“Come with me?” he asked.
She gently slipped her hand into his and let him guide her back through the ruins. She knew where they were heading long before they reached the lone-standing building. They climbed the stairs and saw the burned corpse of a tree that had been the symbol of the Leifs of Aonia.
And there it was across the giant room.
The Mirror of Truth.
A mirror that was a talisman to tell you what you wanted to know.
A talisman that drove a person mad if they dared look inside.
Dean had looked inside. His madness had come later.
This mirror had stood the test of time. It had stayed immaculate despite the destruction of the city. It gleamed as if polished to a shine daily despite no one living here in years.
And now…it was shattered.
23
The Truth
“How?” Cyrene gasped, staring at the destroyed mirror.
She rushed across the enormous room, too shocked at the destruction for sense. Dean reached her before she could get too close. He grasped her around the middle and tugged her against him.
“Don’t,” he commanded. “Don’t look in it. We don’t know if it still works like this. Or if it is even more twisted than its original format.”
Her breathing was ragged. She released her tension into his arms. How had she been so compelled to run over there? How had she had no sense at all? She’d been so desperate to see it…she hadn’t even stopped to think.
“A trap, I think,” Dean said.
Cyrene’s mind cleared. “Malysa.”
“She must have guessed that you would come here.”
Cyrene’s brows came together in anger. Malysa had set the trap, and Cyrene had nearly walked right into it. She would have if Dean hadn’t been there.
“Thank you,” she said, gently disentangling herself. “I suppose you have proven that I need your help.”
“I don’t revel in that knowledge,” he said. “It means she wants you dead…or entranced. I think I only saved you because I do not feel the pull of the mirror any longer now that I know the Truth. Not just what it shows.”
“What is the truth?” she asked him softly.
“That nothing comes free.” That great shock of electricity appeared in his palm. “That earning something does not mean it belongs to you. And what was given can just as easily be taken away.”
Cyrene frowned at his words. The hollow ache in them. The barely suppressed anger. What had happened in Domara to elicit such a reaction?
“Magic came for a price for me,” she whispered. “At the cost of my parents and Maelia and Daufina and the life I knew. It cost me suffering. Immense suffering. And I chose it anyway.”
“Yes, I chose it anyway,” he said as if he could understand that. “In Domara, the gods could never imagine breeding with a human.”
“Breeding?” Cyrene asked. “Like a prized mare.”
“Precisely. They’re too worried about controlling who has the power. They would never do what Benetta did and dilute their blood with others.”
“Dilute,” Cyrene whispered.
“Yes. They want pure Doma only. Magic thus is bestowed by the gods as a gift. They can give or take these gifts from people as they see fit, depending on their deeds. It’s not a permanent thing, and you are always at their mercy.”
Cyrene bit her lip, imagining a world like this. “No wonder Malysa wanted…still wants to rule us. She sees us as no better.”
He nodded. “After spending years in Domara, I see exactly how she could feel that way. What’s truly amazing is that Vera is not that way. I have never met a full-blooded Doma who was anything less than a conceited, arrogant prick, who thinks the sun shines out of their ass.”
“I know quite a few mere mortals who believe that, too.”
“They take it to a new level,” he insisted.
“You were bestowed a gift,” she said, gesturing to his clenched fist. “The Mirror showed you how to get it.”
“Yes,” he ground out. “A gift is what they call it. What it really is…is slavery.”
Cyrene’s eyes widened. “Excuse me?”
“When a god gives you a gift, they own you. You are their Daijan.”
“Oh Dean,” she murmured. “I’m so sorry.”
He turned away from her kind words. “I still…I can’t tell you what I went through with that bitch. Valesamy,” he spat the name as if it burned him to speak it. “I don’t…I’m not…”
“Shh,” she insisted, reaching out and tenderly brushing a hand down his arm. “You don’t have to. I never should have pushed you to.”
“No, I wanted to. I wanted you to know. I’ve been through hell and back, Cyrene. I’ve seen and done things that I am not proud of. I was a hardened man because of it, and you brought me back out of it. You showed me who I could be again. I’m grateful.” He sighed and reached for her hand. “But, if I have to become what she created me to be to win this war, to kill a pure-blooded Doma…again, then I will do that for you, too.”
Again.
The word rang out so clear.
He had killed a Doma in Domara.
He knew how to kill a Doma from Domara.
Then she blinked and saw the man standing before her and not the weapon. “If you have to become whatever she made you, then we do not deserve to win this war.”
“Cyrene…”
“No.” She silenced him. “If we have to become as bad as Malysa to win, then what would be the point? We’ll do it together as we are or not at all.”
He searched her face, reading every sincerity that she’d uttered etched into her skin and her eyes and lips. He nodded once.
“Together,” he agreed.
She reached for his hand and pulled him from the Mirror of Truth. Let it stay shattered. It had never shown reality anyway.
With Sarielle and Halcyon out hunting together, Cyrene and Dean decided to just make the hike through the woods into Fen. It was only a couple of hours away, and it was more important for the dragons to be fed anyway.
Cyrene felt the barrier they had erected around the village of Fen before she saw the first outline of a home. Her steps quickened as she approached. A faint flutter appeared in her stomach, the closer she got. It had been a long time since she went to this small village in the north, Ahlvie’s home. But she had fond memories, and her blood seemed to activate at the sight.
Bloodbreaker.
That was what she had been here. Her friends and the Ancient Ones had funneled magic into her bloodstream to try to break the curse from her blood magic. It had never been done before, but she had survived. And they had named her something as ostentatious as her sword.
But that wasn’t why she was so excited.
It was the people within that she was most excited to see.
And when the first person she saw was a small girl with a wheat-colored braid, a bright smile, and unquenchable enthusiasm, she rushed forward.
“Cal,” she cried.
The girl’s face lit up, and her jaw dropped open. “Cyrene?”
Then the girl was running and threw herself into Cyrene’s arm. Cyrene held Cal to her tight, blinking away tears. Caldreva was a reminder of all the work she wanted to do for this world. What she wanted to create so that Cal could grow up in a better one than what Cyrene had.