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Chapter Text

Mircalla kept one hand on her sweeping skirts as the other clenched tightly to Mama’s bigger hand. The servants all smiled at her as they passed and today, Mircalla returned her toothy grin. She knew Mama saw her but she let it pass.

Today Mircalla turned five and she’d get to look in the mirror.

Mama told her not to be disappointed if it was blank. Lots of people had blank mirrors. Soulmates were rare. Papa said it was okay if there was nobody on the other side. She could still be very happy without someone being her soulmate.

When Mircalla had asked if they were soulmates, her parents hadn’t answered.

Mama gave her a kiss on the cheek and a soft stroke to her head. Mircalla clenched tighter to her hand, suddenly scared to go into the library. Slowly, Mama extracted her hand and gave Mircalla a small push into the room, gently shutting the door was a reassuring smile.

The walk across the library seemed endless. All the books she loved, staring down as the five year old moved past the well worn armchair that she loved to curl up in with her Papa.

To stop in front of the large covered mirror.

Mircalla took a moment to stare at the ornate cloth covering the mirror, the Karnstein crest and a pattern of yellow roses crisscrossing the dark red fabric. It was kind of dusty. Half heartedly cleaned by servants who were too afraid to touch the mirror. They all would have had to go to the nearest Lord’s castle when they turned five to look in the mirror. If they had a soulmate and the Lord was kind, then perhaps they’d be allowed to visit on occasion.

Mama and Papa may have kept the mirror covered but they couldn’t put it away. The Karnstein family was one of the few with a personal mirror. It had to be shown off. She’d heard whispers that her great great grandfather had commissioned it when he found out he had a soulmate.

He’d wanted to be able to see her whenever he could.

Mircalla reached out, her tiny hands clasping at the heavy fabric. With a deep breath, she gave a sharp tug and the fabric slowly came sliding off the top of the mirror, pooling at Mircalla’s feet.

Only her reflection stared back.

Her heart dropped slightly. The dreams and fairytales of a child cut to the side.

The only reflection a tiny five year old girl with thick dark curls and too pale skin. Until it wasn’t. Suddenly, beside her reflection was a tiny girl. Even tinier than her with long brown hair that was almost gold and eyes too big for her head and a big smile that was suddenly growing on her face.

When the grin reached it’s peak, the girl spoke, “I’m Laura!”

Mircalla said the first thing that came to her, “you’re a girl!” She gasped, “and you’re dressed like a boy.”

Everything was strange about the image in front of her. The girl, Laura, was clearly in fact a girl. This on it’s own was cause enough for concern. No-one had mentioned the possibility that her soulmate could be a girl before.

And the girl was so showing so much leg, apparently in undergarments, made of a strange fabric. Mircalla snapped her gaze away. And her hair was free. And her shirt was an odd mixture of fabric and designs and swirling colours that didn’t seem to be mixed.

“Yeah, I’m a girl,” Laura said, crossing her arms, “so are you.”

A calm feel over Mircalla the longer she looked at Laura, “We can’t both be girls.” She said reasonably.

Laura frowned, her nose scrunching, “We can’t? Are you sure? Cause they said in school that the mirror is never wrong and then my friend Danny asked how the mirror can’t be wrong and the teacher didn’t know because they said no-one knows which is kinda dumb. And then Danny asked about what happens if you’d already met your soulmate and the teacher said that they’d still be in the mirror cause they have a reflection.”

Mircalla stared at her, marveling at the flow of words and trying to wrap her head around strange terms like school and dumb. Finally she squinted, “I don’t know anyone who has a girl for a soulmate.”

Laura thought about it for a moment, “I know!” Laura’s eyes lit up and she bounced in place, “I’ll ask my mommy. She knows everything.”

Suddenly Laura was gone, blinking away from the mirror as though she’d never been there. Mircalla folded her hands in front of her, wondering how long she had to wait before she could leave. Clearly, there was something very wrong here.

Laura was back before she could seriously contemplate calling her Papa.

“She said that girls can have girls for soulmates!” The grin Laura gave her was toothy, a small space between the front two teeth, “so the mirror isn’t wrong, just like I said.”

“Maybe she’s wrong,” Mircalla said.

Laura stomped her foot, the image in the mirror glowering at her, “No, she’s not! My mom is never wrong. She’s amazing.”

Mircalla couldn’t quite believe that the mirror was telling her that this girl was supposed to be her soulmate, “No-one is always right,” she said, “that’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid!” Laura yelled, “take that back.”

Mircalla crossed her arms and gave her best ‘the servant is being bad’ look, “No. My Papa says that everyone, even the king, does wrong things sometimes.”

“Well, maybe your Papa isn’t right,” Laura said.

“Well, maybe your Mom isn't right,” Mircalla said.

“Well, maybe I don’t want to be your soulmate anyway!” Laura shouted.

Mircalla flinched, then snarled, “I don’t want to be your soulmate either.”

Laura plopped to the floor and crossed her arms, a pout crossing her face, “Great.”

“Fine.”

The girls glared at each other cross the mirror. Laura sitting cross legged on the ground and looking up, Mircalla glaring down. Even she ignored the strange clothes, Mircalla could admit that there was something, intriguing, about the girl. The way she was so convinced of her statement. How she didn’t seem to stop moving, even when sitting, Laura’s leg bounced up and down. How she actually argued with Mircalla.

A peasant yelling at a Countess. Really.

Intriguing.

“What’s your name?” Laura’s arms were still crossed as she pouted on the floor but her face had softened in the intervening moments.

Mircalla ignored her.

“Where do you live?” Laura tried again.

Mircalla turned away from the mirror, “Somewhere you’d never be rich enough to find.” This was ridiculous, she was leaving. She was finding her Papa and telling him that the mirror was broken so that he could get it fixed and she could find her real soulmate.

“Why are you dressed like a Princess?” Laura’s voice came again.

Mircalla turned slightly, her gaze following Laura’s bare legs. Not even the servants were so daring when they snuck for swims in the pond, they at least kept their ankles fully covered. But this girl, was flaunting the entirety of her leg from ankle to mid thigh. Mircalla had never seen a leg that was not her own. She was surprised to find that Laura’s was thicker than her own. Stockier, with more muscle.

Then she remembered herself and looked away, turning back towards the door.

“Why are you in your underwear? Mircalla snapped. Then she stepped away from the mirror, leaving Laura’s reflection sitting alone in it’s depths. It wouldn’t disappear until she managed to leave the room.

She’d just passed her Papa’s chair when she heard the sniffle from behind her. She took another step but froze when a tiny hiccup burst from the mirror. Spinning slowly, Mircalla saw the image of Laura looking up at something that Mircalla couldn’t see. Likely another person who didn’t show in the mirror’s magic.

As she watched Laura hiccuped again, taking big gulps of air as her hands held her sides, “She was mean, Mom. Why was she mean?”

And something tugged on Mircalla’s chest. Before she could make a conscious decision, her feet had already taken her back to the mirror. Laura stared at her, wide-eyes tinged in red, as Mircalla delicately settled her long skirts to sit properly on the floor.

Ankles fully covered.

“I’m not a princess,” she said at last, not looking at Laura, “I’m a Countess. The Right Honourable and Most Excellentest of all Ladies, Countess Mircalla Von Karnstein of Celje. Daughter of Marquess Von Karnstein in the lands of Styria who presides over March Karnstein on the boarder of our great empire from our home at Castle Karnstein.”

“You live in a castle!” The excited in the words forced her to look up. Laura was still wide-eyed but her expression had brightened, “I didn’t know people still lived in castles! Like a fairy tale.”

Mircalla wondered where Laura could possibly live that didn’t have castles, “And, you?”

Laura practically beamed at her, “I live in Canada. Right by Toronto but not in Toronto because Daddy wanted to have a yard because the streets are dangerous. Our house is by a lake and I go swimming sometimes.”

Canada? Mircalla was not familiar with that region of the empire. She would need to request a larger map from her father.

Then Laura looked up at the person Mircalla couldn’t see, “yeah Mommy. She said she lives in a castle and she’s not a princess she’d a,” Laura struggled over the word, “countess living in the empire and she’s wearing a really pretty dress that’s all poofy.”

Laura liked her dress. Mircalla let a small smile slip out, she had chosen it specially for her soulmate.

Not that this girl was her soulmate. The mirror was still in error. She simply did not want to see the girl cry.

“Excuse me,” Laura was tapping on the glass, “my mom would like to know which empire.”

“The Holy Roman Empire,” Mircalla said immediately, “under the reign of King Francis the Second. May he live forever.”

Laura quickly relayed this information back to her mother. Whatever the reply was, it made her giggle, “Mommy, that’s silly. It’s 2001.” This reply made her frown. Then she looked at Mircalla, “Mommy wants to know what year it is?”

Mircalla was still trying to understand what Laura could have possibly meant by ‘it’s 2001’. “It is the year sixteen hundred and and eighty five by the Gregorian calendar.” She said, proud that she knew this when most peasants did not.

It was Mircalla’s turn to look wide-eyed as the next few minutes only re-asserted her belief that the mirror had been in error. Laura claimed to be centuries older than herself. Certainly, soulmates were often varied by a few years, one in say 1685 and another in 1683 as the mirrors pressed their five year old selves together, but centuries.

Her stomach dropped. If the mirror was right and Laura was her soulmate, they would never meet. Mircalla would be long dead before Laura was even born. What kind of a soulmate was that?

The mirror had to be wrong.

Still, there was something reassuring as Laura looked at her through tear-filled eyes at the realization that they’d never be together and said, “I’ll come find you anyway.”

Laura’s mother, through the jumbled words of Laura, telling her not to tell anyone but her parents until they could figure this out.

When her parents asked about the soulmate she’d spent so long talking to, Mircalla had regaled them with the tale of a handsome male Earl in Spain.

They seemed so happy with her lie.

#

It was her sixth birthday when Mircalla returned to the mirror, the magic only working as each year passed by. Perhaps this year, she’d see her real soulmate and not the odd girl in mirror who claimed to be from a far off time in the future and lived across the sea.

The girl with the big smiles.

The cover had long been returned to the mirror and Mircalla pulled it off a little easier than the last year. And once again, the mirror was empty. She gave it a moment, remember how long it had taken Laura to appear last time. Surely, the wires had just been crossed and now the mirror was going to get it right.

And suddenly there she was. Mircalla frowned and crossed her arms, even stomping her foot against the ground. Stupid mirror. Then she squinted at the mirror as Laura appeared before her with a toothbrush in her mouth.

That was kind of weird

For a moment, Laura didn’t notice her. Then her supposed soulmate’s eyes darted to the side. She spat something against the mirror. Mircalla jumped back.

Laura immediately leaned forward, wiping the blue foam off the mirror with the bottom of her shirt, “What are you doing here?”

“It’s our birthday,” Mircalla said, rolling her eyes, “that’s how the magic works.”

Laura pointed a toothbrush at her, “I know how it works.” She flung the toothbrush around like a sword, “but it’s not my birthday.”

Mircalla sighed, “Are you sure? Perhaps you should check. I know that peasants can easily lose track of days.”

“I know exactly what day it is,” Laura would’ve stabbed her with the toothbrush if they’d been close enough, “and I’m not a peasant. We don’t even have peasants anymore. It’s not my birthday and it’s only been a little bit of months since I saw you.”

“Well,” Mircalla said, free to use sass if her mama wasn’t around, “I guess I didn’t turn six today.”

“Guess not,” Laura said and stuck the toothbrush back in her mouth.

Again, the two little girls glared at each other. Mircalla hadn’t known that it was possible to aggressively clean one’s teeth but Laura was pulling it off with reckless abandon.

“Mabef be boke the magick,” Laura said.

Mircalla raised an eyebrow at her. So Laura spat something in the sink and Mircalla turned up her nose. Peasants were disgusting.

“Maybe we broke the magic,” Laura repeated, “cause you’re from old times and I’m from now and my mom and I went to the library and read a whole bunch of books and she didn’t find anything that talked about old people and now people being soulmates. So maybe it’s confused and messed up our birthdays?”

Mircalla had also read books on the subject, searching out everything she could find in her father’s library and slowly puzzling through the large words. She hadn’t found anything helpful either.

“That’s not,” she said slowly, “a terrible explanation.”

There was that grin again. The one that seemed to split Laura’s face open and pour sunshine over everything.

“So you can be nice!” Laura shouted, throwing her hands in the air, “I knew it.”

MIrcalla scowled at her but that only seemed to give Laura a fit of the giggles. Everytime she looked up again, the little girl would resurge into a fresh wave of laughter. By the end, Mircalla was fighting to keep the frown on her face. Suddenly, Laura fell to the side and disappeared.

“Laura?” Her hand went straight to the glass, as though she could pop through and check on the girl.

Just the top of Laura’s head reappeared in the mirror, “Sorry! I need a stool to see the mirror and then you made that silly frowny face were you try to act mean but don’t look mean and I thought it was funny because that’s exactly the face that the old cat makes when I try to give it food but then it totally eats the food when I’m not looking. And i was laughing too hard and I fell off!”

Mircalla took a step back from the glass, clasping her hands in front of her, “Be careful.”

Laura dropped down and then popped up to proper height, “Hey, Countess?”

“Yes?”

Laura smiled, “Happy Birthday.”

It would have been rude not to stay and talk to the girl who was not her soulmate after that. The smile blooming on her face had nothing to do with it.

#

When Mircalla turned 8, Laura finally turned 6. By now, Carmilla was grudgingly expecting to see the small annoying peasant instead of her actual soulmate. The universe didn’t seem to be getting it’s wires sorted out.

What she hadn’t been expecting was for Laura to be the one waiting for her, the girl sitting in the mirror the moment Mircalla pulled aside the fabric.

“It’s my birthday!” Laura shrieked.

Mircalla rolled her eyes, “took you long enough.”

Laura was apparently learning to ignore her, “And it’s your birthday too right?”

Mircalla nodded, smiling slightly at Laura’s enthusiasm.

“I brought us something,” Laura shoved some kind of pastry towards the mirror, “I made it myself.”

The item could charitably be called a monstrosity of baking, an odd lump of undercooked dough and brightly coloured decorations smothered under layers of icing. Atop the explosion of sugar, were what Mircalla recognized as two candles. Although why they were on a baked item, she wasn’t sure. Laura wasn’t the most coordinated person and the fire struck her as hazardous.

Mircalla took a moment to stare it, then said, “It’s lovely.”

The younger girl squealed again before holding it out closer to the mirror, as though waiting for something else.

“What is it?” Mircalla said at last.

Laura’s brow dropped slightly, “It’s a birthday cupcake. You don’t know what a birthday cupcake is?”

“I’m afraid we haven’t been graced with that tradition yet,” Mircalla said. At the fall of Laura’s brow she sought to redeem herself, “although the word cake is familiar. Is this a celebration cake?”

The smile returned, “Exactly!” Mircalla watched carefully as Laura waved the firey tiny cake around, “I can’t believe you’ve never had a birthday cake before. Okay.” Her face went serious, “So normally we use whole cakes and cover them with candles but we didn’t have enough batter for a whole cake. So this is a cupcake. It’s like a tiny cake. But I still put all the icing on it because icing is the best part and I wanted to have lots.” She smiled at Mircalla who suddenly noticed that Laura was missing both of her front teeth, “Make sense?”

“The cupcake is a tiny version of a cake -” Mircalla started

“Yupp!” Laura said, before she could finish.

“-rather like how you are a tiny version of a human?”

For a moment there was silence then, “I am not a cupcake!”

It was too late, Mircalla gave her a wicked grin, “As you say, cupcake.”

“Not a cupcake!” Laura repeated.

“I beg to differ,” Mircalla said.

Laura wasted a minute pouting before cracking into a grumble, “Just blow out the candles and make a wish.” She must have seen Mircalla’s confused look, “that’s why the candles are there. I put the candles in so there’s one for each us and then you blow out the candles and make a wish and it only comes true because it’s your birthday.” She failed to see the logic in that.

Laura continued anyway, “and because its both our birthdays we should get twice the wish and I thought that we could wish that we’d somehow get to see each other and that I could come find you.”

Mircalla felt a light blush patter across her cheeks as Laura looked down sheepishly at her cupcake.

“Shall we complete this odd birthday ritual now?” Mircalla asked at last.

Laura nodded, oddly silent. She held the cupcake out towards the mirror, two candles dripping wax onto the icing. They locked eyes and Mircalla found herself unable to look away from the big brown eyes as the flames danced against them.

Eyes still locked, they blew out the candles together, Mircalla’s breath turning the mirror into a slight haze. When it cleared, Laura was beaming at her from the other side, picking off the candles and shoving icing into her mouth.

It didn’t even feel silly to make Laura’s wish.

#

Mircalla’s ninth birthday was spent spending most of the day enjoying the expression on Laura’s face when she called her cupcake. As much as she enjoyed the girl’s seemingly impossible tales of moving horseless carriages and whirling pictures and musicians trapped inside tiny boxes to always play music. There was nothing quite like seeing Laura’s tiny nose bunch up in aggravation.

So she should have expected what came on her tenth birthday.

After meeting Laura in what was apparently the mirror in her father’s office, the future was just full of mirrors it would seem, Mircalla could immediately see that Laura had something up her sleeve.

The six, and three quarters Mircalla, year old was basically bouncing from her perch in her father’s large chair.

But the answer didn’t reveal itself until halfway through Mircalla’s description of her latest book when she’d called Laura a cupcake.

“I’ll have to try and find it in the library, Carmilla.” Laura’s sly look was familiar to something she usually saw on her own face.

Mircalla wasn’t going to dignify that with a response. Even if she couldn’t figure out why in the world Laura had gone with that name. They sat in silence for but a moment when, as Mircalla had anticipated, Laura broke.

“Carmilla!” she said, “Get it? Cause you keep calling my cupcake even though I told you to stop so I figured that if you get a secret name for me then I get a secret name for you cause that’s only fair. So I thought really hard to try and come up with something but I couldn’t think of something that was really you and didn’t sound dumb because i know you wouldn’t want something dumb.” Laura took a deep breath and kept going, “and then in school, we learned about anagrams and my name was really boring to anagram cause its basically just vowels so I started playing with yours and I really liked Carmilla and it was perfect!”

She stared at Mircalla like the perfectness of the name should be obvious. Mircalla was too busy trying to figure out why she was suddenly so fond of the idea of Laura giving her a secret name. Once, one of the garden boys had tried calling her Mir and she’d almost throttled him.

Again, Laura’s babbling saved the conversation, “It’s perfect because it’s you, but a secret you! Like, it’s still got all the letter of your name but they’re all switched around like a secret version of you that only I get to see and it’s going to be awesome.”

Carmilla.

Maybe she could get used to it if Laura kept smiling at her like that.

#

Their birthdays matched up again when Carmilla turned 11 and Laura turned 8. Laura had started out enthusiastic, telling her all about school and her friends and how she’d apparently gotten to ride a pony. As she owned a horse, Carmilla wasn’t sure why this was significant but she wasn’t about to burst Laura’s bubble.

But as the conversation wore on, Laura became increasingly quieter, staring down at her hands.

Eventually Carmilla interjected, “Cupcake,” there was only the faintest nose crinkle at the nickname, “you don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”

“No, no, no,” Laura looked up, “No, I want to see you. I hardly ever get to see you and you’re like my best friend and I miss that I can’t just tell you things and I get to see you way more than you get to see me. I can’t image always waiting a whole year. That would be insane.”

Carmilla tried not to think about the dozens of letters she had stashed away in a drawer that were addressed to Laura, filling the gap between birthdays.

Instead she watched Laura carefully and said, “I know I’m going to regret asking this, but what’s wrong.”

Laura’s hand went to her shirt, fidgeting with the hem.

“Cupcake?” Carmilla said softly.

When Laura looked up, her eyes were wet, “My mom’s sick. Dad says the doctors are going to try and fix her but they won’t tell me what’s wrong and everybody gets all quiet when I come into the room and what if she’s dying and I don’t want her to die and I don’t know what to do.”

Carmilla didn’t know what to do either.

So she just lifted her hand and placed it against the glass, Laura’s smaller hand immediately coming out to meet it. If she focused hard enough, Carmilla could almost pretend she could feel the heat of Laura’s hand under her fingers.

The sat until Carmilla heard the bells chiming from the church, “Did I ever tell you,” she said, “about the time I convinced the master at arms to give me sword fighting lessons?”

#

On her twelfth birthday, Carmilla got up at the crack of dawn to maximize her time with the mirror, surprising Laura but setting a grin across her face as the younger girl raced away to convince her parents to let her take the day off school. When she returned, Laura cheerfully told her that the experimental drugs they’d put her mother on seemed to be working.

Somewhere during the day, she graduated from Carmilla to Carm.

When she turned 13, Laura was waiting. The freshly christened 9 year old holding another candle ridden cupcake. Laura had spoke about her friends, including an in depth explanation of her friend Susan switching to using their last name, while Carmilla regaled Laura with tales of the balls she was forced to attend. The day ended with Carmilla curled up against the mirror as Laura curled up next to her, reading aloud from her favourite book as the smaller girl struggled to stay awake. If they ignored the pane of glass, they would have been touching.

Carmilla’s 14th birthday caught Laura in her bedroom, the younger girl apparently having installed a large mirror on the wall ‘just in case’. And so the day was spent cracking jokes at the expense of Carmilla’s latest ball gown and Laura’s secret sugar stash.

Laura’s latest obsession was a tv show. A tv in and of itself sounded like a marvelous invention, but Laura was more focused on what the tv was displaying. Tales of a time traveller with a magic box.

“So if I can just track down the Doctor,” Laura said, “then I can make him take me to come see you, Carm! Just like I promised. And if that doesn’t work, Laf promised to build me a time machine. And they’re really smart so they’ll totally be able to do it, I bet. Then I’ll be able to come find you, just like I promised.”

Something in Carmilla’s chest ached as the smaller girl grinned at her. The smile no longer toothless but a smudge of chocolate on the side of her face. Her heart still undecided whether the mirror showing her little Laura had been a blessing or a curse.

“Cupcake,” she said, “as wonderful as the technology of your world sounds and I’m sure your friend is very smart, perhaps fiction isn’t the best thing to pin your hopes on.”

Laura’s smile fell and Carmilla hated to do it, but one of them had to be grounded.

Laura fiddled with a cookie, “I’m probably never going to see you for real, am I?”

Carmilla shook her head, “No. We never should have met in the first place. Mirrors never jump this much time. It was a mistake.” That didn’t stop her from writing the letters overflowing from her armoire.

“We’re not soulmates,” Laura still didn’t look up but Carmilla could hear the tremble in her voice, “are we?”

“No,” Carmilla said again, forcing the word out past the lump in her own throat.

Laura nodded slowly, “but… but we’re friends right?”

The fact that Laura even had to ask, tore at something inside Carmilla “We’re best friends.” she said fiercely.

Once again, the smile returned, something deep shining in Laura’s watery eyes, “Then I’ll just have to keep trying to come find you. Best friends are just as important as soulmates.”

And as they pushed the limits of the mirror late into the night until Laura’s imaged wavered and flickered with every stroke of the clock, Laura’s voice drifted through as she faded away, “I’m glad the mirror messed up, Carm.”

The ornate mirror covering did a terrible job of soaking up her tears.

Chapter Text

The year Carmilla turned fifteen, Laura was waiting for her in front of the mirror in a panic. Carmilla’s fingers hovered over the ornate mirror covering, remembering the last time she’d touched it. The tear stains were gone but in their haste, the servants had left wrinkles creasing the cover. Still, Carmilla yanked the covering back.

“Carm!” Laura shouted before the mirror was fully uncovered.

Carmilla’s eyes widened then, as she took in Laura, they fell into a frown, “What’s wrong, cupcake?”

“Carm.” Laura seemed to breath the word. There were dark circles under her eyes and the usually smooth brown hair was full of flyaways. Carmilla’s fingers itched to smooth them down. Instead, she took a step closer to the mirror.

“Laura.” Carmilla said.

Her name seemed to jumpstart Laura’s mouth, “You’re okay!”

“Naturally,” Carmilla said, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because I haven’t seen you all year!” Laura said, throwing her hands in the air, “And I always see you lots more times then you see me because the mirror always messes up. But this time, I didn’t see you at all and I was worried that something bad happened or that you were dead because we’ve been learning lots of things in history class about wars and plagues and I don’t want any of that to happen to you and you were never in the mirror and then you were late.”

As Laura spoke, a small smile curled across Carmilla’s lips, “I assure you, I’m fine. I will continue to be here every year.”

“Promise?” Laura asked. Then she threw out her hand, shoving it against the glass. Despite the obvious force, there was no shiver on Carmilla’s side. No ricochet of force or sound of smacked glass.

Still, Carmilla met Laura’s hand with her own, “I promise, cupcake.”

The glass was cool against her palm. Carmilla’s larger handing hiding Laura’s from view. So Carmilla shifted her fingers slightly, realigning so that her fingers filled the spaces between Laura’s. Had there not been centuries between them, their fingers would have intwined.

Instead, when Carmilla bent her fingers slightly, all she was met with was the hard glass of the pane.

Eventually, Carmilla pulled her hand away and buried it in the fabric of her dress, “So,” she said, “if it has been as long as you claim, I assume that it is once again your birthday?”

As always, Laura’s grin split across her face. The one thing that the mirror could not dilute as it blasted through the centuries back to Carmilla, “I’m ten!” Laura crowed, “Double digits.”

“Forgive me if I’m wrong,” Carmilla said, holding back her smirk as Laura quirked her head to the side like a small puppy, “but it would seems as humanity has shrunk in the centuries between us.”

“Carm!” Laura said, “I’m plenty tall!”

Carmilla tapped her chin, “Perhaps tall has changed meanings recently?”

Laura’s nose crinkled when she pouted, “You’re only taller than me because you’re five years older. That’s not my fault.”

Settling her skirt as she sat, Carmilla said, “I find it difficult to believe that you would be taller than me even without the age gap.”

“Well,” Laura said as she plopped down on her butt, “I’ll just have to come find you and we’ll measure and then we’ll be sure.”

Something tightened in Carmilla’s chest. Rather than answering, she looked around the library for anything else she could speak of.

The invitation for her birthday gala caught her eye, “My Papa’s hosting another party this year,” she said, eyes on the crumpled mirror covering instead of Laura, “I think the other Lords would be rather distraught if he didn’t as they’ve become known throughout the land as quite the seasonal event. Of course, this will mean dancing with more of those buffoons but as I draw closer to my sixteenth birthday, it’s inevitable that I will no longer be able to avoid-”

“I’m still gonna find you, Carm,” Laura interrupted.

Carmilla hands gripped the folds of her skirt.

“I know we talked about it and you don’t want to think about it,” Laura said, “but the mirror made me find you for a reason and you’re my best friend so I’m going to do the impossible and find you. That’s what I promise.”

It was hard to look in those big brown eyes and not believe every word the ten year old said.

Especially when, moments later, she pulled out another birthday cupcake and made Carmilla make a wish all over again.

#

Carmilla’s sixteenth birthday found Laura when she was just getting out of bed. With the covering pulled aside, Laura didn’t notice her at first. Carmilla smiled as Laura rolled out of bed, slung under one of her arms was a fuzzy teddy bear while the other tugged on the end of her pajama shirt.

A TARDIS flying across the front.

Laura yawned and rubbed her eyes, leaving Carmilla smiling.

“Cupcake,” she called.

Laura’s head swung over to the mirror that Carmilla knew was in the corner of her bedroom. First she smiled but then her eyes widened and she immediately shoved the teddy bear under her yellow pillow.

“What? No...” Carmilla teased, “Sir Bearington will surely suffocate under such conditions and then where will my noble knight be?” It had only been a few years ago when Laura had insisted that she knight the teddy bear so that he would have official status. Carmilla had objected, saying that she wasn’t a Princess, but Laura had insisted.

They’d ended up with an entire platoon of stuffed knights and a magical sword.

Laura looked at the bear under her pillow and then back at Carmilla. She lifted her chin, “I’m too old for teddy bears, Carm.” Laura took a shaky step away from the bed, “I’m mature now.”

“Are you now?” Carmilla teased.

But rather than the usual smile, Laura’s face grew darker, “We don’t have to pretend. I’m not a baby.”

The smile was gone as Carmilla frowned, taking a step closer to the mirror, “Of course you’re not.” Carmilla said.

Laura nodded. Then, rather than dropping in front of the mirror, Laura sat stiffly in front of it, “So,” she said, “Are you excited for your birthday celebrations? Who do you think will be there?”

This still, stiff child was not Laura Hollis.

“Cupcake,” Carmilla said, dropping to the ground without bothering to adjust her skirt, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Laura said.

Carmilla rolled her eyes, “You’re a terrible liar.”

“And you’re old,” Laura blurted. Carmilla froze as Laura’s hands went straight to her mouth.

A squeaking sound came from Laura, “I’m sorry.”

“Care to explain?” Carmilla asked.

The words came quickly, “Cause you’re sixteen now Carm. That’s like really old. Like high schoolers are sixteen and they’re really big and mature and I’m still only ten and none of the other sixteen year olds would want to be friends with me because I’m too little and Theo said that you’re not actually my best friend because I still have teddy bears and old people don’t want to do that kind of stuff. That’s okay though. Because I can be mature and we don’t have to do kid stuff or play with Sir Bearington or anything. I promise. No more teddy bears.”

For all that Laura managed to hold her voice steady, her chin wobbled.

“Cupcake,” Carmilla started.

“No. Carm,” Laura said, “I’m big now.”

The sixteen year old tried to hold back her smile as she stared at Laura. At last, she folded her hands and said, “No more teddy bears? Well then you’ll just have to take his place, won’t you? Can’t have a Countess without her noble knights.”

“We don’t have to pretend,” Laura said, “I’m not a baby. I know you can’t actually knight me.”

Carmilla put on her best serious face, “But what if I wanted to? A Knight Hollis of my very own? After all, my best friend could be no common peasant. Only the highest ranking knight could hold such an honour.”

“You’re being silly,” Laura said but the side of her mouth quirked.

Carmilla put a hand to her chest, imitating some of the more aggravating women she had to see at court, “After all, what is a Countess but for the quality of her brave and fierce knights. Alas, the bravest of them all, Laura of the House Hollis, refuses to accept my sigil as her own. And on my own name day even. Whatever shall I do?”

Laura’s giggle slipped out, “Alright. Fine. Fine. I’ll be your knight.”

“Ah,” Carmilla said, “It is not that simple.” She held out a hand towards the mirror, “Kneel.” She watched as Laura, bedhead and all, dropped to her knees, “Now, recite after me.”

Carmilla said the words that she’d stolen from one of her father’s books of a time even older than herself, “I, Laura of the House Hollis, pledge my service to Countess Carmilla of Karnstein. I promise to protect her from all who wish her harm. I pledge her my sword and my heart. I pledge to uphold the needs of the poor and lonely and defend all who call on my aid. I will uphold the name of Karnstein and honour my house.”

Laura managed to get it out through the giggles.

Carmilla smiled as Laura popped up in front of her, tapping on the glass. “Congratulations cupcake,” she said, “You’re a real knight now.”

Laura did a dance move that she had once informed Carmilla was called ‘the fist pump’.

“What about you?” Laura asked when the dancing had subsided, “Do you have make a pledge when you become a Countess?”

“Afraid not. You’re just born with it,” Carmilla said.

Laura crossed her arms, “Well, that doesn’t seem fair.”

Carmilla raised an eyebrow.

“Cause other people have to promise things to you but you don’t promise them anything back.” Laura said, “So what do the people get out of it? What if you were mean or bad or something?”

“That’s not how it works, cupcake,” Carmilla just laughed, “Go ask your mother if you can take the day off school.”

The second Laura was out of the room, Carmilla ran from the library. Uncaring of her skirts or her mother’s scandalized “Mircalla”, Carmilla sprinted down the hallway and dashed into her chambers. She quickly unlocked the chest that held the letters she’d written to Laura over the years and dug through the contents until something soft hit her hand.

Then she sprinted back, trying not to trip over the skirt.

She was breathing heavy but just made it to the mirror in time to watch Laura tumble back into the room.

Carefully, Carmilla held up the worn and floppy black stuffed cat in her arms, “Lady Bagheera requires a companion.” she said, “Do not leave her alone to face the world.”

A blush bloomed across Laura’s chest even as she pulled the teddy bear back out, “Happy Birthday, Carm.”

#

Seventeen had another cupcake nearly squished against the mirror when she opened it. Even Carmilla could admit that 11 year old Laura’s cupcake baking skills had gotten significantly better than when she’d first started.

Once the candles had been blown out and the cupcake carefully half eaten by Laura, Carmilla picked up the book that she’d started with Laura many birthdays ago and begun reading. They had reached the final chapters and she was eager to learn the ending. Curled up against the mirror, Laura was snuggled into her own side as Carmilla held the book so they could both see the pages. They’d long developed a rhythm for the book, each with characters assigned to them. Laura even going so far as to make up unique voices for each of her characters.

When they finished the book, there was a moment of silence. The last moment of respect for a lingering truth of the tale in their heads before Laura asked, “Are balls really like that?”

“Like what?” Carmilla asked absently, head still lost to stories of dragons and monsters and heroes.

“The dancing,” Laura said. When Carmilla looked over, Laura was sitting on her knees with her eyes practically shining, “Do people really do those old-timey dances where everyone knows the moves and people wear big fancy dresses?”

Carmilla put the book aside, spinning to face Laura with her knees pressed against the glass, “Of course,” she said, “do you no longer have such events?”

Laura shook her head and bit her lip, Carmilla tried not to stare at the bits of metal lining Laura’s teeth. Braces sounded like a monstrous contraption. “Tell me about it,” Laura demanded, “What’ll you be doing tonight?”

“The current stylings come from France,” Carmilla said, watching as Laura’s eyes sparkled, “they say that the most magnificent ballets are being developed in the courts of King Louis the XIV. However, the great Gottfried Taubert has created his own vision for the steps within our empire.”

She continued speaking, explaining the steps that her tutor had drilled into her head. While learning had seemed an arduous task, Laura soaked in her every word as though it was an excitement. The girl a seemingly endless fountain of questions.

Finally Carmilla cut her off mid-question. Laura looked offended for a moment until Carmilla got to her feet and huffed, “I’ll just show you cupcake.”

Laura tripped scrambling to her feet and headbutted the mirror. She was up again in an instant.

“I’m fine,” Laura said, “go.”

Carmilla reached out for her invisible partner and started moving through the steps. She closed her eyes, trying to imagine her partner yet failing to pull up any familiar face that seemed appetizing. She held in the sigh, tomorrow's event would surely be another disaster.

When she opened her eyes again, Laura was dancing. Her arms were up in her own invisible embrace and her brow was furrowed with concentration as Laura’s gaze darted from Carmilla’s feet to her own.

And a smile broke across Carmilla’s face.

A better partner than any she could have.

#

Laura turned twelve when Carmilla turned eighteen and Carmilla couldn’t help but think that something was wrong. The icing covered cupcake was still present with two candles on top and Laura was still made of sunshine smiles and big brown eyes. Yet something was different.

There were pauses in the conversation. Laura would suddenly blush and then launch into a spiel of words that not even Carmilla could keep up with.

Carmilla simply assumed it was part of being twelve.

It had not been her favourite year either.

So they worked around it. Laura filled Carmilla in on the latest season of Doctor Who while Carmilla spoke of her newfound book on astronomy that her Papa had gotten delivered on her behalf. They were interrupted only when one of her handmaidens knocked lightly on the door, reminding Carmilla that she still had to try on the final version of her dress for her birthday celebrations.

“Do you mind?” Carmilla asked.

Laura shook her head and mumbled around the cookie in her mouth, “I wanta see the dresh anywash.”

Nodding, Carmilla stepped to the side of the mirror and let them tie the new dress around her. Laura was silent only for a few minutes before calling, “What’s taking so long?”

“This is simply how long dresses take,” Carmilla replied.

She could hear Laura huff.

The handmaidens could neither see nor hear Laura but they certainly understood that someone special stood on the other side of the mirror.

“I’m sure he’ll love it,” one of them said as she slipped out the door.

He. Of course. Mircalla’s supposed soulmate from Spain.

Still, Carmilla gently smoothed down the bodice and took as deep a breath as the outfit would allow. For some reason delaying stepping in front of the mirror as she picked and pulled at the pleats.

Which was ridiculous.

So she stepped in front of the mirror.

“What do you think, cupcake?” she asked.

Laura looked up with half a cookie in her mouth and froze. She just stared, leaving Carmilla trying not to shift from foot to foot under her gaze. Slowly, red worked it’s way over Laura’s cheeks.

“Cupcake?” Carmilla prompted.

“You’re beautiful.” the words tumbled out. Laura’s eyes widened as though she’d said something she hadn’t meant to.

But Carmilla found herself doing the same, “Really?”

Laura’s head snapped up, “Course, Carm. Don’t you know that?”

Carmilla just shook her head, a wry smile creeping across her lips. Then she sat down again and Laura launched into another story about her friends and the magical wonders of the 21st century.

Carmilla thought that was it.

Until.

“Do you ever wonder why we appeared in the mirror?” Laura asked.

Carmilla frowned, eyes still on the stars that had long since appeared outside the library window. “I think,” she teased, “that you might have smacked your head a little hard on that mirror, cupcake. The mirror made an error. We established that years ago.”

There was silence for a moment.

“What if it wasn’t a mistake?” Laura whispered.

Slowly, Carmilla looked through the mirror. Laura was sitting cross legged in front of her with her head looking down. Her hands were balled into fists, fingers clenched so tightly that the knuckles were white. Her cheeks were flaming red and her hair curtained around eyes scrunched closed.

Something in Carmilla’s chest seized, a premonition born of time, “Cupcake.” She said, trying to stop what was unfolding.

Laura wouldn’t let her.

“What if it wasn’t a mistake,” Laura repeated, “What if the mirror is right and we were supposed to be together and what if I can find you one day. Because I think that it might be right because you’re my best friend and sometimes I get so sad but then I think of you and I feel less sad and I miss you when you’re not here.”

Laura’s hands were practically shaking in her lap, “And you’re so beautiful and I can’t stop thinking about it and it’s not even just that you’re pretty even though you are but you’re pretty on the inside too. Like how you love stars and you’re silly sometimes and your voice when you read books. I know that I’m little and there are lots of years between us and it seems impossible.”

“But,” Laura said, “what if the mirror was right? What if we are soulmates, Carm? Because I think I’m in love with you.”

Carmilla’s hands were tangled in her skirt, clenching at the fabric as though it could ground her. Her breath was gone and all she could do was slid closer to the mirror stuck between them.

Because Laura was looking at her now. Looking at her with big brown eyes that were watery without crying and the sunshine that usually lived in her smile had turned into something else entirely. Something beautiful and vulnerable and a little bit terrifying.

And Carmilla was going to have to break it.

Her hands shook.

So she hid them deeper in her skirt and said, “Cupcake. We can’t.”

There were more words lurking in her throat and in her chest but they got caught somewhere near her voicebox and before she could explain further, Laura was moving.

Recoiling.

She sprang back from the mirror and the tiny hands that had been clenched into fists were hugging her torso instead. Carmilla had to watch the split second where all the hope and vulnerability in her face shattered. The tiny smile cracking into a stifled sob while the warmth in her eyes dropped behind a steel curtain.

“Oh,” Laura said. She kept backpedalling. Moving farther and farther from the mirror.

Carmilla moved closer, “Laura-” she started.

“No. No. It’s okay. It’s fine. I get it. It’s fine. No. I’m just too littl-,” her voice cracked as a sob built underneath the words. “You’re grown up and you don’t feel. It’s fine. No. It’s.”

Laura sunk deeper into herself. Pulled farther away.

“Laura,” Carmilla had her hands on the glass now, the cold biting into her palms like ice, “Laura no. That’s not what I meant, come back.”

“I’m gonna go,” Laura spoke over her. Her head was facing away from the mirror but Carmilla could still catch the reflection of a tear glimmer on her face. Laura hiccuped, “I’m gonna go. I just. I’m sorry. Happy birthday, Carm. I’ll be better next year. It was silly. Of course you don’t. I’m just. Of course.”

And Laura was gone, her image disappearing from the mirror like smoke and leaving Carmilla with only her own face staring back at her. Paler than she’d ever seen it with wide eyes frantically refusing to meet their own gaze.

“Laura,” she shouted, “Laura. Laura.”

Her hands were pressed against the glass as though she could fall through. It wasn’t midnight yet. The day wasn’t over. Carmilla stayed, leaning unmoving against the glass. Waiting.

The bells rang once. Twice. Three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven

Twelve.

The day was over and the only thing staring at her in the mirror was her own reflection. Just an eighteen year old girl in a pretty dress with tears she couldn’t remember shedding drying on her cheeks.

Laura had called her beautiful.

Then, she’d broken her best friend.

Carmilla clawed the dress off and left it lying on the floor in a rumpled heap next to the mirror covering.

She refused to wear it to her 18th birthday ball.

So she wasn’t wearing it when a knife plunged into her chest and left her bleeding on the floor.

So she wasn’t wearing it when teeth pierced her neck, ripping fabric aside and injecting fire into her veins.

So she wasn’t wearing it when she stood alone. A vampire in a room of corpses.

She was, however, still wearing a broken heart.

#

Carmilla had been waiting all year for this. On her nineteenth birthday, she sprinted through the empty halls of Castle Karnstein and skidded to a stop in front of the mirror. Running her tongue over her teeth to ensure that her fangs were well hidden, Carmilla yanked the mirror covering away.

There was nothing on the other side.

The breath she didn’t need caught in her throat but she forced herself to stay calm, to wait. Laura had been late before.

Vampires could still have soulmates.

She would tell Laura that now Carmilla could come find her. That the mirror wasn’t wrong. That she could live through all the years between them.

Laura just had to show up.

Carmilla perched on her toes, smoothing her dress. Watching. Waiting. Staring at the empty glass before her as her eyes ran over the books behind her. An unbroken wall of knowledge in the mirror. All she had left of her Papa.

The mirror rippled.

And there was Laura.

Thirteen year old Laura with a cupcake in her hands and a hopeful look on her face. The flames on the cupcake were already burning, two tiny stars casting shadows on Laura’s face.

“Cupcake,” Carmilla let the word go on a sigh. The tension sinking away from her body. She was there. She was still there. Laura still showed up and vampires could still have soulmates.

Then Carmilla frowned, watching as Laura continued to stare at the mirror with an unchanging expression. Watching. Waiting.

“Cupcake,” Carmilla said again, stepping closer.

No response.

Carmilla put her hand on the glass, fingers spread, “Laura.”

Nothing.

There was no way that Laura couldn’t see her. Carmilla was right there. She knocked lightly on the glass. Perhaps it would just take a moment more. She could see Laura. Laura was there.

Her smile faded a little, “Carm?” Laura called.

“I’m here,” Carmilla shouted.

Laura didn’t react. Her gaze just flickered back and forth between the cupcake and the mirror. Never landing on Carmilla. Laura had clearly gotten older, face a little more angular and just a smidget taller. The sun had brightened her hair into streaks of gold and there was a dollop of icing on her cheek as though she’d been in a hurry. That same face looking out from the glass.

That same face.

Carmilla’s stomach dropped.

Just that face. Only that face.

She fell back from the mirror, knees almost giving out as her mind whirled with a single scenario she hadn’t thought of. She’d considered that Laura wouldn’t show up after her last confession. She’d considered that vampires weren’t allowed to have soulmate. She’d considered that Laura would be angry.

She hadn’t considered this.

Laura couldn’t see her.

Carmilla lunged back towards Laura, slamming her fist against the glass until a thick crack shot down the glass and sliced Laura’s reflection in two. “Laura!” she shouted, “I’m right here!” She forced the vampiric strength down, slamming the mirror again and again but just keeping from cracking the image further. She had to watch as after the first hour, Laura’s smile was completely gone. The light faded from her eyes.

Hour two meant that Laura started calling for her. Every attempt from a shouted “Carmilla” to a pleading “Mircalla” to a broken “Carm” reached Carmilla’s ears. But not one of her “Laura’s” could get through the glass.

In hour three Laura sunk to her knees, cupcake in trembling hands. Carmilla dropped with her, slapping the glass against. The thwacks loud in her own ears.

But not as loud as Laura’s aborted sob in hour four.

The candles had burned away entirely in hour five.

Carmilla lost her voice in hour seven. The fangs had long slipped out past her lips because that hardly mattered.

Hour nine saw the cupcake put aside and replaced with what Carmilla knew was a laptop. She could only watch as Laura mumbled words like ‘1698’ and ‘war’ and ‘karnstein’ while her fingers flew over the keys.

Hour eleven was silent. Laura just stared into the mirror and no matter how Carmilla shuffled and moved on her own side, somehow Laura’s eye never lined up with her own.

In hour twelve, Laura spoke to someone Carmilla couldn’t see and moved just outside of the mirror’s frame. But her words still came through. A jumble behind tears, “She didn’t show up, mom. She didn’t. Maybe she’s still mad at me and I messed it up and now she’s not going to come and it’s all my fault. She’s not here and I want her to be.”

Carmilla’s roared response was the farthest thing from human.

Laura had dried tears on her cheeks and a teddy bear in her arms but she sat through the night. She stayed until the clock chimed twelve and her image dissolved away with a last ‘Carm’ on her lips.

Carmilla stayed longer. She just stared at the mirror with it’s long crack across the image of all her father’s books behind her. Only her father’s books behind her.

Carmilla didn’t need to see herself to feel the tears on her cheeks.

It wasn’t Laura’s fault that vampires didn’t have reflections.

Chapter Text

Carmilla’s hand trembled on her 20th birthday as she reached for the mirror covering, only dust on her fingertips as she brushed the edges of the fabric. One year. One year since she’d seen Laura in the mirror but hadn’t been seen in return.

Two years since she’d broken Laura’s heart and her own in the process.

Two years since she’d become a vampire.

Only one of those events still hurt like it was new. But she’d spent the year well. 365 days to read every book she could get her hands on. 365 days to plan out how to get Laura to see her. Hear her. Anything.

Her dress floated with every movement as the quiet of the castle permeated everything around her, so quiet that she could hear the slid of the fabric off the mirror. The massive crack from her pounding fists still slicing the image in two. The mirror swirled and a familiar bedroom met her gaze. Carmilla’s gaze automatically went to the bed where a small figure was breathing softly, hidden by a blanket but for a messy bedhead peeking out.

Carmilla’s smile rose unbidden. Laura Hollis, still 13 years old and sleeping in a world hundreds of years away.

She started small, “Laura.” Carmilla tapped on the glass as the word rebounded through the castle but there was no effect on the other side.

Carmilla raised her voice and knocked again, “Cupcake, wake up!”

Her heart jumped into her throat when there was a mumble from the bed and Laura rolled over. Her arm dangling off the bed as her face came into frame.

“Cupcake?” Carmilla was quick to repeat,”Can you hear me?”

Maybe. Please. Vampires could have soulmates.

“Laura!” She shouted, “It’s me! Carmilla. Wake up! Please.”

Laura’s nose twitched but Carmilla’s final word was cut off by the blaring of an alarm clock. Laura groaned and slapped it quiet before slipping out of bed. She rubbed her eyes with her fists, still very much the thirteen year old that Carmilla had last seen. No sign of birthday cupcakes.

That was okay. This had happened to them before. If her math was right, Carmilla would have hundreds of birthdays before Laura was even born. Perhaps the mirror’s odd timing was something done right. Carmilla smiled as Laura mad her bed, drinking in the sight of the girl she hadn’t seen in a year. The girl for whom all the letters in her wardrobe were still written.

“Laura!” Carmilla shouted when Laura drifted closer.There was no response. Laura only picking the extra TARDIS blanket from the floor and folding it on the end of the bed.

Carmilla sighed, closing her eyes against the disappointment. It was okay. She’d planned for this. She reached to her left and picked up a shiny device that she’d scoured the kingdom to find, taking use of her new speed and strength and the connections brought to her by her new ‘mother’, the woman who had transformed her into the vampire she now was.

The woman who’d given her a chance to see Laura.

She picked up the natural trumpet, pointed it at the mirror, inhaled, and then exhaled as sharply as she could. The horn split through the silence, cutting it to tatters. She had no skill at the trumpet but it did not matter, the sound was great.

Perhaps great enough to cut through the mirror.

But Laura didn’t not turn and look.

Carmilla played harder, pushing out every note and pressing the end of the horn against the glass until she was out of breath and red in the face. Laura had not turned, only putting things into her backpack as she prepared for school.

“Come on Laura,” Carmilla growled. She let the trumpet fall to the ground and reached for the next, letting out a resounding thrum on the largest drum she’d been able to procure. The resulting bang thrummed through her head, setting her teeth on edge.

And still Laura didn’t not look. The crack in the glass only mocking her as Carmilla’s heart sunk lower and lower.

She kept trying until Laura walked out the door of her bedroom and the mirror vanished into nothing but the empty space where Carmilla should have been. Her father’s books still behind her.

Carmilla’s lower lip trembled. Then she swallowed hard and set her jaw. Reaching out, she grabbed the mirror and heaved. The whole thing came up, breaking from the wooden bed it had sat in for decades.

She took the mirror through the castle, trying not to think about all the things she would have shown Laura if she’d been able to. The grand ballroom for dances. The staircase that Laura had wanted to slide down.

She took the mirror outside and propped it against the side of the house, as far as she could get in the shadows. Her eyes watered at the sunlight. As the sun moved, she prodded the mirror farther and farther. She slipped once, a hand touching sunbeams. Carmilla hissed, pulling the hand back as the skin blistered immediately.

Her new mother swore it would get easier with age. By the time she met Laura, she would be immune to sunlight.

So Carmilla waited in the shadows until Laura came home again. Her heart jumped but Laura only dashed into the room and then out again, dropping her backpack on the floor.

So Carmilla waited. She waited and waited as the sun set and the night grew longer.

She only had until midnight.

Finally, Laura trudged into her room and yawned as she rubbed at her eyes.

“Cupcake?” Carmilla tried again, “Please. Cupcake. Hear me. I know you can.”

But there was no response.

So with the moon high in the sky and hope in her heart, Carmilla lit a small fire and braced herself for the loudest sound she’d been able to find.

The canon exploded, firing off to the horizon as the blowback knocked the mirror to the ground.

Carmilla raced for it, ears ringing, “Laura? Laura can you hear me? Was I loud enough? I’m right here. I swear.”

She could only watch as Laura climbed into bed without a glance in her direction.

So with tears in her eyes, Carmilla could do nothing but watch Laura sleep until the image faded away.

#
She tried vibrations the next year, her readings suggesting that the glass itself might be connected but nothing seemed to rattle the mirror on Laura’s side. She tried light the next year, shining the brightest fires she could at the glass. At the height of the day, she harnessed the power of the sun itself to shine into the mirror.

Her hands came away burned to the bone, poking through blackened skin, but Laura hadn’t seen a thing.

Carmilla spent the next weeks watching her hands knit themselves back together as bone hid itself behind bloodless skin and wondered if hearts mended just as easily.

Decades passed and Carmilla tried everything that modern science could give her. She held onto a single hope. Laura’s next birthday still had not come and perhaps, perhaps on that day, Laura would hear her. Because Laura would be listening.

So she accepted her mother’s training on controlling her vampiric abilities and waited each year for her birthday with bated breath. But Laura was never waiting and Carmilla could only watch through the cracked mirror as Laura went about her daily routine.

No matter how loudly she called, Laura never answered.

And then it happened, on Carmilla’s 52 birthday the mirror flashed and Laura Hollis was standing on the other side. Fourteen years old and a cupcake in hand, candles unlit.

Seeing her wasn’t a surprise, Carmilla had watched her throughout the years, but seeing Laura staring back into the mirror, her eyes almost meeting Carmilla’s gaze, was something entirely different.

She had to try, “Laura?” Carmilla whispered. Her fingers touched the glass where no reflection stared back at her. “Cupcake can you hear me?”

“Carmilla?”

She jolted in surprise, heart leaping into throat, “Laura! Laura I’m here!”

Carmilla pressed her fingers to the glass, letting her palm splay against the coolness as though she could dig her way through time. Maybe. Laura could hear her. It had worked. On both their birthdays. Laura had been listening.

“Laura. I’m here.” Carmilla said, excitement rose in her voice, “You just can’t see me. I don’t know how to explain it cupcake but I’m immortal now. I just don’t have a reflection anymore. So instead of you coming to find me, I can come find you in 300 years or so.”

She could cross centuries knowing that Laura was waiting on the other side. Little Laura Hollis and the strange world to which she belonged.

Until.

“Carm? Are you there?”

“Laura. I’m right here.”

Laura stared off just to her left, her face pinched but fingers tight on the cupcake, “Mircalla? Please. Please show up this year?”

Carmilla banged on the mirror, “I’m here Laura. Say cupcake if you can hear me.”

Silence hung in the air.

Laura swallowed deeply, took a breath, and nodded, “It’s okay. I’ll wait.” So Carmilla could only watch as Laura folded down to sit crosslegged in front of the mirror, leaning against her bed and waiting.

Carmilla could do nothing but sit across from her, skirts still carefully arranged, staring at the girl who she’d watched grow older. One year in Laura’s time. Thirty for Carmilla. She’d seen nearly thirty days of Laura’s year and still she found herself tracing the lines of her face over and over again.

The face of her best friend.

Laura said nothing for the rest of the day, she just waited with big eyes and an unlit cupcake in her lap, gaze fixed on the mirror.

The cupcake was never lit.

#

As the years rolled on, Carmilla couldn’t decide if she loved or hated her birthdays. Waiting eagerly for and dreading them in equal measure. She did occasional tasks for her mother in between, attending parties and other drudgery. She made a tentative friend in another vampire, one of her mother’s other charges, and spent nights running around with Matska to see bits of the world.

But each year, on her birthday, she always found herself back at the castle in her long skirts and pulling the same dusty covering off the mirror as the castle started to crumble around her.

Carmilla would watch Laura go about her day as a fourteen year old in the far-off twentieth century. There were interesting pieces to pick up about the future she would eventually join but her focus was primarily Laura. What she did. How she was feeling. Time seemed to stretch and it seemed that every birthday for Carmilla was nothing more than a week for Laura.

She watched Laura repaint and decorate her room with nerd posters.

She watched as she struggled over homework.

She watched Laura invite her friends over for slumber parties, an unexpected sixth as they talked about boys and girls and school and everything in their lives.

She watched the heart eyes that were slowing growing in Laura’s eyes for one of her friends and felt her own heart give a panged thrum it had no business giving.

She watched Laura giggle as her mother and father twirled her around her bedroom. They were invisible through the mirror but even so Carmilla could feel the love. Her heart thrummed in pain for a different reason.

She watched Laura smuggle the meanest cat Carmilla had ever seen into her bedroom. Soft and svelte and a dark brown but with the most disdainful look Carmilla had ever seen.

She watched Laura dance herself around the room only to come home late at night, smile, and put a rose on her nighttable.

She watched Laura kiss someone and blush and look happy.

And Carmilla couldn’t keep doing it. Slowly the visits back to the castle became less and less, the place filled with ghosts that no longer needed her. Her world had become something else entirely. She travelled broader, running through the streets with Mattie and having the time of her life. She tried men’s trousers and cut off half her hair. Her ability to go out in the sun grew and one morning she awoke to find she could turn into a panther.

Mattie had laughed, cuffed her furry ears, and said that given enough time, “Carmilla might catch up to all of my different forms.”

The years flicked by as she let herself go farther and farther away from home until days were meaningless. Birthday’s were best forgotten.

So she was caught off guard when the mirror at a party in Spain shifted before her eyes and there was Laura Hollis. Still fourteen and happy.

It seemed Carmilla couldn’t avoid her. Mirrors had become more and more common and it seemed that any sufficiently metallic surface would create even a blurry vision of Laura if the day was right.

So Carmilla marked birthday’s only by the days when the mirror would shift and then she’d walk away. Walk away from the girl who perhaps history had never intended her to meet anyway. The girl who didn’t need Carmilla.

After all, she didn’t have a reflection.

Vampires couldn’t have soulmates.

Or perhaps, on her worst nights, Carmilla wondered if she could still see Laura because Laura was her soulmate but she wasn’t Laura’s.

Mattie had coaxed the story out of her one drunk evening and her only response had been to touch Carmilla’s hand softly and buy her another drink until Carmilla couldn’t remember anything at all, waking up tucked tight into her bed in their rented rooms.

Carmilla was able to ignore Laura for nearly a century until she stumbled to her bathroom one morning after a long night, fangs out and blood sticky on her face, when the softest voice spoke to her.

“Carm?”

Carmilla froze. She looked up to find Laura sitting in front of the mirror with a cupcake in her hand and tears in her eyes.

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it?” Laura said, “A whole nother year gone by and I still haven’t seen you. Haven’t seen you for years really.” She hiccuped and tried to smile, “I guess the universe finally figured out how to stop getting it’s wires crossed. You were right.” She paused, “I’m going to talk to you anyway? If that’s okay?”

Carmilla didn’t say anything, her feet rooted to the floor.

“I’m fifteen now,” Laura said, “It’s been a busy year. School got tougher and I’m kinda seeing someone I guess and I got published in the school paper which was pretty cool and,” with every word, Laura seemed to collapse a little deeper into herself, “and. And. My mom died.”

Carmilla’s heart froze.

“The cancer came back and they couldn’t stop it this time. Not the drugs or the therapy or anything. She was here and then she was sick and then she was gone. It was so fast. I feel like I barely got to say goodbye and it’s been months since she died.”

Months. Laura had been dealing with this for months and Carmilla, with her hundred plus birthday check-ins had missed every sign.

“The funeral sucked,” Laura said, “Because everyone was crying and I didn’t know who so many of them were but all of my friends were there and they hugged me tight and told me they were sorry and that I could talk to them. Except,” Laura closed her eyes, “except the only person I wanted to talk to about it was you. Isn’t that silly? Haven’t seen you for years and you’re still the only person I wanted to talk to.”

The cat slunk forward, and slowly sunk into Laura’s arms. She held it tight, crying into it’s back.

“And I couldn’t,” Laura’s voice broke and Carmilla broke with it, “I couldn’t because you’re gone. You’re gone, Carm. What happened? Did the mirror stop pushing us together? Or did you die in some old timey accident or are you mad at the last time we talked and won’t come to the mirror? Where’d you go, Carm?” Laura was full on crying now, “We’re best friends and you promised that you’d always be here, every single year on my birthday, but you weren’t and you went away and why did you leave me alone?”

“Laura,” Carmilla shoved the sink out of the way, letting it shatter on the floor, “Laura no. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m here now. I’m here.”

Laura hiccuped again, tears pouring down her cheeks, “You promised, Carm. And I’m still looking through all the books and the internet but I don’t know how to find you.”

Carmilla realized her cheeks were wet as she rammed her hand against the mirror for the first time in decades, “I’m here, cupcake. I’ll find you. I will. I’ll find a way.”

The next day, when Laura’s image had faded again, Carmilla headed back to Austria and marched up the steps of her mother’s mansion.

She had one question, “What do you know about the magic in magic mirrors? I need to talk to someone.”

Her mother’s eyebrow went up, power shining in her eyes, “What are you willing to pay me for it?”

Carmilla didn’t pause, “Anything.”

Chapter Text

Time ticked on but Carmilla only paid it mind once a year, her birthday. The day when the mirror would swirl and Laura would be on the other side, living her life as a 15 year old. One who had gotten her first kiss, whose mother had died, whose mirror was empty.

Even when Carmilla was there.

After a hundred years of missed time, Carmilla had sworn she wasn’t going to miss another one of Laura’s birthdays.

And so, each year, she found a mirror and carefully watched just in case this year her birthday would coincide with Laura’s. Her heart tore a little more each year, eyes soft and mouth silent as she watched Laura go about her days. Carmilla no longer shouted, screamed, called out, or pounded the glass. She had tried it all before. It did no good. There was only one salvation.

Her mother.

And so, the 364 days of a year that weren’t her birthday, Carmilla fulfilled her mother’s every wish. Letting go of the days where she’d roamed free, Carmilla threw herself into the task of buying whatever magic would let her talk to Laura again. The cost was small.

The cost was huge.

The cost was worth it.

Her mother’s tasks were easy enough; go to a ball here, make friends there, lead them away, don’t ask questions when they vanished. The same song and dance over and over again as Carmilla’s countess training and pretty face gave her advantages in high society that her vampiric siblings didn’t have.

Until one day, her mother presented her with a small bottle and Carmilla’s heart leapt. A party swirled around them, another one of Carmilla’s marks laughing across the ballroom as Carmilla’s mother lead her out to the balcony.

Blespendent in jewels, she minutely adjusted Carmilla’s gown.

“Now Mircalla,” Her mother ran cold fingers against her skin to tuck a rebellious strand of hair behind her ear, “This doesn’t stop our deal. You still owe me. However,” Carmilla held her breath as the bottle was held out to her, “You’ve done an excellent job darling. So I’ll allow you to speak to this person that you’re so aching to connect with. A taste of your final reward.”

The bottle was warm in her fist, small crystal edges fitting in the grooves of her palm as the jeweled cap shone in the moonlight. Her heart gave an uncommon beat in her chest as she slowly slid the bottle into the hidden pocket of her dress.

Laura. Only a few drops on glass and she’d be able to speak to Laura again. To apologize for leaving her. To explain what had happened. To hope that one day, they could meet.

Maybe, the smallest parts of her heart whispered, we could be forgiven for all we’ve done.

“Now then,” her mother said, “let’s get back to it, shall we?”

Carmilla nodded, swallowed hard, and crossed the room to the girl her mother had picked to disappear. They laughed. They danced. There was a tentative kiss pressed to her cheek before the smiling girl was handed over to Carmilla’s mother’s carriage. The girl was never seen again.

Maybe, her heart whispered, what we’re doing is unforgivable.

Carmilla did it anyway.

#

She did it again and again and again and again, waiting for the day when her birthday and Laura’s birthday lined up. She wouldn’t risk anything else, wouldn’t risk Laura missing her or not looking.

Even now, Carmilla was putting all her hopes that Laura would come back to the mirror on her birthday, come back to the empty reflection for another year. That she wouldn’t give up like Carmilla had once upon a time.

So Carmilla watched and Carmilla waited.

21 years. A whole other lifetime. Until.

The birthday was like any other, Carmilla rolled out of bed at the crack of midnight and put on one of her nicer outfits, one with pants. Laura would appreciate that she wore pants now. Then she’d go to the mirror and the image would swirl until teenage Laura Hollis was in her bedroom. Sound asleep as the stars shone overhead.

So Carmilla waited. She held in her calls and cries as long as she could, Laura needed her sleep and Carmilla wasn’t going to shout her name in Laura’s sleep and miss her. So she settled cross-legged in front of the mirror and waited. Counting every breath. No breath of her own.

The sun rose. Laura slept. The little blaring box by Laura’s bedside went off like it did every year. Laura’s hand flailed out to shut it off and then she rolled out of bed, hair wild around her.

“Laura,” Carmilla couldn’t help it, the little bottle clenched tight in her fist even as she knew that this probably wouldn’t be the year. Last time, she’d had a hundred birthday’s before Laura had even had one. So Carmilla settled into wait as Laura made her bed.

But.

But then.

Laura looked at the mirror. Eyes sad as she ran a hand through her hair, setting the part right, and said, in a small voice, “Alone again. Happy birthday to me.”

Carmilla moved so fast that she nearly left skid marks on the floor, the gem-laden lid of the bottle left to crash to the wood. One drop. Two drops. Three drops. They hit the mirror like cannonballs, sliding down the smooth surface and getting caught in the crack that still riddled the middle.

“Laura!” Carmilla shouted, her voice trembling with hope, “Laura, can you hear me?”

Laura froze, hand in her hair, and Carmilla’s unbeating heart froze with her.

“Laura. Laura, it’s me. It’s Carmilla.”

Laura looked up and something shone in her brown eyes like she was daring to hope in the possibility of magic, “Carm?”

Carmilla could have cried, swallowing past the lump in her throat, “Hi cupcake.”

Laura stepped to the mirror like she was moving through a dream, stopping to stand directly in front of it, her hand hovering near the glass but not quite touching it. She was taller now, the lines of her bones just starting to poke through the softness of a child, caught between the child Carmilla had last spoken to and the adult just around the corner.

“Carm?” Laura’s hand still hovered, her eyes darting up and down and back and forth, “I don’t. I can’t see you, just there’s a blur.” Before Carmilla could respond, Laura put a hand to her eyes and laughed a cry, “I’m just looking too hard for you, aren’t I? Seeing things in smudges. It’s just, we haven’t spoken in so long and it feels like everything’s gone wrong since you went away.”

Laura tilted her head back to blink away the tears.

“Laura, no. You’re not imagining it. I’m here.” Carmilla put her hand against the mirror, ignoring the crack in her heart at the knowledge that even this magic wasn’t powerful enough to make her seen. That she’d need to give more to her mother to get a stronger potion.

This wasn’t the moment to mourn.

“I’m here Laura. It’s really me.” Carmilla said, “I’ve found magic to connect us again but it’s not strong enough for a visual connection. I’ll find more next time. But,” her words were soft, “it’s me.”

Laura’s eyes narrowed and her nostrils flared as she lifted her chin sucked in a shaky breath and everything in Carmilla smiled to see that old look leveled at her again, “Prove it.”

The words came immediately, “The first time we met I told you that I was a Countess. That my name was the Right Honourable and Most Excellentest of all Ladies, Countess Mircalla Von Karnstein of Celje. Daughter of Marquess Von Karnstein in the lands of Styria who presides over March Karnstein on the border of our great empire from our home at Castle Karnstein. But you gave me a new name, called me Carmilla because you thought you need to give me a secret name to get back at me for every time I called you cupcake. You live in a time hundreds of years beyond my own. You’re an awful baker even though I told young you that your baking was good because you’ve got a huge sweet-tooth. We read books together and I called you a peasant.” Carmilla’s words kept going, hundreds of years of planning very specific words falling aside as she tried to prove to Laura that she was who she said she was.

“And then I disappeared,” Carmilla continued, “I didn’t mean to but for years I showed up to the mirror and you couldn’t hear me, couldn’t see me. I tried but nothing worked. And I’m so sorry because I said I wouldn’t but I did leave you. I couldn’t keep watching the mirrors. I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry that I was gone for so long. I really am. But things got complicated and I swear that I’ll explain everything. But I’m sorry. I’m so sorry that I left you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there when your mother died or when the days got hard. I’m sorry that I wasn’t there to help, cupcake.”

There were tears in Laura’s eyes and by the time Carmilla had finished, she was sitting crosslegged on the ground in her pajamas. Carmilla didn’t know if it was accidental or if she somehow knew that was where Carmilla was but they sat, nearly eye to eye for the first time in more than a century.

Laura wiped a tear from her eye, smile hesitant, “You know, I think that’s most I’ve ever heard you say at one time.”

Carmilla’s laugh hurt, “Well, I may have been bottling a few things up over the years.”

“Yeah,” Laura said, “Four years is a long time.”

Carmilla’s heart squeezed. Four years give or take a few hundred.

When Laura spoke again, her voice was small, “You didn’t want to leave me? You weren’t mad that I’d messed everything up that last time? With my,” an indecipherable look crossed Laura’s face but Carmilla still recognized the faint blush, “silly childish confessions and everything.”

“No, no Laura.” Carmilla was quick to say, “it was just bad timing. I swear. I was at a ball and it just all went wrong.” She huffed slightly, “I told you, cupcake, nothing good comes of balls.”

And somehow, just like that, Laura’s face brightened and it was like the sun had come out, “It really is you!”

“That’s what convinced you? Really?”

Laura shrugged, grinning, “Nobody does a disdainful tone like you do!”

It was easy after that. It shouldn’t have been after so long, after so much had changed, but it was. Newly sixteen year old Laura may not have gone to balls or worn fancy dresses or done anything like 16 year old Carmilla had but every word still hung in Carmilla’s chest like it was true. Like she’d felt and heard it all before. She clung to every word, laughed at all the right places, and watched the way that Laura’s nose still scrunched when Carmilla said something teasing.

It was like a hundred years had melted off her shoulders and she could just be an 18 year old girl again.

The smallest piece of her was thankful that Laura couldn’t see her in return, afraid of what Laura might see in the girl with no reflection even if Carmilla had worked hard to wipe every drop of blood from her face. Kept her fangs pulled back. For once, the mirror kept her safe, kept her from looking at her own reflection. Kept Laura from seeing her. All without keeping her from Laura.

Carmilla knew it wasn’t fair.

That didn’t mean it didn’t feel true.

They finished the book that Carmilla had kept a bookmark in since the last time she’d seen Laura, letting the end of the childish story whisk her away. She listened to Laura talk of life and entertained her in return with harmless stories from her travels. She wondered in the modernity of the world to come while holding in the breaths that would explain how she might one day come to view them in person.

For that explanation would require others. Ones of teeth and monsters and reflections. Carmilla knew she wouldn’t be able to dodge Laura’s questions forever but perhaps she could delay long enough to get her modern self to show up at Laura’s door. For all she knew, future Carmilla was hiding in the bushes of Laura’s house waiting to ring her doorbell after this conversation. Now that she knew that Laura had forgiven her absence, there’d be no reason to delay. So Carmilla kept those breaths to herself and buried the words.

But there were some breaths that had to be spoken. “Laura,” Carmilla said as the sun started it’s descent. Her head was whirling, overwhelmed with Laura Hollis, “I’m sorry about your mother.”

Laura’s expression sobered, hands twisting as she nodded, “Thanks Carm.”

For once Laura seemed at a loss for words so Carmilla scooted closer, pitched her voice soft, the only comfort she could offer through the glass, “Tell me about her.”

The hour was anything but wasted as Laura talked of her mother, starting slow and then building to rapid speeds. Crying and laughing all at the same time. Eventually she shook her head, smiling as her tears dried, “Wow. It feels so good to get to tell you all that. Everyone else tried but it just wasn’t the same. All those years and you were still the only one I wanted to talk to about everything.”

Carmilla’s heart panged at the familiar words, “I’m sorry I wasn’t there, cupcake.”

Laura nodded, “I know and you’re here now. We figured it out.” She fingers brushed the edge of the mirror and Carmilla couldn’t help but copy the action, tracing her finger over the same lines.

Then her chest froze, “But Carm. I don’t want to push and you kinda seem to be avoiding it but where were you? What happened? You mentioned magic and how everything went wrong at the ball? What went wrong? Why were we separated? Are you okay?”

“I’m okay.” Carmilla squeezed out. Mostly. Technically maybe.

“Then what happened, Carm? Because I trust you but nothing you’ve said explains why you’ve been gone for four years and why the mirror stopped working or any of it.”

“You don’t want to hear this story, cupcake.”

“I always want to hear the story.” Laura’s voice went soft, “Especially if it’s about you.”

Carmilla should have known better than to look up from her lap but somewhere in the years she’d forgotten what it felt like to have Laura Hollis look her straight in the eye. Or maybe she’d never really felt it. Maybe there was something different about 16 year old Laura Hollis, a sadness behind her smile that still shone bright. Maybe it was because Carmilla met her gaze and she could still see a smaller Laura shattering before Carmilla’s eyes. Maybe it was because she could still hear a weeping Laura’s tears for her to just be there.

But when Carmilla looked up, Laura was waiting for her. All day they’d just been missing each other’s gaze, never quite getting the angle right without Laura being able to see her. But now, all Carmilla could see was soft chocolate brown waiting for her.

The words tumbled out as a sigh, “I lost my reflection.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“I lost my reflection,” Carmilla repeated.

Laura blinked. “You lost?”

“My reflection.”

“Like your actual. In the mirror. See your face reflection.”

“That’s the one.

Laura shook her head, “You lost your reflection. Okay. Just checking. I thought that’s what you said but I’m going to need details because that explains maybe one thing but creates about a hundred other questions. How do you even lose your reflection? Did you just cut it off?”

“Not exactly,” Carmilla said, fear unlocking words she never meant to say, “I can’t say that it was exactly my choice.”

The sentence hung between them. Laura got to her knees and slid closer to the mirror, concern written all over her face, “Carm. Did someone hurt you?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“It kinda really really does.”

Carmilla hesitated, “Laura, I don’t think-”

“Someone hurt you bad enough that you disappeared for years!” the words burst from Laura, “And now you’re telling me that someone took your shadow away from you against your will? Don’t tell me that doesn’t matter Mircalla Karnstein because that sounds exactly like someone hurt you and I will not have you say that it doesn’t matter because that matters so much to me. Like it matters everything to me.”

Her words drilled into Carmilla’s chest, washing away centuries with a sentiment that Carmilla had never heard before. Concern that was never directed at her and an acknowledgement that someone had hurt Carmilla, had done things to her without her consent. Laura said things that unlocked something deep inside her chest even as her gums hurt. All she could see was the girl through the mirror.

There was only one word. A question and a tear and an 18 year old girl who hurt, “Laura.”

Softly, “What happened Carm?”

It slid out like melted chocolate, “I died.” She ignored the sharp intake of breath across the mirror and focused on keeping her shaky breaths from getting any shakier even as her lungs ached, “The ball was attacked and everyone there died. I was stabbed right through the chest with a dagger and bled out on the floor until everything was cold. I died.” She could still feel the slide of the metal. The warmth of her blood soaking through her clothes and sticking to her skin.

Laura was staring. Silent. Jaw dropped.

“And then I wasn’t dead. There’s more magic in the world than mirrors apparently and a very old and very powerful lady found me and brought me back to life. She made me immortal but took away my reflection. So I waited at the mirror on my next birthday but you couldn’t see me, couldn’t hear me even when I shouted. My reflection was gone and the mirror didn’t work.” Carmilla ducked her head and looked at the floor, “So that’s how I lost my reflection and why I was gone for so long.” She took a breath, “I’m a monster now.”

Silence hung through the room, the sky dark with only the moon to cast shadows over the long abandoned library of Carmilla’s youth. The shadows were no longer something to be feared but their length only highlighted how much had changed since she’d last talked to Laura in this library. How much she’d changed. With her aching gums and darkvision and bloody hands.

“You’re a vampire.”

Carmilla’s head whipped up. Laura was sitting, breath held and mind clearly whirling at a thousand miles a second. But she wasn’t revolting. Wasn’t pulling back. She was just sitting. Thinking. Lit by her own moonlight and a tiny set of fairy lights behind her head.

Laura nodded, seemingly content in her own conclusion, “No reflection. Immortal. Die and come back. That’s what you said right? That’s a vampire. You’re a vampire.”

There was only one thing to say, “Yes.”

Laura was still lost in thought, rubbing a hand through her hair.

“You’re not afraid of-” Carmilla started only to have Laura speak at the same time, “So that means you’ll get to meet me!”

They both looked at each other in surprise. Laura recovered first, “Carm.” She put her hand on the mirror like Carmilla hadn’t seen in centuries, “Of course I’m not afraid of you. You’re my best friend. You had something crappy happen to you and we’ll have to deal with that but I’m just happy that you’re alive and that I’m going to get to meet you without inventing time travel.” She paused, eyes widening and backpedaling, “assuming you actually want to meet me and it’s okay if you don’t because i shouldn’t assume that-”

Relief felt a lot like laughter, “Laura. Of course I want to meet you. As soon as I can without messing up the timeline.”

“So tomorrow then?”

Now the laugh spilled out for real. Laura didn’t care. Laura wanted to meet her. Laura was still her best friend, “Sure cupcake,” she said, “tomorrow.”

“Pinky promise.”

Carmilla was familiar with with modern ritual and pressed her own pinky against Laura’s on the mirror, “Promise.”

She grinned back as though Laura could see her, feeling as though her cheeks would split in two.

“So,” Laura said, “I know I’ll be able to talk with future you tomorrow but tell me everything about being a vampire? What you’ve been up to! We’ve still got a few hours til midnight.” Her eyes went wide as a thought struck, “Wait, you always had lots more birthdays compared to mine. How long has it been for you? More than four years, I bet.”

Laura face went apologetic when Carmilla told her how long it had been so Carmilla rushed on to tell Laura of seeing the world. Of her worst sunburns and learning how to turn into a panther. Of seeing all of Europe and meeting the greatest minds of the day. Everything about her life that was good.

When Carmilla looked at the sky again, their time was almost up. So she said, “Don’t worry cupcake, I’ll get more magic in time for your next birthday. Maybe enough to add the visuals next time.”

Laura nodded, “How are you doing that anyway? Is that some super secret vampire power that didn’t make the myths or Buffy?”

Laura’s eyes were alight with the possibility of new nerdy knowledge and Carmilla laughed, “Not exactly. I’ve been doing favours for the woman who raised me for the last few decades in order to pay for the potion.”

“For decades?”

“It’s fine, Laura,” Carmilla said, “I don’t mind.”

But Laura’s eyes had narrowed, an expression Carmilla had only started to see when they’d parted now refined to a bloodhound, “This is the same lady who took away your reflection?”

“She’s also the only reason we’re having this conversation,” Carmilla pointed out.

Laura could not be distracted, “What kind of favours are these, Carm? She’s not hurting you is she? Not again. Because I’m not worth you getting hurt. Not even a little. I can wait. It’s okay. I mean, I appreciate what you’re doing but don’t sacrifice yourself for me or-”

“I’m fine, Laura.” Carmilla cut off the tirade, “She’s not hurting me.”

“Oh,” Laura sat back, relief plain on her face, “Then what are you doing?”

Carmilla stumbled but couldn’t lie, “I, well, I’m recruiting girls for my mother.”

Don’t push Laura. Her heart begged. Don’t push this. Please.

But it was Laura and Carmilla kew what the words would be before Laura said them. She’d expected nothing less from her Laura Hollis. Laura sat back up, “Recruiting them for what?”

“I’m not sure,” Carmilla tried to make her voice flippant, like it didn’t matter, “Probably just another one of mother’s grand schemes to ingratiate herself to the upper class. We go to parties, I dance and make friends and then send the girls off to mother. It’s fine. All part of the game.”

“Are you sure it’s a game?”

Carmilla’s chest clenched, “Laura. Don’t push this.”

“Do you know what happens to them once you send them to your mother?”

“That’s not part of my job. They’re probably fine.” Even as she said the words, her heart protested.

“But you don’t know that, do you?” Laura’s eyes were on fire again, “How do you know she’s not hurting them? She hurt you. Do you ever see them again?”

“Laura,” the word was a growl, “this is the only way to get the magic I need to see you.” Carmilla’s hands were clenched into fists, her fangs popping up, “This is it. This or nothing. And I’d set the world itself on fire if that’s what it took to see you again. I promised I’d be there for you. I meant it. This mirror stuff isn’t always romantic or heroic or clean. We’re centuries apart. It’s messy. Real life isn’t like the stories. This is what it takes. I need my mother’s help. This is what she wants. I won’t lose you again.”

The anger hung between them as strongly as the mirror did, Carmilla meeting Laura’s glare at every inch even though Laura couldn’t see her. Two girls, arms folded and chins up in anger as they sat on the ground like the tiny Countess and peasant they’d once been.

Carmilla rubbed her eyes, “Laura. Look. I don’t want to fight about this.”

Some of Laura’s fight whooshed out, “It’s just. Carm. You can’t be hurting people just to see me. Of course I want to see you and I’m so happy that you showed up today. But, it’s just.” Laura ran a hand through her hair, “Those girls. Maybe they are fine but maybe they’re not and do you really want you and I to exist on the back of someone else’s suffering?”

Yes. No. She didn’t care.

She did.

Laura did.

Laura so clearly did. It was written in every line of her body and all in her eyes. Laura cared about people. Cared about her friends and her family and the girl in the mirror a thousand miles and a few hundred years away.

“Just,” Laura said, “Look into it? For me? And if something is going on then maybe you can help them or negotiate a different deal with your mother or find another kind of magic.” Her eyes lit up, “LIke unicorns or Merlin or something. Those must exist too! Now that I know what I’m looking for I can start doing some research too. Just take a look, for me? That’s all I’m asking.”

Laura’s smile was small and hopeful beneath her bright eyes, like something precious that had wound its way into Carmilla’s heart without her apparent permission. Best friend. Oldest friend. Soulmate or not. She was the girl in Carmilla’s mirror.

“Okay,” Carmilla said, “I’ll take a look. I’ve got enough magic left in this bottle to see you next year again anyway.”

“I’ll eagerly await The Countess’s report!” Laura said

“The Countess?”

“It’s your codename,” Laura said, “Since we’re supernatural Buffy-esque spies now. You’re the awesome and mysterious vampire with a soul whose digging around and I’m going to do more research so...” Laura’s eyes went wide before she frowned, “But I don’t want to be Giles.”

Carmilla had no idea what any of it meant but the bells were ringing and their time was almost up. Her heart ached around the happiness but she forced a smile into her voice.

“It was so good to see you, cupcake,” she said, “Same time next year?”

“Definitely,” Laura said, “I mean, I’ll miss seeing you more often than that but I’m happy with whatever Carmilla time I can get. Plus, this’ll give you more time to do some investigating! And, future you will come see me tomorrow, right?”

Carmilla smiled, “I’ll put it in the calendar.”

The bells kept chiming.

“I’m sorry that I won’t be there for you though,” Laura said, “I’ll get to see you soon but you always have to wait so long.”

The sentiment came easily, like it had always lived on her tongue, “You’re always worth waiting for.”

Laura beamed and, for a moment, Carmilla thought that they might finally end their time in the mirror on a happy note. Until, Laura turned. Smiled. Then she froze, eyes wide and staring at something just off-mirror.

“Laura,” Carmilla leapt against the mirror, “Laura what’s happening?”

Laura’s jaw opened. Closed. She spat the words, “You’re. My. You just. What the frilly hell-”

The words died, overlapped like someone Carmilla couldn’t hear had cut her off. The last bells were chiming and Laura went deathly pale, eyes wide. She leapt towards her own mirror, slamming against it, eyes wide “Carm! Wait! If you’re still there then you need to-”

The image cut out as the final chime died.

And Carmilla’s heart went cold.

Laura.

Chapter Text

The image of Laura’s panic was burned into the back of Carmilla’s eyes as she was forced to continue living her undeath. With every step of the dance floor and every swirl of a dress, all she could see was Laura’s panic. Laura trying to tell her something.

And Carmilla had no way to know what it was until the next time their mirrors crossed. It could be years. Decades even.

The only reassurance Carmilla could offer herself was the knowledge that she’d be there in the future. That she’d find Laura’s house and wait right outside so that she could be at Laura’s side right at the stroke of midnight and make sure that everything was okay.

As soon as she saw Laura again, she’d know what she was up against. Then she’d have a few hundred years to plan her actions.

Until then.

All Carmilla could do was keep earning magic from her mother.

But now even those simple tasks had Laura written all over them, her voice in Carmilla’s ear asking questions that Carmilla didn’t want to dig into and didn’t want the answers to. She’d told Laura that she’d burn the world down for her and Carmilla had meant it.

Was she allowed to mean it if that wasn’t what Laura wanted?

Carmilla took to philosophy, drowning herself in new and ancient texts as she tried to understand what the best action to take was. The texts were beautiful and as her own birthdays flew by without Laura’s matching in the mirror, she found solace in their words. But she didn’t find answers. As Carmilla watched 16 year old Laura, who seemed to have absolutely dived in research, she couldn’t shake Laura’s questions and requests for answers.

Until she couldn’t ignore the realities of her Mother’s jobs anymore. Carmilla had approached Mattie first, asking her older sister what she knew of their Mother’s plans but Mattie had only told her not to interfere. She’d shaken her head, glass in hand, and said, “You leave that well alone Mircalla or Mother may make it so that you never see this little cupcake of yours again.” She’d drained the glass and given Carmilla a fond touch as she’d crossed the room. “Leave it be.” Mattie had warned.

There was fear in her eyes and Carmilla believed her, took her advice. Took it until she couldn’t. As another birthday faded the Laura in the mirror went with it, Carmilla’s mother sent her to a ball. So it was with Laura fresh in her mind that Carmilla met Elle.

One of mother’s targets, she was a girl after Laura’s own heart. Elle was made of questions and fire, attacking the world with a vibrancy that made Carmilla ache for her own girl in the mirror. So when it came time to hand Elle over to her mother, Carmilla couldn’t do it.

Couldn’t do it to Elle.

Couldn’t do it to Laura.

She tried to be subtle, recruiting Elle to her mission as they snuck through the castle and tried to determine the truth of her Mother’s plans in a way that would have made Laura proud. Look into it for me, Carmilla, is what Laura had asked.

So she looked and Carmilla’s heart plummeted straight into her stomach. She clutched the magic bottle in her fist, knowing it held her last chance to speak to Laura. That Laura would never let Carmilla barter for more if what lay before Carmilla’s eyes was the price. That Carmilla wouldn’t have been able to do anyway.

They would not let girls die for their happiness.

Carmilla took a breath, grabbing Elle in her other hand and slowly backing away. It would be okay. She would run to the new lands across the ocean. Maybe New York. There she’d talk to Laura one more time in the mirror until the magic was gone and then she’d wait. Make her way to Canada. Wait for Laura to be born and turn 16. Then she could see her again.

She could wait. Carmilla could be patient.

Patience was all she was thinking about as she ran, not realizing that there were worse things than waiting until one of those things materialized in front of her.

“Mircalla, darling,” Carmilla’s chest froze as her mother appeared in front of them, face pinched in sympathy but eyes cold, “I was so sorry to see that you’ve been poking around into places you don’t belong.”

Carmilla shook her head, “We just got lost.”

“Did you now?” Her mother raised an eyebrow, “Well then, just hand over the little poppet there and you can go get yourself unlost and ensure that you never lose yourself in this direction again.”

Elle’s grip was tight in her own but all Carmilla could see was Laura’s eyes, “What are you going to do with her?”

Her mother waved a hand, “It doesn’t matter, darling. Just let her go and we can forget this whole little incident.”

Laura’s voice in her head - Look into it for me Carmilla. Those girls, Carmilla. Maybe they are fine but maybe they’re not and do you really want you and I to exist on the back of someone else’s suffering?

“I won’t ask again, Mircalla.” Her mother said.

There was a pinky promise made that Carmilla would be there for Laura after their conversation. A promise that she’d always be in the mirror for Laura. She’d broken that promise once, she didn’t want to do it again. She just wanted to see Laura, wanted her best friend.

But.

Laura’s words. Maybe they are fine but maybe they’re not and do you really want you and I to exist on the back of someone else’s suffering?

She knew what Laura would do.

Carmilla took a breath, squeezed Elle’s hand. “No.”

A beat. A moment. A choice.

Her mother shrugged, “Pity.”

Carmilla barely got two swings into the bodies materializing from the shadows before the world went dark and Elle was pulled from her grasp. Laura’s image faded into darkness.

#

She opened her eyes and it was still dark. Confused, Carmilla moved just enough to feel the scrape of cold stone against her bare arm. Her hands shot out, eyes wild in the dark even though there was nothing to see. Her hands barely made it past her nose before they slammed into more stone. The jolt vibrated through her arms, creating an ache in her palms. Carmilla’s hands searched, tracing the edges of stone on every side from her head to her toes as she lay on her back. There was barely more than an inch between the tip of her nose and stone, her bare feet scraping the stone against her heels while her skirt caught around her ankles.

“Elle?” She called. There was no response and Carmilla only closed her eyes, knowing that the girl was likely already gone. She spent a moment to mourn then set her jaw and opened her eyes again.

There was only dark.

Carmilla waited for her eyes to adjust to the dim light but the moment never came. There was simply nothing. Nothing to see. No light to see by. Her breath started to come quicker, little panicked bursts that Carmilla thrust down.

Her fingers kept tracing smooth stone until she felt a single edge just above her chin. She followed it with her fingertips, finding a small square firmly embedded into the stone but raised.

Then, “Mircalla, I see you’ve awoken.” Carmilla tensed as her mother’s voice rang through the dark. There was something wrong with it, an almost tinny quality that her mother didn’t have in real life that bled into Carmilla’s ears to sneak inside her head.

Magic.

There was only dark as the voice continued, “I’d like to say that I’m sure you’ve realized your situation but I’m not confident that you have, darling. You may be my glittering girl but you’ve always been slow to catch on. I’ll spell it out for you. I’m displeased, Mircalla, and you need to learn a little lesson for disobeying me.” It was easy to breathe normally when she had her Mother’s voice to focus on hating.

Until the next words stole every modicom of calm from her body, “I’ve decided to make sure that you never see that little ingenue you’ve been saving up magic to meet.”

Carmilla slammed the stone, “You can’t!”

Her mother laughed, “Of course I can. My instructions were very simple. If you did what I asked then I would give you ability to see the little poppet again. You ceased doing what I asked so the only fair punishment is that you never see her again.”

Carmilla roared, smashing upward again.

“Now now,” her mother said, “I wouldn’t do that. After all, I was kind enough to place a mirror in there with you and you wouldn’t want to break it. Who knows, maybe you’ll be able to catch a glimpse. Ta ta darling. I’ll see you in a few centuries.”

Her mother’s voice as nothing but a mockery as the darkness loomed unchanging in her eyes. Carmilla slammed upward again, smashing against the stone with the full force of her strength. She shouted. Screamed for mother to let her out. There was no reply. Each jolt slammed through her entire body but Carmilla didn’t care. She just slammed again and again even as the skin on the palms of her hands started to peel away. The lid of her prison grew slick and damp, her palms sliding in their own blood as her voice grew horse.

The stone never moved, didn’t even wiggle.

Carmilla only stopped when her voice gave out all together and she could hear the crack of her bone against the stone.

Her bloody fingers crept upward, tracing the edges of what must have been the mirror, trying to see anything in the dark. There was no reflection, no light to show one even if she’d been able. There was only dark.

And Laura was gone.

Out of reach. Beyond time. Carmilla might live to her age but if her mother had her way then she’d never see Laura. Never get to see her face in person or hear her laugh float through the air. Never split a cupcake or even just hold her hand.

Never explore that little piece of Carmilla’s heart that still wondered. Wondered about mirrors and time and distance and if it was possible that two girls so far apart in time could actually be soulmates.

Carmilla stared into the dark at the mirror she could not see above her head. It wasn’t her birthday. There wouldn’t be anything for the mirror to show anyway.

But one day, one day it would be birthday.

And then maybe.

Carmilla closed her eyes against the dark. Against the screaming of her palms and the pain in her joints and the lingering sound of her mother in her ear and the guilt of Elle’s fate. Instead, Carmilla closed her eyes and Laura was waiting behind them.

So Carmilla started to count. Every day, every minute, every single second until her next birthday.

Each number a prayer and a plea.

She counted and when the day came, Carmilla opened her eyes to find thirst clawing at her throat and only darkness before her eyes. She couldn’t see the mirror, couldn’t tell if Laura was living beyond it’s frame. For a moment she thought the mirror swirled but couldn’t believe it was more than a trick of the non-light. Still she tried, “Laura?” Her voice croaked, “Laura, it’s me. Please.” Carmilla coughed on the words, inhaled air exhaled a hundred times over. She listened but there was no response.

Carmilla kept counting.

She counted from one year to the next, holding onto every single second. Every year on her birthday straining for any sign of life but finding only the dark. Always the dark.

Tears bloomed in her eyes, “Laura. Laura please.”

Carmilla kept counting.

She counted until the counting was all she had left, the only thing to hold onto was the fact that the numbers meant that she could still meet Laura. That she hadn’t broken her pinky promise and that somewhere a Laura Hollis was still waiting for her. Birthday after birthday, holding onto the idea that one day Laura would call out for her. That Laura would be waiting on the other side of the dark. That one day their birthday’s would match again and Laura would call out for her.

That Laura would come find her.

Laura had promised. She’d promised. She’d always promised.

Carmilla kept counting as her tears dried up and her body withered. She counted as her body started to spasm from years of no blood or food or sun. She counted because there was nothing left but the count and the girl painted on the back of her eyelids. Birthdays came and went, the dark shadows sometimes wiggling into shapes and squiggles that she could pretend were more than her own imagination. Sounds that were made of memories as her ears screamed for anything to hear when there had only been silence for so long. She counted when her throat dried up and she could barely move. Carmilla counted.

She counted every second until the stroke of midnight marking the end of Laura’s 16th birthday, the moment when Carmilla had promised that she’d be waiting in Laura bushes. She’d made it here. Made it all the way to the 21st century.

But she’d never see Laura. Carmilla’s eyes and throat burned but there were no tears to cry and nothing to swallow down.

Slowly, so slowly, against the screaming pain and fatigue in every withered muscle, Carmilla lifted her hand to the mirror. Pressed her fingers against it, begging the universe for anything. For the girl who lived only in her head.

There was only darkness and the cool press of a mirror against her skin.

Carmilla closed her eyes, as her hand tumbled to her chest, unable to stay up any longer.

Her lips moved and the crack of her voice barely echoed into the dark, “Happy birthday, Laura. I’m sorry.”

Carmilla stopped counting.

Chapter Text

There was nothing but dark and Carmilla had stopped counting. Her tears had long dried up, voice vanished into the silence of the dark as whispers that could not be ran through her head. There was no escape from the dark. Only dark and silence and a cold tomb that surrounded her. Every day no different from the night, each only another moment spent in the dark.

Another moment farther from Laura.

Laura who would never know what had happened to Carmilla and would be waiting with her big smiles and concerned eyes and boundless determination to achieve her goals. I’ll find you. Laura had always promised. Not even Laura could find her now. No-one could. There was only the dark and waiting, waiting for the day when her mother returned to crack Carmilla from her tomb and into a world where Laura was long dead.

Laura who might have been Carmilla’s soulmate after all. The girl in the mirror.

But none of that mattered. There was only the dark.

After all, what was the point of a soulmate that you’d never see?

So Carmilla lay in the dark, uncertain as to if her eyes were open or closed because there was no difference. There was only the dark and her memories. And she would not fall into her memories because those would only lead her to Laura. To all the broken pieces and promises and the way she’d looked as a five year old yelling at a Countess or a sixteen year old excited to see Carmilla once again.

She’d never see Laura grow old, see her grow up and achieve all of her dreams.

There was only the dark. And Carmilla didn’t count the moments lost to them. Only dark.

#

Until there wasn’t. A crack slashed through the darkness, the stone above her fracturing into two pieces as the smallest sliver of light burst through. The mocking mirror her mother had placed on the lid of the coffin broke completely in two, dropping to rain shards of glass down on her face.

Her eyes slammed closed, both against the glass and the light. Too much light. Too bright. Searing the inside of her pupils. Carmilla burned. She wanted to crawl away from the sliver, descend back into darkness. There could be no light. Only dark. It was a trick.

If there was light then Laura was dead. It had to be a trick.

But she couldn't’ move. Couldn’t breath. Couldn’t speak. Carmilla couldn’t slither back into darkness when she didn’t even have the strength to brush the glass from her face. She could only close her eyes and watch the light flicker behind her eyelids, feel the faintest touch of the breeze slither down to her face and tickle the edges of her skin like a caress.

It was too much. Too much touch after years alone. Too much light after a life lost to the dark.

But then. Then. Then.

The light and the breeze brought something else with them. Voices. And at the first word, Carmilla’s unbeating heart tried it’s best to start again.

“Well, what are you doing? Waiting for an invitation? You’re the one with super strength! Get down there and crack that thing open the rest of the way before the other vampires get here!”

Laura. That was Laura’s voice drifting down on the breeze. Full of anxiety and indignation and Carmilla would recognize it anywhere. Across time and mirrors and through cracks in the darkness. The voice she heard vibrating in her head every time she left the dark and gave into the memories.

Carmilla scrunched her eyes tighter. That couldn’t be Laura, couldn’t be. There was no way for her to have found Carmilla down in the dark. This was a memory. A dream. A final hope. Another time she could only hear Laura’s voice but never see her, like all the other times in the mirror.

Except. The voice that came next was as familiar and equally unexpected.

“Oh calm down, poppet. I’m not a jackhammer and there are ways to do this kind of thing properly.”Mattie said, “Mircalla is not going to be as you remember her and I want to be prepared for every eventuality.”

“I am covered in dirt,” Laura’s voice was low with rage, “from digging a hole that you refused to help with and now you’re going to make her wait even longer?”

“If we get Mircalla out of that hole and the first thing she does is accidentally drink you dry then she’d just going to kill herself all over again. Forgive me if I’d like to prevent that by taking a few extra moments when we’ve spent years to get here.” Mattie’s words were biting, her tone as acerbic as Carmilla remembered. Then, softer, “I’d rather not get her back to lose you.”

Laura and Mattie were here. Together.

Two people who never should have met, not even in her dreams.

“Oh. Well. Okay.” Laura paused. Then, her tone went up, “I knew you cared about me under all that disdain.”

“I care about my sister,” Mattie said, “Who happens to care about you. Don’t take it personally, Hollis.”

The smug was rolling off Laura and Carmilla drank it up, “Please. You were my childhood cat. I know about all those times you pretended not to like me and then secretly came into my room at night to snuggle.”

“I did no such thing.”

“You absolutely did.” Laura said, “I set up a video camera.”

“Move,” Mattie huffed, “Be a blood slurpee for all I care. Just keep watch for Mother’s goons.”

There was shuffling above her head then, slowly, the crack began to widen. Light pouring down over her skin and searing her eyes even from behind the safety of her eyelids. Carmilla would have whimpered if she’d had the voice for it, vocal cords long gone dry. Then something touched her face and Carmilla flinched. The feeling retreated then came back, slower, carefully brushing the glass from her face.

“Oh little monster,” Mattie’s words were soft, “What did she do to you?”

Carmilla barely managed to open her eyes, squinting against the light to see the hand retreat back through the wider crack as dark hands curled around both sides of the stone. They flexed and the stone broke, an entire half of the stone lid flying backward like it was nothing. Then there was a hand behind her neck and she was being slowly lifted, caught in Mattie’s arms as a large glass bottle was pressed to her lips.

“Drink.” Mattie said, arms careful but giving her no choice in the matter as she tipped the blood into Carmilla’s mouth. It ran down her throat, velvety and smooth, and before Carmilla knew what she was doing, she latched onto the bottle. Practically tearing it apart to get inside, get the blood faster, to drink every precious drop as the screaming for food that she’d spent decades ignoring came roaring forward all at once.

Her limbs were trembling, whether from exhaustion or exhilaration, she wasn’t sure.

A second bottle was pressed into her hand when the first was finished. Mattie had come prepared and Carmilla drank it down thankfully. The last thing she wanted was to go feral.

To have Laura see that side of her.

When she finished it and took the third, Carmilla slowed and took a breath in the half light of her tomb and looked at her sister. “How’d you find me?” she croaked, first words in centuries.

“Your girl in the mirror is more stubborn than even mother gave her credit for,” Mattie said, reaching out she brushed Carmilla’s hair back into place, “Stubborn enough that she insisted on being here instead of letting me extract you alone where she could remain safe and you could make yourself look like something other than fresh out of the tomb before you met your soulmate in person.”

Carmilla hacked her first laugh since the dark, “You don’t believe in soulmates.”

“I didn’t.” Mattie’s eyes were heavy, full of meaning as she leaned into the past tense, the curve of a smile on her lips as she made minuet adjustments to Carmilla’s long worn outfit and hair. Little fleeting touches that grounded her and passed care with every movement, “Hollis is more stubborn than I gave her credit for too.”

Carmilla quirked her head, working her throat for sounds she hadn’t made in years.

“How we doing down there?” Laura shouted down, her voice strained but curious.

Mattie voice was somehow loud without shouting, “Give us a moment. These things don’t come easily, you know.”

“Sure. Yupp. I get that, it’s just that I don’t think we really have any more moments to spare? Cause there’s some real angry folks on the horizon.” Laura voice came, the sound of it sinking into Carmilla’s chest more than the words. She was here. She was alive. Carmilla hadn’t missed her. Her breathing slowed as the blood started pushing through her veins, reality leaking into the darkness. She let herself spend a moment falling into her sister.

Laura was here.

“Yupp,” Laura voice made Carmilla’s chest want to beat again, “Those are definitely angry vampires.”

Then the words made it through the feelings and Carmilla jolted. Laura was in trouble.

She sprung from Mattie’s arms, moving so fast that Mattie’s fingers only caught the edges of her ancient dress and ripped it free. Carmilla didn’t care. Nothing else matter. Nothing mattered but to keep moving. To get out of the hole, to get to Laura.

She would not miss her final chance.

Vampiric speed kicking in, Carmilla blurred with speed up and out of the hole to trample the stone beneath her feet. There was blood up here. She could smell. Practically taste it. Hear the twang of a string and the cadence of what must have been Laura’s breathing.

Mattie grabbed her just as she crested the hole, “Mircalla,” she pinned Carmilla to her chest, “You’re not fit to fight yet, let your body recover.”

Carmilla roared at her, struggling against the arms around her.

“Carmilla.” The word cut through her blur. Carmilla’s head whipped around, locking onto the source of the blood. Laura was staring at her, absolutely covered in dirt and years older than Carmilla had ever seen her. A crossbow was tight in her hands, a fallen vampire with a wooden crossbow bolt sticking out of his chest nearby. Laura broke the spell of their locked gazes, ducking under another vampire who went to grab her and hitting him right in the windpipe so that he stumbled back. Then she pulled back the mechanism and shot him.

Laura ignored him, looking back at Carmilla. Her eyes more brown than the mirror could have ever portrayed. They were also full of tears, her hand trembling, “You’re real. We really found you.”

Carmilla’s head was pounding, the light and the noise and everything screaming at her senses that had known nothing but dark for years. Her throat was still on fire, begging for more blood that she could smell only a few steps away. But she couldn’t take her eyes off Laura. She pushed against Mattie, trying to break free from the iron grip on her arms.

“Let her go,” Laura said.

“Mircalla’s not necessarily herself right now,” Mattie said, “That’s a truly awful idea.”

Half of Carmilla agree. Half roared in protest.

“It’s Carmilla,” Laura argued, stepping closer.

“There’s no mirror to protect you,” Mattie reminded her.

“Let her go,” Laura said and kicked the dead vampire at her feet, “If I can handle these guys then I can handle her if I have to. But I won’t have to.”

A pause. A beat. “I’ll send flowers to your funeral.”

Mattie let her go.

Carmilla stumbled a few steps forward on momentum alone before freezing only an armslength from Laura. She just looked at her. She was older than Carmilla had ever seen her, probably much closer to 20 than the 16 year old living in Carmilla’s memory. Brown hair a little shorter, brown eyes a little heavier. She smelled like chocolate and dirt and the scent of her blood whisking over the air from the cut on her arm where one of the vampires must have nicked her. Carmilla swallowed hard and forced herself to ignore it.

“Hey,” Laura said then smiled, hesitant and shy, “I’m Laura.”

“I know.” She knew, of course she knew. Carmilla could only believe that even if she hadn’t seen Laura until she was wrinkled and grey then she’d still know her.

“Right,” Laura dropped the crossbow and twisted her hands together, hesitating. Then she reached out, hand headed towards Carmilla’s hand, “I can’t believe you’re really-”

Carmilla’s instincts screamed, overwhelming everything before she could stop them. She moved and roared, grabbing Laura into her arms and yanking her around. She pulled Laura back tight into her chest, Carmilla’s arm and iron bar over her stomach, as her mouth hovered right behind Laura’s neck.

“Carm!”

“Mircalla, no!”

The two shouts came at once, only a second before something cold and sharp slammed deep into the space between her shoulders. The space where Laura’s heart had been only moments before. Carmilla tensed and whirled, her hand clamping down onto the throat of the unfortunate vampire. With one fluid motion, she snapped his neck and tossed him away.

Then she realized Laura was still pressed against her. Awkwardly, limbs twitching from the overexertion so soon, she let go, “Sorry.”

“Don’t you dare.” Laura cut her off and pulled her in closer. Carmilla let herself sink, head falling into Laura’s hair as she felt Laura burrow into her neck. Laura’s arms were gentle but her grip was firm, fists tight on Carmilla’s clothing like she was never going to let her go. She was warm and solid in Carmilla’s arms. “I just found you; I kept my promise,” Laura whispered into her skin, “You don’t get to go anywhere.”

Carmilla closed her eyes and nodded.

#

It was Mattie who pulled the knife from her back and hustled them off to a van before any more of Mother’s vampires could track them down. She shoved another bottle of blood into Carmilla’s hand, rolled her eyes at the way Laura refused to let Carmilla go, and climbed into the driver's seat before taking off at a speed that showed complete disregard for the lives of pedestrians.

The information filtered in as Carmilla drank, revelling in the feeling of Laura’s hand on her skin; soft simple touches only trying to clean and bandage the wound in her back.

When Carmilla had been buried, Mattie had noticed. She’d spent the centuries trying to track Carmilla’s resting spot down but their mother had been notoriously tight lipped. To track Carmilla down, she needed information that only Carmilla could tell her. So she’d bided her time until she lived into the early 1990’s. Then came the most unbelievable part of the whole thing.

Mattie had turned into a housecat and pretended to be Laura’s pet for the better part of two decades, listening to all of their conversations in the mirror. All in an attempt to figure out what had happened to her little sister.

Unfortunately, she’d misjudged the years and had been unable to warn Carmilla of what was to come. What Laura had seen in the mirror the last time Carmilla had spoken to her was Mattie realizing her mistake and transforming from a cat into her human form. She’d given Laura a message to give Carmilla but time had run out too soon.

And Carmilla was buried.

However, Mattie had told her whole story to Laura and the two had begun searching, digging into every history book and likely location. It had taken them four years but they’d finally done it.

Just like Laura had promised.

Apparently, Laura and Mattie were even sharing an apartment in the city where Laura was doing her degree - journalism to help her track Carmilla down. That was the second most unbelievable part. For all they bickered, Laura and Mattie were close.

They bickered while Mattie drove them to the apartment. They fought as they took Carmilla upstairs. They argued once they were in the apartment.

The only thing they didn’t argue over was that Carmilla need to rest. She’d meant to argue against that point but had no chance against the united front.

When she woke up, Carmilla found herself on the couch with Laura curled up beside her and Mattie sitting in a chair nearby.

And when she started crying, tears falling out because this was real and not a dream, she had Laura in her arms and Mattie’s hand on her shoulder as the moon watched overhead.

#

Just because they were in the same time, didn’t mean the mirror stopped working.

The first time Carmilla went to the bathroom, the mirror in front of her swirled and she was met with an image of pacing Laura yelling at a cat. Then the cat unravelled and the image of what must have been Mattie vanished from the mirror’s view. Laura just kept yelling, hand on her hips and a book in her hand. Then it faded. Only a few moments of a memory.

Carmilla frowned, checking the date on the new phone Mattie had gotten and Laura had patiently explained. It wasn’t her birthday. The image wasn’t of Laura’s past birthday. It was just a day.

And yet, it kept happening. Not every time she confronted a mirror but often enough, an image of Laura studying or Laura with a giant map covering in notes or Laura throwing a book across the room in anger.

Eventually they figured it out.

Carmilla had missed several hundred birthdays and the mirror was trying to shove them all in.

So she saw glimpses of Laura over the 4 years she’d worked with Mattie to find Carmilla again. Bits of their search and how hard they tried and Carmilla’s heart ached with too many feelings to understand.

That seemed to be a constant state around Laura. Her heart ached when it saw Laura in the mirror and it ached when it saw her in person.

So it ached all the time.

She saw Laura every day, ate at the same dinner table, and listened to her talk about her projects. Carmilla would lounge on the couch and read books with Laura and her laptop sitting at her feet. They watched movies ‘to educate Carmilla’ and Laura sat a breath from her side. Mattie had offered but somehow Carmilla had ended up sharing Laura’s bed, sometimes ending up tight in her arms and waking to Laura pressed against her chest.

But.

They never talked about being soulmates. Never talked about what kind of soulmate they were, never discussed if Laura still had those feelings she’d had as a child that Carmilla had so cruelly been forced to shatter.

Didn’t know if Laura even wanted a vampire for a soulmate.

And Carmilla didn’t know how to ask Laura.

Even more, she didn’t know how to tell Laura that between the years and the bickering and the dark and the lazy Sunday mornings waking up in her arms she’d fallen in love with her. Given in to that piece of her heart that had always believed in loving Laura Hollis, in believing her promise.

The promise had been fulfilled.

Carmilla had fallen.

And her heart ached.

#

Carmilla had lived in the apartment for seven months when the mirror that lived in Laura’s room swirled. Laura herself was gone, leaving at an early hour to go to class, but there was a Laura in the mirror waiting for her.

“Hey,” mirror Laura waved, an almost sheepish smile on her face, “Happy Birthday Carm.” Then she snickered, “Finally beat you awake to one of these things. And although I’m still from the future, I’m only from like two months into the future. Can’t believe after hundreds of years in the future, I’m going to always be stuck two months in your future just because I have a late in the year birthday. Definitely unfair. But here we are.”

Carmilla blinked against the sleep in her eyes, shaking her head and letting her bedhead fall into place, “Laura?”

“That’s me!” Laura said, “You know, the girl in the mirror! It’s our birthday!” She held up a birthday cake that looked like an explosion, one unlit candle on the top. “Don’t blame me for this mess,” she said, “Someone tried to make me a cake and underestimated just how hard it was.” The way Laura turned her head told Carmilla there was someone Carmilla couldn’t see or hear in the background speaking. Laura rolled her eyes, swatted the person, and turned back to the mirror, “So yeah,” she added, “Happy birthday! Get over here and blow this out with me!”

Carmilla was half out of the bed when she stopped, “Wait. You can see me?”

It was Laura’s turn to look surprised, “Yes? Of course? They stopped using silver in mirrors a long time ago so it doesn’t do the whole anti-vampire thing anymore.” She tried to smother an amused smile, “Didn’t you notice that you can see your own face in mirrors again?”

“I guess it didn’t register,” Carmilla said.

When she’d come out of the coffin, everything had been new. The world completely changed over the centuries she’d been gone. She could remember seeing her face in the mirror for, what she now realized, must have been the first time in centuries. At the time, all she’d registered was how sick she looked. Pale and starved with deep circles under her eyes.

She hadn’t realized.

She stopped to consider, matching the new memories of her face to the ones of her old human face. There was only one conclusion she was willing to express, “At least I’m still hot.”

“Trust me. That I know,” the words seemed to fall out of Laura because she immediately froze and turned bright red.

Carmilla may have been fresh off a few centuries long nap and in her pajamas but she knew an opening when she saw one, “Well now cupcake, you didn’t tell me you’d been looking. I would have put in some effort.”

Laura turned even redder, “That’s not even fair-” She cut herself off, biting her lip and running a hand through her hair in a gesture that was achingly familiar, “Actually,” Laura started again, “That’s what we need to talk about.”

“My hotness?” Carmilla tried for light, inching away from the topic as she sat on the corner of the bed closest to the mirror, “That would take longer than a day.”

“The fact that you don’t know I’m looking,” Laura clarified. Her tone was gentle, the cake passed to the person she couldn’t see even if Carmilla’s heart had the smallest hope as to who it was.

Carmilla sighed, “Shouldn’t I be talking about this with present you, not future you?”

“Maybe,” Laura shrugged, “But we’ve always been better at talking with the mirror between us, I’d like to use this as a last chance to fix that.”

Carmilla raised an eyebrow, “And what’s your plan do that? Should I take notes? Do you have one of those powerpoint things for me?”

“I’m in love with you.”

Carmilla couldn’t breathe. Laura said it like it was easy, the simplest thing in the world. With a small smile and soft eyes glinting with mischief as her hand found the invisible hand behind her.

“I’m in love with you, Carm.” Laura repeated, “Future me is in love with you and the me in your time is in love with you and the little girl yelling at you in the mirror for being me was in love with you too. I know you’ve always doubted, and that’s okay, but I never stopped believing that you were my soulmate and that I would find you. Even when it hurt. I believed in us, without mirrors in the way.”

That she was saying all of this from behind a mirror made Carmilla’s heart ache all the more.

“And it’s been amazing,” Laura continued, “Getting to live with you and know you and see you all the time; only made me fall for you all the harder even if you are a terrible roommate with your clothes everywhere and your lack of cleaning ability. I loved you more.”

Carmilla couldn’t breathe as Laura’s smile turned a little sad.

“But Carm, now I know everything, now I understand but the me in your time, she doesn’t know. She knows she loves you but she’s afraid to push.” Laura swallowed hard, “She’s afraid to bring everything up again after how much it hurt when you said no the last time she tried.” Carmilla’s hands were tight on her knees, “You were right to say no then but now she’s afraid to tell you again. Afraid of the same answer. Afraid of pushing something on you that you don’t want.”

Carmilla swallowed down her wants and fears and dreams, looking at the Laura in the mirror, “Why are you telling me all of this?”

“Because this way,” Laura said, “I get to tell you first but you also get to tell me first. And because I promised Carm. I promised that I’d find you and you’re still a little bit lost. So this is the final piece of finding you, the one current me can’t give you.”

Carmilla watched as the candles on the cake were lit, Laura toasted it to the mirror and Carmilla stood. She crossed the room towards it and put a hand on the cool glass. Smiling, Laura reached out and met her. Hand to hand with nothing but the cool glass between them.

“Happy Birthday Carm,” Laura said.

They blew out the candles and the door of the apartment, Carmilla’s actual apartment, slammed open and then closed, “Carm!” Laura’s voice came and Carmilla’s head turned, “Class ended early so you need to get out of bed because I have birthday cake and I was thinking we could eat it for breakfast.”

She looked back at the mirror; Laura was smiling, “Go. I’ll see you later,” she laughed, “or now. It’s all the same really.” Laura held up the hand that wasn’t holding cake, clearly interlocked with invisible fingers, “Bring me with you next year!”

“Carm!” Came her Laura, “I know you’re awake, hurry up or I”m barging in there!”

Carmilla smiled, shook her head, and walked to the bedroom door. She stopped with her hand on the handle and looked back at the Laura in the mirror. So many things to say. She settled for the most important, “Happy Birthday Laura.”

Then she turned, opened the door, and saw her Laura with a cake in one hand, balanced on a stepstool, and digging in a cupboard for candles. Muttering to herself as she searching. Her cheeks were pink from the air outside, hair flying wildly from the wind. Her shirt was covered in animal print, her socks were an awfully bright shade of yellow, and Carmilla realized that the candles were actually shoved into the back pocket of Laura’s pants where she’d clearly forgotten them.

The smile was spreading over Carmilla’s face and she couldn’t stop it. Didn’t want to. Didn’t care. Laura was here and real and in the flesh and there was nothing between them but the glass they’d constructed.

So Carmilla, in her pajamas and in the middle of the kitchen, said, “I’m in love with you.”

Laura froze and the cake fell, in almost slow motion it dropped from her hand to plop on the counter with a satisfying smoosh.

Carmilla walked past it, moving instead to stand behind Laura where she was frozen on the stepstool. Laura turned slowly, eyes locked onto hers as she perched on the highest rung, “What did you say?”

“Laura Hollis,” Carmilla said with every ounce of formality in her voice, the Countess making knights once more, “Dreams can come through glass mirrors. They light up dark coffins when they arrive and darken light places with their absence. They make their exits and their entrances with the sun and laugh at audacity of time. For so long I dared not dream and yet, that could not stop the edges of my heart from building dreams anyway. Only time and the mirror keeping me from expressing the truth of my heart. Both have ceased to be problems and I will silence my dreams no longer. Not when, for the first time, they could come true. Not when I can perhaps believe that the mirror was right.”

Laura was silent but her eyes were filled with everything that made Carmilla’s heart swell.

“Laura,” Carmilla reached for her hand and Laura gave it, their fingers intertwining like they were always meant to fit together. “I have been in love with no-one and never shall, unless it should be with you. I love you.”

Laura half walked and half tumbled down into her arms as she stepped to the lowest rung of the ladder, a solid thump of warmth against her as the word “Carm,” half sobbed and half whispered was pressed against her lips like a breath of air. Carmilla held Laura as tight as she could, looking up. “You love me?” Laura asked.

“Neither time nor death could keep me from loving you,” Carmilla said.

“I’m sorry it took me so long to find you,” Laura said.

Carmilla rubbed the tip of her nose to Laura’s, “But you did. You did the impossible Laura Hollis. You kept your promise to a lonely Countess born hundreds of years before you. You found me anyway.”

“Well yeah, of course I did,” Laura hand was on her jaw, thumb softly tracing the line of her face, “Cause I love you too.” She smiled, “Even if you were a stubborn soulmate.”

“I’m still a stubborn soulmate.”

“Good. You owe me another cake.”

“I’ll make you one for your birthday.”

Laura kissed her or Carmilla kissed Laura. It didn’t matter. More than four hundreds years of pressing skin to glass and now all they could feel was each other.

Nothing between them.