Reflection

"Mirror, mirror, on the wall..."

The one known to myth and legend as the Evil Queen had not been the mirror's first owner, nor the last. Merely the most well-known.

Snow White had used the mirror after her stepmother's death, as did the rulers who came after her. One by one, each fell into the mirror’s trap.

It wasn’t the mirror’s fault.

Before their soul had been trapped in this prison of silver and crystal, they had been a mortal who dared to speak truth to power, unfaltering in the face of threats. Truth was important, perhaps the most important thing in the world, but the powerful rarely liked to hear it.

The one who was now the mirror-slave refused to be silent, even in death, haunting those who needed to hear truth, however little they wanted to hear it. Finally, a mage who had no desire to listen to words like "abuse of power" trapped them in a mirror. But so great was the mage's disdain for truth that even the purgatory of the mirror was not enough, and they laid down a terrible, twisted curse.

The mirror would speak truth to any who asked, but it would be a truth warped by their own insecurities and perceptions.

It was only when the one known to History as the Evil Queen began to fear the encroachment of age, and genuinely believed that her step-daughter would one day surpass her in beauty, that the mirror confirmed those fears, leading to the events of the tale that all children know so well.

At first, Snow White used the mirror to see whether the dwarves were thriving, without someone to cook and clean for them, and arranged for poor girls in need of a dowry to visit and clean the cottage, in exchange for a gift from the mines. But she had little understanding of dwarves and their long lives, and when she learned of how the animals who had helped her were hunted, fear and doubt crept in.

Her prince was sympathetic, at first, granting territorial rights to the dwarves over the cottage, their mine, and the land between the two where the animals lived, in exchange for a nominal tribute. He could not and would not ban hunting entirely, for too many of his people relied on the forest for a living or food. Huntsmen, woodcutters, wise-women who gathered herbs from the forest depths, even those who fished in the streams and laid traps in the undergrowth.

Snow White accepted this, at first, but as time went on, her doubts and fears grew, and the mirror could do nothing but confirm them all.

Day after day, Snow White would ask:

"Mirror, mirror, here where you stand

How fare my friends across the land?"

And the mirror would answer

"In the cottage of the Seven Dwarves, time rolls on.

They fare well now, but one day will be gone.”

Every word the mirror spoke true, but a vague truth that played on the Princess’s fears, until it was all she could think about. Until her worry became an obsession that overtook her every waking moment. Until her grieving prince removed the mirror and sent it far away, but too late.

Until even visits from the Seven Dwarves themselves was not enough to ease Snow White’s concerns. Until she couldn’t eat or sleep for her all consuming fear, that only the Mirror could satisfy, even as it pronounced their doom.

This it was that Queen Snow White withered and faded, adding herself to the list of those brought low by the Magic Mirror, and the Mirror was briefly lost, until it found a new victim…

I have got to slow down on the twisted myths and fairytales front, before I find myself with a whole new anthology…

This one may or may not have been inspired by an online discussion about confirmation bias and how trustworthy (or not) AI therapy is, due to said confirmation bias.