Chapter 101 The Night the Mirror Broke
Bella
I wake to a voice that doesn’t belong to the dream I was having.
“What are you doing?”
Someone hissed the panicked words, followed by the scrape of a boot against stone, and my eyes snapped open as instinct kicked in before reason. For a moment, nothing makes sense. Then the cold hits, and it's not the creeping chill of night air or a draft slipping through cracks in old stone. It steals breath and burns skin, seeping inward and spreading across the floor in pale, branching veins of frost that crawl toward us with horrifying intent. I suck in a breath that fogs immediately in front of my face and push myself upright, heart slamming hard enough to make me dizzy as my gaze locks onto the far end of the room. Ashlyn stands there barefoot, facing that fucking mirror. Ice spills outward from its base like a living thing, climbing the stone walls and creeping over crates and furniture, swallowing the legs of the table and licking hungrily toward the stairwell as the lantern flame shrinks, guttering weakly against the sudden drop in temperature.
“Ashlyn,” I say, my voice rough with sleep and rising fear as I scramble to my feet. “Hey. Ash.”
She doesn’t turn.
The soldier on watch stands frozen halfway across the room, blade half-drawn and shaking in his grip as he hisses again, louder now, panic cracking through his restraint.
“What are you doing?” he demands. “Step away from that thing—”
The mirror ripples like water disturbed beneath ice, and my stomach drops so hard it feels like the floor has vanished beneath me. Something moves inside the glass. No, wait, not something, someone. She steps forward as though emerging from depth rather than surface, tall and pale and impossibly old, her form outlined in frost and shadow and magic so dark it makes my skin prickle with instinctive dread. Her hair is white as fresh snow under moonlight, her skin translucent enough that faint veins show beneath like frozen rivers, and her eyes blaze with an impossible, cutting blue that I recognise instantly.
“Shit,” I whisper, horror and certainty crashing together in my chest.
The witch smiles slowly—the First Frostborn. The same bitch who poisoned the apple and thinks I should die for falling in love. She lifts one elegant hand and curls her fingers in a lazy, beckoning motion, her voice echoing strangely through the tower.
“Come closer,” she croons, syrup-smooth and razor-edged all at once. “You’ve been so tired, little one. Let me show you how to rest.”
Ashlyn takes a step forward.
“No!” I shout, already moving, heart pounding as panic sharpens my vision. “Ashlyn, stop—”
She doesn’t hear me. Her face is unfocused, her eyes glassy with something that looks like relief, her lips parted, as if she’s standing at the edge of something beautiful instead of lethal.
“I can see it now,” she murmurs, voice barely more than a breath. “Everything. Where I went wrong. Where I should’ve been braver.”
The witch’s smile widens, satisfaction curling through it like smoke.
“That’s it,” she murmurs. “Just a little closer.”
Ashlyn lifts her hand, and her fingers reach out... and pass straight through the glass. Sinking into it like the surface of a frozen lake that was never frozen at all. The air screams with a piercing sound that rips through the room, setting my teeth on edge. The frost surges violently outward, cracking stone and freezing breath mid-air while the soldiers shout and stumble back, slipping on ice as panic explodes through the tower. And then Damien roars. The sound hits like thunder, ripping through the space as he moves faster than thought, faster than fear, his body slamming into Ashlyn’s side with bone-jarring force as he tackles her away from the mirror. They hit the floor hard, Ashlyn gasping as the spell snaps like a broken wire, her hand tearing free of the glass with a wet, awful sound that makes my stomach twist. At the exact moment, the mirror crashes forward. The frame snaps as it slams into the stone floor, glass splintering outward in a violent spray of silver shards and ice that skitter across the room like thrown knives. Red stands behind it, boot still raised, blade already in her hand.
“Not tonight,” she snarls.
The witch shrieks in fury, her image fractures across the shattered glass, her face splitting into a hundred snarling reflections as she reaches out. Then the glass dissolves into frost and mist that evaporates into nothing. Silence crashes down around us.
The cold vanishes as abruptly as it came, leaving the room gasping and raw. Ashlyn sobs, sharp and ugly and real, her hands clutching at Damien’s shirt as he pins her gently but firmly to the floor, his chest heaving, eyes still burning with the aftermath of fury.
“I almost—” she chokes. “I almost went—”
“I know,” Damien says, voice low and steady, grounding. “You didn’t.”
I cross the room on shaking legs and drop to my knees beside them, grabbing Ashlyn’s face between my hands, forcing her to look at me.
“You’re here,” I say fiercely. “You’re here. Look at me.”
Her eyes find mine, and they're wild, terrified, but unmistakably hers.
“She knew my name,” Ashlyn whispers. “She knew things I’ve never told anyone.”
“I know,” I breathe. “She's a complete bitch.”
Red steps closer, gaze sweeping the ruined remains of the mirror with undisguised loathing.
“I'll bet she’s been hunting us since the woods,” she says flatly. “Testing cracks and looking for someone willing.” Her eyes flick to Ashlyn. “She almost found one.”
Ashlyn lets out a shaky laugh that turns into another sob. “I didn’t even want to go,” she says. “I just wanted it to stop hurting.”
Damien exhales slowly as he helps her sit up, his grip never leaving her.
“That’s enough,” he says. “We all knew this would be dangerous when we set out. At first light, we burn what's left, then move on. We'll be the ones hunting her from here on.”
The dragon growls beneath his words, restless and furious, and I glance at the frost still clinging stubbornly to the edges of the room, to the place where the mirror stood, now nothing but frosted stone and splintered metal.
“She’ll be back,” I whisper.
Red meets my gaze. “Yes.”
Ashlyn wipes her face with the heel of her hand and sniffs. “Cool...cool... Love that for us.”
Despite everything, a weak laugh escapes me. I pull her into a fierce hug, holding her like the world can’t take her if I don’t let go.
“Next time,” I murmur into her hair, “we stab first.”
She laughs wetly. “Deal.”
The tower settles again, quieter now, but no longer peaceful, the night pressing close around us with teeth bared. She knows we're coming now. Let's see what she's got.