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“Power is a worm that crawls into your heart and eats away your soul. Finally, when there's nothing left—that's when the good part starts.”

—Malevolent,
Dungeon Confessions

Starting at the point of impact, the fire devoured me, burning away my hair before traveling to the rest of my body. I felt a flash of intense searing pain before my nerves thankfully singed away.

Black Crow backed away from my nightmare and covered her nose to escape the stench. Her back hit the dresser, bumping the mirror so that it tilted in such a way that I could see the fiery angel I had become.

The angel's arms—my arms—came up, and the fire shifted, burning white, then green. Where the green fire burned, the skin reknit itself. In moments, I was healed and renewed—like a phoenix rising from the ashes of my former self.

That couldn't possibly be me, could it?

Girl
of
Emerald, no man can tame. Burn down the world, consumed by flames
.

Seeing part of the Emerald curse come to life should have scared me hexless. But I felt strong and powerful. Like I could take on the world. The feeling was intoxicating. I wanted more. I
needed
more.

A brown blur streaked across the room, snapping me out of my trance and knocking me over. Kato's tawny wings felt like ice as they covered me, smothering the flames. Continuing to pat me, he cried, “Dorthea, are you okay?”

The euphoria of the intoxication was gone, and I felt frozen, physically trapped under the weight of the chimera. Mentally and emotionally, I seized up in shock. This was clearly another pixie dust–induced hallucination.

“It's amazing. I've never seen anything like it.” Black Crow looked at me like you might look at a three-eyed toad.

That couldn't be a good thing.

“Take a look in the mirror.” Her earlier craziness completely gave way to her curiosity. Well, maybe that wasn't true. She still looked utterly mad but more like a mad scientist.

I pushed Kato off me and walked to the mirror. Before looking in it, I glanced back at him. The look on his face was indecipherable, and I don't think it was just the furriness obscuring his thoughts. I had the feeling that his human face would have been just as difficult to read. His overall body language looked wary.

But of me or Black Crow?

I didn't want to look. I was afraid of what I would see. The girl of Emerald consumed by flames? A burned-black husk? Finally, I took a deep breath and stared in the mirror. My nose was no longer bleeding, swollen, or broken. All my earlier wounds were completely healed.

And my hair was still on fire.

Bright orange tendrils of flame weaved and swirled over my shoulders as if directed by the wind. The tips of my hair ended in emerald-green flickers.

“Get it out! Get it out!” I screamed. I beat at my head to tamp out the flames. They didn't go out, but they didn't burn my palms either.

“A living flame. I've only ever read about it in myths. I didn't think it could actually be achieved,” Black Crow said with a tone of reverence.

“Where's a bucket of water?” I looked around frantically for the bathroom, ready to dunk my head in a toilet if I had to.

Crow grabbed my wrist. “I wouldn't do that if I were you. Living flame is life magic.” Taking her razor feather, she cut off one of the emerald sparks and stuffed it into the empty vial.

“Hey! Give that back.” I tried to swipe the vial, but she danced away. “And what does that mean, anyway?”

Kato spoke quietly. “The magic is tied to your life. Put simply, if those green flames die, so do you.”

That little fact made me stop playing keep away and stare back into the mirror.

Crow prattled on, examining the vial. Turning it this way and that. “Quite right. Glad one of you has a brain. I still don't know how it was done though. The potion itself was a simple explosion hex, but I suppose when it mixed with the blood from your head wound… Well, look at the results. Do you understand what this means? How much money I could make using your blood with the rest of my potions?”

Black Crow paced, going on and on about possible combinations, but I mostly tuned her out. I stood transfixed by what I saw in the mirror. There was no pain—I wasn't getting burned. My fingers twirled the tendrils of flame unharmed.

Was it permanent? Could I ever shower again? What if I got caught in a rainstorm?

“—and maybe if Grizelda had given me a little bit of warning about your blood, I would have crafted the wishing star differently.”

“You would have what?” My voice hardened, unrecognizable even to my own ears. The ends of my hair flared a brighter green.

Black Crow blinked a few times, trying to adjust to my abrupt change in attitude. “The star. I would have made—”

“You did this. You ruined my life. You made my parents disappear. You killed Verte.”

“Now…I…d-d-don't…think,” she stuttered, backing away from me.

The living flame turned inward, burning away nearly all rational thought. It honed my pain, my focus, and my rage onto one central point: Black Crow.

“Bring. Them. Back.”

Crow's eyes went impossibly wide and her mouth went slack. She looked like she had seen the devil, and maybe she had. Backing farther away, she offered more denials, but her excuses fell on deaf ears. I could only hear a little voice whispering to me in the back of my head. It no longer chirped like a cricket. Now it slithered through my consciousness like a snake.

This
woman
has
taken
everything
from
you, just to make a quick buck. She deserves to pay. You could make her pay.

Yeah, I should make her pay.
But first she was going to tell me how to undo this spell.

I sent my hands out to snatch her, but green flames burst from my palms instead. They slammed into Black Crow, knocking her into the potions case. All the remaining vials and bottles broke, spilling their contents onto her.

She didn't burst into flames like I had. Her skin turned a sallow yellow and bubbled, dripping like hot wax. One eye drooped down her cheek; the other pleaded with me. Her mouth tilted into a sickening mockery of a grin. Her limbs flattened and went boneless.

Without a doubt, the most horrifying thing I had ever seen.

And I had done it.

My earlier rage was extinguished immediately, replaced with a shame deep enough to bury a giant. “Oh my Grimm. I'm… I didn't…”

Her hand stretched out to me, and I rushed to it. Before I had a chance to help her, she slashed across my palm with a razored feather. Blood flowed freely from the almost surgical slice. I sat motionless as she applied my blood to her melting skin.

Within the room, the air changed. Something was happening but probably not what she wanted.

The puddling stopped and her skin re-formed into a solid state. She got a little taller and stiffer, the surface of her skin taking a clothlike appearance. Her face looked flat, like someone had painted all her features on. Her limbs got bulbous and lumpy, as though they were stuffed with straw. When the magic finished with her, the only thing that remained was a scarecrow.

The horror in front of me would not compute. I could have blamed a lot of things, but deep inside, I'd wanted this. Not
this
per se. But I'd needed Crow to pay, and she had. In full.

Mentally, I added Verte's and Black Crow's names to the tally of things I had a hand in destroying.

The list kept growing.

Kato sat by the bed; he had been ever since putting out the fire, quietly watching the events unfold. He hadn't reacted at all, and that just seemed wrong. Spell's bells, he still wasn't reacting at all to the fact that
I
had
just
changed
a
living
being
into
a
scarecrow
.

He calmly stood and padded to the door.

“We can't leave. We have to do something.” My voice cracked.

“There's nothing we can do for her. And she doesn't deserve your pity. Don't forget she tried to kill you and keep me for a pet.”

“I don't need the reminder, thanks.” Crow was in league with the wicked witch of the west, but right now, I felt like the bigger monster.

“Maybe you do. Evil needs to be stopped, whatever the cost.”

The crackle of shattering glass came from outside, and the floor shook from some sort of impact.

“It's time for us to go.” Kato turned again to leave.

“I'm staying. Rexi might still be here somewhere. And maybe I can help—” That plan went out the window. Or rather out the roof.

With a loud creaking sound, a large metallic gigan, with an equally large ax, sliced the roof off from the house. He peered down at us with empty black eyes and a nose that poked out crookedly, like the tip of an oilcan. Shiny, pieced-together tin plates made up the rest of his enormous body—including the hand that reaching down into the room.

“Rule of Heroics: If you want to be remembered as a heroic ruler, face danger head on. If you wanted to be remembered as a wise ruler who lived a long life, face danger from a very safe distance.”

—Thomason's Tips for Ruthless Ruling

“Run!” Kato roared over the shrill creaking of the gigan.

Like I really needed that little piece of advice. I was already down the hall. “What the spell is that?” I shouted behind me.

“My guess would be the Tinman.”

We ran out the front door and headlong into a different giant monster.

We were trapped. And I was out of ideas. “Glam it all. Isn't this a tad bit of overkill?”

“You wanted to know the plan, well, this is the plan,” Kato sniped at me, then yelled up to the huge creature. “Bobbledandrophous, can you carry both of us on your back?”

The beast looked down in surprise. He was easily the size of the house, and now that I looked past the huge legs and really sharp talons, I could see that he bore a striking resemblance to Kato: lion head, ram horns, dragon tail, and ginormous wings. Oh, fairy fudge. Had I turned Kato's entire family into chimeras?

His voice boomed. “My Lord? How did—”

“Later. Escape now.”

The beast lowered himself and allowed us to climb onto his back. “Yes, my lord. Is that little human yours as well?” The big chimera nodded to the side.

The little human was Rexi, tied to the laundry line with hot-pink panty hose. Her eyes were closed, but she stirred a little, so at least she was alive. Of course, if she opened her eyes and saw a massive chimera and a metal giant about to step on her, she might have a heart attack.

Tinman's creaking was ear-shattering, worse than fingernails running down a cauldron. It made a great early warning system though. Bigger-version-of-Kato flapped his enormous black, feathery wings and took to the sky as the Tinman swung his ax in an attempt to bring us down.

“No!” I shouted. “We have to get Rexi.” She wasn't much, but with Verte gone, she was the only tie I had left to Emerald.

A scream sounded from the ground below. Rexi was awake.

“What would you have me do, Highness?” asked our ride.

I started to reprimand the chimera when I realized that I was not the
Highness
the he was referring to.

“We don't have time for this, but leaving her here would give the Gray Witch the upper hand. Bank left and use the gigan's higher center of gravity to knock him over. Then fly swiftly and snatch up the line.” Kato spoke with confidence and grace, giving directions with ease.

I'd had my doubts about Kato's claim to royalty—understandable given his earlier appearance, then kittenish nature after the change. That playfulness disappeared the more he grew, and there was no mistaking the air of authority he now wielded. Furry or not, he was a prince and not my pet.

The larger chimera did exactly as he was told, swooping low and using his tail to swat the Tinman.

That saying,
the
bigger
they
are,
the
harder
they
fall
? Totally true. The Tinman flew back and landed right on the house, squishing it flat. He looked like a silver turtle stuck on its back, unable to flip itself over.

We took advantage of our fallen foe and flew back over to the clothesline. The chimera gingerly gathered the poles in his mouth, letting the line—and Rexi—hang down. If screaming and cursing were any indication, Rexi was not happy with her mode of rescue.

The Tinman creaked and groaned as he rolled off to the side, readying himself to stand.

“Fly, Bobbledandrophous! Take us home,” Kato ordered.

Bobblewhatshisbucket curved sharply and flew away, hitting and denting the tin gigan with his barbed tail.

The chimera flew quickly, and I watched Crow's house and the Tinman grow rapidly smaller. Soon, I no longer heard his scraping sound, just Rexi's shrill shrieks as she kicked and flailed helplessly in midair.

“Shouldn't we get her up now?” I said.

Kato looked sheepish—and on a lion's face, that is something to see. “Do we have to? It might do her some good, you know.”

“It might, but she'll also scream herself hoarse.”

“I'm not hearing a downside.”

I smacked his furry side. “Do I have to try and do it myself?”

Kato's cool blue eyes stared into mine.

“What?” I squirmed, suddenly feeling very self-conscious in my extremely expensive dress/now rag.

“I don't understand you. If you wanted, you could have that girl executed for treason for striking you. You lost an opportunity to get help from the wizard because you were too soft. Even Crow manage to garner your concern. You think personal accountability is something to do with your pocketbook, yet for some reason you still keep attempting to help people that don't deserve it.”

“Thanks, I think.”

He shook his head. “It's not a compliment, Dot.”

My chest felt like it was being shredded by the shards of glass that still littered the big chimera's fur.
Dot.
That was the nickname Verte had given me as a child.

Kato huffed in his growing mane. “At best it's slightly noble. At worse it's dangerous and puts everyone around you at risk. You mean well, but that won't keep us alive.” He turned away, carefully padding his way up to speak to his friend and figure out a way to better secure Rexi.

I felt anything but secure. Sitting alone, I had nothing left to distract me from…me. Or what Kato said. Was he right? From playing with a lost child in the garden, to giving Crow information for food, my best intentions had brought nothing but ruins.

Soaring high in the clouds, my thoughts weighed me down like lead balloons. Everything was…wrong. This wasn't the way my life should be written. The Storymakers had made a misstep somewhere. Verte couldn't really, truly be gone. She had to be missing, just like my parents.

But she had been my one hope to setting the whole mess right-side up again. And now I had no idea what to do or where to go—or if I should go anywhere. Maybe with the curse, the world would be safer if I was dropped in a deep fireproof pit somewhere.

Kato and our beast pilot must have argued during their talk because as the enchanted prince made his way back down the larger chimera's back, his face looked like he'd sucked down a gallon of rotten curds and whey. I did my best to push all thoughts of the curse out of my head before he reached me. Denial, thy new princess is Dorthea.

Kato approached and shrugged his wings. “The best Bobbledandrophous can do is lower her down into his paws. It would be too risky to try and bring her up here midflight. She'll be fine…probably.” He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes before plopping down in a big heap. On my lap.

“Ahh!” I tried to use his horns to pick his head up, but even that part of him weighed a ton. “What are you doing? Did you just die?”

“No,” he growled and turned his face up, pursing his lips in total seriousness. “I've recently been advised that you might find the cute and fuzzy approach much less threatening. Supposedly it's also more endearing.”

“I hate to tell you, but that Jolly Roger has sailed, sunk, and been eaten by ticking crocodiles.” I tried to stifle a laugh, but it was too large to contain. Kato really had zero skill at manipulation, but at least he was honest.

“I told him it was a stupid idea,” he grumbled and rolled off me.

“What gives? You've gone more than five minutes without finding some new way to call me incompetent.”

Shaking his head, he swiped a paw across his face to hide what looked like a smile. “I can't decide if the Storymakers are brilliant or mad as hares for bringing us together as partners.”

“
Partner
is an awfully strong word. Let's go with
associates
for
a
brief
duration
until
the
ever-after part
.”

He sighed. “Well, I suppose that's an improvement over
disgusting
beast
.” Finally he looked me in the eye. His glacial stare was serious but neutral and without disapproval—an improvement of its own. “We need to talk.”

“Good, I'll go first.” I sucked in the biggest breath possible to blurt out all the questions on my mind before Kato had a chance to change the subject. “The way I figure it, you seem to know a lot about me while I know next to nothing about you. Why is that? Were you friends with my parents? And what's this big threat thing to both our kingdoms? And where is your kingdom anyway? I've never ever heard of a chimera or seen pictures. Bob here looks like something out of a nightmare, especially the big pointy fangs.”

“Bob?” Kato's muzzle quirked up in amusement. “He's not so scary, and he'd do anything to keep me from harm. And now you too.”

“Avoiding the more important part of that rant.”

Kato huffed and sat on his haunches across from me. His eyebrows drew together while he unfurled his right wing out wide. “That's where I'm from.” He gestured to the mountain we were rapidly approaching. “Even though I lived a day's flight away, you could see the tall, glittering green towers to the South. I'd never been there or met your parents before Muse Day though. In fact, I rarely needed to venture away from my domain.”

Instinctively, I scanned the skyline for the towers of Emerald City. They weren't there anymore.

He continued. “My home is nothing like yours. And I'll give you bit of warning now that you would be wise not to make a fuss about…” His face scrunched up as he searched until he found the term he was looking for. “The decor.”

I stiffened in defense at the insinuation, but I really didn't have room to talk. When we first met, I had thought I was better than him because my clothes were designer and he had dirt smudges on his.

His tail poked my back in what I think was supposed to be a reassuring pat. “But don't feel too bad about not being in the know about chimeras. My
people
are a well-kept secret.” He craned his neck and looked at the horizon. “You'll see soon enough though. We're almost there.” He rose to all fours and turned away. “I'll be right back.”

“Wait. Almost where?” I yelled and leaned forward as far as I dared. Before I could get any answers, he'd already kind of hopped, skipped, and flew back up to the top. I still didn't understand why he pushed for the
alliance
. (A much better word than
engagement
.) And what exactly did he mean, his “people”? What kind of kingdom was Kato prince to?

“Hang on, my lady,” Bob bellowed. That's all the warning I got before he arched into a steep swan dive on a crash course with the mountain.

I did the only thing I could—took a death grip on his fur and joined Rexi in screaming my head off. As the mountain got closer and we hadn't slowed, I closed my eyes. I didn't need to know which jagged edge was going to rupture my spleen.

My first clue that we didn't hit the mountain was the lack of a bone-crunching splat. The second was a little more subtle—our screams echoed back at me. I'd missed it because my eyes were shut, but we must have flown into a cavern or tunnel or something.

No, that wasn't right either. I think we were somehow
inside
the mountain.

Everything was pitch-black; the only light came from my flaming hair. The sinking in the pit of my stomach told me that we were headed down. I saw a warm, red glow bouncing off the walls ahead. The closer we got, the hotter the temperature.

Please, Grimm, don't let us be traveling to the pits of hell.

The rocky chute ended abruptly, dumping us into a surreal new world. My first thought was,
There
is
no
way
all
of
this
could
fit
inside
of
a
mountain
. My second was,
Of
course
it
has
to
be
made
up
almost
completely
of
fire
.