Chapter 34 Rhett
Rhett
The moment Seth’s hand touches the mirror, everything changes.
Silver light explodes outward, so bright I have to shield my eyes. The chamber floods with warmth—not heat, but presence. Like standing near someone you love, close enough to feel their heartbeat through the air between you.
And then I see her.
Bree.
She’s on the other side of the glass, pale and barefoot, reaching toward us with trembling hands. Her hair falls loose around her shoulders, and her eyes—those light green eyes with gold flecks—lock onto mine.
The breath leaves my lungs.
Fire knows fire. I’d know her energy anywhere—the way it calls to mine, the way my magic recognizes hers like coming home. That pull in my chest, the one I didn’t even know was missing, suddenly sings.
Like something lost has finally been found.
The air between us hums, recognition older than memory.
Around me, the others react. Gray goes perfectly still, wolf-sharp focus locked on the mirror. Jace whispers something that might be a curse or a prayer. Wes takes a step forward, hands reaching instinctively.
But I can’t look away from her face.
She’s moving her lips, trying to tell us something. I lean closer, pressing my palm to the warm glass, desperate to hear—
Then I feel it.
A flicker. Just for a second. Like watching someone’s reflection in water when the surface ripples.
Her chest doesn’t rise and fall in rhythm with mine.
My fire reacts before my brain catches up—protective fury slamming through my veins. I conjure a small flame between my fingers without thinking, holding it up to illuminate the glass.
Through the light, I see it clearly.
The distortion. The shimmer of something wrong.
Her eyes are too empty. Her edges blur slightly, like she’s not quite solid. And when I focus on the space around her, I can see the seams—the way reality bends to hold her shape.
Not her. An illusion. A trap.
“No,” Seth gasps from beside me. He’s on his knees now, staring at the mirror with devastation carved into every line of his face. “It’s not her. It’s not her.”
The chamber trembles. Every mirror rattles in its frame, glass singing with stress.
My flame flares hotter in my hand, begging to be unleashed. To burn this lie away. To tear through the Void until I find the real Bree and drag her back myself.
But I force it down. Bank the heat. Breathe through the rage.
Control through love, not destruction.
“Theo?” I say, voice rough. “What do you see?”
He’s clutching Stellan’s arm for support, silver tears still streaming down his face. “A test,” he whispers. “The Void is testing him. Testing all of us.”
The illusion of Bree begins to fade, her form dissolving like smoke. Seth makes a broken sound, reaching for her even as she disappears.
Then—silence.
The mirrors go dark. The warmth vanishes. We’re left standing in the chamber with nothing but our ragged breathing and the terrible weight of knowing she’s still out there. Still trapped.
Seth’s familiar coils tight around his wrist, pulsing with anxious light.
“I have to go,” he says quietly. “The bond—it’s pulling me. She’s through there somewhere. I can feel it.”
“Then we go with you,” I say, stepping forward to grip his shoulder.
He looks up at me, eyes wide. “You don’t have to—”
“You’re one of us now,” I cut him off. “We go where you go.”
Gray moves to Seth’s other side, steady and certain. “All of us.”
Jace nods, spinning a blade between his fingers. “Not letting you have all the fun.”
Wes’s voice is quiet but absolute: “Together.”
Theo just reaches out, touching Seth’s arm. The gesture says everything.
Thane steps forward, silver eyes locked on Seth. “The bond you carry leads to her. We follow that thread.”
Stellan adds from beside him, “You’re not walking into the dark alone.”
Zira watches from the edge of the chamber, arms crossed. “This is what the Oath meant. Shared risk. Shared blood.” She meets my eyes. “Bring her home.”
Seth stares at each of us in turn, something breaking and reforming in his expression. He swallows hard, then pushes to his feet.
“Okay,” he whispers. “Okay.”
He faces the central mirror—the one that showed us the illusion. It’s dark now, just polished glass reflecting our faces back at us.
But when Seth lifts his hand toward it, the surface ripples.
His familiar slides off his wrist, transforming into pure light that snakes across the glass. The runes carved into the frame ignite one by one, silver fire racing along stone.
And the mirror opens.
Not shattering. Not melting. Just… opening. Like a doorway that was always there, waiting for permission.
Beyond it, I see silver mist and drifting ash. Darkness that feels alive. And somewhere in that void, a faint thread of warmth that might be her.
Seth takes a breath, steadies himself, and steps through.
The glass swallows him whole.
For a moment, nothing happens. Then every mirror in the chamber flares at once, their light converging on the central portal. The Oath sigil reappears above us—half bright, half black, spinning slowly.
I feel the burn in my chest. An invisible tether stretching between us and Seth, between us and wherever Bree is. Between us and the Void itself.
“He made his choice,” I say, turning to face the others. “Now we make ours.”
Gray’s eyes catch the light—just for a second, they flash silver like his animal’s. Wes’s pupils are blown wide, the air around him humming with barely contained hunger. Jace’s grin looks too sharp, too eager. Theo mutters fragments of vision under his breath, words I can’t quite catch.
And Stellan—his voice drops lower, resonant with something ancient when he speaks: “Together. Or not at all.”
We join hands. Fire, air, shadow, light, hunger, vision. The circuit closes, and power surges through us—volatile, amplified, barely controlled.
My fire wants to burn. To consume everything in its path until I find her.
But I hold it steady. Channel it into purpose instead of rage.
“Three,” I say.
Heat builds beneath my skin.
“Two.”
The Ether hums, answering.
“One.”
We step into the light.
The world dissolves.
Heat, mist, silence.
For a moment, I’m nowhere—suspended in silver nothing, feeling the bonds between us stretch and strain but hold.
Then my feet hit solid ground.
I open my eyes to ash drifting through silver air. The sky above us isn’t sky—it’s void, endless and hungry. The ground beneath us is smooth black stone that reflects nothing.
The others materialize around me, one by one. Gray stumbles, catching himself. Jace lands in a crouch, blade already drawn. Wes presses a hand to his chest like he can’t breathe. Theo sways, Stellan catching his arm to steady him.
Thane appears last, silver eyes scanning the landscape with predatory focus. “We’re scattered,” he says quietly. “Seth’s bond pulled him through first. We followed, but the Void doesn’t play fair with arrivals.”
“Where’s Seth?” Jace asks.
I turn in a slow circle, searching. But there’s nothing. No landmarks. No direction. Just endless drifting embers and ashen light.
Then I hear it.
A laugh. Faint and distant, carried on wind that doesn’t exist.
Bree’s laugh.
My heart leaps—
Then it cuts off into a scream.
The sound is swallowed by distance before I can locate it, leaving only terrible silence.
“Bree!” I shout, fire igniting in my palms.
But the Void doesn’t answer.
I force myself to breathe. To think. To remember why we’re here.
Hold on, little flame, I think, sending the words out into the dark like a prayer. We’re coming.
Around me, the others gather close. We’re here. We made it through.
But as I stare into the endless black, feeling the weight of the Void pressing in from all sides, I realize the truth:
We didn’t rescue her.
We walked into the trap.
And somewhere in the dark, something smiles.
The Void has us now.