"-Hm?"

"...You're distracted."

"Guess I am."

"Do you think it's a thing the mirror's doing?"

"Um." She blinks. "Maybe?"

"Probably we shouldn't keep poking it, then."

"I guess..."

"...C'mon, let's keep exploring."

She takes Ellie's hand.

She allows herself to be tugged away.

She keeps an eye on Ellie as they keep wandering the castle until they finally get tired enough to sleep.

She doesn't show any continued ill effect.

Good.

Anathema spends the next day reading, mostly.

Ellie takes a break from ongoing projects to research magic mirrors.

There's not a lot of serious scholarship. They're mostly viewed as curiosities or divination tools. They're poor for viewing the future or past, generally, working mostly to see elements of the present (though that isn't an absolute). Two way communication mirrors are the most common type of 'practical' enchanted mirror. The second most common is a broad category of beautification mirrors - really sophisticated ones can keep track of your wardrobe and what beauty spells you know or potions you have, and can either make suggestions or just let you preview different things.

Magic mirrors were really popular as entertainment at parties in the nineteenth century, and a lot of the field's innovation happened then. Some of the more impressive mirrors from the nineteenth century could reportedly show paths to things, or connect viewers to an actual place they could reach through the glass. One German wizard managed to make linked mirrors you could travel between, though her method proved utterly unrealistic to copy. Most mirrors just distorted the viewer's appearance in humorous ways, though. 

Cursed magic mirrors do exist, but effective curses are actually really hard there, since most cursed items require contact to activate. Every known example of an actually cursed mirror was hand held. A witch was once sentenced to the Dementor's Kiss for trying to make a mirror that would kill her enemies even if they just looked at it, but she didn't actually succeed. 

(All mirrors do actually have mild magical properties, one book probably meant for younger children cheerfully explains. They won't show some magical creatures, but will show others that're normally invisible. And, of course, a mirror is rather useful if you're a hero fighting a Medusa or basilisk.)

Are there any... famous mirrors?

There's a couple! Most seem to have gotten famous because of who used them - scrying mirrors, chiefly, especially of the famous European mirrors. One mirror from Japan gives those who glance into it great wisdom. One in China showed a person's true self - not just stripping away disguises like Thief's Downfall does, but reflecting their very soul (its current fate is unknown). There's a famous mirror in Mesoamerica that lets you speak to the dead (this is one of the dangerous ones). There was an Ancient Greek mirror that could diagnose disease.

None of those seem quite right for the one they saw. The writing was with English letters, even if the words were nonsense so it's probably European... Oh well.

Anathema seems content to ignore it going forward.

Ellie kind of wants to figure out what that inscription meant, at least.

Maybe she'll ask Professor Reynolds about it during one of their chats.

Professor Reynolds is pretty available over winter break, fortunately.

Has she ever heard of a magic mirror with this inscription?

She hums. "I don't think so, and I don't recognize the language at all..." She writes it out, looking over it for a few minutes. "I think it might actually be modern English, just written backwards and rearranged - 'I show not your face but your heart's desire.'"

"-Oh. That makes sense."

"Oh?"

"Based on, um, what we saw."