The fracture in the conduit mirror widened with a sound like ice splitting on a frozen lake. Silver light bled from the crack, casting sharp shadows on the walls of the Ash Wing. The air grew thick and cold, carrying with it the faint smell of wet stone and something older, like dust that had been trapped for centuries.Norra’s grip on Mason’s arm was iron-tight. “Back away!” she shouted.The porcelain-faced figure on the other side pressed both hands against the glass. Each touch left a spiderweb of fresh cracks. Its blank face was inches from Mason’s, but its wide jagged mouth was stretching open, revealing rows of teeth like shards of mirror.John stepped forward, wand raised. “Mason, if this thing gets through.”“It won’t,” Mason said, but his voice lacked conviction.The creature struck the glass. The conduit shuddered, silver light flaring. Mason felt the force through the frame, like something was pounding directly on his chest.Aurora’s voice carried faintly from the mist be

The Ash Wing was quiet now. Too quiet. The silver light from the conduit was gone, leaving only the faint torchlight that flickered against the cracked walls. The air was heavy, thick with the dust that had fallen during the battle. Mason stood in front of the black mirror. His breathing was rough, his grip tight around the shard in his hand. He could still feel the heat from closing the conduit, but it didn’t matter. The image of Aurora being dragged back into the vault realm replayed in his head over and over, each time sharper, crueler. “She told me to close it,” Mason said finally. His voice was low, almost to himself. “I did what she asked.”Norra wiped blood from the side of her face. “And she’s gone because of it.”John shot her a sharp look. “Not helping.”Norra didn’t back down. “He needs to hear it.”“I heard it the first time,” Mason said, turning toward her. His eyes were cold, but there was something else there too, a hollow space where his usual fire should be.Behind

The black mirror swelled outward like something inside it was pushing to escape. The air in the Ash Wing turned icy, so cold that every breath burned Mason’s lungs. Norra gripped her sword with both hands. “Get back!”John didn’t move from Mason’s side. His eyes stayed locked on the mirror, his jaw tight. “It’s not just reaching this time. It’s coming.”Mason’s heart hammered. The last word the mirror had shown still burned in his mind, “TAKE.”He lifted the shard, ready, but the mirror pulsed again, harder. The torches on the wall guttered out one by one until only the faint glow of the mirror lit the room.The surface split down the middle. A long, pale arm pushed through, the fingers impossibly thin, joints bending the wrong way.It reached straight toward Norra. She swung her sword hard. The blade passed right through it, no resistance, no sound, and yet the hand still caught her wrist.Norra gasped, her breath turning to frost in the air. The pale fingers began pulling her toward

The fall felt endless. Mason tumbled through blackness, his hand reaching desperately for anything solid. Norra’s scream cut through the void, then was swallowed by the silence.Cold air whipped around him. The shard in his grip burned, silver light flashing in bursts as though trying to fight the dark, then, impact.He hit a hard stone, the breath knocked from his chest. For a long moment, all he could do was lie there, gasping, his body aching. “Mason?” Norra’s voice. Close. Alive.He forced his eyes open. She was beside him, pushing herself up, her sword lying a few feet away. “We’re here,” she muttered, though her tone was grim.Mason sat up, clutching the shard tighter. “Not where we want to be.”The air around them was thick and bitter. The ground was made of the same black stone he had seen in his vision. Above them, there was no sky, only a swirling canopy of shadows.And in the distance, rising higher than anything else, stood the tower. Its walls stretched endlessly upward,

The courtyard was silent. The silver blast had burned everything away, the tower’s hum, the endless whispers, even the porcelain army. Now there was only silence, broken stone, and the faint glow of the shard lying on the ground.Aurora’s hand was still outstretched where she had grabbed Mason. Empty now. Her fingers trembled in the cold air. Her chest rose and fell in sharp, uneven breaths.“Mason?” she whispered, her voice breaking. She took one step forward, then another, until she stood where he had been. But he was gone. Only the shard remained, humming faintly.Norra bent down and picked it up. The silver light shimmered in her hand, but it didn’t burn her. She stared at it with narrowed eyes. “Damn it,” she muttered. “He’s gone.”John limped toward them, his face pale. “Not gone,” he said, his voice low. “Not yet. If the shard is still here, then, then part of him is still inside it.”Aurora spun to face him, tears in her eyes. “You don’t know that!”John met her gaze firmly, t