epilogue: i become one with the forest, forever and ever ___ i choke on vines. why am i reduced to this? helpless, like the songbird that i saw the emerald-eyed beast devour, now nothing left but bones, pearly white bones. like my ma, with her blood-kissed lips, when the teeth came for her. i am sleeping beauty, but i lie in the sprawling roots, twisted like snakes around me, crying. no prince will come for me.
