Ophelia soon realized that it was not the enchantress she had to fear, but Vera.

The captain of the guard knocked on her door, during the earliest hours of morning, when light had yet to rise. "Open up," she said. "Or I'll come in there myself."

A yawn took over Ophelia's features. Her stride was lazy, her footsteps crooked, as she pushed her sluggish body out of bed, away from sheets that had kept her warm when her morale could not do so anymore.

Events from last night flooded her mind. She did not know what to think of the situation, nor did she know whether it was wise in cases like these to think at all. Ophelia wanted out, yet, to where was still a mystery to her—and so, she hadn't a choice but to stay here, where everything was twisted inward; like a strange dance that never stopped, like someone's last breath before the first snows of winter, like the air filled with rumors that would never wash away with the waves of summer.

Ophelia yanked the lock away from old wood. She opened the door. Vera wasn't pleased. She did the things that people did when they prepared themselves to scream, and accuse others of negligence in parts of their lives. She tapped her elbow with her fingers. Her lips were shaking, not out of fear. In she came walking, with boots that made floorboards creak. To the window outside she pointed, and said, "Get dressed, Ophelia. I don't want you here."