Once upon a time, a young queen walked through her garden in the middle of winter. Snowflakes fell on to the branches of  the dead, leafless trees. She wandered over to her once beautiful rose bush and pricked her finger on one of its  many thorns. A single drop of crimson  blood fell upon the snow. Next to the rose bush, was a bench made from the wood of an ebony tree. She sat down on it.
“Oh, I wish to someday have a daughter with skin white as snow, lips red as blood and hair black as ebony,” she said to herself .
True to the queen’s wishes, she gave birth to a daughter with skin white as snow, lips red as blood, and hair black as ebony. She became known as Snow White. All who knew her instantly fell in love with her beauty. Unfortunately, the queen died shortly after Snow White’s birth.
This is where I come into the picture. But be warned. From here on out, everything is not how it seems.
One year after the queen’s death, the king sought out to find a new wife, but more importantly, a mother to help raise Snow White. He came to my village. I remember the day rather vividly. I was picking apples from a nearby tree to bring back to my cottage. Much to my embarrassment, I bumped into a man and every single one of those apples fell out of the basket and on to his feet. I looked up at the man’s face to apologize. That man turned to be the king. “ I am so sorry, Your Majesty,” I hastily apologized as a sunk into a deep curtsy. I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks which only added to my embarrassment.
“What is your name, girl?’ He ignored my apology.
“Adalia,” I answered him softly.
“Adalia,” he muttered imploringly as he picked a piece of my dark hair. “Would you like to be my wife?”
In all honesty, the question caught me off guard. I knew I couldn’t really refuse an offer like this, especially from the king. “Yes, Your  Majesty”, I practically blurted out. It was like word vomit. “ I would be honored.”
Our wedding was spectacular. Nearly everyone in the kingdom attended to give us their congratulations. I settled into the castle and into the daily routine of a queen. Snow White grew into a beauty, not just in appearance. She was kind to all she came across and everyone love her for it, even I. I came to love her as a mother would her daughter. And I like to think she looked to me as a mother, as someone to confide in. However, I loved the king, but I was not in love with him. I was grateful towards him and saw him as more of a good friend. Nothing more, nothing less.
After the king died in some military campaign, I became queen in my own right as Snow White was still too young to rule a kingdom on her own. I would pass the crown on to her.  On a happier note, I truly fell in love with someone. His name was Elijah. We met a banquet held in honor of Snow White’s sixteenth birthday.
We began talking but it quickly turned into something more. We kept it quiet to not draw too much attention to ourselves. We were the only one who knew about our relationship. I’m not afraid to say that I was in love with him, but there always a small part of that questioned whether he felt the same about me. I was given an answer about a year after we met.
I had been unable to sleep that night. I couldn’t stop tossing and turning due to the wind howling right  outside my window. So, I got out of bed and decided to wander around the dark corridors to clear my head. The shadows of the lit candle danced on stone walls. This was the lonely wing of the castle. People left it alone, claiming the place was haunted, I always said that it was just ludicrous.
I went into the room at the end of the corridor. Across the room, two embracing shadows were visible. “I love you,” said the first. It sound like Snow White. I smiled faintly to myself and began to shut the door behind me as I left to give them some privacy.
“I love you too.” No, it couldn’t be. It couldn’t be Elijah. He was with me, not her. It didn’t make sense.
I ran out of the room, letting the doors slam shut behind me.
“Adalia?!” Snow White hollered after me.
The sound of frantic footsteps followed me until I managed to lock myself in my room. I sunk to the floor, sobbing with my back to the door.
“Adalia, are you alright? What happened?” Snow White shouted through the locked door as if she didn’t know.
“Go away. I don’t want to look at you right now!” I replied as I stood up and walked over to an unopened crate in the corner of the room. It had been a gift from a neighboring kingdom. As I slowly removed it from its wrappings, I heard, “My queen?” Startled, I hung the ornate mirror on the nearby wall.  The voice seemed to be coming from the mirror itself. “ I live to serve my queen. Her wishes are my commands.” A face formed behind the glass of the mirror.
Ignoring the mirror’s plights, I crawled back into my bed. It felt as though someone had reached into my chest and tore my heart into a million little pieces. I put a pillow over my head to drown out the annoying declarations of allegiance from the mirror.
The next morning, I woke to the maids opening my curtains. “My lady, Snow White made you breakfast,” said the eldest. “ Isn’t she just the fairest in all the land?” She set the breakfast tray on the foot of my bed.
“Isn’t she though?” I muttered through clenched teeth. “Leave me be!” I told the maids. They obeyed and left me alone in my room.
“My queen should know I will always be honest with her,” The mirror on the wall pledged.
Taking a slow, deep breath I turned around and looked at the mirror’s face. If it was true how honest he was, then I could ask if anything. If only I had known that this was the beginning of it all, maybe I would have thought twice before I uttered those words. “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?” I knew I asked the question in vain but I needed an honest answer.
“My queen, you are the fairest that I see. But, there is one who surpasses you in beauty and charm.”  He almost sounded scared, yet I could see that he was rather sure of himself. “She goes by the name of Snow White.”

I could feel the rage coursing through the veins as my breathing sped up. I picked up my hairbrush and chucked it at the mirror, but the glass didn’t even crack in the slightest. “I thought you were loyal to me and not that man stealer!”
“I also told you I would be honest at all costs,” he stated calmly.
“Then I must rid of her!” My anger reached its peak and all I wanted and all I could think about was revenge. She was a problem that had to be solved.
“Who are you speaking of, my queen?”
“Snow White, of course, you useless piece of junk!”
Just as I was about to turn away, an image appeared in the mirror. It showed Snow White, dressed in her riding gear, huddled on the side of the door, crying with a look of terror in her eyes. Good.
“Bring me the Huntsman!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. Snow White sprinted down the hallway as she passed the Huntsman on his way to my room. I watched him knock on my door. “Come.”
His peaked through the crack as he opened the door. “Your Majesty, how may I be at your service?”
I smile spread over my face as I began to laugh. “Chase down Snow White. She has fled into the forest. Bring me her heart.”
“My queen you don’t want-” the mirror tried to warn me.
“Did you say Snow White, Your Majesty?” the Huntsman stammered.
“I am your queen and you will do as I say!”
“Yes, Your Majesty,”the Huntsman bowed and left me in peace.
I turned back to the mirror but the wretched face had vanished as though it had never been there. Instead, my face was the image in the mirror. It was the same as it had always been, yet I still didn’t recognize the person in the mirror. I was an entirely different person.
Not too long after that, the Huntsman brought me Snow White’s heart. I had the cook salt it and I joyfully ate it for dinner. After that, I went back to the mirror and asked, “Mirror, mirror on the wall who’s the fairest of them all?”
“My queen, you are still the fairest that I see, but Snow White still lives and has found shelter with seven dwarfs just over the seven mountains.”
That’s when I decided to take matters in my own hands. I disguised myself as an old beggar woman and offered to lace a new corset for her. She fell dead after I laced them too tight. I hid in the forest and watched as the troublesome dwarfs unlaced the corset and saved her life.
Next, I went back with a poisoned comb. I offered to put in her hair. She obliged. As she did before, she fell dead. I receded back to the forest and saw the dwarfs come back from work. After they found her dead body, they removed the comb from her hair and she woke up.
“You have to promise us that you won’t speak to anymore strangers,” said one of the dwarfs.
“The queen is sure to come back in another disguise with intentions of taking your life.”
“I promise,” she told them genuinely.
I went back to the castle and devised a new plan. She certainly couldn’t just get away with stealing Elijah from me and being the fairest in all the land. Elijah should be with me, not her. I should be the fairest in all the land. I am the queen and I will get my way.
A week later I went back with a half poisoned apple. I knocked on the front door of the cottage disguised as an old spinster. She answered the door. “Deary, would you like to try one of my delicious red apples?”
“No, I really shouldn't,” she declined my offer ever so politely. “I had a rather large lunch, but thank you.” what kind of excuse was that?!
“Are you afraid I poisoned them?”
“No, don’t be silly,” she told me, her cheeks turned red as they always did when she got nervous or frightened. 
“How about I split one with you?”
“Sure, I don’t see the harm in that.” She led me into the shabby little cottage. She must have really been desperate for shelter if she came here.
I cut the apple in half and handed her the poisoned half. She took a bite and fell to the ground and dropped the apple. I crouched down on to the floor and checked her pulse. Just as I had expected, she was as dead as can be.
I rushed out of the cottage and headed back to the caste as fast as my feet could carry me. “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?” Excitement began to well up inside me because I knew I had finally won.
“My queen, you are the fairest of them all since Snow White is no longer breathing.”
“Show me Snow White,” I demanded giddily.
“As you wish my queen.”
The image of the face dissolved to show the seven dwarfs weeping around a glass coffin. Snow White lay in the coffin holding a single red rose. Her face was forever set in a peaceful expression, the likes of which I had seen on a dead person, to put it bluntly. The dwarfs’ heads turned as Elijah rose into the scene. He kneeled before the coffin, a single tear streaming down his left cheek. Was he in love with her? Guilt rose up in my throat in the form of bile. 
“May I please take this beauty back to my kingdom to show my father who I wished to marry.”
Suspicious glances were shared between the dwarfs. The middle one stepped forward and nodded, gesturing towards the coffin. Was it it true that Elijah was the son of another king posing as one my army generals? My head was beginning to hurt. This was all just too much,
Elijah opened the glass coffin and took Snow White into his arms. A look of pure love and tragic loss spread over his features making me regret everything, Yet, I still saw it as punishment for those for breaking my heart and feeding it to the wolves, so to speak
Just as he was about to carry her away on his magnificently white stead, the apple fell from her throat and on to the ground. “Elijah,” she breathed then placed a hand on his cheek.
“Snow White, will you marry me?”
“Yes, I wouldn't want anything more than to marry you,” she said gleefully as Elijah lifted her up on to his white horse and then they began to ride deep into the forest, far away from the glass coffin and far away from me.In a fit of rage, which I hate to admit was a tantrum, I threw an unlit torch at the mirror, shattering it into hundreds of tiny shards of glass.
One week later, I received an invitation to their wedding. Against my better judgement, I attended. I should have known that they had ulterior motives for inviting me.
Upon entering the lavishly decorated ballroom, I caught a glimpse of Snow White and Elijah having their first dance. For a moment I was honestly happy to just see him happy.  Then, several soldiers seized me and buckled hot iron slippers on to my feet. I cringed as the scalding hot metal came in contact with my skin. I fought back tears to avoid showing weakness, but every ounce of me was fighting back the urge to scream in agony.
“Go on,” Snow White hollered angrily. “Dance.”
“I can’t stand the sight of you. You’re nothing more than a pathetic, cruel witch.” Elijah came closer to me. “I hate you,” he spat.
Those were the last words I heard before I started dancing and before I fell dead on the cold, stone floor. They were from the man I loved.