos tear from the palms of her hand. A stream of heat turns ice into steam before the heads can get close.

"Do. It. Then," she says through gritted teeth.

No hesitation now, Carissa grabs Allison's free hand none-too-gently. That same feeling of disorienting disintegration takes hold, floating through the void.

Then they're on top of the walls of the castle. Releasing Allison's hand, Carissa collapses to the floor, gasping down breath. She wraps herself with her own arms. Kneeling, rocking back and forth, shivering.

Dammit! Dammit why that of all fucking things. "Fuck that. Fuck that all to fucking hell. Damns this fucking Beast." Tears worm down her face, hot shame burnt in red flush across her cheeks. The icy daggers of terror twist in her pitting stomach.

The Black Queen retches, and what looks very much like magma comes out. She reaches around for her bag, fumbling in an attempt to pull something from it.

Carissa's ears swivel and flick. She holds out a hand curling and uncurling her fingers in the universal "give it to me" symbol.

Aleison clumsily passes over the bag. With what body motions she can manage, she vaguely gestures to a kit that contains needles, a plunger and a vial of white crystalline liquid. The vial glows faintly.

With a single, almost concerningly practiced motion, Carissa liberates the syringe, needle, and liquid from the container. The jab finds the vein on the first go, with surprising gentleness.

Aleison shudders and coughs. Her eyes clear and white light sputters in them for several long moments before they return to normal.

Carissa watches her retch for another few seconds before she fully recovers. Of course, the first thing this vain, self-absorbed creature does is fix her fucking hair.

"Thank you darling, the come down from demonarcotics can be rather dreadful, as I'm certain you can attest."

"Dangerous as hell," Carissa says, breaths fast and shallow.

"Needs must I'm afraid. Well, I do hate to waste the angelic emissions, but they ought to stabilize ourself for the moment. Not bad for the skin either"

She holds her head, rubbing one temple.

"The akivic backlash shan't be pretty tomorrow, however."

"If you're not careful with that shit, you'll trigger a pre-mature fucking ascension." Carissa shudders. "Fuck this bitch. Fuck her for this."

"Mm yes, best not to become a goddess before one's time." Aleison waves the comment off with a lazy hand.

Sparkling brimstone wafts from Aleison's lungs with a series of racking coughs. After a moment, she appears to remember her manners and covers her mouth.

"Terribly sorry, darling, most uncouth of me."

Aleison crosses her legs and raises her head up, shutting her eyes. Breathing in and out.

Carissa shivers violently. C'mon, get it together. She's just trying to get in your head. She's just trying to get in your fucking head.

"Fucking frozen ass, popsicle ass, bitch ass Queen."

With a flourishing of several fingers, reality swirls in Aleison's palm, and a black flame curls to life. "Indeed. Perhaps we should rest a moment and recuperate?"

"If you need to," Carissa says, voice shaking. "All I want to do right now is rip that Ice Giant's skull from her spine and beat her to death with it. Motherfucking, sadistic, frost-bitten-ass, raven-starving, graverobbing, CARRION EATER." She punches the floor, the ice fragmenting beneath the force of her blow.

"FUCK," Carissa yells, trembling. "5000 years. Five fucking thousand years, you'd think I would be over what he did to me."

Aleison listens dispassionately, using breathing exercises to refind her center. "Carissa, dear, perhaps you should take a moment to centre yourself? Best not allow Skadi to goad you at this stage."

"Too late for that," she says with a pained laugh. "She's pulling out all the bullshit to get to me, and it's working."

"Oh? You have history with Scylla then?"

"History!" Carissa snort-laugh-sobs. "Understatement of the century. Ambushed in the middle of the night, chained up and a rock tied around my legs, before I was tossed overboard to the world's garbage disposal. All the while that motherfucker was feeding the love of my life a love potion."

"Mm, this is in some ways your own personal nightmare then? I can see why you'd be rather flummoxed." Aleison's neutral expression softens.

"Yeah, she's personally targeting me." Carissa pushes herself up off the ground, standing shakily. "And she has one more fucking card to play. Probably the worst one."

"I'm well aware. She may well be targeting myself as well, albeit more… subtly."

Carissa looks at her a moment. "The mirror."

Aleison nods.

"I’d… thought myself above its influence. But I clearly underestimated its power."

"Some part of me still hasn't let go of what happened, I guess."

Carissa looks her over. "Yeah, well, are you going to be, okay? Can't have you being corrupted by the damn thing mid-battle."

"I- I think so? I don't know."

Carissa gives her a look that is firm but tender.

"You can."

They sit in silence for some time as they recuperate.

With growing impatience, Carissa begins pacing and sending furtive glances at the palace entrance, shivering.

"I suppose waiting further will only serve to make you more anxious?"

"Nail on the shitty damn head. There's also, oh I don't know, the fact that I don't know how we're going to solve the ice puzzle. Detail #3 that I remember from Medea's briefing."

"Ah yes, the puzzle. You know, a few interpretations exist, of the ending of the fairy tale." Aleison gestures languidly, almost with Shakespearean theatrics. "Myself, I take it as a symbol, mayhaps a metaphor, for love."

“I think you have far too much faith in a fairytale. You ready?”

"Love is the law, love under will," she recites. "I suppose so, though I do believe we'll have one other obstacle, before the throne room."

Carissa raises an eyebrow, muscles tensing. “What sort of bullshit now?”

"Snow bees, I'm afraid. This is their hive, after a fashion, and Skadi their queen."

Great. Just Great. “Right well, what do we need to do?” Carissa growls.

"Mm, there are a few options…. I suppose you'd be opposed to using tantric magic?"

“What?” Carissa looks at Aleison like she’s just vomited nonsense all over the kitchen floor.

"Are you unfamiliar with tantric magic? I imagined that someone married for…. Thousands of years, was it? Would experiment a little, surely." BQ raises an eyebrow.

“A mage I am fucking not. In English please. Or Greek. Or whatever.” Her patience is starting to wear thin, tail twitching with the tip down, foot tapping.

"Sex magick, to put it mundanely."

Carissa's lips hover slightly parted, staring at BQ with knitted brows. “How would… what!?”

Aleison exhales exasperated. "If I have to explain sex to a thousands year old being, I swear to Lucifer…"

“Fuck off, who the hell do you think you are? I've had more sex tha—" She stops, realization clicking across her face. "— wait, you motherfucker. You did this to get me talking about the subject.”

A finger presses into Aleison’s chest accusatorily.

Aleison grins. "Perhaps." She raises an eyebrow and gestures at herself dramatically. "Interested?"

“Take a fucking hike. What’s the other option?”

Aleison rolls her eyes and exhales.

"Your loss. Would have been an amusing diversion. The other option is…. far less dignified. One moment."

"Really, less dignified than fucking someone I barely know, while walking across the courtyard to avoid buzzing snow bees?"

Agitation burns as tiny electric sparks in Carissa's chest. Aleison ignores her. She stands still a moment and her disposition changes from mild annoyance to exuberance, shifts the bag around on her shoulder, and begins digging inside of it. Seconds later, she extracts a card and a fast-food bag.

She holds out the card to Carissa with a shit eating grin. Carissa looks at the card, narrowing her eyes. She looks at BQ, then looks at the card again.

POEE_Pope_Card.svg

"Congrats, you're a pope of Discordianism now!" Alex reaches into the paper bag and takes out two bunless hotdogs.

Carissa scowls. "Fucking Eris."

"Damn Right!"

Carissa's head tilts up from the card and spies the hot dogs. "And what the hell are those for?!"

Alex shrugs "It's Friday."

Carissa stares at Alex, the shit eating grin on the latter's face oozing 'totally self explanatory.' When this continues for several seconds more, she sighs.

"A Discordian is Required during their early Illumination to Go Off Alone & Partake Joyously of a Hot Dog on a Friday. So if snow flies at you funny… Do that."

Carissa pinches the bridge of her nose and snatches the hotdog from Alex. "Fucking unbelievable. Is it even Friday?"

"Yes, and I try my best."

"Maybe you shouldn't try at all."

"Well, what fun would that be?"

Carissa sighs. "I suppose this is better than the fucking mirror magic."

They move around the walls until they find stairs down into the courtyard below. The entrance of the palace looms tall and terrible. Great sculpted ice doors, lovingly tinged with color and stained translucence that projects image and wealth in a way that really shouldn't be possible with something made of pure ice. Snowflakes buzz before them hovering in mid-air.

"Welp, them's the snow bees."

"Let’s just fucking get it over with," Carissa sighs, shoulders sagging in abject defeat. "The faster we get there, the less… time I have to mald."

The Black Queen guzzles her hot dog as she walks through the snow into the throne room.

Carissa does the same, taking her irritation out on the doors by shoving them in.

Medea

The throne room is the coldest and most beautiful in the palace. It's the freezing heart of the realm, much like the Snow Queen herself. Everything, from the intricately carved columns to the flocculent rug. Even the coolly glowing chandelier - all of it is made entirely of glimmering ice and snow. Open windows look out onto the entirety of the pristine landscape from above, cool winds whipping through them, bringing snowflakes which dance around the room.

Bordering the room are grotesque ice sculptures depicting all manner of beings, giants, elves1, humans, dwarves, garbed in dress from a myriad of periods, weapons extended, a look of fear in their eyes all aimed towards the far end, at the room's apogee. The throne.

The throne itself rests atop a small set of stairs. It is a simple chair with a back and two armrests designed for the comfort of its occupant, the true splendor of the room, Skadi.

At first, you might mistake her for a statue due to her chiseled perfection, her alabaster skin and hair of fairest white. Her unmoving gaze and posture, draped in white furs and a delicate ice crown, one hand cradling her cheek. But then, you may catch a small movement, a blink of her crystal eyes, the slight heaving of her breast. If you're incredibly blessed, you may even see a slight smile or hear a small exhale.

If you're cursed, you may instead see her throw her spear Jǫkull, never far from reach, faster than the mortal eye can see.

Medea basks in the intoxicating cold of her queen, her goddess, Skaði. Seated at her feet, she creates wondrous illusions with driving motions of her body. She looks up at the Queen on her throne with the hope of receiving a smidgen of praise, a hint of a smile.

Her eyes lazily regard the only other being in the room. A woman at her feet, Medea. A sorceress, winter coat and combat gear hanging distantly near the throne. Her attire has been replaced with a short, backless dress at Skadi's desire. Sylvan ears, brown hair, and fascinatingly complex thaumic tattoos of lilac coloration writhing and shifting across her flesh.

Medea, trying again and again in vain to find the trick, the perfect display of her love for Skadi. The affection she craves burns a deep flame in the pit of her belly, desperate for the slightest smile or touch. She's desperate to skate with her love on the Mirror of Reason that the throne room sits atop. Medea thinks of nothing else, for there is nothing else to think of. The icy pillars and crystalline chandelier mean nothing to her, not even the monuments erected to Skadi's glory, frozen statues of her own glorious visage, can hope to compare to the cold radiance of the real thing.

Medea is performing minor miracles, a small being of light dancing in her hands, Skadi's hunts occasionally looking up expectantly at Skadi, gazing longingly at her face.

All of this is reproduced in full detail on the frozen river that runs through the room as its floor, the infamous Mirror of Reason.

"My love, what may I do to please you?" Medea coos at her huntress.

The queen exhales an icy breath. "Precious little it would seem." The queen picks at her fingernails. "Your parlor tricks begin to bore me already."

The words sting, piercing Medea through as if Jǫkull had been thrown. Fear and desperate desire dance in the light of her eyes reflected in the icy surfaces. She banishes the parlor trick and stands slowly, spinning in small concentric circles. Her fingers languidly carve through the air. Glyphs take shape and form from lines of light that burn off her fingertips. Caught in this ancient swirling dance, she completes the symbol; light and magic flare in a circle that burns into the ice at her feet. A construct, a ferocious cat of considerable size, bursts through the ice, pronouncing its entry into the world. There it stands next to its summoner, proud and searing with magical fire that blankets the area with wreaths of steam.

Skadi rolls her eyes. She sighs, and shifts on the throne. "A cat, of course you'd make a cat." She raises her right palm, fingers outstretched, and snowflakes descend upon it in a spiral, forming a large icicle. It’s tossed moments later with all the lackadaisical energy of a bored Carnivale attendee, all the while a sardonic smile rests upon her face.

The construct takes the icicle head on, clearly not meant for combat but for show. A tight pang of euphoric delight blossoms in Medea's chest, having accomplished her goal of amusing her love. But something is off. A twinge of dissonant distress swims in and spoils that nascent joy. The gravely injured construct spawns a just out of reach image.

"Hm, passingly amusing."

"I thought… you liked Cats?" Medea struggles with the words.

Skadi's lips purse down, eyes hooding with wrinkled yet perfect lines of sadness. "No, my dear, I much prefer dogs." With a simple, and yet incredibly dramatic motion, a great white wolf bursts into existence from a nearby snowdrift. She runs a hand through its fur, gazing at it affectionately. “Good hunting companions. Loyal. Obedient. They never leave you."

She looks at Medea again, gaze cold and harsh. "You'd never leave me, would you, pet?"

"Never my love," Medea coos. No sooner have the words left her lips than a small sharp pain arcs through her right temple. Fingers press to the ache on instinct. She tries not to let her queen see the moment of strange, painful weakness. In further betrayal, a single tear flows down the contours of her cheek. She wipes it a way with a smooth motion.

"Good. Yes. Of course, why would you?" Skadi stares off into nothingness as she continues petting her wolf. "I'm the most beautiful, the most powerful, the most gracious god queen in the nine realms. The greatest hunter ever, certainly better than that Greek hussy." Her eyes snap back to Medea. "More glyphs. Those are… adequate distraction. You might happen upon some amusement and unencumber me from this ennui."

Desperate to please her icy queen, the glyphs rise along her fingers and mind once more. As she's beginning to call the threads, her ears prickle.

The doors to the throne room open with an agonizing groan.

The Snow Queen's bored gaze shifts. Medea's eyes follow as two intruders enter. The first is a simple mortal clad in black. Her eyes dart across the room like a prey animal, skulking slightly back to the rear as if hiding behind her companion, utterly dull and uninteresting compared to Medea’s queen. The other— The image burns in her skull, a sudden sharp war of mind as her whole world begins to swim and spin with the far too warm ontokinetic probe that greets her.

Olive tan skin, hair the color and saturation of deeply oxygenated blood. Large, fur-tufted feline ears, a thick sinewy tail. Yellow, cat-slit eyes. They're hard as steel until their gaze meets, softening with—

Pain ripples behind one eye, but Medea can’t pull her gaze away.

The familiar stranger’s thin lips tremble. Fear burns behind the irises, worry etched into the creasing lines. Even as she stands there, gazes locked together, she trembles.

Medea's right hand grasps her left, stopping her own from trembling.

Fire burns in Medea’s chest, head throbbing with agony. This is a mind splitting affliction to behold, as if someone has driven an icicle right through her eye and straight into her brain.

Turn away. look away.

She pivots her gaze and the pain recedes. Skadi sits before Medea, a sudden cool comfort. A smiles, a pat on Medea’s head for her loyalty. She wants this, that's the attention and affection she wants. But—

The pit growing in her stomach deepens, where should be warmth now is hollow uncertainty.

What's wrong with me?

"Hello again, Artemis. Found yourself another pet I see?" the name storms through her skull with a slow aching throb.

It explodes upon looking back to the interlopers.

The figure that makes Medea's head scream in syncopating torment, snarls. "I'm no-ones fucking pet."

The icy relief of her queen once more washes away the agony.

Something is so very wrong! The thoughts tighten around her ribcage like a vice. "My Queen, you know these intruders?"

Skadi speaks with sharpened ice knives in her voice, "Petty thieves come to plunder my pristine kingdom. Unimportant. A mortal pawn of Eris, and a fellow huntress's soul riding some beast." She stares at the leonine interloper with disgust. "I thought I put you out of your misery already today, Artemis."

"It takes more than a fucking icicle to put me down, ice bitch," the leonine figure hisses. Her words spike another sharp burst of pain behind Medea's eyes.

"How dare you talk to my Queen like that." Needles against her skull as infernos of rage rise in her chest.

Parts of her shriek, screaming incoherently behind the searing ache that looking raises in her skull. Magic flows through shifting arms and legs, ancient dance taking hold of her. Sluggish, slothful limbs and fingers deny the immediate propagation of light into air like a two-headed snake that can’t agree on the next direction. It takes the fullness of her focus to keep the spell in her mind. The glyphs flow viscously. It’s like she's an apprentice again.

WAKE UP. DON'T DO IT!

My own body resists me… Why?

Skadi throws a harsh look at Medea. It burrows into her skull, adding to the aches.

"Defend your queen's honor."

"Yes, my love!" It takes far more energy than it should for the glyphs to twist off the fingertips into the air. Twisting knuckles drive pulsing magic and lights through dress and skin. Fire lances out of the rippling symbols, straight across the chamber towards the interlopers reflected in a thousand icy surfaces.

In mid evasive dive, a shining bow of fiercesome magic ripples into existence between the-one-who-hurt’s fingers. Medea’s caught in a moment of admiration, despite the hostility burning in her mind, a strange flush washing her cheeks.

The mortal woman lingers in the back, as if attempting to fade into shadows and the chaos of the moment. Multi-part magic warps in the air around her, jerking Medea’s attention. Parts of it are targeted in her direction, binding and stories, odd but she needs to deal with it.

"Can't you see Artemis? She is mine. Loyally mine. Eternally mine. I can protect her, can you say the same?" Skadi holds her hands wide, somehow both invested in the moment, and yet still incredibly bored.

"Fuck you! She'd never love a sadistic, cold monster like you." A spike of riveting pain worms behind Medea's skull. "You're not protecting her, you're caging her!"

A countering glyph rapidly spinning from her maddening dance.

It's only the— ugh. We need to figure out a way to deal with that one to protect our love.

WAKE UP.

“Don’t just stand there, move!” The feline huntress appears where she should not have been. The lightning rockets through the air like a bullet. It slams into her, provoking a powerful yelping.

NO! White, blinding pain snarls through Medea’s skull, gasping for air as she staggers.

She doesn’t see it, she feels it, the binding curse smashing into her. It worms across her skin like dark chains trying to drag her to the floor. She thrashes against it. Vision clearing, something else surges across the gap towards her mistress. A summoned minion, huge and angelic, lower body of a snake, upper half of an elven woman, many arms wielding thick, enchanted swords.

"NO!" Medea screams.

Reality swirls around her in a lilac haze in the shape of a coiling serpent. Her dress oozes something thick and dark. Into a fragmenting sheet of stainglass panes the binding spell snaps and shatters. Bolts of acrid green fire scream from the purple spirals towards The Black Queen. In the same breath, her scream becomes a roar of effort through the dance; thick purple bubble of astral fire smashing into the sword of the summons.

The mortal witch dives out of the way, losing some of her components in the process.

Small victories.

"Shit. Didn't work. Didn't even seem to weaken the connection…"

"Medea!" the-voice-that-hurts cries, nearly faltering the blood rights and shield rising at her fingertips.

Medea screams, the very tip of the blade eating into the palm of her hand, only pushed back seconds later by the force of her magic.

Through the reflective surfaces she watches her love, her Queen closely watching the fight with a faint smile, eyes an icy blue. The gaze is refreshing cold against her mind.

We can’t let her down!

"She must be reinforcing it somehow! Ball's in your court, Carissa! I'm gonna say hello to Queen Bitch."

Reality swirls with a vibrant hue, hot fire racing along the shoots of ice in her skull, burning like a strobing spotlight she can’t escape. The name. It hurts her so damn much. Why does it hurt?!

Four black, pulsing, chittering orbs slip from the pack on the Witch's back and into her hand.

Medea's eyes widen. Another spell worms off her fingertips, piercing the summoned creature holding half her attention through fifteen times with spiked purple chains.

Freed from the blades falling limply to the floor, she slides down to her knees all that kinetic momentum from the dance abruptly unleashed. Hops, stands, palms out, arms lifting. Blood congeals into the air and starts to swirl around her in the shape of a hissing cobra. The minion crumples to dust moments later, exsanguinated.

B.Q.

Oh fuck. Alex grits her teeth, holding the grenades and pulling the pins. "You didn’t mention she was a blood witch!"

“She's not a witch!” Carissa yells, diving out of the way of a snapping strand of blood string.

“What?!”

“That's Daeva blood magic!”

Alex flings the grenades, only processing the words seconds later. “Are you seriously arguing semantics now?!”

Alex grits her teeth harder.

"Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. Allison, look out!"

A wall of ice smashes the blackfire grenades out of the air, summoned through a twirling purple glyph at Medea’s dancing feet. Crackles of lightning zig zag and snap through the atmosphere, a whip of searing superheated electrostatic plasma.

"Carissa, do something!"

Alex claps her hands together, golden fire whirring around her body in prayer. Lightning curves and arcs around her form.

Zzzzhiiip. An arrow tears past Medea's head.

“I’m trying!”

Medea staggers, visibly struggling to hold the dance.

Well, she is trying.

Yeah, A for fucking effort right there.

Allison retreats and hunkers down behind an ice pillar, peering out to meet Medea's reeling gaze. Alex pants, akivic backlash throbbing through her skull.

“Shit.” Rage roars behind the lilac eyes. Several more arrow shafts hiss by their opponent’s head, but she’s unphased. Medea’s feet glide across the ice, drawing the lavender in waves, an oscillating orbit mimicking the dance of stellar bodies. A hand arcs smoothly up. A glyph breaches off her fingers in a swirl of purple miasma. Metal ripples across the gap towards Alex’s pillar. It curves around and attempts to impale her in a dozen agonizing ways.

Or it would have if she wasn’t already rolling out of the way to another pillar.

I have to hand it to her, I see why Tilda was so interested now.

Medea half twirls preparing for the next incantation. Allison’s gaze darts towards Carissa, expecting her to get hit any second, but Medea is incredibly sluggish. The spell dies on her fingertips, but Carissa is still just standing there, bow raised and shaking.

"Carissa, what the fuck are you doing?" Allison yells from behind the pillar. ”Are you blind, she’s giving you openings for days!”

"I'm shooting her, what the fuck do you w—GAH."

Medea gasps and stamps a foot. Sharpened stacks of earth race across the gap of the throne room in a sharp wave of rock and nearly takes Carissa's head off. She tumbles backwards, Medea’s frustrated squeak echoing off the sharp walls.

Alex grits her teeth, mentally scrolling through rituals to try to find one she can get off in time without getting skewered. As if emphasizing the lack of space to operate, Medea screams and chunks of rock are hurtling her way. Scrambling, Allison barely manages to get out, taking a pebble to the hip for her troubles.

"You're holding back! Can't get a fucking ritual off with your wife on my ass!" The itching burn of the mirror calls to her, laughs at her, but she shuts it down.

Medea swirls, desperation burning across her face, trying to force an arm up to get a spell off at Carissa.

"I— I don't know what to do!" Carissa yells, another arrow slurring by Medea's cheek.

"How about you try not fucking missing?"

Then, the blood begins to move. Medea swirls, dress and skin a kaleidoscope of purple, black, brown, and maroon.

“Oh shit.”

Hardened blood lances outwards in serpent shaped tendrils towards Carissa. She dives, leaps, rolls. It’s not enough. Three tendrils lance her through the shoulder, the stomach, and the chest, just shy of the heart in sequential blows. Carissa gasps, air knocked out of her lungs, spitting blood, before she’s slammed against the wall, and then smashed into the floor.

“Shit. Carissa!”

“I don’t know how to reach her!” Carissa vomits blood onto the floor, as the tendrils retreat.

Alex’s attention flits away from Carissa to Medea, as she stumbles. She gasps for air. Hands pressing to her skull, screaming. Skadi looks on, gleeful smirk knitting into moderate boredom.

"Are you fucking stupid? You're her fucking wife, you know her better than anyone, even if she is under some shitty mind control! Fucking, use the power of love or some shit. She's clearly holding back, or you'd be dead on your ass."

The Snow Queen's eyes narrow. "How crude. She's mine now, you should just accept that you weren't enough for her."

Medea stumbles, one arm grasping at her throat, the other trying to pull it away. "I-I love only my queen."

Allison scowls as the words punch across the room, visibly lancing through Carissa where she’s pushing herself up into a kneel.

The Snow Queen smiles, sitting back. "Yes, yes my pet. Now do kindly rid us of these interlopers hm? I'm growing bored."

Carissa

Carissa bites her lip, kneeling in the debris as the lancing wounds from Medea's blood magic heal. The reprieve doesn’t last long. Like a vengeful spirit, a typhoon strength burst of air smashes into the pillar she was behind moments before, forced to scrabble like a dog in the mud on all fours.

You could try talking to her.

This is Medea.

I see cracks in the facade of control, but true. Well, I do have another suggestion, but you'll have to get close.

An arc of serpentine blood and lightning wails after Alex. She dodges the lightning and then Allison wheels about, hands extended to counter Medea's blood control. Carissa's stares in moderate disbelief as it actually works, and in the process visibly confuses Medea. Allison gives her a thumbs up when it doesn't run her straight through.

It’s now or never.

Allison is forced to dive aside as Medea's skill and talent finally overwhelm the witch. Blood smashes the floor, where she was moments before to pieces.

"Oh what the fuck. Carissa, do you need me to shoot her or something? Because at this point, I'm willing to." Allison's head pokes around the column in Carissa's peripherals.

Carissa walks forward slowly at first as her muscles recover. She tosses aside her bow. It'll come back when she needs it.

Walking becomes a jog.

A translucent green barrier materializes around the witch as she tracks the huntress.

Then a sprint, rushing towards Medea to close the gap.

In the initial moments of Carissa's run, Medea is distracted.

It doesn’t last.

Her full, furious attention darts to Carissa and their eyes meet. Screaming, blood trickling from her nostrils, Medea skids back in a 3-step slide to create distance between them.

Two pulses of pure lightning and a thick eviscerating stream of angelic blood whip across the room and lance Carissa through. It beats the air from her lungs and yanks her up into the sky with a yelp. Flings her like a dismissive arm on a backwards trajectory. Carissa clenches her teeth; eyes focusing in and she vanishes from the lancing blows. She rematerializes a few steps forward of where she was flung back.

“I know you’re still in there.” She says aloud.

It takes everything she has to stay upright and not keel over.

“I know you can hear me!”

Alice scrambles behind her barrier. Medea screams at Carissa.

I can't give up. They're both counting on me.

Clutching one arm as the bones knit back together, gaping holes in her suit and skin closing with slurps of surging flesh. Carissa walks forward lit by green fire and swirling blood like a fucked up matte painting.

She has to still be in there.

Alice grabs components out of her bag willy-nilly.

Medea screams, struggling to raise one arm. The other comes around to clasp the wrist, trying to force it up, trying to fire the spell off at Carissa as she stumbles ever closer.

She's fighting it. Fight it harder love, please.

Alice extracts a book, a quill, and an inkwell.

The scream dies in Medea's throat as Carissa steps inside her guard. Her huntress takes the hand and lowers it. Blood trickles down from the corner of Carissa's mouth as she gasps for breath, staring into Medea's eyes.

The purple striations swim with disorientation. Medea's face twists between expressions of clenched agony, wrinkled lines of confusion, wide-eyed fear, and the trembling lips of dismay. Carissa wraps an arm around her sorceress, pressing forehead to forehead.

Tears leak from the corners of Medea's eyes.

"I—I'm sorry," Medea croaks out.

Something sharp, warm, alien, and semi-solid spikes through Carissa's belly. Radiating waves of agony crawl through her. A cavity made where one shouldn't be. She bites down a scream, tears flowing down her cheeks.

"Allison, now!" Blood flecks on Carissa's lips. She gasps for air, staring down at the column of blood and ice lancing through her belly. "Should—" she coughs blood. "have seen, that one coming."

Alice holds up her shattered mirror, stepping out where she is visible while still behind the barrier. This is the reason for her journey. Shaking slightly, she sets it down and mumbles under breath.

Medea shakes in Carissa's arms, head trying to snap toward the threat to Skadi. She's stopped by her lover's free hand. Carissa gently takes Medea's face between claw-like fingers; caressing her sorceress’s cheeks.

As the Black Queen mumbles, the items begin to glow and float together, pages and ink orbiting the mirror. She writes on the back of the mirror with a quill, which has become bright white and icy. Alice winces and shivers but continues to mutter.

Carissa presses in and kisses her wife. She gently falls with Medea to the floor. Her fingers slide the bracelet chain around her wife's wrist. Carissa's band bursts to life with bright red light, pressing to the purple of Medea's own gleaming band.

Warmth moves across Medea's cold body as they embrace, Carissa laying atop her. Her heart beats faster, her eyes water. Then, glass shards begin to fall from her eyes and exit her chest. Medea groans in pain, then screams, as the shards rapidly begin to flow across the room toward Alice's shard.

Carissa breaks the kiss, tears in her eyes. She holds Medea's face, desperately scanning for signs of her wife.

Medea's eyes clear, returning unto themselves. Her face ripples with grief, eyes widening in distress.

"Carissa, I'm so—" Medea starts to speak, tears pouring from her eyes. But Carissa presses a finger to her sorceress's lips.

"Don't apologize, it wasn't you. It wasn't your fault." The ice shaft impaling her vanishes as the healing factor takes over. "I've got you." She pulls Medea up into a tight hug. "I've got you."

Medea wraps her, trembling, and sobbing softly. Carissa shivers and silently lets soft tears flow down her face.

The Snow Queen's expression darkens. With a crack like thunder she rises from her throne. She looks to Medea, her plaything, who has now betrayed her like the rest. She looks to the woman embracing her. Her old enemy huntress, ruining things for her yet again.

Ice swirls in a storm about the palm of her hand, dancing along her fingers. Magic preparing for an execution.

But she stops.

Something tugs at the threads of her mind and body, a slight sense of déjà vu, as if her fate was following a slight groove. Eyes widening in horror, her head snaps towards the mortal.

Alice's eyes are still glowing. She's writing upon the mirror as the Snow Queen turns towards her and races forward. Alice begins to panic, going into fight or flight, feeling the need to escape far away from here. But she can't leave Carissa like this….

"Carissa!" she yells in fear, hoping she can protect her from the Snow Queen's wrath.

"Carissa," Medea intonates. Time seems to slow down. Carissa looks, feeling the pulse of Medea’s temporal magic rippling along the floor in ancient lavender script. Even Skadi is unable to escape her hemotemporal grip.

"I hear her, can you stand?"

"I can do more than that." Medea's eyes burn with lilac fire.

Carissa pushes herself up off the ground, untangling from her wife. One hand snaps out as the bow whips through space and time back into her fingers.

"Now listen here you pale icy bitch." An arrow burns in thaumic brilliance spawning against the string of her drawn back bow.

Time bursts, winding forwards again.

Carissa fires, reality whumping with a sudden burst of ontokinetic fever. A wall of green fire bursts across the Ice Queen’s path. Skadi is forced to a halt. Cold rage squirming across her lips.

Medea rises from the floor. Gone is the manic puppet of Skadi's affect, replaced now with a phantom of terror. Dark robes ripple and drip down her body, a mace comes free of their folds, acrid smoke belching from the censer on its spiked head.

"We are going to smear your blue blood across every wall while your palace melts," Medea growls in a low tone, and starts to spin the mace's chain. A harrowing howl arises from the holes in the metal. Thaumic constructs begin rising and pulling themselves out of the smoke.

Skadi turns towards the hated rival and her lost pet, then back to Alice. As if in answer to her indecision, a multi-part layer of hardened blood-iron ripples around BQ in a thick shield.

"Blood witch," Skadi hisses, features twitching into cold amusement. "It has been a few hundred years since I've been properly challenged. Between the huntress and the witch… this could be interesting."

“I’m no witch,” Medea hisses, rising mists from the floor cleared by a burst of lavender light.

“No, you’re right, you’re a puppet. Never a thing to be loved, only used.”

“Only to a cruel and lonely thing like you who could never understand love.”

The palace begins to disintegrate into snow particles which swirl around the Snow Queen. Dancing flakes form into a bow, a quiver, and arrows of ice, as well as a spear and skis. The four find themselves on the smooth surface of the frozen ocean, the ice perfectly reflecting all their forms, but uglier, distorted. A funhouse mirror of nightmares.

The Black Queen’s reflection appears suddenly shattered, fragments fighting tooth and nail, the world around them darkening, Tilda looking away in disappointment. Medea's reflection appears, holding that horrible Jason in her arms. Crimson feminine shade hovers behind her, arms outstretch with puppet strings embedded in the Sorceress's back. She laughs at the underwater reflection of Carissa, feral, uselessly fighting against the waves.

The Snow Queen's reflection, however, appears identical to her actual appearance, languidly arming herself with her spear as snow falls all around her.

Is It my time to shine? A voice rings through the castle. Are you actually going to openly worship me to thwart a Beast. How delightful.

Carissa takes Medea's hand; Medea holds it in turn. The mace continues to howl over their heads, ignoring the fears of their reflections.

"Apart we were weak," Medea says to the Beast, as she unravels and reshapes her pocket-dimension. "But you knew that. It is why you separated us and put on this pantomime."

Artemis solidifies just behind the two of them, her crown of antlers, and leathers, green hair and pink eyes all physically manifest. Skadi stops her slow forward advance, eyes widening.

"But together we're unstoppable. The two of us and the Goddess we worship," Carissa says, squeezing Medea's hand. The point of contact between the two brimming with growing light.

"And two finer worshippers I could not have," Artemis's voice booms in the air. "But I'm just a supporting role in this lovely show. They are the stars now, my old frenemy Skadi. You chose the wrong grounds to hunt in." Gone is the playful mischief, here is the expression of severe judgement and ire of the goddess of old. Her hand comes to rest on Carissa and Medea's clasped embrace.

"Apart we succumbed to our fears. This may be your plane, but it's our story. Our narrative. We decide where these threads end, and it ends with our love winning," Carissa and Medea say together, in unison. In a moment of shining brilliance, they bring their ontokinetic sculpting to bear.

Sensing the bearing weight of Alex's sorcery on the Mirror, Skadi roars, and tosses the spear at Carissa, arrows lancing from her bow at Medea in quick succession. The air grows heavy with buzzing snow.

The spear ripples through the air and slams into a barrier of stinking purple thaumic discharge, constructs blocking the arrows path as they dissolve back into smoke. Medea's constructs charge Skadi. She bats them aside, tearing them apart like pieces of paper.

"Now is the time to enact your will!" Carissa yells to Alice.

"For there will be no better artifice!" Medea adds.

“Remember my words and use it well!”

The buzzing of the snow grows louder and louder, as more snowflakes swarm to their queen, kicking up a blizzard, the cold stinging all present.

"For I am the aspect of nature, the tithes of a gleaming forest upon a cliffside," Artemis intones, as she whips up the ontokinetic sculpting flowing from Medea and Carissa, a full silver moon burning into the air behind her. "I am the silver moon in the night’s sky, I am the prancing buck in the deep flows of summer, the flowering figs in spring’s grasp."

Carissa's bow flicks out of her hand, and into Artemis' above them. She draws the string back languidly, all of reality at her whim. The silvery moon behind her ripples, and streams downwards, a massive silver shaft glistening and burning against the string.

Artemis yawns and makes a flicking noise with her finger. "You know the line, something something guide me true." The arrow whips off the string with a roar, as a blazing pillar of moon light rips into Skadi's blizzard. It rockets right through her skull, right in the eye, knocking her from her skis into a flailing slide as the world tumbles.

Alice screams and covers her ears as the mirror gleams with brilliant light, her task complete.

Skadi bolts upright, screaming, and jerks towards Alice as she intonates the final motions of her spell.

The barrier of blood iron unwinds, and surges forward in a wave sweeping the Snow Queen up. It wraps around her, raises her, smashes her into the ground. Just enough time for Alex to finish. At the final hour as the bell tolls, Skadi breaks free. Alice turns the mirror towards the ice giant, icy claws inches from ripping her to shreds.

Skadi stops and stares at her reflection.

The mirror now reflects her, not as a beautiful goddess. No, she is an ugly troll, features giant and snow burned, covered in scars, missing teeth, hair sparse and brittle.

Skadi falls to her knees and rips her eyes away from the mirror staring at the ground.

But the same image is reflected back at her through her mirror of reason.

She screams in impotent rage as ice rises from the ground to surround her, reflecting her from all sides so that she cannot turn away from the ugly truth.

Alice keels over, and reality whirls inwards, everything turning black.

B. Q.

The Black Queen returns to consciousness in a dim series of waves and is greeted by sound of a softly rolling tide washing against sandy shores. The room she is in is relatively dark, the lights off, and curtains drawn, but she can see little bits of light filtering in at the base of the curtains, indicating it's daytime. It's not clear how long she has been out, but she was out. There are blankets very gently layered over the top of her, and it is mildly chilly.

There's the low drum of voices somewhere else in the building she's in. Not terribly far away.

Exhausted, Alice blearily gets on her feet. A mistake, as the nausea curls in her belly, almost knocking her back down onto the bed.

Ugh, thaumic backlash after the adrenaline wears off.

She quietly creeps out of the room to investigate the voices.

The door to her room creaks as she opens it, taking her out into a small hallway. There are several other doors here. Now that the light is leaking in, she can see the interior of the room behind her. A double-sized bed, paintings hung on the wall, bookshelves arranged in a pleasing pattern. Slightly to her right and ahead is another bedroom, this one stacked with personal items and knicknacks, tall bookcases with intricate volumes on magic, myth, cryptids, and other things in-between.

The light of the hallway catches on a pair of eyes in that room on one of the shelves. Wide and feline. But the voices aren't coming from in there, it's further down the hall.

The window on her right peers out towards a treeline, beyond which there is another structure among the trees. Low and possibly a bit wider than the building she's currently in.

She passes the second bedroom, keeping an eye on the cat’s eyes as she does so. She continues toward the voices down the hallway.

A thump comes from behind her, and a small fuzzy shape trots past.

To her immediate front she finds a sitting room, currently empty. There's a fireplace, a decent bit of space, and some stairs that lead up into a loft-like area with a study, and, you guessed it, even more books. An ancient-looking computer, and a sleek more modern one sit arranged on an expansive desk. The conversation is coming from ahead, and to her left, where multiple voices start to resolve.

"Well, we're going to have to come up with some sort of explanation as to why we're coming back empty handed." Carissa's voice.

"We tell them the truth. The mirror destroyed itself when Skadi looked into it." Medea's now.

Allison steps into the room with a slight grimace. Like the other areas of the house, the Kitchen is well lived in. Spacious with lots of counter space, an island, a smattering of high and low cabinets, a deep double-sink, a surprisingly modern fridge, and a rare 8-burner stove. Someone likes to cook a lot.

"And who are 'they?'"

She immediately meets Carissa's gaze, who is already looking towards the door with her ears pivoted. Medea, on the other hand, is not. She's at the counter, back to Allison in what could be approximated to be pajamas. The smell of a warm meal on the stove carries through the room. Something meat, spicy and undoubtedly Greek.

"Welcome back to the world of the living," Carissa grunts, not quite answering BQ's question. "Head on straight?"

"Um, yeah, I think so. I guess I kind of overdid it with the catoptromancy, huh?"

"Heh, catoptromancy"

Alice cringes.

"Sorry. Um, thank you for… helping me."

She looks around slightly concerned.

"Where, uh, where are we?"

Her gaze draws to Medea, who sets the stovetop to simmer. A rapid flutter of fingers starts a timer on the microwave above. She turns to face Alice. In the heat of the fight, it was really impossible to tell, but this close, and now with their full attention on her, the cold and cunning analysis of Medea's eyes hone in, boring holes straight through Alice's skull.

"You are in Carissa and I's home."

"We don't bring strays home often, especially not these days." Carissa eyes Alice again carefully.

"Oh. It’s nice! Cozy. Definitely better than that ice palace."

They both shiver at the mention, exchanging a small glance.

"We do owe you our gratitude," Medea says after a moment. "Carissa could not have pulled this off alone, loathe as she is to admit it."

"Aww, it was nothing, she's not as much of a sourpuss as she seems." Alex grins pointedly at Carissa.

Carissa narrows her gaze and side-eyes Alex, before grumbling.

Medea snorts. "She is soft at heart, once you prove yourself to her." The microwave timer beeps, and she turns back to the stove.

Carissa rubs her face as Medea begins to fork out grilled chicken and vegetables onto plates.

"Are you hungry?"

"Are we going to tell her?" Carissa asks her wife.

Allison crosses her arms. "Tell me what? The they you were mentioning before, or is there something else now?"

"Sorry darlings, woke up on the wrong side of the bed I suppose." Aleison smiles at Carissa. "And yes please, thank you for your hospitality, I would love some food."

"And some answers," Allison grumbles under her breath.

Medea brings over the plates. "Carissa is alluding to the fact that we are technically Jailors."

Allison stares at them for several long moments, guts twisting together into knots. She backs away slowly, sliding into a defensive stance.

"You're fucking Jailors?!" Her eyes dart around to study the area in case it becomes a battlefield.

"Is this a fucking trap? I am not going back into containment."

"Don't get your crown in a twist, we're not handing shit over to the Foundation." Carissa takes the plate from Medea, and her face screws up. "Foundation. Found- Dammit this fucking cognitohazard."

Medea shakes her head at her wife and then turns back to speak to Allison.

"If we wanted to turn you over, we would have. No one but us knows you are here."

Allison's eyes widen in panic, as she starts speaking in rapid-fire bursts. "You're fucking traitors, you work for the fucking Jailors, can't fucking trust you, studying me, bringing me here, my weapons, I can't-"

Allison inadvertently backs herself into a corner, looking like a wild animal ready to lash out.

"Don't fuck with me, or I'll fucking destroy you- I I I'll-"

The Black Queen slides down the wall and bring her knees in close, breathing shakily and sobbing slightly.

They both watch Allison. Lines on their faces wrinkle with concern, lips pursing. Their gazes meet in small gestures with hands and flickers of expression.

"Hey uh… look, we just said we're not turning you over to anyone. If you want to go, the door is right there. You're free to leave anytime you want," Carissa says carefully. "I know that might be hard to believe, but we wouldn't be offering you food and have put you up to recover in our guest room if we wanted to hand you over. We're not idiots, and we're not all in on the containing shit." Her face screws up. "Oh, fucking come on, I can't even say contain? GAH."

"You are not bound here. Your bag is there by the door." Medea nods to Allison's pack.

The Black Queen looks up with a stony face, seemingly completely calm, and stands.

"Indeed, that is logical. Apologies, the personal situation with the Foundation is somewhat traumatic. Feeling, albeit illogically, like one is trapped by one's greatest fear, can certainly cause one to be overly emotional. It shan't happen again."

They both blink at her. They look at each other and share a few indecipherable facial expressions and then look back at her. "Yeah. We get it," Carissa says.

"I'm certain you do, I've seen you grapple with such things firsthand."

Medea sits wordlessly at the table, takes Carissa's hand, and squeezes.

“Yeah,” Carissa says, closing her eyes.

The Black Queen sits down at the table, and stares at the plate of food for a moment as if it might lash out and sting her as some anomalous serpent. Carefully she picks up a fork, spears peas and chicken through, and takes a bite.

No dose of poison comes, only the seasoned taste of Mediterranean cuisine. The spicy kick is unsurprising but good. For the next few minutes they sit in silence, quietly eating. Carissa and Medea let Allison adjust to the new information.

“You’re welcome to stick around for a few days, but I wouldn’t be here more than that. They know better than to send anyone out here, but we do get occasional runners and summons.” Carissa breaks the silence.

“If you are looking for a place to crash longer term, we have some friends in Ibiza who would likely be happy to give you shelter."

“Friend is a strong term.” Carissa huffs out air. “Though I’m sure you’d get a fucking kick out of them.”

Alex grins. "Ha, if that's your reaction to them, maybe I will!"

“Sumerians. Strange bastards the lot of them,” Carissa huffs.

"But the mirror is gone, huh?"

“We were ejected from the pocket dimension with you, so I assume it consumed itself and Skadi,” Medea says with a nod.

"Oh. That's…. too bad."

"Consider it a fucking blessing after all the trouble it caused you." Carissa's gaze bore into Alex, watching her reaction with that patented scrutiny she's gotten used to.

"It's not-that's… I just wanted to fix it," Alice says limply "All that… for nothing," the words are embittered as they roll off her tongue.

"Except it was not for nothing," Medea says, after a long drink of wine. "You have gained in the place of loss."

"What, defeating the Snow Queen? I don't like fighting, and anyway you two did most of the work. I just wanted to sneak in and sneak out."

With a mouthful of food Carissa says, "No you idiot, don't be dense." The words, though insulting, are far less harsh and venomous than they might have been in the previous days. One could almost call them affectionate.

Alice stares at the plate for a long moment, puzzling over the response before she returns to eating. "Um, the food is really good?"

Medea sets her fork down, chews and swallows politely, before dabbing the napkin at her lips.

"No, Carissa, you're going to have to spell it out for her."

Alice bunches her lips up, crinkling her forehead as she looks between the two. She cringes since she's clearly not getting…. something.

Carissa swallows. "Idiot, you gained us."

Alice's eyes widen a bit with a slight look of fear and her face goes red. Then Alex is grinning widely and giggling slightly.

"Ha! I knew you liked me, catgirl. How could you not, with my roguish good looks and witty banter."

Carissa, mid bite, half chokes on the food. She coughs while she attempts to glare. "Not like that."

"Have you ever had a friend Allison? A real friend, besides Tilda?" Medea asks sincerely.

"Of course! I'm exceedingly popular, can't you tell from my throng of adoring fans?"

"Are you talking about that weird little crown thing? How does that fucking work by the way, always wondered about that." Carissa squints at something unseen.

Medea just presses a hand to her face and sighs.

Alex tilts her head. "Crown?"

Carissa wrinkles her brow and purses her lips.

"I don't think she can see it, Carissa, leave it alone."

Alex looks up a bit. "Uh, is that something to be concerned about?"

"It's a conceptual thing. It's fine," Carissa says, in the least reassuring manner possible.

Medea sighs and adds, "But yes, you may have lost the mirror, but you have gained us within your sphere."

"Which is arguably a huge improvement."

"Ha! Pft, think highly of ourselves, do we?" Aleison considers a moment. "Mmm, I suppose it is useful to know goddesses… I suppose that's a decent trade-off for such an artefact."

Allison frowns harshly. "But you are still Jailors. Don't think I've forgotten."

"We didn't exactly become Foundation willingly." Carissa begins to bare teeth, ears pinning back, turning just a tiny bit red.

Medea puts a hand on her wife's shoulder before she has an outburst. "Keep that to yourself if you would. It is not common knowledge." A pause. "The goddesses bit. Tilda gave us very little choice in the matter."

"Tilda. I should have known, that traitor."

"Less traitor more… grand design. Stopping an apocalypse apparently. Really, we should have seen it coming."

Medea blows air out her nostrils. "Apocalypses. Everyone is trying to stop an apocalypse."

"In any case, she told us fuck all about what she was doing before it was sprung on us in classic Tilda fashion. At gunpoint by a Foundation MTF."

"I- just, stop I don't want to hear any more about them."

They both wince.

“Sorry.”

“Touchy subject, right.”

"Yeah, no shit."

They sit in silence for a few more minutes, eating.

"Anyway…" Carissa restarts, somewhat awkwardly. "You're welcome to stay here for a few days, rest, recharge, whatever. After that, you'll probably want to head out in case we get a runner coming by."

"If you need another place to crash, we have friends who are not Foundation you could crash with," Medea offers.

"She'll crash alright. Artemis's bow, are we really going to recommend them?"

A grin spreads cheek to cheek across Alex's face. "The more you say that the more I want to visit them!"

Alice says a bit more quietly. "I might take you up on staying here a night, if that's ok. The sea here is beautiful."

"Sunrise is always gorgeous." Medea smiles softly at Alice.

"Feel free to go out there and sit whenever you want."

"Thanks, I think I will." Alice picks up her empty plate from the table, taking it and setting it in the sink. She maneuvers to the kitchen door as Medea and Carissa finish the meal, and rise to set about their day. Alice is greeted by the warm rays of the rising sun just coming up over the horizon.

For the first time in a long time, she doesn't feel quite so alone.

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