“Fuck!” he roared. The echo in the cave ensured that we all got to hear the word at least five times.

“Silence!” Imala hissed.

Tam spat a choice word of his own, drew one of his swords, and vanished back into the dark of the cave. If anyone was waiting to ambush, beat the crap out of, and dump us at Sarad Nukpana’s feet, Carnades had just done a damned fine job of announcing our arrival.

I looked back at the mirror and bit back my own verbal contribution.

The tip of a crossbow bolt protruded from the mirror’s surface. The mirror itself was cracked, broken, worthless. Cracks radiated out from the bolt like a spider’s web. Carnades’s word choice confirmed loud and clear that we had no way home.

Instead of punching through the mirror, that bolt could have just as easily punched through any one of us. When Carnades had slammed that mirror shut behind us, the bolt had been trapped like a fly in amber. There was definitely a cracked mirror here and most likely a destroyed mirror there. Neither one could get us out.

Tam, Imala, and Chigaru were home. The rest of us were trapped in Hell.

I didn’t know about everyone else, but my morale had just hit an all-time low.

Chigaru was speaking in low hissing tones with Imala. Without his bodyguards—or at least the one who hadn’t tried to kill him—the goblin prince no doubt felt as naked as the day he was born. He’d been on the run from his brother for years, and every second of that time he’d been surrounded by guards and armed courtiers. Now he was within ten or so miles of his brother and his army—without any guards. I sympathized and could have told the prince that I knew exactly how he felt. I was in a similar predicament without my magic. Since Carnades didn’t know that, I kept my mouth shut.

“Jabari would never betray me,” Prince Chigaru was saying. “It was chaotic; he must have—”

“It was no mistake, Your Highness,” Imala told him firmly.