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I never liked it when my lovers used the mirrors hanging in my rooms. It always seemed like a violation of my space, of myself. Why wouldn’t they admire or frown over their imperfect faces elsewhere? In the opposite apartment’s window panes perhaps or their own sorry pocket mirrors?

My mirrors belong to me and me alone. They cannot reflect anything other than me and my body and my own thoughts and passions. They were my greatest critic and ugliest rival.

Each day, I would awaken to a trompe-l’œil ceiling depicting lovers languorous intertwining around each other and submitting to their primal natures. Beautiful, wonderful creatures who didn’t give a damn to the lovers I brought to share my bed. They would writhe in each other’s arms in careless oblivion to the court I would hold in their shadow.

It can be chilling when such beauty is presented as your morning’s first view. It always left me cold and ashamed.

The mirror that hung over my boudoir would then come to my rescue. An intricately haphazard arrangement of glass shards, the mirror hung from across my bed would show me the next beautiful object in my room – Me.

No matter what kind of lover shared my bed- accomplished or sorry and no matter what manner of night I would have – energetic or idyllic, I would be the first to arise. Nothing and no one could put a pause in my pattern.

My eyes would open and gaze at the impersonal beauties above me and then fall on the beauty I would see reflected in my jagged mirrors. I would then stretch in joy and a renewed thirst for life.

Smooth skin that glowed with the spent passions of a night that refused to be chased from my rooms, abundantly thick and flowing hair that would be tousled with a lover’s wild clutching, pouting lips that sometimes held a faint glisten of another’s essence, and very rarely, a purpling bruise were the night and my moods demanding enough. I would take in all of it.

My mirror reflected my power. My mirror held my soul. The old wives tales sometimes do ring true.

My lovers would never witness this early morning ritual of mine. They would usually be to soporific thanks to the previous night’s ministrations. Nyx and I combined, usually had that effect on the weaklings that graced my bed.

But this morning, I woke up to a view that invited my fury and a hesitant arousal.

I saw last night’s subject looking at himself in the mirror. Before I could use my precious shards, I saw him trying to have a glimpse at himself. The very nerve!

He didn’t seem to realize that I was watching him discretely in a growing fury. I was about to rage at him, when he lifted his hand and traced his face in the cold glass. His forefinger moved lower, tracing the firm ridges of his abdominals. I was fascinated. I had never seen a man admire himself like that. My mirror was for someone else’s viewing pleasure today, so I looked on.

His fingers moved downwards, to his dark thatch and stopped. It was then that I became painfully aware of the breath I had held tight.

And suddenly, he turned and looked straight into my eyes.

“What are you looking at Princess? Why have you gone red? And oh look, now pink as well.”

“You worthless man! You dare speak to me so? Get away from my sight!”

“Ah, so many spirited exclamations and such glorious anger! My nakedness delights in the way you look now. Maybe it is time for you to have your turn at the mirror and see what you are today morning yes? I shall move aside.”

I was surprised at what he said and the manner in which he said it. He was supposed to be docile. The men who shared my bed were never strong or bold enough. Before I was halfway to the mirror, I was yanked back to the bed.

I think I hit my head on the sideboard, but I hardly felt that then. What I felt was his kiss or rather the way he ravaged my mouth; a universe apart from the manner in which he had kissed me last night.

Bathed in the glow of last night’s waxing moon he was a man I possessed. Clothed in the new sun’s rays, he was a man bent on possessing my mind and savaging my body. In a burst I cried my satisfaction at him and craved for more in the next instant.

He gave me more. There was no route to his journey of lust. He would bite my lobe one moment and nip me under my breast the next. He would cup my flesh one second and then, in a flash, he would clutch at my thigh with his thin hard fingers. The sun grew hotter and he hurt me harder.

“Do you know that mirror of yours is a thing to be wary of? It showed me my lusts and chalked out my passions for me. I could barely look at myself, for it was showing me things I would rather not do to you.”

“I wonder if you would want me to heed to what your wyrd mirror shows me. I wonder if this is what you do to your lovers each night Princess.”

I didn’t have any answer to that. I was scared for the very first time, but yet I knew that I didn’t want this sweet pain to end. I bit my lips till they bled. I do not know who drew the first blood though, him or me. I just clawed in mad desperation to get him closer to me, to my skin.

Such savagery did not become me. Me of the soft sheets and soft men who thought themselves to be hard-won. Me of the gilded cups and lavish apartments and rich furs and multiple titles. I barely recognized myself today morning.

My screams of pain were harsh, unlike the throaty moans I would otherwise sigh. My cries of surrender contrasted with the cries of passion I would usually utter after possessing my men.

This time, I was close to surrendering myself to a man. He knew it.

He looked at me and smiled. “Princess, today I shall break your mirrors forever. I have heard the other men who shared your bed damn it. Yes, gasp not. They know all about your morning rituals.”

“Today, I shall show you what it is to let go of your soul forever and revel in that freedom. Fight me if you will. But fight me well. You shall no longer be in any cold glass’s thrall and neither shall you hold any other man in thrall.”

I gave in on a sigh. A sigh I never knew existed for people like me. Perhaps this was bliss and beauty and everything my mind sought. Perhaps it was a dying night’s dream.

Perhaps it was neither but just a part of my soul that was towering above me, making cruel sweet love to me.

Aah… What did I care! I was replete and touched by a man I would remember forever. Proud Princesses sometimes needed more than a prince that would fight demons for them. Love and lust and life were for the taking weren’t they?

I never thought about men the same way again. Neither did I sigh wistfully at the surreal beauty above me again. My mirrors were replaced as well.

By him.

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