Let's Write Together
Authors: hughville and athousandsmiles
Word count: 1026
Prompt: Dream
Summary: The pain subsided to a tolerable throb, but the fear of returning to her nightly hell remained.
Rating: K
A stiff wind blew as grey clouds scudded overhead, blotting out the sun and darkening the grass beneath with heavy shadows. Before her, the Evil Queen stood, holding out an apple as if in friendly offering. Snow felt a momentary kinship with Eve from the old Bible tales, tempted by the fruit that would be her demise. But this one would save her Adam, not bring him down with her.
For a moment, Snow remembered the Evil Queen as a young woman, kind, gentle and loving. The woman standing before her was like a distorted image of that young woman, Regina.
"I take that apple, and he lives?" Snow asked, eyes fixed on the shiny red skin of the fruit, so perfect, so innocuous in appearance. "That’s the deal you want to make?"
"With all my heart."
The irony of that statement was not lost on Snow.
She stared into Regina's dark eyes, hoping to see some glimmer of the woman Snow knew as a child. Instead, there was nothing; just darkness and hate.
Snow lifted the apple and sank her teeth into the smooth red skin, chewed the sweet, juicy pulp, and swallowed.
Everything became blurry and then it seemed as if she was looking at Regina from the end of a long tunnel. Her limbs grew limp, weightless, and she felt herself falling as if from a great distance, her body gaining speed as gravity took hold. She fell forever or for only a moment, she couldn't tell. Time was meaningless and hard to measure. As she waited for an impact that never came, everything went black around, above, and below her, and her body's momentum slowed again. She felt as if she was floating in a dark, endless void.
She could not see or feel at first. Her only sense was of smell and then taste, the noxious fumes of some kind of fuel-fed fire reached her nostrils and filled her mouth and lungs, setting off a fit of coughing. Crying out as she finally made impact, she fell from the void into a room consumed in flames, landing on her backside with a painful thump.
Instinctively, she shielded her face and shrank back from the bright orange fire all around her, her eyes stinging from the smoke and odor. It licked at the square tiles covering the floor and partially obscured what appeared to be an arched doorway with a massive door on the opposite side of the room.
Wrapping her cloak tightly around her, she used the hood to cover her mouth and nose, and stood to her feet with determination. She made her way toward the door, picking her way around the patches of deadly flames. But the more she moved toward it, the further away it seemed. And then a great roar of heat and light blazed upward, blocking the door from her view entirely, and sending her scuttling backward to the relative safety of a flameless square of tile.
Snow sank to her knees in hopeless surrender. The floor was cool beneath her, despite the conflagration all around, and she welcomed its touch, pressing herself as close as possible to gain relief from the intense heat. Perhaps this was all an illusion created by the Queen, she thought, a brief moment of hope taking hold. Unfastening her cloak, she swung it over a pool of flames, intent on smothering the fire, then watched in renewed horror as her cloak turned to ashes in an instant. This was no illusion and there was no way to escape. This was hell. She covered her face with her hands and cried, tears running down her jaw and dripping on to her tunic.
"Oh, Charming!" she sobbed into her sleeve, as the fire burned all around her, crawling closer and closer with each breath she took.
The smoke singed her nostrils, the acrid smell of burning flesh rousing her from sleep as she cried out in pain.
"Sh, it's okay," Charming said, drawing her into his arms and murmuring soothing words into her ear. "You're safe now. It's only a dream."
But was it? Her breaths came in great gasps as she drew her arm up and saw the blistered, peeling skin that started at her wrist and continued up to the inside of her elbow, curling like thin layers of parchment. The pain was blinding, a hot poker searing her flesh, and she closed her eyes against it, willing it to go away. Large salty tears fell, landing on the injured section of her arm as Charming lifted it to examine the burn.
He said not a word, but the straight line of his mouth told her all he could not say. Reaching out to the night table, he grabbed a pot of salve and lovingly slathered it across her scorched flesh, so gently she could barely feel his ministrations. When he was done, he wrapped it lightly with strips of cloth.
The pain subsided to a tolerable throb, but the fear of returning to her nightly hell remained.
"This has got to stop," Charming said, as if reading her thoughts. With soothing motions, he stroked the hair away from her face, love and worry in his eyes.
"I don't know how to make it stop," Snow answered, shoulders slumping hopelessly.
"We fight fire with fire," he replied, leaving her only long enough to light a candle beside the bed.
"When I was a child," he said, softly, taking her in his arms again, "after my father died, I began having nightmares. My mother would light a candle for me each night. She told me it was a flame of protection against evil spirits, a light to chase away the blackest of night."
"Did it help?'
"Always."
She watched the flicker of the tiny flame, undulating, casting friendly shadows against the walls of their bedchamber, a living thing that calmed her at once. Laying her head back on her pillow again, Charming's arm loose around her middle, she fell asleep and for the first time since his kiss woke her from the sleeping curse, she slept as one at peace.
Word count: 1026
Prompt: Dream
Summary: The pain subsided to a tolerable throb, but the fear of returning to her nightly hell remained.
Rating: K
A stiff wind blew as grey clouds scudded overhead, blotting out the sun and darkening the grass beneath with heavy shadows. Before her, the Evil Queen stood, holding out an apple as if in friendly offering. Snow felt a momentary kinship with Eve from the old Bible tales, tempted by the fruit that would be her demise. But this one would save her Adam, not bring him down with her.
For a moment, Snow remembered the Evil Queen as a young woman, kind, gentle and loving. The woman standing before her was like a distorted image of that young woman, Regina.
"I take that apple, and he lives?" Snow asked, eyes fixed on the shiny red skin of the fruit, so perfect, so innocuous in appearance. "That’s the deal you want to make?"
"With all my heart."
The irony of that statement was not lost on Snow.
She stared into Regina's dark eyes, hoping to see some glimmer of the woman Snow knew as a child. Instead, there was nothing; just darkness and hate.
Snow lifted the apple and sank her teeth into the smooth red skin, chewed the sweet, juicy pulp, and swallowed.
Everything became blurry and then it seemed as if she was looking at Regina from the end of a long tunnel. Her limbs grew limp, weightless, and she felt herself falling as if from a great distance, her body gaining speed as gravity took hold. She fell forever or for only a moment, she couldn't tell. Time was meaningless and hard to measure. As she waited for an impact that never came, everything went black around, above, and below her, and her body's momentum slowed again. She felt as if she was floating in a dark, endless void.
She could not see or feel at first. Her only sense was of smell and then taste, the noxious fumes of some kind of fuel-fed fire reached her nostrils and filled her mouth and lungs, setting off a fit of coughing. Crying out as she finally made impact, she fell from the void into a room consumed in flames, landing on her backside with a painful thump.
Instinctively, she shielded her face and shrank back from the bright orange fire all around her, her eyes stinging from the smoke and odor. It licked at the square tiles covering the floor and partially obscured what appeared to be an arched doorway with a massive door on the opposite side of the room.
Wrapping her cloak tightly around her, she used the hood to cover her mouth and nose, and stood to her feet with determination. She made her way toward the door, picking her way around the patches of deadly flames. But the more she moved toward it, the further away it seemed. And then a great roar of heat and light blazed upward, blocking the door from her view entirely, and sending her scuttling backward to the relative safety of a flameless square of tile.
Snow sank to her knees in hopeless surrender. The floor was cool beneath her, despite the conflagration all around, and she welcomed its touch, pressing herself as close as possible to gain relief from the intense heat. Perhaps this was all an illusion created by the Queen, she thought, a brief moment of hope taking hold. Unfastening her cloak, she swung it over a pool of flames, intent on smothering the fire, then watched in renewed horror as her cloak turned to ashes in an instant. This was no illusion and there was no way to escape. This was hell. She covered her face with her hands and cried, tears running down her jaw and dripping on to her tunic.
"Oh, Charming!" she sobbed into her sleeve, as the fire burned all around her, crawling closer and closer with each breath she took.
The smoke singed her nostrils, the acrid smell of burning flesh rousing her from sleep as she cried out in pain.
"Sh, it's okay," Charming said, drawing her into his arms and murmuring soothing words into her ear. "You're safe now. It's only a dream."
But was it? Her breaths came in great gasps as she drew her arm up and saw the blistered, peeling skin that started at her wrist and continued up to the inside of her elbow, curling like thin layers of parchment. The pain was blinding, a hot poker searing her flesh, and she closed her eyes against it, willing it to go away. Large salty tears fell, landing on the injured section of her arm as Charming lifted it to examine the burn.
He said not a word, but the straight line of his mouth told her all he could not say. Reaching out to the night table, he grabbed a pot of salve and lovingly slathered it across her scorched flesh, so gently she could barely feel his ministrations. When he was done, he wrapped it lightly with strips of cloth.
The pain subsided to a tolerable throb, but the fear of returning to her nightly hell remained.
"This has got to stop," Charming said, as if reading her thoughts. With soothing motions, he stroked the hair away from her face, love and worry in his eyes.
"I don't know how to make it stop," Snow answered, shoulders slumping hopelessly.
"We fight fire with fire," he replied, leaving her only long enough to light a candle beside the bed.
"When I was a child," he said, softly, taking her in his arms again, "after my father died, I began having nightmares. My mother would light a candle for me each night. She told me it was a flame of protection against evil spirits, a light to chase away the blackest of night."
"Did it help?'
"Always."
She watched the flicker of the tiny flame, undulating, casting friendly shadows against the walls of their bedchamber, a living thing that calmed her at once. Laying her head back on her pillow again, Charming's arm loose around her middle, she fell asleep and for the first time since his kiss woke her from the sleeping curse, she slept as one at peace.