NOVEL ONLINE FREE Chapter 7: Chapter 7: The Echo in the Mirror
Elara woke with her heart pounding like war drums in her chest.
The dream was gone—but something had stayed.
It was still dark. Not night-dark, but Hollowmoor-dark: the sort of darkness that felt sentient, like it was thinking, like it had teeth. She sat upright, blinking the sweat from her eyes.
And then she saw it.
Her reflection.
It stood at the edge of the full-length mirror across her room.
Still. Unmoving.
She tilted her head slightly.
The reflection did not follow.
Her breath caught.
She raised her right hand.
The reflection raised its left.
Not like a mirror. Like a copy.
Then the reflection smiled.
Elara hadn't.
She stumbled out of bed, nearly tripping on the edge of the rug. Her eyes didn't leave the glass.
The smile in the mirror widened.
And then the reflection lifted its finger to its lips.
Shh.
She ran.
Barefoot. Still in her nightgown.
Out of her room, into the hallway, heart hammering with every step. Hollowmoor's corridors were too long in the dark, stretched out like they led into nightmares. The torches flickered overhead, whispering in languages she didn't know.
Past the statue of the headless priest. Down the stairwell that turned in impossible spirals. Through the archway that only opened on moonless nights.
To the library.
The doors opened on their own this time.
She stepped inside.
And instantly felt the change.
The Hollowmoor Library didn't hum with knowledge.
It hissed.
The books twitched on the shelves like sleeping animals.
Ink dripped from the chandelier above.
The Librarian stood behind her desk, motionless. Her blindfold—stitched together from what looked like skin-thin pages—shifted slightly as Elara approached.
"I saw it," Elara whispered.
The Librarian didn't speak.
"It moved before I did."
Silence.
"It smiled."
The Librarian finally moved, slowly turning her head. "It remembers what you were before."
Elara frowned. "Before what?"
The Librarian's hands—long and cracked with black ink—lifted a book from the desk. She opened it. Blank pages. Then writing appeared, slowly, like ink being dragged across the surface by invisible hands.
"You asked your second question. The mirror heard it."
"You are not Elara. You are the remnant."
Elara shook her head. "No. That's what the Grimoire said. That I'm what's left of her. That I replaced her."
The Librarian turned the page.
"You replaced her in the world. But the mirror kept her."
"That is the price."
Elara's throat went dry. "What price?"
The Librarian leaned forward, whispering:
"Memory doesn't die here. It's transferred. Mirrors trap it. Reflect it. Twist it."
She slammed the book shut. The sound echoed like thunder.
"You weren't the first to be copied."
"Who was?"
The Librarian's mouth twisted into something that might've once been a smile.
"The girl who smiled first."
Elara left the library shaking.
Back in her room, the mirror was covered.
A heavy black cloth draped over it. Thick. Dusty. Ancient.
She hadn't covered it.
But someone—or something—had.
On her desk, the Grimoire was open.
Words scribbled across its yellowed page:
"Third question asked. Rule broken."
"It knows your voice now."
"Do not speak near glass."
Her mouth went dry. She looked at the mirror. Something moved beneath the cloth.
Not violently. Just… a shift. Like someone standing up on the other side of a thin wall.
A second line appeared on the Grimoire:
"It is watching you even now."
Then a knock.
From inside the mirror.
One knock.
Then two.
Then silence.
Elara backed away.
The mask from the wardrobe lay on the floor now. It faced the mirror.
She hadn't moved it.
The Grimoire flipped a page on its own.
More writing:
"When the third bell tolls, it can leave the mirror."
She felt cold all over.
How many bells had she heard?
Two.
She remembered them clearly.
Dong. The night she arrived.
Dong. After the Trial.
If there was a third bell, and she hadn't yet heard it—
Then she still had time.
Didn't she?
Elara didn't sleep.
She sat by the desk, eyes fixed on the mirror all night.
But the third bell never came.
At dawn, a knock at her door.
Lira.
"Morning," Lira said, looking as composed as ever. "You look like death chewed on you."
"I didn't sleep."
"Obviously."
"There's something in my mirror."
Lira blinked. "Of course there is."
Elara stared. "You knew?"
"This is Hollowmoor," Lira said. "You think you're the only one with shadows that move on their own?"
"But it's me. It looks like me."
"No. It looks like the girl you used to be."
"I was never—"
"You were. Once. But not anymore."
Lira stepped into the room. She ran her fingers along the mirror's cloth.
"It's trying to remember what it felt like to be alive."
"Is that what happens to everyone?" Elara whispered.
"Not everyone."
"Then why me?"
Lira turned to her. "Because something burned you out. And Hollowmoor doesn't like empty shells. So it filled you with echoes."
Later that day, Elara wandered to the west wing.
A hallway she hadn't explored.
She wasn't sure why she went there. The floorboards creaked like old teeth. The paintings were scratched out. One had a hole where the eyes should be.
She passed a door she didn't remember.
It was red. Slightly ajar.
Elara stopped.
There was no reason for her to know it, but she did.
That was her room.
Not the one she'd been sleeping in. The one from before. From her old life. Before the Trial. Before the fire.
She pushed it open.
Inside: a bed with the same gray blanket. A notebook on the desk. A single mirror on the wall—uncovered.
She stepped inside.
The mirror was cracked.
But it didn't reflect her.
It reflected the other girl.
Talia.
She knew that name now.
Elara reached for the notebook. The cover had her name on it.
No—Talia's name.
She opened it.
Inside, a single page:
"I'm still here. Let me out."
Her hands began to shake.
From behind her, the mirror rippled.
She turned.
And the girl stepped through.