Archive of Our Own ^beta

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It is a funny thing, the identity of a man, the concept of such and the ever-shifting nature of it, the autonomy of a man to be what he thinks he ought be, in this life or the next two or three or seven. It is a funny thing, how easily broken it is, a concept such as identity, like glass, like the delicate paperweight atop his dark mahogany desk, or the little dishes of candy rested away in the drawing rooms of his more decadent friends and correspondents, or the simple, smooth reflecting surface of a mirror.

Jonah Magnus is quite well acquainted with mirrors, in all of the many myriad forms that they choose to take, and they are well acquainted with him in all of his. He has looked in many mirrors over his time, his many, many stolen lives and fragile destroyed identities, many a man carved out from his mind to make way for Jonah inside.

^

The first mirror he knew was, as natural, the glossy surface of the grand and glistening lake on the bounds of his family’s sprawling estate. He was, at first, a solitary child, preferring to take his leave from other children and dither his afternoons away standing down by the lake, staring at his reflection, his neat and proper dress, his well-mannered hair, admiring himself like Narcissus of old, watching his slightly ripple distorted form wave there on the surface and stare back at him. And no matter how the winds turned the water and ripped his reflection apart, limb by torturous limb, his eyes would stay untouched, their bright color shining through. They would never be fogged over or muddled or rippled away.

And it was there, at this lake, that he met his first love, if love was truly a thing he could feel for another young man, if love was nothing more than a petty favor or transaction, or a simple tool that could be honed and manipulated for Jonah’s decadent fancies and pleasures.

It was there, standing on the rain-slicked dock, that he first glimpsed the other boy, standing across the way from himself, and they were boys, then, however odd it is for him to think that the innocent flower of childhood once bloomed inside of his rotten, decrepit heart. The boy was hardly discernible through the distance and heavy rain-fog roiling up from the banks. He could feel it swirl around his own self, cold and clammy, but it did not touch him. He looked across the way to the boy, and he realised that it was no longer so difficult, that he could see farther than he had once thought.

He wonders how he had looked, then, to the other boy, the shining green light of his eyes luminous and cutting through the cloying fog like the sharp glow of a lighthouse, guiding faithful ships to port. He wonders if he had looked beautiful. If he had appeared holy. Ships and captains worshiped the lighthouse, it’s light and power and beauty. He knows that such a description could not have been held by one more worthy than himself—one more worthy of such a title simply did not exist, and as long as Jonah was to live, one such never would.

The boy spoke to him then, from somewhere behind him, and somehow, Jonah, even young as he was, found it unsurprising when he turned and saw the boy materializing there, the mist coalescing into a lovely sprite with hard features, a silky slick of black hair, not too unlike Jonah’s own—albeit far less intentionally, seductively ruffled as Jonah’s own—and a neat and trim suit of royal blue, a soothing, pleasing contrast against Jonah’s open green jacket and slightly unbuttoned white shirt, his cravat fluffed purposely to the side.

He smiled at the boy, a rakish half-smirk, cocking one thin, manicured eyebrow upward. The other boy hadn’t smiled, per se, but it was something similar, and something close, and it was enough for Jonah, for now.

They met at the lake many times after that, he and Mordechai, for such simple dates as watching their own reflections in the water, silently beside one another, a soft understanding between them. The lake was a good mirror for Jonah, his first, but not his last, no, not by far.

^

Jonah Magnus was never a vain man, never pretentious, and he never held himself in undeserved positions of godhood. Because Jonah Magnus never spoke with a fake confidence on subjects he truly knew nothing of—it was impossible for such things to fall from his lips. How could he speak out of unknowing, when he simply Knew all he desired? All that was relevent and tidy for his mind to catalogue and file away.

And as for the claims of godhood, the placing of himself on such high and undeserving pedestals…These claims were nothing unfounded, and the placements well earned. He was a wealthy man, a handsome man, a cunning man sharp of wit and manner, intelligent to a near fault and curious in a way that near surpassed all other traits.

Jonah simply enjoyed seeing and knowing. It was only that he wished to see beautiful things, and he knew that he numbered within their ranks.

And it was for those reasons that his manor had a hall of mirrors, a hall that Jonah could walk through and see himself from every angle, every curve and ripple and subtle shadow of himself. He could see the neat shine of his artfully glossed hair, the strong, sharp angles of his face and the crisp manner of his well-kept green and gold. And his eyes, how beautiful they were. They were what he admired the most of all, and what his consorts and lovers and all of the banquet hall foonies would point out first about him. They would all suck in such lovely little gasps when he would stride into a room and flick that emerald gaze to them.

And so Jonah spent much time in his hall of mirrors, and the hall of portraits he had commissioned over the years—although he need not commission much at all, with the eagerness of the artists to explore and chart and capture the elusive and beautiful Jonah. Even on pleasant strolls with lover s and friends, though that line blurred more each day, he would always be sure to lead them down those halls, to show them the true beauty and power of seeing themselves, cast a hundredfold, and to show them the experience of the hundreds of reflected Jonahs there, staring down at them from the walls, th e intensity of his powerful gaze magnified over and over and over.

Their reactions were splendid to him either way—be they of fear or delight. Both he found to be rather delicious and beautiful, to say the least. To say slightly more, the ecstasy of drinking in such a thing from such a target with so many eyes, so many times over was utterly blaring. He knew that if he could see more than the men there with him, spots would have swam in his vision, such was the intensity of the effect. That was when he began to dare a little more. He was beloved, of course, and any tinge of eccentricity would be explained by his old money and respectable manner.

And so he fashioned eyes for himself from gold and adorned himself in their form, pinned to his lapels, hanging from his ears, fashioned around the knot of his tie, stitched onto his cuffs. And he adorned the manner in kind, subtle designs on the wallpapers and porcelains, the spoons and forks and knives. The chandelier positioned above the dining table, and the subtle pattern woven into the edges of the table cloth and place cards. The fine grain of the wood and the handles on the doors, the slight incursion of his portraits into rooms beyond the great hall and portrait hall, watching in on his guests, who found acts of sin or dubiosity overwhelmingly difficult under the reproachful stare of whichever Jonah rested on their wall. He etched his symbols into the bedposts, wove them into sheets and covers, adorned the arch over his precious library, sent for a sight reformation to his personalized stationary.

These were mirrors too, he found. Not mirrors of his body, of course, but of his soul, consumed by the desire he had felt burning inside of him since he was young and crucifying butterflies to a board, showing their struggling beauty to his childhood friends and loves, willing to pierce through them just as easily. The desire to know, to see, to lay bare and scrutinize. To behold.

The biggest renovation of all was to his private chapel, made utterly unrecognizable from the neat bastion of sacred, devout Christianity he had once claimed. He had always entertained the idea that there was a god out there, watching its people suffer on Earth and doing nothing. He had always liked that idea. He wanted a god he could relate to, who he could stand beside. He knocked the stained glass windows of Christ down and replaced them with his own image. Green light usurping golden, a crown of sharp, glowing green eyes replacing a crown of thorns. Arms wide and high, head thrown back in exaltation.

He took his guests to the chapel, occasionally. Some of them he entertained, as lovers or favors. Some of them came back. And the others? He had no reason to say. He had once told Mordechai that they simply were drawn to despair and the brink of death at the sight of his beauty, which they knew they could never attain for themselves.

Yes, those were good mirrors. Perhaps his favorite mirrors. It is hard to say, when he has looked into as many as he has.

^

Jonah sat at his desk, clutching a golden mirror in his still-shaking hand, a wine glass trembling in the other. He was back in his office, but he could still feel the memory of the ceiling collapsing downward that glorious expanse of stained glass above shattering around him. He could not clear from his ears the sound of millions of glass shards hitting the ground and splintering apart, the screams of his confidants telling him to stop, to back out before it became too late.

They had not known—It had always been too late. It had been too late the moment that the first brick had been set, that the first stained glass had been formed and shaped and colored. It had been too late the moment that the plans had been set and laid, that Smirke had politely exchanged smiles with Jonah in the manor’s ballroom, a guest at another lavish regency party. It had always been too late.

The wine could not wash the choking, gritty taste of dust and dirt from his mouth. Even as he scraped his tongue across his teeth, he cannot rend the phantom flavor from his cells. He sighed, and returned his gaze to the mirror, taking himself in. Soft brown curls framing a soft, round face, daintier features, a dark red jacket cinching awkwardly around his waist, leggings too tight around his thighs. He feels discordant, as if slipping into this new identity is more difficult than the initial pain of it had been.

He felt as though he did not quite fit inside of this man’s form, as though the bending and shifting of his malleable identity brought him discomfort. But he was alive, and he would become used to it. At least, awash in a sea of unfamiliar they may be, his eyes were his own, the same that have stayed since his childhood. He smiled at that. Some things never change, even as faces and clothes and moods do, even as one person becomes someone else, something else. Some things stay the same, unwavering.

He dresse d himself in clothes that fit him in style, rich golds and greens, the same decorations for himself and his office, the inheritance of the manor that once was owned by Jonah. It is still owned by Jonah.

Once he had himself truly renovated, his image changed into a mirror of the Jonah that was, he looked at himself once more. He smiled, running a hand through the curls. They really were soft, springy. He found that he quite liked them for that. Yes, Jonah could be his own mirror, he found.

^

He is looking in a mirror now, the huge ornate one hung on one of his walls. His hair is blond now, already smoothed down into his signature look, his suit already crisp, the taste of wine and Knowing still heady and spinning his mind.

The lifeless husk of James Wright is still laying there, face down on the wood, useless and empty now that Jonah has finished with him, now that the body has outlived its usefulness. He finds, then, the sudden desire to kiss Wright, however odd that be, considering that Wright is dead and unneeded. But his appearance, even in death, the man is a mirror of Jonah, still holding the same appearance that graced the room’s paintings, the lush green pinstripe, the gold adornments, the slicked back professional black hair…He could not appear to be anyone but Jonah. And for that, Jonah loves him.

And it is an odd thing, he thinks, as he gently flips Wright over, to see such a perfect Jonah, another iteration of the glorious purpose that is Seeing. It is odd to see such a Jonah without his eyes, those signature eyes, so attuned to their god of Knowing. It is almost disturbing to him, this fallen Jonah. He has never had time to truly admire the m before, the shells of forms he has left behind.

He wipes the hair from Wright’s eyeless face, gently lifting the man’s head into his lap. Wright is surprisingly light, something Jonah would have never considered, judging by the weights of his previous dinner guests.

And before he can stop himself, he is leaning forward to press his mouth to Wright’s, which is slack and gives easily, his head lolling slightly back. Elias knows not why he is doing this, but he likes it, thinks that Wright deserves this appreciation after hosting Jonah’s glorious purpose. Elias wishes to allow what is left of Wright the knowledge that he is being thanked, that what he did was wonderful.

And then there come three tentative knocks on the door, and Elias rises quickly to his feet, brushing the wrinkles from his suit.

“I am on my way,” He says as he walks over, as he closes his hand around the door handle. “I am on my way.”