He turned the deadbolt on the door and Constance-Mrs. Colbert-sang a scale of disharmonic notes. The letters on the box lit up, and Mina heard another click as if the box had unlocked.

Nan looked scared, but her curiosity got the better of her. "Escape? What's go-"

Nan froze. Mrs. Colbert finished waving her hand in the air and let it fall to her side.

"What did you do? Unfreeze her now!" Mina rushed to her friend and checked to see if she'd been harmed.

"She's fine and will unfreeze momentarily. We just need a minute without her to discuss our terms before we proceed."

Mrs. Colbert gently opened up the lid and then pulled the sides open to reveal a hundred small compartments, each covered with a unique symbol. Her fingers flowed across each of them as she searched for the one she wanted.

"Aha!" she said softly. As she pulled open the small compartment, a tendril of light began to trickle out of the box. She wound it around her finger, and it solidified into a small golden charm. Quickly, she closed the drawer, as another tendril of light wanted to escape after the first one.

"What is that?" Mina asked, wondering if these were the charms her mom wore.

"Pandora's box," Mrs. Colbert answered, walking toward Nan with her hand outstretched.

"Like the Greek myth? Where Pandora opened the box to release all of the evil into the world. Is that the same box?"

"No, that box was destroyed. Since then, Pandora has tried to make up for her transgression by collecting the strongest and best attributes in the box as a way to make amends. We've been the protectors of this box for over a century now. This is Pandora's jewelry box."

Nix moved over to stand closer to the box, highly interested in the other symbols, his lips moving as he read them. Ever kept to the edges of the room as she watched in silence. She had her arms crossed in front of her and leaned against the wall, pretending she wasn't interested in what was happening.

But Mina could tell. She was as curious as Nix.

"It took many years, but we were able to add locks to each compartment." Constance approached Mina and leaned down to speak quietly with her. "The Guild and I have spoken. We listened to your request for help, and we've voted in your favor."

"Meaning?"

"We've decided to allow you one."

"One?"

"Yes, you are allowed to tell one human. We will allow only one to know of our existence. Other than your immediate family of course...and your Fae friends." She looked over at Ever and Nix.

Mina was quiet for a second, contemplating how wrong all of this was. There were hundreds of Fae that knew about her, but she could only tell one human person. She had already told Brody and now Nan knew. She was already over her allotted human limit. "What happens if I want to tell more?"

Constance shook her head. "We can't allow that. We would have to erase their memories ourselves. Any more and they become a liability to us, to you- to all Fae. So I have to ask you now..." She held out the small gold charm in the shape of an anchor. "Is Nan Taylor your one?"

Mina's eyes flew to Nix who leaned back in surprise. He pinched his lips tightly, signaling that he wouldn't say anything about Brody knowing. Now-when they were locked into a magic room with Pandora's box-was not the time to argue. But this clearly made him even more interested in the box full of charms.

When Mina hesitated, Constance added, "Because if she's not, we need to erase her memories before she leaves this room. And unfortunately, we aren't as skilled as the Fates in doing it."

Her veiled threat made Mina rush out her answer. "Yes, yes. She's my one."

"Okay then. The Guild will be happy to hear you've chosen." She waved her hand and Nan picked up right where she left off.

"-ing to escape?"

"Nothing that you need to worry about. Here, Nan. Take this charm and wear it, but do not ever take it off." She pressed the small key-shaped charm into her hand. "It will help unlock your memories and keep them from being altered in the future."

Nan looked at the little golden key charm. "Sweet." She lifted it up in the air and promptly dropped it. The charm slipped across the floor. "Oops."

Nix moved away from Pandora's box and reached down to pick up the runaway charm. He handed it to Nan, shooting Mina a disappointed look.

Mina understood. If the Guild caught her-she'd just chosen her best friend over Brody. They would once again be back to square one in their relationship. But in that moment, she'd had to make a choice.

She would just have to make sure the Guild didn't find out.

Mina was silent and despondent as Constance led them back to the main hall. Nan seemed as chipper as Mina had expected and took everything in great stride. She had a spring in her step. It also helped that Nan held onto the charm and continued to rub her finger over it like it was a good luck token.

"I'm to bring you to the hall of mirrors," Constance said.

"Ooh! Sounds interesting," Nan smiled and came over to squeeze Mina's arm.

The hall of mirrors was a white circular room filled with mirrors of all shapes and sizes. Mina had been in there once before. With Jared.

The door they entered disappeared into the white wall, making it almost impossible to detect in the rounded room. The mirrors covered almost every square inch. One was the size of a small moving truck with an illegible plaque next to it. Many had ornate frames of gold or silver; a few had simple wood frames.

Mina walked past an antique mirror, the glass now cloudy with dust. There was no shadow of movement behind it and she briefly wondered if that was because the Grimm it watched had passed on. There was no reason to clean a mirror if you weren't looking into it every day.

Usually she could see at least the barest glimmer of a silver shadow before it came into focus. But now she noticed more mirrors had no movement behind them. They were just lifeless.

She was drawn to her own looking glass, a smaller handled mirror that hung on hooks on the wall across from them. It took only a moment after her finger brushed the surface for her image to appear in her mirror. This time she didn't look around searching for the hidden cameras.

Nan had moved over to a large mirror to check her reflection. She was studying the spot on her forehead where there'd previously been a cut, but jumped in surprise when someone else's image reflected back at her.

Mina turned to see who was in there. A large man in his fifties, wearing a suit, sat eating a bratwurst at his dinner table. The colors of the kitchen and the cabinetry didn't look American. It must be one of the distant Grimms over in Germany or Europe somewhere.

Something moved near the edge of the frame, catching Mina's eye. A little brown mouse perched precariously on a wooden ledge, watching the goings on in the mirror closely.

Nan waved her hand in front of the man's face but nothing happened. "Hey. Hey you!" The man continued eating, oblivious to the fact that he was being watched in the mirror. "This is so creepy."

Nix had apparently never been in the mirror room and was writing in the dust on all of the old mirrors. When he walked away, they read NIX in capital letters.

"Why'd you do that?" Nan asked.

He shrugged his shoulders. "Now they will have to be cleaned."

"Dork," Nan rapped his shoulder playfully.

"Sprunk." Nix answered, his face lighting up.

Nan looked taken aback. "I don't even know what that is."

"And you think I know what a dork is?"

"Ha, ha. Very funny. That is exactly something a dork would say."

"Not only are you a Sprunk, but you're a Feeter too!"

Her eyes went wide, and she called out in a whiny voice, "Ever?"

Ever held up her hands. "Don't drag me into this name-calling game, or both of you will lose."

Just then, Mei entered the hall of the mirrors, rejoining them.

Constance moved to a small door near the floor and gave a slight knock. The door opened, and a little white mouse wearing spectacles and a blue robe stepped out.

"Hello, Constance, Mina, and friends," the small mouse said in greeting. His high-pitched voice was soft and squeaky. Nan squeezed Mina's arm in unbidden excitement at seeing the talking mouse. He quickly ran up the closest frame, perched at eye-height for Constance.

"Hello, Baynard. What is our current situation?"

Baynard rubbed his small paws over his eyes and adjusted his glasses. "It's not good, not looking very good at all. They're disappearing at random." He ran across the frame and crawled up a wire to the frame around another mirror. "Our sources say that this one is next." It happened to be the same mirror that Nan had been looking into earlier. Baynard hopped onto the same ledge as the little brown mouse, who moved over so he could sit by her.

"What's going on?" Concern gripped Mina. Were the Grimms disappearing?

Constance rubbed her hands together and then pressed them to her lips. "We're not sure, but once we heard Mina's concern about her brother, the Guild has been monitoring the other Grimms more closely. We've noticed that they are fading."

Mina's heart beat a little faster at that word. Fading?

"The watchers seem to have discovered a pattern."

"What kind of pattern?" Nix asked, moving to get a better view of the mirror everyone was now crowding around.

Baynard nodded his head and looked at a small pad of paper that the brown mouse held up for him to see. "We don't know for sure that it's a pattern, but all of our research points to Leonard Grimm as the next one."

"Next one to do what?" Mina asked, feeling extremely anxious. She wondered what in the world Constance meant by "fading," but now wasn't the time to ask. Everyone was busy watching Leonard.

Mina wanted answers, and grew more frustrated by the second. She was bored with watching this distant relative eat his dinner. He had polished off his sausage and was now working on the sauerkraut. He burped, wiped his mouth with a napkin, and then speared another sausage for his plate. He began cutting the sausage and stabbed a piece on his fork.

Mina's stomach was queasy just watching him eat, and she wanted to turn away, to look anywhere else. But everyone seemed to be waiting for something. So she watched the silver tined meat-bearing instrument head to his mouth and those fat greasy lips.

The fork never reached Leonard's mouth.

It dropped suddenly to clatter on the blue plate.

The reason it never reached its destination?

The Grimm in question ceased to exist.

Chapter 14.

"He's gone!" Nix exclaimed. "Where'd he go?"

Mina couldn't believe what she'd just seen. One minute he was there-eating-and the next...he was gone. He'd just blinked and faded out.

"Did a Reaper get him?" Mina asked, scared of the reply. She knew personally how dangerous it was when a hunter from the Fae plane had a Grimm in their sights.

"Negative." Baynard turned to the other mouse by the mirror. "Rewind it, please, Thistle." The little brown mouse reached up and ran her hands across the glass. The Grimm was once again back in the frame. Thistle paused the glass by placing both paws over the mirror. They were able to get a closer look at Leonard, and in his paused state they could actually see him starting to appear translucent-thinner? Thistle lifted one paw, and we watched the horrendous scene all over in slow motion. He raised the fork to his mouth, and this time Mina watched Leonard's face. He didn't look scared; in fact, he didn't even seem to notice what was happening to him. He was so focused on the food in front of him, he never saw his own doom.

"What does this mean?" Mina asked. Her voice sounded anxious even to herself. "This has happened before? How often?"

"Constance, do you mind?" Baynard asked. Mrs. Colbert held out her arm, and he scampered down onto her hand toward Mina. "Mina, I know you don't know me. I'm one of the Guild, and we take our job very seriously. We are the ones who assign the Godmothers to their Grimms. And lately, like you just witnessed, they are disappearing."

"How can you let this happen?" Mina accused Constance.

"We didn't know what was happening at first. Our Godmothers were simply reporting that they couldn't find their charges. But when you informed me about seeing Charlie flicker out, I knew it had to be more. We checked the looking glasses, but they can only hold a few minutes' worth of history. All we saw were empty mirrors, frozen in time in the last place the Grimm was."

"Do they reappear somewhere else?" Nix asked.

The mouse shook his head sadly. "All of our research shows that they've just ceased."

"What do you mean 'they've just ceased'?" Mina cried out, fearing she already knew the answer.

"They no longer exist. It's like they are being erased from time. All we know for sure is that something seems to be following the Grimms' line and wiping each of them out," Thistle explained softly.

"So you're saying that because Mina is a Grimm, her branch of the family could be next? That Charlie, her mom, and she could be in danger of disappearing like that?" Nan pointed to the empty mirror.

"Unfortunately, yes." Thistle hung her head.

"But you're not certain it will target her family? It's just a hunch? It could skip over her family entirely?" Nan's voice rose in pitch with each question.

"It won't," Mina spoke up.

Ever turned to Mina. "It could be a fluke. Maybe it will stop. There's no guarantee that the rats are right."

"They're not rats. Baynard is part of the trusted Guild of Fae Godmothers, like me," Constance spoke up sternly. "We are doing the best that we can."

"Well, maybe your best isn't good enough. Maybe she needs a new Godmother," Ever hissed.

"Ever!" Mina warned.

"No, she's right," Mei agreed solemnly. "I don't know if I'm capable of protecting her. That's why I pushed for allowing her friends to be a part of this. She needs help."

"It's too late. I'm already starting to fade. It's happened to my brother and now me. Tell me you know what's causing this!" Mina spun toward Constance and Baynard.

Constance sighed and looked to Mei. "I was afraid of that. Something has altered the course of the tale."

"Which tale? This doesn't sound like any I know of," Mina said.