Hidden Agenda

So she guarded her beauty like a flame in the wind—jealously, desperately. She drank strange tinctures from forest witches, bathed in milk and crushed petals, and avoided sunlight when it threatened to mark her skin. When she bore a daughter, Lysa, the villagers rejoiced again, claiming the child was even more luminous than the mother.

Something inside Elira cracked.

At first, it was subtle tightening of her smile when others praised Lysa, a coldness in her touch. But as Lysa grew, her beauty unfolded naturally, without effort, without fear. She laughed freely, stood in sunlight, and never once checked her reflection for signs of loss. To Elira, this was not innocence, it was arrogance.

“You think it will last,” Elira would say, voice sharp. “You think you are safe.”

Lysa did not understand. She tried to love her mother, to earn her warmth, but affection was always just out of reach.

The mirrors in their home began to change. Where once they showed Elira as she was, they now whispered the truth of faint lines and dimming light. But when Lysa passed, they seemed to glow brighter, as though remembering her more vividly than the present.