Nightspire slept beneath a velvet sky when the messenger stone vibrated against my bedside table. Its gentle chime thrummed along bone until dreams scattered. I rose, waved a touch‑spark over the shard, and Auron's face shimmered in miniature: pale, wind‑blown hair, eyes stark.
"Forgive rousing you," his voice murmured from the gem, "but my first night among the Isles brought a visitor—a woman carved of living mirror. She asked after Dawnroot Glen, spoke of 'roots still hungry.' Then she shattered into starlight. I fear the void has not closed."
His image faded before questions formed. The stone cooled. My chambers, newly filled with lilac cuttings awaiting sunrise planting, suddenly felt too tight. I slipped on travel leathers, summoned a candle of jade flame, and threaded through dark halls toward the Mirror Wing.
The corridors kept their hush, though the mirrors no longer pulsed violently. After our terrace purge, they'd mellowed to gentle reflections. Yet as I passed, each pane's surface rippled, showing not my face but fragments of far‑off waves, cliffs, moonlit vines. The Isles.
At the Chrona Glass obelisk, Ravan already waited, silver cloak thrown over bare shoulders and hair unbound. He touched the glass, brows drawn. A thin crack spiraled outward like frost.
"Auron's warning?" I asked, stepping beside him. He nodded. "Mirror wraith visited him. Not my former bride—another shade. It asked, 'Where do roots feed when sap dries?'"
I pictured the spontaneous root‑iron blade from Ashvale's fringe, the way it thirsted for purpose. "The void offers power to what feels forgotten," I said, recalling the Archivist's caution. "Dawnroot Glen thrives, but peripheral soil still carries grief. That's an opening."
Silver eyes caught mine. "We need to walk the Glen's shadows."
The idea of leaving Nightspire again so soon felt weighty; still, ignoring specters never ends well. I called Calia from sleep, left her instructions to continue rooftop planting at dawn. Vael prepared flight harnesses—since mirror‑gate risked further fractures we would fly by night, hugging the ley‑line rivers that glowed like molten lightning in the dark.
We departed before the first rooster crow: Ravan and I astride twin nightmare steeds; Vael and two sky‑scouts flanking. Night air slapped cheeks, carrying scent of volcanic ash that slowly diluted into earth and dew as we crossed the Veil. Ahead, the faint twin sunrise cast the horizon in watercolor layers—lavender for original sun, opal for Afterlight.
The Glen appeared like a patch of fallen moon: silver grass waving in windless predawn, mirror seed now a slender trunk of crystalline bark, leaves translucent and faintly humming. Graygrain rows shot green across fields; penitent priests walked irrigation ditches with lanterns, their faces radiant with pride.
Yet something felt wrong. My boots sank deeper into earth than yesterday—soil sodden. When a priest approached to greet us, his lantern illuminated puddles reflecting stars though sky overhead was beginning to pale. Water shouldn't mirror constellations at dawn.
Ravan knelt, pressing palm into puddle. The reflection swirled, becoming a vortex of glass shards. He yanked hand back before they sliced skin. "Pocket mirrors," he muttered. "Thousands, seeding through irrigation channels."
We followed the ditch upstream to the central fountain, where stream pipes fed fields. There, the stone basin that once sparked with gentle dawn glimmer now churned with liquid mirror. Mirror seed roots dipped deep beneath waterline—the crystal trunk resonating like a bell struck from within.
I counted heartbeats—every toll pulsed outward, and puddles across field brightened. Children still slept in tents nearby; if mirrors burst, shards would scythe through canvas like knives through parchment.
"Cut the flow," I commanded. Vael's scouts sprang toward lever pumps while I circled basin, chanting binding glyphs. But the liquid mirror resisted, thick as mercury. When my soul‑fire touched it, ripples formed silhouettes: faceless gardeners bearing scythes of glass.
The silhouettes climbed water surface, limbs splashing into shape, then stepped free, dripping shards. Mirror‑wraiths again, but these looked emaciated, hungry. The first slashed at me; I parried with dawn‑scarred blade. It cracked but didn't shatter; their composition tougher, fused with root‑iron thirst.
Ravan's shadow coiled, snaring three wraiths at once, crushing them to powder, yet powder slithered toward grass, veins of root‑iron singing acceptance. The field itself threatened complicity.
Archivist's voice echoed memory: roots ask who keeps us? They'd received answer yesterday—but hunger remained for those on edges.
"Draw them to trunk," I called. Maybe mirror seed could reabsorb corrupted reflections, balancing.
We pulled back, feinting. Wraiths followed, swirling into column that spiraled around crystal tree. Trunk brightened, absorbing shards, but bark strained, cracks spidering. If it shattered, glen would become mirror sea.
A deeper solution demanded sacrifice again. I pressed palm to bark; signals raced through scar, weaving with crystal lattice. I offered the empty space inside—ache where laughter was lost—and the tree drank, sealing cracks. Mirror liquid drained back toward fountain, which hardened to dull stone.
But void inside me deepened, a hollow echoing with foreign stars. I wavered, knees buckling. Ravan caught me, channeling his shadow into my ribcage like brace beams propping roof. Balance returned enough to breathe.
"We must find root source of hunger," he whispered. "This field cannot rely on your memories forever."
I nodded, dizzy but resolute. We summoned priests, ward‑smiths, and children—now awake, frightened but brave. I led them in circle around fountain, each person laying an object of promise into dirt: a spoon newly earned, a shard of wing‑shell, a promise written on cloth. These pledges, infused with living intention, would anchor roots to community rather than emptiness.
Calia's absence pricked me—wish she could witness—but rooftop garden still needed her. I poured last of phoenix‑tear water into basin; priests chanted forgiveness hymns.
Dawn proper burst over hills. This time Afterlight did not follow. Instead, sky remained single‑toned blue for first morning since arrow's flight. I feared—was Afterlight gone? Yet children pointed south, gasping. Across ocean a second dawn shimmered, separate track as though finding new nest. Afterlight relocated, granting Glen moment under single sun.
I interpreted: Custodians repositioned probation lines, testing. Good sign.
We spent rest of day cleaning ditches, lining them with ceramic shards etched with dual runes—mirror cannot copy what bears balanced sigils. Vael buried root‑iron fragment near trunk inside lead-and-glass coffin, insulating.
Toward sunset I visited edges where spontaneous root‑iron had sprouted earlier. Shoots looked normal now, no metallic glint. I whispered gratitude, hoping they'd understand caretaker had heard their hunger and answered with promises, not power.
On flight back, exhaustion stole voice. Ravan wrapped cloak round both of us as nightmare steeds cut through clouds tinged peach. He spoke softly, as if fearing to disturb stars. "You keep giving pieces of yourself."
"I still have many pieces," I answered, half‑smile. "But yes, we need new strategy—collective stewardship, not single martyr."
He kissed scarred palm, sealing vow. "Tomorrow we convene joint guild: farmers, magi, children. Glen will choose guardians."
Nightspire lights flickered on horizon. When we landed, Calia awaited on terrace, hands stained with soil. She'd planted first lilac beside glass‑vine sprout; fragrance mingled sharp and sweet.
"I saved blossoms for your return," she said, eyes shining.
I inhaled the scent. The hollow within eased—for laughter born today would one day echo again, filling space memory left. And as moon rose, carrying faint opal reflection of relocated Afterlight, I realized the sky, too, was learning balance: letting each realm own dawn without erasing the other.
Inside palace halls, Mirror Wing glass stood silent. Archivist met us with tired smile. "Roots quieter?"
"For now." I squeezed Ravan's hand. "But we all keep watch—and we'll teach the field to sing its own lullabies, untempted by hollow stars."
I went to bed believing that was possible, candle flickering over new lilac in vase, scent anchoring me toward dreams where children's voices might one day find way back, not to be bartered, but freely returned by life itself.
And in that dream, I heard the seeds whisper: We grow because you do.