She doesn't like mirrors anymore, no matter their size. She wasn't particularly fond of them before, but now.. now she expects to see a witch on the other side of it, whispering through her dreams, telling her how lovely she tasted and how lovely they tasted and how she wants to see them again very soon.
"Your youth is so appetising," she said to her once in a whisper thin hush. "I just want to lick you dry."
That kiss was the first of many that night, and she can only think of her lips as cheap whore-things now, even when she scrubs them in front of a mirror, trying to rub out the itch before she gives in and scratches them right off her face.
# # #
She hears them before she sees them, all loud shouts and happy children. It's a veritable stampede in the village, for all that she can hear, and she stays solid in her house on the outskirts, waiting. It doesn't take long, the voices get closer, the people following them as they move.
Wilhelm steps into her living space without knocking first, and she goes to meet him.
"You look well," he says to her, another year older but still rough and charming. He's gotten a new scar there, on his cheek, and she reaches up and thumbs across it, feeling the scarred skin contrast with the afternoon growth of hair.
"You are a flirt," she says in return, twists her lips into a smile, drops her hand. "You are a flirt, and a horrible man indeed."
He smiles quick and light, his own twisted lips smiling back at her in cheshire emotion. He steps close, breathes down on her face, licks the back of his teeth as he takes his turn in examining her face. "You never take me seriously. I will have you know that I am deeply wounded by this fact."
"And you?" Her head tilts, as if on it's own wheel. She never tilts her head so, but here she is, tilting it for him. "And you are the paragon of seriousness?"
"There are few things so important as life," he licks his lips at this, still smiling but more wolfish than twisted now, "and love, and I happen to take them as seriously as required."
This amuses her, so she laughs. "The love for one's sibling the most important of all, then?"
A child's sudden shout- probably Sasha, if the volume is any indicator- causes her to pull away from him, go back into the cold portion of the house and sit at the table. Wilhelm stands there, watching her, smile still affixed but no longer wolfish.
This man has so many emotions, she thinks, and all of them in a quirk of the lips and brush of his hands. Even in regards to his own family.
"Well, Will? You have nothing to say?"
"As always, Angelika. You are as always quite the shock."
She is amused once again, so she laughs.
Jakob raps on the glass, his eyes wide and happy like a bonfire flame. Sasha's arms are around his neck, her face a mirror of his expression, but more innocent, more joyful. He waves at her, mouths "Hello", and does not notice how his brother's eyes go dark at the sight of him.
She waves back, just as enthused, and pretends she doesn't notice either.
# # #
They've returned to the village to make sure there's nothing more to the tower, that there hasn't been any reconstruction or magical activity. She rolls her eyes at them, they can't just say that they wanted to see everyone, can they? No, it must be on some mission, a noble cause that they've never bothered to actually pull through with before now.
"Tell us," the children beg that night, a good sleep before the work to be done. She will take them back out to the forest, and will not enjoy it. "Tell us of all the evil you've vanquished since you left us!"
Wilhelm laughs, lets himself be pulled into the centre of the room. "Our most magnificent feat thus far was when we battled a man with a beard of blue," he begins.
She looks over at Jakob, across the room and huddled in a corner. He speaks even less than he did last they were here, his head ducked into that book, only emerging to chance quick glances at the people around him with a quirk to the lips and twinkle to the eye. Everything is more amusing now, she thinks, now that he knows there is genuine magic in the world.
It must be like a dream come true to him.
Jakob looks at his brother, speaking of cannibalism and robber bridegrooms to young children, and returns to his book before he's caught watching.
The old crone beside her cackles at something in the story, and she startles. Curiouser and curiouser, she muses, looking between the two of them. These brothers are always full of interesting bits and pieces to track back to the cavern of human souls.
# # #
It is night.
The Mirror Queen comes to her. Elegance and grace. Supplication and fervour.
She gasps with no name on her lips, and wakes with the clacking of glass heels snapping together rattling around in her head.
# # #
"Those elves aren't worth it, Jake!"
"And I say they are!"
Clearly, this once-monolithic structure isn't as captivating as it was the last they were here. She feels a little indignant on its behalf, but bites her tongue as they continue to argue while standing on either side of the next crypt over. That was the one she was in, perhaps. Or perhaps not.
"We aren't going all the way back to Frankfurt! I refuse!"
Jakob gasps in outrage, throws his hands up over his head. Starts to shake a little, as if the confrontation is taking all he has. "Elves, Will! Elves! Imagine the stories we can extract from them! Imagine the stories we can write just from one encounter! You simply cannot tell me that it wouldn't be good for the book, and it wouldn't be profitable to you if we helped these people!"
"I do not want my feet stolen, Jake," Wilhelm bites out. His fingers curl into fists, uncurl, then curl back again. "I happen to like the pair I'm already in possession of."
This is getting ridiculous, she decides. And that wasn't the crypt she was in, she was two over the other way. "Oh, just kiss him stupid and get on with life," she shouts, flops back into the crypt she's sitting on, winces as a rock juts into her lower back.
Well, this is small and nervous-making. Why she ever though it would be a good idea to lay back down into a stone box, she's no idea.
Jakob stammers "What is she-" and Wilhelm cuts him off with "She's crazy, pay her no mind." Footsteps head towards her, someone's footsteps walk farther away, and Wilhelm's crazy hair attached to his crazy head comes into view.
He looks angry.
She smiles at him as sweet as she can manage, and twirls a strand of hair around her fingers. Schoolgirl trick number one: innocent, innocent, innocent.
"I thought we had an understanding, Angelika," he says, quiet as violence in the dark.
"I thought you would have become a man by now, Wilhelm," she returns, just as serious.
"Will, I found a shard of the mirror!" Jakob calls from somewhere back there, and it pulls Will's attention away from her. He must be able to see him, because his eyes go dark again, and he waves a hand.
"Wrap it up, we'll take it with us when we leave tomorrow!"
She bites back a sigh, and closes her eyes. Ah, men. They'll never learn.
# # #
"..now see, this golden goose, it laid golden eggs. Not just as a trick, but genuine eggs, made of gold!"
The children love Wilhelm. They don't really remember when he saved them, but they remember the stories he told, his magic tricks, his charming smile. They are bewitched by him, entranced, and would follow him like the rats after that Pied Piper he mentioned once if they could.
Jakob is back in his corner, watching his brother. Joy has been replaced by vacancy in his eyes, and his quill is still on the page.
She dances around the room, one step two, with the miller, the baker, the candlestick maker. Eventually she's in front of Jakob, blocking his view of his brother, and finally, finally he looks at her.
"Angelika?"
The scratch of his beard is familiar on her cheek as she leans down and places her traitorous lips to his ear. "He watches you too, Jake. He sees you everywhere."
She turns and heads to the door, two sets of eyes on her back. Wilhelm, looking at her with a frown, not knowing what was said. Jakob, eyes wide and alarmed, knowing what she says and being terrified as a result.
The brother's eyes meet across the room, and they immediately look away, one returns to tell the stories, the other begins writing again.
At least, that is what she imagines happens as she leaves. She's too busy walking away to take a moment and look.
# # #
"If you love me, I'll make your dreams come true," the Queen whispers to her in her dreams. "Every single one of them. Even the dreams that have them."
She shivers as she wakes, and there is no thought, she pulls the wolf fur close around her and gets out of bed. Walks out of the house barefoot, creeps through the tall grass to the village. It's bitter tonight, autumn in the air, but anything is better than back in bed, with the lies (truths) that the haggard witch tells.
Music is still bellowing from the Main Hall, and she creeps towards the building, intent on having a look in. She stops a good distance away, though. The Brothers Grimm arguing off in the dark next to the stables are much more interesting.
"What do you mean, Will?" Jakob flings his hands wide, arms outstretched to encompass the whole wide world. Or just the two of them. "Your definition of this isn't correct, I don't care what you think on the matter."
"Jake- Jake, listen to me here," Wilhelm's smaller tonight than he was this morning, all desperation and hands grabbing shirtfronts of younger brothers. "I never meant for you to know, you can't know about this, I don't care what she said to you."
"You know there are truth in her words, brother," Jakob replies firmly. Their roles are switched, and yet they are very much the same. "And what right have you to keep such things from me?"
"Jake-" Wilhelm starts, is cut off this time by Jakob's arms closing around him, his head angling down towards his, their bodies touching lengthwise as they fall back against the stable. When they're like this, it's obvious that Jakob is the tall one, that he may not be stronger, but he does have the advantage of height.
She stands there in the bitter cold, mud caking on her feet and wolf fur wrapped tight around her body, and she bites her lip as they kiss in the dark. Jakob cradling his older brother's head in his hands, Wilhelm canting his head upwards and fingers twisted in the lapels of his younger brother's jacket.
After a few moments, Jakob pulls away. Releases Wilhelm's head, and takes a step back. Rubs his lips with the back of his hand, stammers out "I'm.. Will, I'm sorry," and flees.
Wilhelm remains slumped against the stable, and watches him go.
"Are you happy now, you vile woman?"
She shakes her head, even though she knows he will not see. "Never happy when it comes to you two, dear Will."
# # #
The children are subdued in the morning, sad to see their entertainment go. The brothers carry their own brand of quiet, eyes not meeting and standing apart from one another as much as possible.
Jakob gets onto his horse in one fluid motion- he's practiced! She smiles to herself- and checks the book secured to his belt. He looks at her, smiles a little sadly, and pats a pouch attached to his saddle.
"You still have dreams, Angelika?"
She nods her head. "Do birds sing with the morning dew?"
Wilhelm is listening to their conversation, but he doesn't look over. Instead he turns and jovially cries out at the gathered children, "Don't miss us! We will return some day!"
Jakob leans forward in the saddle, down over her head to be heard over the roar of noise. "Don't worry, I'll look over the shard from here to Frankfurt. If there is a way, I'll find it."
She reaches up, touches the side of his face with one hand. Rubs his jaw with her thumb, and notes how he doesn't lean into it this time. Her smile is sad this time, she can feel the emotion sink through her flesh and into her bones.
"Don't worry, Jake. I'll survive. I always do."
"Ready, brother?" Wilhelm asks, swinging onto his own horse, still not looking over at him.
Jakob pulls out of her touch, and adjusts his grip on the reigns, looks straight ahead. "Always, brother."
They ride out of the village not forty-eight hours after arriving, and she watches them leave with the boys and girls crying out in pain. "Don't leave us, Grimms! We have so much more to tell you!"
Wilhelm looks back and waves jauntily, smiles wide but cold in his eyes. The distance between him and Jakob is the same as it always has been, two feet between the horses and never a look in the eye. He looks right at her, and she knows he blames her this time.
She raises her hand in farewell, and hopes they never return here.
# # #
"Such a pitiful little girl," the Queen says to her, before lowering her lips onto hers.
Angelika wonders who really is the pitiful one before she succumbs to the kiss.
Surely it isn't the Brothers Grimm.
Surely it isn't her.