Alice, in turn, appeared before the entrance to the Beast's tower. The silver key fit the lock perfectly, as expected.

In a room on the top of the tower, she found a big glass coffin. And in it — the body of Lady Autumn.

For the first time, Alice saw her face. The woman she met on Island of Souls, the one who was such a great help to her and Kira, had a mask on and was not actually Lady Autumn herself but a memory of her kept in that world, a palm print on the sand, easily erased by the lightest of winds. As all souls are.

Lady Autumn in a glass coffin seemed peaceful, as if she was sleeping. She looked similar to Kira and Alice. Wide cheekbones, sharp chin, wide-set eyes. Same red hair. Only her hair was long, reaching her feet, as befits a queen from a fairy tale. Alice never saw anything prettier than this hair. It was like cooling embers in a hearth, like lamplight in a dark room where a scary but exciting story is being told, like magical gold of elves that turns into a heap of dry leaves, like withered grass in November trembling in the wind, like rusty pebbles in clear water of a creek, like stripes on a back of the red cat who is hiding in folds of mum's skirt.

If Alice were not a doll, tears would surely trickle down her cheeks.

Gentle reader, you think this is not the right time to admire Lady Autumn? But every story needs a pause for the heroine and the storyteller to rest, even their breath and stop fingers from trembling. Because... you must have guessed what happened at that moment by laws of the Greek drama, right?

A terrible noise made the walls tremble. The glass of the coffin clinked highly and despairingly... And suddenly the Beast's dark antlers covered the whole world.

He was enraged, and seeing Alice near the glass coffin made him even angrier. He moved towards her with a huge roar, deafening as the voice of the storm.

"Wait!" she screamed. "I am..."

But he did not stop to listen. He threw her at the wall with a single swing of his giant paw.

Maybe I am stupid for coming here, Alice thought. It was hard enough to even hold the swords in her fragile doll hands, let alone fight with it! She tried touching the shiny blade, calling for Kira, as she always did in the most desperate of minutes. But the Beast swiftly snatched away her sword and broke it. The blade shattered to thousands of sharp pieces, too small to see Kira's face in them.

"That's it, Kira", said the Beast. "You are done."

He stepped on her doll body and crushed it with a loud crackle.

"I am not Kira", the girl whispered. "I am Alice..."

"Alice?" the Beast repeated, dumbfounded. "My Alice?"

His body started shrinking, his features — changing. He became the man known as the Wizard in Amber City.

"What have I done?" he murmured, heartbroken. The Wizard fell to his knees beside the maimed doll and took her cracked head in his arms. "How could it happen?"

"Father, I am dying..."

Alice lied: she still had some strength left. She felt for a piece of the shattered blade with her fingers. It was lying not that far away.

"Take pity on me and explain, please, what happened between you and Lady Autumn?"

"What happened?" The Wizard gave a short, wicked laugh. "Love. Love that was worse than war. Lady Autumn... Is that how you call her? She had another name before. Alright, Alice, I will tell you everything."

He began talking, and the further he got into the story, the softer was becoming his gaze, changing from enraged to sorrowful.

 "We met in a different place, the one neither you nor Kira have ever seen. My own world seemed boring and monotonous to me, so I loved visiting foreign ones. And she... Oh, who in their right mind would call her world boring? But she has lived long enough to get used to it, and nothing surprised her, nothing excited her anymore. She wished to die, and I tried to keep her at my side. I was sure together we could create something new, wonderful and miraculous. I hoped she would breathe life into my bleak world, bring that graceful deviance that distinguishes a living butterfly from a beautiful drawing... But it happened the other way around. She brought suffering and destruction. We turned out to be too different, painfully so, and that is why we could not offer anything good to one another. It is a very long story, and I am not going to recite it all, also because it is only ours, not yours, not Kira's. We caused a lot of pain to each other, and the end is predictable — she died anyway. You two were all I had left, and I wanted to keep you apart. I was afraid that otherwise, you would become just like her, unattainable darkness and storm. I wanted to make a version of her that would never leave me. Never change. Never die. I was too scared..."

"...of being left alone", Alice finished for him. "It was not love, father, it was fear. I know what it means to fear loneliness. But it does not redeem what you have done. I love you, father, but you tried to kill my sister, and that would strip me of my possible future, of what I could become. The world you built for me is a prison..."

The Wizard did not seem to listen.

"I will mend you", he mumbled. "You will be as small and adorable as before. Who will remind me of her if I lose you? Sometimes it feels like it was only my imagination and she never existed, you know? I am not even sure if all of that was real or not... Did she... "

He trailed off and looked at her with clouded eyes.

That moment of confusion gave Alice a perfect chance to push a piece of the shattered blade into his chest.

Alice stared at him in terror, as if she could not believe it was her doing. Regular human blood, red coloured, was streaming from the wound.

The Wizard's expression changes to infinite astonishment, as he could not ever hope this would happen, and then — to blissful happiness.

He slid down to the floor, not even trying to put pressure on his wound. It seemed like he was looking through Alice, not at her, but something in the distance.

"Finally... Take me with you in the calm darkness..." he murmured. "You will not leave me again, right? I can not live without you..."

Alice remembered how the two-headed Cat told her that sometimes a villain can turn out to be a victim. She knew this had to happen, but still, she felt like crying.

"Father", she said, her voice trembling. "I am no Autumn, I am... Have you ever noticed me — the real me?"

He looked straight at Alice, with a slight surprise, as if he saw her for the first time.

"You are not even that similar. Yes, I know who you are. Poor girl, you inherited loneliness from me..." His voice was gradually fading. "But you got courage from your mother. I hope it will help you and you will be happier than me..."

And with this, the Wizard — the Beast — her father — died.

Oh, I wish I could rest a bit, Alice thought to herself, pressing her doll cheek to the stone floor. I am ever so tired. And in so much pain. I will sleep for a few minutes, just for a few minutes...

And her set-in eyes closed.

*

Kira, crawling through the tunnel in the well in complete darkness, was relentlessly trying to peek into the black horn, but she could see neither Alice nor herself. But Kira always thought that she would definitely feel it if something happened to her sister, and she had no such feeling yet.

Soon she saw a light at the end of the passage.

Looking at this tiny as a winter moon spot that promised freedom, she felt sad for the loss of everything she will cease to be and happy for the gain of everything she was going to become in but a moment. And then Kira felt the dire need to share these feelings with Alice since they were always sharing all they had.

Kira dipped the tip of the horn in her blood and slowly, clumsily wrote in the Wizard's book, tracing out each letter painstakingly:

Sisters finally met and never parted ways again.

She climbed out and gladly noted the Wall of Amber City was now behind her. And here, beyond that wall, she saw the fields with bellflowers and other blooms, just as citizens were always describing, even though they never saw these fields with their own eyes.

She also saw a railroad, stretching all the way to the skyline, where it blurred in a single glistening spot. And a small station without any nameplates, signs, or timetables. Kira noticed it right away when she got up on the railway embankment.

There was nothing else beyond the Wall — only the vast fields, rails and a station. Kira came to the edge of the platform and started waiting for the train.

Sooner or later — let me remind you, gentle reader, that this expression always means "later" — the train arrived.

Kira stepped in a carriage and sat beside the window. A girl was sitting opposite her, a girl like her, with red hair.

The train began to move.

If one of them were to look out the window, she would not see the Wall behind. It was gone. And no Amber City, a toy stuck in a timeless space.

She would see another city, devoid of any human soul, a kingdom of empty streets, paving stones crumbling from time, squares with overgrown grass, rusting machines, collapsed statues, dried-up fountains, shattered columns; inhabited only by birds and cats. A city that has finally achieved a delicate balance.

It will remain this way forever: in a limbo, between dreams and reality, darkness and light. There is a hint of death to the place, but you should not be scared of it: there is no life without death.

People will wander into this city — mostly children, of course. They will play in the ruins of old buildings eaten by winds, climb ancient stones covered in vines, cheer to anyone who would be lucky enough to find a mouldy gold coin of some unknown country or notice a rusted anchor with strange writings in a foreign language.

Ah, why am I wasting my time telling you all this? We all have been to this city, and any road can lead to it, especially in autumn or in the twilight. I am sure you suspected it was not only your world when you were playing there, you noticed footprints on the sand, maybe found a piece of paper with a drawing or a fragment of someone else's story — a silent hello from another child who also got to visit this place?

But Alice and Kira did not see the city they left behind, familiar and unfamiliar to them at the same time. They were not looking out the window, but at each other, holding hands, talking endlessly, when you might think they already knew everything about each other — what else is left to tell?..

And one of them had a deep voice, dark and quiet as the night sky.

And another had a soft touch, warm and confident, the one that gives hope.

Wheels were clattering rhythmically, and soon empty fields gave way to new, unusual sceneries.

Girls did not know where the road will lead them. They did care, but it was not that important. Sometimes your destination does not mean as much as your companion on the journey.

Gentle reader, you surely wish to ask me — were there two girls or only one and how did the story really end?

But I do not know.