Chapter 2 — The Mirror and the Flame

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“Every empire hides its truth behind glass. Break it—and you’ll find the fire that keeps it alive.”

The corridors burned.

Seraphine ran barefoot over cold marble slick with ash and fallen petals. Behind her, the palace roared — a thousand years of history devoured by flame. She clutched the edge of her cloak, the one her mother had fastened before the festival, now torn and singed at the hem.

“Your Highness, this way!” Captain Lioren’s voice was hoarse over the thunder of collapsing beams. The guards pushed open the iron doors that led to the inner courtyard, where moonlight still reached through the smoke.

But as they crossed the threshold, Seraphine halted.

The air trembled — not with heat, but sound.
A low hum. A song beneath the chaos.
The same voice that had whispered through the mirror.

—Do you see it now, little one? The flame that does not burn?

She turned. Through the veil of smoke, she saw it — the mirror again. Somehow it had followed her, or perhaps she had never left it. Its surface shimmered, reflecting not the burning hall but a field of endless night. And within that night, something moved — a figure cloaked in shadow, walking toward her.

“Your Highness!” Lioren’s hand gripped her shoulder. “We must go!”

The figure in the mirror raised a hand, palm outward. The glass rippled.

Seraphine reached back—
And the world split open.

❈ The Other Side

Silence.

The fire was gone. The air was cold, almost brittle.
Seraphine opened her eyes to find herself standing in a place that wasn’t her world — an endless plain of black stone and drifting light, where stars floated like fireflies caught in amber. The sky was neither night nor day, but both.

At the horizon stood a boy.

He looked no older than her, perhaps a year more, with dark hair that shimmered faintly blue where the starlight touched. His eyes were the color of storm clouds, strange and sharp. A faint mark glowed over his right wrist — a sigil shaped like a crescent swallowing the sun.

When he spoke, his voice was calm, steady. “You shouldn’t be here yet.”

“Who are you?” Seraphine demanded, her voice echoing in the vast emptiness. “Where is this?”

He tilted his head, studying her. “Between what is real and what is remembered. The mirror’s heart.”
Then, after a pause: “You’ve touched it too soon.”

“I didn’t—” she began, but the words caught. Her chest felt heavy, like she’d swallowed light. “What do you mean too soon?”

He stepped closer. “You are the Heir of Dusk. The one fated to open the Gate when the suns align. But your blood isn’t ready. The flame will burn you if you try to wield it now.”

Her heart pounded. “Then send me back.”

“I can’t,” he said simply. “Not yet.”

❈ The Boy of Shadows

They stood in uneasy silence for a moment, surrounded by quiet stars.
Seraphine’s instincts screamed caution — but also something deeper: familiarity.

“What’s your name?” she asked.

He hesitated. “Kael.”

“Kael of where?”

“Nowhere that exists anymore.”

The answer made her shiver. His tone wasn’t proud or defiant — it was mournful, as if he carried the ashes of an entire world on his tongue.

He reached out a hand. “Come. The flame is waking. You need to learn to survive it.”

She didn’t move. “Why should I trust you?”

Kael’s eyes flickered with faint amusement. “You already have. You followed the mirror.”

And before she could reply, the ground beneath them shifted — the stone cracking into molten lines that pulsed like veins. The stars dimmed. From the fissures rose whispers — fragments of voices calling her name.

Her name — and something else. Elarion.

Seraphine clutched her head. “What is that? What’s happening?”

Kael’s hand closed over hers, and heat surged through her arm — not pain, but pure force. A wave of light burst from her skin, scattering the whispers. The cracks sealed shut.

When she opened her eyes, Kael was watching her with a mixture of awe and fear. “You controlled it,” he said softly. “No one ever controls it the first time.”

“What is it?”

“The Flame of Dusk,” Kael said. “The power of what came before — and what will come again. It burns through all that denies it.”

She frowned. “You speak in riddles.”

“That’s because truth isn’t safe to speak plainly anymore.”

❈ Back Through the Glass

The starlit plain began to fade, replaced by the faint glow of torches and the clang of distant battle.
Kael looked toward the horizon, where light was tearing through the darkness like dawn reborn.

“They’re calling you back,” he said quietly. “Your world still needs you.”

Seraphine’s throat tightened. “Will I see you again?”

“You will,” Kael said. “When the two suns meet in one sky, and the mirror no longer reflects.”

Before she could ask what he meant, he pressed something into her palm — a small shard of crystal, faintly warm, humming with that same impossible music.

Then the ground fell away.

❈ The Courtyard of Smoke

She gasped as her eyes flew open.
The smell of fire returned. The palace courtyard loomed around her, half in ruin. Lioren knelt beside her, relief and panic warring on his face.

“By the gods—you vanished, Your Highness! You were gone for—” He glanced at the sky, blinking. “Minutes? Hours? I—”

Seraphine sat up, her hands trembling. In her palm, the shard of crystal glowed faintly.

She closed her fingers around it before he could see. “Where are my parents?”

“They’re safe. But the enemy… we don’t know who struck us. They came from the northern spire — cloaked in shadow, their blades burned with blue fire.”

Her heart thudded once.

Blue fire.

She rose to her feet. “We have to reach them.”

Lioren nodded, but when he looked at her — at her eyes — his breath caught.
For just a moment, her irises flickered with silver flame.

Seraphine didn’t notice. All she could feel was the echo of Kael’s voice, soft and distant.

—The flame does not burn. It remembers.