I walked to the wall. Daddy’s eyes were wild now, and I knew, if not for the gag, he’d be roaring at me.

I stepped up, into the Silver.

But now we see through a glass darkly and, the truth, before it is revealed to all, face to face, we see in fragments (alas, how illegible) in the error of the world, so we must spell out its faithful signals even when they seem obscure to us and as if amalgamated with a will wholly bent on evil.

—Umberto Eco
The Name of the Rose

Good of you to come,” mocked the Lord Master. “Nice hat.” Entering the Silver was like pressing forward into a gluey membrane. The surface rippled thickly when I touched it. When I tried to step into it, it resisted. I pushed harder, and it took considerable effort to force my boot to puncture the silvery skin. I thrust in up to my hip.

Still the mirror pressed back at me with a buoyant elasticity.

For a moment I stood half in each world, my face through the mirror, the back of my head in the house, one leg in the Silver, one leg out. Just when I thought it would expel me with the snap of a giant rubber band, it yielded—sucked me in, warm and unpleasantly wet—and squirted me out on the other side, stumbling.

I’d expected to find myself standing in the living room, but I was in a tunnel of sorts, of moist pink membrane. My living room was farther away than it had looked from outside the mirror. There were forty or so feet between me and my parents. Barrons had been wrong. The LM was more adept with Silvers than he’d thought. Not only was he capable of stacking Silvers, the tunnel hadn’t been at all visible from beyond the glass. In tennis-speak, this set went to the LM. But there was no way he was winning the match.

“As if I had a choice.” I wiped my face with a sleeve, scrubbing at a thin layer of smelly, slippery afterbirth. It was dripping off my MacHalo. I’d thought about removing it before I’d entered the mirror (it’s a little hard for people to take you seriously when you’re wearing one), but now I was glad I hadn’t. It was no wonder people avoided the Silvers.

You had every choice, my dad’s eyes said furiously. You chose the wrong one.

My mother’s eyes were saying way more than that. She began with the mess that was my tousled black hair sticking out from under my “hat,” went nearly ballistic over the tight leather pants I was wearing, made short, scathing work of my butchered nails, and by the time she got around to the automatic weapon that kept slipping around my shoulder, banging into my hip, I had to tune her out.

I took a step forward.

“Not so fast,” said the Lord Master. “Show me the stones.”

I swung my gun forward into my other hand, slipped the pack off my shoulder, opened it, fished out the black pouch, and held it up.

“Get them out. Show them to me.”

“Barrons didn’t think that was a good idea.”

“I told you not to involve Barrons, and I don’t give a fuck what he thinks.”

“You told me not to bring him. I had to involve him. He’s the one who had the stones. Have you ever tried to steal anything from Barrons?”

The look on his face said he had. “If he interferes, they die.”

“I got your message loud and clear the first time. He won’t interfere.” I needed to get closer. I needed to be between the LM and his guards and my parents when Barrons and his men arrived. I needed to be in stabbing distance. Barrons planned to reconfigure his Silver to connect to whatever destination the Lord Master was at, but he’d said it would take time, depending on the location. Stall, he’d ordered. Once I get the photo, I’ll work on connecting to the other end. My men will come in behind you as soon as I have a lock on the location.

“Put down the spear, your gun, the pistol in the back of your pants, the switchblade in your sleeve, and the knives in your boots. Kick them all away.”

How did he know where all my weapons were?

My mother couldn’t have looked more shocked if she’d found out I was sleeping with half the Ashford High football team and smoking crack between touchdowns.

I gave her my most reassuring look. She flinched. Apparently what I considered reassuring lately came off a little … savage, I guess. “It’s been a rough few months, Mom,” I said defensively. “I’ll explain it all later. Let my parents go,” I told the LM. “I’ll cooperate fully. You have my word.”

“I do not require your word. I have your last living relatives. Being of such finite duration, humans care deeply about such things. Alina told me her parents died in a car wreck when she was fifteen. Yet another lie. Makes one wonder, does it not? I would never have thought to look for them had you not led me here.”

How had I led him here? How had he followed me to Ashford? Could he track V’lane? Was V’lane duplicitous? Working with the Lord Master? “They’re not my relatives,” I said coolly. “My relatives are dead. When you killed Alina, you wiped out the last of my line, except for me.” I was hoping to make my parents’ value seem a little less than it really was. It always worked in the movies. “We were adopted.”

I snatched a quick look at my mom, even though I knew I shouldn’t. Her eyes shimmered with unshed tears. Great. She disapproved of everything about me, and now I’d hurt her feelings. I was batting a thousand.

The Lord Master didn’t say a word. Just walked over to my dad and slammed him in the face with his fist. My daddy’s head snapped back and blood spurted from his nose. He gave a dazed shake, and his eyes said, Get out of here, baby.