Only darkness. The darkness of a girl who had chosen to become a monster to kill a monster.
Small bones. Delicate ones. Ribs like birdcages, knuckles like pearls, skulls no larger than her fist. They had been arranged in spirals on the dirt floor, and in the center of the spiral lay a mirror—not of glass, but of polished obsidian. The scrying mirror.
“You were always too curious,” the stepmother said, descending the stone steps with a candle in one hand and the bone brush in the other. Her shadow stretched behind her like a cloak of teeth. “I told your father to beat it out of you. But he was soft. They are all soft.” Snow White A Tale Of Terror
Lilia woke with a scream caught in her throat.
Behind her, she heard Claudia laughing. Not running. Walking. Because Claudia did not need to rush. The forest belonged to her. The roots would trip Lilia. The thorns would hold her. And when dawn came, the mirror would show exactly where the girl had hidden. Only darkness
“Now,” she said, “we bury the bones. And then we find out who else Claudia promised to the thing in the roots.”
“I am no longer a maiden,” she said. “I am a hunter.” Delicate ones
“Come, daughter,” Claudia would croon, seated before a mirror framed in blackened silver. “Brush my hair.”
“You came back,” Claudia said, delighted. “I knew you would. The weak always do.”