Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, Who's the Witch of Fate’s Great Call - Chapter 23
“Is it true that this country has a magic mirror that answers truthfully to any question?”
She said the exact same words his mother had once said when she met his father.
‘So, it’s her. This is the princess destined to break my curse.’
Feigning calm, Vylon led the princess, who wanted to see the mirror, to his bedchamber.
Just as he had suspected, not only was she unaffected by looking at his face, but she also kissed him without showing a hint of nausea. There was no sign that she was forcing herself to endure it.
“What’s your name?”
Vylon’s heart raced.
“Does my name really matter in this situation?”
She smiled, whispering that he could call her whatever he liked.
Now he understood what his father meant when he said he felt like he’d go crazy the moment he saw his mother.
This nameless princess was making Vylon’s head spin.
How could someone be so playful and beautiful, so annoying yet so adorable?
He was utterly bewildered when she suddenly smacked his bottom, but it wasn’t unforgivable. He liked her daring attitude.
If she had a habit of smacking people’s bottoms, so be it. He was willing to accept that much. He was prepared to tolerate a slightly unusual preference if only she would love him.
That is, until she kicked him and revealed her identity as a witch.
“A witch?”
She wasn’t a princess—she was a witch. A witch, like Grimdelwald, who had plunged him into this pit of despair!
Vylon’s anger at discovering this truth was beyond description.
Just when he thought he had finally found the princess to break his curse. He approached the princess—no, the witch—with the intention of killing her for toying with him.
“Quietly let me end your life.”
“No, thank you!”
The witch clicked her heels twice and vanished before his eyes.
He shouted for her to reveal herself immediately, but he felt it—she had already escaped. He had completely lost her.
Vylon howled in frustration. All he had left were a pile of torn papers and his own pent-up frustration, unable to accomplish anything.
No, there was one more thing. He realized now why she had smacked his bottom—it was to stick him with a sedation needle while she did it.
“Find the witch!”
In a fit of rage, Vylon sent soldiers not only through the castle but to the villages as well. But in the end, they couldn’t capture her.
He felt like he was losing his mind. Just her presence had driven him insane, and she continued to haunt him, even in her absence.
“O Mirror true, I beg thee, reply. Where doth the witch keep her hidden nigh?!”
Vylon demanded from the mirror. The mirror, as calm as always, began to answer.
She has returned to her abode,
thus—
“What? Why did you stop mid-sentence?”
She hast now chosen to return once more,
To steal me away, as she did before.
“The witch is coming here on her own?”
Aye, Majesty Vylon, thy will I heed,
In loyal service, in thought and deed
In that moment, he regained his lost smile.
This time, he would not let her escape. And he would make her pay with her life for toying with him.
Vylon clenched his teeth and ordered new maids to be hired without any special requirements. His plan was for her to attempt to infiltrate the castle again to steal the mirror.
He lay in wait, silently, for her to fall into his trap.
She is here, close at hand, lurking near,
In shadowed guise, yet crystal clear.
It wasn’t long before he learned through the mirror that she had arrived. She was disguised as a maid and was cleaning on the staircase.
Vylon immediately went to capture the witch posing as a maid. But when he reached the staircase, there was no sign of the witch. At this point, it hadn’t yet occurred to him that she might have altered her appearance.
It wasn’t until he went to the storage room a second time that he realized something was amiss.
“I saw someone suspicious fleeing in that direction.”
The maid’s face didn’t look like the witch’s, but her shoes were unmistakably familiar.
He had her.
Vylon pretended not to recognize her and started to walk in the direction she had indicated, only to suddenly grab her by the waist. Without her shoes, the witch couldn’t use magic and was no different from an ordinary woman.
After imprisoning her, Vylon felt at ease, imagining the witch’s execution the next day. At last, he would hold the woman who had toyed with his heart accountable.
“……”
However, when he lay down to sleep in his good mood, he found himself unable to drift off. No matter how much he tossed and turned, his mind was more troubled than before capturing her.
‘Why wasn’t she affected by nausea when she kissed me…?’
He couldn’t sleep, plagued by this question. Finally, Vylon rose from his bed and stood before the mirror.
“Mirror, mirror, truthful and keen. Did that woman—the witch—keep her sickness unseen?
Nay, she did not, I tell thee true,
For no sickness did that witch pursue
‘She didn’t force herself to hold it back?’
A possibility Vylon hadn’t dared consider crept into his mind.
Though she was indeed a witch, was there a chance that she actually loved him?
