Into the Villain's Mirror

Chapter 2 - Your Grace

Waking up for the second time was no less traumatic, but at least this time Lucy was better prepared for her situation.

Blinking her eyes open and seeing a crystalline chandelier in the dark pre-dawn light confirmed that she hadn't gone back to her own body. It made her stomach sink, but no tears sprang to her eyes and her breathing didn't speed up.

She would just deal with this, one step at a time.

So she had somehow possessed an insanely beautiful and probably rich woman she had never seen before.

It could have been worse. She could have woken up as a dung beetle or - god-forbid - a newborn. She really didn't want to go through potty training and pre-school once more, especially if she retained her memories.

Lucy remained motionless and unblinkingly stared at the chandelier above her. Her eyes were unconsciously following each crystal-dripping strand over and over, almost as if her brain was trying to distract itself from her situation with visual stimuli.

But her thoughts were racing, uncaring of the pretty, sparkling crystals above her.

The first thing Lucy ruled out was a rebirth, simply because this woman obviously had a life before her arrival. Which left something along the lines of possession, in the ghost-style way of things, as a big possibility. How she had managed that, or why it was even possible, had been shoved to the back of her mind to deal with later - along with the fact that to be a people-possessing ghost she had to have somehow died in her original body.

The other major thing she didn't want to think about was the shadow in the mirror. She refused to even glance at the curtained alcove, her eyes not once straying from the chandelier. At the moment, she had almost convinced herself that there was nothing unusual about that mirror and that the voice had been a stress-induced hallucination.

Almost.

Excessive opulence, a gorgeous woman who looked young but old at the same time, these could be explained with the rules of reality as Lucy knew them (and some room for suspension of disbelief). Talking demon furniture on the other hand fell slightly too far out of her area of comfort.

Once she felt a little more settled, Lucy rolled out of bed and started exploring the rest of the room. A huge vanity, cluttered with all kinds of small glass vials and tubes, which almost made it look like an alchemy shelf dominated the wall opposite the bed. Lots of heavy curtains shaded the walls and after she finally mustered her courage and lifted one of them, she was relieved to find a huge window instead of another mirror.

What surprised her though was the darkness the window showed. She could spot a night sky which was slowly lightening, but the landscape was gray and murky without a single source of light. Where were the streetlights, car headlights, illuminated windows or blinking adverts? The blueish silhouettes she made out in the rising fog looked like a heavily forested area but no street was in sight.

Was this woman living in some kind of nature reservoir? Or apart from society because she was famous and wealthy and wanted her calm and quiet? Lucy hadn't recognized the face though, and it was one that would stay in one's memory even after just one glimpse.

Looking around the room again, Lucy noticed another strange thing. While there was every opulence one could think of, none of them required modern technology. The crystalline chandelier was equipped with actual candles. There was no sink or shower in the marble-covered, adjourning bathroom, only a big gold inlaid tub, which wasn't connected to any plumbing and placed in the middle of the circular room. She couldn't find a toilet, sink or spot a single heater, not even hidden behind wand paneling.

So no electricity, heat or water? Did this woman, for all her gold and glitter, like to rough it like a medieval person?

No, everything was too luxurious, more in line with a self-indulging instead of self-abusing character. Something wasn't adding up.