Page 25 of A Taste of Silver
Ice flooded my veins, colder than anything in the Mirror Realm should have been capable of producing. Of course he would notice. A Mirror Queen's full name spoken for the first time in decades would be like a beacon to something that fed on reflected power, on the essence of what mirrors could show and be.
The garden's transformation accelerated around us. What had been paths now became rivers of liquid silver, flowing in directions that physics wouldn't have approved of but magic understood perfectly. The mirrors hanging from nothing beganto spin on invisible axes, each one showing different angles of Aurea, different moments of her life, different possibilities of who she might become now that she'd claimed herself completely.
My marks, the ones that mirrored hers but ran along my spine instead of my arms, flared with sympathetic heat. They'd been dormant for so long, faded to barely visible lines after years of separation. Now they blazed like brands, writing themselves larger, spreading across my shoulders in patterns that matched the ones I could sense growing on her skin. The bond between us, weakened by distance and suppression, suddenly roared back to full strength.
It hurt. Gods, it hurt in ways I'd forgotten pain could reach, but underneath the agony was something else entirely. Connection. Real, solid, undeniable connection after fourteen years of fragments and stolen moments and desperate attempts to reach across a divide that was never meant to exist.
"Silvyr." Syra grabbed my arm as I stumbled, her form solidifying enough to provide actual physical support. "You can't manifest fully yet. You're burning through your essence too fast, the awakening is pulling at you. If you try to cross now, you'll?—"
"I don't care." The words came out harsh, desperate. Through the mirrors I could see Aurea standing, see her looking at the silver blood seeping from the cut on her hand, see the confusion and wonder and fear playing across her face in equal measure. "She's going to walk into danger, Syra. The court will respond to this, the Crown will send soldiers, and she doesn't fully understand what she just unleashed."
"Then help her understand from here." Syra's grip tightened, surprisingly strong for something that was mostly made of reflected light and stubborn will. "Guide her through the reflections. Save your strength for when she truly needs you to manifest."
She was right. I hated that she was right, but thousands of years of existence had taught me to recognize wisdom even when it contradicted what I wanted. I forced myself to breathe, to center, to pull my scattered consciousness back from the edges where it was trying to reach for Aurea with desperate, grasping need.
The garden responded to my forced calm, its chaotic growth slowing fractionally. The rivers of silver found more stable courses, the spinning mirrors gradually aligning to show more coherent visions. I focused on the one showing Aurea most clearly, watching as she tucked the three small mirrors away and began making her way back toward the village, toward Melora and whatever confrontation was waiting there.
"The palace mirrors," I said, the words coming slow as I thought through implications and possibilities. "They're all covered, sealed, supposedly dead. But with the awakening..."
"They're not dead anymore." Syra finished the thought, her fractal features settling into something grim. "Every covered mirror in the kingdom just remembered what it was made for. And the ones in the palace, the ones that were sealed for good reason, they're going to be the most dangerous."
Through my network of reflections, I began searching for the palace, finding it in the polished armor of guards, in the windows of noble estates, in the fountain at the center of the courtyard. The building looked peaceful from the outside, but I could sense something else beneath the surface, a disturbance in the mirror-space, like ripples from a large predator moving through deep water.
The Crimson One was already there, I realized with dawning horror. Not fully manifest, not yet, but his influence spreading through the covered mirrors like poison through a bloodstream. He'd been preparing for this, probably for years, waiting for a Mirror Queen to emerge so he could finally have access tothe kind of power he needed for whatever nightmare he was planning.
"I need to get word to her." My hands curled into fists, constellation eyes blazing brighter as I poured more power into maintaining the connection across realms. "She needs to know the palace is compromised before she goes there."
"Will she even listen?" Syra asked, not unkindly. "She barely remembers you. Fourteen years of suppressions, of being told that magic is dangerous, that mirrors are forbidden. You're still mostly a stranger to her, however much you might wish otherwise."
The truth of that landed like a blade between my ribs. She'd recognized me in the garden, in the dreams, but recognition wasn't the same as remembering. She didn't recall the promises we'd made as children, didn't fully understand the bond we shared, couldn't remember the thousands of small moments that had made me love her so completely that the word love itself felt inadequate to describe it.
But I could help her remember. The awakening had thinned the barriers enough that I could reach her more directly now, send her images through reflections, speak to her through any surface that could hold my form. It would cost me, every manifestation burned through essence I couldn't easily replace, but what else was I saving it for if not this?
The garden had found its new equilibrium around me, transformed but stable, more beautiful and more dangerous than it had ever been. The crystal roses now bloomed in colors that didn't exist in either realm, their petals showing glimpses of the space between worlds where we might finally be able to meet as equals. The paths had settled into patterns that pulsed in rhythm with Aurea's heartbeat, matching the tempo I could feel through our bond.
Everything here responded to her now, I realized. The garden I'd maintained alone for so long had remembered that it had always been meant to be ours, had always been supposed to be tended by both of us together. Her awakening had restored that truth, whether I was ready for the implications or not.
Through the mirror showing her most clearly, I watched Aurea reach the edge of the village. She was walking with purpose now, her shoulders set in a way that reminded me painfully of her mother. Lyralei had had that same determined stride when she'd made up her mind about something, that same refusal to be deterred by anything as insignificant as impossible odds.
"Be careful, little flame," I whispered to her reflection, knowing she couldn't hear me yet but needing to say it anyway. "The world you just woke up is more dangerous than you remember."
Syra settled beside me, her form finding a shape somewhere between solid and spectral. "How long do you think we have before everything falls apart?"
"Hours," I said, watching Aurea disappear into Melora's shop. "Maybe days if we're lucky. But not long. The awakening has set too many things in motion."
"Then you'd better rest while you can." Syra's hand found my shoulder, offering what comfort she could. "Because when she needs you to manifest, to truly fight beside her, you're going to need every scrap of power you've been hoarding for the last fourteen years."
She was right again. I hated how often she was right.
I let myself sink down onto the transformed garden paths, my back against one of the crystallized trees that now grew in patterns matching the marks on Aurea's arms. Through the hundred mirrors I was maintaining, I kept watch over her world,tracking threats and allies alike, preparing for the moment when I'd need to cross that divide fully, regardless of the cost.
The garden sang around me, its song now harmonizing with the ghost-melody that had always hummed beneath reality's surface. But there was a new note in it now, one that tasted of silver fire and desperate hope and the chance, however slim, that we might actually survive what was coming.
Aurea Miren Solis,the garden whispered with my voice, with her voice, with the voice of every Mirror Queen who had ever lived.Come back to us. Remember who you are. Remember who we were.
And in the distance, across the thinning barriers between worlds, I felt her pause as if she'd heard something. As if some part of her, buried deep beneath years of careful forgetting, recognized the sound of her own true name being sung by the one who'd never stopped calling it.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
