Page 17 of Trick Me (Immortal Vices and Virtues: All Hallows’ Eve)

Chapter

Seven

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W e’re both staring into the water, and I immediately wish we weren’t.

The pool is wrong in every possible way.

Too still, too dark, too perfect in its reflection of the moon overhead.

It’s like looking into liquid obsidian, if obsidian could judge you and find you wanting.

The surface doesn’t ripple, doesn’t move, doesn’t even seem to breathe.

It’s the kind of still that makes you want to throw something in just to prove it’s actually water and not a portal to somewhere where teeth live.

“This is giving me serious horror vibes,” I mutter, gripping Ash’s hand tighter. His palm is warm against mine, the only warm thing in this clearing. “Where everyone knows looking in the cursed mirror is a terrible idea but they do it anyway because the plot demands their stupidity?”

“And then they die horribly,” Ash finishes, his thumb brushing over my knuckles in what might be comfort or might be him checking that I’m still solid and real. “While screaming about how they should have listened to the warnings.”

“Exactly. And there are always warnings. Usually from a creepy local who speaks in riddles and has cataracts.”

“We had a creepy witch who spoke in riddles.”

“No cataracts, though.”

“That we could see.”

“Fair point. Or maybe she had perfect vision and that was the real curse.” I’m babbling, but looking at this pool has every instinct in me screaming that we should run. Now. Fast. And never stop. “So we agree that this is stupid?”

“Incredibly stupid,” he confirms, but he’s leaning forward anyway, drawn by what I assume is a terrible curiosity I’m suffering from too.

“But we’re doing it anyway?”

“Obviously. We’ve come this far on bad decisions. Why stop now?”

My reflection stares back. It’s normal at first, just me appearing exhausted and disheveled in a borrowed dress that’s already showing signs of our trek through the woods.

There’s a leaf in my hair I didn’t know about, and my makeup has given up entirely, leaving me with what Sera calls “raccoon chic.”

Then my reflection smiles.

I definitely didn’t smile.

Her eyes start to glow with this silver light like moonlight on morgue metal, and her smile keeps widening, showing too many teeth. Far too many teeth that belong in sharks’ mouths, not human faces.

“Oh, fuck no,” I breathe, but I can’t look away. It’s like she’s got hooks in my eyes, keeping them locked on hers.

Ash makes a strangled sound beside me, and I risk a glance at his reflection.

Gods. Oh gods.

It’s him but wrong, caught between forms, human face stretched over wolf bone structure, the geometry all off like someone tried to fold a person into an animal shape without removing any of the original parts.

His jaw extends too far, packed with teeth that shouldn’t fit, some human-flat, others wolf-sharp, creating this horrible, crowded mouth that looks as though it’s in constant pain.

His hands can’t decide what they want to be, fingers elongating into claws and then shrinking back, bones breaking and re-forming in endless loops.

“That’s not—” he starts, but his reflection grins, and the expression is pure darkness, pure wrong, pure nightmare fuel .

My reflection tilts her head, still grinning that awful smile, and mouths words I can’t hear but somehow understand: You’re nothing without them.

The them feels plural, feels like it means the ghosts, means Ash, means everyone who’s ever mattered.

“Okay, backing away now,” I say, but my body won’t move. It’s as though the pool has gravity, pulling us closer. “Ash? We should really stop looking at the creepy murder water.”

“Agreed,” he mutters, but he’s not moving either. His jaw is clenched so tight I hear the grinding of his teeth.

Our reflections move in perfect synchronization, pressing their palms against the underside of the water’s surface. The pool ripples—finally, movement—but it’s wrong, moving upward like something is pushing from below.

“Look at you,” my reflection says, and her voice drips contempt like honey laced with cyanide. “Playing dress-up in someone else’s clothes, in someone else’s life. You think he actually wants you? You’re just convenient. Available. Here.”

“Shut up,” I whisper, but she keeps smirking.

“Without your gift, what are you? A mediocre employee with a dead houseplant collection and a ghost cat that isn’t even yours.

Your parents used to call twice a year out of obligation—your birthday and Christmas, and even then they kept it under five minutes.

Your best friend had to convince you to come tonight because you’d rather sit at home reading about other people’s lives than live your own. ”

The words strike me in the chest like precisely aimed arrows, each one finding its mark in my softest spots.

“Face it,” she continues, her glow intensifying. “You’re background noise in everyone else’s story. The quirky friend. The weird girl who talks to dead people. Never the lead. Never the one who gets chosen.”

My gut hurts, and I’m going to be sick.

Beside me, Ash is as rigid as stone, and I hear his reflection speaking too, that grinding voice full of cruelty.

“Dead pack members because you were too weak to save them all. You carry their names like prayer beads—Eero, Astrid, Jens, Bjorn, Ingrid, Olaf, Mikael—but prayer won’t bring them back.”

Ash flinches at each name, his hand tightening on mine until it almost hurts.

“Your father was right,” his reflection continues. “You’re soft. Playing at being Alpha while real wolves die for your mistakes. The pack whispers about it when you’re not around. How many more have to die before they realize you’re not strong enough?”

“Enough!” Ash bellows, but his reflection laughs, making this horrible sound like bones breaking.

“Even now, you can’t protect her. You’re standing right there, and you can’t stop what’s coming. Just like with Mikael. Just like always. You’ll watch her die too, and add another name to your litany of failures.”

“I said, enough!” Ash roars, and the sound is barely human.

We stumble back from the pool simultaneously, breaking whatever hold it had on us.

I’m breathing as if I’ve run through the woods, my chest heaving, heart hammering so hard I’m surprised it’s not visible through the dress.

Ash is panting too, perspiration on his brow, and when he glances at me, there’s a wildness in his eyes that speaks of real fear.

“What the absolute fuck was that?” I gasp, bending over with my hands on my knees, trying not to vomit from the adrenaline surge. “Since when do reflections have opinions? Strong opinions? Rude ones? I didn’t sign up for therapy via aggressive water spirits.”

“Magic,” Ash says grimly, but his voice is shaky. “The kind that knows exactly where to twist the knife.”

“Yeah, well, magic can go fuck itself with a rusty spoon. Sideways. Twice.” I straighten up, still trembling, wrapping my arms around myself. “Something feels really wrong here. More wrong than the general wrongness we’ve been dealing with all night. This is advanced wrong. ”

“It’s trying to break us,” he admits quietly. “Using our own fears against us.”

“Well, it’s doing a bang-up job. Five stars. Would recommend to enemies,” I say.

That’s when the parchment in Ash’s hand flares with heat, making him curse, which sounds like it involves gods and fish and possibly someone’s mother.

Words appear on the previously blank surface, writing themselves in what looks like liquid starlight:

To break the curse, speak your truth. Shed the lies that bind your soul. Only those who see themselves clearly can be free.

“Oh, good,” I say, voice dripping enough sarcasm to fill the pond of water. “Vague mystical instructions. My favorite. Why can’t magic ever just say ‘Push this button, curse broken, have a nice life’?”

“Because that wouldn’t be sufficiently traumatic,” Ash replies, staring at the words like they might rearrange themselves into something helpful if he glares hard enough.

The wolf in me is pacing, agitated, wanting resolution.

“We have to go back to the water,” Ash suggests, and I hate that he’s right.

“I know.” I take a breath that doesn’t quite fill my lungs, like the air here is too thin or too thick or too something. “But if my reflection starts talking about my houseplant graveyard again, I’m fighting her. I don’t care if she’s made of water. I’ll find a way.”

“I’ll help. We can take them together.”

“Deal!”

“I want to help you fight anything that hurts you,” he says simply, like it’s obvious, like it doesn’t make my chest feel too small for my heart.

“That’s… that’s actually really sweet. Stupid, but sweet. Stupidly sweet. Sweetly stupid.”

“You’re deflecting.”

“Absolutely. It’s that or cry, and my face is already a disaster without adding tears to the mix.”

“You’re beautiful,” he confesses, and the sincerity in his voice almost undoes me.

“Now you’re deflecting.”

“I’m really not.”

“We should—” I gesture vaguely at the pool, unable to finish the sentence because what we should do and what I want to do are very different things.

“Right. The curse. The breaking thereof.”

We approach the pool again, slower this time, like we’re approaching a wild animal. Or a bomb. Or a wild animal holding a bomb while juggling chainsaws.

Our reflections are waiting.

They look normal for exactly three seconds before the wrongness starts again. This time, I’m ready for it. Or as ready as anyone can be for their reflection to develop sentience and attitude problems .

“Back for more truth?” mine says, and her voice is clearer now, more present. “Here’s one—you’re terrified he’ll leave. Everyone does. Your parents, emotionally. Your friends, gradually. Now him, inevitably.”