Mira Ardent's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

Mira forced herself to breathe slowly while Dame Crystalline arranged the vials on the stone bench. Six stolen colors, each one moving like trapped lightning inside frosted glass. Her mentor's crescent-scarred hand hovered over them, fingers flexing in that familiar pattern. The door slammed open. Astral stood there holding something flat against her chest, her face flushed from running. "Mira. Outside. Now." She didn't wait for an answer, just turned and left. Dame Crystalline looked up sharply, but Mira was already moving, the vial in her boot pressing cold against her ankle with each step. Astral had set up in the practice yard, a chart propped against the stone wall. Two crescent scars carved in frost, side by side. One labeled with Dame Crystalline's name. The other labeled Master Cornelius. Next to the chart sat a bone knife with a notch in the handle that matched the second scar perfectly. "I checked the records," Astral said, her voice tight. "Cornelius cut himself forty years ago in the burned studio. The same night Wintergale nearly killed three people. Everyone saw it happen." She pulled Mira closer to the chart. "Look at the curves. Dame Crystalline's scar bends left. The one you saw in the East Tower bends right. Like Cornelius's." Mira stared at the chart, then at the knife, then back at Dame Crystalline's studio where rainbow light spilled from the frosted windows. All those vials she'd been sorting. All that time spent helping her mentor organize stolen colors. For nothing. For the wrong person. The cold in her boot felt different now — not like evidence, but like proof she'd been looking at everything backwards. "We need to tell her," Mira said, but her voice came out hollow because she already knew what Astral would say. What she'd have to do next. Stop sorting colors for Dame Crystalline and start watching Cornelius instead.