CHAPTER 17: CRACKS IN THE MIRROR
753 Words
Lyra didn’t sleep.
The safehouse was quiet except for the faint hum of the refrigerator and the distant sound of traffic bleeding through the walls. Elara lay on the narrow bed, eyes half-closed, listening to the familiar rhythm of her sister’s movements. Metal clicked softly. Once. Twice. Again. Lyra sat on the floor, back against the wall, dismantling and reassembling her weapon with almost ritualistic calm.
“You’re going to wear it out,” Elara said quietly.
Lyra didn’t look up. “Good.”
Elara pushed herself upright, studying her sister in the dim light. There was something unsettling about the way Lyra moved—no hesitation, no wasted motion. It wasn’t fear driving her anymore. It was certainty.
“You’ve been doing that for hours.”
Lyra’s fingers paused for the briefest moment. “I’m thinking.”
“That usually makes me nervous,” Elara replied, attempting a weak smile.
Lyra finally lifted her head. Her eyes were sharp, alert, reflecting something colder than before. “He helped us again.”
Elara didn’t need to ask who. “Luca.”
“Yes.” Lyra snapped the weapon back together. “And that’s the problem.”
“He warned us,” Elara said. “If he wanted us dead—”
“He wouldn’t dirty his hands,” Lyra interrupted. “He’d let Matteo do it.”
Elara hesitated. “You think he’s manipulating us?”
“I think all De Santis men breathe lies,” Lyra said flatly. “And I think you’re starting to forget why we’re here.”
That stung.
“I haven’t forgotten,” Elara said, her voice firmer now. “I just don’t want to lose ourselves along the way.”
Lyra stood slowly. “We lost ourselves the night our parents died.”
The words landed like a blow.
Silence stretched between them, thick and suffocating. Elara searched her sister’s face, hoping to find doubt, fear—anything familiar. But Lyra’s expression was set, resolved in a way that scared her more than anger ever could.
Later, when Elara finally drifted into an uneasy sleep, she didn’t hear Lyra leave.
---
The docks were alive with fog and whispered movement.
Lyra moved through it like a ghost, hood pulled low, footsteps silent against the damp concrete. She had memorized the patrol patterns days ago. Matteo’s men were nervous—overworked, overstretched, sloppy. Fear had made them predictable.
A guard rounded the corner too quickly.
Lyra reacted without thinking.
She disarmed him swiftly, twisting his arm just enough to make him freeze, his breath hitching in panic. She pressed him against a cold steel container, her voice calm and terrifyingly steady.
“Don’t scream,” she whispered. “You won’t like how that ends.”
His hands trembled.
“Tell Matteo something for me,” Lyra continued, leaning closer. “Tell him the past doesn’t stay buried. It comes back. Always.”
She stepped away before he could answer, melting back into the fog as distant voices began to shout. She was gone before the alarm fully sounded.
For the first time in years, Lyra felt something close to satisfaction.
---
Elara was waiting when Lyra returned.
She stood near the window, arms crossed, eyes blazing. “You went alone.”
Lyra shrugged out of her jacket. “And I came back.”
“That’s not the point,” Elara snapped. “We don’t split up. We don’t improvise without telling each other.”
“Plans change,” Lyra said coolly.
“So do people,” Elara shot back. “You scared me.”
Lyra met her gaze, unflinching. “Good. Fear keeps you sharp.”
“That’s not who we are.”
Lyra stepped closer, her voice low. “It’s who we need to be.”
Elara opened her mouth to argue, then stopped. She saw it then—the shift. Lyra wasn’t just angry. She wasn’t grieving anymore.
She was becoming relentless.
Across the city, Luca De Santis listened as reports filtered in—dock disturbances, shaken guards, a warning delivered without bloodshed but heavy with threat.
Twin signatures. Same pattern.
But one was sharper now.
Luca leaned against the balcony railing, the city lights burning below him. “The sister,” he murmured. “She’s escalating.”
His jaw tightened.
Elara still hesitated. Still questioned. Still felt.
Lyra didn’t.
And if she continued down this path, Matteo wouldn’t be the only one caught in the fallout.
The mirror had cracked.
And soon, it would shatter.
- Writer
