Page 268 of Commanding Scythe and Sky

An amused purr.

Insane. Certifiably insane. This had to be some kind of captivity-induced psychosis.

Maybe I wasn’t so far off from Ally in that sense—a little mad by the end of all this.

Left, right, right, straight—one turn after another, heart hammering too loudly to hear my own footsteps over stone, I followed the ruby’s nudges. I rounded the final corner so fast I nearly collided face-first into a towering wall.

A whimper slipped out as I stared wide-eyed at the final dead end. A road to nowhere. And I’d be lucky if the ruby could guide me all the way back.

Only…

There were runes. My fingers found them quickly, tracing their outlines in the dark as an effervescent light hummed beneath my skin, casting harsh lines over the rough facade.

A gate. The telltale arch of runic symbols marked a gate.

My heart leapt, eyes scouring the carvings as I tried to make sense of them.

Something about blood. Fate. A curse…

“Ouch!” The ruby, still clutched in my other hand, nipped the soft flesh of my palm. I glared down at it, mouth agape. “You just bit me,” I complained, earning another indignant buzz.

Blood. Of course.

Feeling half crazy, half brilliant, and half fucking hysterical, I smeared my bloody palm across the stones—and cursed when it worked. Just like Hazelharbor, the runes flared silvery blue, the floor rattling beneath my shoes as the gate slid inward.

Bit by bit, the entrance revealed itself while dust fell like snow over my shoulders.

The hair along my neck rose, my stomach dipping with the sense that I was about to fall a very long way. The ruby didn’t buzz now; it hummed—purred—as if this were where it had always belonged. So I stepped forward.

Into a library. A stunning circular room wrapped in floor-to-ceiling cherrywood shelves, all lined with tomes so ancient it was a wonder they remained intact. Only magic could preserve relics like these. Mouth hanging open, I stepped deeper inside and gasped when the fireplace burst to life, followed by the torches mounted along the walls, bathing the room in flickering warmth.

My hand flew over my mouth as I reached the center of the hidden alcove, turning in a slow circle until I landed on…

A mirror?

A beautifully ornate slab of warped black stone that… didn’t reflect me.

Empty. Save for the shelves behind it. Shadowed and dark, but those images…

Whirling, I scoured the portraits hanging between the books—not paintings, but magic-rendered images against faded metal. It took an incredible witch to cast enchantments of that caliber. My attention snagged on one familiar face that haunted nearly every waking moment.

Only…

He was young. So, so young. Missing the weight of his current burdens.

A soft thud jerked my attention back to the broken mirror. A book lay splayed across the stone floor, its pages open and…

Blank.

Brow furrowed, I closed the distance and snatched up the petal-soft leather cover. The moment my skin—the blood smeared across it—touched the pages, the telltale metallic-blue glow of magic at work swallowed the book and sent me staggering back.

Magnolia

“Well. That can’t be good.”

I barely heard Lana as she took a cautious step away from the spot where the book had vanished.

Because a figure had appeared in the mirror—someone I’d know in any realm. Any lifetime.