Chapter 10 #2
Through my network of reflections, I began searching for the palace, finding it in the polished armor of guards, in the windows of noble estates, in the fountain at the center of the courtyard.
The building looked peaceful from the outside, but I could sense something else beneath the surface, a disturbance in the mirror-space, like ripples from a large predator moving through deep water.
The Crimson One was already there, I realized with dawning horror.
Not fully manifest, not yet, but his influence spreading through the covered mirrors like poison through a bloodstream.
He'd been preparing for this, probably for years, waiting for a Mirror Queen to emerge so he could finally have access to the kind of power he needed for whatever nightmare he was planning.
"I need to get word to her." My hands curled into fists, constellation eyes blazing brighter as I poured more power into maintaining the connection across realms. "She needs to know the palace is compromised before she goes there."
"Will she even listen?" Syra asked, not unkindly. "She barely remembers you. Fourteen years of suppressions, of being told that magic is dangerous, that mirrors are forbidden. You're still mostly a stranger to her, however much you might wish otherwise."
The truth of that landed like a blade between my ribs.
She'd recognized me in the garden, in the dreams, but recognition wasn't the same as remembering.
She didn't recall the promises we'd made as children, didn't fully understand the bond we shared, couldn't remember the thousands of small moments that had made me love her so completely that the word love itself felt inadequate to describe it.
But I could help her remember. The awakening had thinned the barriers enough that I could reach her more directly now, send her images through reflections, speak to her through any surface that could hold my form.
It would cost me, every manifestation burned through essence I couldn't easily replace, but what else was I saving it for if not this?
The garden had found its new equilibrium around me, transformed but stable, more beautiful and more dangerous than it had ever been.
The crystal roses now bloomed in colors that didn't exist in either realm, their petals showing glimpses of the space between worlds where we might finally be able to meet as equals.
The paths had settled into patterns that pulsed in rhythm with Aurea's heartbeat, matching the tempo I could feel through our bond.
Everything here responded to her now, I realized.
The garden I'd maintained alone for so long had remembered that it had always been meant to be ours, had always been supposed to be tended by both of us together.
Her awakening had restored that truth, whether I was ready for the implications or not.
Through the mirror showing her most clearly, I watched Aurea reach the edge of the village.
She was walking with purpose now, her shoulders set in a way that reminded me painfully of her mother.
Lyralei had had that same determined stride when she'd made up her mind about something, that same refusal to be deterred by anything as insignificant as impossible odds.
"Be careful, little flame," I whispered to her reflection, knowing she couldn't hear me yet but needing to say it anyway. "The world you just woke up is more dangerous than you remember."
Syra settled beside me, her form finding a shape somewhere between solid and spectral. "How long do you think we have before everything falls apart?"
"Hours," I said, watching Aurea disappear into Melora's shop. "Maybe days if we're lucky. But not long. The awakening has set too many things in motion."
"Then you'd better rest while you can." Syra's hand found my shoulder, offering what comfort she could. "Because when she needs you to manifest, to truly fight beside her, you're going to need every scrap of power you've been hoarding for the last fourteen years."
She was right again. I hated how often she was right.
I let myself sink down onto the transformed garden paths, my back against one of the crystallized trees that now grew in patterns matching the marks on Aurea's arms. Through the hundred mirrors I was maintaining, I kept watch over her world, tracking threats and allies alike, preparing for the moment when I'd need to cross that divide fully, regardless of the cost.
The garden sang around me, its song now harmonizing with the ghost-melody that had always hummed beneath reality's surface. But there was a new note in it now, one that tasted of silver fire and desperate hope and the chance, however slim, that we might actually survive what was coming.
Aurea Miren Solis, the garden whispered with my voice, with her voice, with the voice of every Mirror Queen who had ever lived. Come back to us. Remember who you are. Remember who we were.
And in the distance, across the thinning barriers between worlds, I felt her pause as if she'd heard something. As if some part of her, buried deep beneath years of careful forgetting, recognized the sound of her own true name being sung by the one who'd never stopped calling it.