Page 80 of The Mirror in the Mountain

Chapter 35

Eva

We journeyed north until long after day turned to night, only stopping to make camp when the moon peeked from behind the dusky clouds littering the starless sky. Despite Aviel’s head start, it wasn’t enough to warrant us riding through the night and risk injuring the horses, though we had only scant hours until daybreak and our journey began again.

There would be no more updates from within Aviel’s ranks. I hadn’t needed to ask to know that Aviel’s spyfinder had done its work.

Bash caught me as I dismounted Nisa, his face haggard with concern. His thumb skated over the pulse in my throat, its rhythm traitorously giving away my nerves.

I had spent most of our ride trying to block my feelings from him, hoping he wouldn’t read too far into whatever I wasn’t successful in suppressing. And yet that worry swallowed me like a shroud—the thought of what I could have done differently wrapping inescapably around me.

“I’ll take care of them,” Bash said, nodding at our mounts. “Rest while you can. I’ll find you back at our tent.”

I lifted onto my toes, my hands coming up to frame either side of Bash’s face as I looked him in the eyes for perhaps the first time since breakfast. “I love you.”

His head tilted slightly, the only hint of his concern as he replied, “I love you too.”

Yael came up beside me, hooking her arm in mine. Her other side was already taken by Marin who was holding a small lantern, the light inside crackling with some form of suspended fire. “Figured you could use an escort.”

“Tents are being set up this way,” Marin said as Yael led us through the trees. Indeed, the tents had sprung up as if by magic. I blinked, not having it in me to smile at that entirely apt description. Because of course they had.

Yael led us to a few tents near the edge of a lake, no larger or grander than any of the others—just gray fabric and four walls brought to a peak. She let out a yawn, muttering, “Don’t worry, they’re more soundproof than they look.”

I pulled them both into a silent hug before I ducked under the tent flap, unable to manage another word. As I walked inside, I barely took in the plush sleeping mat in the center of it, the space far too large and the amenities far too nice to match what I had seen from the exterior.

Instead, I stared blankly forward. All I could think about were the consequences of my own selfishness, about each and every life that could’ve been spared today. Picturing the sprite’s endless dark eyes staring me down as she said the words that might doom me.

There is only one way to be certain. To stop him for good.

Looking down, I curled my fingers in, one at a time…and a blade of darkness, short and sharp, appeared in my hand, slowly solidifying as I clenched my fist around it. I could stop this allright now. I could end him—if only I had the courage to end myself. Or, perhaps, the lack of it. The lack of faith that we could pull this off without my sacrifice.

I had never been suicidal. Not even after losing my family in that fire, though it felt like my heart had torn asunder. To choose to die now without even a fight, except with my own soul and will to survive…

Would it be worth it to stop the battle ahead from taking even more lives? To save both realms? I wondered if my mother had any idea that the philosophical scenario she had once posed would one day become my own personal trolley problem.

I couldn’t shake the foreboding sensation that it still felt utterly wrong. Not only for myself, but what my death would mean for those I loved. I could barely think about what it would do to Bash. To Tobias, who I had just gotten back from the dead, especially when I knew exactly how his death had nearly destroyed me. To Quinn, my lone family for so long, who had already been through so much loss. To Rivan, Yael, and Marin—the family I had found here who had welcomed me with open arms. To the Solearans who had finally gotten me back after years of sacrifice and struggle.

After all, death was only felt by the people left behind.

The sprite’s shrill laughter filled my ears, and I fought the urge to cover them.

There is always another way. And there is always another choice. But will you be able to make it? Or will it be made for you?

I knew that if it came down to a choice between my family and myself, I would swallow my damnation without a murmur. But to premeditate my own murder? Yet I couldn’t deny the lives I was putting at risk by not taking my own.

Taking my own life.Taking it.From myself, from my future, from everyone who loved me. Even if doing so wasforthem, along with everybody else.

Bash would never forgive me for this. I could barely think his name, knowing what my loss would do to him. Would he waste away like his mother had after his father’s death? Or would his sense of duty, his resilience, and the help of our family keep him among the living, even if I took his heart with me?

But even if I added his life to my death toll, our happy ending didn’t outweigh the greater good.

I should have known I couldn’t escape my fate. That even though I may have been able to delay the inevitable, I wouldn’t be able to run from it forever.

Slowly, I brought the obsidian knife an inch from my face. I stared, mesmerized, as its black edge glinted ominously in the dim light, the tinier twin to the blade on my back. The walls of the tent pressed in, the edges of my vision blurring. But I only felt cold, paralyzed, as if all feeling had seeped from my bones into the magic blade before me, taunting me with its deadly choice.

A voice in the back of my head screamed at me to stop as I tilted its tip toward my heart. A voice that was far too easy to silence.

The tent flap swung forward. Bash stormed in before I could let the magic go. His face was ashen, his stormy eyes whirling with alarm as the tent darkened with shadow.

---