Snow White

Background

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Powers and Abilities

While she has no real powers, Snow is, like all Fables, extremely long-lived and difficult to kill. These attributes are allegedly proportional to their individual popularity among the mundanes. She has survived a serious shot in the head which would have instantly killed a normal person.

She is a highly competent administrator and organiser, basically running Fabletown while Deputy Mayor. She is also a formidable fencer.

Children

Her children have inherited abilities from their father and grandfather. When they were born they mostly looked slightly inhuman, but thanks to training from their grandfather they have learned to change their form from human to wolf. However they do not have full control over this yet, and they sometimes change when surprised.

They were also born able to float, and have learned to fly in a controllable fashion.

The one named Ghost, was born invisible and is unable to change this. Since he has not been trained by their grandfather, it is unlikely that he can change his shape.

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History

[A fuller history of Fabletown can be found in the main article]

Once upon a time the sisters Snow White and Rose Red lived in the forest with their mother. The sisters were inseparable, and vowed to stay together forever. Fate had other ideas.

Befriending a talking bear, they learned — after getting caught up in an evil dwarf’s misadventures — he was actually an enchanted prince. The sisters sought to help the ungrateful dwarf out of his predicament by the only way they could: cutting his beard. This also took away his power, allowing the bear to find and kill him.

With the dwarf’s death, the bear transformed into Prince Brandish Descry. Brandish promised to marry Snow, and that Rose would marry his brother. Brandish’s father had other plans, and decided to have Snow killed.

Snow’s mother saved her by pretending she’d drowned, lying even to Rose. Snow was sent to live with her aunt, the queen of another realm. Her aunt, however, was vain and jealous, and when her magic mirror said Snow was fairer, the aunt told her woodsman to execute Snow.

Prince Charming

The woodsman let her live, but Snow was on her own in an unknown part of the vast forest. She was captured by seven dwarf brothers, who kept a diversion cabin nearby. They regularly kidnapped village girls to serve their needs, using them until they died. Snow didn’t. She was eventually found in the empty cabin by Prince Charming, and they were married soon after.

When he promised anything she wished as a wedding gift, he was surprised when she asked for fencing lessons. Nevertheless he agreed, provided they were performed in private. So Snow learned to handle a sword and put her skills into practice, taking long rides and losing her escort as she began hunting down the dwarf brothers.

She killed the last of them in their diversion cabin. Charming had been investigating the murders due to the political tensions it created with the dwarf kingdom beneath them, and recognised the cabin. He had a convicted murderer framed of the killings to ease tensions, but let Snow know he knew the truth (although nasty rumours spread about her time with the dwarves).

Divorce

This put a strain on their relationship, and may be what ultimately undid it. It wasn’t, however, the overt factor.

While Snow had forgotten much of her youth following her trauma, it eventually returned, and she remembered her sister. Rose was brought to be with her, but learning she’d been lied to poisoned their relationship as Rose believed Snow had betrayed their pact.

After causing havoc among the men of court, Rose set her sights on Prince Charming. It took some time, but she eventually seduced him, and Snow found them in bed together.

Flight

Snow ended the marriage. Not long after, the Empire invaded the kingdom. Snow fled with Red, who was after all still her sister, joining those fleeing the invaders. The invading forces caught up to the exodus, and the sisters only escaped by fleeing into a dark forest.

Finding the burnt-out remains of a gingerbread cabin, they discovered the charred remains of a witch in the oven still lived. Helping the old woman (who they’d later know as Frau Totenkinder) recover, Rose insisted they take her with them. Snow was reluctant after hearing of the things she’d done, but Rose was adamant.

They took turns carrying the witch until they found transportation, but were separated from her before reaching the haven they’d sought.

The wolf

The sisters were caught before reaching safety, and became part of a chain gang. The troops escorting them were attacked by a wolf of giant size, who easily dispatched them. While many terrified prisoners attempted to flee, Snow took up a fallen sword to defend herself and her sister.

Amused by her defiance, the Big Bad Wolf explained he was self-appointed guardian of the portal in the Witch’s Cave through which they’d hoped to flee. He offered to escort them there, on the condition he was allowed a nip of each of them, to ensure that their blood wasn’t tainted by service to the Adversary.

They agreed, and so the Wolf helped them reach the mundane world around the year 1450, where they joined the nascent Fabletown. Snow became part of its government, serving as assistant to Ichabod Crane, although they were never friends. Her relationship with Rose continued to deteriorate, and they drifted apart over the centuries.

Civic duties

Due to their previous encounter, Snow was assigned to contact the Big Bad Wolf when he finally left the Homelands a couple of centuries later. She travelled with Feathertop to Carpathia, where they found the Wolf, and convinced him to join their community.

Cutting him with an enchanted, lycanthrope-stained knife, Snow gave him the ability to shift into a human form, in which he adopted the name Bigby Wolf.

While Bigby accepted the role of Sheriff, Snow continued to act in various capacities in the government, including envoy to the Arabian Fables. During this assignment she found herself trapped by a sultan. For three years she had to tell him stories to keep from being killed. After a thousand nights and a night she ran out of stories, but by that point the sultan had become so enamoured with her that he let her free.

Snow eventually became Deputy Mayor after Ichabod Crane’s dismissal in recent times for embezzlement and sexual harassment. Boy Blue became her assistant.

Animal Farm

When her sister appeared to have been murdered, Snow insisted on being involved in Bigby’s investigation. This occurred at the same time as Prince Charming’s return to Fabletown.

Bigby eventually revealed that Rose and her boyfriend Jack had faked her murder to evade a debt she owed Bluebeard. When Bigby used the opportunity of their working so closely together to admit his feelings to Snow, she quickly rebuffed him.

Rose was sentenced to community service at the Farm for her actions, so Snow escorted her there in hopes of finding a way to reconnect. On their arrival, Snow was surprised to find the farm’s administrator, Weyland Smith, missing, and a number of the residents acting suspicious. She soon discovered a revolt underway amongst some residents, but evaded capture with the assistance of Reynard the fox.

Revolution

She was hunted by the tiger Shere Khan, but managed to kill him using a firearm converted for use by the revolutionaries. Finding the captive Weyland Smith, Snow was forced to join him in captivity when the revolutionaries caught up to her. She was only allowed to live due to her sister — who’d apparently joined them — insisting she be left alive.

Snow and Weyland escaped, and Snow woke the sleeping giants and dragon in a nearby valley. They returned with her to the Farm buildings, where they easily overpowered the revolutionaries just as the cavalry arrived from Fabletown.

They arrested all the ringleaders except Goldilocks. Before making good on her escape, Goldilocks shot Snow in the head. Despite her fable nature, Snow only just survived the experience, and it took months for her to fully recover. When she did recover, she discovered Rose had been made the new administrator of the farm, and the two began a reconciliation.

Storybook Love

Goldilocks wasn’t finished with Snow, and made an alliance with Bluebeard, who wanted Bigby dead. Bluebeard had Bigby and Snow bewitched to go off on a camping trip together, where Goldilocks would have the opportunity to kill them. Bigby and Snow awoke one morning in camp with no memory of how they came to be there.

They tried to leave, but Goldilocks shot their car off the road, forcing them to wait in ambush for her. Goldilocks got the drop on Bigby, flooring him with silver bullets. But Snow caught her by surprise, planting a hatchet in her head and sending her into the path of a truck.

Snow and Bigby returned to Fabletown to discover Prince Charming had killed Bluebeard in a duel. Soon after, Snow learned she was pregnant. She confronted Bigby, who admitted he’d smelled instantly that they had been intimate while under the enchantment, but hadn’t told her so as not to distract them from the matter at hand.

Children

She remained furious at him for a long while, especially on learning she was carrying a litter, but had to admit eventually that she did have feelings for him.

It wasn’t long after the wooden soldiers attacked that she gave birth to six babies, although Frau Totenkinder congratulated her on the birth of seven. As Prince Charming soon won the election for Mayor, both Bigby and Snow resigned.

With the children not appearing entirely human, Snow was forced to take them to the Farm to raise them, where Bigby was unable to follow. They had little choice but to separate.

Mean Season

Soon after they arrived at the farm, Bigby’s father, the North Wind, turned up to see his grandchildren. He offered to help them learn to control their powers. Since this would also allow them to assume fully human forms, Snow agreed.

After a while, a series of murders occurred with the victims being deprived of air. The North Wind claimed it was the work of a zephyr, a corrupted member of his kind usually killed at birth. He ordered his servant to hunt it down and kill it.

Snow realised what Frau Totenkinder’s comment had meant and found her seventh child – the zephyr who’d unknowingly committed the murders. Afraid of what would happen, she told Ghost it’d have to survive on normal air, rather than that in living bodies, and, realising it was in danger, sent it to find Bigby.

An education

The other children learned from their grandfather how to shift to fully human or fully wolf form, although it’d take years to learn the discipline to avoid shifting as their mood took them. Determining the children were sufficiently tutored, the North Wind returned home with an invite for the family to visit.

The cubs were a few years old before allowed to meet Bigby. After completing a mission for Prince Charming in the Homelands, the family was given a portion of the Farm, renamed Wolf Valley, where they and the kids could live. On their reunion, Bigby proposed to Snow, and she accepted.

They were married by King Cole, and returned from their honeymoon to a house built in Wolf Valley.

Inherit the Wind

Snow played a guiding role in the war against the empire, as Wolf Manor became the command centre for the war effort. During time of danger, such as when Mister Dark threatened Fabletown, they sent the cubs to stay with their grandfather. Bigby still didn’t like the old man, but under pressure from Snow did relent enough to visit, and they reached a kind of understanding.

After North Wind died stopping Mister Dark, his servants revealed one of the cubs would have to inherit the role, or all would be in danger from the other Winds. After a number of test, Winter was revealed as his successor (to Darien’s disgust). Bigby stayed to watch her training while Snow returned home with the other cubs.

Descry returns

Their family life was shattered when Therese went missing, soon followed by Darien as they searched for her. Bigby returned home and set out searching for them, leaving Snow to look after the other kids and worry.

She had little chance to do much else as a visit to the reclaimed Fabletown brought her face to face with Prince Brandish. Claiming his spoken oath had made them man and wife, and that her later marriages were null and void, Brandish abducted her. He then used his magic and Fabletown’s laws to prevent anyone stopping him. Snow sent Ghost to fetch Bigby.

Brandish claimed his intention of killing Bigby and the cubs, and an enchantment on him meant any damage done to him was instead inflicted on Snow. She didn’t tell Bigby when he arrived to challenge Brandish, although the witches of the Thirteenth Floor worked to counter the enchantments. It didn’t matter, as Brandish’s magic sword eventually turned Bigby to glass.

Duel

Rescued by Rose during the fight, Snow had her broken arm (punishment for her disobedience) quickly set, and found a sword. She challenged Brandish, and didn’t let him refuse. Even forced to use her off hand, Snow proved the superior fencer, and soon had him on the defensive.

Seeing his defeat, Brandish took his revenge early by smashing Bigby to shards. Snow then ran Brandish through, the witches countering his magic just in time.

Cubs in toyland

Returning home, Snow was soon confronted by an older Therese, who told them what had happened to her and Darien. Therese had been seduced away and abducted by the inhabitants of Toyland, toys banished there after killing their owners. They’d made her their queen, hoping she’d survive long enough to begin restoring them.

Darien had followed her with the aid of the clockwork tiger, Lord Mountbatten, but the toys had repelled his attempt to find her. Injured, he’d found magic and a guide to help him save Therese, but the cost was his life. He gave it. The shock of learning what’d happened brought Therese back to her senses, and the magic Darien’s sacrifice had awakened gave her a source of food.

She accepted the role of Queen of Toyland, and tasked the toys with saving the lives of a hundred children in danger as repentance for their crimes before she’d restore them.

Fairest in all the Land

Dealing with the loss of children and husband (though the witches were working on restoring Bigby), Snow began fencing lessons with Edmund Dantes to keep her skills honed, despite his protestations she was better than him. She had such a lesson when apparently approached by Prince Charming.

It was actually Goldilocks in disguise. She killed both Snow and Dantes, but only Snow was later revived by Cinderella.

Description

Snow White has always been a clothes horse when possible, wearing at least one different ensemble every day. This might have slowed down with the pups around, but not by much, and when attending business she dresses businesslike.

Personality

Strong-willed and independent, Snow has suffered so much betrayal and tragedy that she’s slow to let anyone past her guard. This has resulted in her being seen as an ice queen while deputy mayor, often coming across as hard and unyielding. The children have softened her somewhat, but centuries of hurt take time to work through.

She’s actually fairly emotional, but has grown used to hiding it until the children came along. She can still suppress it when she wants. She still cared a lot about Rose during their troubled times, but had trouble showing it.

It wasn’t until recently that she forgave her sister’s betrayal, the first real betrayal she suffered, which was probably one of the most devastating moments of her life, but the time they spent together when Snow moved to the Farm with the kids has helped mend their relationship, and Rose served her as bridesmaid at her wedding.

She’s less forgiving of Prince Charming, and her natural sarcasm becomes sharper when aimed at him.

Other traits

She retains the reputation of being a very proper, procedure-minded upper class lady who sees herself as a Serious Grown-Up Woman doing Serious Grown-Up Things. With centuries of having grown into the persona she often falls easily into it when interacting with anyone outside her family.

For centuries she devoted all her energies to Fabletown, taking her role very seriously, and basically running it while deputy mayor. She’s since switched that devotion to the cubs, although she will bring that determination and organisational ability to other tasks when required, such as directing the war efforts against the Adversary.

Snow has overcome her tendency to associate love and happiness with handsome princes, fairy-tale castles and the trappings of high society, which prevented her from easily accepting Bigby until he was gone.

While she doesn’t often get directly involved in trouble, and unless personally motivated won’t seek it out, Snow can take care of herself. Neither field-hardened nor combat-hardened, she nevertheless deals with whatever circumstances facing her with determination.

Quotes

[Doctor Swineheart begins to suggest abortion]
Snow: “Stop right there, Doctor Swineheart. Don’t you dare finish that thought.”
Doctor Swineheart: “But I only…”
Snow: “Have you forgotten how to tell your mundy and fable patients apart, or do you imagine I’ve gone native ?”
Doctor Swineheart: “I brought it up because it’s obvious you’re not happy about —”
Snow: “Since when is our happiness of primary consideration ? Some of us are still governed more by duty and responsibility. Don’t bring it up again, Doctor, if you want to remain part of Fabletown.”

“You dumb bastards ! I’m Snow White ! I run Fabletown and I’m never outgunned !”

“Brandish ! Step up and draw steel, you scurrilous cockface !”

“Do me a kindness in the next life. Suffer endlessly.”

By Gareth Lewis.

Source of Character: Fables (Vertigo, by Bill Willingham).

Helper(s): Wikipedia.com, Frank Murdock, Peter Piispanen, Sébastien Andrivet.