Silence.
A vast, suffocating silence stretched around Vivian like an ocean of nothingness.
She opened her eyes—except, there was nothing to open them to. No light, no darkness, just an endless void, as if existence itself had unraveled. She reached for something—anything—but her hands met only air.
Had she fallen into the mirror? Had she become the void?
Then, a whisper.
Soft. Familiar.
"Vivian."
She turned, though there was no ground beneath her, no direction to follow. The voice wrapped around her like an old memory, distant but warm.
"Do you remember now?"
A flicker of something—an image, a feeling—surfaced in her mind. A garden bathed in twilight. Fingers brushing against glass. A name she had forgotten but somehow always known.
Elara.
The realization struck like lightning.
Elara Sinclair. The woman in the mirror. The real Vivian Sinclair.
No, not real. Original.
Vivian—her Vivian—had been a fragment, a reflection given life. But Elara… Elara had been the one who was lost.
A ripple coursed through the void, and suddenly, the nothingness began to shift. Pieces of a forgotten world reassembled around her. Shattered glass floated in the air like stars, each shard reflecting a different moment in time.
Vivian stepped forward, drawn to one of them. As she touched it, a memory pulsed through her like a heartbeat.
A dimly lit room. The greenhouse. The cursed mirror standing tall.
Elara staring at her own reflection, whispering words laced with magic, desperation.
"Take my place."
Vivian's breath caught. No… she didn't fall into the mirror. She traded places.
Elara hadn't been a victim of the mirror's curse. She had used it. She had created Vivian—not as an accident, but as an escape.
A perfect copy. A life that could continue in her absence.
Vivian staggered back, her heart hammering. All this time, she had believed she was the lost one, the mistake. But she hadn't stolen a life—she had been given one.
She wasn't a lie.
She was a choice.
A hand reached out from the darkness.
Elara.
Her form flickered, fragile, trapped between existence and oblivion. Her face—Vivian's face—was lined with exhaustion, regret. "You understand now," she murmured. "You were meant to be free."
Vivian's hands clenched at her sides. "Then why are you still here?"
Elara's expression was unreadable. "Because I never let go." She exhaled, a whisper of sorrow. "But you can."
The mirror shards trembled, the void shifting once more.
A choice.
Stay and be swallowed by the past. Or return and claim the life she had been given.
Vivian took a slow, steady breath.
Then, she reached for the light.
Everything shattered.
Vivian gasped as she woke, cold air flooding her lungs.
She was back.
The study. The manor. The shattered remains of the cursed mirror at her feet.
Sebastian was there, his arms wrapped around her, his voice breaking with relief. "Vivian!"
She blinked, the weight of everything crashing into her at once. She was alive. She was here.
The mirror was gone.
And Elara…
Vivian closed her eyes. A part of her knew—Elara was gone now, truly gone.
And for the first time, Vivian felt whole.
Sebastian pulled her closer. "It's over."
She met his gaze, a slow smile forming on her lips. "No," she whispered. "It's just beginning."
Because this life—her life—was finally hers to live.
And this time, she wasn't just a reflection.
She was real.
To be continued...