As they passed under the last of the thick branches, the clearing opened up in front of them and their cottage, bathed in golden sunshine, came into view. Dreamy smiled. Grouchy had been right. He was too caught up in his world of stories. Snow White, dressed in her riding breeches and shirt, was sitting on the heavy wooden table where they all ate outside in the summer. A bowl of peeled potatoes was to her right and a tankard sat to her left. Dwarf ale, of course. She could drink the heady mix with the best of them and sing along until dawn when the occasion arose, her beautiful face shining with earthy joy. The thought stabbed at his insides.

He wished she could shake this terrible sadness that was on her. She’d refused to send a message to her father. She’d cried. A lot. They hadn’t really known what to do about that. Dwarves didn’t cry that much and as far as they’d known neither did Snow White. They’d brought her drink and forced her to eat something and left her to work it out of her system. That had been Dreamy’s suggestion. There were lots of women in the stories he’d been reading and he’d learned that sometimes they just needed to be left alone to think. More of the stories would have turned out better if the men had seen that as clearly as Dreamy did.

At least today she was up and keeping busy. Maybe it would all work out all right. He grinned and waved and she gave them a soft smile in return before raising something to her mouth. Dreamy froze as he saw what it was. An apple; large and impossibly red and waxy. He tried to cry out – to stop her taking a bite – but the words choked in his throat.

No good can come of a crone.

Her eyes widened as she took the first crisp bite and as the dwarves dropped the deer and started to run, she was on her feet and clawing at her neck. Her legs buckled and, with the rest of the apple still gripped tightly in her hand, she fell lifeless to the forest floor.

With shattered hearts they searched the forest for the crone but there was no sign of her. She had vanished, leaving them no outlet for their anger. When the other four marched back to the cottage and discovered the awful events, the dwarves mourned, singing low songs into the moonlight and through until dawn. The deer began to rot where it had been dropped, a symbol of their stupidity that they taunted themselves with.