Page 69 of Let Slip the Dogs of War

“I’ve got this, too,” he says, handing Ophelia a small, green stone. She rolls it in her palm.

“We’re both going to have to do it, huh?”

“Can I help?” Grant asks eagerly.

Ophelia and Dante exchange glances. Ophelia smiles. “Usually, I’d say yes, but let us have a go first? I’m not sure how your magic is going to react to ours, and it’s a long distance to be scrying as it is…”

Grant deflates. “Yeah, okay. Can I watch?”

Dante snorts. “Yeah. We’re not going anywhere.”

He sets the mirror down on the table so all it reflects is the ceiling. He and Ophelia kneel at either end of it, and their magic flickers when they reach and take each other’s hands.

I have seen so much magic performed before in my life. We use it like breathing because, really, it is the same kind of thing to a fae. To wear my glamour, to wake a sleeping plant, to reach out into the blanket of magic that surrounds us… It does not take a thought.

But this—I watch, rapt, as Dante closes his eyes and the magic deep inside him, that flicker linked to me, sparks and stretches out. There really is not much of it, but it does not matter as he pushes it into the mirror and it spreads across the smooth glass surface.

Ophelia murmurs under her breath. The words do not matter, I think, except that they keep her focused, and after a moment, her magic reaches out just like Dante’s, tendrils wrapping together until they have formed a magical net over the mirror.

Dante squeezes Ophelia’s left hand. “For focus,” he says, and she nods without opening her eyes. It doesn’t matter that he can’t see her, I realise. He didn’t need to say that about the stone at all. That is for Grant, for us, because Ophelia’s power is already seeping into the stone, down her arm, up Dante’s…

They have been using magic together for much of their lives. That is clear. Deep inside my chest, I feel a dull ache. Dante’s magic will never be like mine, never an unquenchable depth, but I will also never wield it with him like this. I will never have the chance to be as close with him as all the other people in his life.

Their magic surges and lifts, and all at once it floods the mirror, leaving it pulsing with power. Dante opens his eyes and scoops the mirror up. “Cassian? Are you—”

“I’m here,” a faint voice says. “And impressed. That’s a lot of power.”

“Yeah, it wasn’t just me.”

Dante turns the mirror so Cassian can see Ophelia, and another voice echoes around the room.

“Ophelia!” Sam. I cannot quite see the entire mirror surface from here, but I hear the way he jostles Cassian aside. “Fuck, are you okay?”

“Fine. Seriously. But we’re ready to come back.”

Silence. Dante frowns, turning the mirror back to face himself. “Guys? What’s going on?”

“A bit of a hiccup,” Cassian says. I hear a short scuffle, and then Sam’s voice comes a little louder.

“Another one of his boyfriends fucked off for the night, so there’s only two of them here.”

“Sam—”

“What? You weren’t going to say it.”

“I don’t get it,” Dante says, “how many of you do you need to open the gateway?”

Cassian sighs. “Two of us could do it, but not for long. And it’s easier when Isi and Soren are both here, but Soren went to help deal with some high fae, and Einar is still gone, and Clem is out feeding…”

“What does that mean?” Ophelia snaps.

“They should be back in the morning,” Sam says. “Can you wait until then? Like, daybreak. Is it safe?”

Dante looks at me helplessly. Ophelia’s own disappointment is palpable.

“They will be safe,” I say. “They will be at the position we arrived in just after the suns rise.”

Sam lets out a relieved sigh. “Guys? You’re sure?”