The Queen collapsed to the floor, sitting there in the paradise of the castle with her face buried in her hands.
She looked up at the King, who gazed down upon her pitifully.
“Please, forgive me, dear,” said the King. “You mentioned the battlefield earlier. You were correct, it does change you. It turns you into something more than a man…and at the same time something less. I was not myself.”
The Queen saw this was true. She saw it in his eyes, and written on the scars on his face, and in the wildness of his unkempt hair.
“I will go check on Snow,” the King said, clearly processing everything he had just learned of the Queen’s early life.
“Of course, my darling, kiss her for me. I’m going to change for bed.”
The King kissed the Queen, leaving her sitting on the edge of the massive four-poster bed. He kissed her again and went off to lay eyes on his sleeping girl, no doubt with the hope of easing his guilt-ridden conscience.
The Queen was utterly spent. She lay back on the feather bed, without the energy to change into her nightclothes. She heaved a deep sigh, rubbing her temples.
“Good evening, my Queen.”
She sat bolt upright, expecting one of the guards with news of the sisters. But no one had entered the room, at least it didn’t seem so.
“Over here, my Queen.”
She directed her gaze to the opposite end of the room, where the voice seemed to be coming from.
“Hello? Is someone there?”
“Yes, my Queen.”
“Show yourself then. And state your business, man.”
She approached the hearth.
“Up above you, my Queen. There is no need to fear, my Queen.”
The Queen looked above her, all around the chamber, even within the fiery hearth, but she could not see anyone.
“I am your slave,” the voice said.
“My slave? This kingdom keeps no slaves.”
“It is my duty to deliver you news of the kingdom, anything you wish to know; I see far, I can show you anything you desire.”
“Can you?”
“I see all, my Queen, into the hearts and minds of every last soul in the kingdom.”
“Tell me then, where is the King?”
“With his daughter.”
“You just heard him say as much before he left the room. What is happening now?”
“He is crying. He is deeply shamed by his treatment of the girl and how profoundly it hurt you.”
The Queen felt dizzy.
“What is this lame trickery? You must have been in the room the whole while. Heard everything the King was saying. Now show yourself!”
“Please don’t be frightened, my Queen, I’m here to assist you in all things. I am not the man you perceive me to be in your dreams, I cannot hurt you.”
“You know of my dreams?”
“Indeed, my Queen. And though you have been looking all about the room, you have not looked in the one place where you know you can find me.”
The Queen’s heart seemed to stop and all the blood in her body felt as if it were rushing to her head. She whipped around and tore the curtain from her father’s mirror. Though she already half expected what she would find there, she was not prepared for the shock of seeing a living, moving face, hovering before her in the mirror. Her eyes grew wide with terror, her mouth gaped. It was a petrifying apparition—a disembodied head that looked like some sort of grotesque mask. Plumes of mystical smoke whirled around its hollow eyes and its long drooping mouth; its macabre face seemed forlorn.
“Who are you?” the Queen gasped.
“Do you not recognize me? Dear, has it been so long? Have the years that separated us caused you to forget me…enchantress?”
And in that moment, the Queen’s face blanched.
She recognized the face in the mirror, promptly lost all ability to steady herself, and collapsed.
But before she had fallen into blackness, she heard two final words ushered from the mouth of the visage in the mirror: “My daughter…”
Hearing the crash, the King rushed to the Queen’s chamber. He found the Queen awake but shaken, lying on the cold stone floor. The Queen was trembling, clutching the curtain she had torn from the mirror.
She looked up, but the man in the mirror was no longer there.
The King reached out to her, but she recoiled in horror.
“What is it, woman? Speak to me!”
“I’m, so sorry…my love…I didn’t mean to…frighten you,” the Queen said groggily, attempting to catch her breath. “I just…I must have fainted.”
The Queen was dizzy. She couldn’t find her own voice to further explain what had just happened, all she could manage was, “The mirror…”
The King looked to the mantel.
“Your father’s mirror. Of course. This is why you have had such an aversion to it. Had I known everything you just told me, I never would have brought it into our home.”
The Queen struggled to speak again. “Break it, please,” she managed to mutter.
Without hesitation the King tore the mirror from the wall and smashed it into the mantel. Shattered glass littered the chamber floor like stardust sprinkled over a moonless sky.
The Queen sighed, relieved, though not entirely convinced that the mirror was destroyed for good. She gathered all her strength to speak.
“Before the day I met you, my lord, I dreaded visiting my father in his workshop. Seeing my face reflected back at me again and again only reminded me of how unsightly I was—a fact of which I didn’t need reminding. A day of my childhood didn’t pass when my father didn’t tell me how unattractive I was, how ugly, and that is how I saw myself.
“My mother was beautiful; I knew that from the portrait that hung in my father’s dingy little house. The one source of beauty in my life was that portrait, and I would stare at it for hours wondering why I wasn’t beautiful like her. I didn’t understand why my father was content to live in a rundown hovel of a house, when he could afford to live anywhere he desired. No matter how much I scrubbed, I couldn’t rid the house of its stale, musty scent. I couldn’t imagine my mother—so beautiful—living in that house, and I fancied that somehow the house, too, must have been mourning my mother’s death. I fancied that while she was alive it was probably a pleasant little cottage where birds would alight to feed on the windowsills, and flowers bloomed all around. But after her death, everything within the house was moldering and distressed, all except for my mother’s things, which my father kept locked away. Sometimes I would go through her trunks and adorn myself with her old dresses and jewelry. Lovely dresses with intricate beadwork and jewels that sparkled like the stars. She seemed to love beautiful, delicate things, and I wondered if she had lived, would she have loved me, too, ugly as I was?
“Stories of my father’s love for my mother were known throughout the lands. Tales of the maker of mirrors and his beautiful wife were told throughout every kingdom like an ancient myth woven with strands of love and sorrow. My father made beautiful mirrors of all shapes and sizes, lovely mirrors that inspired the great kings and queens to travel over hill and dale just to purchase one of his gorgeous and enchanting treasures.
“My mother loved the winter solstice, and my father would make the grandest spectacle of the occasion. He made tiny mirrors in the shapes of suns, moons, and stars and hung them in all the trees on their grounds. Candles, too, decorated the trees, casting the most magnificent light reflected in the mirrors, so that their home could be seen for miles around—a tiny magical city illuminated and glowing in a sea of wintry darkness. He was heard to remark upon the gorgeous glow he created around his home every winter, saying it was pale in comparison to the beauty of his wife: her raven hair, fair skin, and sparkling onyx eyes—the sort that tilt up at the corners, adding a catlike quality to them. How I wished someone would love me the way my father loved his wife; so inspired by her beauty, he created intricate treasures so she could see her grace reflected back at her. I thought I would never know that love, or know what it was to be beautiful. And then I met you in my father’s mirror shop.