Eventually someone did come to Absolon's cottage to check on things and they found his dead body still sitting in his chair looking at the mirror. They also found Bertrand's body mouldering away in the barn. The villagers decided that since the cottage had been so tainted by death, the best thing to do would just be to burn it and the barn down, so that's what they did. But not before they had ransacked the place and taken whatever they liked. Miss Pidgemoker, the town drunk, saw the mirror first. When she looked into it she saw herself as she once was, young and desirable. She quickly grabbed the mirror and made her way silently out of the house before anyone else noticed. Six months later, she too was found dead. Wasted away. No one particularly cared.

Decades passed, and the mirror traveled from one owner to another doing exactly the same thing it had done to poor Absolon and Miss Pidgemoker, doing exactly what it was made to do; ruin lives. Then finally, one day, Death got fed up and she went to visit The Dreaming, the realm of her brother, Dream. She stormed right into the throne room of Dream's mighty castle where she found him sitting on his dream throne, contemplating.

"Have you seen what they're doing?" she demanded of him.

"Who?" asked Dream, looking at his sister with eyes as black as the cloak he was wearing or the hair on his head, which all stood in sharp contrast to his skin, which was as white as Death's.

"Our siblings," said Death, knowing full well he knew who she meant. "With their stupid mirror."

"Of course," said Dream.

"You have?" asked Death.

"Those who fall prey to The Mirror of Erised need to sleep as much as anyone else, do they not? When they dream, they dream only of that which they see in the mirror during their waking life," said Dream.

"This needs to be stopped," Death said, firmly. "This is unnecessarily cruel. People waste away in front of that thing."

"And when they do they become your priority, yes?" said Dream. "So what difference is it in the end?"

"Life was not meant to be wasted pining away for things you can't have," said Death.

"It is not our business to meddle in the affairs of our siblings, nor those of mortals," said Dream.

"Convenient for you to say that, isn't it?" Death said, bitterly.

Dream ignored her inference.

"If only he were here. He'd help me destroy this thing," said Death.

Dream knew she was talking about their brother, Destruction.

"Perhaps you can enlist one of our other siblings in your crusade," he said.

"I've tried," said Death. "Believe me, you were the last one I wanted to come to for help. Delirium is basically in on this with Despair and Desire, since she's reaping benefits too. If victims of the mirror don't fall into complete despair, they just go crazy instead. And you know Destiny, he says that if it is someone's fate to fall victim to the mirror than that is how it must be."

"Well, I am sorry," said Dream, although he really didn't seem so.

Death looked at her brother, searching for signs of mercy or generosity and was not surprised when she didn't find either. She scowled, turned around, and began to leave the enormous room.

"Of course. Why should you help me. You know nothing of suffering," she called back, and then she was gone.