Cherion rubbed his eyes hard with the heel of his palm, pressing until sharp bursts of static flickered behind his eyelids. He shook his head, tapped his cheeks with two quick, stinging slaps, and forced himself to open his eyes again.
The portrait hadn't shifted, faded, or transformed into something else.
The woman in the crimson dress was still standing there, painted against the backdrop of a dark, moonlit balcony. Her striking obsidian hair fell in soft waves over her shoulders, and her piercing, deep red eyes stared straight through the room.
It was, without an ounce of doubt, the exact same face from the solemn portrait hanging in the private wing of the Valtrane estate back in the North.
Zarius's mother.
"What in the actual world..." Cherion whispered, his voice barely a breath against the quiet air. He took a slow, trembling step backward until the backs of his calves bumped against the edge of a low paint table, rattling a pair of dried brushes sitting in a glass jar.
