Only I knew for a fact thatIdidn’t think those words myself. That reflection had, and I’d heard her.
My eyes moved to the mirror on the left, which showed me a completely different version of myself. My arms were wrapped around my torso, my brows narrowed, my lips parted, chest rising and falling fast.
I looked so afraid—I wasterrified.You could see it all over that face.
Don’t forsake me—I keep you focused!
The words popped into my head again that same way, and the voice was the same, but…also different. This onesoundedterrified as well.
I moved back on instinct, dropped an axe and brought my hand to my mouth, which none of the other Oras on the mirrors reflected. That’s because they weren’tme—they were literal versions of me. I saw it now, I saw it so clearly. They were all versions of me.
The one in the middle was strength, maybe arrogance.
The one on the left was fear, focus.
And the one on the right…
If you forsake me, you forsake who you are.
She was standing there with half a smile on her face, this Ora. A smile I’d never quite seen displayed like that, neverfrom the eyes of an outsider. It was a soft smile, and her eyes were soft, too. Kind.Like she understood. Like she cared.
The words popped up in my head—she wascompassion.
Suddenly my legs gave, and I only noticed when I hit the cold stone floor on my knees. My hands were over my face, covering it, because I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to see myself separated like this—not a whole person, but pieces of me laid out in the open, reflected on that glass.
The whole message was clear to me. When I broke a mirror here, I would forsake aversionof me, quite possibly. And I knew I had to choose carefully.
My mind rushed.Get out—get out—get out of here,said my thoughts, and I couldn’t exactly forsake the Ora in the middle. She was strength. Without her, how would I ever hope to get through these trials that were much more dangerous than I could have ever thought possible?
And how could I give up fear, when it indeed kept me focused, alert, when it could save my life in the coming trials? There were another two left. Time only knew what they planned to put us through, and Father always said my fear was essential in the toolkit of emotions my body used to protect itself.Essential.
But compassion wasn’t, was it? I didn’t need compassion right now—I needed to be strong. To see the end of it. Not just for me, but for the other Hands. For my parents.
For Jinx.
If these were the only options I had, it wasn’t even a choice. Strength and fear stayed. Compassion, I could do without.
I didn’t allow myself to think longer than that. I hardly even noticed myself standing, moving, getting in front of the right mirror, slamming the axe that was still in my hand onto the glass with a scream that tore from my very soul. And I could have sworn that, a second before the glass broke, theOra reflected in it smiled a smile that said she understood exactly what I was doing. She understood why.
It was okay, though. I reminded myself that despite how dangerous this was, it was still a game, that whatever I had to do here, it would all go back to normal as soon as I was out of the Labyrinth. It was all going to come back to me when I returned home, and I would be perfectly fine.
Glass broke, fell in front of me in a million little shards. I had tears in my eyes and I was way past surprises at that point, so when I saw the room on the other side, I didn’t stop to wonderhowit was possible when the back of this mirror was made out of stone.
There really was no time for it, because the pain that ripped me in half took all my energy away. I held onto the edge of the stone for a second, breath held, eyes squeezed shut. I even cut my hand between my thumb and my index finger on a piece of glass that still stuck to the edge, but I didn’t feel it. Only saw the blood when I opened my eyes again.
I went through, right into the frame without daring to look around me another single time.
In the room beyond, there were windows, and there was light coming from outside, and there were cheers, too. People somewhere far away.
Over.
The trial was over for real this time, I could feel it.
I ran.
23
They moved around us, went from one Hand to the other, cleaning our faces with these cotton pads, putting a salve onto our cuts and bruises.
