“Once we were the Death of Suns, the dark before the dawn. Now, we are a mirror smashed, the sharp slivers put back together wrong, the reflection splintered and distorted. We stare at ourselves, recognizing the face and yet knowing something is missing.”

That line pretty much sums up what The Lord of the Empty Mirror is doing, and what Khraen is at this point. Not a man so much as a collection of pieces arguing with each other.

I loved the original Obsidian Path trilogy, so I went in with high expectations and this didn’t disappoint. Khraen is hunting the shards of his heart but also he's against one that represents the worst (or maybe most honest) version of himself. The part that understands power, control, conquest. Which means you get two Khraens. Sort of.

One is trying to fix things and unite the world, stop a god, and maybe do a bit less mass murder along the way. The other version is much more focused on conquering everything, trusts no one, and absolutely don’t let feelings get in the way. 

Bringing in another POV, especially one tied so closely to Khraen himself, works surprisingly well. It allows to dive into one of the series’ core ideas of how memory shapes identity. Who you are, what you remember, and what you choose to become aren’t cleanly separated here. Fletcher really digs into that, and it pays off.  If you take a man, break him into pieces, and then put him back together… which version is real? The one trying to be better, or the one who remembers how effective being worse used to be?

Plot-wise, there’s always something happening and it never drags. I liked the twists, but I won't spoil them for you. 

Also, it’s properly grim. Every solution costs something awful. There’s a moment where Khraen casually weighs how many souls something is worth, and it doesn’t feel out of place. That’s the level we’re operating on.

Khraen himself is, well, still Khraen. Powerful, determined, and capable of making deeply questionable decisions with full confidence. There were a few “why would you do that” moments, but they always track. He’s not stupid, he’s just very committed to his own logic, which is sometimes worse.

The ending is going to split people. If you didn’t like how the original trilogy wrapped up, this won’t fix that. It follows the same idea and you get no neat closure or the sense that everything is finally “done.”

For me, it was perfect since it fits the series. But if you’re looking for clear answers and everything tied up nicely, you won’t get that here.

TL;DR: I loved it.