Girls Made of Snow and Glass

by Melissa Bashardoust

  “When I grow up, I want to look like you,” Lynet said softly.

  Mina pretended not to hear. It was an impossible wish. But she couldn’t explain that to Lynet, of course, no more than Mina could explain her own glass heart.

  Mina’s hands paused as they brushed the skin on Lynet’s neck. Her skin was always so cold, and yet she never seemed to feel the cold at all. Perhaps her seeming immunity to the cold was one of the effects of her creation—but was that the only one? Mina had never considered that Lynet could have the same power over snow that Mina had over glass, but now she wondered how she could have missed it. There had been times during her walks with Nicholas when Lynet had played in the snow, making elaborate structures that should have been difficult, if not impossible, for such an impatient child. Mina hadn’t been able to shape glass until her father had told her about her heart; perhaps Lynet couldn’t fully transform the snow until she knew the truth of her birth. I might teach her, Mina thought. I’m the only one who could.

  But then she would have to explain to Lynet the circumstances of her birth, the debt she owed to Gregory. Mina still had nightmares sometimes of that rotting heart in its jar, her father’s voice behind her telling her that she owed him her life. She remembered the way the village girls had looked at her when they had seen her experimenting with her powers. Lynet was probably better off never knowing the truth.

  Even when the last tangle was free, neither Mina nor Lynet moved away. Running her hands through the girl’s hair was surprisingly soothing. It was thicker than her own, but softer. Could Nicholas even look at it without thinking of his wife’s hair? His wife, Mina thought, as though he only ever had one. She had the sudden urge to pull out Lynet’s hair, every last strand, and burn it all.

  Lynet let out a little yelp, and Mina saw that she had started to act on her fantasy without meaning to, a few loose strands of Lynet’s hair coming away in her hand.

  “I think it’s time you fly back to your room, Lynet. Your father might wake to find you missing, and your stepmother is tired.”

  Lynet bounced off the bed in happy oblivion, and Mina watched her go. How many years would they have together before Lynet realized that whatever love she thought she felt for Mina was nothing but a childish illusion? How soon before Lynet began to resemble the portrait of Emilia on Nicholas’s wall? One day they would both start to see each other differently, and Mina couldn’t imagine how they could become anything but enemies on that day.

  18

  LYNET

  The huntsman went straight to Mina and took her face in his hands, studying her intently. “You look sad,” he said. “Tired.”

  Lynet was rapt. She’d never seen anyone approach her stepmother with such intimacy. Her father always wore a layer of formality when he was with the queen. But despite his youthful appearance, the huntsman spoke to her and touched her like they’d known each other for a long time.

  Mina brushed his hands away, and her voice was cold as she said, “I look sad, do I, Felix? And why do you think that is?”

  The huntsman—Felix—took an uncertain step away from her. “Is the king dead?” Was there a faint note of hope in his voice?

  “Not dead,” Mina said, “but hardly alive. The surgeon did a fine job of closing him up, but it’s … it’s like he wants to die. He keeps asking for her, for his dead queen. I think he means to join her.”

  “I’m sorry, Mina—”

  She laughed, a brittle sound. “Are you? I don’t think you know what it means to be sorry.”

  “I only know what you know. What you want me to know.”

  “And do you know how to hurt? How to destroy? Have I taught you that?” She grabbed his arm and pulled up one of his sleeves, revealing the scarred skin of his forearm. “Look at all these scars. Did you receive one today, when you tried to slay my husband?” Felix flinched, pulling his arm out of her grip, but Mina didn’t relent. A terrible silence hung over them both, and Lynet kept her hand over her mouth, afraid she would reveal herself by some small sound.

  “Mina,” he said at last, “I promise you I didn’t kill him. It was a stag. We were separated. I wasn’t there to help him.”

  “You weren’t there, but you saw it happen, didn’t you? I can see it now in your eyes.” She lay her hand on his chest, and then Lynet witnessed something extraordinary: cracks appeared on the surface of the huntsman’s skin, cracks that branched all across his neck, moving up toward his face. The huntsman stood completely still, not even breathing. Was Mina doing this to him? How could that be possible?

  “What did you do, then?” Mina said, her voice dangerously quiet. “I already know the answer, but I want to hear you say it.”

  “I thought of you,” he breathed, and he buried his head in the crook of her neck and shoulder, his arms encircling her waist.

  The cracks on his skin disappeared as Mina returned his embrace, one hand digging into his back, the other tangled in his hair. Lynet felt an unexpected pang in her chest. She had always thought that she was the only one who saw Mina’s private self, the woman behind the stately queen, but now she understood that she had never seen the real Mina at all.

  “Oh, you fool,” Mina murmured against the huntsman’s neck. She pulled at his hair, bringing his face level with hers. “You sweet fool. You’ve ruined everything.”

  “I don’t understand,” he said. “He didn’t love you. He made you suffer again and again.”

  “Oh, Felix.”

  He pleaded with her like a hurt child, begging her to understand him. “I wanted to see you smile, as you once did,” he said. “I wanted you to look into my eyes and see yourself as you are, smiling and beautiful. What did I do wrong, then?”

  “When the king dies, I will no longer be queen.”

  “And what of it? Weren’t we happier before then? Before you chose him over me? It was when you became queen that you began to look so unhappy, so different from the first night I saw you.”

  He reached for her, but she flinched away from him. “That was when I had nothing to lose. Now I can feel it all slipping away—my youth, my beauty, my crown. Even if Nicholas lives, he’ll give Lynet all my power, piece by piece, until I’m left with nothing but the glass heart my father gave me.” Her fingers curled over her chest, and she grimaced. “She’ll replace me.”

  The huntsman tilted his head slightly, frowning a little in thought. “Do you want me to kill the girl?”

  The silence that followed was as thick as the darkness in the crypt. Mina’s silence was worse to Lynet than anything else she had heard. It was the silence of thought, of doubt—and no matter what Mina answered, Lynet would never be able to forget the pause that preceded it.

  “No, Felix,” Mina said at last, her voice hoarse. “You can’t—I can’t do that.” She turned away from the huntsman, looking up at the stained-glass windows like they might speak to her. Through the windows, the moon threw dappled shadows on her face, reminding Lynet of the strange cracks that had appeared on Felix’s neck. Mina was walking toward Lynet’s altar now, and Lynet shifted to hide herself better—and then she heard Mina inhale sharply.

  A moment later, Lynet learned why—the moon had changed positions since she’d first hidden here, and so she was now casting a large shadow that had moved with her.

  Mina’s voice, strong but slightly fearful, echoed through the chapel. “I know someone’s there.”

  There was no point hiding anymore. Better she should stand and reveal herself than be caught crouching in fear. Lynet stepped out from behind the altar, trying not to wobble on her cramped legs, and Mina’s face crumpled when she saw her. Lynet knew that Mina was going over everything she had said to the huntsman, everything that Lynet must have heard. And perhaps, like Lynet, she decided she would rather face this moment directly than cringe away and be dragged out into the open.

  Before Lynet’s eyes, Mina became the proud queen again, standing tall. She held up an imperious hand to Felix, gesturing for him to stay wh
ere he was as she approached Lynet with measured steps. “You’re always snooping and spying, aren’t you, Lynet?” Mina said. Her tone was sharp, but with a fearful waver underneath that she was trying to control. Mina reached out to touch Lynet’s face, and Lynet couldn’t help turning away as Mina brushed her cheek with the backs of her knuckles. “What do I do now?” Mina whispered. “What do I do with you now? You’ve heard so much. You’ve seen—”

  Mina drew back, her hand going to her throat, her eyes darting to the huntsman, and at the same time that Lynet realized what the cracks on the huntsman’s neck had reminded her of, she remembered what Mina had said about having a glass heart that her father had given her. She hadn’t understood before, but now she wondered … if one girl could be made of snow and never feel cold, then perhaps …

  “You’re like me, aren’t you?” Lynet said. “You’re made of glass.”

  Mina shuddered and bowed her head, her hair hiding her face. When she looked up again, she truly did seem like she could be made of glass—cold and sharp, her eyes as unreadable as the huntsman’s. “My heart is made of glass, Lynet, but I’m not like you.” She grabbed Lynet’s wrist. “Did you think you were my father’s only experiment? His only success?” Mina held Lynet’s hand against her chest, over her heart. Lynet waited, too confused and too scared at first to understand what she was feeling—what she wasn’t feeling. There was no heartbeat, no sign of life pounding underneath Mina’s flesh. Lynet gasped, and Mina laughed at her.

  “There, do you see? When I was a child, my heart stopped, so my father cut me open and gave me a heart of glass. Do you remember what I told you about your birth, Lynet? About my father’s blood? Blood is what makes you real, but there is no blood in my heart. It serves its function and keeps me alive, but it cannot love, and no one can ever love a heartless thing like me.”

  Lynet wrenched her hand away, her own heartbeat wild and frantic. There was so much defiance in Mina’s voice that Lynet almost missed the fear hiding beneath. It was there, though, waiting for Lynet’s next move, her next word. With each second that passed, Lynet knew she had to do or say something if she wanted to prove that she wouldn’t look at Mina differently now, that she wasn’t afraid of her, that she still loved her stepmother. But there was nothing to say, no words capable of breathing life into Mina’s heart, and the truth was that Lynet was afraid. Mina was a mystery to her now; how could she claim to know her stepmother’s heart better than Mina did?

  And so she could only watch as the hope on her stepmother’s face slowly died away with each moment of silence.

  “Say something,” Mina said, so low that Lynet thought she’d misheard at first. “I can’t stand to see you look at me like that.”

  Mina backed away, her arms wrapped around herself. But still Lynet said nothing, like this was a test or a trap, and she was sure to fail—or perhaps she had already failed.

  “Say something!” Mina roared, and in that same moment, the stained-glass windows all shattered at once, colorful shards raining down on them both.

  Lynet quickly covered her face, but she still felt one of the shards bite at her cheek, and without thinking, she ran for the chapel door to escape the blizzard of glass. As she crossed the threshold, she heard Mina shout, “Go after her!” and then she felt the pounding of the huntsman’s boots under her feet as he followed in pursuit.

  Lynet’s heart beat furiously as she ran through the halls. She emerged breathless in the western courtyard, pausing only a moment to gather her bearings. Lynet rarely came here, knowing that it was one of her mother’s favorite places, but she knew that if she climbed over the high wall opposite, she would be outside the castle walls. When she had imagined running away, she hadn’t pictured herself like this, furtive and desperate, empty-handed and afraid. But even in the silence of the night, she could still hear the sound of glass shattering in her ears, and she was more eager than before to run and leave behind the wreckage of her old life.

  She had no time to waste, and so in that brief space between one breath and the next, she made her decision and ran for the wall, pulling herself up as quickly as she could. But she wasn’t familiar with this particular wall, and so she placed her foot on a stone that happened to be loose. The stone slipped under her, and Lynet fell backward, waiting for the impact of the snow against her back.

  But she never hit the snow—someone caught her.

  “I’ve got you,” said the huntsman, his arms wrapped around her waist.

  Lynet kicked at him, and he let out a surprised grunt, releasing her. Lynet didn’t look back as she started to scramble for the wall again, but the huntsman was used to chasing far quicker beasts, and so he caught up to her quickly, throwing her to the ground. Felix held her arms down, one knee on either side of her waist.

  When Lynet looked up at her attacker, she noticed how clearly his eyes reflected her own face, her own terror. But Lynet refused to let him see her that way. She had to be brave, even if it was only for show.

  “Did she tell you to kill me?” she spat at him. “Is that why she sent you after me?” Even as she spoke the words, she was surprised to discover that she wanted to know the answer. Mina had told him not to kill her before, but she might have changed her mind after finding out that Lynet had heard all of her secrets. Had she sent her servant to do what she couldn’t do herself?

  “It’ll be easier for her if you’re dead,” the huntsman said.

  Lynet wished she could stop trembling. She wished she could look him in the eye and tell him to do it quickly. “So it’s true, then,” she said, but her voice sounded so small, so unsubstantial, like the feel of an eyelash against her cheek. “You’re going to kill me.”

  The huntsman’s jaw tensed. “I’m sorry, child,” he said.

  Lynet didn’t understand why he sounded so frightened, or why his voice started to break as he called her “child.” When Lynet grimaced from the pain of his tight grip on her arms, he did the same, like a perfect reflection. It reminded her of the night she found him in the garden, the way he had seemed to follow her lead, even imitating her posture. He’s some kind of mirror, Lynet thought, recalling the way Mina had almost made him shatter apart like the glass windows. He feels whatever I feel. If she stared at him with fierce resolve, he would only do the same. She would win nothing from him by pretending to be brave.

  She started to sob, taking loud, shuddering breaths that threatened to choke her. “Please,” she gasped. “Please don’t kill me.” Showing her fear was easier than she wanted to admit. She didn’t even have to try; it was more like she had to stop trying.

  Her sudden outburst caught him off guard, his grip on her arms easing slightly.

  “Please don’t hurt me, I don’t want to die, I’m so scared.” The words gushed out of her, and she wasn’t sure she could stop if she tried. “Let me go—”

  He released her, his face contorting, and Lynet sat up slowly. But then he shook his head and shot one arm out, his hand circling her throat. “And what if I do?” he said. Lynet didn’t move. She was certain, somehow, that as long as he could see the fear on her face, he wouldn’t hurt her.

  “This isn’t what she made me for, not at first,” he said, his voice low. “She made me to love her, to show her what love is, not to hunt or to kill.” His hand tightened. “If I kill you for her, then what will she see in me? And what will I see in her?” He released her throat, and Lynet fought to keep still.

  Felix stood, and Lynet froze like a frightened rabbit, waiting to spring. “Go now,” he said. He took a small purse from his belt and tossed it on the snow beside her. “Leave her in peace, and don’t let me find you again. If you need help, ask the snow.”

  Ask the snow? Lynet didn’t understand, but she didn’t stop to ask him. She grabbed the purse, staggered to her feet, and ran to the wall, scaling it easily this time, and dropped down on the other side—her first steps outside of Whitespring.

  Part of her was afraid that Nadia would be right, that
as soon as her feet touched the ground, the earth would open up beneath her and swallow her whole. She would have to cross a dense wood in the dead of night before she’d come to the nearest town—what made her think she could survive at all?

  But she took one step toward the wood, and then another, and nothing happened, except that she was now two steps closer to a new life. She had nearly died tonight within the walls of Whitespring, after all. Death was everywhere in that castle, in each day that was just like the last, but life—life was what happened next, life was the rush of air in her lungs when she made a jump she wasn’t sure she could make.

  She knew she shouldn’t linger here; it would be foolish to gamble her life on the huntsman’s whim. And Mina … she didn’t want to think about Mina, yet. She didn’t understand a world where she was in danger from Mina—so she would simply leave that world behind.

  Lynet looked up at Whitespring one last time, saying good-bye to everything she’d ever known.

  And then there was nothing left to do but run.

  19

  MINA

  Mina stood in the chapel, surrounded by pieces of shattered glass. She hadn’t meant to lash out like that, but the fear and rage building up in her had demanded some kind of release, something to drown out the silence of her heart. Since Lynet knew the truth already, she had no reason to hold herself back anymore.

  The chapel was dark and silent, but Mina could still hear the echoes from when the glass had shattered, could still see the horrified look on Lynet’s face, the look she might give to a frightening stranger. And perhaps she was a stranger—Mina had kept so much hidden from her over the years, whether for Lynet’s safety or for her own.

  But she had known this would happen one day. The moment Mina had realized how much Lynet had grown—the same night when Mina had first seen a strand of gray in her own hair—she knew that this disillusionment had been inevitable. She knew that Lynet’s childish adoration couldn’t last forever, and that when she became old enough to see Mina—to see right to the heart of her—she would only ever be able to hate her. She should have been better prepared for this night.