Page 60 of A Taste of Silver
"You've been busy," I said as we turned. "Weakening the barriers between worlds."
His hand tightened on my waist. "Observant. Yes, I've spent three weeks having my mages carefully crack every mirror in the palace. Not enough to break them, just enough to make them... permeable."
"Why?"
"Because something is coming through whether we allow it or not." We spun past a cluster of courtiers, their crystal masks sending rainbow fragments across my vision. "The only question is whether we control the crossing or if it controls us."
My marks flared with heat. Through the polished surfaces around us, I caught glimpses of movement that didn't match the ballroom. Shadows sliding through reflection, gathering like storm clouds.
"You're summoning him," I breathed. "The Crimson One."
"Among other things." Aldric's smile was sharp as glass. "Did you know that mirror entities can be bound to human will? With the right preparations, the right... bait."
The dance pattern shifted, couples weaving between each other in complex spirals. Each intersection created a new line in the binding circle, each turn reinforced the cage being built in plain sight. The other dancers moved with perfect precision, their faces blank behind their decorated masks. Compulsion magic, I realized. They weren't guests. They were components.
My dress began to change.
The violet silk lightened, silver threads spreading like frost across fabric until I wore starlight itself. The transformation started at the hem and climbed upward, the dress reshaping into something that belonged in the Mirror Realm, not a mortal ballroom. Whispers rippled through the watching crowd.
New gloves materialized over my hands, translucent as spider silk but somehow completely opaque, hiding the silver marks that would have blazed like beacons. The touch was familiar, Silvyr's magic, sent through our connection at what must have been enormous cost.
"Impressive," Aldric murmured. "Your bonded entity still tries to protect you, even from his prison."
"He's not my?—"
"Please." The Prince spun me sharply, my new dress flaring like wings. "The resonance between you could be felt three kingdoms away. Every mirror in the realm sings with it."
The binding circle was nearly complete. I could feel it in the way reality grew thick, resistant. The reflective masks around us showed not faces but fragments of otherwhere, glimpses of the Mirror Realm bleeding through.
Then the ballroom doors opened again.
The figure that entered wore Silvyr's face like a perfectly crafted mask. Every detail exact, the silver hair that caught light like moonbeams, the sharp angles of his jaw, even the way he moved with liquid grace. But the eyes were wrong. Instead of constellation-filled depths, they burned crimson, the color of old blood and dying stars.
"Aurea." The Crimson One's voice was Silvyr's timbre but pitched wrong, too smooth, too hollow. "My love, you came."
The crowd drew back, creating space. Several guests made warding gestures, but their hands shook. This was what they'd been promised, a tame mirror entity, bound and controlled. But faced with the reality of it, their courage wavered.
Prince Aldric released me, stepping back with calculation in his eyes. "Lord Silvyr, I presume?"
"I am what she made me." The Crimson One moved closer, each step too perfect, too practiced. A mockery of humanity worn like an expensive coat. "What we made together, in that garden of glass and starlight."
Lies wrapped in enough truth to be believed. I forced myself to remain still as he approached, even as every instinct screamed to run. Through the polished floor, I caught a glimpse of the real Silvyr, his form fracturing with rage.
The Crimson One extended his hand to me, and his smile was poisonously beautiful. "Dance with me, little flame. Like we used to, before the world broke."
If I refused, it would reveal I knew he was false. If I accepted?—
Music swelled, different from the waltz. Older, stranger, notes that didn't belong to any mortal instrument. The binding circle pulsed, and I realized with sick certainty what Prince Aldric had done. He'd invited the Crimson One in, thinking to trap him, use him. But the Prince had no idea what he was truly dealing with.
I took the offered hand.
Cold shot through me at the contact, not the clean cold of winter but something rotten, empty. The Crimson One pulled me into the dance, and we moved across the binding circle that was meant to cage him.
"You don't remember me," he murmured against my ear. "How convenient. How tragic."
Through every reflective surface, I saw Silvyr fighting to manifest, his form gaining substance only to dissolve again. The real Silvyr began to sing, not with voice but with resonance itself, a counter-melody to the Crimson One's presence.
The false face flickered.
