Red hair, so much like mine, hung in thin strands to her ankles. Her pale skin had such a translucence to it, dark veins webbed everywhere just underneath. Protruding from them in two-inch needles were thorns. Hawthorns. As if she'd stabbed herself with them like the Counselor. Or as if they had sprouted from inside her.

The picture of her that used to hang in Whaty-Whats always made me think someone as beautiful as her could never have darkness inside her that made her kill ...