Chapter 11 #2
The days ticked by. My mom and Rhi were clearly concerned, but I kept telling them I was fine.
I pretended to be reading the books Rhi had gotten for me.
I told them I had other homework. I came down and forced myself to smile through meals, and pick at the food on my plate.
I worried down just enough of each meal to keep the others from asking me if I was feeling all right.
I think they would have zeroed in on me more closely if it hadn’t been for Persi’s repeatedly empty seat.
Rhi had resorted to leaving plates of food covered in foil outside the workshop door.
Sometimes, Persi would bring them inside.
Other times, they’d freeze under a slushy coating of snow, untouched.
Sensing I was wrapped up in my work, Rhi took my shift at Shadowkeep on Friday, so I was able to avoid Leila and her desperate pursuit of Persi.
In fact, I was avoiding everyone. Zale, Nova, Eva, even Jess.
All their texts and calls went unanswered.
I was turning into a ghost in my own life, but I couldn’t bring myself to care.
Finally, on Monday, I couldn’t take it anymore.
I had to get out of the house, or I’d lose my mind.
The hours I spent staring into reflective surfaces were starting to feel like the definition of insanity.
My mom looked relieved when I told her I was going downtown—maybe I hadn’t been doing as good a job at appearing okay as I thought I was.
Luckily, she was smack in the middle of a delicate project in her greenhouse, and didn’t offer to come with me.
I bundled up and set off, the air cold and delicious against my cheeks.
Downtown was practically deserted. A few figures hurried quickly into a shop here and there, carrying a cardboard cup of coffee like a talisman to ward off the weather; but otherwise, everyone seemed to be tucked safely in their homes and businesses, like hibernating animals.
Again, I was glad for the lack of company.
I didn’t want to make small talk, smile at people, or pretend I was okay.
I pulled my hood more tightly down over my face, hoping that anyone who did pass wouldn’t recognize me.
As I tried to decide where to go, I kicked something small with my boot. It tumbled along a foot or two ahead of me, and then came to a stop, glinting in the sun on the icy sidewalk. I stared down at it, a strange feeling coiling in the pit of my stomach.
It was a piece of sea glass, pale blue and sparkling… and familiar.
I bent down and plucked the sea glass up into my gloved hand, turning it over between my fingers.
It was the same piece of sea glass that had washed up against my feet on the beach, the one I had given to Granny Nightjar as payment for my divination session.
I knew it was. It had the same curved shape, like a fat teardrop.
How was it possible that it was here, of all places?
I looked up and down the sidewalk. Had Granny Nightjar dropped it or lost it somehow?
I couldn’t imagine her strolling down Main Street, window-shopping.
I couldn’t imagine her leaving her little room, let alone her apartment.
She’d look like a wraith drifting along under her veil.
But though I questioned how it had found me again, I had no doubt at all that this was the very same piece of sea glass.
And as I stared down at it, I became aware of another sensation, one I hadn’t noticed at first, distracted as I was by the unexpected reappearance of the sea glass.
It was the unmistakable feeling of being watched.
All the hairs on the back of my neck were standing at attention. Goosebumps erupted on my arms. I was standing right in front of Xiomara’s Cafe with my back to the windows. Whoever or whatever was staring at me must be inside; and somehow, I knew it wasn’t Eva or anyone else in the Marin family.
Fighting the impulse to run, I turned around instead, and found myself staring at… me. My own reflection, wide-eyed and pale, was blinking back at me, asking a question I didn’t have the answer to. It was a moment before I realized that the rest of what was reflected in the window was wrong.
I could see the interior of the restaurant—the menu above the counter, the familiar black-and-white checkerboard floor, the laminate tables with their shiny silver napkin dispensers.
But I should also be able to see the street at my back, the occasional car driving slowly past, the lampposts, and the narrow Victorian houses across the street.
So why was my reflection staring back at me from a dense copse of fir trees?
For a moment, all I could do was blink and stare.
Then I whipped my head over my shoulder to look behind me.
There was the street. The houses. The lampposts.
Exactly where they should be. I turned back to stare at my reflection again.
No street. No houses. No lampposts. Only a shadowy wall of towering trees rising like a specter behind me.
I let my gaze drift over to the front window of the neighboring boutique.
The reflection there looked exactly as it should have looked.
As I watched, a small red car drove along, superimposed over the dresses and sweaters being modeled in the front display, then vanished as soon as it reached the cafe window, as though it had driven right into those mysterious trees and disappeared.
My feet felt rooted to the spot, my body frozen in shock even as my mind raced. Something had happened between the moment I’d spotted the sea glass on the ground, and the moment I looked back at the window. Was I having a vision? A breakdown?
And then it clicked.
The portal isn’t in the mirror, Granny Nightjar had said. It’s inside you.
I didn’t know how, but I’d opened the portal entirely by accident.
I was scrying as I stood here, the window in front of me acting as the reflective surface.
What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t just stand here, staring into the cafe window like some weird stalker, but how was I supposed to look away?
What if this was my only chance to get more answers?
I thought back to the birdbath in the garden at Shadowkeep. I’d touched the surface of the water accidentally, and fallen into the vision. Was it possible… could it work again?
I looked over my shoulder. The street was quiet, apart from one woman walking a small, sweater-clad dog, and she was too engrossed in something on her phone screen to pay any attention to me.
The cafe was still closed, the lights off in the front section, though I knew someone was probably already at work in the kitchen, prepping for opening soon.
Maybe, if I was quick, no one would see.
I felt almost dizzy with fear and nerves as I took one step closer to the window, so that my toes were scraping against the brick below.
I met my own eyes in the reflection, and something in those eyes burned the fear away.
It wasn’t something I was used to seeing in myself, especially when magic was involved; it was resolve, bright and clear and reassuring. It was all I needed.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I reached forward and touched my fingertips to the glass. There was a strange rushing sound, a whirl of color, and the glass was gone.