"You never know," Sabrina said, and she and Daphne went to join Granny Relda.
The old house was a museum of memories. Every wall was decorated with photographs from Granny Relda and Grandpa Basil's months of honeymoon adventures. Sabrina saw a picture of the two of them holding an enormous fish near an icy river, another of them white-water rafting, and still another posing in what appeared to be Red Square. There were many more photos of the girls and their father and mother. There was even one wall dedicated to the family dog, Elvis.
Their uncle Jake stepped out of the bathroom as they went down the hallway. He was a handsome blond man, a bit on the lanky side, with a crooked nose he had gotten in a fistfight. He was still in his pajamas and had a toothbrush in his mouth.
"Good luck," he said, giving them a thumbs-up gesture.
"Easy for you to say," Sabrina mumbled. "You don't have to spend your mornings running from a certifiable psychopath."
"You say it like it's not going to be any fun," Uncle Jake said with a grin.
Granny met them at a door at the end of the hall. She reached into her ever-present handbag and took out a giant key ring. There must have been a hundred keys--made of gold, silver, crystal, brass--on the ring. There was even a skeleton key that looked as if it had been made from a real skeleton. Granny sorted through the keys, found the one she wanted, and then inserted it into the door. When it was open, she escorted the girls inside. There, Sabrina found herself in a spare bedroom with an ornate, full-length mirror hanging on the wall and a queen-size bed in the middle of the room. On the bed were her parents, Henry and Veronica Grimm. They were sound asleep, as they had been for the last several months.
"Go on, girls," Granny said, nudging them forward.
Sabrina and Daphne walked up to the mirror. Daphne reached out to touch its surface and her hand slid through. The reflection rippled and moved like water upset by a skipping stone. Then she did something most people would have thought impossible: She stepped through the reflection and vanished. Sabrina and her grandmother followed.
The group found themselves in a brilliantly lit hallway, as big as Grand Central Station, with enormous columns holding up a barreled ceiling. The hall seemed to go on forever and was lined on both sides by doors. A little man in a black tuxedo was waiting for the Grimms. He had thinning hair and a soft, kind face.
"Look at my little snow bunnies," the man said as he clapped his hands with glee.
"Hello, Mirror," Sabrina said.
"Are you ready for the escape training?" Mirror asked. He gave her a wink for encouragement.
Daphne grumbled something under her breath.
"They're both a little tired," Granny explained.
"Well, I suppose we should get started," Mirror said as he turned and led the group down the hall. Sabrina looked at the doors on both sides. Some were made from wood, some steel, and others from more unusual substances. Once she had seen one that seemed to be made out of fire. Each door had a little brass plaque that stated the contents of the room beyond: magic carpets, unicorns, enchanted armor, golden fleeces, lions, witches, wardrobes--the rooms went on and on.
Finally, the group stopped at a door with a little plaque that read "The Snow Queen's Homeland." Granny handed Mirror her keys and he went to work unlocking the door.
"Hey, wait a minute. I've read the story of the Snow Queen," Sabrina said.
"Indeed," Granny said. "Hans Christian Andersen wrote about her."
"Yeah, and he said she was a nutcase and a killer. She froze some poor kid to death!"
"Are we going to be safe?" Daphne asked.
"The Snow Queen doesn't live here anymore, girls," Granny explained. "This is just where she was born. Now she lives on Beechwood Avenue near Old McDonald's farm. I think she drives an ice-cream truck. All right, girls. Let's get started."
The door opened and bitter cold wind blasted the group. Sabrina swore she could feel icicles forming on her back teeth. She looked up at her grandmother. "Are you crazy?"
"This is going to be fun," the old woman shouted over the noise as she stepped inside.
"Good luck! See you when you get back," Mirror said as he nudged the girls through and closed the door.
Sabrina glanced around. She had learned that some of the rooms held magical items and others held unusual creatures, but only recently had she discovered that some of the rooms led to other worlds. They'd been to the top of a Mist Giant's mountain, on an island that seemed to be alive, and inside a volcano--all inhospitable. But this world, this Snow Queen's Homeland, was the worst. Everything was covered in ice. There were huge boulders of it wherever she looked. The frost-encrusted ground was rock hard. Even the forest that stretched out before them was frozen stiff.