Chapter 6: The Reflection
The hot water scalded her skin, but Ellie didn’t turn the temperature down. She stood under the stinging spray, eyes closed, letting it beat against the shoulder blades she’d pressed into the hard wood of her kitchen table. The memory of that surface against her cheek, wet and cool, was imprinted on her mind as vividly as the searing, otherworldly climax that had followed.
She felt hollowed out. And remade.
Shutting off the water, she pushed open the shower door and reached for a towel. The steam was thick, curling in the small bathroom. She wiped a swath across the fogged mirror above the sink, her reflection emerging in pieces: a slice of flushed cheek, a damp curl of auburn hair, the swell of a breast.
Her breath caught.
Ellie leaned closer, wiping more condensation away until her full image appeared, veiled and wavering but unmistakable. The woman in the glass was familiar, yet fundamentally altered. Her lips were parted, as if still caught in a silent gasp. Her eyes were darker, the pupils wide and deep even in the bright bathroom light.
And her body…
Her hands rose, trembling slightly, to trace the changes. Her nipples, always a soft pink, were now a deep, berry-brown, swollen and sensitive even to the brush of her own fingertips. The areolas had widened, a subtle but definite darkening. She cupped her breasts, feeling their new, heavier weight in her palms. They felt full, ripe. A faint, bluish vein traced a new path beneath the skin.
She dropped her gaze. Her inner thighs were marked with faint, drying streaks, a map of her own slick desperation from the kitchen floor. Between them, her sex felt profoundly different—swollen, tender, and alive with a persistent, humming warmth that had nothing to do with the shower.
“Jesus,” she muttered to her reflection. Her voice was raspy, used. “What the hell did you do to me?”
As if in answer, a soft, resonant hum emanated from the soap dish on the sink’s edge. She’d placed The Hummingbird there after staggering from the kitchen, needing to separate herself from its immediate presence. It lay inert, or so she’d thought. Now, in the damp air, its carved surface began to glow with that soft, internal cerulean light.
Ellie froze, the towel clutched to her chest.
The light pulsed, slow and patient. The intricate glyphs along its length—once just beautiful carvings—shimmered and then began to move. They swam across the toy’s surface like minnows in a dark pond, rearranging themselves. The hum pitched higher, a questioning, beckoning tone.
“No,” she whispered, but it was a reflex, a ghost of her old resistance. The woman in the mirror didn’t look convinced. That woman’s hand, moving as if of its own volition, released its grip on the towel. It fell, a heap of terrycloth at her feet.
The humming grew insistent.
The humming grew insistent. It wasn’t a sound in her ears anymore; it was a vibration in her teeth, in the newly sensitive flesh of her breasts, in the hollow ache between her legs. The glyphs finished their reconfiguration, the blue light spelling out a simple, undeniable shape in the foggy air: a curving arrow pointing downward, right at her. Right at the slick, tender ache it had created.
“Stop it,” she breathed, but her hand was already moving.
It wasn’t a decision. It was a reflex, a magnetic pull from her core answering the call. Her fingers, still damp from the shower, closed around The Hummingbird. Its warmth was immediate, a gentle heat that seeped into her palm. It pulsed once, a slow, confident heartbeat against her skin.
A shiver, half dread and half thrilling anticipation, raced up her spine. She saw her own reflection—the wide, dark eyes, the parted lips, the body marked by its use—and something quiet in her mind simply switched off. The librarian, the sensible woman, receded. The other Ellie, the one rewritten by pleasure, stepped forward.
As if possessed, Ellie brought The Hummingbird to her swollen labia.
The moment the carved crown touched her, a bolt of pure, electric need jolted through her. She gasped, her head falling back. Then it moved. Not her hand. It leapt from her grip, a fluid, alive motion. It thrust into her, a deep, penetrating glide that stole her breath.
There was no resistance. Her body, already reshaped and yearning, opened for it instantly. It wormed inside her in one smooth, continuous motion, a perfect, filling invasion that went deeper than it had on the table. Deeper than should have been possible.
It didn’t stop. It kept going, a relentless, gentle pressure until the last sculpted curve disappeared inside her. The base, which she had held in her fist, was simply gone. Subsumed.
It was inside her. Fully engulfed.
She stood there, naked and dripping, staring at the empty space where the toy had been. Her hands flew to her sex, her fingers probing the slick, engorged folds. She felt only herself, hot and swollen. There was no protruding base, no evidence of the substantial object she had just watched vanish into her body.
“What?” The word was a punched-out whisper.
Panic, sharp and cold, sliced through the arousal. She tried to clench, to push. Nothing happened. She hooked a finger inside, stretching herself, seeking purchase. Her inner muscles felt different—sleeker, tighter—but there was nothing to grab. The Hummingbird was nestled deep within.
“No, no, no,” she chanted, her breath coming in short, frantic hitches. She braced a hand against the cool sink, the other hand still frantically searching the impossible, empty entrance. “Get out. Come out.”
The panic crested, a cold sweat breaking out on her skin despite the steam. She was stuffed, filled to what felt like her limit, yet visually there was nothing there. Her mind scrambled, images of emergency rooms, of explaining this, of surgical tools flashing behind her eyes.
Then, deep inside the heart of her, The Hummingbird began to hum.
It was a low, resonant frequency, a vibration that started in her womb and radiated outward. It wasn’t the urgent, demanding thrum from before. This was different. Soothing. It pulsed gently, a warm, internal massage that unclenched the knot of fear in her stomach. A wave of profound comfort, of rightness, washed over her.
Her probing fingers stilled. A slow, shuddering sigh escaped her lips. The pleasure was subtle, a constant, reassuring pressure like a hand resting on the small of her back. It was being held from the inside.
She looked back at her reflection. Her face was flushed, her eyes wide, but the blind panic was receding. She looked down at her body. Her labia were plump, glistening. Visibly aroused. But that was all. There was no telltale bulge in her lower abdomen, no outward sign of the nine inches of carved, magical material currently residing within her.
A crazy, impossible thought formed.
Maybe she could go about her day with it inside her.
The hum deepened slightly, a contented sound that vibrated through her bones. It seemed to agree.