The stairs spiraled endlessly into the dark—worn stone steps descending beneath the ruins of the Echoing Chapel. Aurora moved slowly, her fingers tracing the damp, moss-lined wall to guide her path. There was no light, yet she saw everything.
Roots curled around the steps like veins beneath ancient skin. The deeper she went, the more they pulsed—alive with a rhythm not her own. They whispered faintly, in languages she didn't know but somehow understood.
"She wakes. She breaks. She bleeds.""The dreamer has stepped beyond the frame."
Her breath grew shallow. Air thinned. The world narrowed into the tunnel, the heartbeat of the wood, and her own questions, circling like wolves.
She didn't know how long she walked.
But eventually, the stone underfoot gave way to something else—glass. Smooth, cold, reflective. She stepped onto a floor of mirrors, and above her, far above, shimmered distorted images.
Not just memories.
Lives.
One mirror flickered with the image of Cinderella, eyes lined with ash, holding a dagger made of crystal. Another showed Red, cloak billowing as she stood before a burning forest. And another still… showed Aurora.
Sleeping.
Again.
But her hands were covered in blood.
She turned away.
There was a chamber ahead, dimly lit by floating orbs of soft violet flame. The roots here formed arches, braiding into a high dome that pulsed with light. And in the center—
A throne of bone and books.
Seated atop it was a figure swathed in layered robes the color of wilted violets and candle ash. Their face was hidden behind a cracked porcelain mask, half-smiling, half-frowning. Chains of silver ink looped around their fingers, linking them to scrolls that drifted in the air like paper birds.
The Oracle.
They looked up as she stepped forward. The silence cracked.
"You arrived later than expected," the Oracle said, voice a thousand whispers in one.
Aurora steadied her voice. "You knew I was coming?"
"Everyone comes. Eventually."
She didn't sit. "Who am I?"
The Oracle tilted its head. "A cruel question. And you already know the cruel answer."
"Tell me anyway."
The Oracle gestured, and one of the floating scrolls unfurled midair. It showed an image painted in blood and gold—a girl with sunlit hair, asleep beneath a spindle. Time moved around her like a noose.
"Aurora. Dreamer. False heir. You were born for sleep, but not for waking."
"False heir?"
Another scroll opened—this one rougher, torn at the edges, the ink twitching. A different girl. Dark hair. Sharp smile. Hands stained red.
"Elara. True dreamer. The one the curse was meant for."
Aurora's stomach turned. "Then why me?"
"Because you were easier to forget."
The words struck like ice water. Her lips parted, but nothing came.
"You were born into the wrong blood. A girl too quiet to be seen. You wandered too close to a story not meant for you—and the curse mistook you for the heir."
A bitter laugh escaped her. "So I'm just… a mistake."
The Oracle stood slowly, scrolls folding back into the air like wings tucking in. "You were a mistake. Now, you are a threat."
They stepped down from the throne. Their robes whispered secrets with every movement.
"Do you know what happens when the wrong princess wakes up?"
Aurora shook her head.
"The other stories start to unravel."
She remembered the chapel's mural. The mirror girls. The screaming child with sewn lips. Cinderella's ashes. Red's knife.
Broken endings. Bent beginnings.
"You have walked paths meant for others. You've tasted dreams not yours. That is why you were brought here—to make a choice."
A stone pedestal rose from the ground between them. On it lay two items.
A mirror shard, still wet with red. And a silver spindle, humming with soft magic.
Aurora stepped forward.
"One returns you to sleep. Back into the lie. The other… tears the threads completely."
She looked at the shard. Her reflection stared back—but flickered between her, Elara, Red, and Cinderella. Pieces of a puzzle that never quite fit.
Then to the spindle.
So simple. So delicate. But she could feel power inside it like coiled lightning.
Aurora spoke, voice low.
"What happens if I don't choose either?"
The Oracle was silent.
Then—
"Then the stories bleed. And the world forgets how to dream."
Aurora closed her eyes.
She remembered her years of sleep, a girl frozen beneath enchanted glass while the world turned above. She remembered waking in ruins. Remembered the way her hands had trembled. How her dreams had whispered lies dressed as comfort.
And she remembered now—she didn't want to forget again.
She opened her eyes.
And took the mirror shard.
The Oracle said nothing.
But the world answered.
The chamber began to shake. Roots shrieked. Scrolls burst into flame. The mirrored floor cracked beneath her.
Aurora stood at the center of it all—bleeding, trembling, but awake.
"I'll rewrite the story," she said.
The Oracle, before vanishing into ash, whispered one final line:
"Then beware the ones who wrote it first."
And everything collapsed into light.