~*~
And then one day it happened. Rosalyn would never forget that day.
“Mirror, mirror on the wall”
“Who’s the fairest of them all?”
She lazily asked, as she ran the gold and jewel encrusted brush through her long silky black hair. It had become habit now, each night she sat in front of her mirror and asked for reaffirmation of her stunning beauty. Each night the mirror obliged her.
But this time it answered:
“Oh lovely Queen”
“Your beauty is true”
“But young Snow White now surpasses you”
Rosalyn put down her brush, stunned by the admission. Her heart stopped and she suddenly felt cold; the mirror was incapable of lying. Throwing back her chair she stalked out of her room and flung open the doors to Princess Snow’s sleeping chambers. There had to be some mistake.
Laying in her huge canopied bed, the gauzy canopy curtains floating ever so slightly in the midnight breeze, soft blue blankets pulled up around her head, was Snow. Her thick shiny black hair spread across the satin pillow like wings, her dark lashes caressed the top of her high cheeks and her perfectly sculpted rosebud lips made a sharp contrast to her creamy pale complexion. She was beautiful....very, very beautiful.
Rosalyn regarded her with sharp eyes, when had this happened? Just last week she had been a child. A pretty child to be sure, but a child just the same. Certainly not the “fairest of them all”.
“No, please. Anyone but her.” The Queen whispered in horror. Pain crept up her spine and gripped her heart, she wrapped both of her arms around herself to contain her agony.
The mirror had prophesied this years ago. It was an end to her pain, finally the answer to her prayers, but instead of elation, Rosalyn felt only horror. She had never felt so powerless. There had to be another way....
She began her search in earnest.