Chương 129: The Territory with No One There

Nhaless had not closed its gates. There was simply no one left to guard them. The city stretched through a thin mist in the northwest of the demon continent, built in terraces around black canals. Palaces of dark glass leaned over the water. Narrow bridges linked the districts like threads stretched between lies. No voices. No guards. No merchants. No servants. Only mirrors. They were everywhere. On the walls. In the streets. Hanging from the arches. Planted in the middle of empty squares.

Floating above the canals like flat moons. Elyra stopped before the first avenue.

"This isn't a city." Zayn looked at the reflections. In some, he saw himself without the mask. In others, he was still in the sealed chamber. In another, his throat was slit open. The fused scythe vibrated in his hand.

"It's a city that decided its inhabitants were less useful than their reflections." Lumeï timidly emerged from Elyra's cloak.

"I hate this place. There aren't even any normal shadows." Zayn walked forward. His reflection did not follow him right away. It stayed still in the first mirror. Then it smiled one second too late. Elyra saw it.

"Zayn."

"I know." He raised the scythe and cut the mirror apart. The glass exploded. Behind it, another mirror was waiting. Then another behind that one. Seryth's voice came from all the reflections at once.

"You always start by breaking whatever answers. It's almost comforting to see you so easy to read on certain points." Zayn slowly turned in place.

"Show yourself."

"No." Her voice was soft, elegant, shifting. At times close. At times at the far end of the street. At times behind his own reflection.

"I emptied Nhaless for you. Not out of fear. Out of courtesy. You would have killed the extras before reaching the stage." Elyra tightened her grip on her blade of light.

"You have the black plate." A mirror before them lit up. The plate appeared in a dark hand full of shifting reflections. ZAYN VEYLOR — FIRST READING The rest was blurred. Censored. Cut off. But the title alone was enough to make Zayn's right palm burn. Seryth laughed.

"Cassiel wanted to possess it. I wanted to know why it refused to be complete." Zayn took a step forward.

"Give it back." Every mirror along the avenue repeated his face.

"Give it back."

"Give it back."

"Give it back." Then the reflections spoke in his voice.

"It's all mine."

"Everything taken from me comes back."

"Anything that refuses will end up in my hand." Elyra went pale. Zayn did not move. Seryth murmured,"You see? Avarice makes for very beautiful echoes. But I do not steal like Cassiel. I do not keep things in vaults. I take the shape. The angle. The weakness that lets me enter." The mirrors changed. Zayn saw Rhel-Fosse. The hunger. The toxic flesh. His mouth covered in blood. Then the Mist Fangs. Then Narek, kneeling in the firelight, looking at Zayn like an older brother he never should have chosen.

Zayn went still. The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. Elyra looked at the mirror.

"That's false." Seryth replied,"Not entirely. The best lies keep enough true bones to remain standing." In the mirror, Narek reached out a hand.

"Brother?" Zayn raised the scythe. Elyra grabbed his arm.

"Don't strike. That's what she wants." Narek's reflection smiled. Then his face burned away. His voice became that of a falling child.

"Why did you leave me?" Zayn's left hand trembled. The mark of Wrath heated. Drakhar's blood ignited in his veins. Red flames ran beneath his skin and spread to the edges of his black wings. Pain bit into him from the inside. Voragna's regeneration answered at once, sealing what the heat tore apart. Seryth breathed out,"There. It isn't difficult. You only have to know what image to place before what wound." Zayn smiled.

"You think so?" He pressed his right hand against the mirror. The mark of Avarice opened in his palm. The Locks of Ghelkar shone around it.

"Right of Seizure." Seryth laughed.

"You cannot seize a reflection."

"No." The black lines went into the glass.

"But I can seize what anchors it." The mirror cracked. Not outward. Inward. The false Narek warped. Behind his face, a very thin thread appeared, almost invisible, leading toward the heights of Nhaless. Zayn pulled. All the mirrors along the avenue shuddered. Seryth stopped laughing.

"Interesting." Zayn clenched harder. The thread snapped. The mirror exploded. The images of Narek vanished. Not the pain. Only the way it was being used. Elyra looked at him. He said nothing. But she understood that it might be worse that way. Nhaless tried to separate them next. The streets changed. Not physically. Their reflections imposed other directions. Elyra saw Zayn turn left while his real body kept walking straight ahead. Lumeï bit at the air and screamed because his teeth passed through a cold light.

"The ground is lying!" Zayn drove the scythe into the paving stones. Ruined Time spread in a circle. The nearest mirrors aged. Their surfaces grew black stains. The images turned blurry. The real street reappeared for a few seconds.

"There," said Elyra. They ran. Mirrors fell from the facades like guillotines. Zayn cut through two, dodged the third, then used his left arm, heated by Drakhar's blood, to strike the fourth. The glass exploded in red flames. Every shard reflected a different face. Lena. Jonah. Maelor. Elvarin. The elven king. Drakhar. Voragna. Cassiel kneeling among his vaults. And at the center of all those fragments, a face Zayn did not recognize. An older man. Human. Covered in wounds.

Sitting at the foot of a throne that did not yet exist. The image lasted only a fraction of a second. But Seryth spoke at once.

"Ah. You saw." Zayn stopped.

"Who?"

"That," she said, "is precisely the question my mirrors cannot keep." Elyra stiffened.

"You know something about him."

"I know that this is not the first time certain reflections have refused to die. I know that ancient records sometimes speak of a different face with the same direction. I know that the Black Throne does not always call. Sometimes, it remembers." Zayn raised the scythe.

"Speak clearly." Seryth laughed softly.

"If I could speak clearly, I would not have emptied an entire city just to bring you to one mirror." They reached the central square of Nhaless. It was empty. At the center stood a single mirror. Immense. Black. Taller than a tower. Its surface reflected neither Zayn, nor Elyra, nor the city. It reflected a red night. A stone garden. Statues of ancient dragons. And a woman seated beneath a black moon, her delicate horns like crescents, her eyes lowered toward an untouched cup.

All the mirrors around her were turned toward the ground. As if they were afraid. Elyra whispered,"Lyséa." The name made the air tremble. Seryth spoke more quietly. For the first time, her voice was no longer mocking.

"This is the reason you will go to her." Zayn stared at the woman in the mirror.

"I have nothing to take from her."

"False." The surface of the mirror trembled. Behind Lyséa, an enormous shadow passed. Not an ordinary dragon. Something ancient, vast, royal, whose wings seemed to carry centuries.

"She has lived long enough to recognize what my mirrors can only fragment. She saw the previous cycle. Perhaps even traces of the one before. And above all…" Seryth paused.

"She is the only General the others fear without wanting to admit it. Not because she is the loudest. Not because she commands the greatest armies. Because she remembers too well." Zayn looked at Lyséa's reflection. The woman suddenly raised her eyes. Not toward Seryth. Not toward Elyra. Toward him. Through the mirror. Lumeï's breath caught. The fused scythe stopped vibrating. Even Drakhar's burning blood seemed to slow in Zayn's veins. Lyséa did not speak. But her gaze changed. Recognition. Not of Zayn.

Of something behind Zayn. He made an almost imperceptible movement backward. Seryth whispered,"You want to know what you are, candidate? Then go to Velmour. Go to the Dragon Garden. Ask the one the mirrors avoid." The central mirror cracked. The black plate appeared at the bottom of its surface, embedded in the glass. Elyra saw it.

"The plate!" Zayn reached out with his right hand. The mark of Avarice opened. But the Locks of Ghelkar burned at once. Something resisted. Not the glass. The information. Seryth murmured,"You can take it. But if you take it brutally, it will break. And if it breaks, you will lose the only fragment that indicates why your first status was censored before it was even understood." Zayn smiled.

"Another choice."

"Always." He placed his palm gently against the mirror. No force. No fire. No Ruined Time. Only Avarice. But a precise Avarice. He did not pull the whole plate free. He took its right of reading. The plate remained in the mirror. But the black letters passed into his palm. An icy pain climbed all the way to his skull. The system appeared. Not fully. Fragments. [Name: Zayn Veylor.] [Race: Human.] [Recognized Title: Demon King Candidate.] Then one censored line trembled. [Previous resonance detected.] The rest cut out. Then a final line appeared, older than the others. [Memory access: locked by the Throne.] Zayn pulled his hand back. He was breathing hard. Elyra asked,"What did you see?" He did not answer. Seryth answered for him.

"Not enough. Just enough to continue. That is often how monsters are led to doors they would have hated opening on their own." Zayn raised the scythe.

"You think you get away with this?" The central mirror filled with thousands of eyes. All different. All turned toward him. Seryth spoke through every one of them.

"Zayn Veylor, you killed Voragna. You killed Drakhar. You ruined Cassiel. You received a letter from Morvessa. You will go see Lyséa, and then Vaelthor will descend from his heights because your existence will make him sick." All the eyes blinked together.

"Killing me now will teach you almost nothing. Letting me live will irritate you far more. But it will allow me to see how far you resemble the ancient reports." Zayn smiled.

"You want to be a witness."

"I want to be the one who understands before the others."

"And if I refuse?"

"Then break the mirror." He raised the scythe. Elyra did not stop him. This time, she only waited. Zayn stared at the thousands of eyes. Then he lowered the scythe. The central mirror split in two. Not fully destroyed. Enough. Seryth let out a small breath of pain. All across the city, hundreds of mirrors shattered. A rain of glass fell over Nhaless. Seryth's voice became distant.

"Cruel compromise." Zayn answered,"You wanted to keep an eye on me. I'm leaving you half of one." A faint laugh ran through the black canals. Then silence returned. The city remained empty. But less intact. Elyra looked around.

"She's alive."

"Yes."

"You let her live."

"She has something more useful than her death."

"What?" Zayn looked east. Toward Lyséa's domain. Toward the nocturnal gardens and the ancient dragons.

"Fear." Lumeï murmured,"Of you?" Zayn did not answer right away. He saw again Lyséa's gaze through the mirror. The recognition. The way all the mirrors around her had turned toward the ground. Then he said,"Not of me." The fused scythe spoke more quietly than usual.

"That is rare." Elyra followed his gaze eastward.

"Then we're going to see Lyséa." Zayn walked out of the central square.

"Yes."

"Because she knows something about you?"

"Because she thinks she recognizes something."

"And if she's right?" Zayn did not answer. In his right palm, the fragments of his first status were still burning. Previous resonance detected. Memory access locked by the Throne. The road to Lyséa had opened. Not through vengeance. Not through possession. But through a question more dangerous than all the targets before it. A question Zayn had never truly wanted to ask. What in me was already there before I was?