Wanda listens, because Istredd has proven himself someone she can trust, someone wise whom she could rely upon. He knows magic, even if the energies of that which strives in both their worlds are different; there has to be a common ground amidst all this.

Stop fighting, however, goes against every instinct she's ever heard in order to survive. If she stops fighting now, won't she be swallowed by the immensity of it all? Her burst of indecision and fear is felt palpably between their connection, though she knows she needs to find a way to remove her own will from that of her magic.

To stop fighting herself. To stop letting the chaos disrupt the seams between her human soul and the threads that make the Harbinger of Chaos whole—a gap she's been afraid to cross, ever since she saw the fear in the eyes of her boys, sane enough to bring down Wundagore Castle upon her to end it all.

The mirrors break and refract some more, Wanda's own subconscious fear feeding into this. She shakes her head minutely, as if particularly aware of what will happen if she lets her magic grow strong in her.

I can't.

And the world, unfortunately, stirs again. In chaos and corruption, a blast of some kind, smoke and debris and the sudden cold of a winter night where silence reigns, the ringing from the blast catching onto Istredd's hearing.

Until—