The rain didn't so much fall as it gnawed at the city, turning Lowbridge's narrow alleys into crooked rivers of soot and sorrow.
Inside his little shop, Dorian lounged behind the counter, balancing a cracked teacup on his forehead. He stared up at the stained ceiling, contemplating life's great mysteries.
"How many days will it be," he mused, "before I just start selling umbrellas?"
The bell above the door gave a delicate tinkle.
The teacup fell and smashed spectacularly at his feet.
Dorian jolted upright, heart hammering as if he'd been caught stealing from himself. He hastily wiped his hands on his waistcoat and pasted on a smile he hoped said Welcome, respectable shopkeeper here, instead of Please don't notice the broken crockery or my soul falling out.
The woman who entered was a walking chandelier.
Pearls, velvet, silk so rich it probably had its own bank account. Her blonde hair was swept up into a storm-defying tower of braids and pins. Everything about her screamed.
Money. Power. And Lawsuits.
Her sharp gaze scanned the shop with the sort of distaste one usually reserved for public toilets and tax audits.
Dorian swallowed.
'Wonderful,' he thought. 'My two favorite things. wealth and contempt.'
"Good afternoon," he said aloud, bowing slightly. "How may I assist your...radiance?"
She raised a perfectly manicured eyebrow. "This is the shop? then... Are you the relic trader?"
He gave a humble shrug. "One simply tries."
'Who the hell is that?'
She sniffed, stepping carefully around a teetering pile of brass compasses and something that might once have been a stuffed owl.
"I was told," she said, drawing out the words like she was tasting spoiled wine, "that you sell... rare artifacts. Items of power."
Dorian nodded solemnly.
(It was a good thing lies didn't physically weigh anything. Otherwise, he'd have felt it crawling on his back.)
"I require," she said crisply, "something unique. Something that will enhance my reputation. Bring me...favor. Admiration."
She paused.
"And, of course...command respect."
Dorian tapped his chin thoughtfully, as if carefully considering which powerful relic to entrust to such an important patron.
In reality, his mind was screaming.
'Ahhhhhhhhhhhh'
Still, survival demanded confidence. And Dorian was practically drowning in that particular currency.
He nodded gravely. "You seek...the Mirror of Aramore."
The words left his mouth before he'd even finished thinking them.
'Mirror of what now?'
The lady's eyes sharpened. "The Mirror of Aramore?"
He leaned forward, lowering his voice into the register reserved for ghost stories and tax advice.
"Forged long long ago... by the most beautiful Queen that drove even kings to madness," he said, weaving as he went. "A mirror said to show not the face you wear... but the face you deserve."
The noblewoman inhaled sharply, suspicion flickering in her gaze.
Good. Let her doubt. It made the reveal all the sweeter.
"And where," she asked slowly, "is this... mirror?"
Dorian gestured grandly to a battered oval mirror hanging lopsidedly between a cracked vase and a suspiciously toothy mask.
It looked like something a particularly aggressive cat had used for target practice.
The lady's lip curled.
"This?" she said. "It's filthy."
He bowed his head. "Of course. It is not meant to please the eye, madam. It is meant to transform it."
He almost clapped himself on the back for that one.
The lady hesitated.
Her reflection, distorted and ghostly, stared back at her from the pitted glass.
Dorian watched her closely. People didn't come to his shop because they wanted reality. They came because they wanted hope, wrapped up in old wood and whispered lies.
He just had to nudge the fantasy into place.
"It is said," he murmured, "that the Mirror of Aramore reveals the sovereign within. Those who gaze into it and believe... truly believe... may find themselves wearing crowns of light."
The storm outside cracked sharply, as if punctuating his words.
The woman flinched.
Dorian pressed on, lowering his voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
"But beware... a mirror does not lie. It simply reveals truths you may not wish to see."
(That sounded deep. He had no idea what it meant. Perfect.)
The noblewoman's hand hovered, uncertain, over the mirror's chipped frame.
"Is it dangerous?" she asked.
Dorian allowed himself a tiny, solemn smile.
"Only to those who doubt their worth."
For a long moment, she stared at the glass. Her reflection shifted in the flickering lamplight, shadows twisting.
Dorian stayed perfectly still.
The shop seemed to breathe around them, shelves creaking under the weight of unseen things.
Finally, she withdrew a jeweled purse from her gown.
"I will take it," she said.
Dorian somehow kept his knees from buckling in relief.
"Excellent choice," he said, already wrapping the thing in a moth-eaten velvet cloth like it was priceless treasure.
(If dust counted as treasure, it truly was.)
"That will be," he said, plucking numbers from the ether, "ten gold pieces."
She blinked.
He braced for outrage, haughty dismissal, threats of legal action.
Instead, she nodded, and placed a pouch heavy with coins onto the counter.
Ten coins.
Ten gold.
Ten real gold.
Dorian nearly wept.
As he handed over the mirror, her fingers brushed his glove. Cold. Precise.
"You will find," she said softly, "that I am not one to be easily deceived."
Dorian gave her his best enigmatic smile. "Neither am I."
(He absolutely was.)
She swept from the shop without another word, vanishing into the downpour like a ship into a black sea.
The bell gave a last, lonely jingle.
For a long time, Dorian just stood there, staring at the gold in his palm.
"Gods above," he whispered. "I'm a menace."
Later that night,
as the city drowned quietly under the storm, whispers began to slither through the streets once more.
"She bought something from him, you know."
"The baroness herself!"
"She looked different afterward. More noble right?…"
"Swear I heard her talking to her reflection."
"Said it answered back."
Some said the Mirror of Aramore was more then that.
Others said Dorian had cursed another soul into damnation.
And Dorian?
Dorian sat behind his counter, counting gold coins and humming tunelessly, sipping a cup of tea so awful it could legally be considered an act of war.
"Maybe," he thought, "I should get a new sign."
Something simple.
Something honest.
Maybe.. "Dorian's Curiosities: Where Truth are Sold."
Outside, the rain whispered against the cobblestones, hissing secrets no one wanted to hear.
And in the back of the shop, unseen, the battered old mirror shivered.
once.
Just once.
As if something inside had turned over... in its sleep.