Leona Lake was a picture of stillness that night, drawn as tight as a drum and trembling with such kinetic potential that it was a shame to leave undisturbed. But the siblings had no time for such antics; even Glint forwent the chase of a passing moth, mindful as she was of Rage Cinder's sheparding shadow.

Guile resisted the urge to turn around as he trudged down the shoreline, hand in hand with his sister. "Did we do something wrong, Father?"

The Lethrblaka was alarmingly silent for several heartbeats, the sound of his deep breaths and pebble churning claws an ominous mantra. When at last he did speak, it was in their species audible tongue—curt and artificial. "Perhaps it is I who has made a mistake, my pupa."

In the wake of Guile's perplexed silence, Glint stiffened her spine and dared to carry on the conversation. "Are we going hunting then?"

"No."

She eyeballed her brother, who only offered a shrug in response. How was he supposed to know why Cinder had drug them from their nest as soon as the sun had set? Why he'd given his mate such a piercing look as they climbed onto his back? Something was surely afoot, but not even Guile and his telltale namesake could deduce what it was.

A cryptic hush befell the trio as the rocky beach thinned into sand and then dirt. The lake was left behind as their father ushered them into an autumn ravaged copse of maples. Their young boles were numerous but supple, allowing the Ra'zac to dart between them as their larger companion simply bent them aside. When the family could no longer see past the trees no matter which way they turned, the Lethrblaka gave a sharp whistle. Obedient as hunting hounds, the twins froze and turned every bit of their attention toward the colossus in their midst.

Cinder tipped his beak toward the heavens, appraising the stars above and their cold light for several moments. When the celestial sight failed to satisfy, he gave a bone chilling sigh and returned his gaze to his children. "Perception is a funny thing."

Glint was the first to speak, the first to ask and to wonder. "Perception?"

"It's the way you see things," Guile offered quietly. His eyes darted to Cinder, relaxing only when the Lethrblaka nodded in agreement.

"Your hatchmate is correct. For instance . . ." his talons worried the earth, digging mulch and loam up from their moldering layers. At last he paused, lingering over the vestige of a leaf; it blushed with fall's vibrant hues and was torn slightly from the creature's rough rifling. "I perceive this to be red and yellow."

"Well, it's uhh . . . certainly red," Glint said uncertainly. "Although I'm not really sure what yellow is supposed to look like."

Cinder's shoulder twitched as he sought out another example. This leaf was gilded entirely in seasonal gold. "This is yellow; I suppose nobody ever bothered to give you a word for it." he laughed and the Ra'zac flinched.

Their father never laughed.

Only Guile could find the gall to speak—although his words were little more than a hesitant whisper. "Yellow looks quite a bit like red, father. Why is there even a name for two colors that look so similar?"

The Lethrblaka's stare was glassy and distant, bottomless orbs of black. His beak opened, closed, and then opened again. "That's because they are not the same color. But that's alright, my pupae. You two just perceive the world differently than others."

"Why is that?" Glint was genuinely confused, her temper beginning to flare. "Why are we different? I don't want to perceive things differently!"

Her brother's attempt at consolation was cut short as Cinder leaned in to hold his daughter. She froze, she clammed up, she stopped breathing. Never in her entire life had anyone but Guile drawn her close or murmured assurances into her ears. Soon she found her hatchmate by her side, heart hammering, mouth slightly ajar as great wings wrapped around the two of them. Like hooded hawks, they fell silent and abandoned all movement as Cinder uttered the single sob they would ever hear him indulge in.

Then, like a memory, the moment faded and they were back on the ground. Their father gave them a dazed glance, and without prompt, the twins leaped onto his back and settled down for the flight back home.

The journey itself was smooth and silent, Cinder using the night's dead air to show off the impressive stamina of an adult Lethrblaka. Between rapid wing beats, Glint and Guile could hear the faint sound of a peculiar song. With the flesh beneath their bodies humming in tandem with the tune, there was no doubt that their father was its source. But rather than questioning the beast below, the Ra'zac simply huddled together and enjoyed the soothing melody until Helgrind loomed in the distance.

The tower's false wall gave way to abrupt darkness as they glided into the grotto, Cinder's landing graceful as always. As soon as he touched the ground, the Ra'zac slipped off of his shoulders and disappeared into the cavern's gloom.

The pitter patter of their retreating footsteps masked Mirror's approach until her lean neck slipped over his own. "How is their sight? Is it normal?" desperate and defeated, these were not the thoughts of the creature she had been a few hours ago—a few hours ago when Guile asked why all the trees had turned red.

"No . . . no it isn't."

She reeled, she hissed and she spat. The walls of Helgrind knew her fury, felt her roars reverberate down into its very core. But like a candle in the rain, she could only rage so long before her fire was put out. Shaking and grimacing, she paced in a circle, whipped her tail, and then abruptly sat. Hunching her shoulders like the Ra'zac she had been so long ago, Mirror chittered to herself until Cinder dared to sit by her side.

"Tritanopia," she growled mentally. "What an ugly word."

"I know."

"Our kind gets it from incest."

"I know."

She flopped onto the ground, frowning as a sonorous echo reverberated throughout the entryway. "What do remember about your Mother?"

Joining her in laying down, Cinder thought a moment and then picked absently at her crest. "She was beautiful and fearsome, much like you."

"What else?"

"Well, she loved Human music," he mused softly. "I think it used to drive father crazy, the way she'd play with her food—make them sing themselves hoarse, make them play away on their lyres and flutes until they bled. Nobody could tell her what to do though, and she'd keep bringing them home no matter the danger."

His mate took a breath, slow and deep. "Was your mother's name Eternal Avarice?"

"Star Mirror . . ."

"WAS IT?"

"You know it was."

Cinder didn't hesitate, didn't fumble or stutter those hateful words. His mate appreciated that, she really did, but it didn't make the confession any easier to accept. A hush as thick as raw cotton reeled out between them; when her words came they were muffled and syrupy, even within the icy purity of his mind.

"When I was still a pupa, I had two hatchmates. Both were as calm and cool as a fucking cucumber, like all males are. They kept me out of trouble, kept me away from a father who hated my guts and a mother that wanted to eat them. I loved them a lot, and I think my parents did too, but they never really showed it."

"That's how things were back then, before the War," Cinder whispered. "Before every pupa born became rare, precious, coveted. Before pupae like Guile and Glint . . ."

"I remember their faces when we found my eldest sibling blackened past ebony one spring night. He'd been cooked alive in his own carapace, like bread in a pan. Mother was livid, which made her stupid. I never knew how much she cared about her precious pupa until she left that same hour to track down the Dragon responsible."

"She never came back."

"No, she didn't," Mirror agreed, idly pushing a pebble across the floor. "Father grieved as he watched over what remained of our brood, but when every night began to ring with the shouts of men and elves high in the sky, he made a choice that I didn't expect."

"Mir-"

"He took my sibling, wailing and kicking in his claws, and fled to the East. He flew as the sun rose, knowing that the riders wouldn't expect many Lethrblaka to make such a hazardous move. I heard his thoughts as they dwindled in the distance—full of pain, animalistic, disappearing along with his sight."

Her tail traced Cinder's cheekbone, just below the right eye that was ever so slightly hazy. "I cried so hard and so long that not even the roars of Dragons could reach my ears. The headache of sorrow, of utter despair pounded the names of my family out of my head. When hunger drove me into the Human villages, I went as a vessel empty of memory, thought, and sustenance. They thought me a monster of myth, until the stolen children turned into adults, and the change gave me a mighty form none would dare to challenge."

"I found a young female, newly shifted one evening. It was the sound of sobs and screams, the smell of blood and piss, the sight of fire and steel that drew me in. I expected to find the sacking of a town, but what I saw was a Lethrblaka drenched in crimson, a string of bodies dangling from her jaws." The gaps were filling inside of Cinder's head, blank patches that had been full of nothing but questions suddenly rewritten in full color. "Ever since my father had died a week or two before my own transformation, I'd not seen another of our kind. Even so, I remember being afraid to approach what could have been the last member of my species."

"When I saw that grey figure in the distance, when I met it at full tilt in the sky, it never occurred to me that they'd be anything but another genocidal survivor; maybe some far flung comrade from across Alagasia come to remedy my solitude. We danced and we killed and we sang until the tears that came were no longer bitter and sleep brought rest rather than endless dreams of fire. When my stomach became heavy with pupae I was nothing short of elated, when Galbatorix granted us a future I held my peace, but never did I think that my mate would be my brother; somehow he had survived and taken on a new name, only to find his way back to me." Her thoughts were stormy and indistinct. "How was I supposed to know? Your smell was as different as your body, my memories had been drained away . . . and I was lonely, I was so lonely."

"Glint and Guile are sound children," Cinder reasoned. "Their sight may be strange, but their minds are sharp and their bodies strong. We've done nothing but excel, Star Mirror, and you need to know that I don't regret a single moment of my life but for letting father take me away from you in the first place."

Mirror rose and began to pace, her gait drunken with distress. "But what will they do, my mate? What will they do? All of the land seeks to draw a noose around our necks, but still they grow and thrive. What will happen when they leave the ground behind and stand on equal ground with us? When there are no other Lethrblaka to come sing to them and take them far away from each other? I see it in the King's eyes, the way he thinks us to be nothing more than beasts. When the time comes, he will seek to exploit their love for one another and use it against them."

"If they are truly bonded, then they will do what they must to survive. Any Ra'zac to come from their union may suffer for their actions and ours, but in the end, it's always about keeping your own head above water." He scowled into the darkness, a lifetime of poor decisions bearing down upon his body and soul.

"Should they even be told?"

"Perhaps one day, but not now. They are yet young, and I wouldn't burden their minds with such poisonous knowledge until they're old enough handle it."

"The world is tragic, Cinder."

"Only if you perceive it to be."

In the distance, the twins huddled together within their nest. Glint's brow was still furrowed in thought over their father's baffling behavior, and her brother wasn't faring any better.

"Well that was weird," she whispered, fearful of parental eavesdropping. "What do you think he was trying to do?"

"I haven't the faintest idea. To be honest, I'm still trying wrap my brain around the color yellow."