veryroundbirdfics | Discworld | Unbalanced (Reply)

Rating: Mild
Words: 2942
Characters: Lily Weatherwax, Original Characters
Relationships: Gen
Summary: Lily Weatherwax finds herself freed from her mirror prison and flung somewhere strange upon the event of her sister's death--and finding herself wrapped in the coils of a story, considers for the first time maybe having to do things a little differently.
Notes: References the King of the Snakes and also The White Snake, which are Chinese folk tales.

The thing about mirror magic is that it must always be balanced.

She didn’t know how long she wandered, lost between life and death, in her own self-made world; all she knew is that it had started with the gentle tinkle of breaking glass.

And that’s how it ended, too. It could have been eternity or a moment, her endless reflections turning in sequence toward something Lily couldn’t quite see, their smiling faces turning to concern and winking out one after the next until the world was near-dark.

What was the one about the glass coffin, again? Lily thought, but one single shining pane remained.

The face reflected wasn’t smiling.

No—

It wasn’t hers. More worn, more weathered. Angrier. Not wearing white, but midnight; asleep, or…

She didn’t think—she moved, reaching forward. Through the mirror, to her sister-reflection, almost on instinct—

“Esmeralda—”

Esmé couldn’t do this to her. She couldn’t. She couldn’t, not yet.

The mirror shattered against her outstretched hands, and Lily stumbled forward—toward her sister, her mirror, her greatest enemy, the good one, who, perhaps… had, in the end, been very cruel after all.

Mirrors require balance, and now Lily was finally and irreparably alone. But instead of landing near her sister’s still (and, somehow, smug face), her hands hit cool, damp grass.

And then she realized she was bleeding^[1], and promptly fainted.

[1] This is a common side-effect of reaching both hands through a mirror, as her sister before her discovered.

Death didn’t come. Lily wasn’t sure if she was disappointed, when she opened her eyes to daylight, a gentle pressure on both her arms.

“My, my,” said a voice. “Ssssssssso she awakenssssssss. Dear girl, don’t you know that you shouldn’t play with mirrorssssss?”

She blinked once, then twice; something white wrapped her arms, which ached dully, but it wasn’t gauze—rather something cool and textured. Scaly.

Slowly, the coils relaxed, leaving her arms free, albeit stiff, and—mottled with white scales.

Lily’s immediate impulse was the magic the scales away. After all, she hadn’t gotten where she was in life by just wishing or accepting, and it wouldn’t do to have her skin so blemished.

A curious thing happened: absolutely nothing.

It took Lily a few moments to remember that she didn’t have the mirrors anymore. She’d have to start from scratch—

“I think perhapssssss, you do not understand,” said the voice again, and this time, Lily’s chin jerked up to follow it, even as she had a sinking feeling of premonition—

The white snake stared back at her, and she realized that she was resting against it, too—coils so enormous they could hold her upright.

She felt strange. Like a spell had been cast on her. What was this feeling—

Oh right. Bugger all, she hated powerlessness. And furthermore—no, she knew this one, didn’t she?^[2] But rather—

“Lady Serpent,” she said, as sweetly as her strained voice would let her. “Should I offer you my loyalty?”

Because, when one is in the jaws of a story, it’s easiest to go with the flow until you can escape, if you’ve been assigned a bit part. Lucky that she was the kind to be able to recognize it at all; lucky that she should see the way to turn it to her advantage.

But the serpent shook her great head, tongue flicking out lazily. “No, no. Jusssst… a simple favor should do. After all… I should hope that thisssss… is no story I know. And I know many.”

Oh, she’d met the Lords and Ladies, at least once a time. She knew where she had to be very careful, lest she lose. Agree to nothing to the extent that she could, and be unfailingly polite.

“Milady,” she said, with a simper, because an ingénue is the safest thing to be in a story, “what would you ask of me?”

The great serpent somehow managed to click her tongue in an oddly humanlike way. “My fool of a brother,” she said, “has taken a mortal wife, and the wife has a sister. There will only be trouble.”

Ah. That was always trouble for one of the parties at least. “Is his wife perhaps very beautiful?” Lily asked.^[3]

“Oh, the fairest—particularly when compared to her sister,” said the serpent. “Have you heard this one, girl?”

“Oh, my,” said Lily, feigning innocence. “I can’t say I know either of these women, as I’m a traveler and a stranger to these parts.”

“No, no, no,” said the serpent, and threw her head back like an exaggerated eyeroll. “The story, the story. You stink of them. I can ssssssmell it on you. You,” she said with a hiss, “are trouble. But I will ussssssse you.”

Lily frowned—delicately, nobly. “By what right?” she asked, and then—

—winced, as silver pain lanced up her arms. “By right of payment,” said the serpent. “One way or another—kill the story, and live your life. Or don’t; I will find a way, regardless.”

For a moment, Lily weighed it in her mind. Some things were always meant to be in balance. Good and evil. Mirrors. Pairs of sisters. What was one sister, alone?

But instead she just stood, as smoothly as she was able, and curtsied with the shreds of her white dress. “Then I will make it so,” said Lily Weatherwax, and became a fairy godmother again.

[2] It would have been surprising if she hadn’t; after all, in her lifetime, Lily Weatherwax had pushed an uncomfortable number of people into stories. Most people think that being part of a story is a lovely, exciting thing; those people are only thinking about protagonists.

[3] Admittedly, this wasn’t going to narrow it much down; after all, there are very few stories about a prince marrying the plainest or ugliest sister. There were a few, however, about marrying the cleverest sister, and if she was going to have to deal with annoying riddles, she wanted to be prepared.

Primula was an eldest daughter, and as eldest daughters are in stories, she was far from beautiful. If she’d never had a sister, she might have stood a chance.

Maybe, she thought, she ought to have stayed home with her father. It was just—it felt strange to be here. Someone like her certainly didn’t belong here.

After all, she’d thought for certain that her younger sister would be devoured by the serpent prince who’d demanded one of their hands in marriage. She knew she was a coward. She couldn’t afford to be brave, with her own circumstances—no, those kinds of things were best left to heroines. She was just—ordinary.

And now that she looked at this place—she felt even less like she should be here. It was downright palatial, with jewels inlaid in the intricate metalwork, not for the likes of farmer’s daughters. Even her sister… even if her sister had sent her father home draped in fineries out of joy, was she really fine here?

As she stood there, though, before the gates, there was a whisper in the back of her head. You could have had all this. Does your sister deserve this? All this should have been yours. You could make yourself a heroine. The sound of a quiet turning page, an unfurling scroll.

Primula shook her head. Now wasn’t the time for fancies—probably. Instead, she rang the bell by the door, and waited, and tried to shake off the feeling that she was being watched.

Bugger all wasn’t a phrase that Lily Weatherwax used,^[4] but it was a very different thing to see a story wrap itself around someone when it wasn’t her doing.

There was a knack to seeing it. From some other fairy godmothers—before she got tired of their nattering—the seeing was a little different to everyone. For those who’d never learned their letters, it was more of a hearing.

For Lily, it was always the quiet sound of her father’s voice, by candlelight—the only thing from those years so long ago that she could still summon up properly. Even Esmé’s face was just replaced with a vague mirror of her own.

...of course it had to be sisters. Of course it was always bloody sisters.

Stories loved a mirror; they loved a light and dark. It was what had made her so powerful in Genua, after all.

She knew how this one went. The ugly one, jealous, murders her sister; the beautiful sister escapes death and finds her way back to her new husband, and her jealous, hideous sister is executed, with nothing even to show for her crime.

Then again—

This girl was really better described as plain, thought Lily, and she looked more worried than hateful. Sloppy casting, honestly. Amateur effort.

...she supposed her sister would have taken this apart for justice. Esmeralda, with her spite and loathing and her conviction that people should be left to their own simple-minded will.

Lily couldn’t be her. Couldn’t, and wouldn’t. She’d take care of this, all right; after all, it was a matter of professional pride.

[4] Swearing didn’t suit a fairy godmother, after all; one’s image was part of the story that others believed about you. Lilith de Tempscire was refined, graceful, and elegant, and absolutely didn’t get into situations that required cursing. Until recently, anyway.

Primula hadn’t meant to lose herself in the garden.

The guards' eyes on her had been too much; she didn’t really like to be looked at. It made her nervous, and something about their gaze and the way they abruptly looked away made her feel…

...ugly. Primula didn’t even think about her appearance much, but maybe it was just how odd this whole day was. She took a seat on the edge of a slightly overgrown stone well among the high, beautiful flowers, and tried not to feel like they were crowding in around her.

And then she thought: were I the wife of a prince, and draped in riches, others wouldn’t look upon me so—

She thought she heard a rustle in the greenery behind her, and turned—but there was nothing. Just the deep darkness of the well… that her eyes lingered on. Anything could disappear down there.

Something white flashed by, in the corner of her eye; she whipped her head around on instinct and very narrowly avoided being the next thing to disappear.

And then there was, suddenly, a woman seated across from her, perched on the stone. Grey-haired in a stately sort of way, clad in white, legs crossed at the ankle. Beautiful, for her age.

“You could have left off the ‘for her age,’ you know,” said the woman, in a melodic voice. “But I suppose there’s no un-narrating it.”

She reached out, and before Primula could scoot back, took hold of her chin. “You’re an elder sister.”

“Y-yes? What’s this about—” Primula could feel her voice pitching upwards scratchily. “Who—who are you?”

She fixed Primula with a too-perfect smile. “Dear, you can call me your Fairy Godmother. I’m here to help you. After all, you must have many worries and cares. But I’m here, now. All your worries are at an end.”

This was probably the kind of thing Esmé would do, Lily figured; try and get inside their head and get the story out. She was always so boring.

But without her mirrors, Lily’s magic wasn’t nearly what it had been, so. Improvisation.

Honestly, she had a thought that one way to kill the story would be to simply push this sister down the well. It’d be easy enough.

But stories liked endings, and that was hardly a happily ever after, when someone simply fell to their death halfway through without having done anything.^[5]

“Um,” the girl said, looking down at her knees. “Are you sure you’re not here for my younger sister? She lives here, you know.”

“No, no. I’m here for you,” said Lily, brightly. “After all, if you’re to meet your princess sister, you should be able to meet her looking your best.” After all, if it was a matter of insecurity, she could correct that easily. Simple as pie. “Wouldn’t you like that?”

“I’m not—” The sorry girl shook her head, dark braids flying back and forth. “Maybe I should just leave. I don’t… belong here at all.”

Lily frowned. That wasn’t how a girl learned confidence, and—well, honestly, maybe this lass would have been better off as a mouse. (Maybe there was still time to fix that, if she could reassemble her magic focuses.) At this rate, the story would have even more ways to get its hooks into her.

“Nonsense,” said Lily, standing, with all the confidence of someone who’d made the world give her what she wanted since she could form her own desires. “Don’t you want something a little better than being afraid of your own shadow? Now if you want a happy ending, you’ll listen to me—”

Sisters were always opposites. In balance. You couldn’t hold your own like that, she thought. She’d find one way or another to get this one to accept that—

“Prim!” called a voice, and something slammed into Lily from behind, tipping her over into the well.

[5] That was just a non-sequitur, as they said in Genua.

“Oh,” said Calanthe, looking balefully down the well from under the jeweled headdress that jingled atop her brow. “Did I just… kill someone?”

Prim sidled over next to her. “...well,” she said. “You can’t really tell, I guess. I didn’t hear her land.”

“You just looked really scared!” said Calanthe, throwing her arms around Primula’s shoulders. “You’re all right? Please say you’re all right!”

“I—think so,” said Prim, and realized her hands were shaking a little. “I had no idea what was going on—who was that, Callie? She was going on about how I needed to be dressed up to meet you and if I wanted a happy ending I’d listen to her, and you know I’m a coward—”

“No idea, if you don’t know,” said Callie, frowning. “I guess I’ll ask my husband to have more guards on duty, but you know I’d never mind you showing up comfortable. I’m just glad you got here all right—I was starting to think you might not come, even though I sent you a letter with father. You’re no coward—you were brave enough to get here, after all.”

“Of course I’d come!” said Prim, resting her chin on her little sister’s shoulder, that strange episode starting to fade into the back of her head. It had all felt so unreal. But of course nothing would have changed between her and Callie. Of course they’d always be who they were, together.

As they walked off, arm in arm, to go meet Callie’s husband, there came, very quietly from the bottom of the well:

“Bugger all.”

Then again, thought Lily Weatherwax, picking herself out of the muck and looking dolefully up at the rope and bucket, at least it had somehow worked.

Maybe her sister knew a thing or two after all.

“So,” said Lily, stopping at the mouth of the cave and projecting the complete confidence of someone who always meant to do everything she did, despite being covered in several layers of mud and grimy leaves. “Thus, our bargain is complete, is it not?”

For a moment, she thought she’d gotten the wrong cave, or something.^[6] But then there was the quiet whisper of scales across stone. “Thissssss is acceptable,” said the serpent. “I thought you sssssseemed dependable.”

Lily didn’t say that she didn’t need the approval of a serpent who lived in a cave while her brother lived in a magnificent palace, because she knew the rules. Instead, she said, “I’m happy to repay your generosity, your eminence.”

The serpent flicked her tongue out, in a way that seemed less like a natural movement and more like a rude gesture. “Pleasssssse,” she said. “Do not lie to me, girl. You are no ingénue, no sssssweet heroine. You are like me.”

“A snake?” murmured Lily.^[7]

“A witch, and an outcasssssst,” said the serpent. “Are you ready to let your ssssssstory end, girl?”

Lily thought about it. She thought about her sister’s still face, and broken mirrors, and years spent wandering between life and death—and of two sisters who could have hated each other but didn’t.

“No,” she said. “Not yet.”

“Good,” said the serpent. “Then, girl—we have work to do.”

“What’s this we?” She couldn’t quite keep the petulance out of her voice.

“Did being a witch alone work out for you ssssssso well?” said the serpent, with what felt like a smile. “Perhapsssss you could even learn a thing or two.”

“Isn’t it the callow youth who might have a thing to teach her elder?” said Lily, but stepped inside. Though she wouldn’t admit it, maybe she did have a thing or two still to learn—about being a good witch; about who she was without everything that had made her.

“We shall ssssssee,” said the serpent.

“I suppose we shall,” said Lily, and surprised herself by looking forward to it.

[6] She wasn’t an expert in whatever caves wherever this was had and she wasn’t eager to become one.

[7] Admittedly, Lily Weatherwax had always been fond of snakes. Stories didn’t like them, of course, but she’d always felt a sort of kinship.
However, the kinship she was feeling right now was less of sisterly fondness and more like she was under the eye of an opinionated auntie.

Discworld | Unbalanced

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