mirror // pansy parkinson

twenty-four | part two

- third person's point of view

All this was for Pansy Parkinson.

Poppy stared at the sack that fits just right in both of her palms. It was heavy, and as she looked straight into it, the brightness blinded her.

Pansy Parkinson.

Was she worth this?

Her head spun. She sank low into the chair, and without giving herself a chance to rethink, she tossed the sack on the table. It landed harshly, making a loud clank sound.

The man watched her intently before reaching for the pouch. His fat fingers tore it open and he peeked inside. Then snickered.

'You resulting for bribery, madam?' he said as if he was ridiculing her.

'Yes, I am.' She could not believe what she was doing. 'I will be giving you gallons of coins if you agree to make another vial.'

'Miss madam, like I said,' began the man, namely Hawthorne, whilst standing up all dramatically, 'the lone ingredient needed vitally for the cure has already gone extinct.'

'But you said-' Poppy tried to reason hastily, 'you said there is another way-'

Hawthorne suddenly launched into a coughing fit. Poppy grimaced. When his fit died down, he looked at her dead in the eyes.

'Do you know how your girl's curse differed from a blood curse?'

'Do entertain me, Lord Hawthorne.'

'Blood curses inherited naturally as the family line passes by. It has a pattern, much to all wizard scientist's surprise. A complicated pattern to say at the very least-'

'Yes, I can see that. A person I know inherited the blood curse, just because she was 214 in line.'

Hawthorne clucked his tongue.

'Too bad for her, eh?'

Poppy agreed.

'Anyway, as I was saying,' the man continued, 'it inherited naturally. And blood curses weren't particularly a curse, to begin with, but that was just some of the scholars' opinions. Your girl's curse on another hand...'

He paused for a while due to another coughing fit. Poppy was finding this extremely annoying.

'The curse itself is named the mirror curse, and this curse is not inherited in a pattern form. It attacked the members randomly.  May I assume your girl is either a...Parkinson or Neverneen?'

'Parkinson, yes.'

'Ah. Parkinsons were devils one time. A curse brought down to them. It was, like some people said, deserved.'

'But my girl isn't a bad person.'

'It doesn't matter. When your ancestors do something horrible, some had to pay for it.'

'A question, though. Why is it called the mirror curse?'

'You see, the curse is brutal and troublesome. It makes one go absolutely insane. Color blindness would kick in, unable to move would too shortly later, then extreme fatigue, insanity, some other batshit stuff, and then death. But you know why some victims of this curse would last so long?'

Poppy waited for the answer.

'When one's mind is meddled by some witchy factors,' Hawthorne went on, looking grim, 'the only thing that kept them at bay were reflections of the real world. The mirrors can actually lessen the rotting time of the brain. It kept you sane. Though, some weak-minded and hearted victims usually, ah, exterminate themselves as the symptoms and effects were quite overwhelming for them, even with the mirrors. '

Poppy gasped at this.

'Which is why I marvel your girl. She must be a fairly strong lass.'

A tense silence hung in the air.

'So that is why,' Poppy realized,' my girl's so-called healer pampered her with mirrors.'

'Eh? That lad sure knows his stuff,' Hawthorne said, surprised. 'That bit of information wasn't exposed to most healers.'

'Another question,' Poppy began slowly, still hoping she hadn't heard the suicide bit, 'could mirrors be the cure?'

'No, of course not. They are just a symbol of hope for their sanity.' 

Symbol of hope.

She watched as the elderly man sat back down, grunting as he did so.

'Then a particular someone came and introduced an ingredient that could evolve as a cure for that-'

'But then it was all used up,' she finished it for him.

'Correct.'

'And what's the other way you spoke of just now?

Hawthorne went silent. He didn't show any signs of telling her anytime soon.

That irked her, she didn't have all day. She had an infirmary to take care of. She already lied to the headmistress and roped a student into vouching for her. Sighing, she reached for her coat pocket and fished out another pouch. She let it slide across the table and under the man's nose.

'Is that enough for you to speak up, my lord?'

The man stared at the pouch. He took off his old-fashioned glasses and rubbed the lenses with a piece of cloth lying about beside him. 

'The other way, madam,' he said, at last, his voice an octave lower, 'is pretty hard for me. It will take long- probably a few weeks? I need to mix a lot of ingredients just to create an equivalent of the extinct secret recipe.'

'So you were just lazy before I bribed you?'

The man grunted. 'I'm an old man, madam. But in exchange for money, who am I to say no?'

Poppy rolled her eyes as he hollered. Money-grubbing men. How much she hated them. Then again, she hated all men. She whirled her wand in the air and a small piece of paper appeared- with a messy scrawl of an address. 

'When you're done, deliver the vial here,' she demanded, then added in a threatening tone, 'are we clear here?'

'O-of course, madam.'

She tipped her hat reluctantly, curtsied, and left the room. 

Hawthorne heard the door close and sat in silence as the madam's footsteps fade away. 

'Winona's sister, eh?' he laughed, which turned into a shot coughing fit. 

'What a small world.'