“You would have fought your own gifted,” Lilia said.

“Becoming a thing, isn’t it? Killing ourselves.”

As they came down into the military camp, Lilia tensed. The mass of the army up close was far more overwhelming than from afar. Massive, stinking bears were camped in large rings outside the periphery of the camp. A few blue-clad kennel girls led tall white bears past them. Lilia saw runners and pages. And the troops… they were too many and too different for Lilia to comprehend. She expected they would all be Dhai, but the armor, the hair, the clothing, and the languages – the languages! – were all foreign. She saw every type of face in every shade of brown – from pinkish tan to the deepest violet-black, and every type of hair in every type of color, from red to white to black, coiled and curled, straightened and dreadlocked. What confounded her even more was that the groups were mixed. People who bore little resemblance to one another wore uniforms that clearly marked them as units. Lilia looked at every standard they passed, noting how many were parajistas, sinajistas, tirajistas… Finding the omajistas was much easier. She could still see the misty trails leading off from the mirror. As she followed those trails, she saw they wended back to groups congregated around omajista flags. Whatever her mother had made, it needed a lot of power to work.

Ahead of her, Zezili’s right hand kept twitching. They had expected a challenge, a fight. But blending into this colorful group proved to be easier than Lilia imagined. In fact, as they passed, people tended to glance at them once, lower their eyes, and step away. It took Lilia a long time to realize it was because they looked like Dhai.

Lilia trotted forward to catch up to Zezili. She opened her mouth to talk in Dorinah because she didn’t want anyone knowing what they said. Then she realized that might be worse.

Instead, she spoke very low in Dhai. “They will kill us after we break it.”

“I expect so,” Zezili said. “But you were willing to burn up my legion to save a few hundred sniveling dajians. I figured killing yourself to save forty thousand or so would be fine by you.”

“But you’ll die, too,” Lilia said.

“I like living,” Zezili said, “but I don’t fancy living as a slave.”

“That’s very strange coming from you.”

Zezili grunted.

As they got closer to the mirror, the troops thinned out. Finally, they reached a barrier of bone-white pillars that jutted up from the charred ground. It completely encircled the mirror. This close, Lilia could see through to the other side. The sky wasn’t as dark there. She saw the moons’ light glinting across a broad field of amber-colored grass. In the far distance, Lilia saw the winking lights of a house or hold of some type, obscured by a stand of spiky trees.