She’s sewing and telling the story of the faerie princess who fell in love with the shadow king. “When the golden princess’s parents learned their daughter was meeting the shadow king in the mortal realm, they combined their magical powers to lock all the portals between the human world and Faerie—keeping their daughter from reaching her lover and preventing the shadow king from returning home.”
When the image fades, I start to put the mirror down but decide to try something else.
“Show me my mother.” I stare at my own reflection for so long I think it’s not going to work, but then she appears.
I haven’t seen my mother in nine years, but the woman in the mirror looks exactly as I remember her—tall and graceful, with the same chestnut hair as Jasalyn. It’s braided and wrapped into a coronet atop her head. She’s walking through a cemetery, and she stops at one gravestone and sinks to her knees. The setting sun makes the red highlights in her hair shine, and my chest aches a little with unexpected longing. She was such a good mom. We laughed together, and she told us stories. She always wanted to play games and take long walks with us. She always put us first.
Until she didn’t.
That’s the real reason I need to guard my heart against Sebastian. Loving a faerie can make you lose yourself. It can make you forget what matters most. My mother did.
Why is she in the cemetery? Could that be the grave of the faerie she loved? I scan the image in the mirror over and over. Something about this looks familiar. Then I realize what it is. This is the same cemetery Finn took me to when he wanted to show me what my power could do. It’s not far from here at all.
The image in the mirror fades, and I make a quick decision. I loop a leather satchel over one shoulder and slide the mirror inside. Then I run toward the cemetery, a golden stripe of the evening sun the only light left along the horizon.
If my mother is so close, maybe she can help me get Jas back. I know the faerie she loved was important—a noble fae, she said, a male who loved his people and cared for them enough to sacrifice his own happiness. Maybe he has some sort of connection to the Unseelie king. Maybe she could get him to release Jas before I finish retrieving his artifacts. Even if she doesn’t have pull, it would be a relief to have her close. To have someone to confide in and know I’m not alone in this.
My soft dress shoes weren’t made for running on this rough stone ground. The rocks bite into the bottoms of my feet, but I don’t slow down until I reach the graves I saw in the mirror.
The cemetery stands empty, and I spin around, hoping to see where she may have gone.
“Mother!” I call. “Mom?” My voice cracks, and with it something in my chest leaks out.
I pull the mirror out again. “Show me my mother.”
The image shows a tomb, a rotting corpse lying in darkness, her arms crossed over her chest.
I drop the mirror as if it burned me. “No.” I back away from it. No. Sebastian said it might not work for mortals. Just because it’s worked until now . . . No. This means nothing.
A cold breeze whips through the gravestones, and the last of the sun disappears, but I’m not ready to go back to the palace.
I swallow hard and force myself to pick up the mirror and shove it into my satchel. That image meant nothing.
“Brie!” My name comes from a cry in the woods and it sounds like— “Brie! Help me!” Even as I move toward the call, I try to convince myself that the voice isn’t familiar—isn’t one I know better than my own.
I hear the cry again—a cry and a terrified sob. At the sound of my little sister’s desperate shrieking, I run as fast as I can into the trees. The forest floor is dense with brush, twigs, sticks, and leaves. My skirt snags on a bush, and my useless shoes tear away, but I keep running.
“Help! Brie? Brie, help me!”
Racing toward the sound of Jas’s voice, I swing around trees and through underbrush, following her cries as they grow louder and more panicked. I run until my legs are burning and my throat is raw. I’m not even surprised when I see my childhood home—the one we escaped from almost ten years ago. The one where my father died.
Flames whip around the walls, licking at the roof and reaching higher and higher. Just like that night.
I back up a step. This isn’t real.
The fire crackles and snaps, and smoke shoves itself up my nose while the heat of the flames burns my cheeks.
“Brie, please!”
I race inside without letting myself think.
The next time she calls my name, my ears are filled with the roar of the fire and I can barely hear it. I know that her voice will get quieter and quieter. I know because I’ve been here before. And I know she’ll go completely silent before I reach her. She’ll be unconscious on the floor beneath her bed.