“I thank you, dear sister,” the Faerie Godwitch whispered into the ear of the quivering, quiescent Faerie Queen. Her eyes still swam with visions of grandeur and truth. “You do not realize it, but you have helped me find the solution! Simply by allowing yourself to be this vulnerable, to crack your controls, you have opened the door.”

Hurriedly, Choleis stood, angrily shaking her sister’s arm away. “Do not mock me, Chyseis!” she snapped. “I know I was weak and foolish. I lost control and I am suitably shamed.” Her hauteur was cracked and imperfect, but she donned it automatically, like a comfortably familiar torn cloak she was unwilling to discard.

“I do not mock, Choleis, I swear to you. Look at me, dear. Look into my eyes.” Chyseis was adamant. At last the Queen reluctantly flicked her gaze toward that of her sister. Seeing no sign of mockery there, she searched more deeply.

“Why, you are serious,” she said. She laughed bitterly. “I don’t know which of us is the more foolish!”

“I admit, I do not understand why what you did opened the closed gates of understanding for me. Somehow the powerful vibration of your raw, true emotions profoundly and deeply affected my state of being, perhaps because of our relationship as sisters. We are two sides of the same coin, you and I; opposites, yet connected in ways we have never understood and I, at least, haven’t always been comfortable with.” She smiled wryly at her sister’s expression. “While your body shook under my hands, I was transported to a new and greater level of awareness. I felt and knew things I could only guess at before. It was clear to me that your sound and movement, your vibration of energies, was causal to my experience.

“And that is not all. Sister, I have found the answer. I can heal the stone!”

Choleis’ amber-gold eyes sharpened and her nostrils flared. She tossed her head like a restless horse. “What! You are certain? There is no possibility of error?”

“I am as certain as I have ever been of anything.”

The witch turned toward the house. “I must call out the younglings. The otherside child holds the key.”

Snowpepper, it’s time, Sylvie said. She’s coming for us.

Snowpepper had been drifting, trying valiantly to stay awake. Now she snapped to alertness, every cell buzzing with energy. She felt it, too, whatever Sylvie was sensing. A thick portent, an ominous looming. The air seemed viscous; she could hardly breathe.

Just then, the door opened and Mother Maples entered. “Children, dear little ones, your presence is required. Please, come out now.”

Quickfoot and Winkling stirred sleepily. “What’s happening?” the black faerie asked, rubbing her eyes.

“I don’t know,” replied Snowpepper. “But I think it’s important. We have to go outside, Mother Maples called us.”

Snowpepper and her two sleepy friends exited, blinking, into the bright sunshine, where they found the Faerie Queen watching them with an avid intent gaze that Sylvie found disconcerting.

What’s she looking at? she fretted. She looks like she wants to eat us up or something.

Snowpepper shuddered. I don’t even want to think about it.

Mother Maples led them to the portal where the Stone was visible, its glow clouded, the crack stretching nearly all the way through now. As they watched, they saw it creep ever so slightly farther. The Queen’s sharp intake of breath seemed loud in the ringing, shocked silence.

The brown witch turned resolutely toward the little group. “Now,” she said, “I need the two of you, Quickfoot and Winkling, as witnesses. You are not directly involved. But your support is needed.”

She turned to Snowpepper. “Your presence in this world, child, I am afraid, is the cause of the damage to the Stone.” She ignored Snowpepper’s horrified gasp as she gazed at the Stone, her eyes hard. “I am afraid I have no time for mercy or compassion. Dear, you must listen carefully to what I say. Your otherside self has perpetrated a terrible crime, and it does not matter that she was only a small child when it happened. Such deeds reverberate and the consequences can be grim. She must accept responsibility for her behavior; that is her job.”

Snowpepper, very confused, thought, Sylvie, I don’t understand. What’s she talking about? For a moment her otherside self didn’t answer. Then, her grim thought came. Snowpepper, I know what this is about. And you’d better listen. It’s really important.

“Your task, little Snowpepper, is more difficult, I’m afraid.” Mother Maples continued. “You must remember what happened. You must remember who you are, and what was done to you. You must face your past, but it has been locked away so securely that you have no hope of remembering on your own.

“I apologize for what I am about to do, for it will hurt you, I’m afraid. I do this only for necessity’s sake.” Taking a deep breath and closing her eyes, she reached into Snowpepper’s subconscious in the way she had recently understood and, very carefully, removed the block she found there.

Stored memories that had been hidden behind the block flooded into the faerie’s conscious awareness with shocking suddenness.

She gasped, shook her head, and batted at the air. “No!” she moaned, “No, I can’t, no, don’t, please…” Inexorably, irresistably, memory upon memory piled into her, a tsunami, a deluge of information. For long moments Snowpepper tumbled helplessly in chaotic confusion, spun about by sheer volume of images, feelings, experiences, thoughts and remembrances from the past.

A quiver began in her belly and became a swelling wave that grew toward her heart, her throat and finally burst out her mouth. She howled in agony, writhed and twisted in the air, her feet kicking, every muscle taut and fighting.

“Oh, dear,” muttered Quickfoot to Winkling. “My poor dear Snowpepper. What has Mother Maples done?”

“Hush,” Mother Maples chided. “Look to the Stone.”

Through the portal, they saw the Stone and gaped in awe. Its glow slowly increased as its cloudy interior cleared, gradually yet undeniably, and the hair-thin crack was ever so slowly vanishing. The Stone was healing, and its effulgence grew at the same pace.

The tortured faerie whimpered. “Oh, what did you do to me, my otherside self?” An anguished cry sounded like it was ripped from Snowpepper’s throat. “Why did you do it? I didn’t do anything to you! You didn’t have to push me out!” She screamed again, the agony in her voice terrible to hear. “You didn’t have to do that! You didn’t have to! It was mean and horrible! And all this time you pretended to like me! And you didn’t want me to be you! As if you get to decide! Oh! Oh!

“I am you! You are so stupid! Stupid and mean and nasty! I didn’t deserve to be pushed out into the cold and dark—you don’t know what it was like—I didn’t know, I didn’t want to know and I wish I didn’t remember but I do! I do!

“Oh, it was horrible!” Snowpepper sobbed, “So awful, all alone except for the voices, the whispers, and the teeth… the teeth…

“I had a right to be alive! I was born too! I was you too! I used to be as much you as you are! Who said you could? Why did you?” Snowpepper was babbling and crying at the same time, still writhing in the air.

“I am so mad at you!” Snowpepper’s fair skin was flushed, her little hands formed into fists. “I am so mad! You were wrong, just wrong, and all this time I thought you were so wise, and I felt so guilty for making you ride in the back of my head, when you wouldn’t even give me that! You pushed me right out into a nightmare! I lived in nightmare for twelve years but it might as well be a thousand because it felt like a thousand!

Snow, I’m so sorry, Sylvie whispered. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed the Stone shining radiantly now without trace of crack or cloud, and the sight lifted her spirits, even in the face of her humbling. Oh Snowpepper, my dear sweet self, I did it, all of it, just like you said. Please, please forgive me.

“No! It’s too late! I will never forgive you! I hate you!!” Snowpepper mustered her breath and roared in a bellow impressive for such a small faerie, “I HATE YOU, SYLVIE!”

With a sound like a thunderclap, everything vanished.

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