Page 51 of A Taste of Silver
"It's not just my mirror." I turned to face the captain of the guard, whose hand had moved instinctively to his sword hilt. "The whole palace is singing."
Outside my window, I could see lights flickering on throughout the city. Distant shouts carried on the night air. Whatever was happening here was spreading outward like ripples from a stone dropped in still water.
There was a new presence at the edge of the room and the guard captain stepped forward, his weathered face grim. "My lady, Prince Aldric has issued new orders. Given the... instability... of recent magical events, you're to remain in your chambers for your own protection."
The euphemism was so transparent it was almost insulting.Your own protection. As if I were the one in danger, rather than the danger itself.
"The guard rotation is being doubled," he continued, his tone apologetic but firm. "No one enters or leaves without express royal permission."
Melora crossed to where I stood. Her hands found my shoulders, gripping tight enough to bruise. "Child, what have you done?"
"I remembered." The words tasted like silver and starlight. "I touched him. Actually touched him."
"The serpent?" Melora's voice cracked. "Aurea, the barriers between realms exist for a reason. If you've weakened them?—"
"The barriers were already weakening." I pulled away from her grip, moving to the window. Below, I could see more lightsblooming across the city like flowers opening to moonlight. "This started days ago."
The harmonies from the mirrors were growing stronger now, more complex. Multiple voices joining the chorus, each one distinct yet part of a greater whole. I could pick out individual threads of melody, some mournful, some urgent, some that sounded almost like... celebration?
"They're singing because they remember," I said, understanding dawning. "The mirrors remember what they used to be. Before the prohibition. Before the fear."
"They remember what destroyed the realm," Melora countered, but her voice lacked conviction. "Child, mirrors aren't just glass and silver. They're doorways. And some doors should never be opened."
The guard captain cleared his throat uncomfortably. "My lady, my orders are to secure this room. With respect, I need all unauthorized personnel to?—"
"I'm her grandmother." Melora's voice carried an authority that made the captain pause. "If you think I'm leaving her alone in a room with singing mirrors, you're mad."
A compromise was reached. Melora could stay, but the guards would be posted directly outside the door. No one else in or out without Prince Aldric's express permission. The chamber had officially become a gilded cage.
When the guards withdrew, leaving us alone with the fractured mirror and its increasingly complex harmonies, Melora sank into the room's single chair. She looked older than I'd ever seen her, worn down by decades of careful vigilance that had finally, inevitably, failed.
"Tell me about the Awakening Chord," I said, settling cross-legged on the bed. The silver rose still rested on my pillow, its crystal petals catching and reflecting the mirror's strange light.
Melora was quiet for so long I thought she wouldn't answer. Then she said, "It's what happens when enough mirrors remember their true purpose simultaneously. They begin to resonate, each one calling to the others, until..."
"Until what?"
"Until the song becomes strong enough to bridge the realms permanently." She lifted her head, meeting my eyes with something that might have been pride or terror. "Your mother tried to create the Awakening Chord once. Before the prohibition."
"What stopped her?"
"Fear." Melora's laugh was bitter. "The court, the nobles, even some of the Mirror Queens' own advisors. They convinced her it was too dangerous. That forcing the realms together would destroy them both."
I thought of the portraits in the Hall of Covered Mirrors, generations of women with silver eyes who'd lived and died within the constraints of others' fears. "What do you think would have happened if she'd succeeded?"
"I think," Melora said carefully, "that we'll find out. Because what you've started tonight? It can't be stopped. The chord has begun. Every mirror in the kingdom will join it, one by one, until either the realms merge or..."
"Or what?"
"Or they tear each other apart in the attempt."
The harmony swelled around us, no longer just coming from my broken mirror but from surfaces throughout the palace. I could feel it in my bones, in the silver threading through my blood. It was beautiful and terrifying and completely beyond any human ability to control.
Outside, the first snowflakes of a new winter storm began to fall, each one catching the light like tiny mirrors descending from heaven.
The harmony that had filled the palace settled into something deeper, more intimate. Through the cracked mirror, Silvyr appeared again, his form more solid than before. The Awakening Chord seemed to strengthen his manifestation, lending him substance that made my breath catch.
"The melody." His voice carried a resonance that matched the mirrors' song. "I can teach you to hear it properly. To use it."
