Yao frowned as he sat up in bed, still unable to sleep. The question Instructor Quan had asked him that morning was still bouncing around in his head, distracting him from enjoying the soft weight of summer night. She hadn't asked him anything else, hadn’t explained what she meant. She merely joined them in the exercise and when they were done, Yao went for his final lesson with Instructor Shen. 

He didn’t see her for the rest of the day.

He didn’t know what cultivation was still. He had tried asking his mother, but she said he would understand the more he did it. How was he supposed to answer a question he didn’t understand? Yao pouted, glancing out the open door to the courtyard beyond. It was the one thing he liked about summer; it was cool enough at night that the door would be left open to encourage the night air to chase away the heat from the day. As such, he could hear the sounds from the pond better. 

Slowly, Yao stood, careful not to wake his mother in the next room. He considered going to the lake, it had been a long time since he checked on his collection, but shook his head. She had made him promise not to go to the lake without her now that he was marked. Carefully, Yao stepped outside, slowly walking toward the garden. He would just look at the carp, watch them swim in their lazy circles until he was tired enough to go back to sleep. 

The stones in the courtyard were still warm beneath his feet from the long summer day, and Yao took his time stepping across them, careful not to make too much noise. He didn’t need to worry about the carp. They never startled, not even when he dropped a pebble into the water just to see the ripples. He just didn’t want to worry the adults. 

Soon he got to the edge of the pond and he laid down next to the clear water. The fish stirred lazily in the shadows, gliding beneath the lily pads and Yao barely noticed as one seemed to drift toward him. Its scales shimmered faintly under the moonlight, but not in the same dull way the others reflected light. This one seemed to glow, as though the silver of the moon had pooled just beneath its skin. It glided forward again, coming closer to the edge, until it was nearly touching the stone where Yao lay. 

Yao sat up slightly, resting his chin on his hands to get a better look at the fish. He had never seen one like that before, not even earlier when they were training next to the pond. Weren’t all the carp in their pond black?

“Yao.”

Yao blinked, glancing around to see who said his name. 

“You want to be a dragon like me, right?” 

Yao slowly turned his head back toward the pond. The fish was still there, hovering just beneath the surface, its silver shape clearer now, glowing not with reflected moonlight but something deeper, something inside. The voice had come from nowhere, or maybe from everywhere at once, but it was soft and calm.

“You can be a dragon.”

The fish didn’t open its mouth, didn’t move or gap like the fish that were sometimes pulled from the pond, but Yao was certain the voice was coming from the fish in front of him. His eyes widened in surprise and he felt his heart pound in his chest. 

“I have a gift for you. Something only you can use.”

“Me?” Yao finally answered, watching as the fish swam closer to the edge of the pond, lifting its fins out of the water onto the stone. It finally opened its mouth and he watched in surprise as a small mirror fell out of the carp’s mouth. It was barely the size of his palm and shaped like a teardrop, the surface smooth and polished, rimmed with the same pale silver as the fish’s scales. It clinked softly against the stone, no louder than a pebble in the dirt, and Yao flinched at the sound, glancing quickly back toward the house.

No one stirred. He turned back to the fish. It hadn’t moved, and the mirror lay only a finger’s breadth from where his hand rested.

“You have special blood and a special soul, Yao, that is a blessing and a curse. Blood that will make others want to control you.” The fish continued and Yao watched as it slid back into the water. “But you are not the first. The mirror will let you see the past. The past of others like you.”

“Like me?” Yao felt silly with all his questions. Instructor Shen always told him he needed to be more firm and he did his best to swallow his awe and wonder. “How does it work?”

“When you need an answer, the mirror will help you.” the fish replied and Yao frowned, finally picking it up. It felt cool in his palm, not cold like water or stone, but cool the way shade felt on a hot day. It was heavier than it looked too, the kind of weight that made Yao instinctively curl his fingers tighter around it, afraid it might slip away. The polished surface shimmered faintly, and as he tilted it, he could see the moon reflected perfectly within it. But his own face wasn’t there.

Just the moon.

He turned the mirror left, then right. Still no reflection of himself. He tried holding it close, then far, and even raised it high over his head before setting it gently back down on the stone. Maybe it was broken. Maybe it only worked at certain times. Maybe he wasn’t holding it right. But when he glanced back at the fish for clarification, it was already gone. Only the ripples remained, a faint widening ring on the pond’s surface, already beginning to fade.

“I don’t know what to do,” he whispered, the words slipping past his lips before he even realized he was speaking again. He sat on the smooth stone, balancing the mirror in his hands. How was he supposed to use this? What did the fish mean, special blood and soul? 

As the thought crossed his mind, Yao noticed the surface of the mirror shimmered, and he saw a face in the smooth glass. He eagerly lifted it up, wanting to get a better look at himself.

But it wasn’t his face.

It was the face of a boy about his age, but this boy had piercing green eyes and brown hair that was styled in a way Yao didn’t recognize. He wore robes more colorful and heavy than Yao had ever seen, and he was looking away, looking up toward someone else. 

“Is Mother coming to visit soon?” The boy’s voice was similar to his own and it made Yao frown to see the look on his face. This boy's eyes held the sort of hope that had already been disappointed once, maybe twice, and didn’t want to be again. “You said she would visit this week.”

“She plans to, but you know it's hard for a cultivator to find time.” A man’s voice rang out from the mirror, and Yao jumped, pressing it to his chest to soften the sound. However, there were no sounds of the adults stirring, no one shouting to know who was there. “She spends a lot of time helping to protect you.”

“I know! When I get my mark, Ima fight those demonic bad guys too!” the boy beamed and Yao felt his heart pound, still nervous that someone would hear the voices from the mirror. Yet at the same time, he couldn’t stop watching. He loosened his grip slightly, letting the mirror tilt back into the moonlight.

The boy in the mirror grinned, his small fists clenched at his sides, practically vibrating with excitement. But his smile didn’t last. The moment the man reached out to tousle his hair, the boy’s expression faltered.

“You don’t have to fight,” the man said softly. “You just have to grow up.”

“But growing up’s too slow,” the boy muttered, his voice slipping into a whisper, almost too quiet to hear. “I want to help now.”

The mirror shimmered again, and Yao could see the moon’s reflection once more. Was that what the fish meant when it said it would show him the past? The boy’s robes had looked strange, too, like the ones in the old wall scrolls, not anything he or his cousins would wear. Yao looked down at the mirror again, angling it this way and that, but the surface remained still now.

Yao felt tears in his eyes. He still didn’t understand. He didn’t know why the mirror showed him that, what the fish meant. Why was the boy so excited to get marks that Yao hated? None of it made sense, and the more Yao stared at the mirror, the heavier it felt in his hands. 

The wind shifted gently, brushing through the reeds near the pond and curling across his shoulders like a soft breath. Yao shivered and held the mirror closer to his chest again. The stone beneath him had cooled, no longer warm from the day, and he could feel the night settling in, heavy and quiet. Even the carp left in the pond had stopped moving. He glanced at the water. The silver one was still gone.

“I don’t want to be special,” Yao whispered, almost too quiet for even himself to hear. “I just want everything to go back to the way it was.”

“I’m sorry, but things can never go back.”

Yao looked to see that the fish was back, but this time it was already up on the stone, laying on its side as it looked at him. The tears finally spilled over to his cheeks and Yao bit his lip to keep from sobbing. 

“Why? I didn’t want this! I–”

“Neither did your mother.”

The mention of his mother made Yao stop, even as the tears continued down his cheek. His mother… didn’t want to be a cultivator? But he could tell she enjoyed it. She was good at it, everyone said so. So how could she not want it?

“Your mother wanted a different life, but she accepted her marks because they allow her to keep you safe. She simply never let them define her.” the fish continued and Yao noticed how its eyes seemed to be locked on his. As if it could actually see him. “You need to know who you want to be as well, Yao. And like your mother, never let the world take that answer from you.”

What kind of cultivator do you want to be?

Yao watched as the fish slid back into the water and just as quickly, it disappeared again. The boy sat for a moment longer, thinking over what the mirror had shown him and what Instructor Quan had asked. Then slowly, Yao stood, still holding the mirror close to his chest as he walked back to the open door. His mother’s door remained closed, but her soft breathing reached him now that he was closer. 

Who you want to be.

He slipped under the blanket and stared at the ceiling for a moment before turning to face the open door again. The mirror rested in his hands, and he tucked it beneath his pillow. He didn’t want to lose it, and he didn’t want anyone else to find it.

He would figure it all out tomorrow.