The Sisters Grimm

by Menna Van Praag

  “Oh, please.” He stops pacing to sigh. “Don’t pretend to be so puritanical. You’re almost there. You only need to take the last teeny, tiny step. I know you got a taste for it, didn’t you, dear Ana?”

  I snap my head round to Liyana, who’s silent now, all bravado evaporated. I too am wilting in the presence of my father. I press my feet into the moss, wondering how Ana might react. She doesn’t move.

  “Oh, come now, don’t be such spoilsports. Give me a chance to be a father, after so long. I’ll be the papa bear, you be my cubs, and I’ll show you how much fun you can have in the dark!”

  He waits for one of us to speak. None of us do.

  “I must say, I’m disappointed by your manners.” He scowls at us, deepening the furrows etched into his face. “Didn’t your mothers teach you anything?”

  Where the hell is Leo?

  I feel Scarlet twitch beside me. Instinctively, I reach for her hand, then instantly let go—her skin is so hot it’s like sticking my fingers into fire. I bite my lip to keep from crying out.

  “Well then,” our father continues, “I see I’ll have to educate you myself. We’ve clearly got a lot to catch up on.”

  Liyana looks up, meeting his eye. “I’ll learn nothing from you.”

  I stare at my sister in shock. Scarlet and Bea stare at her too, incredulous.

  “On the contrary, my little Ana,” Wilhelm says, “judging by how gleefully you boiled your soldier alive, I’d say you’ve already learned quite a lot.” He grins again, his mouth like a furnace, his tongue turned to flames. “And how about you, Red? I did so enjoy watching you incinerate that hapless boy—but not as much as you enjoyed doing it, I’d wager.”

  Scarlet says nothing.

  “What?” He waits. “Wolf got your tongue?”

  I wonder if it’s possible that Leo’s deserted, abandoning me to my fate to save his own life.

  “You might be right.” My father catches my eye. “He should be here by now, shouldn’t he?”

  I try to shrug but can’t. My shoulders are frozen in place, as if I’ve finally turned into a tree, a soft little sapling. My father, the redwood, towers above me.

  “Don’t worry.” He smiles. “Leo will get what’s coming to him. Speaking of which, time is ticking on. So if you’re not going to join me, then I’m afraid we’ll have to part.”

  At this, Scarlet takes a step back. She tries to take another but, all at once, she’s stuck fast, as if she’d taken root in the soil.

  “Your mother was right about one thing, my dear.” Wilhelm’s eyes flash. “If you don’t go dark then I’m afraid I’ll have to—quel est le mot juste?—slaughter you.”

  “I . . . If—if I do . . .” My voice is a whisper on the breeze. “Will you spare Leo?”

  “Interesting proposition.” He smiles, as if cheered by a particularly delightful thought. “Would you kill one of your sisters to save him?”

  I don’t hesitate. “Of course not.”

  “That’s a shame.” He sighs. “Since you can’t get something for nothing. Not on Earth, not in Everwhere.”

  “But I . . .” I want to protest, to bargain, but I’ve lost words and reason. I feel the shock of my sisters beside me. We might have contemplated evil in the abstract, but it’s clear that none of us had truly considered what it might entail.

  “It’s of no matter anyway.” Wilhelm floats a hand above the rosebushes, brushing their petals. “I can’t spare him. He broke the rules. Without rules there’s anarchy. And we can’t have that, now, can we?”

  I close my eyes and pray.

  “Oh, that won’t do you a bit of good,” my father snaps. “Not here. Right, let’s get on with it, shall we?” He looks to Bea, who nods. “But it isn’t fair that he misses this spectacle, is it? Since he was supposed to kill you himself. Not quite the same, but it has a sense of poetic justice nonetheless, wouldn’t you agree?”

  Bea claps once and, in the echo of the sound, Leo appears: standing under an oak tree, shocked and confused. Whatever had kept him away, it wasn’t by his own hand.

  “All right.” Wilhelm plucks a rose petal. “Now that we’re all here to witness it, I’ll give you one last chance to choose. What’ll it be? Dark or light? Life or death?”

  We’re silent.

  “I’m waiting.” Slowly, he begins to rip the rose petal. “I don’t like to be kept waiting.”

  I don’t glance at my sisters. I wish we’d had the chance to form a plan. Still, I hope that our father’s bark is worse than his bite. He reminds me of my stepfather, when he’d escalate his threats—the more extreme he became, the more desperate he felt, and the more the balance of power shifted between us.

  “Come now, I haven’t got forever.” Our father sighs. “Well, I have. But I’m not wasting it waiting.” He pauses to consider. “Am I asking too much? Do I need to give you a little incentive?”

  He looks at me and I feel myself wilting under his gaze, like a flower under a hot lamp. I glance at Leo.

  “Good idea!” My father’s eyes glint gleefully. “Let me show you how to bind someone—your first attempt lacked a little finesse.”

  Instantly, the hanging branches of the tree lift and curl around Leo’s wrists and ankles, wrapping him to the trunk so fast he cannot run, so tight he cannot move. My hands are clammy, my heart racing. I was wrong. There’s no balance of power where my father is concerned. He has it all.

  “Well then, Bea,” Wilhelm says. “Would you like to do the honours?”

  For a second I’m frozen by confusion, shock. I watch my sister raise her hands.

  “Wait!” I shout. “No, wait! What are you going to do?”

  I run towards Leo, focusing on those branches, flicking my fingers, clenching my fists. But nothing happens. His bonds don’t slacken, don’t loosen even a little.

  When I halt, I’m close enough to see the tears in Leo’s eyes. Bea hesitates, then steps forward. She lifts her hands above her head again and I hear an almighty ripping, as if the ancient oak were being torn asunder. Instead, hundreds of thorns are ripped from hundreds of roses. They rise into the air, gathering like a swarm of bees. I lift my hands and they start to fall. Bea brings her hands together and they rise again. We stand apart, fighting for control of the thorns. I think I see a flash of regret in her eyes, but it’s obliterated by the intensity of her determination. Now we’re soldiers on opposing sides. But she’s stronger, more practised than I. And her focus is undivided.

  The thorns turn, aiming at Leo: a hundred arrows pointing at his heart.

  “No!” I run through the rosebushes, over the stones, the moss. I run as the thorns fly. I throw myself in front of him, a moment after every inch of Leo is pierced. Too late. He is impaled on the tree, crucified.

  As I fall to the ground, praying he might survive the attack—he’s hardly human, after all, he’s a soldier, a star—the man I love is blown apart, exploding as if a firework had detonated in the centre of his chest, scattering his dust to the four corners of the glade.

  He is gone. Quicker than a heartbeat, quicker than a breath.

  A great crack of lightning splits through the dark sky as I scream, striking the trunk of the oak tree, flaying its bark, leaving a glimmering white scar that twists from roots to crown.

  Battle

  I’m screaming as I hurtle towards my sister. I am all scream, propelled by the force of the sound. I collide with Bea so fast, so hard, that she falls, smacking the back of her skull against stone. I wince at the crack, even as I hope it kills her. I stumble, but Bea is already pulling herself up. I curl my fingers, tugging at the ivy so it twists its tendrils around her ankles and wrists, pulling her down again, fixing her to the ground.

  I catch sight of a rock and reach for it, but Bea barely flinches.

  “Who do you think I am, a piffling little soldier?” Contempt twists her face. “Your snivelling boyfriend? Your ropes can’t trap me.” She breaks free, snapping each thick bond with a single flick of h
er wrist. Awe and rage surge through me.

  “Look out!”

  The pain is a searing shock as I fall. In the distance, I hear my father’s applause. I scrape the ground, my fingers encircling something: An antler? I wrap my fist around the spear of bone piercing my scalp. Blood drips into my eyes. My sight begins to blur, as if the fog were rolling in, the darkness returning. I press my hand to my temple, the pain ebbing, warmth spreading slowly through my skin. I feel the leaves falling and settling on my body. I think of Ma, how she used to pull a blanket over me when I napped.

  The leaves. Ma. I sense something but can’t quite see it.

  Somewhere, I hear Bea shouting. One of my sisters is fighting for me, holding her back. I have a chance. I have a little time. I drift in and out of consciousness, of light and dark. The pain ebbs and flows but the warmth spreads. Gradually, just as I heal my plants, I am healing myself.

  I hear my sisters’ screams. The realization is immediate.

  These leaves: the spirit of every sister, every mother, that he and his soldiers have killed is in these leaves. They are the leaves. Their power is palpable: a bolt of lightning, a hundred thousand volts. If only I could harness it.

  I pull myself up, slipping twice, legs shaking as I stand. A stag’s antler lies at my feet, the tip sticky with my blood. I blink to see Scarlet holding Bea back with scorching flames sparking from her fingertips. Liyana stands between us.

  “Oh, that’s hardly playing fair now, is it?” our father tuts. “Ganging up on your sister like that.”

  He doesn’t do anything that I can see, but Scarlet is yanked back, thrown through the air, landing in a drift of white leaves at the base of a willow tree. A branch snaps out to whack Scarlet’s knuckles. Bea smirks as Scarlet yelps and, in that split second of distraction, I draw a hefty rock from the soil and lift it above Bea’s head. She sees the stone as it falls and shifts just in time, so it strikes only her shoulder, smacking her to the ground.

  In a moment, I’m standing above her, the rock returned to my hands, holding it over her head. Bea looks up at me. I look down at her. I will smash this rock into her skull again and again and again.

  No.

  I’m pure scream, pure hate, pure dark. I—

  No!

  My veins are ink, my fingers spider’s legs on the pale stone. Vines of ivy undulate beneath my feet. The leaves fall but do not touch me. The fog rolls in through the moonlit night, but I can see as clearly as if it’s a summer’s day.

  I grip the rock.

  No, don’t lose your light, not for me.

  Unbidden, the ivy twines around Bea’s hands and feet, tethering her to the ground. A preparation for crucifixion. She tries to twist and thrash, but she cannot move. She fixes me with a look of pure disgust.

  I’m about to let the rock fall, when I see that beneath the disgust is despair. And then I feel it, coming off my sister in waves. She speaks, but I can’t hear. I hear nothing except blood pounding in my ears, power coursing through my veins.

  But Leo’s voice rushes through me too. Don’t do it.

  I draw the stone back, ready to bring it down as hard as I can. I take a deep breath. In the distance, I hear my father’s cry.

  “Oh, yes! To the victor go the spoils!”

  I stay myself.

  “Come now,” he snaps. “What are you waiting for?”

  I look down at my false sister. She looks up at me. I hear the echo of her words: Killing a soldier gives you a taste for the dark. But killing your sister . . . Now, that’ll send you right over the edge. Neither of us shifts. Our father’s impatience crackles through the glade. Rain starts to spill from the sky.

  “What’s it to be, Goldie?” he shouts. “Light or dark? Death or life? Fragility or power? Your sister or me. It’s time to make your choice.”

  Showdown

  I hesitate. I remember that spark of regret in Bea’s eye, before the kill. I want her to suffer, I want her to die, I want to be the one who—but does she deserve it? It’s my father who demands my rage. It’s he who turned and tainted us all. I stay my hand.

  “Come on! Chop, chop!” His voice is a whip that cracks across my knuckles. “Make up your fucking mind!”

  The rock is wrenched from my grip. It lifts into the air, hovers for a second, then falls. I see shock in Bea’s eyes as it drops, fear too and relief. Then her face is gone.

  I whip round to see my father, golden eyes flashing, grinning like a naughty schoolboy caught with his hand in the biscuit tin.

  “Oops.”

  “What did you do?” I scream. “You wanted me to kill her—why did you do that?”

  He shrugs, as if he’d done nothing more than swat a fly. “She’d served her purpose. I had no more use for her.”

  I step away from Bea’s body. “Her purpose?”

  My father sighs. “It’s you I want, Goldie. It’s you I’ve wanted all along. From the beginning, from the moment you were born—the darkness in you . . . By the Devil but it’s magnificent.” He plucks the petal of a rose, rubbing it between finger and thumb. “Bea had darkness, certainly, but her motivation was off—she only wanted to please me.” He shrugs. “Daddy issues. But you . . .”

  My father looks at me as if I’m the only girl in the world—either on Earth or in Everwhere. Only Leo has ever looked at me this way. It’s intoxicating. It’s all I’ve ever wanted, to be loved like this.

  My father steps towards me. I look up at him, lifting my palm to his face. He covers my hand with his own and he holds me. My small hand rests in his and I gaze into his golden eyes, so soft, so safe.

  “Imagine what we could do, you and me.” His voice is a whisper, his smile kind, his eyes full of love. “Imagine, an eternity together . . .”

  I nod. My father leans down to kiss my cheek. I close my eyes.

  No—this is not love.

  I shake Leo off. I don’t want to hear him now. My father wraps his arms around me. I sigh into his chest. My first love. Without him, I wouldn’t even be . . .

  “Daughters like you come along once in a century,” he whispers. “I’ve been waiting all your life for you to join me. You have such power, such potential”—he holds me tighter—“I got giddy thinking of all the destruction we could inflict together, the devastation, the despair . . .” He tips his head down to kiss my lips. “So, would you like to do the honours, or shall I?”

  I pull back to look up at him. “Do what?”

  A flash of annoyance creases his face. “Why, kill your sisters, of course.”

  The shock of his words pins me. I can’t let go, can’t step away. The air is dense, pressing down, trapping my breath, fogging my thoughts.

  “I’m happy to do it.” He gives a slight shrug. “But I thought you might like them to be your first—”

  I shake my head.

  “Come now, don’t be so quick to dismiss me.” His smile spreads slowly, as if anticipating the massacre. “You might even enjoy it. And afterwards”—desire fills his golden eyes—“We can . . . celebrate.”

  “No,” I say, finding my voice. I pull away, step back. “I won’t.”

  “Oh, Goldie.” His voice is soft with disappointment, sorrow. “Don’t you want an eternity together?”

  Slowly, I shake my head.

  “You’re so strong.” He sighs. “Why do you have to be so weak?”

  I stare at him, meeting the disgust in his golden eyes.

  Leaves settle on my shoulders as I step towards my sisters. Splinters of lightning cleave the air and pierce the soil, shattering stones, scorching blankets of moss, igniting ivy, sending fiery streaks across my path as I walk.

  But, I think, what if my strength has nothing to do with the dark? I am hate and love, dark and light. I am powerful beyond measure. I can command armies. I can topple nations. Flames scorch my feet, but I feel no pain. Rain spills in great sheets now, but I’m dry. My inky veins pulse with accelerating strength. I am fiercer than every crack of thunder in the sky.


  I turn from my two sisters to fix my eyes on my father. I snap together my finger and thumb.

  The sound of the willow tree, its roots rending from the soil, its trunk crashing to the ground, is tremendous. I feel the shockwaves shudder through my body, through the earth, through my sisters. I feel their shock and his. But, even caught by surprise, he’s still too quick, sidestepping the falling tree before it’s even halfway to the ground.

  “Oh, Goldie.” He’s standing in front of me.

  The fog rolls back. The rain lifts. The leaves suspend in the air.

  “I thought you were special,” he says. “I thought you were . . . I allowed hope to cloud my . . .” He sighs. “Intuition requires impartiality. Another lesson learned. And now . . .”

  The fire ignites in his eyes. He lifts his right hand.

  I freeze.

  I see the giant bolt of lightning flare from his hand, bridging the gap between us, shooting straight for my heart. But it’s stopped by a flare of electricity firing from the opposite direction. I turn to see Scarlet focusing all her strength to hold her father back.

  It’s not enough. I look up at the leaves, falling again. Their power is intensifying, vibrating the air. If only I knew how to harness it.

  “Oh, please, not that again.” Wilhelm flicks his wrist, sending Scarlet crashing against the fallen willow tree. “I applaud your efforts, my dears. But, I’m afraid,”—he steps forward—“If you’re not going dark then you’re going to die. Sister to sister.”

  A fork of lightning strikes from the sky, cracking into the centre of Bea’s dead body, and she is extinguished. Just as Leo was.

  Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

  We watch as Bea’s soul sinks into the ground, as her spirit lifts into the air, soaring high into the black-and-silver sky.

  We aren’t strong enough. I was wrong, Leo was wrong. I feel my strength start to ebb; I tug at its threads. Am I not the fighter I believed myself to be? I ball my fingers into fists and every stone in the clearing lifts into the air, suspended for a second before a hundred rocks fly at my father. But he’s too fast, a streak through the air, catching each and every one, crumbling them all to dust. I stare at him, deflated, defeated. But he’s looking at Liyana.