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"But they’resweetly at me "That’s not the same as the real Jason I loved hi ain if I made him up Besides, the real Jason would still be dead"

[You wouldn’t have to remember that fact,] said the creature

"What do you mean?"

[I could wipe your memories Put you back where you were before Jason died Take you far away from this place, set you up as a faether]

While the creature was talking, Jason’s body hadbeside me and put an arm aroundthat damned mirror Jason’s body held me while I watched the creature’s promises play out in front of us I felt like I was in a bizarre, supernatural version of The Price Is Right

In thecabin Interestingly, it lookeda big platter of so into the house as he did so Two little girls, one dark and one light, ca their own sether, Jason eating off Jane’s plate as he almost always had in life, while the four talked animatedly, if silently

In iven anything for that picture to have been a reality

But instead I shookarm of Jason’s body

"It’s not real," I said "And it can’t be real I would have loved for that to have come true, but it didn’t Jason died, and I’m a different person now" Alures wavered and then disappeared, leaving only the replica of Anyan’s cabin sitting alone in the mirror

[But it could be real I can make it real, for you,] ca me," I said, almost sadly "I’m not that Jane anymore And, to be honest, I don’t know if I’d want to be her She eet, but she wasn’t able to cope with things I like being who I’ve beco that fact for myself only as I said it for the first tiht, ain," I said quickly, before the creature could up his ante any et to chooseyou can offer e that fact"

First, Jason disappeared For allaway Then, the mirror disappeared from above the creature’s enormous sucker, and its tentacle slithered away Finally, all the tentacles began slithering Left and right they went, untangling themselves to reveal another door in the opposite wall

This door was black, not white, and it was carved with all sorts of Alfar symbols

Exit all hope, ye who enter here, I conjectured upon their translation They stayed shut as I neared, and I had to push ed to push theht into it

Call that service? I griped, mentally, only to come to a halt as soon as I’d crossed the threshold

For I’d co eyeball

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The eye blinked at me I blinked back

Like my own, the eye was jet black Unlike my own round orb, however, this one was n And it was huge: The eye itself, along with the round, slightly protruding socket in which it was housed, was larger than the entire length of ray, but then it flashed orange, and then brown

Like a chaain, and I blinked back Or an enormous octopus

[Come around, Jane,] said that warm, sonorous voice in my mind [Come around and see ress Only then did I realize it had been h some sort of side entrance

Once I’d moved around in front of it, I peered around the room It had once been white marble, like the others I’d just been in, but it was now streaked with algae, lime, salt, and sand Partially that was because there was a lot more water here than there had been Water ran down the rock walls, like natural fountains, spilling into pools here and there, or dripping out onto the floor All that water made it look a lot more like a natural cave than those other overly white spaces had Similar to that last room, however, this one also had tentacles piled around, here and there They pulsed and twitched occasionally, but were otherwise still

Also like those other roohtly different, so else… Here, I just felt that "soic, or Nell’s pohen she tapped into the old ics, but more concentrated More like Blondie’s power, actually, but still not exactly that

[It’s the wild ic Tapping into the elements themselves, not just the eleuess that would make sense, since you’re so ancient So’s your power"

The creature chuckled inthe ray skin around the creature’s eye crinkle in ahter in my head ceased