I sometimes questioned my purpose as the “Magic Mirror.” I am capable of many things;, my powers are unique for my very being goes against most objects. Yet, I am doomed to answer in the same few words to the same agonizing question. Queen Grimhilde did not seem to care for me outside my voice. I was never greeted, nor asked anything personally. Her calling of me was a demand, nothing more despite what it seemed. Every morning I was met with her grating voice. “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” she’d ask; “You are, your Majesty.” I’d, reluctantly, respond with.

It was not a lie, for Queen Grimhilde was no less than beauty itself. Her skin was bright and youthful, her lips plump and full. Her eyes sharp, her hair free of tangles. She needn’t my words of affirmation, she has reveled in her reflection enough to know that the King was envied to have her – to know that no other stood as her competition. Yet, the inside of her was ugly and damned. Her ego alone would shrivel her eventually, but I would not tell her this. Not as though she allowed me to speak freely, anyway.

For years, this was the routine. However, I quickly noticed the Queen’s stepdaughter was quickly rivaling in the unspoken competition of loveliest. Snow White was her name, given by her pale skin. She was a sweet girl, kind to whomever she’d speak with. She has even said her small hellos to me when walking past! I was not permitted to respond, but it did bring a certain warmth that I had never felt by the Queen. As Snow White grew, I couldn’t help but find myself struggling to conform to the Queen’s expectations. It was an aching feeling until, one day, I could not continue to go with what became a lie.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” She had asked me again in the early morning. I was awaiting it this day, a form of joy filling me. I did not properly know what that felt like until today. “Snow White is the fairest of them all.” The words spilled from me naturally, as if it was the purest and truest I have ever told:  I feared that she would strike me with how furious she was, my pieces scattered against the tiles. Would I be whole, yet split into smaller mirrors? Or would I be a part of something bigger, where there was more of me than before? I did not know, I was the only mirror of my kind and I had yet to be broken. 

Though, fortune for my fate, she had turned from me sharply. Her features that were once so graceful were now contorted into a scrunched mess. She knew she could not argue, for I only spoke the truth. A satisfaction bubbled within me, I was sure if I was able to have an expression it would be one of pure glee. I wanted to say it over and over, or tell her in a yell, “It is finally not you!”