Chapter 60
Agroan slips from my lips.
My head throbs as I lift it after what feels like an eternity with it slumped forward. I blink a few times, finally taking in the bathroom mirror in front of me.
I know this place. I’ve been in this bathroom twice before—this is the third time. Even through the haze clouding everything, I recognize it as the one in Xeraphine’s house, the one attached to the bedroom I stayed in with my men.
But it isn’t the familiarity that makes me squeeze my eyes shut and shake my head.
It’s the perspective.
I’m… not looking at the mirror.
I’m looking through it.
A trembling breath escapes me. My chest feels heavy, even though nothing is pressing down on it. I try to move my arms, but I can’t.
Metal cuffs clamp around my wrists, chains pulling them taut and vanishing into endless darkness. I shift my gaze downward, and my feet are bound too. I’m not standing—I’m suspended. The restraints hold me out, stretched and weightless.
Panic floods in as I scream, “Help!!!”
No echo. No reverberation. The sound dies the moment it leaves my mouth, swallowed by the silence.
The memories from right before I blacked out start to surge back when the sound of a door opening and closing snaps my attention forward.
I watch myself walk into the bathroom, right in front of the mirror.
There’s blood all over me, and my stomach twists hard at the realization of whose it is.
“Atlas…”
I begin to shake as indigo eyes meet mine—as though she can actually see me.
“Well,” she says, leaning forward onto the counter. Her lips curl into a smile that tells me everything I need to know. I’m fucking doomed, and so is that world. “It’s been a while.”
My lips part, and in a breathless whisper I say, “Morgana.”
Her back straightens, lifting a hand to thread her fingers through her hair.
Then, as if remembering something, she flicks her wrist. A barrier ripples around the bathroom, the shimmer draping the room like a veil.
She’s silenced everything and everyone from the outside hearing what she’s about to say.
“You know,” she whispers, head tilting, “it really hurt my feelings, what you did to me.”
Heat fills my eyes as I stare at her. The ache in my bones is nothing compared to the heart breaking open in my chest.
“You had no vision. And then you trapped me in that fucking mirror. I should really hate you.”
I’m not even sure I’m breathing—too busy trying to understand, trying to accept what’s happening, and unraveling under the weight of it.
Her smile widens, her eyes narrowing in a way that sinks fear straight into my heart.
Not for me.
Not for that world.
But for Kayn.
For Lucifer.
“You’re really not going to talk to me?” she coos. “No pleading for me to let you out? Nothing of the sort?” She exaggerates a pout. “You’re not the sister I remember—”
“I am not your sister!” I scream, yanking on the chains, my whole body shaking as I try to tear myself free.
“We shared the same womb. At the same time, matter of fact…” She leans closer to the mirror. “A fact you can never forget. It’s why you struggle so much to look at yourself… at the monster looking back at you. Must have sucked getting out of prison to see me in every reflection.”
A shrill scream rips out of me—no words, just raw, unfiltered rage shredding its way up my throat.
“You ruined everything that night for me, but that’s alright.
I won’t have to go through as much trouble as I did last time.
” She looks down at her fingers, using her middle fingernail to pick dried blood from her thumb.
“You’ve brought me two incredible beings to sacrifice—one of them being the son of the Demon I am to summon. ”
Her maniacal laugh sends chills racing down my spine.
“Oh, fuck me, what a dream.” She tilts her head. “I’ll use them to help me get rid of this hex first though… and, sis?”
My shoulders shake as tears spill down my cheeks.
“You’ll watch as I destroy your world, before the one around us goes with it.”
“Please… please, Morgana, you don’t understand what this will do!” I sob through the plea. “There will be no place for you after this. They don’t deserve this! Please!”
“Deserving, undeserving—it matters not to me what anyone else feels entitled to. I am all that matters, and this world, along with the others, have wronged me for the last fucking time.”
I scream.
And scream.
And fucking scream.
“You could’ve stood beside me, but you had to have a fucking heart for people that would rather see you dead. And once again, it’s placed you in a prison.”
“No… no, please don’t…”
Liquid trickles down my arms as I yank harder. There’s no physical pain as my wrists tear open, but it feels like micro-fractures are splitting through my brain.
“Darkness is quiet.” She places her hand against the mirror, and for a moment it stills before breaching through. “It’s lonely.” Her fingers touch my cheek, and I jerk away. “It’s maddening.”
Her hand clamps around my throat, and I gasp through a choking sob.
“The monster was always me, Amarah, but seeing you called one made the imprisonment in Verraketh worth it. Now, you’ll watch as you truly become the villain you fought so hard to avoid being.”
A knock on the door has her pulling away from me and quickly turning on the water. The spell dissolves as she says, “Come in.”
I stop breathing as Kayn walks in.
“Everything okay, little slayer?”
“Kayn!!” I scream so loudly it rips my throat, sending me into a coughing fit.
She smiles up at him. “Mhmm. Sorry, I’m just… just a little slow to move still. Feels new to me—like I haven’t walked in years.”
“Kayn! Please! Don’t—” He puts his hand against the side of her neck, and my vision blurs. “It’s… no, it’s not me…”
“You know how I love to carry you.”
She rises onto her tiptoes and wraps her arms around his neck.
“We have to go,” Kayn says as he looks into the mirror. It’s brief, and I know he can’t see me or feel my presence here, but seeing him look at me—for what feels like the last time—shatters me. “The entire militia is after us, and they know where we are.”
He’s about to lift her when she pulls him down…
And kisses him…
“Kill her, Kayn. Kill her, please!!”
The bond is quiet.
The link to Lucifer is nonexistent.
And I’m alone…
And I know, in this moment, that death would’ve been my only escape from a life of imprisonment.