"Some mirrors don't show who you are. They show what's been carved away to make you."
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The reflection didn't blink. Because it wasn't mine.
I stood before the mirror, breath snagged in my throat, watching the glass pulse faintly—like it had a living heartbeat. Within its depths, seven figures slowly took shape.
Women with my face. My stance. My breath. But not my eyes. Not my soul.
The first bore heavy iron shackles, her wrists bruised and raw. Her mouth was sewn shut with silver thread. But her gaze? It screamed. Wordlessly.
The second was drenched in blood—not dried, not imagined, but fresh. Glistening. She stood like she'd just been torn from her deathbed.
The third smiled sweetly, too sweetly. Clad in a white gown, crimson lace licking its hems. A veil covered her face, and a ring glittered on her finger.
And behind her… Gustav.
But it wasn't the Gustav I knew. He knelt before her, his hands trembling as he placed a crown of thorns on her brow. Like a groom. Or an executioner.
I stumbled back, heart racing, bile rising.
"What is this?" I whispered, the words dry in my mouth.
The mirror offered no answer. No voice. Just… memory.
But not mine. Not yet.
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Later that night, Gustav found me curled on his study couch. Candles flickered like nervous witnesses. Books loomed high around us, their spines cracked from use. A mug of cooling tea sat untouched on the table between us.
"I heard you crying," he said softly.
"I wasn't," I lied.
He didn't argue. Just stared into his mug. "Not with your mouth, maybe. But the version of you in my head? She screamed."
I went still.
"What version?" I asked.
He pointed to the mirror across the room—plain, oval-shaped, blackwood frame. "There's more than one of you in here," he said, tapping his temple. "They speak at night. Fragments. Like broken film reels."
My voice turned tight. "What do they say?"
"Some beg. Some warn. One calls me husband. Another—traitor."
My stomach turned.
"You believe them?"
"I believe something in you was torn," he said. "And it's trying to return through the cracks, Clara."
I stood. "This is psychological. A projection. I'm not a vessel for... versions of me."
"Then why do you bleed when they dream?"
His voice was soft, but it cut deep.
I looked down. A thin, fresh scratch marked my wrist—red and raw.
I hadn't noticed it. I hadn't felt it.
Gustav's shoulders slumped. "And now they're using my voice. My thoughts. I'll be reading, and
suddenly—lines of poetry I never wrote. Memories of you… I never lived."
My fingers gripped the mirror's table until my knuckles ached. "Are they all me?"
He hesitated. "Yes. Different timelines. Different endings. But all from the same origin."
I turned to the mirror again. It had shifted. Now it showed a corridor—seven flickering candlelights stretching into darkness. At the end: seven doors.
Each carved with its own symbol. Glowing faintly.
"What are they?" I asked.
"Rooms," he murmured. "Prisons. Echoes. You'll have to step through them—one by one—to reclaim what was lost."
"But wait," I said, frowning. "You said I'm the seventh. Yet the mirror shows seven versions of me. So… am I the eighth?"
Gustav's eyes softened. "Good question. But no. You're not the eighth. You are the seventh—the last. The others you see—they're not reincarnations. They're… pieces. Fragments of one soul. Shattered. Scattered across time."
It wasn't seven past lives, I realized—it was one life, shattered like glass and scattered across time.
"And my role?" I asked. "I have to… gather them?"
"Yes," Gustav said. "Your soul. And mine. We're both tied to this. To break the mirror's curse, both of us must become whole again."
"So we're both broken?"
"No," he said quietly. "We're both bound."
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The mirror shimmered again, revealing a vision.
A crimson chapel. Candles floating mid-air. A woman in red—me—walked toward the altar. A man waited. Gustav. But older. His eyes... tired.
"I've dreamed this," I whispered.
He didn't answer, but I saw his jaw tighten.
Then the scene shifted.
Now I knelt in chains, blood dripping from my sewn mouth.
Another version stood before a dark throne, a crown of bone on her brow.
"Which of these am I?" I asked.
Gustav's voice broke. "All of them. But none completely."
A final image flickered—a woman, my face, screaming before a burning library. Her scream shattered the mirror in the vision.
And then—darkness.
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Gustav swayed, drained. "They're trying to reach you. But not all of them want the same thing."
I backed away. "What if some don't want to be saved? What if some… want to replace me?"
He didn't speak.
I turned to the Codex, lying open on its pedestal. Its pages fluttered on their own, as if searching.
It stopped on an image:
A seven-pointed mirror, each shard reflecting a different Clara.
Underneath, an inscription:
To reunite the soul, one must bleed with each of its faces.
A cold chill slid down my spine.
"They won't come easily," I whispered.
"No," Gustav agreed. "Some will fight you. Some… already are."
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We stood in silence for what felt like centuries.
Then—Bathory appeared in the mirror. Watching. Smiling. Whispering my name like a curse—and a promise.
The candle flames trembled.
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Later, Gustav opened a page I'd never seen before.
Another wedding. A woman in crimson. A man cloaked in black. Their hands bound by salt, ash, and blood.
Clarae. Gustavus.
"I think this was us," I whispered.
"Or what we were meant to be," he said. "Before the pact fractured everything."
Suddenly, the ink on the Codex bled. Letters twisted. The mirror beside us showed the scene come to life.
The kiss. The scream.
And the blade—driven into the bride's heart by Gustav's mirror-self.
Blood bloomed like ink in water.
"That's not me," I choked. "That version—she chose wrong. I won't be her."
Gustav didn't argue.
The mirror cracked—just slightly. A line running down the veiled Clara's face.
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That night, sleep came slow.
When it did, they came with it.
One Clara stood on a battlefield, fire in her palms.
Another knelt by a cradle of bone and roses, weeping.
One whispered over a dagger.
And behind them—her. The girl in red. Not me. Not truly.
But waiting.
"You're not the original," she whispered. "Just the last one who still believes she is."
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