Chapter 15: Fractured Reflections
The darkness stretched infinitely.
Theo stood in the void, his breath shallow, his pulse hammering. The world had dissolved around him the moment the trial began. There were no walls, no ceiling, only an expanse of black stretching in all directions.
Then, a ripple.
A mirror materialized before him—tall, ornate, its gilded frame twisted with unfamiliar symbols. The glass was fogged, but he could see something shifting behind it. His reflection.
Or at least, he thought it was.
Theo took a step closer. His reflection did the same. But something was wrong.
The other Theo tilted his head—just slightly too slow, just slightly too stiff.
Theo's breath caught.
The reflection smiled.
A razor-thin grin, unnatural, stretching wider than it should.
Theo staggered back. The mirror shattered, and from the shards, hands clawed out—pale, emaciated fingers grasping for him.
He turned to run—
But the void had closed in.
The hands reached him, pressing against his skin, his face, his throat. Cold. Clammy. Crawling.
Whispers slithered into his ears, overlapping voices, words he barely understood.
"Who are you?"
"You don't belong here."
"Give it back."
Theo gasped, struggling, but the hands gripped tighter. He tried to push them away, but the fingers passed through his skin, sinking into him, pulling something from within.
His vision blurred. His limbs felt numb.
And then—
The world shifted.
The Other Self
Theo blinked. He was no longer in the void.
He stood in a dimly lit room—no, a house. Wooden floors, dusty air, bookshelves filled with journals and parchment. The scent of old ink. A fireplace crackling low.
A house he did not recognize.
But his hands—
He lifted them.
Larger. Calloused.
Not a child's hands.
Not Theo's hands.
His breath hitched. He reached for his face, his hair. Short. Coarse. His body felt wrong—too tall, too heavy, too familiar.
And then, he saw it.
A mirror, cracked but standing in the corner of the room.
He stepped toward it.
The face staring back at him was not Theo's.
It was his.
Samuel's.
The man he had been before.
Theo's mind reeled. He touched his face—his real face. For the first time since waking in this world, he saw himself as he had been. The lines of his jaw, the weight of his gaze.
A life lost.
A life stolen.
The door creaked behind him.
Theo whirled.
A shadow stood in the doorway, featureless, its presence suffocating.
"Theo," it whispered.
Not Samuel.
Theo.
The name clung to him like a noose.
"That's not my name," Theo said, voice shaking.
The shadow stepped closer.
"You are wearing a dead man's body."
Theo's chest tightened. He stumbled back. "No. I—"
"You took his life."
Theo's breath hitched. "That's not true."
The shadow tilted its head. "Then why are you afraid?"
A scream tore through the air—Theo's voice, but not from his mouth.
He turned—
The mirror reflected him as a child again. Theo's form, trembling. The cracks in the glass spread like veins.
The shadow loomed over the child in the mirror.
It reached out—
And Theo felt something inside him splinter.
The Trial of Identity
Theo gasped as he was yanked back into the void. The weight of the stolen body, the name he carried, the memories that weren't his—they all threatened to crush him.
The Eidolon stood before him now, watching. Its form shifted, flickering between Samuel's face and Theo's.
"You are nothing," it whispered.
Theo fell to his knees. His thoughts twisted. Was it right? Did he steal this life?
"You are not real."
"You are only a shadow."
The whispers clawed at him, filling his mind with doubt.
Then—
A voice.
Soft, steady.
"Then you will stand again."
Father Emmanuel's words.
Theo's breath steadied.
No. He was not nothing.
Not just Samuel. Not just Theo.
He was both.
The void trembled. The Eidolon recoiled.
And Theo rose.
The trial was not over.
But he was not going to lose.