Winter watched the tall shadow creep. Breathing out, he silently placed his hands on the ground and tried scooting further to the back of his cell.

CLANG, CLANG.

He winced. The iron chain’s links lightly shifted over the cold ground. Winter held his breath at the sound and froze. The shadow paused, too. It was eerily shaped like a person, but its unnaturally lanky form on the wall showed otherwise.

I have nowhere to run, nowhere to go.

So all Winter could do was wait.

Wait to be attacked.

Wait to be eaten.

Just wait.

After a tense minute, it continued moving, slinking in jerky movements closer… and closer… and closer… to his cell door. It was right there, but he couldn’t tell exactly what it was. The room wasn’t bright enough.

Winter didn’t want to look, though. His jaw trembled. He would rather not see the thing that would kill him today. 

Is this really how it’s gonna end? I didn’t even accomplish anything or did something to be proud of.

There were a lot of regrets. Not living his life was one of them.

THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP, THUMP.

Though his heart thumped wildly, Winter knew it was not his captor. The fast beating in his chest wasn’t mysteriously responding to the apparition, not the same as with that guy. No, this was just pure dread of what was to come. 

Speaking of his heart…

Pins and needles tingled inside, from that deeper place within. A cough wanted to explode, an unbearable itch he couldn’t scratch. Winter bit his lip and swallowed hard. The spit did nothing to relieve the bothering sensation.

Winter brought his knees to his chest. 

Don’t look at it. Don’t give it attention. Maybe it’ll go away.

From the corner of his eye, the newcomer didn’t seem gangly, unlike what he imagined based on the shadow’s shape. It stood there on the other side of the cage door. Watching him. Observing him. Chilling clicking sounds sounded in its throat.

A shiver ran down his spine, shoulders quivering. The cold wasn’t the cause.

A minute passed. Two minutes. Three. Then, ten. 

Ugh, it’s getting more freezing. Is it gonna stand there the whole time? 

Winter slightly turned to look. He shuddered at the sight. It was a mistake to have done that. Not even a second later, he focused on his shoes, praying to anyone who would listen.

No way!

It was himself. Winter. Yet… it wasn’t. It resembled his demeanor and wore the same clothes. The thing was a supernatural phenomenon. For a person to encounter it in their lifetime… there was only misfortune for them. And in some cases, an omen of death. 

He had read about them in a book about creatures, which he had found in the Nordenstein Castle’s library at night when he’d sneak out of his tower. The notion frightened him as a child, always on the lookout for anything that looked exactly like him. 

A doppelgänger—an evil twin. These spirits were ominous. Everyone had one, but it was rare to come across; a one-in-a-million chance, honestly.

Winter’s thoughts scrambled, wondering how in the world his doppelgänger ended up here! Though it was possible a nearby spirit shapeshifted into one but… still!  

CLANK.

Winter flinched. It slid the door open.

O-open?! Was it not locked?! Is that why I’m chained to this forsaken wall? 

It entered, limbs twitching, struggling to walk. Yes, it was likely to have recently shifted. Winter would not glimpse again. His eyes remained down, sitting without any subtle movement.

STEP.

He shouldn’t peek.

STEP.

He had to be invisible.

STEP.

Winter’s breath hitched sharply when his doppelgänger dropped to his level suddenly, face a hand-span away. 

Don’t look. Don’t give it attention. Don’t look. Don’t give it attention.

“Why?” it asked. It would've sounded just like Winter if it hadn’t been for the throaty voice. “Why are you so weak? Why do you choose to live the way you do?”

Winter kept quiet, ignoring his double. They existed to deceive and manipulate, so why listen? He wanted to cover his ears.

“You were always easy to control, just a feeble soul without a fucking backbone. Pathetic and small.” 

It wants a reaction. But I can’t respond. I won’t give it! Do not give it validation.

The doppelgänger edged nearer, humming random, off-key notes. Its rancid breath brushed down his neck. 

“There’s a whole world out there,” the twin croaked, making more clicking noises. When it talked, spit sprayed on Winter’s face. “Don’t you want to see what’s outside this dungeon? The door is open, you know. Stop being a wretched littl—”

The inhuman spirit stopped abruptly in the middle of its ridiculing, hissing loudly toward the door. 

And retreated.

W-what?

He took another risk to see it. The contorted Winter crawled low to the ground twistedly, disappearing into the hallway shadows. The clicks faded along with it. Silence.

Why did it just…?

He wasn’t complaining by any means, but it worried him. There was no indication of footsteps coming. What was his doppelgänger scared of to flee like that? It was a terrifying thought that 1) Winter had to fret about that monster returning and 2) there was something else to frighten it.

The earlier itch in his chest constricted his lungs, more so than earlier, forcing him to get on all fours for some relief.

COUGH, COUGH, COUGH.

A violent cough hurt his throat, feeling his vocal cords scrape with every rough expel of air. The uncontrollable choking made it hard to breathe! Winter placed a hand over his heart. There was an ache there. 

What is this pain? Am I getting sick? Is my childhood sickness coming back? But… this…

COUGH, COUGH, COUGH.

The tingles seeping from his heart turned to zaps. Winter collapsed to his side, sweating despite the frigid air. He couldn’t breathe, immobile entirely. 

COUGH, COUGH, COUGH.

“H-help.” It was so quiet, the call couldn’t even be considered a whisper.

The room became blurry, outside of his vision turning black. The last thing he saw was the skeleton looking at him, laughing at him with his jaw wide open.

***
(Taerynn’s point of view)

The king stood on his balcony overlooking his ruined kingdom. The blood-red moon was especially bright tonight. A full moon. A cursed moon to highlight his embarrassment that he couldn’t leave this damned realm. 

Though, I suppose it is better than Fenrir’s case, with the Gleipnir tying him to his side only. Sensitive mutt.

The fae souls who lived in this part of the hellish afterlife, Myrkrheim, trudged through the old, deteriorated buildings and streets. Ever since the war, nothing had been able to be restored to its prior self. 

Several things had become cursed after his Magic Mirror broke 45 years ago—the land, the mana, himself…

And no one in the other realms cared, despite the light elves being partly responsible for the mess. The empty promises to help repair this area, so vital for demonic fae souls to be maintained…

Taerynn growled. It was all because they looked down on him for being different. 

But he wasn’t the only one different.

Snow White—the princess who was secretly a prince. It was a fact withheld from everyone, which he still couldn’t understand. Humans were unpredictable and sought out more than they needed, so who was he to get their wa—

“My Lord.”

Taerynn kept his gaze on the moon. “Yes.”

Rowan doesn’t come at this hour. It’s the middle of the night.

His head servant, a dark elf soul who had been serving him since the beginning of his reign, bowed. “I sincerely apologize for disturbing you so late, My Lord. There’s a report you need to be aware of.”

“Proceed.”

Far away, screams were echoing throughout the hellfire. A fight was occurring between two trolls in the distance. 

“I’ve received three complaints from servants that a… humanoid spirit is slithering around Myrkr Castle.”

“And why does that pertain to me?”

Phantoms wander around often. They are harmless. Usually.

“They said the spirit has, er, red lips, black hair, and is so beautiful that they have to stare.”

At the mention of that description, Taerynn turned his head. It was impossible. 

“That is no spirit,” he denied. “It is merely the human I discovered with a portion of mana that belongs to me.”

Rowan shifted, getting uncomfortable about proving his king wrong. “The servants were adamant it was not a mortal. Though their beauty was undeniable, there was something… uneasy about them. Its shadow did not reflect the body shape, very different.”

“Hmm. I suppose you are correct. It seems an annoying thing has attached itself to my belonging.”

“What should we do about it?”

“Doppelgängers are relatively harmless, merely a nuisance. To say they are an omen of death is poppycock. Warn the others that if they catch it, dispose of it.”

“Understood, My Lord.” He bowed and went to depart to his room.

At the same time, a blustery wind chilled him to the bone, blowing his long white hair. Humans could not survive these temperatures. He thought of the prisoner's thin outfit—the flowy white shirt with a red pattern and black pants—but it would not be enough to keep him warm. 

“Rowan,” Taerynn said, turning around to face his trusted servant.

“My Lord?”

“How long has Snow White been in the dungeon?”

“I would say more than half a day.”

I suppose it’s time I ask about his decision. If a favorable answer and gives me his true name, he can come out. 

“You can go.”

“Thank you, My Lord.”

The king observed the harsh landscape some more. It never got easier to look at, too bleak to wonder if things would improve with time.

No. They never would. Not with his soul core like this. 

He went inside his office, shut the doors, and left his quarters. It was quiet now. Farther he descended to below the castle, where some of the most despicable torture was held for the worst of fae souls. 

And it wasn’t quiet down here—cries and wails begged for forgiveness, that they were sorry for their evil deeds on Midgard and the other Yggdrasil realms. But Myrkrheim was the end for them, their souls’ final destination. This was it. No forgiveness. No mercy.

When Taerynn reached mid-level with plain cells for simply holding fae, his blood ran cold when seeing Snow White on the floor, unmoving and with pale skin. A trickle of blood fell from the corner of his pretty mouth.

He grabbed the iron bars of the door and tossed it aside, crashing to the wall behind him. He picked up Snow White, limp in his arms and unresponsive. After removing the shackle, the king whisked him away into the night, leaving the dungeons.