Page 67 of Strange Lights

“What is that thing?” Zara asks, looking at my glove.

I hold it up, flex my fingers, the silver glinting in the few fluorescent lights that remain unbroken. The swirling shadows running along the cracks of the silver surface seem to consume the light. When I flex my fingers and twist my wrist, miniature voids are visible in every joint. The thing is like a black hole, dangerous, dark. But I’m more fascinated than scared.

“A Gauntlet,” I answer Zara. “Protection. A weapon.”

She shakes her head. “It’s wrong. It’s bad.”

“No,” I say. “It’s freedom. It’s power. It will save us.”

I’ll let word reach my mother before I show her what I’ve done. The first thing I do is add protection⁠—spells to tie this thing to me. I don’t think anyone but me could use it, in any case, with the way it’s tied to my own magical signature. But I add an old blood spell to key it to my specific magic, to ensure no one else can use it. I’m not stupid, and I know the first thing my mother will do is try to take this from me.

Between the lab I destroyed and the guards I punished, I’m convinced Adele will know within hours, if not minutes, what I’ve done. I don’t wait long enough for her to come to me, though. This will be on my terms. I stalk through the halls to her office. No one is allowed to go in without express permission. It’s an impressive space. A long hallway leading to a cavernous opening in the cliff face. The open side is a wall entirely made of magically shielded glass. It gives the impression it’s open air, that Adele might throw you off the cliff face on a whim if you piss her off. It’s a facade of danger that doesn’t scare me anymore after a taste of the real thing.

The guard stationed at the entrance tries to prevent my intrusion, but with a flick of my hand, he’s writhing on the ground, screaming in agony. No one tries to stop me after that, and I stalk my way down the hallway.

Adele is pacing by the glass wall, staring up at the stars. The last vestiges of a wistful look are still in her eyes as she takes in my approach and I shut the door carefully behind me. Several members of her personal guard, her perpetual shadows, linger.

“Out,” I command. They don’t move, and Adele laughs.

“You don’t get to give those orders,” Adele says.

Adele eyes my gloved hand without surprise as I raise my arm. She watches with clinical interest at first, and then something like hope crosses her eyes as I force the guards to leave.

“I was right. You had it in you all along. You simply needed the right motivation.”

“I will no longer be tailed by guards like I’m a child who needs a babysitter. Give me back my sisters. I’ll do what I like, when I choose, how I choose.”

“Or what, Regina?” Adele says scathingly.

I want to crush her, wrap the metal hand around her throat, and squeeze until I crush the life from her. Instead, I remember amber eyes and promises I didn’t keep. I won’t let her wield me as a weapon any longer. I won’t let her make me a murderer. So I settle for reaching with the magic. It’s harder with her, and I’m not sure why. I grit my teeth and grab, holding on with all my might as she tries to wriggle away.

Her mind is slippery as an eel, familiar yet foreign. I know her almost as intimately as I know myself, yet she feels almost alien. Maybe her mind is something more, after all. Her pupils dilate and she hisses, but she won’t give me the satisfaction of watching her scream.

“Or I will hurt you. I will make you suffer. I’ll take you apart slowly until there’s nothing left,” I say, stepping close, pulling my mask off with my free hand. Keeping my eyes cold, I lean in and whisper my threats. She falters, a single unsteady step, her nostrils flaring as I drop my hand.

“Impressive. You can try, but there’s hardly any of me left for you to take,” she says, recovering her composure.

My Gauntlet twitches, then starts to rise, dragging my arm along with it. I growl and yank my hand back. Rather, I try to yank my hand back. My control over my own arm fails me.

“What’s happening?” I whisper. It points toward Adele, my own fingers curling uselessly inside the Gauntlet.

“You will do as I wish,” she says.

My free hand scrabbles at the cool metal of the Gauntlet as I try in vain to remove it.

“I don’t think so, Regina. Weapons stay on you at all times.”

She’s breathing hard, nearly panting with effort, but she’s smiling. Her hand is outstretched, mirroring my own, mirroring the Gauntlet’s actions.

“No, no, no, no⁠—” I gasp. “I keyed it to me, only me.” I desperately pull and flail, but my arm remains stuck as if in quicksand. I don’t understand what mistake I made. I don’t understand how this is possible.

“We’re the same, you and I. My blood in your veins. Of course I can use the weapon you made for me,” Adele says.

Same. One. Of course.

That can’t be right. It shouldn’t work like that, but somehow Adele is still controlling my arm, this weapon. Even my subconscious agrees with her. My stomach turns as other implications run through my mind.

I have no control, am only along for the ride when the Gauntlet gently replaces my mask. When she calls in the guards. When she makes me demonstrate what the Gauntlet can do on one of them. Then a second. And a third. The pain stops only when I stop fighting her, when I perform of my own accord. A numb acquiescence sinks over me. I only stop when they are all terrified of me.