The Mirror Of Lost Souls

Chapter Two: Night Terrors

The house was silent, the kind of silence that comes when everyone else is asleep and you’re left alone with your thoughts. I lay in bed, staring up at the ceiling, trying to push the image of that twisted reflection out of my mind. But no matter how hard I tried, it kept creeping back, the hollow eyes, the cruel smile. I pulled the blankets tighter around myself, as if that could somehow protect me from whatever was lurking in the depths of that mirror.

Eventually, exhaustion overtook fear, and I drifted off to sleep.

That’s when the nightmares began.

It started like a regular dream—if any dream could be called regular after what I’d seen. I was in the attic again, standing in front of the mirror. But this time, the room was darker, the shadows deeper. I felt the same cold chill race down my spine as I looked into the glass, but I couldn’t turn away. My reflection was there, staring back at me with those empty, black eyes.

She smiled, that twisted, cruel smile that made my stomach churn, and then she moved. Slowly, deliberately, she raised a hand and pressed it against the inside of the glass. I felt a strange tug, like something was pulling me toward the mirror, and before I knew it, I was moving closer, my feet shuffling forward against my will.

“No,” I whispered, but the word came out weak, barely audible. The reflection grinned wider, her fingers curling against the glass as if she was beckoning me closer.

I tried to stop, to pull back, but it was like I was trapped in some invisible current, being dragged toward her. My heart pounded in my chest, my breath coming in short, panicked gasps as I fought against the pull, but it was no use. I was getting closer, closer, until I was right in front of the mirror, so close I could see every twisted detail of that horrible reflection.

And then, with a sudden, jerking motion, the reflection reached through the glass and grabbed my arm.

The cold shock of her touch jolted through me like an electric current, and I tried to scream, but no sound came out. Her grip was impossibly strong, her fingers digging into my skin with an icy, painful pressure. I struggled, pulling with all my might, but she wouldn’t let go. She was pulling me into the mirror, into that dark, endless void behind her, and I was powerless to stop her.

“Let go!” I managed to choke out, but the reflection only laughed, a low, sinister sound that echoed in my ears.

I could feel myself slipping, the world around me growing darker as the mirror’s pull grew stronger. I was being dragged into the void, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

And then, just as I thought I was lost, I woke up.

My heart was pounding so hard I thought it might burst, and I was drenched in sweat. For a moment, I lay there, gasping for breath, trying to convince myself it was just a dream. But the terror still lingered, the memory of that cold grip on my arm fresh and vivid in my mind.

I reached over to switch on the lamp beside my bed, needing to banish the darkness, to see that I was still in my room, that I was safe. The light flicked on, casting a warm glow over the room, and I breathed a sigh of relief. But then I glanced down at my arm, where the reflection had grabbed me, and my breath caught in my throat.

There, on my skin, was a faint, dark mark, like a bruise, in the exact spot where she had touched me.

My heart pounded in my chest as I stared at the mark, my mind racing. How could this be possible? It had just been a dream… hadn’t it? But the mark was real, as real as the fear that still gripped me. I touched it, half-expecting to feel the icy cold of her fingers, but the skin was warm, normal. And then, as I watched, the mark slowly faded, disappearing into my skin as if it had never been there.