The steps were broad and shallow, sharp corners rounded off by the passing centuries. It wasn’t long before Alice lost sight of the river, though Flicker’s hair glowed through the gathering mist for a few minutes longer. Then that too was gone, and she was climbing alone in a world of ancient marble and cold, dripping pines. Columns had once lined the steps, but most of them were broken, and some had toppled altogether and lay among the moss and bushes on the rocky slope. Periodically there was a statue on a pedestal, missing arms or legs, face weathered into a featureless oval.

There was still nothing that looked dangerous, but the silence was eerie. The mist muffled the noise of the river, and before long the only sound on the mountainside was the scrape of Alice’s boots against the stone. There was no birdsong, no rustle of small animals in the grass, not even a breeze to stir the trees. Alice found her breath coming faster. When she caught a flash of movement, she froze in place, reaching for her threads.

“Hello?” she said. The mist swallowed the words as though she were swathed in rolls of cotton.

When she took a cautious step forward, something moved again. Alice raised her hand, and finally caught sight of a small figure farther up the mountain, repeating the gesture. She squinted, taking another step closer.

It’s a mirror. She shook her head. I’m jumping at my own reflection.

To be fair, she thought as she got closer, it was hard to see. The mirror was the size of a shop window, standing at an angle off to one side of the marble staircase. The mist blurred the edges. If not for her own image, Alice would have had a difficult time picking the thing out from the ruin-filled forest it reflected.

There was another mirror across from the next switchback, and then two more side by side, so that for a moment a pair of mirror-Alices climbed beside her. Other mirrors were set deeper in the forest. None of them were within arm’s reach of the path. She kept climbing, and the mirrors multiplied with every turn, showing reflections of reflections of reflections. Dozens of Alices, then hundreds, followed by her side.

At last, the staircase reached a flat space, a broad circular courtyard floored with weathered marble. It was surrounded on every side by towering mirrors, smooth and perfect. As soon as Alice stepped in among them, she was multiplied into infinity, versions of herself receding into the distance in every direction. She turned in a slow circle, and they all turned with her, like an army on maneuver. The staircase ended there.

“Hello?” Alice said again. Here, among the mirrors, the word echoed on and on, down to the very cusp of hearing. “Is anyone there?”