The castle was perfect.

Perched on a windswept bluff in the Scottish Highlands, it had been converted into a luxury wedding venue years ago, it's crumbling stone walls rebuilt and restored. Tartan drapes. Antique chandeliers. Exquisite battlements looking out over manicured grounds and the wild surrounding highlands. 

Isla Blackwood stepped out of the hired car with a duffel bag, a headache, dreading the weekend to come.

The air was sharp, laced with peat smoke and damp moss. A single raven cawed from somewhere above the ramparts. The front door was twice her height, iron-handled, and very imposing.

She rolled her eyes. Of course Fiona found this place.

Inside, everything smelled like money: waxed wood, old books, too much perfume. Fiona had gushed about how “storybook” it all was.

And it was.

That was the fucking problem.

At the front desk Isla checked in under the name Fiona had submitted for her, Miss Isla Blackwood, Maid of Honour, staying in Room 6. The room was on the third floor, down a stone corridor lit with flickering sconces and uneven rugs. No lift, obviously.

The room was huge. Vaulted ceilings, antique furniture, and despite the radiator ticking loudly in the corner there was a slight chill in the air. The bed was four-poster, the wardrobe looked so large and sturdy it could withstand a siege by itself, but that main thing that drew her eye was the mirror that stood across from the bed.

It was wrong.

Too tall. Too dark. Its frame carved in what looked like twisted thistle and bramble. Isla paused when she noticed it, something prickling at the back of her neck.

She didn’t unpack.

Instead, she went straight back down to the bar.

The hotel bar was tucked into a vaulted chamber near the old kitchens. The ceiling curved low with blackened stone. Lit mostly by firelight and golden sconces, it felt oppressive to her in her current dark mood.

Isla ordered a whisky. Neat. Then another.

By the third, her fingers stopped shaking.

She sat alone at a shadowed table by the fire, watching Fiona through the haze of flame and resentment. Her sister stood at the centre of a small circle of guests, radiant, laughing, hugging someone Isla didn’t know. 

Alistair was by her side, hand resting lightly on the small of her back. He looked like he belonged in this castle tall, trim, with broad shoulders. 

He leaned down to kiss Fiona’s temple.

Isla downed the rest of her drink.

She didn’t hate them. Not really. It wasn’t their fault. She had never told Alistair how she felt. They had spent years as friends and then she made the mistake of introducing him to her sister. Now less than two years later they were getting married and she was sitting alone and brooding.

By midnight, the crowd began to thin. Fiona blew Isla a kiss goodnight across the bar. Alistair gave her a warm, genuine smile.

Isla forced one back. Held it just long enough. Then took her last whisky to go.

The hall to her room was colder now. The wind outside howled low and constant through the old stone. She kicked off her shoes as soon as she got inside, letting her bare feet hit the freezing wooden floorboards. Her head was spinning, her mouth dry.

The mirror stood in the same place. Still looming over the room.

She peeled off her dress and underwear, dropped it on the chair, and caught her reflection in the glass.

It looked tired. Messy. Too thin in the wrong places, too soft in others. Hair undone. Mascara slightly smudged. Not like Fiona, she was perfect. Everyone said so. Everyone commented on how she just lit up a bloody room when she entered. 

She ran a critical eye over herself one last time. Out of the corner of her eye, just for a moment there was a flicker of a smile in her reflection. 

Except… she wasn’t.

Isla blinked.

The smile was gone.

Her heart stuttered, just once. Must’ve imagined it. Must have drunk too much. Maybe not drunk enough. She took her drink to bed and stared up at the ceiling.

She took a long sip and muttered to the darkness, “Fuck Fiona’s fairy tale.”

The whisky burned warm in her chest. The room was too quiet now. She could hear every tick of the ancient radiator, every brush of wind against the castle stones. The heavy curtains shifted slightly, like they’d breathed.

She set her glass down on the nightstand and slid under the thick covers, still naked. Her skin was cold. Her thoughts weren’t.

She didn’t want to think about Fiona.

She didn’t want to think about Alistair’s hand on her back, or the way he looked at her like she was the only woman in the room. She didn’t want to think about how she’d caught herself staring at him in the bar, at his hands, his throat, the way his trousers fit.

She closed her eyes. One hand slid down over her stomach. The other pulled the blanket aside.

Cool air kissed her skin as her fingers found her slit, already warm, already wet.

Of course it was. It always was when she thought of him. She couldn’t help it.

She exhaled slowly, circled her clit once, twice. Let herself relax into it. She needed to come. Just to take the edge off. Just to sleep.

Movent caught her eye. The mirror.

It stood across from the bed. Her reflection lay in the same position. Naked. Legs spread. Hand between her thighs.

But it wasn’t right.

Isla froze.

Her reflection was already moving. Fingers working faster. Head tilted slightly, lips parted.

She looked down, her hand still, resting on her mound. Looked back up, her reflection was rubbing, slowly, deliberately. Smirking.

She jolted upright.

The reflection matched her perfectly. No smirk. No delay. 

She stared at herself in the mirror for some time, the reflection staring back. Nothing out of the ordinary. Was she losing it? Maybe the whisky. Maybe the stress. Probably the whisky. She took another sip.

She lay back down, heart racing. She’d finish, she told herself. Get it out of her system. Then she’d sleep. Then she’d be fine. She just needed to relax.

Her hand slid lower again, fingers parting soft labia, slick with anticipation. She started off slow at first. Her nipples tightened. Her hips lifted.

Her reflection followed. In sync again. Normal.

She watched herself, slowly circling, pressing. Her moans were soft, caught in her throat. Her thighs spread wider. She imagined Alistair’s hands gripping her knees, his mouth on her breast, that voice saying her name just once, just for her.

The mirror sped up.

Isla gasped. Her hand kept moving, but her reflection had already gone faster, deeper, head rolling back in pleasure she hadn't caught up to yet.

She blinked.

Her body ached now. She was grinding up into her hand, chasing the pleasure, trying to match the mirror. The reflection licked its lips, eyes half-lidded and hungry.

It wasn't following her anymore.

She was following it.

And she couldn’t stop.

Isla moaned, louder this time. Her fingers slipped inside, two, then three, wet and thick. Her clit throbbed under the pad of her thumb. She panted, eyes wide, fixed on the mirror.

The reflection leaned in. She followed leaning in too.

Closer.

It was whispering something. She couldn't hear it.

The dread came then seeping in like fog. She was still moving, still circling her clit, still soaking her slender fingers, but something inside her screamed to stop. Her body didn’t listen.

She moaned, softly. Reflexively.

Her reflection arched its hips a tiny fraction before she did, one hand pinching and rolling her nipple, the other grinding between its legs. Isla stared, stunned, as her own body matched it, not the other way around.

She wasn’t leading anymore. She was copying, mirroring, her reflection.

Her fingers slid inside, deeper, faster, without command. Her thighs spread. Her back arched. Her lips parted to moan because the girl in the glass moaned, and her body obeyed.

“Stop,” she whispered.

But her fingers thrust harder.

“Stop.”

Her voice broke on the word.

The reflection grinned. Eyes half-lidded, cheeks flushed, body slick with sweat. Unashamed. Perfect in her desire.

Isla was trembling. From helplessness. From pleasure. From fear. From desire.

Her hand found her clit again, rubbing furiously now. Her body jerked, her hips lifted. She moaned aloud, loud enough to echo in the old stone room.

And she felt it coming.

That familiar pressure, tight and hot and rising so fast it was almost cruel.

“No,” she gasped. “I don’t want to,”But her body didn’t care. It didn’t listen to the lie. She wanted this, she couldn’t escape it.

The mirror girl cried out, eyes rolling back, mouth open wide in silent bliss.

And Isla followed.

Her orgasm tore through her. Her spine bowing off the mattress, thighs quaking, fingers still buried and soaked. Her vision flashed white. Her breath vanished. Muscles fluttered and clenched, every nerve alight with pleasure.

And in the mirror, her reflection came too, matching her perfectly. She saw in the reflection quivering pelvic muscles as she felt them on her fingers. 

She lay there after, breath stuttering, cunt still pulsing around her fingers. The room smelled like sex. Her hand was soaked. 

She looked directly at her reflection which stared back. And then it smiled.

Her reflection stood.

It stepped back from the bed and reached for the hotel robe. She pulled it on slowly, tying it at the waist, still smirking.

Isla couldn’t move. Laying naked on the bed, fingers still buried inside herself, her limbs were jelly, her chest heaved.

The mirror girl looked at her, adjusted her hair then turned and walked out of the room.

Still panting, Isla sat up slowly, dragging the sheets with her. Her skin prickled with cold sweat, her muscles twitching with the ghost of the orgasm.

The room looked the same. Same bed. Same window. Same heavy wardrobe. But something was off. The air felt thinner, the shapes less substantial.

And the mirror was empty. She could still see the reflection of the room in it, the rumpled bed sheets where she lay but her reflection was gone.

Isla scrambled out of bed, nearly falling as her legs gave way. She staggered to the door and yanked it open.

Nothing. No hallway. No sconces. No stone floor. It wasn’t darkness, darkness is something you can squint through. This was a void. A wall of empty space, unmoving, unbroken. Like the world ended just beyond the threshold.

She slammed the door shut.

Her breath stopped. Her pulse thundered in her ears.

“Okay. Okay,” she muttered. “You’re dreaming. Or drunk. Or both.”

She turned back to the room.

She sat on the edge of the bed having a panic attack, unable to gauge how much time was passing. Maybe minutes. Maybe hours. Her skin wouldn’t stop crawling.

Then she heard footsteps from the mirror. Isla jerked up, heart hammering again.

The door in the mirrored room opened. Although she suspected that that room might be the real one right now.

She watched as her reflection walked in, glancing towards her with a smug little smile.

She wasn’t alone.

Alistair followed behind her, laughing softly at something she’d said. His smile was warm and friendly. He thought it was her.

Isla ran to the mirror.

She slapped the glass. “No, no, no, no!”

He didn’t notice, he couldn’t hear. 

Her doppelgänger turned toward Alistair, brushing her fingers along his jaw.

Isla screamed.

She watched, helpless, horrified, as the reflection leaned up to kiss him.

He melted into it.

Her hand slid under his shirt, up over his chest. He moaned.

The reflection whispered something in his ear.

He smiled again.

And started pulling off his clothes. His shirt hit the floor, his trouser pooled round his feet. He kicked his boxers off, and they landed in the bed. 

Isla couldn’t move. She couldn’t breathe.

But her thighs were wet again. She couldn’t look away.

Her forehead was pressed to the mirror, palms flat against the glass. Her skin was clammy with panic, but her reflection? Cool, collected, seductive.

Alistair stood at the foot of the bed, naked, exposing the clean lines of his chest, the hint of muscle at his stomach. He looked down at the fake her with a look Isla had pictured so often in her dreams. His hand brushed her cheek.

And then she dropped to her knees.

Right in front of him.

“No, no, don’t!” Isla slammed her fists against the glass. “That’s not me, stop it!”

She may have wanted him, but she didn’t deserve him, didn’t deserve to ruin her sister's happiness. The thought that he would give himself to her, and it wasn’t the real her hurt her more that she could cope with.

She watched herself wrapping a hand round Alistair's cock, which was sticking out proudly, the tip glistening in anticipation.

Isla gasped.

Then sobbed.

“No… please…”

Her reflection looked up and locked eyes with her. That smile again. That infuriating smirk.

Then she opened her mouth and took him in.

Alistair groaned, a sound of deep pleasure and longing.

“Fuck, Isla, I had no idea you felt like this!”

His hand tangled in her hair.

Her reflection moaned around his cock, eyes still fixed on the real Isla trapped behind the glass. Isla’s throat burned. Her hands trembled. But her legs squeezed together involuntarily.

She hated this. She hated how hot it made her.

Every slurp echoed in the mirrored chamber. Every filthy word.

“God, your tongue, fuck, you’re perfect.” Alisair moaned at the imposter.

Isla screamed.

And no one heard her.

The reflection ran her tongue from base to tip, eyes fluttering like a satisfied slut. She cupped his balls. She sucked him back in. She deep-throated him easily. No gag. No hesitation.

He moaned again. His hips began to move. Slowly. In rhythm. It was surreal to watch the man she had obsessed over for years fucking her face, thinking it was her, but it wasn’t. It was someone else, something else. 

Isla pressed her forehead harder against the glass.

“Please,” she whispered. “Please stop.” she couldn’t take the whirl of despair and desire the swirled in her body. For a moment it seemed like the reflection had heard her. She pulled back from him with a wet slop, gasping for breath, as she stood. Isla desperately hoped it was over.

The reflection took Alistair’s hand as she crawled onto the bed “I want you Al, I need you. I need that fucking cock inside me now.” Isla saw herself moan.

She should have turned her back, closed her eyes, but Isla just stood there. Frozen. Naked. Trembling. Staring into the mirror, a window into some obscene dream she couldn’t wake from. 

On the other side, her reflection lay spread on the bed, flushed and panting. Alistair was between her legs, his hard cock swinging in the space between them as he kissed her. Kissing her lips, her neck, kissing round her nipples and making the fake Isla moan under him.

Then he pushed inside her.

Isla gasped. She could feel it. There was no contact. No weight. Nothing touched her. She was standing. But she felt it.

Just a flicker. A deep, aching pressure between her thighs. The echo of fullness. A phantom intrusion that made her knees buckle.

Inside the room, Alistair groaned.

Her reflection arched into him.

And Isla felt it again. It was faint but there. That faint stretch, that glide of skin on skin, an impossible, maddening sense of being fucked without being touched.

She bit her lip hard. Hard enough to taste blood.

Alistair thrust again. Deep. Isla watched her reflection moan and rake nails down his back leaving red marks over his skin. He groaned louder. The bed creaked.

And every time he moved, Isla’s body reacted.

A twitch in her stomach. A tight pull low in her belly. Her nipples peaked. Her pulse thundered.

He whispered her name as he thrust into her reflection. “Isla…” She had pictured him moaning her name so many time and when he did it wasn’t for her.  Isla sobbed once, her breath fogging the mirror. Her thighs trembled. Her core clenched around nothing. Her cunt throbbing round the ghost of his cock.

She pressed her forehead to the glass, moaning quietly, ashamed of herself, terrified, and so horny, she couldn’t cope.

On the bed, Alistair picked up speed. His hips snapped forward. The reflection cried out, it was her voice screaming his name. Her face twisted in pleasure Isla hadn’t earned.

Isla’s legs gave out.

She slid down the mirror, breathless, dizzy, legs pressed tight together.

And still, she felt every ghost thrust.

Every grind.

She tried to look away but couldn't. The fake Isla looked over Alistair's shoulders, the moment her reflection locked eyes with her, Isla felt the floor vanish beneath her.

She was on the bed. Still in the mirror but suddenly on her back, naked, legs parted. A direct imitation of the mirror. And she could feel it, feel him.

Every thrust Alistair gave her reflection. No longer soft or vague. She felt it as if he were really on top of her. His cock plunging deep, slow, stretching her open. Her own body bucked, even though she wasn’t being touched. Her breath caught in her throat.

She moaned.

Loud. Raw. Desperate. She could hear the sound echo through the mirror.

She was looking down her body, seeing it jerk as if she was being thrust into. In the mirror, framed by her legs, her reflection writhed under Alistair, Isla’s hips mirrored it. Her thighs flexed. Her pussy clenched around nothing, but it didn’t feel like nothing.

It felt like she was being fucked.

Hard.

She could just see the top of her reflection face, her eyes poking over Alistair's rutting shoulder, staring at her. 

Alistair groaned her name again “Isla, fuck, you feel so good.”

Her hand clutched at the sheets in the mirror-world bed. She moaned, screamed, a mix of pleasure and helplessness released from her in that cry.

The rhythm built. His hips drove forward, faster. Her breasts bounced with the momentum. Her toes curled. Her back arched. Her clit throbbed with every thrust like it was being grazed by friction that wasn’t there.

But it was. Somehow.

Her reflection's face twisted in pleasure.

Isla’s own body matched it, perfectly. She couldn’t escape it. Couldn’t break the connection.

She screamed, but it came out as a sob.

This wasn’t her life.

Wasn’t her man.

Wasn’t her body anymore.

But she was being fucked anyway.

It was too much.

Her body burned with it, the rhythm, the friction, the weight of him slamming into her reflection again and again. 

Every thrust jolted through her hips. Every drag of skin over soaked flesh made her gasp, made her legs twitch, made her cunt clench like it was real.

She couldn’t stop grinding against the phantom feeling. Couldn’t stop mirroring the reflection of her.

“Isla,” he groaned in the real world. “I’m gonna, fuck, I’m so close,”

She cried out, “No, don’t!”

Her reflection’s eyes flew open. Looked directly at her again. A wild, greedy flash in those too-familiar eyes.

Then everything snapped. The mirror shattered inward without breaking.

And she was in the bed, the real bed. She didn’t know how she knew but she did. 

One big clue was Alistair. He was there, above her. His real weight, his real heat. His real cock slamming into her, wet and fast. His real breath panting into her ear as he got closer and closer.

Her scream broke from her throat.

He didn’t notice. He was too far gone. His hands gripped her thighs as he drove deep, lost in the pleasure.

“God, Isla, fuck, fuck, I’m gonna cum!”

She tried to speak, tried to tell him no, tried to push him away, she couldn’t have her sister's fiance cum in her, the night before his wedding. Hell it was past midnight, it was the day if the wedding. 

But her body betrayed her again. Her hips rose to meet his. Her cunt spasmed around him.

She came. Hard.

The orgasm ripped through her, blinding, full-body, violent. Her back arched, her legs kicked, her voice shattered on a ragged moan as he drove into her one last time, and came deep inside her. Hot. Pulsing. Filling her with seed that wasn’t hers.

They lay tangled, breathless, soaked in sweat and slick.

Alistair collapsed beside her, murmuring something soft. She couldn’t hear him.

All she could hear was her own heartbeat and the silence from the mirror. She turned her head. Her reflection was back where it belonged.

Smiling. Damn, she was smiling, the reflection was just reflecting her. She was grinning, she had finally fulfilled the dream she had harboured for years. Before the guilt at what she had done could creep back in through the post orgasmic bliss, she fell asleep.

Isla blinked awake slowly, groggy, her head pounding with the dull throb of too much whisky and too little sleep. The sheets were wrapped around her. The rest of the bed was empty.

The mirror stood silent. Still. Ordinary. She stared at it for a long moment. No smirk. No indefinable wrongness.

Just her reflection, pale and hungover, with mascara smudged under one eye.

It had all been a dream. Of course it had. A vivid, depraved, absurd dream spun from too much jealousy and whisky and the lingering guilt of wanting something, someone, who was never hers.

She breathed out slowly.

Just a dream.

The wedding was beautiful.

Fiona was radiant, glowing in her ivory gown, flowers tucked into her golden hair looking like a princess. Alistair looked dashing and bashful in his kilt, fidgeting with his cuffs before she reached him at the altar.

Their vows were simple, heartfelt. The way they looked at each other made Isla soften her jealousy. Maybe Alistair had been meant for Fiona, he had never been hers. They made a perfect couple. Isla resolved to try to move past her petty childish obsession. Move on with her own life. Find her own soul mate, just like her sister had. 

The day passed in a haze. Speeches. Dancing. Laughter. Food. Wine. Catching up with family that she hadn’t seen since the last family wedding. 

It was after midnight when she finally slipped back into Room 6.

Drunk. Exhausted. Buzzing from the festivities. Her heels dangled from one hand and holding up the hem of her dress in the other.

She kicked the door shut behind her and moved through the room dropping her heels, wiping the make up off her face. The mirror caught her in the corner of her eye, just a flash of bare shoulder, messy hair, dazed smile.

She didn’t look at it.

She just pulled back the covers, ready to collapse into sleep, and froze.

There, between the sheets, thrown there in a moment of passion she could remember watching so clearly. A pair of men’s boxers. Dark grey. Scrunched up.

Her breath caught. Her heart lurched.

Slowly, so slowly, she turned toward the mirror.

Her reflection was looking back at her.

And smirking.