Author notes: AU. Snow White is eighteen years old when the Old Hag comes to visit. All credit to the Brothers Grimm and the imagination of Walt Disney for these lovely characters.

That night, she dreamed of laces. Shimmering like emeralds in the winter sun, sparkling like raindrops on the ferns, the laces wound like silken snakes around the old woman's hands.

"Good things, pretty things," the woman trilled, her gnarled fingers sifting rainbows in the basket.

The men told her not to open the windows, nor the doors.

"There's evil afoot," Grumpy told her one morning, rubbing his palms over his pickaxe as if priming it for battle. She laughed, but the deep wrinkle creasing his forehead worried her. She felt the chill then, too, something acrid in the air as the dwarves stamped out the cottage door and through the woods until she could just see the tips of their caps bobbing between the trees.

She shut the door and fastened the bolt - a new one of heavy iron that Doc and Happy installed the night before - and rested for a moment against the doorframe. Eleven years in the woods, and what had she to show for it? Still the same fear that gripped her heart whenever the men started talking about omens and witchcraft. Still the same beads of sweat that shone on her cheeks whenever they cautioned her before leaving for another long day at the mines. And nothing, after eleven years, not so much as a touch of frost or the smell of burning oleander to signal harm.

Across the creek, in the glade, laces. Soft laces, velvet ropes.

"Good things, pretty things," the old woman sang.

Snow's fingers went to the bolt; she slid the iron latch open and cracked the cottage door.

One eye stared back, the hood of the eyelid pulled back to reveal one stunning green iris.

"Good things," the old woman rasped, her nervous fingers strumming the laces.

The door swung open slowly, and if Snow had opened it, she could not remember. The woman was soft, almost timid as she maneuvered around the cottage. She bent over the table and laid her laces like rays of sunshine, like lines of the delicate cobwebs that hung from the rafters.

"Pretty thing," the old woman sang, brushing Snow's curls from her face. Pretty thing. Pretty thing. A kind smile, a tousle of the child's black ringlets. Pretty green eyes, peering through long black lashes. A mother.

The old woman hummed as she moved, her fingers flying over the cords at Snow's back until the girl's dress spilt, heavy and red, onto the floor. Golden stay-laces tumbled from her hand, twining through the eyelets of the corset like sinew binding muscle to bone.

The door was locked, and if Snow had bolted it, she could not remember.

"Mark my words," Grumpy told the men one evening, when Snow was supposed to be fast asleep. She lay on her stomach at the top of the staircase, peering through the banister to watch the flickering candlelight illuminate each face around the kitchen table below. The men were clothed in stocking caps and flannels, but it was the night when no one slept.

"Eleven years she been here," he said. "The bitch will find a way into our homes. Maybe not tonight, and maybe not next year, but she'll come with all her spells and witchin' powers and she'll snuff us right out."

"Now... now look here," Doc stammered, his voice faltering a little on the last note. "We don't know what that mean old... witch... is tup who... up to. Maybe... maybe she's forgot all about Snow White!"

The men glanced around the table, each a perfect reflection of the other's worry. Snow felt her heart pound in the silence.

Grumpy guffawed. "That's poppycock," he huffed. "She dispatched half the girls brought to the castle, ain't she? And those weren't even Snow's age nor temperament. No, you watch, she's biding her time until she gets the girl alone. And then..."

Snow put a hand to her neck, feeling the darkness siphon the air from her lungs as the men snuffed out their candles and retreated to their posts. It was a fine night for witching, all fog and moonlight, a night made for skulking and bleeding and death.

Doc was right, they'd had no ill luck for years, but Grumpy's surety felt like an omen. She couldn't breathe, couldn't move...

The laces cut into cloth and flesh, pulling and constricting and strangling breath from body, life from form.

"Pretty thing," the old woman crooned. "Pretty..."

The girl fell to the floor, heavy and warm against the blood-red dress.

It was morning.

"Miss Snow!" Happy yelled. "We're about headin' off, are you gonna see us as we go?"

Snow sprinted down the stairs, a mess of blankets and morning hair.

"Did you eat? Do you have your gear? Did you wash?"

Happy blushed, readjusting his bag so he wouldn't have to look her straight in the eye.

"'Course we did," he mumbled. "You know, you don't have to look after us all the time, Miss Snow. We survived thirty years without your meddlin', didn't we?"

Snow whacked his arm.

"Don't be smart," she said. "I'll be here when you get home, and I'm making that gooseberry pie for after supper, too. See if you can't catch a rabbit or something when you finish at the mines, we haven't had a fresh catch in weeks."

Happy looked out the window; halfway along the creekbed, Sneezy and Doc were waving their arms. "Look, Miss Snow, I have to go. I'll ask Grumpy, he'll know where to find fresh game this time of year."

He leaned in, his voice a whisper above the rustling of the pines and the men's hollering. "And don't go opening any doors, miss, you hear? You know what today is."

"Oh, Happy," Snow sighed. "If it'll make you feel better, I'll stay inside all day. Promise."

He whistled all the way around the bend of the creek, where the pines cloaked the path to the mines. Snow ducked back inside the cottage, pulling the iron bolt tight against the door. It wasn't a day for dwelling, or dawdling, or devil-baiting.

The house was still, warmed by the morning sunlight and quiet enough to hear her heart pulsing, a tick faster than it had before. She closed her eyes and imagined the cold laces at her back, stretching like cords of muscle around her chest, tighter and tighter.

The vision cleared with the sun as she made her way to the kitchen, seven bowls covered in porridge and milk piled high in the sink, a fine film of dust on the windowsill overlooking the lacework of pine needles and dandelions.

"Gooseberry pie, gooseberry pie, who will buy my gooseberry pie?" Snow pumped spring water over the dishes and reached for a clean wooden bowl. It was during times like these that she wished for companions other than the men, someone to teach her about life beyond the forest or, at the very least, someone to bring gossip from the kingdom.

She crumbled dried basil and bay leaves in the bowl, crushing garlic beneath her palms as the fragrance of the herbs filled the kitchen. Cloves, anise, fennel, and peppercorns followed, then dill seeds, then sage. She sprinkled the last of the salt over the offering; Doc would have to replenish their stock at the market during the next full moon. Snow sometimes wondered how the men survived on their own before she arrived, making do with the hare and waterfowl that strayed too close to the creek and were roasted and devoured, rubbery and pink, from the spit over the fire.

"Salt and herbs, nine times nine, guard well this home of mine."

Snow poured the contents into a small copper jar and shook the talisman nine times. Her mother's green eyes burned like the sun in her memory, her fingers blistering against Snow's cheek like a ray of light refracted through white-hot glass.

The talisman glinted under the window, beaming a warning that pierced through the heavy shade of the forest covering. In the distance, soft footfalls and the scratch of basket and cloth, apple and skin.

From the light, a voice:

"All alone, my pet?"