A name isn't just a name.
It's a tether.
A lock.
A spell.
And someone—something—was trying to pick it apart, syllable by syllable.
---
Skyevale Academy – The Mirror Courtyard, Dawn
Irena's dreams tasted of glass.
That was the first sign.
Not blood. Not fear. Not even memories.
Just the weight of mirrors cracking under her skin and the sharp, metallic aftertaste of her own reflection breathing too loudly.
She woke with her pillow soaked. Not sweat. Not tears. Just… cold water. Like something had pulled her face through a pond and left her gasping on dry land.
Lucien's charm was blackened.
That was the second sign.
It had burned through its wire and left a soot-ring around her throat. As if it had fought something off in the night—and lost.
The third sign?
She couldn't remember her middle name.
She had to check the inside of her journal where she always wrote it, in a swoop of nervous cursive:
> Irena Calisse Vale
It looked like her handwriting.
But she didn't remember writing it.
And she didn't remember being her.
Not completely.
---
Fragments in the Garden
She found Lucien under the frost trees. He was practicing again—shards of air magic slicing in slow, sharp arcs around him like wolves pacing.
"I don't feel right," she said.
He didn't answer.
"Lucien."
Still no reply.
She stepped closer—and saw it.
His eyes weren't blinking. Not moving. Wide open, but hollow. Like his soul had been scooped out.
The frost around him flickered.
His reflection, standing just behind him, smiled.
Irena gasped and stepped back—and just like that, it was gone. Lucien shook his head, dazed.
"Irena?"
"What the hell just happened?" she snapped.
He looked at her, brow furrowing. "You were just standing there."
"No. Your—your reflection. It moved."
He froze. "Mine or yours?"
"What?"
"Which one of us did the moving?"
She didn't answer. Because she couldn't be sure.
---
The Library – Theda's Warning
Theda was waiting for her again.
As if she knew Irena would come unraveling.
The Lorekeeper looked older now. More fragile. Her robe hung loose, like the weight of truth had stretched it thinner.
"They're overlapping," she whispered. "The mirrors. The people in them. You can't look too long, or they'll want you."
Irena sat beside her on the old chaise in the west wing, where the books were all locked shut and the light flickered like gasps.
"What's happening to me?" she asked. "I—I feel like I'm being rewritten."
Theda's hand found hers. It was cold. Steady.
"You are."
"But how? I haven't touched the mirror again."
"It doesn't need your hands. Just your doubt."
Irena looked down. Her palms were scarred. She didn't remember when that happened.
"Someone's trying to erase me," she said.
"Not erase," Theda corrected softly. "Replace."
---
The Lost Day
That night, Irena found a page torn from her journal.
She hadn't torn it.
She hadn't written it either.
But there, in her handwriting, was a memory she didn't recall:
> "He kissed me in the rain, under the east tower. Said he loved me. Said it felt like something ancient waking up. I didn't want Mara to see—she would've ruined it. She always ruins things."
Irena blinked.
Lucien had never kissed her in the rain.
He'd never said he loved her.
But the memory itched. Crawled under her fingernails. Tried to plant itself inside her.
She turned the page over.
At the bottom, in writing that wasn't hers at all:
> "Let me have this. Just this one life.
You weren't even using it properly."
---
The Confrontation
She found Mara in the Reflection Hall.
There were no mirrors there. Only covered ones. The sacred room where students learned mirror theory—without risk.
But Mara had uncovered one.
She stood before it in Irena's favorite boots, wearing Irena's old emerald ring, the one she'd lost last winter and swore she'd only misplaced.
"Mara."
Mara didn't turn.
"I know what you're doing," Irena said.
"Do you?"
"You're stealing me."
Mara laughed softly, but there was no humor in it.
"I'm just picking up the pieces you left lying around. You always drop things when you're distracted."
"I'm not yours to wear like a costume."
Mara turned finally, and for a moment—Irena's breath caught.
Because the face looking back at her was almost hers.
Same cheekbones. Same lashes. Same tilt of the chin.
Only the eyes were wrong. Too green. Too empty.
"You gave me everything," Mara whispered. "All I had to do was want it enough."
Irena stepped forward. "I want it back."
Mara smiled—and it wasn't cruel. It was sad.
> "You're too late. The mirror knows who it wants now."
---
Lucien's Touch
She ran to Lucien.
Didn't knock. Didn't explain.
Just flung the door open to his tower quarters and collapsed into him like drowning.
He caught her. Held her. Tight.
"Tell me who I am," she said.
He didn't ask why.
Just whispered into her hair:
> "You're Irena Calisse Vale. You kissed me first. You hate strawberry tea. You hate mirrors more. You called me a coward the first time I flinched. You said I make your heart feel like thunder when it rains."
Her heart cracked.
"I feel like I'm fading," she whispered. "Like there's not enough me left."
He pulled her closer.
"Then let me hold what's left."