Page 64 of The Scars of War
A helmet scorched black, still etched with the bloodstained crest of a long-dead empire.
A rusted scythe blade, curved wrong, like it had been forced through something hard. A child’s doll, headless, wrapped in a soldier’s bandage and marked with ash. None of these things belong to the other horsemen. They’re all his. Riven’s wars. Riven’s ruin. Riven’s legacy.
And somehow, walking through them now feels different. Because I know what he is. Because now I know what I am.
The air thickens as I move deeper into the hall, past the relics arranged like coffins standing on end. Not labeled or explained. Just…remembered.
One case holds a crown split straight down the center. Iron, dented and stained from battle. Another holds a weapon I don’t recognize. A wicked, jagged thing shaped like a question mark, half-dagger, half-hook. The plaque below it is cracked, and the name has worn away. The only thing left behind is a smear of something too dark to be rust.
Riven didn’t collect these for display. He kept them because he couldn’t let them go. Because war doesn’t end when the fighting stops. It lingers. It breathes. It builds shrines like this one, where no one can forget what’s been done.
Including me.
I stop when I reach the end of the hallway. There’s no plaque here. No display case. Just a mirror.
Tall. Narrow. The edges gilded in tarnished silver, vines curling up the sides like they grew there on their own. The surface isn’t smooth. Not anymore. It’s pocked with age, the kind of glass that reflects in shades of memory, not clarity.
I’ve passed it before. But tonight, it’s different. Tonight, it sees me. The moment I step in front of it, the mark on my palm flares. Faint. A soft pulse, like a second heartbeat, not mine.
I raise my hand. Press it to the glass. No breath fogs the surface. No reflection stares back. Just the outline of me…warped.
My silhouette ripples. The features are mine, but the shape behind my eyes is something else. Something watching. Something caged. Something waiting.
The mirror doesn’t move. Doesn’t shimmer or glow or offer any sign of magic. But I feel it, the veil here is thinner. It knows I’m more than blood now. More than banshee. More than bone and flesh.
I’m the thing that doesn’t belong. The thing that calls.
“Let us through.” The voice isn't loud. It isn't even sound. It's an impression behind the glass. A vibration against my bones. A pressure that pushes instead of pulls.
I clench my jaw. “No.”
The mirror doesn’t crack. But something inside me does. A sound like wind in a sealed room scrapes down the back of my spine. The crown in the case to my left rattles once, then goes still. Every light in the hall flickers.
I back away. My reflection doesn’t move. It stays where it is, pressed against the glass, staring through me. And when it smiles, I don’t. The mark on my palm burns. A single flash. Like a warning shot. The mirror darkens. The reflection fades. The hallway stills. Something lingers.
Not on the other side of the glass, but behind me. I turn slowly. And he’s there, Vale.
He doesn’t speak. Just stands there, half-swallowed by the dark at the far end of the corridor, as if he’s always belonged to shadow more than light. The war gallery curves slightly, and the way the illumination hits him makes him look like a statue carved from moonlight and blood. Perfect. Still. Wrong.
I don’t move, I wait. Because I’m not sure which one of us is the threat right now.
“I told you to be careful with what you let hear you,” he says quietly.
I swallow the taste of iron. “So, you’ve been watching me?”
His head tilts in a subtle motion, almost gentle. “I never stopped.”
My pulse stutters. He walks toward me, slow and smooth, hands loose at his sides. No aggression or tension. Every step sets the air off-kilter, like gravity is bending around him. Like the veil is closer here because he brings it with him.
“You’re not ready for what that mirror shows,” he murmurs.
“I don’t care,” I lie.
“Yes, you do.” He stops just in front of me. “And that’s the problem.”
I look up at him. I hate how beautiful he is. How calm. How everything about him feels like sleep, the kind that drowns. The kind you don’t wake up from.
“You knew what I’d see,” I say. “Didn’t you?”
