Nina and Kuba find a strange green mirror in their grandmother’s cellar, and one touch sends them into a glowing forest where something is watching them.
The cellar under Grandma’s house had always felt half-forgotten, as if it belonged to another time. Nina usually hated going down there. The air was cold and dusty, and every box seemed to be hiding something spidery or broken. But on that holiday afternoon, boredom pushed her and her younger brother Kuba to explore the darkest corner together.
They found the mirror behind a stack of old books.
It was large, with a heavy gilt frame, and the glass had a deep green tint, like bottle glass held up to the light. Kuba leaned closer at once. "Look at that," he whispered.
Nina stepped beside him. The mirror wasn’t reflecting the cellar the way it should. It seemed to drink in the light, then shimmer, as if the surface had turned to water. She wiped it with her sleeve. Her own face blurred, stretched, and vanished. In its place, pale swirls drifted across the glass, and shadowy shapes moved far beyond it.
Kuba lifted one finger and touched the mirror.
His hand disappeared through the surface.
Nina gasped. "Kuba!"
Before she could drag him back, the glass pulsed under their fingertips. Green light flashed around them, cold and bright, and the cellar dropped away. A heartbeat later they were standing in a forest where the leaves glowed blue and the trees seemed to whisper to one another.
Somewhere ahead, a creature with a fox’s body and a plume of silver feathers on its head watched them with narrow yellow eyes. Then Nina felt something light but unmistakable close around her shoulders, as if invisible hands had found her in the dark. Bright dots began to drift through the air. A branch snapped nearby.
The creature in the trees did not blink.