The mirror showed her something vile… something she did not wish to see… it unveiled the hideous truth before her eyes.
Under the table, from the angle she tilted it, Sylvia stared into the mirror—at Bel's reflection. But the beautiful black-haired woman… was gone.
What stared back at her was something else.
Sylvia looked upon pulsing, pale skin stretched over a twisted frame. Horrible, chalk-white hair was scattered across a half-bald scalp, her head unevenly shaped and grotesque. Her face—gaunt, with sagging wrinkles—was riddled with warts. A long, thin chin jutted downward from a sunken face. Her teeth were tiny, brown, and rotting… maggots squirmed between her gums.
She was hunched, draped in tattered clothes, the sleeves of her gown loose like shed skin. Her eyes—pitch black—held eerie, irregular brown irises that glowed faintly in the dim light.
Sylvia's breath caught in her throat.
The name rose in her mind unbidden.
"Bel… her name was Bel… she's… she's a beldam…"
