Prologue

In the Mirrorhall

Fire World

By the light of a red sun, on a dying world, in the tower of an evil sorceress, Leah stood alone before the Four Worlds mirror and tried to Call her otherself.

Tried and failed.

Tears of frustration burned in eyes already red-rimmed from fatigue and too little water to drink. A gust of wind blew through the long, horizontal window in the Mirrorhall, swirling up more ash from the belching Volcano Lords and leaving a fine black coating on her skin and the mirror.

Taller and wider than herself, the Four Worlds mirror hung a foot off the floor, its sides seamlessly melding into the stone alcove. A magic far beyond her own abilities had wrought four mirrors together. Each one represented a different Mirror World: gleaming black obsidian for Fire, cold ice for Water, transparent glass for Air, and yellow gold for Stone.

Mechanically, Leah used the sleeve of her once fine dress to wipe the ash from the beaten panel of gold. Her reflection looked gaunt: her dress hung on her like a flour sack, her chin even pointier than usual. Her long, dark hair was tangled and filthy.

The reflection ought to have shown Dorotea.

Leah had been trying to Call her Stone World otherself in the gold mirror for four hours now with no success.

The four Mirror Worlds were imperfect copies of the True World. The original copies had even included their inhabitants, with the Mirror versions known as “otherselves.” Centuries had passed since the Mirror Worlds’ creation, and much of the population had diverged, through accidental death and marrying different people than their otherselves on other worlds had, but an elite few still possessed otherselves on some or all of the Mirror Worlds. Leah was such a one.

She’d Called Stone World before, but it had been difficult. Hadn’t the sorceress Qeturah said that Stone World had a dearth of reflective surfaces? Although Qeturah had been born on the True World, she was very knowledgeable about all of them.

Of course, Qeturah was also a liar.

Thinking about the lies Leah had swallowed in the belief that she was helping Qeturah’s son Gideon—the young man Leah had loved—made her stomach twist.

Qeturah’s power-mad drive to rule Fire World had led to war and Gideon’s death, and the deaths of thousands when the Volcano Lords had erupted in fury. Instead of being appalled at what she’d done, Qeturah had been triumphant. She’d immediately started draining magical energy from the dying world and schemed to do the same to Water. Leah and her Water otherself, Holly, had stopped her. Barely.

Leah did not doubt that Qeturah and her mysterious True World allies would try again with either Stone or Air.

Leah had sworn to stop her.

She’d meant it—at the time.

Leah sagged against the wall and faced the truth. The white-hot anger that had sustained her after Gideon’s death had burned out. Right now, all she felt was exhaustion and a soul-sucking grief that made her want to curl up under the blankets and sleep the week away.

Except she kept having nightmares of Gideon dying over and over.

What Qeturah was doing was terrible, and Leah ought to care, but the fate of another world she’d never seen meant little to her. How could she scrape together concern for other realms when her own personal world had collapsed into ruin?

Rebellion rumbled through her. Why was this her responsibility anyway?

Maybe she could send a message to Holly and dump the problem on her shoulders. Her Water self could warn their otherselves on Stone and Air. The three of them could fight Qeturah without Leah’s help.

The relief that came with that thought made Leah sway. She turned away from the mirror and took a step toward the door. Bed. Rest. Hopefully, this time she wouldn’t dream, or would dream of being with Gideon.

She halted, head bowed.

Because while Stone and Air were abstracts, Gideon wasn’t. And Qeturah’s plan for shattering the Mirror Worlds hinged on the death of Gideon’s otherselves. Each boy had an elemental for a father, the element associated with that particular Mirror World. Just as Gideon’s murder had sent his Volcano Lord father into a paroxysm of grief that resulted in a chain of devastating volcanic eruptions, so would Gideon’s otherselves’ murders spark worldwide disasters.

A spike of grief pierced her at the thought of Gideon. Dead and cold, his diamond eyes shut forever.

The only thing that made his death even slightly bearable was the knowledge that part of him still lived on in his otherselves. Leah had saved Ryan, his Water self.

She couldn’t leave the survival of his Stone and Air otherselves to chance. She had to save them, too.

Resolve tasting like iron on her tongue, Leah put her hand on the golden panel and Called yet again: “Dorotea, find a mirror.”