It had been a day and a half since she’d come back, wrapped in a dwarf blanket, her back and ribs as violet as her eyes with bruising. The queen had tried to apologise but Snow White hadn’t even paused, just gone into her rooms and locked the doors. Lilith had questioned her maids of course, and they told her the princess had simply had a long bath and then slept. The queen ordered them to remove all the new dresses and have them burned. She’d supervised their destruction herself. She’d hoped it would go part way to an apology but it had dawned on her, as she caught the looks flashing between the kitchen staff as each of the new garments was thrust into the oven, that they thought she might just be disposing of the evidence.

Her heart thumped hard as she stood in her room of treasures. Her face was flushed. She poured wine with a shaking hand and swallowed half the glass in one go. It was too early to drink but she needed to calm herself. What had she done? The glimpse of the bruises on Snow White’s body haunted her. She’d gone too far. How could she take it back? How could she make it better? It was one thing to be feared, and quite another to have the entire castle thinking she’d tried to murder the princess. Had messages been sent to the king already? She needed to get more spies abroad. She needed eyes everywhere.

She drank more wine and tried to breathe deeply, finally calming. There were images she couldn’t shift though. The bruises. The glare of the old dwarf who’d defied her ruling to bring the princess back safely. And more than all of that, Snow White’s face as she walked past Lilith in the corridor as if she wasn’t there. Her eyes watering still. Her shoulders slumped. She’d looked defeated. All her natural fire had gone. She’d looked so desperately unhappy.

Unhappy.

Lilith stared into the glass cabinet, her reflection like a sad watery ghost trapped on the other side. She stared so long her breath misted the surface. But still, on its velvet cushion, the small silver hair comb shone in the candlelight. She’d tried to apologise but just couldn’t get the words out. She’d never get the right words out, not now. She thought of the corsets. She thought of her own unhappy marriage and her relief when the king had gone to war again. She tried to imagine Snow White, so wild and free, confined in a marriage like hers. No tight corset could prepare you for that. Her head was giddy with wine and her heart was heavy with things she didn’t understand.