Snow White Sorrow (The Grimm Diaries #1)

“Good,” Charmwill said. “Heroes always save the squirrel.”


A wide smile took shape in Loki’s heart as he opened the door and stepped out to begin his journey without Charmwill for the first time.





4



Babushka’s Alicorn



Leaving Snoring behind was like escaping a closet Loki had been trapped in for a very long time; yanking the door open and starting a new life was way past due. Even Carmen felt good about it. Being a clunky, almost shattered Cadillac didn’t deter her from helping Loki to reach his destination. She rattled and chugged on the bumpy highway while Loki tapped his fingers on the wheel, singing along with the radio. Today, Carmen played a song called ‘Highway to Hell’ by another imaginary—or deceased—band called the Sweet Pickleheads. The band was very good, even if they were all dead.

Loki had what looked like a cigarette between his lips. Although he didn’t smoke, and despised smokers, he thought the act made him look older, and seemed to make people take him seriously. The trick had worked before when clients doubted his ability to kill vampires due to his young age.

But that was in the past. He didn’t need to kill ninety-nines vampires anymore; only one special princess in a haunted castle was enough. He tried not to think too much about his weakness toward demon girls for the moment.

What excited Loki was the Dreamhunter’s notebook on his dashboard. He was curious about all the things he had to learn, and he planned to read it as soon as he got the chance. For now, he patted it while driving; assuring himself that he wasn’t a loser. He was a Dreamhunter. Although he didn’t know how a Dreamhunter killed Demortals exactly, it still felt amazing to be important.

Driving under the waning moonlight, Loki gazed into the mirror to check a pimple on his cheek.

“Aaahhh!” Loki screamed as he almost hit the brakes with his foot. His eyes nearly popped out of his skull, and his jaw dropped while the cigarette clung loosely to the drool on his lower lip. There was a ghost in a white hood sitting in his backseat.

The ghost had long, black hair waving from underneath the hood as if floating underwater. Its face was hollow and had two glowing-red spots where the eyes should be. For a moment, Loki’s scream startled the ghost; unexpectedly, it bounced against the windows like a ball in a pinball machine—Loki had assumed ghosts walked through walls, but there was no time to argue.

When the ghost finally settled in the middle of the backseat, Loki watched it reach for him. It had skeleton fingers that shimmered like a wraith out of a movie projector, and when it reached for his face, Loki tried not to wet himself.

The ghost snatched the unlit cigarette from Loki’s drooling lips then disappeared underneath the hood again. Loki heard a flicker of a match followed by the sound of the ghost drawing on the cigarette, finally puffing out spirals of curly smoke into the car.

“How many times have I warned you about cigarettes?” the ghost complained, talking in a heavy Russian accent, staring at him in the mirror. Loki watched the ghost’s face slowly turn corporeal.

Wait. I know that ghost!

Loki let out a long sigh. It was all right. The ghost was just his—

“Mom?” he squinted in the mirror.

“Who else scares you like I do?” she said, looking happy while smoking her stolen cigarette.

“You look…awful,” Loki said. “And scary,” he meant it as compliment. Ghosts love to look scary.

“Behave, Loki,” she pouted in her own monstrous way. “I don’t look awful. I’m only aging. I was the prom queen when I was your age.”

Yeah, yeah. Everyone’s mom was the prom queen.

“You look more like my ex-mom, mom,” he mumbled, shying away from her hollow eyes. Although she was turning corporeal, Loki had always wondered why his mom was different from other ghosts. She didn’t have the ability to venture through walls, and she looked more like a zombie than a ghost.

“Naughty boy,” she slapped him on the cheek. “Didn’t I ask you not to call me ‘mom’? It makes me feel old.”

“You are old, mom—I mean Babushka,” Loki hated calling her by that name. His earliest memory of her was from just a year ago after Charmwill had unshadowed him. While Charmwill took care of him, she was rarely around. She only appeared when she felt like it, criticizing his sleeping habits, reminding him to brush his teeth before sleep, urging him to clean his car, knitting the holes in his trousers and socks, and pestering him about meeting an earthly girl he could fall in love with and marry. Calling her Babushka was silly; he needed to taste the word mom on his lips more often. It made him feel loved.