I screamed and recoiled backwards, nearly tripping over a book. The canary squawked in sympathy or fright, I couldn’t tell which.

As I ran to the farthest corner of my room, I watched in horror as the casement suddenly opened, the lock falling down to the garden below. The figure floated into the room and landed on the floor.

She was a woman of inconceivable age, beyond age, the face so wrinkled and weathered that her eyes were sunken into the decayed flesh. Her eyes glittered with a cruel light as she extended a hand towards me, her nails impossibly long and yellow.

“We are reunited. At last, daughter, at last. That imbecile could not hold me back forever. The curse was just a ploy, just a clever ruse to keep you safe until I could come back to claim you. And now I have come. At long last.”

My brain dimly registered what she was saying. The curse…just a ploy…to keep you safe.

“Are you saying I’m not cursed? My hair can be cut and I won’t die?” I asked her.

“That’s right, my little one.”