Chapter One: The Crack in the Glass
Elias awoke with a breath that felt stolen.
Not gasped, not startled—stolen.
Like someone had reached into his chest and plucked the air from his lungs.
He sat up slowly, confused, listening.
But the room was silent.
Not just quiet—still.
The kind of stillness that exists in the seconds after something breaks.
His eyes adjusted to the dark. The ceiling fan spun in slow, irregular circles, making no sound.
The light from the street outside slipped through the blinds in thin, hesitant strips.
And on the wall across from him, the old clock blinked blankly.
3:07.
It had stopped working months ago.
He never fixed it.
But somehow, it felt right.
As if tonight, for once, time was being honest.
He pushed off the covers. His feet met the cold floor with a soft slap, grounding him.
But the chill didn't make him shiver.
If anything, it steadied him.
He stood.
Waited.
Listened again.
Nothing.
But still, he felt watched.
Not from the outside.
From behind his thoughts.
He moved through the apartment like a ghost in his own story—quiet, barefoot, unsure if he was awake or dreaming.
The hallway stretched longer than he remembered. Shadows hugged the corners. The light switch stared at him from the wall, untouched.
He didn't flip it on.
He didn't need to.
He could see well enough.
And something about the dark… felt familiar.
Like an old blanket he used to love, now moth-eaten and wrong.
His hand reached the door before he realized where he was going.
The room.
The one at the end of the hall.
His mother's room.
Untouched for years.
Not locked.
Not forbidden.
Just… avoided.
She had died in that room.
Not violently.
But not peacefully either.
Her last days had been filled with strange sentences, whispered thoughts, and long stares into the old mirror in the corner.
After the funeral, Elias had closed the door and never opened it again.
Until now.
He didn't remember deciding to come here.
But his fingers were already curling around the brass knob.
It turned with a sigh.
The door opened an inch.
Then two.
Then all the way.
The scent hit him first.
Old. Thick. A blend of dust, dried perfume, and winter.
It didn't smell of decay.
It smelled of waiting.
The room was dim.
Filtered light from the hallway crept across covered furniture, softening their outlines into strange shapes.
The curtains were frozen in place, the air unmoving.
Everything felt preserved—like a painting pretending to be a room.
His eyes drifted to the far corner.
The mirror.
It stood where it always had.
Tall. Tilted.
Framed in black iron that curled like the gates of a forgotten cathedral.
No dust on its surface.
Not even a smudge.
Just silence.
He stepped toward it.
The floor creaked softly beneath his weight, the only sound in the house.
He didn't remember the room being this cold.
Or this alive.
He stopped a few feet away.
The mirror greeted him with nothing.
No reflection.
No silhouette.
Just blackness.
But not true black.
A black that moved.
That pulsed, faintly, like lungs inhaling in the dark.
He leaned in.
Not close enough to touch.
Just enough to feel the gravity of it.
And there it was—something ancient, wordless, pulling from behind the glass.
He should have turned away.
Instead, he reached out.
His fingers touched the surface.
Warm.
Not like heated glass.
Like skin.
And beneath it… a faint rhythm.
A heartbeat?
His own?
No.
The mirror's.
Then—
Ripple.
Like water disturbed by a whisper.
A line split down the center of the glass.
Delicate. Silent. Terrifying.
And in it—
A child.
Alone in a corner, weeping silently.
A girl's body lay nearby. Blood spread out around her like wings.
The child turned slowly.
His face blotched with tears.
And it was Elias.
Or rather… had been.
He watched the scene unfold with sick recognition.
The trembling lips.
The whispered words:
"Mother… I didn't kill her… please… believe me…"
It wasn't audio.
It was memory.
Poured into his chest like cold water.
His breath hitched.
He tried to step back.
Couldn't.
His hand was still on the glass.
Or maybe in the glass.
Another image surfaced.
A street at night.
Rain.
A woman running—wet hair, eyes wide with terror.
"Elias! Don't stand there—please!"
A shape emerged behind her.
Too fast.
Too quiet.
She fell.
Blood kissed the pavement.
And across the street, under a flickering streetlamp—
He stood.
Older.
Colder.
Watching.
A future?
Or a warning?
The mirror didn't answer.
It simply swallowed the image whole.
Then showed him something else.
A place beyond place.
A stone platform suspended in nothing.
Floating mirrors orbited a black throne.
On it—Elias.
Or something wearing his shape.
Eyes like burnt paper.
Figures bowed at his feet.
Some missing mouths.
Others holding broken glass like offerings.
One mirror hovered before his face.
It did not reflect him.
Instead, it revealed a stone wall covered in a sentence—written in his handwriting:
"Everything begins when you don't understand what you see,
and ends when you understand what you shouldn't."
The glass shattered from within.
Darkness.
Then his reflection returned.
Only… it was smiling.
And it spoke.
His voice—but wrong.
"You didn't open anything, Elias.
Something chose to open for you."
Silence followed.
But not empty silence.
Expectant.
Then—something clinked.
He looked down.
A shard.
Glass.
Cracked.
A tiny drop of red on its edge.
His body finally responded.
He stumbled back, breathing hard.
His mind screamed.
His mouth didn't.
The mirror simply stood there.
Still tilted.
Still silent.
But now… it no longer reflected him.
It reflected the room behind him.
Only—
No one was there.
The bed.
The furniture.
The door.
All visible.
But not him.
And then—movement.
In the very back corner of the reflection—
Something shifted.
He turned fast.
Nothing.
Empty space.
But the air had weight now.
The kind of weight presence carries.
He backed out of the room, heart pounding in rhythms he didn't recognize.
Closed the door softly.
Walked the hallway like a man returning from war.
Entered his bedroom.
Stopped cold.
There was something on his pillow.
A piece of folded paper.
He hadn't put it there.
He opened it slowly.
One line. Written in thin black ink:
"The glass sees backwards before it looks ahead."
He stared at the words.
Then glanced at the mirror across the hallway—still hidden by the closed door.
But he could feel it.
Awake.
Listening.
And for the first time, Elias realized:
He hadn't been the one looking into the mirror all these years.
The mirror had been looking into him.