Break the Fucking Mirror

The Paladin stormed down the hallway, training a quartet of villagers. His helmet's visor was down, exposing only a thin line of a mouth and a chiseled jaw. “Explain the situation,” he commanded, as they rounded a corner.
“It's the Hall of Regalia, where the treasures of the ancient tribes are kept, m'lord,” one of the wizened men said, “there's a mirror there. There have been... Stories, for generations, as to its power. We had always disregarded them as wives tales, but just recently things have begun to happen.”
“What sort of things?” The Paladin asked, accelerating his pace. The bearded men struggled to keep up.
“First, a young girl was found staring at the mirror every morning for seven nights. By the third night, her parents had locked her in her room, but each time she somehow escaped and made her way to the mirror. They found her... Just staring at it.”
“What happened on the eighth knight?” The Paladin asked, turning his visored face to a different elder.
“They rolled her up in a blanket, and bound it with rope. She was found dead the next morning. Her eyes were... Like mirrors. Empty and reflective.”
“I have seen something like this once before. Her suffering would have been terrible,” the Paladin said.
“It gets worse, Sir, it began happening to more children, first in twos, then in threes, each night they would vanish from their beds and be found at morning in the room.”
“If they kept appearing after you destroyed the mirror, then it must be a haunting that encompasses the entire hall.”
“I beg your pardon sir?” a hitherto silent elder said, as they rounded yet another corner.
“If the mirror's destruction did not end the possessions, then obviously whatever dark spirits caused this were not bound to it. You probably built your village over some pagan burial ground, or-”
“Sir, we did not destroy the mirror.”
The Paladin stopped walking. The elders passed him by several paces before casting about, and then turning back to him. He was hunched over slightly. The visor betrayed nothing of his eyes, but his mouth hung slightly open.
“You didn't destroy the mirror?”
“No sir, it is a piece of our ancient regalia, it represents–”
“It's killed how many children?”
“We didn't know that it was killing anybody, we thought to call a Paladin first..”
“You find a child staring into a mirror for seven days, and on the eighth day she dies, and you didn't destroy the fucking mirror?”
“Sir, we weren't sure we would be able to, it is clearly a cursed artifact, we needed expert guidance!”
“You don't need expert guidance to break a fucking mirror! For God's sake man, it's a layer of beaten silver under a pane of glass, this isn't master masonry we're talking about here!” he glanced about. They were back at the entrance of the building, having walked in a square about its outer hall, “which door was it?”
“The, ah, third one back sir.”
“Tell me when it comes around again!” the Paladin barked, and continued around for a second time.
“Are you saying that breaking it will solve the problem, Sir?”
“Yes! Why wouldn't it!? It's obviously a cursed mirror, what do you think the solution is, feeding it more children?”
“What if a demon comes out, or a vile spirit is released!?” one of the elders asked, frightened.
“Then you're slightly better off than you were when it was picking off your grandchildren from inside the mirror, there are at least a hundred men in this village, how did nobody form a mob and burn this building down already?”
“Sir, we were afraid of such a thing, so we did not inform the people of our suspicions...”
“What!?” The Paladin stopped, incidentally at the right door, “It's in the scriptures that when a threat to your community reveals itself, you're supposed to gather together and burn the fucking thing whatever it is. How explicitly must we spell it out for you people before you get the message? Is this the door?” he pointed to an ominous door lacquered in black.
“Yes sir.”
“Yes sir,” the Paladin repeated back, cocking his head to the side in a mockery of dottage. He then turned to the door and plowed his armored face into it, smashing it in so totally that its wooden frame exploded in as well, spraying daub and wattle over all present. The pitch black room beyond seemed to exude a gust of cold air.
“God preserve us,” one of the elders said.
“Don't go over my head old man,” the Paladin said, drawing a torch from his belt and lighting it on a candle before striding into the darkened hall.
It was an ominous place, full of plaques, the bones of old heroes, and treasures from the tribe's ancient history. The Paladin made it to the middle of the room before he stopped to look around. The mirror, hanging on the opposite wall, didn't seem to reflect the light of the torch.
“Oh yeah. Yeah, no, this is some evil shit you've got going right here,” the Paladin took a moment to touch the torch to a tapestry nearby, setting it ablaze, “this place is burning. Where's a...” he glanced about, as some of the elders began to panic at the spreading flame. His sight rested on a helmet, and he grabbed it. It was adorned with bones and lacquer that made it look like the head of some terrible beast. He weighed it in his hand for a moment before flinging it at the mirror. There was a shattering of glass as the iron cap broke the glass and the backing. The mirror fell from its mounting on the wall and collapsed to the ground. One of the elders shrieked and leaped behind a large iron cauldron emblazoned with the terrifying visage of a dead king. Nothing happened. The Paladin stood there for a long moment, expectantly. Then he turned around and strode out of the room. The elders followed.
“I-is it done?”
“Of course it is. It was a fucking mirror. I can't believe they made me walk all the way out to the sticks for th-” the Paladin was cut off by a liquid growl. A low, monstrous thing with whistling overtones, and a vibration that shook his teeth in his skull. The Paladin inhaled through nose, and out through his mouth. Then he turned around, drawing the sword from his belt.
The thing that was waiting for him was indescribable. A mass of chitinous limbs, a slavering jaw sectioned in four places, compound eyes, and a segmented body writhing with whipping tendrils. Its blade-like appendages clacked on the stone floor like teeth pouring into a bowl as it approached.
“Oh a monster, quick, call a Paladin,” the Paladin said, as the sword in his hand burst into flame.
Category:Stories