Page 129 of The Mortal Trials

I nod, then speak around the stone lodged in my throat. “I do.”

“That’s why you hate mirrors. Because you see her, and Carina, in your reflection.”

I gesture to his boat. “Please don’t leave me, Cillian. You and Abuela are all I have left.”

The agony in my voice sharpens him and I know that whatever the gods did to make him forget is gone; he remembers wholly now. He digs the pole into the riverbed, faster and faster, until the little boat runs ashore.

I smile, relieved. “Jump onto the ash, not the mud,” I warn him.

Torsten is covered in it beside me as he paces, telling another of their stories. His mother is almost to the shore.

I think about August… Where is he?

Cillian jumps from the bow onto the ash, gazing with wide eyes at all the people still bobbing along in boats in the river. “Why are we here?”

“Because the gods want to punish us.” I push the mud-slick spear into his hands. “Just in case.” My brother takes it and follows me down the riverbank, trudging through the ashfall. “You don’t remember being taken here?”

He shakes his head. “No.”

“We have to get back to the portal, but first, I need to find August.”

Cillian agrees.

August’s loved one was placed on the river farthest from Cillian. He’s beside Niall, whose older sister Fiona is in one of the boats. She appears as no more than a pale specter with rust-colored hair and their mother’s citrine eyes.

Niall finally coaxes her back, but August is struggling to persuade the little boy in his boat. He can’t be more than five or six, and he’s too close to the other shore.

“Is that your brother?” I ask when Cillian and I reach him.

August’s golden sword lays in the ash. He tugs one boot off, then the other. His socks are next to go. He grabs the back of his shirt and rips it over his head. “Nothing’s working. I’ve tried stories, jokes, and even threats. I’m going after him.”

I look down the line of mortals. “Who else jumped in?”

“Peng, I think.”

I scan the riverbank and don’t see Peng anywhere. “Has he made it back, yet?”

“I don’t know.” August starts toward the water.

I catch his arm. “Sing to him.”

“What?”

Something tells me if August gets in the water, I’ll never see him again. “He’ll know your voice. Your songs. Does he have a favorite?”

August rubs his forehead for a moment and then squares his shoulders. “Yeah. Yeah, he does.” He blows out a tense breath, focuses only on his baby brother, and begins to sing.

I recognize the melody as one he hums at the oikos, but I’ve never heard him sing the words. The lyrics crash over me and drag me under, trapping me in their undertow.

The song he sings – is about me. I cover my mouth with my hand.

Cillian cups my elbow. I twist to look up at him, confused as tears spill down my cheeks. Did he know? The thin pinch of his lips and the pity on his brow tell me he’s heard it before.

My brother knows this song. Knows its words. And he didn’t tell me about it because he knew this was how I’d feel and react. Like this, or far worse, because the lyrics are another sort of mirror and he knows how much I hate my reflection.

August paints my past with strokes that are equally vivid and delicate. Words that are cutting and harsh. Careful and gentle. Each one purposeful.

On his canvas, I’m a phoenix Ares cut down, and he sings the story of how I rose again.