Blade's Edge || Deception Book II ||

Chapter 28: Maze of Mirrors Pt. 2

"Daughter of magic." 

"Shadow-walker."

"Clarianna Sinclair." 

"Heir of the witches." 

"Daughter of Hecate, goddess of the crossroads."

"Wake up." 

I gasped, my eyes flying open, the rings on my fingers snapping into daggers as I-

I blinked, freezing. 

Darkness, from all directions, surrounded me. Blackness darker than the night sky, inky and thick, obscuring even my night-vision, leaving me, for the second time in my life, utterly blind. 

"Where am I?" I whispered out loud, getting my feet underneath me as my weapons shifted back into rings. 

What was I doing here? Hadn't I been at a coffee shop with Luke a minute ago? 

A dull throb speared its way through my head and I flinched, remembering the pain that had probably knocked me unconscious. 

I'm dreaming, I realized, turning around in a circle, trying to peer through the shadows. It was futile. I couldn't see, even as I summoned my own. 

This darkness was not mine, I realized. It wasn't mine. Not dangerous, I sensed, as I speared my magic into the blackness around me. Just different. 

I unsheathed my sword and prodded the ground in front of me. It hit the surface with a solid thunk. Satisfied that I wouldn't fall into some sort of hole on a one-way trip to Tartarus, I took a step forward. 

Then, the darkness moved, shooting forwards towards a pinprick of light that appeared in the distance before me. My head throbbed again, and I gasped, leaning against my sword as stars burst across my vision. When they faded, the impenetrable darkness was gone. Instead, towering walls of black glass surrounded me, jutting up into nothingness. 

I'm . . . in a maze, I realized, walking silently through the corridors made of shining black stone. Glass, actually, I thought, as I reached forwards to gingerly brush my fingers across the surface in front of me. A maze of black mirrors. 

Sure enough, as I turned a corner, shadows of myself flitting along the walls, an image of myself appeared, staring back at me. A girl with waist-long blond hair, tangled and dirty, and shadowed green eyes filled with thoughts that would keep most people up at night. And yet . . . it wasn't me. 

I held up my hand, peering at my slightly tanned skin from the months in the sun, and raised my gaze to the girl in the mirror. The girl who had skin so pale it was almost translucent.  

The girl with shadows peeking out from her shoulder blades. 

Wings. 

I swallowed my scream and fought the urge to sprint through the maze blindly, ignoring my instinctual urge to put as much distance between myself and the thing in the mirror. 

Just breathe, I told myself, my hand tightening around my sword. And then, realizing it would be useless in such cramped corridors, I sheathed it and clenched a hand against my daggers. 

There must be a reason you're having this dream, I reminded myself. Look. 

I forced myself to step up to my reflection and hesitantly placed my fingers against the glass. I peered at myself, searching, looking, both in the me in the mirror, and the me standing before it. 

Down and down, I plunged, through my mist, into the sea of shadows inside me. Deeper I went, tunnelling into myself as the girl in the mirror stared at me.