There was a silence that lived beneath the flame.
Not born of fear.
Not made of peace.
But the kind of silence that waits behind your heartbeat.
Selene had heard it before, deep in the chamber beneath Karron, when the First Spark whispered her legacy into fire.
But now, it returned.
Louder.
Heavier.
Because the silence was no longer alone.
It brought a name.
The Mirror.
She first saw it in the dreams.
A woman draped in crimson robes, standing inside a burning city untouched by ash.
Her back always turned.
Hair like her own.
Shoulders familiar.
But never a face.
When Selene called out, the woman would walk away into flame.
Each night, farther.
Each time, colder.
After the fifth dream, Selene ordered her entire room stripped of enchantments.
The drapes burned.
The mirror shattered.
Even the tiles beneath her bed torn up and replaced.
And still, the woman came.
Ingrid reported more intercepted messages.
Letters written in Selene's hand.
Sealed with her crest.
But she had never sent them.
One had reached the chancellor of the Western Isles.
Another delivered to a Drowned Ember outpost.
Each message promised fire.
Each one signed:
S.A.
"Let it burn twice."
Elric called an emergency meeting.
"The nobles are murmuring."
"Let them."
"They believe you've turned… or split."
Selene's gaze darkened.
"Explain."
He hesitated.
"They say the fire cracked you."
"That you made another version of yourself. A reflection. A twin."
Selene rose from the table.
"I made no such thing."
Cassian met her eyes.
"But what if someone else did?"
They searched every vault.
Every temple.
Every ruin.
In the fifth night of searching, they found it.
Deep beneath the first temple of Ember.
A sarcophagus with no name.
Inside, not bones.
But ashes.
Still warm.
Still pulsing.
Still watching.
Etched on the side: a mirror, cracked down the center.
Selene stood above it and whispered,
"Who are you?"
And the air answered with her voice:
"I am what you left behind."
Back in the palace, Selene closed herself in the flame chamber.
No guards.
No scrolls.
No mirrors.
Only heat.
And the blacksteel dagger she hadn't touched since the Trial.
She cut her palm.
Watched the blood drip onto the ember stone.
And the fire flared.
From it, a shadow stepped forward.
The Mirror.
Not a ghost.
Not an illusion.
A form.
Made of ember and flesh and memory.
She wore Selene's face.
Her voice.
But none of her chains.
"You climbed your throne with fire," the Mirror said.
"I was the flame left behind."
Selene's jaw tightened.
"You're a trick."
"I'm a truth."
"You were made to divide me."
"I was born when you broke."
The Mirror circled her.
Every movement a mirror, but reversed.
A left when Selene stepped right.
A smile when she frowned.
Cold when she burned.
"I bled when you hid," the Mirror said.
"I watched when you ruled."
"I whispered when you screamed."
"And now,"
She stepped close.
"I speak."
Selene gripped the dagger.
"You won't take what I built."
"You already gave it to me."
"I did not."
"You whispered my name in Karron's tomb. You dreamt of me. You feared me."
"And fear, dear sister, is always an invitation."
Selene stabbed forward.
The blade passed through flame.
The Mirror faded.
But her laughter lingered.
Ingrid entered minutes later to find Selene collapsed near the stone, blood dripping onto the runes.
"She's real," Selene whispered.
"Who?"
"My shadow."
Ingrid's eyes widened.
"Then we need to...."
"No."
Selene stood.
Shaky.
But whole.
"I brought her here."
"And now I burn her out."
She ordered every temple flame reignited.
Every record rewritten.
The Ember Veil expanded its reach.
Because if the Mirror wanted fire?
Selene would give her too much to survive.
But in the mirror chamber beneath the old palace ruins, the flame flickered once again.
The Mirror stood in silence.
Watching.
Waiting.
And whispered:
"She thinks she holds the flame."
"But I am what comes after."
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