Chapter 28: The Other Kael
The copy stepped into the chamber like it had always belonged there.
Same build. Same scar across the cheek. Same eyes but colder. Glossier. Like mirrors turned inward.
Kael froze.
The air pulsed. The black water rippled beneath the mirror.
Even Taren took a step back.
"Don't move," Lyra said, hand already reaching into her coat.
The doppelgänger smiled. "You always reach for weapons when you should be reaching for answers."
Kael turned to Taren. "What is this?"
But Taren was staring at the doppelgänger with a strange look a satisfied one.
He knew.
He brought him here.
Kael's throat tightened. "You set me up."
Taren shrugged. "I guided you. Same thing."
"You're with the Saint."
"I am," Taren said. "And so are you. You just forgot."
Kael backed away. "No no, I'm not one of them"
The doppelgänger stepped forward, voice calm and cruel. "You were the first, Kael. The prototype. The town's gift to the Hollow Saint. You didn't just get hollowed you opened the gate."
"No," Kael whispered. "That's not true."
Lyra's voice rang out. "He's lying."
But Kael didn't know anymore.
The mirror above began to tremble. Cracks widened across its surface like veins bursting under skin.
From the pool, more echoes rose shifting forms, all of them Kael. One crying. One bleeding. One laughing with a mouth too wide.
The doppelgänger pointed at them. "Every time the town reboots, one of you survives. One Kael. One mind. One puppet."
Lyra stepped in front of Kael, shielding him. "Get away from him."
The copy tilted his head. "Still clinging to the lie? You erased him once. Do it again."
Kael whispered, "Is that true?"
Lyra's silence was louder than a scream.
Suddenly the chamber cracked with a thunderous snap. The mirror above shattered, pieces falling like frozen rain.
But instead of breaking, the shards hovered spinning, glowing with sickly red light.
And each one reflected a different version of Kael.
In one, he was bleeding. In another, he was smiling. In another, he wore a crown of thorns and burned with pale fire.
"Pick one," Taren said. "Choose who you want to be. The Saint will shape the rest."
Kael turned in a slow circle. "What happens if I don't choose?"
"You stay nothing," the doppelgänger hissed. "Half of a memory. A puppet with no name."
---
Lyra threw something at the base of the mirror a vial of ash and bone. It exploded in pale fire, sending a shockwave through the chamber.
The doppelganger shrieked as its skin blistered and peeled, revealing something underneath not Kael at all, but something made of smoke and leeching mist.
Taren backed away. "You shouldn't have done that."
"I should've done it sooner," Lyra snarled.
She grabbed Kael's arm. "We have to go. Now."
But Kael couldn't move. He stared at the floating shards.
Each one calling to him. Offering something he wanted back:
A mother's touch.
A brother's voice.
A girl with silver hair.
His true name.
He reached toward a shard just one.
And the moment his fingers brushed it
He screamed.
Lyra held him as he collapsed, spasming. The shard had stabbed into his palm, glowing red, then disappeared into his skin.
His eyes rolled back.
For a moment, he stopped breathing.
The chamber fell silent again.
Then Kael gasped and sat up.
But he looked… different.
His gaze scanned the room too smoothly.
He looked at Lyra.
And didn't recognize her.
Kael blinked slowly.
"Where am I?" he asked. "Who are you?"
Lyra backed away, heart pounding. "Kael, it's me."
But he stood cold and distant.
"I don't know that name."
Then he smiled faintly.
"I think my name is Taren."