The man stayed seated on the horse until the vendor spoke again. "Don't just stare," the vendor muttered. "You'll make the statues jealous ,the man dismounted. Up close, the vendor looked nothing like a merchant , no goods, no coins, just a man sitting beside broken mirrors as if waiting for someone to need one. "I don't trade," the man said. "Good," the vendor replied. "I don't sell." He nodded toward the largest shard, propped against a crate ,The man stepped forward and saw nothing. No face. No figure. Only empty glass. "It's broken," he said. "No," the vendor sighed. "Perhaps you are." The vendor pushed the mirror aside like it didn't matter. "Sit. You look like someone who forgot how to breathe." The man didn't sit, but he stayed a little cautious but curious too. "Long ride?" "Yes." "Pain anywhere?" "No." the questions were short and direct and the answers were even shorter. "Before you came here," the vendor asked suddenly, "Who waited for you?" The man opened his mouth,but no answer came. Only a sound, like breath turning to dust a flicker moved across the mirror. Not an image. A tremor, so the man decided to look again ,he noticed a shape,a jawline, then gone. A brow, then ash. A mouth he couldn't form into memory. "I saw something," he whispered. "You remembered something," the vendor corrected. "That's how it works." The man felt a name surface "Ja-"then sink before it formed. The vendor leaned back. "Careful. Faces don't lie. If you're not ready to meet yours, it will invent one for you." ,the man stepped back as he felt pain in his head,The mirror shimmered once, twice then stilled into blankness. "That's enough," the vendor said calmly ."no i was so close who was that man? i almost said his name" said the man….the vendor stood up , his direction is clear "we will meet again, you have all the question young man all you need are the answers, i don't have them neither does this place" with that in a single blink and before the man says anything the vendor vanished.
The man stood there long after the vendor vanished, staring at the empty space where his shadow should have been. The air had grown still again, unnaturally still, as though the village itself had stopped breathing. The mirrors were no longer shattered; they were silent, waiting, reflecting only the dull light of a sun who refuses to move. He turned toward his horse , it watched him as if it, too, had seen the man's face in that mirror and pitied him for it. The man mounted without a word. The saddle groaned softly beneath him, and as he rode through the village, the mirrors along the path trembled, faintly cracking as his reflection passing by ,the path stretched ahead it was narrow, cold, and climbing into the mountains.the roots of trees twisting from the rocks like dying hands reaching for help that would never come. The sun still hung above, same place as always, its light pale and deceitful.
The man began to lose the sense of time. His breath came slower, heavier, merging with the horse's rhythm , and after a few hours , the road vanished. Only ridges and fog. The horse stopped. Its hooves tapped against stone and hollow air. "Forward," the man murmured. The horse obeyed. The silence became unbearable until it wasn't silence anymore. It was whispers they slithered along the wind, faint but clear, "Ja…" "Ja…" The half-name the vendor had stopped him from speaking echoed among the rocks , the man clenched his fists. "Who's there?" Only the mountain answered but with laughter. But it wasn't mocking; it was cruel in its joy, the sound of something that remembered him better than he remembered himself , the horse tensed, nostrils flaring. From the mist, two glowing dots emerged , then four, then six. Eyes. Low and unblinking. Wolves. They came silently, paws scraping stone, circling. He drew his blade though he didn't remember where he'd found it, nor why it felt so familiar in his hand. The first one lunged. He struck. A blur of motion, a flash of teeth, a cry but not from the wolf, but from himself. Blood start spilling . He didn't know whose. More came. He swung, again and again, until sound itself became rhythm ,steel, breath, growl, scream. The horse reared, kicking. One wolf fell, another rose. Shadows multiplied. Then teeth met flesh. His arm burned, his shoulder tore. He fell. He hit the ground and the world fell silent. No pain. No wolves. No mountain. Just the faint crack of glass…he's still alive and aware of his surroundings but he feels cold and pain…he couldn't move but he could hear the wolves fading away so does any source of sound….the horse? no idea where is he.
He opened his eyes. Mirrors. Hundreds of them. Surrounding him in a vast black hall with no ceiling and no walls , only endless reflections that weren't reflections at all. Each mirror shimmered with pieces of him ,a hand, an eye, a memory of a face he could not name , and then came the laughter again louder this time. Mocking, echoing, filling the space until it became unbearable. "You've forgotten well," the voice said ,his voice, yet not. It came from everywhere and nowhere, from behind the mirrors and beneath his skin. "Who are you?" the man asked, though part of him already knew. "I'm what's left of what you ran from." The mirrors began to ripple. In them, he saw himself , kneeling, bleeding, broken ; but somehow smiling? why is he smiling?. Behind each reflection stood a figure: tall, shadowed, dressed in fragments of pride — crowns of light, robes of smoke, eyes that looked like pity turned to disgust. "You fought regret," said the voice. "And in the end, you will bow to me." The man pressed his hands to his ears. "Stop." But the mirrors cracked. Each time he turned away, another one shattered, sending shards through the void. And within each shard a piece of memory: a woman's silhouette, a child's laughter, a door closing. He fell to his knees. "What did I do?" "You called it survival," said the voice. "But you called everything survival." The mirrors began to hum. One by one, they showed him not what he wanted to remember, but what he had chosen to forget
He saw himself walking away from a man begging forgiveness , a reflection of him smirking in a banquet of ashes. "That's not me." "It was." The voice drew closer until he could almost feel its breath. "Do you know why you can't remember your face?" it whispered. "Because you broke every mirror that dared show it to you." The man looked around , very surface began to fracture, a web of light and sound. Cracks spread like veins. The laughter turned to screams , he didn't think twice he just started running. Every mirror he passed shattered into dust. "Coward." "Pretender." "Look at yourself." "Face it." He stumbled and fell.
The ground split open beneath him, mirrors falling into nothingness, until only one remained tall, crooked, ancient , the same one from the vendor's table. He crawled toward it, his hands bled, his voice trembled. "Show me," he whispered. The mirror obeyed , for the first time, he saw a complete face. His face. But it was glitching , flickering between versions of himself. A proud man, a weeping one, a young one with eyes full of ambition, an older one full of disdain ,the faces merged, separated, screamed silently. Then , it smiled. .
And when it spoke, its mouth didn't move. Only the sound came. "Face it… or be doomed to repeat it." The glass exploded , he woke to the sound of hooves, the horse was gone. He was surrounded by the ruins of mirrors, their shards glinting in the fading light. Ahead of him a path. Straight, carved through the mist. At its end massive gates. The palace, dark and cold, reaching toward a sky that had never known a sun. He stood, unsteady. The air around him was heavy, full of that same faint laughter , he took one step forward, and every shard of glass behind him turned to dust , the voice spoke once more, faint, fading "You can't fix what you won't face." And then silence. He reached the doors. They opened. And as he stepped into the shadows of the palace, the wind carried the echo of his reflection's last words: "Face it… or be doomed to repeat it..