When it finally did begin to glisten with its rainbow colours, he broke into a wide smile. He put on his watch and ever so slowly thrust his hand inside.

AOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

‘Aki-chan, where are you? It’ll be time soon and we need to go home. The howling has started.’

‘It’s OK, Ureshino. There’s nothing we can do.’

‘Why don’t we go home now, just us. Time’s running out.’

He tried to go into the mirror, but was pulled back.

This is bad, he told himself, this is really bad.

‘Subaru. Over here! We’ve got to get Kokoro in!’ He turned to face Kokoro’s mirror. ‘Kokoro’s the only one of us who didn’t come today, so she won’t be forced back and eaten. We’ve got to get Kokoro to help—’

Honestly, he’d known all along.

That the Wolf Queen’s insistence on calling them ‘Little Red Riding Hoods’ was completely fake.

There are seven of us.

According to the fairy tale, the key had to be inside the grandfather clock.

The piece of knowledge that Rion had kept to himself, thinking it was he who would be granted a wish.

KOKORO’S FOREHEAD ACHED.

She felt a massive blow to her face.

As if she were practising on a horizontal bar and accidentally smacked her face against it.

At that moment, Rion’s shape started to break up.

She heard a voice.

‘Your wish—’

Whose voice, she didn’t know. She wasn’t sure if she’d actually heard it, or imagined it. And then she heard another voice. A child’s. A girl’s.

‘I—’

‘I’m all right. So take her and—’

‘Can you see it?’

A voice had intruded while she was experiencing someone else’s memories.

Kokoro’s eyes widened in astonishment. She pulled her hand out from under the bed and turned around. She screamed.

‘WOLF QUEEN!’

The Wolf Queen had pushed open the door and was standing outside in the hallway.

Looking the same as ever.

A pinafore dress with frills, and the wolf mask.

Yet in the darkness of the castle, now engulfed by some weird force, she seemed different. Kokoro’s immediate instinct was to move away, but from the small room there was no other exit. The Wolf Queen stood, as if blocking the door.

Kokoro got to her feet and was about to push past when the Wolf Queen said, ‘Wait!’ She let out an exaggerated sigh and folded her arms.

‘This is the second time you’ve tried to run away, isn’t it. I remember you on that very first day.’

‘Well, what do you expect …’

What do you expect when there’s a wolf lurking about who is known to have gobbled up six living creatures?

Kokoro had the feeling this little Wolf Queen had created herself in the image of that wolf. And all the while, Kokoro had been trying her best to avoid any attention from her, but now …

I never expected we’d actually be having a conversation, Kokoro thought.