Back to: A Mirror of Shadows

BEX

The men dragged me through a wooden arch, my boots scraping stone as we passed through a dark corridor, down two flights of stairs, and into a murky, candlelit dungeon lined with rows of cells.

Inmates stirred as we passed, the hopeless ones little more than husks staring through me. The active ones were worse. A woman’s eyes glowed faintly in the dim light, shadows leaking from her mouth each time she exhaled. An older man gripped the bars until his skin split, blood streaking down his palms and hissing where it met the metal.

In the next cell, fingers that were too long to be human curled around the bars, knuckles bending backward like spiders as he slammed them against the steel. The clang echoed through the hall, sharp enough to rattle my bones.

I kept my gaze forward, afraid that if I made a sound or protested in any way, they would feed me to one of those horrors. Instead, I let my body go limp as they opened a cell near the end of the row and dragged me inside.

I stayed as still as I could until the cell door slammed shut and the sound of footsteps faded into the distance.

After a while, I slowly opened my eyes, terrified of who I might see staring back at me, but I sighed in relief when my only cell mate was a girl about my age sitting on a wooden bench attached to the far side of the wall. She looked clean, and I wondered if this was her first day here, too.

Judging from the smell, the bathing facilities in this place were likely nonexistent.

So much to look forward to.

The girl leaned back against the moss-covered wall, one well-worn Doc Marten propped up beside her on the bench as she stared at me with the bluest of blue eyes. Her bright pink hair was pulled into a high ponytail secured with a purple scrunchie.

“You’re alive,” she said. “Which is a better start than most.”

“Am I?” I asked, glancing around. The sconces I’d mistaken for candles were actually orbs of magical light hovering on tiny wooden shelves nailed into the stone. “I was afraid I’d died and gone to hell. What is this place? The guards called it the Shadow Games, and I’m almost afraid to know what that means.”

She tilted her head. “Specifically? You’re in the dungeon beneath the lowest of the Amethyst training grounds. But more generally…” She motioned to the cell around us. “They call this place the Shard. And yes, it absolutely is hell. Just with better weather.”

Maybe she was trying to lighten the mood, but I just stared, my throat dry.

Shard? Training grounds? What was I in for?

“You’ll get used to it,” the girl said, watching me steady myself.

When I met her gaze, she lifted a pierced brow.

“The spinning. The burning. The absolute certainty that you’re never getting out of here? It’s all part of the initiation. I felt the same way when I first got here a couple years ago, but after a while…” She smirked. “It’s just another Tuesday, you know?”

Despite myself, a small, broken laugh escaped. “Another Tuesday in hell. Great.”

“Exactly.” She grinned and pushed to her feet, holding a hand out to me. “Sorry. Where are my manners? Mary Calliope, but everyone calls me Calli. Crow shifter, witch, professional bad-decision-maker, and apparently your new roommate. At least for one night.”

“Bex,” I said, shaking her hand and then hugging my arms close to my chest, unsure about the idea of making a new friend. Not after what just happened.

“Nice to meet you, Bex. Though your timing sucks. Tomorrow’s the first mini-game, and unless you’re hiding a week of training somewhere in those jeans, you’re fresh meat.” She nudged my shoulder lightly. “How does someone show up late to their own execution?”

Execution. That’s what the chamber at the end of the Hall of Doorways was supposed to be. But this place? Someone specifically wanted me here. But why?

“Unfortunately, I can’t answer that question any better than you can,” I admitted, my throat tightening. “Give me the short version. Who runs the Shard?”

Calli dropped to the floor beside me, boots scuffing the stone. “That would be the Regent. Daughter of the Amethyst Priestess. Cruel. Gorgeous. Completely unhinged.”

“The trifecta,” I muttered, half-delirious.

She leaned her head back against the wall and grinned. “If you’re lucky, you’ll never see her up close.”

“She sounds lovely,” I joked. “And what about the big guy up there who seems to be running the show?”

Just remembering the intensity in his eyes made my body tremble.

Calli let out a low whistle. “You mean the rock-hard god of a man carved from rage and regret? Yeah. That’s Slate. He’s the Regent’s favorite weapon,” she added. “Trains the new recruits. Breaks the ones who won’t obey. Trust me. You don’t want to draw his attention, Bex.”

“Too late,” I said softly.

I wanted to ask more questions, but the door to the dungeon opened and the corridor filled with noise. Shouting, the clatter of boots, the clang of cell doors. I scrambled to stand, but Calli put a hand on my forearm and shook her head. 

“Just stay still. Keep your head down and the Sentinels won’t even notice you. You’ll be fine.”

It was hard not to watch as a wave of fellow prisoners joined us in the last few cells on the row. They’d obviously just come from training in the arena above.

Some sobbed openly, others stumbled with blood still wet on their skin. A boy with pointed ears and bruised knuckles cursed the Sentinels until one slammed him face-first against the bars.

Calli leaned closer, her voice dropping. “Prisoners here are called the Condemned, of which you’ll soon join the ranks. We both will, though this isn’t my first round in the grinder, if you know what I mean.”

I had literally no idea what she meant, but there would be time for more questions later.

I swallowed hard, my stomach turning as a girl no older than twelve or thirteen was shoved into the cell across from ours, her face streaked with tears and her arms shredded from claw marks that oozed green pus.

What kind of monsters threw such young kids into cells like this? And since when did humans have pointed ears and bleed green?

The sound of weeping echoed through the corridor, soft and hopeless. Just hours ago, I’d thought freedom was within reach. Now I was trapped underground in a world that reeked of blood and magic, surrounded by people who looked more broken than alive.

The hope I’d clung to all these years cracked somewhere deep inside me.

“Don’t,” Calli murmured, barely moving her lips. “Don’t let them see you cry. It’s like blood in the water down here. Show weakness, and they’ll eat you alive.”

I pressed my shaking hands into my knees and forced the emotion back. I couldn’t fall apart. Not here. Not yet.

I sniffed and turned away from the Sentinels and the new recruits shuffling into our cell. With a tattered corner of my shirt, I wiped off any sign of tears and pulled myself together.

“What did you mean earlier when you said it wasn’t your first round?”

Calli smiled. “Most of these people piling in with us? Well, like you, they just got here recently. Forced through the mirror, either because they’re being punished, paying a debt, or ended up on the bad side of the witches for some reason or another. But me? I’ve been in The Shard for two years. This will be my fourth time trying to qualify.”

“Qualify for what?”

“The Shadow Games,” she said simply. “This time, I need to get on Slate’s team and actually win. It’s the only way out of this place.”

“One way in. No way out,” someone said.

A woman sat in the corner of the cell across from us, legs crossed, eyes gleaming like wet garnet.

“Don’t listen to her,” Calli said. “She has no idea what she’s talking about.”

The woman chuckled. “The blood never lies, little crow.”

 A thin smile tugged at her mouth as she dragged a sharp nail across the inside of her forearm. A bead of crimson welled up, and instead of wiping it away, she traced a symbol on the stone beside her.

The air hummed faintly, and the symbol pulsed once before fading into the wall.

It was difficult to guess at her age. Maybe mid-twenties, but her face carried shadows that made her look older, haunted.

Her dark hair was hacked unevenly at her shoulders, strands stuck together as if matted with old blood. She wore no shoes, just stained bandages wrapped around her feet and ankles, and her eyes had that too-bright glimmer of someone who had lived too long with madness as a companion.

Calli forced a smile. “Elara’s a blood witch. Likes to play with her food.”

She tilted her head at me, smile widening. “Don’t worry. I only use what’s mine. For now.”

I’d never even heard of blood witches, and as I looked around, I could only guess at what other powers my fellow prisoners hid.

Calli said we were called the Condemned, yet she had managed to survive for two years. Maybe I could, too.

The heavy door at the end of the corridor opened, hinges groaning, and the light from the stairwell flared briefly. Boots clattered down the stone steps.

“If you’re injured, step forward!” a voice barked. “The alchemist will see to you.”

A ripple of movement passed through the cells as prisoners pushed toward the bars. I stayed back, uncertain, until a small shadow appeared at the far end of the hall.

I don’t know what or who I was expecting the alchemist to be, but the small child who practically floated through the dungeon was not it.

She looked no older than eight or nine years old and wore a high-collared Victorian dress, the fabric gray and frilled with lace at the cuffs, as if she’d stepped out of some faded portrait.

Composed, she walked by the first cells without flinching at all. Back straight, chin lifted, looking calmly ahead. In her hands, she carried a silver tray filled with glass vials that rattled together as she walked, creating an eerie musical cadence with each step.

Her long lavender hair was tied partly up with a perfectly-pressed white bow that fell down her back and onto her loose curls. Her eyes were twin violet jewels that sparkled with kindness as she began passing out the vials to those most in need.

She poured a single drop of a glowing pink potion onto the claw marks of the girl across from us, and in seconds, the wounds closed and healed. The girl’s color instantly returned to her cheeks.

A man with skin dark as onyx swallowed a shimmering blue liquid, and his torn flesh knit itself together in a blink, his ragged breaths softening to a sigh.

One by one, she passed out her potions and elixirs, smiling and offering kind words as she worked. Fascinated, I watched her, wondering how someone like that had ended up in this place.

“That’s Lavender,” Calli said. “Don’t let her youth fool you. She’s not what she seems.”

When she stopped in front of our cell, her head turned slowly until her jeweled eyes met mine.

“You’re not supposed to be here,” she said softly, sadness in her tone, though I couldn’t imagine why.

“And you are?” I asked.

A sad smile turned up the corners of her lips as she studied the bottles on her tray. After a moment, she mixed several drops of colorful liquids into a smaller vial with a corked lid and handed it to me through the bars.

“What’s this for?”

My energy was low, but I had no visible wounds that needed healing.

“Save it. You’ll need it soon.”

Her eyes dipped to the dragonfly pendant around my neck before she nodded and walked away, taking the Sentinels with her and leaving the dungeon silent for a few minutes as everyone rested from their training.

I tucked the small vial in the front pocket of my jeans and leaned back against the wall, resting my fingertips on the pendant Maggie had given me.

Everyone who saw this dragonfly acted like it meant something. A chill crept down my spine.

It was pretty obvious by now that it hadn’t come from some random woman at an outdoor market. This pendant had been given to me for a reason. Maybe by the same person who opened the portal to the mirror in the first place.

What I wanted to know was why?

Why save me from certain death only to condemn me to another?

Calli pulled her knees up, resting her chin on them. “It’s not the most comfortable place to sleep, but try to get some rest. They’ll feed us in the morning, right before the first trial. You probably won’t be forced to compete since you just got here, but you’ll need your strength for what’s next.”

“Trial?” I asked, my voice barely above a whisper.

“Mini-games, tests, whatever they’re calling them this round.” She gave a humorless laugh. “Many of the people sleeping down here with us tonight won’t make it through the morning. Get some rest.”

Her words settled over me like a curse.

Somewhere down the corridor, a chain rattled, followed by a low moan that might’ve been human. Or not.

I wanted to ask her what she’d meant earlier about getting on Slate’s team, especially after she’d told me to avoid getting his attention. But I was too tired for more questions.

I drew my knees close, exhaustion seeping into my bones until the sounds blurred into darkness.

Like a riptide, sleep pulled me under, and I was powerless to resist.

Before long, I was dreaming of the arena.

Dust swirled in the air, thick as smoke, the copper tang of blood clinging to every breath. A shadow moved at the far end of the battlefield, broad-shouldered and tall. As he stepped into the light, markings flared to life beneath his skin, lines of molten gold twisting like fire through stone.

Slate.

He turned slowly, and his gaze found mine. My heart stuttered as his blood-slick blade glinted faintly in his hand.

I tried to move, but my legs wouldn’t obey. Shadows snaked around my ankles, climbing higher, wrapping me in a dark shroud until I could barely breathe.

He raised his sword, light spilling across his skin as the markings brightened. Runes older than language itself.

He whispered something I couldn’t hear, and then the blade came down, a flash of white light cutting through the dark.

I threw up my arms—

—and woke with a gasp, the sound torn from my throat.

Stone. Bars. The dungeon.

This was real. A nightmare I’d never wake up from.

A rough voice cut through the fog of my half-sleep. “Up.”

A Sentinel yanked the cell door open, the hinges shrieking in protest. “The Warden wants a word.”

The Warden.

Please don’t let that be Slate. Or someone worse.

My stomach turned, but I stood anyway.

They led me down the narrow corridor toward a side chamber lit by magical orbs. Slate waited inside, standing by a table covered in blades. His armor looked even darker in the dim light, the edges dulled by dried blood.

Awesome. What a great way to wake up.

He didn’t turn when I entered. “You arrived late,” he said. “The Condemned always enter the Shard together. Explain.”

“I’d love to,” I said, voice hoarse. “But I’m still working on figuring out what the hell this place even is.”

He faced me then, eyes cutting to the dragonfly pendant at my throat. “Who gave that to you?”

I folded my arms. “Someone who clearly knows more about my fate than I do. Why? What does it mean to you? Or to the alchemist girl?”

For a heartbeat, something flickered in his expression. Surprise, maybe. But it vanished as quickly as it came.

He stepped closer, close enough that I could feel the heat radiating from him, something almost electric in the air between us.

“You will learn to answer questions when I ask them. Defiance might have kept you alive where you came from,” he said, voice low. “Here, it gets you killed.”

The vision of him in the dream with those burning runes flashed again in my mind. But here, there was only skin, scarred and human.

“Is that so?” I asked, unable to keep my mouth shut. “Because so far the only thing I’ve been good at my whole life is surviving certain death.”

The corner of his mouth twitched. Not quite a smile, but close. He stepped back, signaling to the Sentinel.

“Mark her for today’s trial,” he ordered, his piercing gaze never leaving mine . “Let’s see if she’s the survivor she thinks she is.”