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“Look deep inside yourself.”

Yet another familiar saying. “Christ,” I say, “this is just like old times.”

“Yes, it is,” she snaps. “Because you’re the same person, trapped by the same fear of what you are.”

I snort. “Turns out I was right to be afraid. I should have run, screaming, as fast and as far as I could and never looked back.”

I know that’s one of the reasons she didn’t tell me who I was. Why she believed I had to remember for myself. Because if I’dhad even an inkling of what I was, I probably would’ve given up trying to remember.

“And do you think hiding from what you are will save you now? Will it save any of us?”

I grit my teeth. “Just what do you want from me? You clearly have no idea what I can do, yet you’re so fucking sure that I’m going to save the freaking world. Why?”

She gets up and paces the short distance across the courtyard, then back again.

“Because Ravenna told me you were our only hope.” Hecate’s voice is steady, but there’s something underneath it—a weight pressing against the words. “That only you could end Lucifer’s reign in Hell and stop him from taking over the rest of the known worlds.”

I feel the words should sort of shake the ground beneath me, like something so momentous but instead, they land with an eerie stillness. I swallow. My throat feels tight and raw. But really, this is nothing new, just verification of what I already knew. And it’s all well and good but doesn’t really help. “She must have told you more than that.”

Hecate exhales, her fingers tugging at the end of her long plait, a habit I recognize now—she does it when she doesn’t want to say something out loud. “There was no time.” Her voice drops, lower, softer. “She used the last of her strength to bring you to me.”

A sharp pressure builds in my chest. My mother—the woman I have never known, the woman who handed me over like I was a package to be delivered—spent the last of herself for me.

I sort of wish she hadn’t.

“She did tell me she’d destroyed all the mirrors in Hell,” Hecate continues. “That only Lucifer’s Mirror remained, and she’d hidden it. Without that mirror, Lucifer was trapped. Andyou…” Her gaze meets mine, piercing, unwavering. “Only you would know where to find it and how to use it to enter Hell.”

A cold wave crashes over me. I shiver despite the warmth of the sun on my skin. I have the mirror, and I know the whole point is to use it. But I don’t want to go to Hell.

Hecate is watching me, her eyes shrewd. But I’m not going to lie and act as though I’m happy about all this. It’s fucked up. “And?”

She frowns. “And nothing. That was all she had time for. She vanished. That was when I realized she wasn’t even really there. That I was just seeing a shadow of her through the mirror. That she was still in Hell, five thousand years in the past.” She sinks down into the bench beside me. “And when her power was used up, the mirror vanished.” She sits back on the bench and stares at the sky for a moment, her fists clenched at her sides. Obviously, it’s not a happy memory.

I wait. And wait.

Finally, her fingers uncurl, and she continues, “She never came back. And I looked after you. I watched you grow. I could sense the magic deep inside you. You were a happy child, until...”

“Until I wasn’t.”

“We were living in the south at that time. The shadowguard came looking for you. You seemed to draw them to you, and I knew I had to find a way to hide you better. You weren’t safe with me. So I sent you away and I moved back to Selene’s temple.”

She goes quiet, and I think about what she’s told me. What my mother did. The sacrifices she made.

But she also sacrificed me.

How could anyone expect that of a baby? How could she know that I would be able to do anything? There must have been more. She must have...died before she could tell Hecate everything.

What are we missing?

My head feels like it’s going to explode.

Which is a joke. I’m supposed to be a deep, clear, calm well of knowledge.

Ha!

What am I going to do? What if I disappoint everybody? What if everybody dies because of me? What if—

“Breathe,” Hecate snaps. “You’re hyperventilating.”