The Creature Within

I stir in the abyss of my own making, an echo in the void where no sound should be. My existence is a fragile yet infinite thing, birthed not by gods or devils but by the very marrow of her despair. Isabelle—the vessel, the artist of my form, though she knows it not. She fears me, hates me, but oh, how she has summoned me! Not by name, for I am nameless, but by the resonance of her anguish, her desire, her duplicity. I am her reflection, her truth wrapped in the guise of monstrosity.

I have waited, as all such creatures do, lurking in the periphery of her consciousness. The first crack in her resolve gave me shape. It was not the dagger or the chalice or Madame Delacroix’s infernal chants that called me forth. No, it was the surrender before the ritual ever began. Isabelle surrendered long ago, the moment she chose this life. I am merely the harvest.

They call me a beast, but what am I if not a mirror? What are you, Isabelle, if not the architect of your torment? As I linger now, half-formed in this sanctum of decadence and despair, I feel her approach. Her steps echo down the gilded hallways, a staccato rhythm of defiance and dread. She believes she has a choice tonight, but she does not. She belongs to me already.

I press myself into the shadows, my form malleable, ever-changing. I prefer not to solidify too soon; the fear must ripen. From this liminal space, I observe her. She is beautiful, of course—cruelly, achingly beautiful. Hers is a beauty that wounds, that commands, that demands. But beauty is nothing without power, and power is what she lacks. I am here to show her that.

Her voice reaches me first, a trembling whisper to herself. “Is this where it ends, Isabelle?” Such a delicious morsel of self-pity, wrapped in the thin veil of courage. It makes me ache for the feast to come. I do not yet answer, for my place is in her mind, in her doubts. I watch her hesitate before the iron door, her hand hovering as though it might catch fire upon contact. Ah, touch it, my sweet. Open the gate and step into the den of your undoing.

The door creaks open, and I allow a whisper of myself to seep into the air: the faint scent of damp earth and decay, the low hum of a presence too large for the space it occupies. She recoils but enters, as they always do. The room is my masterpiece, my altar, where the mirrors distort her lovely face into the grotesque. How fitting, for is she not grotesque beneath her flesh?

She stands before the chair, her breath quickening. She feels me now, though she cannot yet name what she senses. Her pulse thunders in my ears, a drumbeat that stirs my form to greater solidity. I can no longer resist; I take shape in the corner, cloaked in shadow but unmistakable.

Her eyes meet mine, and there it is—that moment of recognition, the flash of horror when she sees herself in me. It is intoxicating.

“What are you?” she whispers, her voice trembling. She does not yet understand, poor creature, that I am merely her truth unmasked.

I move closer, my steps deliberate, each one a blow to her fragile courage. The mirrors ripple with the motion, their surfaces alive with a mocking reflection of her fear. I do not speak yet. My silence is the weight she cannot bear.

When I am near enough to feel the heat of her breath, I allow my voice to fill the room. It is a sound not made for human ears, low and resonant, laced with the echoes of all her darkest thoughts.

“But I am real, Isabelle. I have always been real. I am the truth you bury. The hunger you deny. The darkness you try so hard to escape.”

She clutches her head as though to ward me off. Ah, how they always fight at first. It makes the submission sweeter.

“No!” she cries, her voice rising in desperation. “You’re nothing but a figment, a hallucination!”

I laugh then, a sound that makes the very walls tremble. The mirrors fracture slightly, their surfaces splitting like the fragile psyche of their maker. “Then why are you so afraid?”

She cannot answer, for the truth chokes her. Fear pours off her in waves, a perfume more intoxicating than any concoction Delacroix could devise. It strengthens me, gives my form more solidity. I move closer, and she stumbles back, her reflection leering at her from the fractured glass.

“What do you want from me?” she pleads, and there it is: the question, the surrender. My grin widens, impossibly so, revealing teeth sharp enough to rend flesh. “To feed,” I reply simply. “You starve me, Isabelle. You bury me beneath your facade of control and reason. But tonight, you will face me. You will nourish me.”

She shakes her head, her denial weak and futile. “I won’t,” she whispers, but her voice betrays her. She will. She must.

“You have no choice,” I hiss, and then I lunge.

My hands, her hands, wrap around her throat. The warmth of her skin, the racing of her pulse—it is ecstasy. She claws at me, a pathetic attempt to break free, but I am her equal and opposite, her strength inverted. The light in her eyes begins to fade, and I am on the verge of claiming her entirely when she does the unthinkable.

You are not real.

The thought pierces me like a dagger, a foreign intrusion that disrupts my very essence. My grip falters, and she gasps, pulling air into her lungs. Her eyes meet mine, and I see not fear but defiance. “You are not real,” she says again, louder this time. “You are nothing but a manifestation of my fear. And I am done being afraid.”

No. No, this cannot be. I snarl, my form flickering, destabilizing. The mirrors shatter fully now, their shards raining down around us, but they do not touch her. My shape dissolves into shadow, then smoke, and finally nothing.

I am undone, but not gone. Not truly. I retreat to the corners of her mind, to the spaces she cannot yet reclaim. I am patient. I am eternal. I will wait for the next crack in her resolve, the next moment of weakness. For she cannot escape me. She cannot escape herself.

And when the time comes, I will rise again.