Lightning and glass shards and swords were battling behind them both, but Linh could only glare down at the Lady curled up in front of her. Linh’s glares were often childish looking, two dots for eyes with some slanted slashes for anger. She knew she wasn’t intimidating. But the woman in front of her trembled regardless, as if Linh were a paper demon here to take her soul.

Linh didn’t know the details of Lady Ella’s story. Maybe she was being unfair. But she knew that if she did not act, the glass woman would be destroyed, and somehow that felt unthinkable.

[I have an older brother. My twin. He never liked me much. The reason I have this body… is because of him.]

Lady Ella’s jaw dropped. Linh felt the burning need to hide away, to curl up into a crumpled ball and throw herself into a river but she kept going.

[I know my situation is not the same as yours. I have no idea what your stepfamily put you through, but regardless, I can empathize. I tried to forget my twin Quang. I tried to pretend he didn’t exist, that this never happened to me. But I grew unhappy. I almost…!]

The ink on Linh’s palms stuttered into spilt blobs, leaking down her fingers like black tears. No, she didn’t want to think about that.

[I was a shell of my former self,] she admitted instead, not thinking about the day her sadness became too much.

Wet streams fell down the Lady’s face. Her fists shook. “I don’t want to forgive them.”

[You don’t need to forgive them. Just accept the memories. What you do with those memories are your choice. Don’t let them destroy you.]

Linh remembered countless days when she’d question why her own twin would do this to her, why he hated her enough to try and destroy her. They’d never been too close but Linh always tried to avoid making him angry. Was she not kind enough? Was she too selfish in her own ambitions? Such thoughts were enough to drive her back to her breaking point.

She tried to shut them away.

[You can be angry,] she told herself, told Lady Ella. [But don’t destroy yourself.]

Maybe it was Linh. Maybe it was the lightning, blades, and glass clashing all around them. But Lady Ella stood up, still trembling.

Her steps wobbled as she walked past Linh. Shards of glass and fire flung cuts all over her skin. But Lady Ella moved forward until she faced the glass woman, who looked like a volcano trying to contain an eruption.

She raised up her hands, uncaring as burns festered through her gloves to her palms, uncaring as she put her hands on the glass woman’s cheeks.

Gretta and Seymour put down their spells and weapons, stupefied.

“I’m sorry I hid you away,” Lady Ella whispered. “Please. Come back to me.”

The glass woman was quiet. The cracks in her image had finally stopped spreading. She observed Lady Ella coolly, her stare strangely warped and bitter.

“Yyooouuuu useddd meee and buriedddd meeee…”

“Yes, yes, I did and I’m sorry. I just didn’t want to be seen as a witch. I didn’t want it to be true, what they said about me… You understand, don’t you?” Lady Ella said desperately. The words you’re me  hovering between them.

The glass woman’s lips shattered open into a terrible smile of jagged shards and mirrors.

“Yessss I understanddd,” she laughed. “Will you accepttt meee back?”

“Wait,” Gretta shouted, “Don’t do it!”

But Lady Ella nodded.

The glass woman laughed, all her pain and hysteria wafting into the room.

Then she broke apart, every shard and jagged edge rushing up and buried themselves into Lady Ella’s body as if to devour her.

Squelches and screams stabbed the air. Linh saw red running down the floors, flickering, then vanishing. Lady Ella was clawing at her face. One moment the Lady looked like she’d been impaled by countless shards, and the next she looked completely fine yet mad.

“Hold her down!” Gretta ordered Seymour.

Seymour was frozen, as if seeing someone else in the Lady’s place.

“Did you hear me, bodyguard?! I said, hold her down!”

Seymour rushed forward and pinned the Lady’s arms down the floors. Linh nearly joined in too, but the lady’s flailing legs nearly tore her apart.

Gretta was chanting, muttering another language. She sounded like dragons before a hunt. Even her eyes were gleaming as bright as the dragon that tried to eat Seymour and Linh in the forest. She lifted her palms—every line in her skin seemed to glow bright blue.

Quickly, Gretta put her hands against the Lady’s forehead. She muttered more harshly in the dragon-like language. Lady Ella spluttered and finally—finally—she fell back, unconscious.

Gretta, too, slumped back down and wiped her face. “Wow,” she said, “at least I didn’t have to kill her. Was honestly worrying that would be the case. Good job team.”

Linh and Seymour could only stare incredulously.