She turned around.

Loki was standing behind her, wearing Axel’s hood.

Still resisting the idea that he’d come to kill her, her fangs drew back and the muscles on her face relaxed.

“Loki,” she still liked the sound of his name on her lips. Her eyes widened cheerfully. “You came back for me,” she ran across the room and threw herself in his arms. “You came back for a monster,” she muttered, rubbing her cheek against his hollow chest. Her longing for him blinded her from the obvious. Love tends to blind people and urge them to sleep in the arms of the enemy sometimes.

Although Loki hadn’t spoken a word or shown signs of passion, she pressed her head closer to him like a lovely pillow she could confess all her secrets to.

Finally, the truth hit her like a dagger. She noticed he was frigid, cold, and speechless. His heart wasn’t beating, just like the dead. This wasn’t Loki she was hugging anymore. It was the shell of what was left of him. Loki was gone; the boy behind his eyes had disappeared. This was Loki’s shadow, the Huntsman with the three-eyed unicorn.

She turned away, and then looked into his eyes one more time, wishing she would get a glimpse of the boy she loved. His eyes sent rays of horror into her soul. They were slatted and yellow like a snake, the Queen of Sorrow’s eyes.

She took two steps back, gathering all of her energy.

You know what you have to do, Shew. The voice in her head reminded her. If you’re really the Chosen One, the first thing you have to do is … kill him.

“No,” she screamed. “What happened to you, Loki?” unaware she was close to tripping over the glass coffin behind her.

Loki didn’t say a word. He just kept staring at her, his eyes turning black as night and appearing endlessly hollow with that glimmer of gold.

Snow White had confronted many demons before, but Loki’s stare bored through her and a headache started pounding in her head.

The whiny, funny, and adventurous Loki she knew was gone. This, standing in front of her, was the Huntsman whom everyone in the Kingdom of Sorrow feared.

“Talk to me, Loki,” she pleaded. Another step back, her stomach hurt as if butterflies where being slaughtered inside it. She felt weaker. “What happened to you?”

He looked so powerful, so cocky and sure of himself. His shirt, ripped open, revealed a six-pack underneath, his body had changed from a boy to a man.

Oh my God, Snow White thought when Loki’s hood fell back. She saw his hair had turned platinum blonde again, the color of the Huntsman’s before he’d been unshadowed by Charmwill. He also had his Alicorn in his hand.

Snow White tripped backwards into the glass coffin, unable to take her eyes off him. It was a hard choice. Death in front of her or the grave behind her.

Back to where you belong, Shew. Her inner voice taunted her.

“Come on, Loki,” she forced a crooked smile on her lips. “You’ve killed me before. It didn’t work,” she tried to sound playful.

Axel and Fable were nearer now, calling for him again.

“Mircalla did this to you,” Axel said from the hallway. “I don’t know how this happened but Mircalla is Carmilla Karnstein, the Queen of Sorrow.”

“She controls you through the Fleece,” Fable said, reaching the door with her brother.

Slowly, Loki turned back to them. He waved one hand in the air, sending the laughing wind whipping at them. The wind laughed hysterically as it blew them back into the hallway. Snow White heard them thud against a wall then fall into silence.

Loki met Carmilla? In the real world?

A Dreamhunter’s Fleece was like his soul. She had been next to Loki when Carmilla took it in the Dreamory.

Loki turned to face Snow White; he had a cocky smirk on one corner of his mouth. The sweat caused by Snow Whites racing heart stuck to her dress.

“Loki,” Snow tried one last time. “Don’t you remember me? I’m the one you love.”

Her words had no effect on him. He knelt down and pulled her hair violently with one hand, the way ancient people grabbed their sacrifices before they slaughtered them for the Gods.

Her veins fueled with anger. The smell of his blood was so intense and beautiful she could just suck him dry. Her fangs drew out, feebly without grit or strength to use them.

Strength is not what you are lacking, Shew. Don’t fool yourself. You just cannot bite him.

Loki gave her one last demonic look and staked her mercilessly. It was fast, the Alicorn plunging through her chest, blood spattering on both their faces.

No apology followed like in the past, nor did he show the slightest signs of guilt.

Feeling betrayed again, killed by the one she loved, Snow White gave in as the world faded away.

Before she passed out, she wondered why Carmilla made him stake her. All Carmilla needed now was to find the Lost Seven so she could consume her heart, stay beautiful without killing young girls, and never be threatened by her daughter again. Why would Carmilla make Loki stake her?

This is much bigger than you think, Shew. It is not just about you. This is about the whole Fairyworld.

As the world faded to black, Snow White felt the Baby Tears in her eyes—although they seemed a bit different. Loki must have used them so she wouldn’t be able to manipulate the dream.

Now she had to face another Dreamory. She wondered which one it was going to be. She felt Loki place two Obol coins on her eyes then whisper the Incubator into her ears. The date was 1803.

How was he going to access something she couldn’t even remember?

The incubator presented an even greater challenge, a strange word that meant nothing to her:

The Phoenix.

2

A World Between Dreams

I can control this. The word ‘Phoenix’ has no power over me in my subconscious. I have no idea why Carmilla made him use it. If only I could just control my dream and send Loki to another place. A place where…

Snow White opened her eyes to the bluest morning skies, bespattered with millions of tiny cloudy patches like snowflakes on a blue veil waving over the world. The sun appeared, slowly wiping the sky clean of the imaginary snowflakes. Weaves of the first threads of an upcoming rainbow curved all over the horizon, and the birds welcomed the morning with their songs as the sun kissed her face.

Her closed eyes twitched against the sun's warmth—she’d expected to be sent straight to hellish nightmares. Slowly, her eyelids opened up like a flower trusting the light, and her pupils made peace with the flare. She breathed easier and felt the warmth of the day gently piercing through her and reaching behind her eyes. Snow White felt as if she lay in a bed with a cushiony, slightly bumpy mattress. How was it possible she was in bed and could see the sun and the sky? How could she smell the flowers of endless fields surrounding her, and how were butterflies fluttering over her head as she lay down?

A butterfly with orange wings touched her nose briefly. Snow White propped herself up on her arms and inhaled the image through her eyes as if they were fabulous words from a fascinating poem.

What a beautiful dream. My dream. Or is it that I am dead and went to Heaven?

Finally, she discovered she was actually sleeping in a bed made of willows in the middle of the meadows away form the Schloss. Puckers of purple poppy blossoms were scattered like brocade, lightly tossed in heaps along the green distance leading to a river before a set of hills. Rills of water ran in curvy waves through the field, feeding the river in the distance, with dandelions dancing on both sides. The sun slanted through the gaps between thick trees of the forest to her left and splayed over the field, meeting with the sunrays from above. It made her feel like sitting in a bubble of pure light.