“Sorry.” He held up his hands, then sighed. “We’re going to have to go back down, aren’t we?”

  Roan groaned.

  “It might be fun, you know?”

  She didn’t appear to know anything of the sort as she continued to frown.

  “I mean this time we’re armed with the knowledge that we won’t splat, and that we can climb back out.” He smiled at her. “So it could be like diving. People enjoy diving.”

  Gifford got to his hands and knees and peered over the edge, looking again for signs of Tesh and Tressa, and wondering if he could see the Typhons. That would be the only real issue—falling on them. He had no clear idea what a Typhon was and didn’t feel the slightest need to find out. He and Roan would need to wait a good long time to ensure the things had moved away.

  But how long is long enough? And how can I keep track?

  Gifford couldn’t see the Typhons, and there was still no sign of Tressa or Tesh.

  “Well, if it helps, I never would have gotten this far without you.” He smiled.

  Roan’s eyes narrowed, and she began shaking her head. “How could that possibly help? How?” Her brow wrinkled, lower lip riding up. Roan started making a noise in the back of her throat, the prelude to a scream. Instead, she punched both of her thighs with her fists and resumed her pacing. “There’s got to be a way. Stupid. Stupid. Stupid.”

  Roan shoved a lock of hair into her mouth and chewed it as she passed by in her eternal walk; then she halted. She didn’t move for a second—just stopped and stared, but only into the distance, not at anything in particular. Gifford knew that when Roan was thinking, she could walk right into a wall and never notice. Whatever she was seeing, it wasn’t the bridge or the Abyss. He often speculated on what she did see: crimbals, perhaps, or the gods pantomiming answers to her questions.

  “You can do it,” she said.

  “Do what, Roan? We’ve discussed this before, remember? How I can’t actually hear your thoughts?”

  She pivoted and showed him her frustrated face.

  “You have to give me a hint, at least. Okay?”

  “The mirror, the mirror.” She pointed frantically. “The door to Alysin.”

  “What about it?”

  “You can go through.”

  Gifford shook his head. “We don’t have the key.”

  “You don’t need the key,” she said, her hair falling out of her mouth as she spoke.

  “Roan, I saw you push on it. You knocked, put your nose to the glass. We can’t get through without the key.”

  “That’s not what I said.” Roan huffed. “I said you don’t need the key. You’re the Hero of Grandford.”

  Gifford smirked and folded his arms. “I’m not a hero.”

  She fixed him with one of her impatient glares. She had an assortment; this was the one accompanied with squeezing fists of frustration. “You thought you were going to your death. We all thought you were going to die. Even Padera did. You did, too, didn’t you?”

  He shrugged. “Yeah, sure, but that doesn’t mean—”

  “It does!” Roan came to him, knelt down, and took one of his hands. She threaded her fingers into his, as she loved to do. She had once told him that the way their fingers fit, the way they wove, was practical evidence of a universal truth. It demonstrated that they were meant to be together. The first time she told him this, he foolishly pointed out the obvious: that everyone’s fingers fit together. He remembered how she had smiled and nodded with profound understanding. Exactly, she’d said.

  “No one—no one in all of Alon Rhist would have dared do what you did that night. Not Nyphron, and not any of the Galantians—and everyone says they’re heroes, but they aren’t, not really. But you are. You risked everything. You, who’d never used a sword or spear before, or sat on a horse—you put on armor and alone rode into the face of the Fhrey army. And for what? Glory?”

  “No!” Gifford said, surprised she could even say that.

  She laughed softly. The sound was music, ice water on a sweltering day, a warm blanket on a cold night. He loved that laugh. “I know,” she said, her eyes full of pride. “You never once thought of yourself. And when Tressa declared she would travel through Phyre, you were the first to volunteer to die with her. Even if it meant leaving me, you couldn’t let her die alone. And when I couldn’t make it out of the Abyss, you stayed to keep me company. Never even tried to leave. You bravely gave of yourself. More important, you don’t even see the miracle in that. I honestly suspect you think everyone is that way, but they aren’t. Almost no one is. Gifford, you are a hero, a real hero, and I think that means that door is open to you.”

  Gifford looked across the remaining bridge at the mirror. Even at that distance he could see himself in it, a shimmering light. “Not without you.”

  Roan’s brows went up. “Did you think I was asking you to leave me behind?”

  “Well . . . ah, then I guess I don’t understand.”

  “It’s just like the Battle of Grandford.”

  “Still not seeing the path you’re walking, Roan.”

  She rolled her eyes, huffing through her nose again. “You need to go get help.”

  “Get help? How can I—we don’t know what’s over there. And anyway, if I go through, I won’t be able to come back. I mean, if I belong over there, Roan, I won’t be able to come back here without the key.”

  “Doesn’t apply to you,” she said with that misty-eyed look of hers. This was the same reverent stare she used to beam at him whenever he gave her cups or that amphora. It proclaimed he was something he wasn’t. Gifford would have thought that she would have lost that expression of awe years ago, around the same time she saw him roll out of bed, something that—with his bad leg and twisted back—he literally did, and oftentimes hit the ground in the process. But there she was, as entranced as ever.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You put your hand through the door back into Rel. Almost got pulled through. You didn’t have the key. Tressa did, and she was nowhere near you. The doorway was locked, had to be. Otherwise Drome’s minions would have come through. But your arm went right in. It passed back. So I have a theory. Maybe everyone can go backward through Phyre and the key is only needed to go forward, or maybe only you can do it. Doesn’t matter. You have the ability to move through doors without the key.”

  “A theory?”

  She fixed him with a smirk. He knew this look, too, but Roan didn’t own that expression. He’d seen Moya display the same twisted smile when anyone suggested she couldn’t hit a mark with an arrow, or when someone asked Brin if she could recall—well, anything. “Okay, so your theories usually work—but not always.”

  “This one will.”

  She wasn’t lying. Roan didn’t lie, but her eyes didn’t match her words.

  “Really? Because you don’t look confident. To be honest, you look terrified.”

  “I’m certain you will be able to come back,” she told him. “I’m just not positive you’ll want to.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Her light flickered. This was hard for her. She was being brave. “Through that door is paradise. If you go there, you’ll want to stay. It’ll make you forget all about me.”

  “No, it won’t,” he said.

  She nodded, but her light dimmed again.

  “I will come back, Roan. This”—he touched her cheek—“this right here is paradise.”

  She offered him an embarrassed smile, then nodded. “I’ll wait for you.”

  He stood up, and together they walked hand in hand to the mirror. Their reflection was strange. While Roan was just as magnificent as ever, the man beside her, the one holding her hand, made him jealous. Tall, handsome, confident—everything he wasn’t. Phyre had a strange way of twisting the view of things.

  “I look so . . . so different,” he said.

  Roan’s face twisted up, befuddled. She peered into the mirror, then over at Gifford. “I don’t understand. You look the way you always do.”

  He laughed. “The guy in there is gorgeous and dashing.”

  Roan nodded.

  “Really?” He laughed, and straightened himself up striking a dramatic, heroic pose. “So this is how I appear to you? This is how you see me in Phyre?”

  Puzzlement once more filled Roan’s face. “No . . . that’s how you’ve always looked.”

  Tears welled up in his eyes as Gifford pulled her to him and kissed her. She had no body, but he felt her warmth, and those lips, soft, moist, quivering. Their faces slid past each other, tear-slicked cheeks pressing as he hugged her as tightly as he could. “I love you so much, Roan. And so help me, so help everyone, I will be back.”

  Then Gifford passed through his own reflection into a world of light, music, and color.

  Roan watched Gifford go, saw him pass through. Once he was gone, she was left with only her own reflection in the mirror. Some stranger she’d never known glared back at her through the glass. The stranger looked sick and terrified.

  Turning away, she surveyed her tiny realm. Nothing but a broken bridge and the little cave with the door.

  I wonder how long I’ll be here? This is the first time I’ve been completely alone since I killed Iver.

  After Iver’s death, Padera had arranged for Moya to move in with Roan, and the old woman was a frequent visitor. The two took turns watching Roan, who had expected to be executed or severely punished at the very least. Any idiot had to realize she’d killed her owner. Instead, Padera taught her how to cook, and Moya taught her how to live. Yet it was Brin who gave her the greatest gift—admiration.

  Roan couldn’t understand it at first. The girl visited frequently, asking all sorts of questions. Roan was convinced Brin was after evidence to prove Roan had killed Iver, only she acted so oddly. She would arrive all excited, sometimes bringing little gifts—things she’d found. Brin would ask what the name of a colored stone was, as if Roan knew everything. And then she realized, that was exactly what Brin thought. The girl wasn’t looking for evidence; Brin was in awe. No one had ever looked up to Roan. But Brin did. Realizing this, Roan discovered that she hated herself a little less afterward. Brin had managed to open the door that Moya and Padera had struggled to bust down, the door to a prison that Roan herself had built.

  Now here she was again, alone in the dark. She had shed all her old ghosts and left them below, but she quickly discovered new ones. She was scared that Gifford wouldn’t come back, and also frightened that he would. On the other side of that mirror was paradise—some sort of wonderworld that she couldn’t begin to imagine. Through that glass was the reward that Gifford deserved; inside was his happiness. But she wasn’t allowed in. Roan wanted Gifford to have everything, but she also wanted Gifford—needed him. Padera had given her wisdom, Moya courage, and Brin confidence, but Gifford—Gifford had given her love. She could deal with being stupid, scared, and insecure, but she couldn’t go without love.

  Gifford was the one who had truly saved her. He was the one true thing, the unbending, unmoving, unbreakable hero of her life. And Roan resolved in her heart that she would wait by that door forever, wait for Gifford—and hope, for his sake, he never returned.

  “Roan!”

  She spun.

  There was no one there, no one near her. The voice came from far away.

  Tesh? Tressa? It didn’t sound like them, and it hadn’t come from below.

  “Roan! Over here!”

  “Are you sure that’s Roan?” Moya asked. All she could reliably see was the light and a figure within it. “That light is so bright.”

  “I’m telling you, it’s Roan,” Tekchin said as they stood on the end of the broken bridge, peering out across the dark gulf.

  “You also told me you were too weak to stand, remember?”

  “Aye. I think it’s Roan, too,” Rain said as he continued to fidget with the sword. They had all rushed out of Mideon’s castle, and the dwarf was still having trouble with his blade. The pommel of Lorillion kept hitting the handle of his pickax whenever he took a step. He had clinked all the way there.

  “That was hours ago,” Tekchin said with a mischievous smile. “I’m feeling much better now.”

  Moya frowned at him. “So you’re saying you made this perfect recovery in a few hours after being near death for who knows how long?” She put a hand on her hip. “And how exactly are you telling time, my sweet? Besides, Beatrice already spilled the beans. I know what the two of you have been up to, and don’t try denying it.”

  Tekchin let the battle die and returned to the topic at hand. He pointed at the distant light and said, “It’s her, I’m telling you.”

  “Then why is she so bright? And why doesn’t she answer?” Moya held her bow, Audrey, above her head and waved it. “Roan!”

  The figure stood up.

  “Moya?” Roan called back.

  Tekchin grinned. “Mystery solved.”

  “One of them,” Moya said. “Why I love you is still up for debate, along with . . .” She clapped her sides in frustration as she glared at the jagged tongue of stone that had once been a bridge. “How are we going to get over to her? How is she going to get over to us?” Moya looked down into the endless dark. How did she get up there to begin with?

  “Didn’t Beatrice tell you?” Rain asked.

  “No,” Moya said, a bit of anger slipping into her tone. “Did she tell you?”

  The dwarf shook his head. “All she ever tells me is how great I am. Makes me homesick for Frost and Flood, who say they can never understand how me mother didn’t drown me the first time she saw me face.”

  “Nice friends you got there.”

  “I’m guessing Beatrice assumed you knew there was no bridge.” Tekchin inched his way out onto the tongue like a cat on a wind-whipped branch. “You two were here when it exploded, right?”

  “We all were.”

  “Yeah, but I was in pieces at the time. This is the first I’ve seen it.”

  “Roan?” Moya shouted. “Do you know how to get across?”

  “Working on it . . . sort of.” Roan’s voice was a chickadee-sized tweet, nearly lost to the overwhelming silence that blew up from the deep.

  “What is she doing, do you think?” Tekchin asked.

  “Who knows? It’s Roan. The bigger question is, where are the others?” Moya scanned the far side and down the length of the pillar as far as she could see. The only one visible was Roan.

  Beatrice had gathered up Tekchin, Moya, and Rain and shoved them out the door into the cold gray of the endless Nifrel night. She gave her usual cryptically confusing directions. Rather than telling them to run after Brin, The Little Princess sent them the opposite way.

  “You need to go to the bridge first. And hurry! You’re running out of time. The queen is asking questions. It won’t be long before she decides to come out and investigate for herself.”

  “But if we have to hurry after Brin, why do we need to—”

  “It will all make sense—just go!”

  “It’s not making sense,” Moya muttered to herself. “Stupid Little Princess.” She whirled on Rain. “Can you do something? Can you build a bridge?”

  Rain looked up at her, startled. “I dig,” he said, then pointed out at the nothing that lay between them and Roan.

  Moya squinted across at Roan. She wasn’t even moving. As far as Moya could tell, her friend was just standing there.

  That’s when Moya heard the drum, a pounding in the distance off to her right. Soon this was followed by a horn. The sounds came from the White Tower of Ferrol.

  “Gifford?” a woman’s voice said.

  Long hair, bright smile, the woman stood before him in a beautiful gown, her arms held out in invitation.

  Gifford wasn’t sure what to do, and his hesitation extinguished the woman’s smile. Then her eyes clouded as tears invaded that once happy face. “He doesn’t know me.”

  Coming up behind her, a man placed his hands on the woman’s shoulders, giving her a slight squeeze of sympathy. He was familiar, a face out of the past, but different—so young.

  “Father?” Gifford asked.

  The man nodded, then looked at the woman he held before him, the first person Gifford had seen upon entering Alysin.

  That should have been my first clue.

  His mouth opened, but not to say anything. It just hung agape as he stared at her in amazement.

  Gifford had always wondered what she had looked like. As a child, he had fashioned her face out of the best bits and pieces he found in others, the most beautiful, the most kind. That was the memory he carried, a timeless illusion of a goddess that he’d invented. The woman before him looked nothing like he had imagined. This person was young—younger than Roan, younger than himself, not much more than a child. And so small, so tiny and delicate, like a songbird. There were freckles on her cheeks. Gifford had never once imagined freckles. He thought of them as imperfections, and this mother could have none. Her hair was wavy. Her face thin, even a bit gaunt. Her front two teeth were a smidge too large, her small mouth drawing too much attention to them. She could have been Brin’s younger sister, or Persephone’s daughter, but she wasn’t.

  Her eyes brimmed with tears as she watched him. In that gaze, he saw pain, fear, regret, longing, and love. A tear slipped down, first one cheek and then the other.

  “Mother?” he said.

  Her shaking hands went to her mouth as more tears spilled. All she could do was nod in reply—nod and cry.

  Gifford had never felt more awkward, never more crippled. He staggered forward and reached out. She extended a hand toward him, and for the first time, Gifford touched his mother. Their fingers clasped, and she drew him to her. She was so small, but her arms engulfed him, her tiny body pressed tight.

  “Gifford. Gifford. Gifford,” she repeated in a whispered chant broken by sobs. “I’ve waited so long to hold you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there. I wish you didn’t have to go through so much all alone. I’m . . .” Her voice failed.