“A what?” Anika asked, blinking at me as if she wasn’t sure whether she’d heard me right.
“A mirage,” I repeated. “Poseidon can create a perfect copy of us using our reflection. If done properly, they’ll have the same appearance, voice… even the same aura signature.”
Her brows knit together. “So—basically clones?”
“In a sense, yes,” I admitted, crouching down near the pool where the waterfall’s water stilled. “But not truly alive. They’re fragments, echoes molded from water and illusion. They can’t think or feel. They exist only to serve one purpose—the one you give them.”
Anika crouched beside me, her expression flickering between fascination and suspicion. “And you want to make one why, exactly?”
I dipped my fingers into the pool, drawing faint sigils across the surface. “Because we
