“No?” Ludo repeated, as if he thought he’d heard her incorrectly.

“There’s something else I need to do first. I want to look at them.”

Ludo’s reflected gaze met her reflected gaze in the space between two mirrors as he frowned. “We are looking at them.”

“No, I mean really look at them, not this distorted version.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Ludo said. “You know, on account of the whole ‘you will surely die’ thing?”

“What do you mean by distorted, Bryony?” Allegro asked.

“Earlier you said the mirrors hide your true natures. Changes them. Correct?”

“Yes, that is what I said.”

“I want to see the real you.”

“If that is what you wish, we won’t stop you.”

“Bryony…,” Ludo said, a hint of warning in his voice. “Don’t do anything mad.”

“I have a feeling,” Bryony said. “Do you trust me?”

“I—I probably shouldn’t, but yes, I trust you.”

“Then here goes nothing.” Without another word, she whirled around, hundreds of other reflections of her mimicking her movement, all of their eyes landing directly on the trio standing in the center of the cave. Her breath caught in her lungs.

“Bryony? Are you okay?” Ludo asked. He was watching her in the mirrors, his entire body pulled tight, like he was ready to turn and grab her if anything dangerous came at her.

“I’m…fine,” she said, watching the huddle of old women before her. They still weren’t wearing any clothes, which only seemed to make them smaller, their wrinkled skin sagging from their bony bodies. Their eyes were laden with cataracts, their hair, or what was left of it, clinging to their mottled scalps like bits of thread from a frayed rope.

“At long last,” Allegro said, ancient voice filled with a ray of wonder. “You’re here. You see us. Are you disappointed?”

Strangely, she wasn’t. Somehow she’d already known exactly what she would see when she turned. “I only have one question: Why?”

Allegro chuckled, a raspy noise that might’ve been a cough in disguise. “Simple vanity, of course. Who doesn’t want to be young and beautiful forever?”

“Sorry, I lied, but I have one more question. Why didn’t I die when I looked at you?”

“I didn’t say when you would die, only that all who look upon us would surely die. Which you will, someday. Alas, we all must return to the earth eventually and make way for new life. Even the Daughters of Ereniel.” She offered Bryony a smile that felt like a secret between them.

“Wait, so you’re saying I could look at you and not die too?” Ludo asked.

“You?” Allegro said, seeming to consider. “I think you would die.”

Bryony blinked, and in that half-moment, the Daughters were gone.