Throughout the night which followed, she tossed sleeplessly upon her bed, thinking of the magic cloak and longing to possess it. And when the morning sun rose over the horizon, she made a solemn vow that she would secure the magic cloak within a year, even if it cost her the half of her kingdom.
Now the reason for this rash vow, showing Zixi’s intense desire to possess the cloak, was very peculiar. Although she had been an adept at witchcraft for more than six hundred years, and was able to retain her health and remain in appearance young and beautiful, there was one thing her art was unable to deceive, and that one thing was a mirror.
“QUEEN ZIXI LEFT THE HALL ATTENDED BY HER MAIDENS.”
To mortal eyes Zixi was charming and attractive; yet her reflection in a mirror showed to her an ugly old hag, bald of head, wrinkled, with toothless gums and withered, sunken cheeks.
For this reason the queen had no mirror of any sort about the palace. Even from her own dressing-room the mirror had been banished, and she depended upon her maids and hair-dressers to make her look as lovely as possible. She knew she was beautiful in appearance to others; her maids declared it continually, and in all eyes she truly read admiration.
But Zixi wanted to admire herself; and that was impossible so long as the cold mirrors showed her reflection to be the old hag others would also have seen had not her arts of witchcraft deceived them.
Everything else a woman and a queen might desire Zixi was able to obtain by her arts. Yet the one thing she could not have made her very unhappy.
As I have already said, she was not a bad queen. She used her knowledge of sorcery to please her own fancy or to benefit her kingdom, but never to injure any one else. So she may be forgiven for wanting to see a beautiful girl reflected in a mirror, instead of a haggard old woman in her six hundred and eighty-fourth year.
Zixi had given up all hope of ever accomplishing her object until she heard of the magic cloak. The powers of witches are somewhat limited; but she knew that the powers of fairies are boundless. So if the magic cloak could grant any human wish, as Quavo’s song had told her was the case, she would manage to secure it and would at once wish for a reflection in the mirror of the same features all others beheld—and then she would become happy and content.