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What did they mean? The dragon was only the beginning? Cole and I had barely survived it. If there were more on the way, we were in trouble.
“It will last.” A pause. “I willnotallow her to be taken again.”
For the hundredth time, I wished I knew what had happened. The people of Hell believed I—the former queen—had abandoned them. Yet the pain in Cole’s voice was unmistakable.Taken?
“I pray you will have that choice,” Hecate replied. “Last time, she made it for you.”
The topic was dropped, and the two shifted the conversation to more stately matters. I didn’t have time to waste. I moved from my listening spot and moved farther into Hecate’s chambers.
Sneaking through her space felt wrong. It was a betrayal.
At least I didn’t have to kiss her to do it.
The structure was unlike anything else I’d come across in the palace. The rooms were winding without rhyme or reason. A door would as easily open to a small cleaning cabinet as an impossibly large empty room or even a stone wall. One room held a green bubbling cauldron that seemed almost stereotypical. But no mirror.
The items that dotted the hall were old. The underworld in general had a mix of ages, which I supposed made sense. People died all the time. Some had been here for centuries, like Stefan, while I was a newcomer. And Hecate… Cole had never told me how old Hecate was exactly, but she might’ve been the oldest creature in the kingdom.
Hecate’s bedroom was obvious once I reached it. Instead of wood, a door of carefully carved gold opened into a medium-sized room. The space was immaculate, though a gut feeling said it was maintained by enchantment rather than any servant being allowed in to tidy up. Purple swaths of fabric were draped over every wall, varying shades overlapping over every inch.
The air seemed to drip with magic. As if simply by sleeping in the room, Hecate’s magic had permeated every stone and piece of furniture.
I stiffened, walking into the room.
I’d felt bad for trespassing through the other rooms. Yet now, the wrongness of my violation was a physical sensation. As if the very space could sense I was an intruder and wanted to shove me out.
Instinct told me the Many Moon Mirror would be here. I hadn’t come across any other obvious scrying tools throughout the other rooms.
I walked farther into the room. My stomach clenched at what I was about to do. But Daphne’s life was on the line. The stupid bargain I’d made wouldn’t compel me forward even if I’d had a choice.
Just find it, scry, and get out. And pray the completion of the bargain would free me to run and tell Hecate and Cole what I’d done.
The mirror wasn’t present on any obvious surface. I opened desk drawers and checked under her pillow. Nothing. My search grew more desperate. If it wasn’t here, I was in trouble. There were too many rooms for me to search for all of them before Phaidros’s midnight deadline.
Think, Avery. Where would she hide a super-powerful mirror?
I scanned the room, hoping an idea would spark.
Then it became obvious.
Hecate wouldn’t leave out the Many Moon Mirror. She was the most powerful enchantress in the realm. She’d use her magic to tuck it away somewhere.
How was I going to out-magic my teacher?I’d finally tapped into some of my base power of life, but that was no counter to Hecate’s enchanting.
The first thing was just to try and find it. I shut my eyes and concentrated. The entire room was dripping in magic, more so than anywhere else. What if it was more than the fact Hecate lived here? What if it was meant to camouflage a blatant use of magic, like a spell?
The magic was not evenly dispersed throughout the room. It thickened and thinned in patches. My steps were light as I circled the room, trying to pick up on the heaviest concentration.
The vanity. I sat in the seat and ran my hands over the wood, trying to find something further out of the ordinary.
The mirror attached was large and obviously didn’t match the demon’s description. The glass reflected my disheveled appearance. Still, magic pulsed in the air.
Where better for Hecate to hide the mirror than within another mirror?
I rested my hands on the glass and pushed. The glass didn’t give.
But my hands left no fingerprints behind either.
There was no reason to be so sure, but pure instinct said I was correct. The Moon Magic Mirror was within this one.
