Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Raven knew that something was wrong long before she heard the knock at her bedroom door. She pulled her headphones down, letting them hang around her throat like a necklace, ignoring the distant beat of the music.

“Come in,” she called out.

Raven’s guard went up the second she saw the soldier at her door. Her grandmother had recently become a little anxious. Though, perhaps “little” was being generous. Over the duration of summer vacation, she had been whisked away on official business many times, which was quite unusual, considering that not only was she a former Evil Queen, but she was also the mother of the most hated woman in all of Ever After. And no one involved the Queens in any business whatsoever.

Though “Queen” was Raven’s own family name, “Evil Queen” was more of a title than it was a name, one to be inherited once it was time for one’s destiny to begin. Raven’s grandmother, who some called “the Evil Queen Dowager” by way of distinguishing her from the current Evil Queen, was the Evil Queen for the Snow White in the generation before Raven’s. After all, an important part of the story was that the Evil Queen would become the stepmother of a Snow White. Raven’s mum, the current Evil Queen, is meant to one day become the Evil Queen to the future Snow White, Apple White, despite her current incarceration in the Mirror Realm. As Raven would become the Evil Queen for Apple White’s future child in thirty years, give or take, she considered herself a Normal Princess at the moment, given she hadn’t had any need to be evil just yet. Destiny was far away. Evil was something she could figure out in time. She figured it would be one of those things you just grow to understand, like algebra… though she hadn’t actually come to understand that yet, either, so she really hoped that would be the case.

As for the guard at Raven’s door, those had been appearing more and more around the castle lately. Raven’s grandmother preferred minimal staff, but every time she summoned for some meetings, she hired some contract dark knights to guard the castle, as if Raven was a small child she couldn’t dare leave home alone without a babysitter. She tried not to be too annoyed about it even if she felt like she wasn’t trusted, because her grandmother had the best intentions… well, as good as the intentions of any Evil Queen could be.

“What is it?” Raven asked the guard.

“Your grandmother wants you to meet her in the grand hall at once.”

Without a word, the guard turned around and marched away, the metal of his black suit clanking with every step. Raven bit back her objections, still outfitted in her pyjamas. She tossed the shirt she was about to fold back onto her bed so that she could deal with it later. The dark knight hadn’t waited, and she scurried to catch up to him.

Raven turned off her music as the knight pushed through the doors, though she was too late to escape the disapproving head-shake from her grandmother. Raven offered a sheepish smile, pulling the headphones off from around her neck and quickly deposited her technology on the table. Though her grandmother didn’t smile, her gaze softened slightly, filling Raven with warmth. Her grandmother wasn’t strict by any means, it was more so that she was just traditional. Black magic triumphs technology any day of the week. She also still dressed in an old fashioned manner. Raven’s grandmother’s hair lay in an elegant knot at the back of her head, a sensible, floor-length gown with many layers, but not ostentatious in the slightest.

“I hope you slept well,” her grandmother said, with no time to waste, “but I have not called you down to have breakfast. We have an important matter to discuss before you are to depart to Ever After High. Quickly, now.”

Her grandmother turned on her heel and started down the hallway. Raven followed.

“Why can’t we discuss over breakfast?” Raven asked. No matter how old her grandmother was, she would forever struggle to keep up with her pace.

“This matter concerns your mother. Keep up with me.”

Raven frowned. A million questions ran through her mind, but she didn’t even know where to start. Yes, this was the time of year that Raven would get her yearly visit with her mum, but her grandmother almost never joined her. While her grandmother still loved her daughter, things had never been the same since the Evil Queen ended up in the Mirror Realm.

They arrived at a checkpoint. Two knights stood guard, but these were not the men that the Evil Queen Dowager had hired. After all, the Whites would never entrust them to make sure the Evil Queen never escaped, even if Raven’s grandmother, more than anyone, did not want her to before her time was served.

As the knights opened their mouths to address her, the Evil Queen Dowager flicked her wrist. There was a flash of purple, and the knights both froze. Their eyes, however, were still moving, flicking between one another and Raven’s grandmother, like they were trying to create a new language solely consisting of eye movements.

Raven winced. “Must you do that?”

“I do not care to hear the same old drivel.” Her grandmother stopped in her tracks and turned to face her, piercing purple eyes looking into her own, trapping Raven into place without even a single spell. She grabbed both of Raven’s arms anyways, with bony, wrinkly hands, and sharp purple-coated nails like claws. “Now, under no circumstances are you to touch the glass. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, grandma.”

“Good.”

With a dramatic wave of her arms, the double doors at the end of the hall threw themselves open, letting them into the most foreboding of rooms. The shadows seemed to stretch and curve unnaturally. Cobwebs had gathered at the corners. However, a mirror in the very centre of the room stood, pristine as ever, emanating its own light like a spotlight, instead of reflecting its surroundings. The doors shut behind them with a dramatic boom.

The light swirled in the mirror, spinning, until swathes of belladonna-purple and void-black and bone-white formed into Raven’s mother, the Evil Queen. She tried not to wince at the fact that their faces were so similar now that it very well could have been her own reflection looking back at her. The only indicator that it really was her mother was the lack of worry on her face, and the age.

“Ahh. Dramatic as ever, Mother.”

The cold drawl of her voice sent a shiver down Raven’s spine.

“Have you finally come to explain to me how I’m meant to fulfill my destiny from mirror prison? Oh, how long have I been waiting for this day to come.” The Evil Queen’s lips curled into a sinister smile. The glee was almost physically palpable. “Has the next Snow White turned seventeen yet?”

The Evil Queen Dowager glared daggers at the mirror. “Snow White’s daughter? Your very own daughter stands right in front of you. Have you no care as to how she’s faring?”

Raven flushed as all the attention was unceremoniously dumped onto her, but she couldn’t help but agree. She gave a small wave. “Hi, mum.”

“Oh, my little birdie,” the Evil Queen cooed, making Raven feel small. “How tall you’ve grown over the past year. Quite the imposing figure you strike, if I do say so myself. You take after your mother. How are you?”

“I’m fine, mum.” That was quite the understatement. Raven would never describe the Evil Queen as a bad mother, but she didn’t have the most pleasant of memories with her either. She’d never admit this to anyone, not even her grandmother, but she spent much of her childhood running around the vast castle and hiding, trying to avoid her mother. Not that there was any hiding from the strongest practitioner of witchcraft in the land. “How’s mirror prison treating you?”

“Oh, you know. It’s not too bad, but dear, how I truly miss human contact.” The Evil Queen placed her hand against the glass.

Raven inched forward to do the same. No matter what growing up was like, she still loved her mother. Now that she was bigger, older, and knew whole-heartedly her mother would never dare to hurt her, she missed her mum.

She stopped herself in her tracks. That was the one thing she was forbidden to do. Raven let out a broken laugh. She should have expected this. Her mother loved her, but first and foremost, she would use her to escape mirror prison if given the chance. She didn’t understand why she would either. It wasn’t long now until she would get to set herself up in Snow White’s castle, stretch her legs, and poison Snow White’s daughter. “Right. Of course.”

The Evil Queen shrugged, grinning wickedly. “Can’t blame an Evil Queen for trying.” She turned, her smile becoming less sincere as she looked at her mother. “When does Apple White come of age?”

Raven’s grandmother lifted her chin, looking down her nose at her daughter. “That matters not anymore. Your crimes against the Dark Fairy and Wonderland have left Milton Grimm with no choice. You have been stripped of your destiny.”

The Evil Queen’s perfectly shaped eyebrows turned downwards as she sneered at her mother. “What? This is completely unacceptable. How could this happen? This is my birthright!”

Harsh purple flames slammed against the glass with the force of a bull. Raven stepped back, half forgetting that the magic of the mirror protected her from any harm, that the glass wouldn’t shatter. The Evil Queen was awash in purple sparks that rained down to her feet. She didn’t even flinch. The purple flames flickered at her hands, dormant but ready to strike on a whim.

“You could not have thought that there would be no consequences for your actions,” the Evil Queen Dowager roared, veins popping out in her neck and temples, deep purple flames burning in her own eyes.

“They won’t just stand by and let the Snow White tale die into oblivion,” the Evil Queen insisted, voice icy, like she had gone into denial. Raven was on edge. Her mother was like a wounded animal at the moment. There was no telling when she’d lash out next. “They need me. They know this.”

“You have replaced others in their tales,” the Dowager said, lips pursed with a grim satisfaction. “What makes you think they can’t replace you in yours?”

“No!”

The purple flames slammed against the glass once more. Raven could’ve sworn the mirror rattled this time, but her grandmother wasn’t alarmed in the slightest, coldly looking at her own daughter.

“Mum, calm down–” Raven tried.

“Who have they replaced me with? Ha, don’t tell me it’s that forsaken fairy. What, is that sore loser upset that I took her destiny, so now she has to take mine? How immature.”

“No.”

The Evil Queen Dowager sighed, her face suddenly aging twenty years as she looked at Raven. All of a sudden, Raven had a bad feeling stirring in her gut.

“Then what? This is ridiculous–”

“Raven will be the Evil Queen to Apple’s Snow White.”

Apple White finds herself in a familiar, pitch black room. Through a peephole in a wooden door, floods in a dim, warm glow from some firelight– possibly the only warmth this dreaded place has ever seen. Her delicate bare feet on rough, hard stone, cold and unforgiving. Her toes have turned purple, and her dress was tattered, not something her mother would dare let her touch, let alone wear. An old potato sack on the corner, her only resting place. Unseemly, for a young princess. How long has she been here? Hours? Days? It felt like whatever was longer than eternity.

A cold draft cuts her straight to her core, and she shivers so hard that pain shoots through her skull as her teeth chatter violently.

“Cut it out!”

The shout is punctuated by a bang on the door, and Apple jumps in fright. Her chest tightens into nothing. Aha! Something she can grasp onto. She backs into the corner of the room, curls up into a ball. Rubs her arms, trying to generate as much heat as she can so that she doesn’t get yelled at again. Apple focuses on the tightness of her chest, the difficulty to breathe, the way her breaths come out in short bursts. This must be what it will feel like the first time her future Evil Queen will attempt to kill her. She pretends that her hyperventilating is actually a bodice tied too tight. That she’s about to faint, but her seven dwarves will come to save her. The dwarves, they’d save her. Her future Prince Charming would save her.

Yet all Apple could wish for is her parents. When would they get here? They always came to her rescue. They were always there for her when she needed it most. Where were they now?

Apple hears a squeak, and opens her eyes. She didn’t even realise she’d closed them, shutting out the world. With her limited vision limited even further than the darkness, she tentatively crawls forward on her hands and knees, ignoring the ache of her unused muscles, the bruises on her knees and the scrapes on her palms.

Another squeak. She gropes around blindly with one hand.

A sharp pain shot through her little pinky finger. Apple yelped in pain.

“Quiet!” a voice boomed, and banged a fist on the door a few more times, the boom reverberating through Apple’s very heart.

Apple could see two red pinpricks in the darkness now. It was a rat, and a big one at that. She made a hasty retreat back to the corner, nursing her stinging hand to her chest. Her finger became warm and sticky. Apple didn’t need to look to know what it was– not that she’d see it in the darkness anyways.

Blood. Her own mother had wished her lips would be as red as blood before she was born.

Apple took a deep breath. She could just start from the beginning.

Her fairytale would begin when her mother pricks her finger on a needle. But she only managed to get through a few more sentences of her story before she realised something was horribly wrong. Has the rat always been this close to her? No, she’d kept her eyes trained on it the entire time. It hadn’t moved. She realised with a start that the room itself was shrinking, the walls closing in on her. Not only that, but the rat was getting bigger. Its beady little eyes looked hungry, and exposed its teeth with a snarl.

Now it was as big as a housecat.

Apple shrieked, and started banging on the door. “Help! Help me!”

“Quiet down!”

Apple screamed as the rat grew larger, while the room became smaller, forcing her closer and closer to the rat. And all of a sudden it was crushing her. It opened its jaw wide. Its front two teeth, sharp as knives, caught the distant flickering firelight. And then it plunged straight down to her neck.

Chapter Text

Apple woke up in a sweat, her heart racing a thousand miles an hour. She glanced around her surroundings, from the white walls to the gold trim to her vanity, before letting out a sigh of relief. Not the dungeon again. She was safe. It was only a bad dream. She shoved down the fear she felt and locked it up tight, somewhere she wouldn’t feel it in the slightest.

With that, Apple threw off her blanket and practically sprang out of bed. After the years of uncertainty as to how her destiny would play out with the Evil Queen locked in mirror prison, her beloved parents had brought her to school yesterday to meet with Headmaster Grimm from Ever After High, Baba Yaga, and the Evil Queen’s mother. The Evil Queen’s daughter, Raven Queen, would serve as her Evil Queen. Apple had a million and one questions, and Headmaster Grimm was ever so patient with her, answering every single one of them. There was no more uncertainty. She knew exactly how everything would play out. Happily ever after was just right around the corner.

Once Apple was dressed, she called out for a maid. “Could you please pack my things for school? I must make myself present for a family portrait.”

“Of course, Princess.” The maid bowed her head and made herself busy.

“Thank you!”

Apple made her way to the throne room, greeting the castle staff and trying her best not to take too much notice of the whispers. Having been homeschooled her entire life, she had never left the castle for longer than a day, and not without an army of guards to protect her from danger. Now, it was Legacy Year, and Apple had insisted upon attending Ever After High. After all, it was most prudent that she familiarises herself with all the people that would be in her story. But not only that, with Apple’s destiny only a year away, she wanted to live as everyone else did, experience their struggles and hardships so that she could be the Queen that they all deserved. She wanted to be able to design and pass policies that would help her subjects the most, not overlook them. Some of the staff believed Apple was not ready to face the real world yet… but she would simply prove them wrong.

Two guards opened the doors to the throne room, where her parents were in discussion with the royal painter.

“Mother!” Apple greeted, and was about to hug her before her mother reached up a hand to stop her.

“Stop right there. I do not want you ruining my makeup or creating a single wrinkle before the portrait. We must be perfect.”

Apple smiled apologetically. “Sorry mother, of course.”

With that, the painter began to position the royals like they were dolls in a dollhouse. “Stand right there. Back straight. Straighter! Snow White, tilt your head about three degrees to the left– no, too much! King Charming, raise your chin. Place your hand on Princess Apple’s left shoulder. Princess, smile wider, show me those perfect teeth. Queen Snow, fold your hands in front of you, yes! The epitome of regal. King Charming, place your other hand on the hilt of your sword. Perfect. Apple, do not smile so wide that your eyes crinkle. Centre yourself in front of your parents.” He kissed his fingers like a chef. “Exceptional! Now hold that exact pose. This won’t take long.”

It was the same song and dance as every year. The painter leaned forward, walked left, walked right, trying to find the perfect angle. Once he did, he snapped a photo with his mirrorPad. Apple let out a sigh of relief once it was over. Her lips settled into a more natural, closed-mouth smile. The painter’s hand flew across the screen, tapping and swiping.

“Is this satisfactory as a reference image?” he asked, turning the mirrorPad around so the royal family could see the screen.

Apple’s perfect facial features turned into a frown. “I don’t understand.”

“What is there to not understand?” Snow White asked.

“I’m blonde. But the photo has been edited, it’s–”

“Black as ebony,” the Queen stated, looking down at Apple’s hair with narrowed eyes, “as it’s meant to be.”

Shame built up in Apple’s chest, her face felt hot. “Mother, this is misrepresenting me.”

“No, it is not. My personal maids will fix your hair.”

“Fix?” King Charming said, which Apple was grateful for. He almost never spoke against his queen. “There is nothing wrong with–”

Snow White fixed her husband with a glare, eyes flitting briefly to his own blonde hair like it was the fault of everything, before turning a gentler gaze towards her daughter. “Destiny is very important, my child. You must adhere to it. Even if it’s something as minor as hair colour. You wouldn’t want anything bad to happen, do you?”

Apple nodded dutifully. “No, Mother.”

Snow turned away and clapped her hands. “Antoine, you can start on painting the family portrait. Grace, Mary, fix her hair at once.”

Two maids who Apple hadn’t even noticed seemingly stepped out of the very walls themselves. She felt a slight guilt, but she didn’t always notice servants, especially the quiet ones. They kind of blended into the background. Apple tried to make up for it by chatting with them all the way to the Queen’s on ensuite, asking them about their day and their families and so on and so forth. Unlike Apple’s own attendants, they responded with the bare minimum answers and barely looked her in the eyes. Apple stopped talking by the time they reached the bathroom, for fear of irritating them.

The maids sat her down and got to work. A hairdressing cape went around her shoulders, squeezing her neck a little too much but she didn’t object. After all, she’d have to become accustomed to many discomforts once her destiny began and she was to leave the castle. The maids weren’t exactly gentle when dying her hair either. They tugged and pulled sections of her hair to paint dye onto the strands, and she soon felt like her scalp was on fire. It was beginning to feel less like the portrait was meant to represent the family, and more like it was Apple who must fit into the image of the portrait.

There was a brief reprieve as the maids went to start mopping up spilled dye on the floor as the chemicals settled into Apple’s hair. She finally worked up the courage to look into the mirror, wondering if she finally looked like her mother. Instead, it looked like her hair had been dipped into an oil spill. She felt a little silly about hoping it would work so soon, but it really felt like the maids had just as much disdain for her hair as her mother did.

Just as the maids had brought her over to the sink to wash the dye out of her hair, the doors burst open, and Snow White marched in, tailed by two attendants.

“How is she? Is She finished?”

“Just a moment, your Highness.”

Apple shivered as a drip of water went right down her neck. The maid quickly mopped it up with a hand towel before it stained her clothes. Cloudy black ink pooled into the sink, and down the drain with a gurgle. The maids weren’t particularly careful as they got her to tilt her head back. She would have raised her head if asked, but instead, one placed a hand over her mouth and forcefully moved her head back while the other maid started towel drying her hair.

The queen sat at a vanity as one of her servants showed her the rest of the day’s schedule on a mirrorPad, paying Apple’s hair no mind as the maids blow dried it. Apple squeezed her eyes shut and bit her lip so as to keep herself quiet. The maids were holding the blow dryer too close to her scalp for her liking, and every now and then her face was hit by a sudden rush of hot air.

Finally, the roar of the dryer died, and Apple felt her hair settle around her shoulders.

“How does she look?” Snow demanded, standing up as she came over to inspect Apple. She let out a sharp gasp. “How could this have happened?”

Apple cracked open an eye. Her hair was decidedly not black. At least, not fully. The maids had managed some black streaks, but it was equally blonde as it was black.

Apple’s mother picked at a lock of blonde hair. “Incompetent! Fix it!”

“Your highness, we tried,” the first maid spoke up. “Her hair just would not take to the dye. Look.”

Snow White followed the maid’s gaze over to the bin. It was full of boxes of black hair dye. A few boxes had even fallen out, they had used that many. Apple frowned. Her hair was thick and long, but she didn’t think she had that much hair. That looked like the amount of dye one would use for Rapunzel, and then still have leftovers.

“This is completely unacceptable,” Snow said. “I’ll have to send you to an expert. I’m going to book you in at 4:30pm at Book End this Friday at the Tower Hair Salon. I expect Rapunzel’s daughter to know some industry secret. She will fix…” Her nose crinkled up as she looked at Apple’s hair. “This mess.”

Apple nodded. “Yes, Mother.”

Snow White clapped her hands. “You have no time to waste! Off you go.”

The worst thing that Apple could possibly do on her very first day of school was to be late. Not wanting her daughter’s approval ratings to go down, Snow ushered her daughter towards her personal carriage– drawn by the fastest horses in all the kingdoms.

As the footman opened the door, Apple opened her arms for a hug. Before she could wrap her arms around her mother, Snow held up a hand once again, stopping her in her tracks.

“No, I don’t want you to wrinkle your clothes or ruin your makeup,” she said, opting instead to take Apple’s hands in her own. “I will miss you dearly, my darling daughter.”

“Mother, I will only be gone for four days,” Apple said with a small smile. “I’ll be back on the weekend in time to watch the bookball game with Papa.”

“No, you will not,” the Queen said.

Apple frowned. “I don’t get it. Briar said that–”

“Uh-uh, no frowny faces. You wouldn’t want to mar your beautiful face with wrinkles.”

Apple fixed her face into a neutral expression. “Right, mother, of course. But I thought that the students only really stay at the school if their kingdoms are too far for the weekly travel.”

“Yes, Apple, that is correct,” the Queen said. “However, I will not always be here. Neither will your father. You know how the story goes. You must become accustomed to a life that we no longer have a part in. You cannot be reliant on us forever. We’ll see you over the winter break.”

Apple nodded. She wished that her parents had told her sooner. She would have made sure to cherish the moments she spent with them as much as she possibly could have, and then more. She had always known that her destiny would start when she was seventeen (after all, seven is far too young to start since she wouldn’t have had enough of an education to become future queen, not to mention the Evil Queen being locked away in the Mirror Realm by then). But she thought she still had a year. She hadn’t even thought of the need to prepare to be apart from her parents. Having been homeschooled her whole life, she couldn’t imagine being separated for so long. But her mother was right. She wouldn’t get very far if she wasn’t self-sufficient. Especially not when they were…

“You must get going now, or you really will be late, even with my steeds,” Snow White said, ushering her towards the carriage.

“But Mother, Papa isn’t here yet–”

Snow pushed her up the stairs of the carriage. “Winter!” she called out, before shutting the door behind her.

Apple leaned her head out the window as the coachman got the carriage into motion. “Give Papa my love, Mother! Goodbye! I can’t wait to see you again over the break!”

Snow White waved her hand, before shrinking into the distance as the horses picked up speed. The force threw Apple back in her seat against nice, soft cushions.
Apple couldn’t let herself feel sad for long. Once they were out of the town square and there were less people milling about to wave at, she took out her phone and dialed a group chat by the name of The Fairest in the Land <3.

After a few rings, Ashlynn was the first one to pick up. “Oh, hi Apple! How are you? I hope you’re not nervous about your first day of school.”

“No, not nervous in the slightest,” Apple smiled. “I can’t wait. This year is going to be perfect.”

The phone pinged again, and Briar joined the call.

“It’s the A-team, just who I wanted to talk to,” Briar said. “Ladies, you know what the first day back at Ever After means?”

Ashlynn let out an amused giggle. “Ahh, yes, of course.”

Apple cocked her head to the side in confusion. “Unpacking your belongings and making an inventory checklist to make sure you haven’t missed anything, and sending a letter back to the castle just in case you have?”

“Boring,” Briar sang. “A back to school party, gorgeous. I’ve been planning this one since the start of summer vacation!”

“I’m pretty sure that Briar has been planning this one since the end-of-year party,” Ashlynn told Apple conspiratorially.

“This one is going to be a blast. It’ll be better than any party I’ve ever thrown in my entire life, I’m being dead serious right now. It’ll be the perfect way to introduce you to the rest of the school– you know, the ones that haven’t been at all your family balls and the like.”

“Aww, Briar.” Apple placed her hand on her heart, even though she couldn’t see it. “That is so very sweet. You don’t have to do that all for me.”

“Pfft, please. You’re one of my best friends. I have to make sure that your first day is a perfect one. Can’t be starting at Ever After High on the wrong foot now, can we?”

“You’re amazing. Ooh, also, a discussion I had with my Mother this morning gave me an excellent idea. Since you’ll be busy party planning, Ashlynn, would you be able to help me with something today?”

“Oh, uh, yeah, of course,” she said, a little too quickly. “I’ll still be at the family business in the morning, and, uh, something at lunch, but I’ll be all yours in the afternoon!”

“Perfect, thank you very much,” Apple said. “Now, how do you think the daughter of the evillest woman in all the lands would decorate her room?”

Chapter Text

No one took the Evil Queen Dowager’s revelation well in the slightest.

The flames sputtered out of the Evil Queen’s hands, and she let out half a chuckle. “You cannot be serious.”

But they all knew full well that the former Evil Queen was not one for jokes.

“Grandma, what?” Raven yelled. “I can’t be the Evil Queen. Not now! I’m– I’m still in school. I’m not ready.” She was meant to have years– no, decades until she had to think about any of this. And yet now destiny was right at her front door. It was like someone grabbed her world and turned it upside down.

Her blood turned icy cold as a terrible thought appeared in the back of her mind. She knew how the story went, she’d been hearing it ever since she was a small child. “Grandma, you can’t mean… you can’t mean that I’m to marry…”

“No, Raven,” the Evil Queen Dowager said. Were her lips pursed together in concern? Raven had never seen such an emotion on her grandmother’s face. “I… I managed to negotiate you out of that. The Good King had some concerns about that as well.”

Raven breathed a sigh of relief.

“There will be some… changes, to how your story goes. But the end result will be all the same. You will order a Huntsman to kill her, as I did her mother. You will try to kill her twice more when she is with the dwarves, as I have. And most importantly, you will give her a poison apple, one that will put her into an enchanted sleep, a sleep so deep that only true love’s kiss can wake her up.”

“No,” the Evil Queen screamed, it having dawned on her that this was all really happening. “That is my destiny! I am the one meant to do all those things! I signed the Storybook of Legends! You cannot take my destiny away from me!”

The Evil Queen Dowager looked coldly at her daughter. “You will have your destiny stripped from you as you have stripped others of theirs.”

The Evil Queen let out an ear-piercing screech, assailing the glass of the mirror with the purple flames of her magic. It became so strong that it burned white-hot, the glass too bright to look at. Raven turned away, blinking the spots out of her eyes.

“Let your mother exhaust herself,” the Evil Queen Dowager said, walking out of the room. “We can to breakfast now. I understand that you may need some time to… adjust.”

“Grandma, this isn’t meant to happen now.” Tears burned at the corner of her eyes. Was that because of the bright light burning her eyes, or was it grief? Raven couldn’t tell. She followed her grandmother out, voice wobbly as she continued, “This isn’t fair. Why are they punishing me for what mum did? I’m not meant to be the Evil Queen. Not yet. Not…”

The Evil Queen closed the doors behind her. The guards were still held in place by her magic. She turned to face Raven, and there was true regret in her eyes. “I am sorry. This is not what anyone wanted. But you are of the Queen bloodline. You will be strong. You will get through this one way… or another.”

That was cryptic as ever. Raven wanted to throw something. She wanted to scream. How could this be happening? She had so many plans, so many ideas for what she’d be able to do in the years before Apple’s future child was even born. She was meant to continue honing her musical talent, study the arts in college, travel the world, find a place where people didn’t hate her just because of who her mother was. But instead, she would poison Apple once she was seventeen. She would never go to college. She would not travel the world, because she would be imprisoned before she would ever get to finish high school, because that is how the story goes. There was no escaping who she was. She was a Queen, and she would always be reviled for something that she had never even wanted. Punished for her very existence.

Her eyes burned even more now, and her vision became blurred with tears. “I have to go.”

“Raven, wait!”

Raven dragged the back of her hand across her face, smearing away the tears, as she ran down the hall faster than she had ever run before. Perhaps, if she ran fast enough, she could escape destiny itself.

Raven Queen had no tears left to cry.

She sat amongst the dry flower beds of the abandoned garden. The castle used to have a garden of poisonous plants on the rooftop, but it had been many years since anyone had tended to them. Now, there were only husks. But Raven didn’t come up here for the old garden. Above her head, her namesake flew about the sky, dancing with the wind, cawing without a care in the world.

She’d also grabbed her phone and headphones from the dining hall on the way up to the roof, so that she could blast her music– now an edgy, moody band to reflect her current emotional state. Putting on music always helped Raven to understand her feelings. Just playing the first playlist that came to mind, was first of all, always quite cathartic. Once she was ready to start wading through her swamp of emotions, merely checking what genre she had put on in a hurry helped her figure out what exactly was wrong. Right now, it was quite punk. This wasn’t how it was meant to turn out. She was meant to have time.

Raven sighed. She stared at the unkindness of ravens flying across the sky, wishing she was anywhere but here, wishing she had any name but her own, maybe even wishing that she was born in a completely different time. One where destinies didn’t matter. But of course, wishing was a luxury afforded only to heroes like Cinderella and Gepetto and Aladdin. Not the daughter of a witch like her. For goodness sake, the very title she’s meant to inherit has the word “evil” in it.

Her grandmother had said she would figure it out one way or another. But what would “another” be? There was meant to be only one way. Following her destiny. Her mother hadn’t followed her destiny, and that didn’t work well for her. Or Raven herself, by extension. How long did she have until Apple White’s seventeenth birthday? Raven remembered the announcement that Apple’s story wouldn’t start until she was seventeen, unlike her mother before her. It was almost exactly a month after her own mother had been banished to the Mirror Realm, after she had cursed Wonderland and stolen the Dark Fairy’s destiny. She was sitting in her grandmother’s lap as they watched some documentary, and a special broadcast from Headmaster Milton Grimm himself suddenly interrupted what they were watching. They tried channels, but he’d taken over all the air waves. It was announced that, with the Evil Queen dead, Apple’s story had been postponed. For how long? No one knew, not at that time. Of course, Raven cried in her grandmother’s arms and begged her to reassure her that her mother wasn’t dead. The Evil Queen Dowager ended up having to get express permission from the elites to be able to visit the Evil Queen.

Raven opened her phone and searched Apple White’s name. She opened the Witchipedia page, which told her that Apple was currently sixteen, and would not be seventeen until the following year.

For the first time that day, Raven felt relief. Okay, she had until May thirteenth. This must have been what her grandmother meant– what she would do in the time before Apple turned seventeen. She would have to make the most of her time, then. Learn everything that she wanted to learn, visit all of the places she wanted to visit, everything she could before her life was upended and she went to prison. That was a solid, what, eight months? Surely she could achieve plenty in that time.

Just then, she heard a door creak. Her grandmother stepped out onto the balcony.

“Why are you lying down on the ledge? That’s dangerous.”

“Oh, sorry Grandma.” Raven sat up and quickly moved away from the ledge.

Her grandmother was visibly relieved. “It’s fine, Raven, just don’t make it a habit. Are you… okay? I found out the verdict recently, but… I wanted you to be able to enjoy your summer vacation. Your last summer vacation, without this dark cloud hanging over your head.”

Raven hung her head. She appreciated it more than she could say, so she said nothing. She got up to her feet, walked over to her grandma, and hugged her. Her grandma stood as still and stiff as a brick wall for a few moments before hugging her back. She took a deep breath, the floral old lady perfume making her nose itchy. If she could stay here forever, she would.

Finally, her grandmother let go of her, and took a step back to look Raven up and down. “I hope you’re not planning to go to school in that.”

She snapped her fingers, and Raven’s pyjamas transformed into the outfit she had laid out on her bed specifically for her first day of school. Another snap of the fingers, and Raven’s baggage appeared by her side in a swirl of purple flames, fully packed.

“If you want to come home for the weekend, you call me, okay?” her grandmother said. “Do not get into a carriage or jump down a wishing well. I’ll teleport you here myself. Now that the news is out… Raven, it won’t be easy. It’s never easy for any Evil Queen during legacy year, but with what your mother has done, I fear it will be especially hard for you.” She put her hands on Raven’s shoulders, and looked her deeply in the eyes. “But Raven, you are strong. I raised you to be strong, correct?”

Raven smiled and nodded. “Yeah, Grandma. I’ll be okay. I promise.”

Her grandmother pursed her lips. “Good. Then I believe you should be off to school. Goodbye, Raven.”

“Bye, Grandma.”

The Evil Queen Dowager waved her hand. A purple flame swirled around Raven, and her view of endless sky and castle turrets was replaced by the courtyard leading up to Ever After High. Raven tried to ignore the pit in her stomach. Magic teleportation always disoriented her, so she tried to avoid it if she could.

“Raven,” Maddie shouted from across the courtyard, jumping and waving to catch her attention.. She bounced over to Raven, before squeezing her in a bone-crushing hug.

Raven laughed and hugged her back. “Careful, Maddie. You might make my lungs pop.”

Maddie cocked her head to the side quizzically. “Like balloons? Oh, how tea-rrific…” She narrowed her eyes, mulling it over. “... –ly horrifying.”

As the two girls parted, the hairs on the back of Raven’s neck stood up. She heard the flash of a camera. Raven looked around. Everyone was very pointedly looking in directions that weren’t her, but they weren’t exactly normal directions either. One of them was staring at a blue patch of the sky, devoid of clouds, another was staring at what must have been some incredibly fascinating concrete, and yet another was face to face with a tree, as if he was about to lean in and kiss it. Something felt… off.

“Maddie, I feel like I’m going crazy right now,” she said slowly.

Maddie nodded so enthusiastically that it was a miracle that her top-hat didn’t fall off, balancing precariously on the top of her head. “All the time. I feel like that all the time. All mumbly jumbly.”

“No, but something’s off.” It felt like there was a word that she couldn’t quite remember, but it was hanging on the tip of her tongue, begging to be realised. Raven’s brows furrowed in deep concentration. “I… think I feel like I’m being watched.”

“Oh, you are.”

Raven looked at Maddie, deadpan. “What?”

“Raven, you were on the news this morning.”

Chapter Text

Raven frowned. “What?”

Maddie twirled her fingers around each other as she blabbered, “I’m sure you know the news, of course you would know the news, but I’m not sure that you know of the news being on the news. News, you know?”

“You mean… that I’m somehow going to be the Evil Queen this year?” Raven hoped that it wouldn’t come to this. She wanted to exist in the fun, peaceful bubble with Maddie where they got to be silly and she wouldn’t have to worry about being the next Evil Queen forever. She was glad, at least, that Maddie had afforded her enough time to pretend that it wasn’t real.

Maddie’s face suddenly soured. “Oh, I just remembered what started me on this tangent. I’m sorry about… well, no one was expecting it to happen this soon. I know you wouldn’t have wanted this. That you don’t want this.”

Raven nodded, wrapping her arms around herself. “Yes, I know. But Maddie, it’s not your fault. Don’t be sorry about it. It’s fine. I promise.”

Maddie grinned, linking her arm in Raven’s. “We can just make it fine! Us girls can all get together and do something fun. I know what’ll make you feel better quicker than a dodo in a caucus race! We could have afternoon tea!”

Raven smiled. Being who she was, she didn’t know how she deserved friends as good as Maddie, but she was eternally grateful. “That sounds great, Maddie. Speaking of which, how long have you been here?”

“Since the doors went squickety shut.”

“I mean, have you seen Cedar or Cerise yet?”

Maddie puckered her lips, looking to the side as she thought long and hard about it. “Cedar is busy working with Blondie Lockes on starting their MirrorCast show back up to get everyone back up to date on all the juicy gossip that’s happened over summer vacation! And I think Cerise texted us to say she has some family stuff she has to take care of before she gets here. Oh, which reminds me, Cedar checked all our dorming and advisor assignments when she arrived. We’re roommates this year!”

“Nice,” Raven cheered, raising her hand for a high five. She giggled when Maddie just ended up standing on her tip-toes to shake Raven’s hand beside her head, before leaning closer to look at Maddie’s phone. “Who are our year advisors? Let’s grab our schedules before the others get here.”

“I have one most illustrious White Queen,” Maddie read aloud. “And you’ve got… Madam Baba Yaga.”

Raven let out a theatrical sigh. “And I thought Mr. Badwolf was bad. At least his office was always in one place.”

“Aww, no fair,” Maddie said. “I’d love to do a treasure hunt for my class schedule.”

“We could swap year advisors,” Raven said with a wink. She looked down at her trunk. “Well, my Grandma spent a few days trying to teach me how to make lugging this thing around easier. It’s worth a spin.”

Raven raised her hands. Her eyes glowed, like two purple lamps, as purple flames danced between her fingers and began to raise her baggage into the air. “Stiff as a board, light as a feather, raise my trunk through the windy–”

“The next Evil Queen is casting an evil spell, run for your lives!” another student cried.

Cacophony. Immediate cacophony. It became a wild stampede as everyone made it their mission to be as far away from Raven Queen as possible. The students all ran, directionless, like headless chickens. One of them even ran into Raven’s back, realised it was her, screamed right in her ear, before turning around and tripping on the stairs to the school in her effort to get away from her. Hopper Croakington turned into a frog. When the dust cleared, the school looked deserted, as if she and Maddie had accidentally walked in during summer vacation.

Raven frowned. Next evil queen. That wasn’t a good reminder at all.

The magic sputtered out of her hands. Her eyes went back to normal. She didn’t know who she was talking to when she said, “It wasn’t an evil–” She let out a grunt as her trunk, still hovering, slammed into her ribcage. “Ow.” She rubbed her side, trying to get rid of the ache, and glared at her treacherous baggage. It knocked into her shoulder.

Maddie laughed and clapped, bouncing on her toes. “Yay! What a wonderful spell!”

Raven shot Maddie a mischievous look. “Last one to get their class schedule is a rotten dragon egg.”

Maddie let out a shriek of delight, and the two of them ran in opposite directions. Raven’s bag collided with her back, causing her to stumble. Her stomach dropped, like she was at the peak of a rollercoaster, and she only just managed to catch herself before she fell on her face.

“Would you cut that out?” she asked it, before remembering this wasn’t nearly the same situation as the overenthusiastic cutlery with minds of their own at the Hatters’ family business.

The carriage slowed down to a stop. Once the horses were relaxed, the coachman stepped down, opening the door for her. Apple thanked him once he helped her down and retrieved her baggage. He barely acknowledged her, simply nodding. Apple decided to herself that when she was queen, she wouldn’t have the same, cold relationship with her servants as her mother did. She figured she was on the right track, since she knew all her maids’ names and about their home lives.

There was an immediate change in the Ever After High courtyard once Apple arrived. Before, they were all milling about, looking for their friends, chatting with others, or trying to find their advisors. Now, all eyes were on Apple White. She smiled politely, and began dragging her luggage behind her.

“Oh, no, that simply won’t do.”

Apple turned around. The voice turned out to be none other than Daring Charming– tall, handsome. His luxurious blond hair was swept back, a crown sitting atop his head, and he wore an Ever After letterman jacket. When someone thought of the words Prince Charming, it was Daring’s face that came to mind, even though there was no shortage of Prince Charmings. No one’s heroic feats came even close to matching his.

He held out a hand towards her. Daring began to smile, but quickly covered his mouth with the other hand. “Allow me.”

His younger sister, Darling Charming, stepped out from behind him and smiled. While Daring was the embodiment of a hero, Darling was the picture perfect sweetheart. She moved with such a grace that she was almost otherworldly. If it weren’t for the fact that Apple knew both her brothers, she would wonder if the girl had a distant fairy ancestor, as it could be the only explanation. A hint of mystery, like there was more to the demure, soft-spoken damsel.

The entire world seemed to stop when Darling spoke, like the birds stopped singing and the trees stopped rustling just to hear the sound of her voice. “Welcome to Ever After, Apple.”

The undivided attention that Darling afforded people tended to make them feel as if they were the only two people in the world. She hardly even noticed as Daring took her baggage. It wasn’t a wonder how Darling came to receive such a barrage of marriage proposals from all the boys her age ever since she was a young girl. While Apple was destined to be the fairest of them all, a small part of her believed that place belonged to Darling.

Apple smiled. “Thank you so very much.”

“Apple! Daring!”

Apple looked around for the source of the sudden yell. A blonde girl in blue was running towards her with a microphone. Apple didn’t know who she was, having never seen them at any balls or galas, but she was followed by a girl holding a mirrorPad that was unmistakably a puppet, meaning she had to be the daughter of Pinocchio. Once they reached the royals, the blonde smiled widely.

“Daring, and the flawless Princess Apple White,” the girl said. “Getting the future queen on my channel would be really good for my career. Would you mind answering some quick questions for my mirrorcast show?”

“Our mirrorcast show,” the puppet corrected.

“Of course,” Apple said with a smile. This would be her first ever interview. It would make great practice for once she became queen. “What are your names, again?”

The blonde looked a bit disheartened at the question. The puppet girl spoke up. “I’m Cedar Wood, the daughter of Pinocchio. She’s Blondie Lockes, daughter of Goldilocks. It’s nice to make your acquaintance.”

“Get the camera rolling,” Blondie said quickly. Apple noticed that having wooden fingers and no warmth of her own, Cedar had to use a stylus to turn on the mirrorPad, aiming it at her friend. “It is the first day back at Ever After High, a nice leisurely day as everyone gets their schedules and room assignments. But for one, very special princess, it is her very first day at any school, having been homeschooled her whole life.” Cedar panned the camera over to Apple, and Blondie walked into the frame. “Say hello to Princess Apple, daughter of the illustrious Queen Snow White. Your Highness, how do you feel about being the new girl on the most important year of our lives: Legacy Year?”

Apple smiled as the microphone was held beneath her chin. “Oh, Blondie, please call me Apple, that’s what all my friends call me. While I’m at Ever After High, I’m a student, the same as anyone.”

Blondie flushed pink, but soldiered on. “Oh, well thank you, Apple.” She said the name like a baby saying their first word. There was some level of satisfaction that Apple didn’t quite understand. “Well? How do you feel about Ever After High?”

“I’m enchanted to be here. It’s already so wonderful and has gone far beyond my expectations-- which were already high enough to begin with. And everyone is so accommodating and thoughtful.”

“Aww, shucks,” Blondie said, waving a hand at the flattery as if it was specifically directed at her. “And how about your Legacy itself? You’ve never shied away from the magazines, and last time I checked, you were a natural blonde. ButI think the new look is just right. Want to tell us about the motivation behind the change?”

Apple tried not to show on her face how much she disliked the question. Why was her hair the most important topic once again? Why not her legacy, or her economic plans for once she became queen, or social justice reform, and all other kinds of policies and legislation she wanted to pass? “Oh, you know, just destiny. I want to be a perfect Snow White. That includes the hair. I simply cannot wait. I have plans for the kind of queen I will be.”

“I already know you’ll be the best Snow White we’ve ever seen,” Blondie said. “And who do you think– or hope– your knight in shining armour will be? Is it Daring Charming, son of the famous King Charming, slayer of dragons and rescuer of fair maidens in towers? You two have been spotted together at many balls together, as well as visiting each other according to the magazines.”

Another annoying question. Apple didn’t understand the whole boy obsession. Her Prince Charming, whoever he may be, was simply a means to an end. Her happily ever after. The only wish she had was that her true love would be the best strategically for her kingdom. The uniting of kingdoms was a delicate process. It would be quite unideal for her if her prince’s kingdom had a lot of trade disputes, or corruption in their knights, or bad economic policies. Instead of being able to improve her already great kingdom, she’d be allocating resources towards fixing problems that didn’t even exist in her own. What a waste of tax dollars. Instead, unifying with a kingdom that was politically, economically, and socially similar would allow her to work on the most current issues. It would also be convenient if her future Prince Charming was from a kingdom geographically close to her own. It would become a whole other issue security-wise if she had to allocate resources towards protecting two separate lands, with a number of other kingdoms in between them. She also needed someone strong and capable, because power couples in royalty are not to be trifled with. The only one who fit the bill for all these requirements was Daring Charming, since the Charmings of Ever After were the neighbouring kingdom to the White Kingdom. But this wasn’t a matter of having a juvenile, schoolgirl crush on him, like Blondie was implying. It was simple logic.

“We visit each other, as royal families do,” Apple said. Blondie’s expression soured again. She figured it was because it wasn’t the juicy details she was hoping for. “Briar Beauty, Ashlynn Ella and I probably visit each other more than I visit the Charmings.” She turned to Daring and smiled. “Not that I don’t like you, of course.”

Daring chuckled. “No one could ever dislike me.” He gave some passersby girls finger guns and a wink. They swooned.

“I truly don’t mind who my Prince Charming will be, as long as he is good at heart.”

Blondie turned back to the camera and grinned. “You heard it here first, folks. Apple is confident and is as ready for her destiny as one could ever be, adjusting well to Ever After High. If it’s not too hot and not too cold, then it’s just right– and Apple White is nothing short of just right. That’s Blondie Lockes for you, signing out. And cut.” She turned to Apple. “That was brilliant!”

Cedar lowered the camera, giving the aspiring reporter a thumbs up before looking at Apple. “Thank you so much for this opportunity. We appreciate it.”

Apple waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, it was nothing. I should be thanking you guys.”

“Should I take this to your room, m’lady?” Daring asked, raising her trunk.

“Oh, that would be most kind of you.” Apple batted her eyelashes at him. “Would you mind taking it to Raven Queen’s room instead?”

Daring frowned. It took him a few seconds to process the name. “But that’s the daughter of the Evil Queen.”

“Former Evil Queen,” Apple corrected. “I’ll explain it to you later.”

“As you insist,” he said, still displaying a look of befuddlement.

“See you, Dare,” Darling said, waving as her brother departed with the baggage. “Why don’t I take you to get your class schedule?”

Apple smiled. “Oh, no need for that, I already got it when I was here last week. Headmaster Grimm has also taken me on a tour around the school when he announced to my family how my destiny continues.” Her mother had specifically requested the tour, not wanting Apple to be late to any of her classes on her first day. “But, you know, Ashlynn promised to help me out with something in a couple hours, but she’s not here yet. Do you wanna join me?”

“I would love that.” The way that Darling said those words, Apple couldn’t believe anything other than that was what Darling wanted to do the most right now.

“Great!”

As the two girls walked to the headmaster’s office, Apple informed Darling of her plan. Darling nodded along. When they arrived, Apple knocked on the door.

“Come in,” a deep voice called out.

They opened the door and walked in. Milton Grimm looked rather stressed, but when he saw the two girls, the tension disappeared from his shoulders and he smiled. “Why, if it isn’t Princess White and Princess Charming. What brings you young ladies to my office on the first day of school? I hope neither of you have experienced any trouble?”

Apple clasped her hands together, her voice chipper when she spoke. “Oh, not at all, Headmaster Grimm. I actually came with a request, if you wouldn’t mind?”

“But of course. Anything for the future Snow White…” He chuckled. “Within reason, of course.”

“Well,” Apple took a step towards him, looking at him imploringly, “I obviously wasn’t here last year when everyone was submitting their roommate preferences, but I was hoping to room with Raven Queen this year.”

Milton Grimm frowned. “Why would you ever want to do that?”

“Why, Headmaster Grimm, she’s important to my story.” Apple looked dreamily into the distance, thinking of her happily ever after. “I had an idea when talking to my mother this morning. Raven and I are going to be living together next year, you told me so yourself during summer vacation. I thought it would be most prudent if we started rooming together now. I regret that my homeschooling has meant that I have not become familiar with who is arguably the most important figure in my story. But this would allow me to be close to her. My happily ever after doesn’t exist without her.” She looked imploringly at the headmaster, who seemed to be in deep thought. “Listen, I understand that it’s a little last minute, but–”

“No, Princess White, that is a wonderful idea,” Headmaster Grimm said. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of that myself. You will be an excellent Snow White. I’ll make all the necessary arrangements immediately.”

Apple beamed. “Thank you. I’ll see you later then.”

“Always a pleasure doing business with you, Princess White.”

Apple and Darling headed out of the room. The second Darling closed the door behind them, Apple squealed.

“Do you think you’ll be able to call your brother? We’ll need him to carry some furniture…”

Chapter Text

Raven regretted challenging Maddie long before she arrived at the cottage. It was her first day back at school, and she was hot, sweaty, and out of breath. But if she thought she could rest now, she couldn’t be more wrong.

Lizzie Hearts, one of Maddie’s Wonderland friends, stormed out of the cottage, huffing and puffing. Her face was rose-red, and by the looks of it, not because of physical exertion like Raven. She was half convinced that Lizzie was trying to strangle the life out of the printed schedule that she scrunched against the royal family sceptre she wielded, her whole arm shaking from how hard she squeezed it. Raven wondered if the girl would even be able to read it by the time she got back to her dorm.

Once she was past the doormat, Lizzie turned and brandished her sceptre at the house. “Off with the chicken-house’s head!”

The cottage let out a strangled squawk. The ground rumbled as the house stood up on two chicken legs like pillars. Lizzie sauntered away with her baggage and her sceptre. The house began to turn around on the spot, each step a thunderclap.

Raven’s fingers twitched, but she thought better of using magic. Her decision was reinforced when her trunk collided with her once more.

Instead, she cupped her hands around her mouth to call out to Baba Yaga, “Hello? Madam Baba Yaga? Your house is about to leave, can you please get it to stay? I need my schedule!”

She got no reply, but the house slowly sank to the ground, until the legs couldn’t be seen. It looked just like any other ordinary cottage to the unsuspecting eye. She didn’t grumble or complain that she had to walk around to the other side to reach the door.

Even though this was hardly her first time in Baba Yaga’s cottage, it still felt nerve wracking to walk through its front door. Sometimes, she saw the shutters rising and falling, like eyelids blinking so the house could see the world around it. If that was the case, it made Raven uncomfortable to walk through the front door– the mouth of the house.

Inside, Baba Yaga hovered over a bubbling cauldron. Little glass vials and bottles of various ingredients floated off the shelves behind her, each dutifully tipping themselves into the concoction. Raven watched in awe. To be able to focus on a dozen bottles, making sure that none collided with each other, that they poured directly into the cauldron, even that she didn’t accidentally shatter the glasses with unrestrained power, all while reading out of a potions book… that required a level of finesse and constitution that Raven couldn’t even begin to dream of. Her trunk collided with her back once more, forcing her to take a step forward to regain her balance.

Baba Yaga looked up from her book for the first time since Raven arrived. “I thought I smelled evil.” She waved her hand, and Raven’s trunk disappeared.

“Where’d that go?” she said.

Baba Yaga shrugged dismissively, returning her attention to her potion. “Oh, don’t you worry. I just undid that sorry excuse for spellwork and sent your baggage off your room. You’re here for your class schedule?”

Without waiting for an answer, Baba Yaga snapped her fingers. A rolled piece of parchment appeared above Raven’s head. Raven snatched it out of the air. Spinning it around, she found that it was sealed with purple wax, embellished with a raven insignia.

“Didn’t take you for an artist, Madam Baba Yaga,” she said as she broke the seal and unrolled it.

“Oh, you know, I thought I’d try a little something new– wait, you weren’t serious. I don’t appreciate sarcasm, young lady.”

“Oh, um,” Raven coughed, “no. It looks nice.” That last part wasn’t a lie, it was very pretty. She only wished it hadn’t been so on the nose, because really? Her namesake? “Let’s see. General Villainy, Home Evilnomics, Poison Theory, History of Evil Spells, Kingdom Mismanagement… oh, no.”

Baba Yaga raised an eyebrow. “What is the matter? It all looks appropriate to me.”

Raven hung her head. “I was hoping for a class I liked. I’m meant to be able to choose my classes until my last two years of high school. I submitted my preferred subject list last year. What happened?”

Baba Yaga’s gaze softened. Sometimes, Raven felt that she got special treatment. The witch had gone to school with her grandmother, and were still best friends. They went to evil lawn bowling every weekend together (where they bowled with skulls instead of bowls). “Raven, you… your grandmother told you the news, right? How much did she tell you?”

And of course, it all came flooding back. Raven sighed. “Yes. I’m going to be Apple White’s Evil Queen, not my mum.”

“Then you understand that your destiny starts next year, and you are woefully unprepared,” Baba Yaga said. “Miss. White turns seventeen before the end of the school year, so it’s not as if we could even place you in summer school and set you up with a private tutor. The plan is that you’ll do the most important subjects at an accelerated pace. Each of your teachers will help facilitate your learning. When the time comes, you will be ready, I promise you this.”

Raven nodded, trying to appear strong. The last thing she needed right now was for Baba Yaga to call home to her grandmother to tell her something was wrong. Otherwise, her grandmother might teleport her home every single day the second the school day was over to try and protect her from the big bad world. Raven couldn’t spend her last eight months of freedom hiding. She wanted to be free, before that freedom was stripped away from her.

Meanwhile, Baba Yaga sighed, like she lost a silent battle in her mind against herself. “If you would be happy to sacrifice your study periods, you may choose one class as long as I see an evil application for it.”

Raven smiled. “Muse-ic, please.” The next eight months might even be bearable.

Baba Yaga looked at her with a scrutinising eye. “You must understand that the second I see your grades falling in your other subjects, I’ll be reverting the class back to study periods so that you can focus on what’s important.”

“I won’t disappoint you, Baba Yaga.” Raven was surprised to hear the resolve in her voice.

“Now, begone! I have other students to attend to, but I sense they’re all outside huddled in fear because they’re afraid to enter while you’re still here.”

Raven walked out of the classroom. Indeed, there was a line of students outside; some royal, some commoners, even future villains, all watching her in anticipation. Never before had a Queen become the Evil Queen while still in high school. Raven tried to ignore them, not wanting any trouble. But she seemed to be destined for trouble, even in everyday life. A blur swooped in and hovered over Raven to seem bigger and more imposing. Wings beating as fast as a bumblebee, creating a low buzz. Hands on her hips, a scowl on her pale blue face. It was none other than Faybelle Thorn, the daughter of the Dark Fairy.

“That destiny should’ve been my mum’s,” she spat, before shoulder checking Raven on the way into Baba Yaga’s. “You better watch your back.”

Raven sighed. She wondered how long it would take to get used to this treatment. Yeah, people weren’t exactly thrilled by her existence the previous year, but at least people didn’t tremble at the sight of her, or flat out run away from her, not to mention outright threatening her. Unpacking her room and getting all cosy in her bed sounded very ideal now.

As she arrived at her dorm room, she heard sounds behind the door. She figured it must be Maddie, having beaten her in the race to get their schedules. Of course, Maddie wouldn’t have needed to negotiate a better school schedule, she likely got all the subjects she wanted and immediately got started on unpacking.

“Ugh, Maddie, you would not believe–”

The door was already open by the time she reached her room, falling open at just a gentle nudge. But it wasn’t Maddie and an undecorated dorm that greeted her. Apple White, daughter of Snow White, gave a perfect, pearlescent smile. “Welcome home, roomie.”

Raven didn’t get this. She didn’t even know that this girl was attending Ever After this year. She thought the princess was homeschooled. Maybe she thought that first day back at school pranks were a thing? Or maybe she just read the assignments board wrong. If Raven had been the one to check her assignments herself, she would’ve gone cross eyed. Cedar, being a puppet, didn’t have such issues, hence why Raven didn’t have to.

“Um, I think you’ve made some kind of mistake,” Raven said. “I’m rooming with Maddie this year.”

“Not anymore! Headmaster Grimm approved my request so now we’re living together! And I’ve already decorated your half of the room!”

Raven’s gaze went from Apple’s side of the room– all red and white and gold and cream extravagance– to what was meant to be her side of the room. Raven tried not to wrinkle her nose at it. She was no snob by any means, this was in fact, the opposite problem. She and her grandmother lived a simple life. Yes, they did reside in a castle, but it was minimalistic. No changes or renovations were made to the castle, all preexisting gargoyles still stood exactly where they were originally placed, not a single extra one added. The decorations were sparse, as the black brick walls and black marble floors spoke for themselves. Furniture existed for comfortability and for living, not flouncing wealth.

But Raven’s room… Well, it was none of those things. She never knew that neon purple was a colour, but apparently it was, because it was the wallpaper that lined her half of the room. Her wallpapers had repeating patterns of skulls and crows made of skulls and vials of poison. Corny posters of the Sea Witch, the Candy Witch, and the Wicked Witch of the West were stuck on the roof above her bed, as if Apple thought she needed to see some witchy role models every morning when she woke up to give her a flash of inspiration and/or motivation. The bed itself was a king sized bed, taking up half of her entire room. Raven didn’t know what she would possibly do with that much bed space. Back at home, she had a single. It was covered in a black duvet, which had broomstick and witch hat motifs. How very stereotypical. Yet somehow, Apple had still found the space to stick even more furniture in Raven’s half of the room. There was an ebony writing desk in one corner instead of a bedside table, fitted with a rolling chair. It would have been useful if it wasn’t covered in white candles, all lit, which were dripping wax all over her desk. Some (hopefully) fake skulls were scattered across the desk. Raven wondered how Apple expected her to do her homework on that. A random dark throne sat against the wall, but there were spikes all across the armrests and right where the headrest would have been. Why? That defeats the purpose of having arm rests. And who in their right mind would give a throne a head rest, only to make it spiky? The only item that would have been salvageable was a mirror with a black frame, only, the embellishments of the frame reminded her way too much of the mirror she used to contact her mother.

“Do you like it?” Apple asked.

Raven couldn’t trust herself to sound convincing at all, so she just smiled and nodded her head. She wandered over to the window sill, gazing out at the school grounds. “Someone better give me a poison apple…”

Chapter Text

Lynn Ella finally managed to finish up her shift at the Glass Slipper before lunch time. She marked off her timesheet as another girl signed the start of her own shift, and went to the change rooms in the back of the store to change out of her work uniform. As she exited the store, she hugged and kissed both of her parents goodbye, making sure to tell both of them she loved them.

The Glass Slipper was a family business, named for her mother’s favourite fairytale. Lynn had grown up comfortably middle class. From a very young age, her mother read Cinderella to her as a bedtime story. At the end, she would always say, “And that, honey, is the value of hard work. You can achieve your greatest dreams, as long as you work hard.” She would laugh, give Lynn a boop on the nose. “How else would mummy and daddy have built the Glass Slipper from the ground up?” Lynn would earnestly ask, “What about fairy godmothers?” Her mother chuckled, and replied, “Oh, silly, no one would have any reason to work hard if we had magical fairy godmothers to make our problems disappear with a swish of her wand. Working hard is our very own brand of magic.” That satisfied her then, and it satisfied her now.

However, things took a turn when Lynn turned ten.

The role of Cinderella was not a typical legacy passed down from parent to child, like many of the others. Rags to riches type fairytales fundamentally could not work that way. It just wouldn’t make sense. How could someone, whose parents were aristocrats, have a humble beginning before happening upon wealth? There would be no reward for the hero if their story ended the exact same way it started. It was like this for Jack and the Beanstalk, Aladdin, and countless others.

Instead, the Brothers Grimm had a magical compass, sealed away in a place even more protected than the Storybook of Legends. When someone from a fairytale role held it, it would glow a soft golden sheen and point at the closest possible exact embodiment of that fairytale. Once they were found, they’d be guided to the next, and the next, until they had found them all. At that point, the hero would have a list of all the candidates, allowing them to start the next phase. The hero would get to know each of the children, one by one, or observe them during an ordinary day, et cetera. And once they selected their final candidate, the mentorship would begin.

The first time Lynn met Cinderella, her parents had entrusted her to wash the windows outside their shop. Lynn had set out to make them so clean that they sparkled and glittered in the light, like Cinderella’s own glass slippers. She was so sure that would draw the attention of anyone that passed by, that they would simply have to stop by the store.

It was as she was wringing out a sponge that she heard the clip-clop of hooves. Lynn stopped what she was doing immediately to take a look. While horse drawn carts weren’t out of the ordinary, they rarely passed through Book End. And Lynn wasn’t disappointed, for it wasn’t a horse and cart. A lavish, gold embellished carriage came to a stop outside in front of the store. Sitting right beside the coachman was Queen Cinderella herself, in a beautiful yet modest dress, a glowing pocket watch clutched in her hands. She looked about the street before her eyes landed on Lynn. Her eyes lit up instantly, and she jumped off the carriage, much to the protest of the coachman. Lynn was in awe. She really was the Queen of the people.

To Lynn’s surprise, the Queen stopped right in front of her and put her hands on her knees, looking her in the eyes at her own level. Though Lynn didn’t think of it at the time, most of her teachers never met her at eye level.

“It is so lovely to meet you.” Lynn couldn’t believe her ears. “My name is Ella. What is your name, sweetheart?”

Lynn’s mouth felt like it was full of cotton, but she managed to stammer out her name.

“Are your parents here, Lynn? I would love to speak with them if they have a minute to spare me.”

Lynn could no longer trust herself to speak without squealing. She nodded.

Cinderella clasped her hands together. “Wonderful! Please lead the way.”

And Lynn did just that.

Lynn, however, didn’t remember in perfect detail the second time she met Cinderella. She was told that she was at school, running through the hallway to avoid being late to her test. On her way there, she accidentally knocked over a janitor’s mop and bucket. She immediately stopped in her tracks, apologised profusely, and helped the janitor to mop up the mess despite the janitor’s protests. Lynn didn’t get a good look at her, but she didn’t recognise her, and she also never saw her at the school again. She was later informed that she had actually run into the very Queen Cinderella, glamoured by her fairy godmother to look like any ordinary woman.

There was no interview process, unlike the others. It was decided then and there that Lynn would be the next Cinderella, and she was none the wiser.

Lynn took pride in the way her parents raised her. She liked to hope that she would have been the good girl that Cinderella chose either way, but she believed it to be the good family values that her family taught her. Even knowing from as young as ten that she would be a future princess, they raised her to believe she was still an ordinary girl with the same expectations as anyone else.

Unfortunately, this newfound favour complicated things for her. Had she the knowledge, maybe she wouldn’t have let her heart lead her astray. But it was too late for that.

Briar Beauty was only a year away from turning sixteen and entering her Enchanted Sleep. She hated that it was described that way. There was nothing enchanting about it. She would be asleep, for who knows how long, and wake up alone. No friends. No family.

If Briar had been cursed by the Dark Fairy, as her destiny stipulated, she would have at least had the guarantee that her sleep was exactly one hundred years– no more, and no less. When her destined prince woke her, reintroducing her to the world, the only face she would recognise would be that of Faybelle Thorne.

Briar had read the historical record of her christening so many times, she practically had it memorized. Everything had gone by the book until the Dark Fairy was supposed to appear. She should have arrived just as the sixth fairy had finished giving her gift. But she never did. The future Evil Queen had come in her place, and was the one to place the age old curse on baby Briar. In a burst of purple flames, she vanished as quickly as she arrived, sparks showering over the guests and causing a panic. In the confusion, Briar’s seventh fairy godmother, the strongest of them all, cast her counter-curse, “She will only fall into a deep sleep that will last for a stretch of time, at the end of which the son of a King will come to wake her up.”

A stretch of time. It could be one hundred years, as per her destiny. But what if it wasn’t? It could be five hundred, a thousand. Briar could wake up truly alone, with not even a single familiar face, if even Faybelle was dead by then. The most powerful fairy godmother in the land would never be a match for the Dark Fairy. How could she ever expect her to match the Evil Queen’s power?

When her family and the Dark Fairy demanded that Grimm reveal how her destiny would play out, if she would sleep for one hundred years as expected or longer, Grimm could not answer. When they demanded that it be fixed, he told them it did not matter. That the important story beats of the fairytale had already been hit. As long as Briar woke up after an amount of time, it would be fine.

The uncertainty as to how long Briar would sleep for, if she woke up with at least a single familiar face, and more, had her wishing that her fairy godmother had never swooped in to save her at all. It did not feel like a mercy– quite the opposite. It was a fate far crueler than death. Then again, wasn’t that the fate of all Sleeping Beauties?

And here Briar was, freshly fifteen years old, marching towards the end of her life as she knew it… and she was preparing a party.

“There’s my favourite sleepy princess,” called a sing-song voice.

Briar smiled. It was moments like these she had to cherish. “Faybelle.”

People were so caught up in the fact that the Dark Fairy cursed the infant princess, that most failed to remember that she was technically a fairy godmother too, before Briar’s ancestors had disrespected her. Yes, by human standards, it was an overreaction, but fairies were different. They were a proud, almost transactional race. If you treated them well, they showed you favour. If you slighted them, they would carry out the appropriate punishment. Most fairies, no matter how sweet, would have cast the exact same curse. As there was always the guarantee that the Dark Fairy’s curse would be countered and become a century’s sleep, that would have been an entirely fair retribution if done to another fairy. It was hardly a blip in their lifespan. When humans ended up on the wrong side of the fair folk, the punishment was disproportional only because fairies failed to take into consideration the physiological difference between themselves and mortals. But as humans refused to come from a place of understanding, a species that Briar herself considered lacking empathy, fairies in turn refused to come to a cross-cultural understanding for the sake of their pride. Such fatal flaws made it impossible.

Assuming Briar’s destiny went exactly as planned, then she would get to be friends with Faybelle, so close that she would make her a fairy godmother to her own future child. But with the generational curse, she would forget to invite her to the baptism, inviting her wrath. As much as it would hurt, she would understand the circumstances that made it necessary.

Briar beckoned the girl over for a hug. Faybelle liked to complain, but she always obliged, and not just because she was a princess. She was careful not to touch her wings.

Faybelle grinned wickedly as they parted. “Time to get this party on the road.”

Briar had long since found the loophole in Faybelle’s curse to allow her to come to parties. Yes, she could never be invited to a party, but if she herself took part in the organisation of the party, then as the co-host she had to be present at the party, meaning she would never need to be invited in the first place, never being forgotten. Plus, Faybelle had contacts that Briar didn’t, meaning the invites went out to all kinds of fun and interesting people.

“Thank goodness,” Briar said. “Girl, I accidentally slept in this morning and I got here so much later than I was meant to. There’s no way I’ll be able to finish setup in time!”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got this.” Faybelle flew up into the air, summoning her pom poms, kicking her feet and waving her hands in the direction of a box of pink, purple and gold party supplies in the corner. “Hey, hey! Grimm get out of our way! Today is the day, we will party away!”

Dark lightning shot from her pumped fist, striking the box of party supplies and the fold up tables in the corner. The tables unfolded themselves and stationed themselves in various corners of the room. Bowls landed on each of the tables. Bottles floated into the air, pouring into some bowls, as ladles stirred, making punch. Cans of soft drinks flew into coolers and nestled in among the ice cubes, and all the food Briar ordered organised themselves neatly on the tables. Streamers flew out of the box, twisting around each other, before stringing themselves from wall to wall or dangling from the roof. Balloons expanded on their own accord. A large banner that Briar had custom ordered with the school crest and a welcome back message in a fun, bold font flew out of a box and pinned itself to the wall. Couches, armchairs, and coffee tables moved away from the centre of the common room, creating a dance floor.

Faybelle’s feet gently landed back on the floor without so much as a sound, smirking as she dusted her hands off. Pixie dust showered to the floor, the byproduct of all fairy magic. “All done. What do you think?”

“It’s amazing,” Briar said.

Faybelle nodded along. “Not so bad if I do say so myself.” She put a hand on her hip as she admired her own handiwork.

While she was distracted, Briar swept up the pixie dust with her hands, putting it in a plastic bag she tucked away into her purse. She straightened back up just in time, as Faybelle looked back to her.

Briar quickly gave her a smile, trying to act cool. Perhaps if she made her escape fast enough, Faybelle wouldn’t notice the lack of pixie dust after her spell. “Perfect. I’m gonna go get Sparrow so he and his band can set up and get ready. I’ll catch you later.”

Lynn took the backstreets and alleyways to the Enchanted Forest, as she always did. It wouldn’t do her any good to be recognised on the way. That was something she feared she would never get used to. Before, she used to be able to fade into the background. Since becoming Cinderella’s protégé, her life was no longer her own. People she once saw as friends began to see her as fundamentally different, fawning over her in a way that made her feel like a golden statue erected in the town square. Even her own name was stripped from her.

The day before her enrollment at Ever After, her parents and Cinderella had taken her to meet her future stepmother and stepsisters. It was broadcast on live TV, for all to see. Lynn gave her most gracious smiles, as polite as could be, and curtsied, as she had been drilled again and again by her mentor. She didn’t know why she expected to be received warmly. She thought that everyone, even those deemed wicked, would have the decency to at the very least have some semblance of manners.
Instead, the Wicked Stepmother (formally Cinderella’s oldest Wicked Stepsister) looked down her nose at Lynn. “Do you really think she’s pretty enough to be the next Cinderella? I think one of my daughters would better suffice.”

Lynn flushed red hot with shame as the two girls cackled at her, one so hard that she began crying, the other so hard that she started wheezing. Lynn bit her lip to stop herself from looking upset. The last thing she needed was to be the cry baby princess on all the headlines for the next few days. Cinderella had warned her how harsh the tabloids could be.

Cinderella gently shook her head. “That’s not right. This young lady is beautiful. And regardless, it was never a story about beauty. It is a story about resilience.”

That gave Lynn the inspiration she needed. She didn’t know how Cinderella could be so classy, always taking the mature route. She had personally selected Lynn. Having her judgement questioned like that couldn’t have been easy. She raised her chin, ready for any blow they threw at her.

The Wicked Stepmother shrugged. “All I’m saying is that princesses are meant to be pretty.”

The younger sister’s eyes widened and she pointed at the edge of Lynn’s dress. “Wait a minute, is that… dust? Ha! What, couldn’t find clean clothes for this? We should be calling you Dustlynn.”

The elder sister swatted her sister’s arm. “That’s stupid. Cinderlynn would be so much better.”

The Wicked Stepmother’s eyes narrowed as she scrutinised Lynn. “Quiet, girls. This kind of idiocy is exactly why neither of you could possibly be Cinderella. You’re on TV, don’t be so juvenile… besides, Ashlynn has a ring to it.”

The worst part was, every News Host, TV personality, and anyone with a mirrorPhone echoed the name until it stuck. Even her neighbours, her friends, her own parents called her Ashlynn. Lynn was but a distant memory.

“Hey, Lynn!”

Ashlynn smiled as she approached the clearing. Even if she somehow managed to forget who she was, he would always remind her.

“Hunter!”

She surged forward into her arms. She held him more tightly than she ever had before. Their bodies melded together. If someone were to stumble across them in the clearing now, no one would be able to tell where one’s body ended and the other’s began. It would take a force stronger than Ever After has ever seen just to separate them.

Lynn parted just enough to stand on her toes and give Hunter a kiss, and he sighed against her lips like he had been aching for her.

Finally, they parted. Lynn giggled as she looked up at her boyfriend. Mouth slightly agape, he looked just as dumbstruck as the first time they kissed. She would never get sick of seeing it. She half expected that he would look at her with just as much awe in the far future once they were married as he did now. If they could ever marry…

Lynn had been dating Hunter since she was fourteen years-old. She had been setting up birdhouses, and he was freeing animals from his own father’s traps. They spotted each other from across the very clearing they stood in now.

Lynn had always known that the fairytale heroes and their legacies were larger than life. They operated in a world completely different from her own. Their names would be great, remembered for generations. Their lives served as lessons for ordinary people such as herself. Lynn would fade into obscurity, and she didn’t care. She enjoyed the quiet life, working for the family business, going to school, and caring for the animals of the forest.

She didn’t think that legacies also cared for animals– so many fairy tales ended with their so-called beloved companions dying, but whoever remembered their names? The tale of the Goose Girl ended with her beloved steed’s head mounted on the wall, but who mourned him? Who cared for his suffering? His name was Falada. The name of the hog that died in Snow White’s place was never mentioned once in the fairytale. In a land full of were-animals that lived and worked alongside the human population, how many were seen as less than people, likened to the non-sentient animal population– if there was a non-sentient population at all? Though Lynn could not communicate with animals at the time, she had long since suspected that all animals were sentient, and the only distinction between them and were-animals was that they did not speak any human language.

But here was the son of the Huntsman, from the most important fairytale in the land, and he was dismantling traps. He didn’t notice her, focused on his task. Lynn nearly fell out of the tree she was perched in, leaning forward to get a better look. Lynn didn’t understand. He was saving animals from traps, the opposite of his destiny.

It was not the dazzling, romantic tale of love at first sight like all the stories. The love they shared was authentic, vulnerable, something real.

Hunter softened his grip, and Lynn broke away, taking a step back.

“What’s wrong?” His gaze was full of concern.

Lynn sighed. “Hunter, we need to talk. I think we need to be sitting down for this.”

Hunter obliged immediately, sitting down on one of the tree stumps he cut down years ago as their perfect date spot. He didn’t even try to pull her into his lap, telling her he was terribly worried. She sat down opposite him.

“Please don’t break up with me.”

Lynn’s eyes widened. “What? No. Oh my, Hunter, I’m so sorry that you even thought I was considering that.”

She reached for his hand across the table to reassure him. His lips curled up slightly into a wobbly smile. Relief. She could read him like a book with her eyes closed on even their worst days.

“Thank goodness,” he said, shoulders slouching. “I thought… with Legacy Day being this year…”

Lynn shook her head, resolute. “No. Please, you have to let me have this. We still have time. Hunter, I love you. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Hunter teared up. Lynn’s heart broke at the sight. She leaned across, put her hand on his cheek. He leaned into her touch, and she caressed his cheekbone with her thumb. A single tear dropped down his cheek.

“I can’t tell you what we’ll do about destiny, I don’t know yet.” She looked him deep into those warm, brown eyes. “But it doesn’t have to end. Not yet. I want you.”

Hunter burst into tears, hiding his face in his hands. Lynn jumped up from her stump. Lynn didn’t remember how she got there, but she was on her knees, her arms wrapped around his midsection, his face buried into the crook of her neck, his chest heaving against her side.

In between sobs, he managed to get out, “I love you.”

Lynn squeezed him, trying to blink away the tears in her eyes as she said, “I love you too.”

She couldn’t stop herself from wondering how long it would be until her duty no longer permitted her to love him.

Chapter Text

The rules and etiquette of school parties appeared to be very different to that of the galas and balls that Apple had attended throughout her life.

“Oh, no,” Ashlynn said, shaking her head.

Apple had just stepped out from behind the divider, after having asked Ashlynn to rate her outfit. She was used to making mistakes at home, that was where they were meant to be made– away from the public eye, where no one would report on her flounder. When she was outside of the castle, people usually told her how right and perfect she was. That was usually in part due to the rigorous pre-event briefing her mother gave her, complete with a binder. But, she supposed, that this modest dorm room was now her home, the sacred space where she was permitted to make mistakes.

“Why?” Apple said. “What’s wrong?”

“It’s a bit…” Ashlynn looked her up and down. “... much.”

Apple thought that she was dressed suitably enough for a social event. She was only wearing a cherry red off the shoulder evening gown with a sweetheart neckline. She had kept in mind that while all of her social circle was royal, most of the school were commoners, and as such she had dressed accordingly.

“Can you even dance in that?” Ashlynn continued.

Apple nodded quickly. “Of course I can. I’ve been waltzing since I could walk.”

Ashlynn shook her head. “This is not that kind of party.”

“Then what kind of party is it?”

Ashlynn looked off to the side as she thought about it. “It’s hard to explain… let’s just pretend this is a family picnic. Nothing too fancy. Keep it casual.”

“Casual,” Apple said. “I can do that.”

Apple ducked back behind the divider and selected a different dress. She was relieved that Raven wasn’t there to see her mistake. Raven laughed in her face when she invited her to Briar’s party as her plus one. When Apple asked, “Oh, do you already have a plus one?” Raven looked all confused and asked if she was serious. Apple flushed red. She hadn’t intended on being funny, and was ecstatic when Raven finally agreed. But that all changed when Ashlynn Ella walked in to help Apple get ready. When she saw Raven, she let out a small squeal and took a step back. Apple tried to tell her that it was completely fine, but Raven simply decided to go get ready for the party with her own friends instead. Apple was a little disappointed, but at least her own future mortal enemy hadn’t seen her make such a blunder.

When Apple came out from behind the divider, she was now wearing a red swing dress, which flared out at the bottom, and had a crisp white colour, buttons, and cuffs. She wore a gold statement necklace with large rubies just below her collarbone, since the dress was more simplistic. Her perfect curls were swept to the side with a simple golden clip so that they revealed the dangling ruby earrings from the same set as the necklace.

Ashlynn hummed appreciatively. “Much better. Once I fix your makeup you’ll be all set.”

Apple frowned. Her mother’s own attendants had worked on it. “What’s wrong with it? I thought it was very sensible.”

“Look, it’s perfect if you’re about to have a press conference, but you’re not. You need to look like you’re ready to have fun.”

With that, Ashlynn took her hand and led her over to the vanity. Apple sat down without being told and closed her eyes so that Ashlynn could get to work.

“Are you sure we’re not going to be late?” she asked.

“Oh, don’t worry. You’re the guest of honour. You shouldn’t be arriving on time. Stop frowning or I’m going to mess up your eye shadow.”

“But since I’m the guest of honour, is that not more reason to be timely?”

“Not at all. Briar asked me to make sure you didn’t get there too early so that the energy of the party is right when you get there. It’s a science, you know.”

She said it like it was an inside joke, and Apple couldn’t help but feel like she was behind all her peers. They grew up and spent much of their time around people of their own age. But Apple simply got herded from one tutor to the next. There was almost a secret code that they all spoke in and lived by, but no one cared to tell her what this code was. But surely, if she got enough practice, she would grasp these lessons quickly.

“And done,” Ashlynn said. “What do you think?”

Apple looked in the mirror and was instantly impressed. Peachy eyeshadow dusted her eyelids, with a small touch of white eyeshadow at the corners of her eyes. On top of all the eyeshadow was glitter, making Apple’s eyes pop. The rouge on her cheeks emphasised her cheekbones, instead of the innocent, youthful look that her maids usually went for.

“It’s beautiful,” Apple said. “You’re like my very own fairy godmother. Thank you!”

She jumped up and gave Ashlynn a hug. She simply laughed it off.

“Oh, it’s nothing.” She took out her phone to take a look at the time. “Okay, the party should be lively by now. Let’s go.”

As they walked to the party, Apple felt a little spring in her step. She couldn’t wait to network with some bright and driven young individuals. Perhaps they would play an icebreaker as everyone went around in a circle and introduced themselves, and then compare class schedules.

They heard the music long before they arrived at the common rooms. The floor vibrated beneath her very feet. Without hesitation, Ashlynn pushed through the doors, and Apple followed. She was never usually the one to follow, unless it was behind her mother.

Stepping into the commons was like stepping into a whole new world. Unlike the lit hallway outside of this room, the lights were completely out. The only lighting was from a few stage lights, arranged near where the rock band stood as they sang on a haphazardly set up stage made out of tables; the disco lights which shone pink, yellow and blue beams of light up and down the room; and the moonlight from outside. Teenagers were absolutely wild on the dancefloor, waving their limbs about and singing at the top of their lungs, some so close that she couldn’t even tell where one person’s body ended and another began. The music boomed so loudly that Apple could feel it changing the rhythm of her own heartbeat to match. Too much was going on. This didn’t have the quiet sophistication of a high society ball. Apple had been thrown in the lion’s den.

“Let’s get you a drink,” Ashlynn said in concern, beginning to pull her towards the refreshments table.

But at that very moment, the music quietened down enough that Apple could hear her own thoughts again. She looked to the stage to find out why.

Briar stood on the stage, a wide grin on her face and a stolen microphone in her hand.

“There’s my girl! The guest of honour! Apple White!”

Maddie was in the boys’ bathroom, on a floor a few levels down from the loud music, ear pressed against the wall. Just when she thought she could hear the pipes, there was a flush from behind her.

“Do you mind?” Maddie asked.

The boy in the stall screamed. “This is the boys bathroom!”

“I know.” Maddie didn’t understand why he was pointing out the obvious. She already knew that. “I am trying to listen here.”

The boy stepped out of the stall. By the reflection in the mirror, he was probably Humphrey Dumpty, son of the famous waller-faller, unless the mirror was a liar and he was actually someone else. Maddie had two philosophies in life. The first was that there was never a bad time for tea, and the second was that mirrors are dodgy and should never be trusted. The boy who was probably Humphrey, but could very well be some other egg, looked downright frazzled. “The music is coming from the party in the common rooms upstairs. Can you please get out of here?”

“I’m not talking to you, silly,” Maddie said. “I’m talking to the narrator. Usually, I’d love to have a fun little chitty chat, but I’m very busy right now.” She looked pointedly up at the ceiling, for reasons beyond anyone’s understanding. Humphrey looked like he wanted to run away, but was too afraid to. “If I don’t find the source of this knocking, it’ll drive me mad!”

“But Maddie, you’re already mad.”

“I know, now shh!”

“That doesn’t make any sense…”

She pressed her ear back to the wall again. Unsatisfied, she pressed a hand to her ear, perhaps to block out the sound of imaginary voices.

Humphrey shook his head in bewilderment and left the bathroom. The door creaked to a shut, and finally, blissful silence. Or as silent as it could be without the music pounding from up ahead.

A few knocks.

“Aha, you won’t escape me long you knockety knocks.”

She took off her little top hat and stuck her arm in all the way until her shoulder in an act that denied physics. She rummaged around in it, before pulling out a map that she liberated from its tape prison next to a fire extinguisher. She didn’t know who would trap a poor innocent map that way. At least, she hoped it was innocent. She wouldn’t like to assist in the jailbreak of a felon, unless they were in jail for a silly crime like tax evasion. The map specifically pointed out all of the staircases and an evacuation point, which were of no use to Maddie. She crossed out the bathroom she was in, and tried to discern which room was directly below her.

She felt a brief pang of sadness in her heart. Maddie considered herself a riddle master, getting to be the one that would stupefy many with her impossible riddles at her future mad tea party. Navigation, however, was not her cup of tea. That was something best left to her friend Alistair, who had been stuck back in Wonderland ever since the borders were shut down. Oh, how she missed him. She wondered if all her friends stuck in Wonderland were okay. Not even communication could get through the borders now.

While that wasn’t a problem she could solve, this one was. Finding the next floor the pipes should pass through, she circled it, stuffed her belongings back in her hat, and ran out of the boys bathrooms.

With the crowd’s attention focused on Apple, it was all too easy for Briar to slip away from the party with the pixie dust from Faybelle’s spell. With Ashlynn preoccupied hanging out with Apple and catching up with other friends at the party, this was as good a chance as any for her to get some alone time without an excuse.

She made her way to the chemythstry lab, not even needing to sneak through the hallways. When Briar threw a party, everyone would be there. No one would miss it for the world.

Out of a mild paranoia, Briar knocked on the chemythstry lab door in case Rumpelstiltskin was up late grading papers or tormenting a poor student who somehow already had detention. When she heard nothing, she opened the door. She had stuck a wad of crumpled up tissues inside the lock earlier in the day to prevent it from being properly locked when the labs were no longer in use, a trick she overheard some General Villainy kids discussing for homework the previous year. She pried the tissue out of the lock with a manicured fingernail and tossed them in the trash, and quietly closed the door behind her. Though she highly doubted anyone would be walking up or down this hallway, she pulled the blinder down over the door before turning on the light.

As a matter of habit, Briar went straight to her benchtop in the middle of the lecture hall. She could set up her equipment without a second thought. Out of her rose shaped handbag, she pulled out an orchid-coloured glitter gel pen, a hot pink logbook, and the pouch of Faybelle’s pixie dust she swiped.

It was a basic fact of chemythstry that pixie dust was an element fundamental to the existence of the world. It was as vital and necessary as iron, or oxygen, or dragonfire. Pixie dust was baked into every spell ever cast by a fairy. The very DNA of the first ever Sleeping Beauty was irreparably changed. Now, Briar’s lineage was narcoleptic more often than not, and when asleep, had strange abilities. And going through the spell each generation was only changing them more and more. It was like many other legacies and their little talents or curses, like Hopper. But that was what made it so hard to undo spells. It would be like setting a paper on fire. It would take a lot of energy and resources to change the ashes back into paper. The best her seventh fairy godmother could afford her was to turn her death into a sleep, rather than fully undoing a curse. The only other option was true love’s kiss, but that was not at all reliable.

Unlike many in the fairytale world, though, Briar believed that magic was simply science that people had no way of explaining. And she considered herself good at science. Very good. In between all the bungee jumping and cave diving and zip lining and other adrenaline junkie activities she got up to, she spent an equal amount of time dedicating herself to chemythstry.

Briar knew how others saw her. She was just a socialite, always chasing the next party so that she could make up for one hundred years of missed time. She wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed, because she was loud, and talkative, and said the word “like” one too many times in a sentence, and wore pink, and was a princess. Even as the first person her friends turned to for help with chemythstry homework or assignments, they still chalked it down to just natural talent, rather than hard work.

Though it was probably better that people thought that way. If she managed to fix her own curse, wake up earlier than she was meant to, then no one would blame it on her. Clearly it was the fault of whoever cast the curse on her. And really, if Headmaster Grimm didn’t care for what length of time she would be asleep for, then who was to say it would matter if she was only asleep for a week? A month? Even a year, she would accept at this rate.

Fairies were known to keep their magic and their practices a secret. They did not teach outsiders, and refused to let academic institutions do research on pixiedust. The limited existing documentation on pixiedust was the basics– atomic number, atomic weight, valency. It was highly reactive. Without a fairy to guide it, it could be explosive. On more than one occasion, Briar accidentally burned her eyebrows off and had to book an emergency appointment at the Tower Hair Salon.

Briar suspected that pixie dust might be similar to sodium and chlorine. Those two elements, on their own, were extremely deadly. When combined, however, it was simply table salt. She had spent her summer vacation trying to find the element that would neutralise pixie dust, with no success. Now, she only had until her sixteenth birthday in August to find the answer. Her focus that night would be on wolfsbane.

Briar measured out exactly a tablespoon of pixie dust, before pouring it into a flask. She placed the flask on a tripod, and set up a Bluebeard burner beneath it without turning on the gas. If she saw something that interested her, she would act accordingly. Then, she grabbed wolfsbane out of the supply cabinet and began her experiment, marking in her logbook her observations.

Much like her other attempts, she was left disappointed. All she caused were explosions, like most other times. Fortunately, the flask was made out of tempered glass, but she still had to cover her head and duck when one particularly violent explosion shot the container across the room. The music from her party covered up the sound, at least.

Briar sighed as she finished another logbook entry. While cleaning up, she decided to head back to the party. At least the dancing would help take her mind off her troubles.

Apple wanted nothing more than to leave the back to school party. It was too loud, the music was unlike anything she had ever heard before in her life, the snacks tasted like pure chemicals (she suspected there was not a single naturally occurring ingredient in any of them), the carbonated drinks were like soda straight down her throat, and the behaviour of the students was outright appalling. Some danced too close to one another, some were playing a game where they took turns throwing table tennis balls into cups, a number were dressed in scandalously low skirts or shirts that were unbuttoned way too much. Even people she expected to have class weren’t exempt from this. Daring sat in the middle of a couch, legs spread wide, a girl in each arm, and one sitting between his legs on the floor. A group of students sat on the floor with a glass bottle in the centre, sending two participants into an emptied broom closet every seven minutes (Apple kept count) for Grimm knows what reason. Briar was nowhere to be seen. It didn’t help that Ashlynn seemed to be preoccupied by the boys’ arm wrestling competition over in the corner of the room. The only thing keeping Apple from leaving was the fact that it felt rude to leave early from a party where she was the guest of honour. So she kept her eyes trained on the door, waiting for Raven to arrive.

After a long half hour, Raven finally arrived. She walked in side-by-side with Cedar. She closed the door behind her quietly, not that it mattered in the raucous cacophony, like she wanted to avoid drawing attention to herself.

Apple grinned and waved. “Raven! Hi, over here!”

Raven and Cedar glanced sideways at one another, which being a puppet did not make subtle in the slightest. Cedar’s eyes were unblinking, and when she wanted to look in a specific direction, she had to turn her whole head. Somewhat reluctantly, they made their way over to the table.

Apple leaned in. “I wouldn’t have any of those party snacks or drinks. They… leave much to be desired.”

Raven scoffed, and picked up an energy drink from the cooler beside the table. “Are you kidding? I love this stuff.” When she flipped over the tab, the can released a small, serpentine hiss. She threw her head back and chugged what must have been half of the drink.

Cedar shrugged. Her wooden face was stuck with a neutral facial expression. “I would love to try it, but…”

Apple covered her mouth. What a careless statement she had made. “Oh, my goodness. I am so sorry–”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll be a real girl someday.”

Apple nodded a little too quickly. “And what a wonderful day that will be.”

Cedar once again turned her entire head to look at Raven. A silent communication seemed to pass between the two of them, because Raven snorted. Apple wished to have that level of communicative ability among friends.

“What a party, huh?” Raven said, brow quirked.

Apple felt a small part of her shrivel up and die. The small talk would destroy her heart and soul. She imagined there would be some kind of instantaneous connection between her and her Evil Queen, like the world would shift on its axis. It was quite disappointing that destiny didn’t work out that way, but she could manage. Everyone loved her. It would happen, eventually.

“Yeah, it’s great. You know, I haven’t actually met anyone from our fairytale, other than you. Why don’t you introduce them to me?”

For a split second, Raven looked upset for reasons Apple could not understand. But then she smiled and said, “Of course. Hey, Ashlynn, you’ve been here for a while, right?”

“Oh, what?” Ashlynn shook herself out of a daze. “Um, yes, I have. Why?”

“Have you seen Hunter?” Raven said.

“Let me think… mhm, yes, he’s been arm wrestling with some of the guys over there.”

She pointed at the back corner. Apple didn’t know why she took so long to think about it when she had spent the whole party watching the arm wrestlers. Perhaps it was the nerves. While Apple was highly appreciative of Raven, she understood why others were a little wary around her.

Raven waved a hand, beckoning them to follow as she made her way to the boys’ table. A boy with a bad haircut who had somehow lost his shirt was arm wrestling Hopper Croakington III. The Frog Prince put up a valiant effort, but his trembling arm was slammed down on the table. The other boy took a swig from his carbonated beverage while their entourage of other princes and commoners cheered.

Raven fearlessly pushed her way through the boys until she was right beside the shirtless boy. None of the other boys dared stand close to her. “Hey, Hunter, hate to break up this testosterone showdown, but I’ve got someone you should meet.”

“Oh, for sure,” Hunter said.

Raven stepped aside, grabbed Apple’s wrist, and pulled her to the front of the crowd. She looked a bit bored. “Apple, meet Hunter, the son of the Huntsman. Hunter, meet Apple White. I guess he’s gonna try to kill you one day, but hey, won’t we all?”

Hunter’s eyes widened, and he immediately dropped to one knee, head bowed. “My future queen. It is an honour to meet you.”

Ashlynn choked and started coughing. Cedar patted her on the back.

“Don’t be silly,” Apple said with a giggle. “Please, stand up. It is my absolute pleasure to make your acquaintance. You will be saving me from Raven one day in the future, after all.”

She held out her hand. Hunter quickly stood up and shook it. His grip was firm, and Apple did her best not to show any sign of discomfort as it felt like her bones pressed together slightly. Raven was looking down at the floor. When Apple looked back at Hunter, his gaze was fixed above Ashlynn’s head.

“Pesky,” he yelled.

A rather mischievous-looking squirrel was perched atop Ashlynn’s head. With a roar, Hunter launched himself at the creature, but ended up knocking the future Cinderella over. Ever the hero, Hunter managed to course correct by quickly wrapping his arms around Ashlynn and rotating them before they hit the floor, his muscular body taking the impact.

“Sorry, L,” Hunter said.

That was strange. Ashlynn’s surname was Ella, not Elle. And the proper way to address someone of Ashlynn’s status would be Lady Ella. Ashlynn burned red as a tomato and peeled herself off Hunter's chest, before Cedar offered a hand to help her up. “Why don’t we go meet the other people from your fairytale, Apple? Like the dwarves?”

“They don’t attend here,” Cedar jumped in. “Since most of their destiny is to do with manual labour rather than academics, they’ve all dropped out to do a mining apprenticeship. They’ll be back for Legacy Day to sign the Storybook of Legends. Blondie and I have been trying to organise interviews with everyone from the Snow White tale, but the dwarves are making it tricky. They run on a completely different schedule in the mines.”

Apple laughed awkwardly. With no more distraction to keep her mind off how unpleasant the party was, she doubted she could pretend for much longer that she enjoyed it. “You know, I think it’s fine to leave it here. I should retire for the night. I wouldn’t want to be tired on my first day of high school. Thanks so much for this, Raven.”

Maddie’s hours of searching had finally come to fruition. She had circled and crossed many rooms on her map, and she now stood in front of a locked door on the bottommost level– it was even lower than the sewers. Based on the cobwebs, it seemed like either no one had been down there in a long time, or perhaps Ever After High had a secret spider-school for spiders beneath it. Both options seemed equally likely. She’d have to ask the daughter of Little Miss Muffet if she knew anything about it.

Maddie tried knocking on the door. Instead of knocking on metal pipes, someone knocked on the door back to her, following her exact knocking pattern. Maddie bent down and peered into the keyhole. An eye peered back at her, blinking like it couldn’t believe the sight.

“Aha,” Maddie exclaimed. “I found you. Well, almost. Would you be a dormouse and let me in?”

Instead of answering, the mystery knocked her knock-pattern back at her.

“I see.”

Maddie cracked her fingers, then her elbows, shoulders, neck, spine, knees, ankles, and toes for good measure. Then she took off her top hat and started searching. Once she felt a glass vial between two gloved fingers, she pulled it out. A label was tied to the neck of the small bottle, which read “Drink me”.

“Don’t mind if I do,” she giggled to herself as she uncorked the bottle. A pink liquid swirled inside it. “End to sky!”

She swallowed down the potion in one gulp, and placed her fingertip against the bottom of the keyhole. The potion made the rest of the world grow in size. When the door became too large for Maddie to be standing next to it, she hung onto the keyhole. Once she was done shrinking, she kicked her legs and shimmied her way up through the keyhole.

Lying halfway through the keyhole, she could now see a haggard old man. “Hellooo.”

The stranger replied, “Feathers and friends, together, hello.”

Chapter Text

Raven should have woken up to the sound of her loud, rock ‘n’ roll alarm that would go off six times in five minute intervals. It was the way she woke up every morning. Instead, she was being shaken awake.

“What the hex?” she gasped, arms flailing around, her sleep mask slipping off her head.

“Good morning,” Apple White said with a brilliant smile. Her hair was up in rollers, and she was still in her nightgown, but she could leave right then and there for the cafeteria and still be the fairest of them all. Somehow, there wasn’t even a single pillow-crease in her face. Her complexion was perfect as well, without even a hint of acne.

“What is it?”

“I thought I’d do you a favour and wake you up bright and early so that you’d be ready for Legacy Day Rehearsal,” Apple said. “You were out quite late last night. You know, I think a nice cold shower would wake you up nicely.”

Raven quirked a brow. “You waited up for me?”

“Of course,” Apple said. “What are roommates for?”

Well, that explained why Apple was fast asleep at her vanity when Raven stumbled back to the dorm room at midnight, shoes clutched in her hand. Not wanting the (probably delicate) princess to wake up complaining about a sore neck, Raven dropped her shoes at the door, rolled Apple’s desk chair to her bed, and using all of her might, awkwardly flopped the girl onto the bed before getting ready to sleep herself.

“I prepared a fresh towel for you.”

“Um, Apple, I showered last night.”

Why was the new girl being so weird? Raven and Cerise had roomed together the previous year, and if either of them dared to do that for the other, they would have ended up on the receiving end of some lighthearted teasing for weeks.

Apple looked down sadly for a moment, before looking chipper again. “Oh, that’s okay. You do you, roomie.”

She gave her finger guns. Raven considered rolling over and getting another hour of sleep, but she was now too awake to go back to sleep. Regardless, Apple was at her vanity, singing all merrily as she took out her curlers and started on her makeup. Raven couldn’t even begin to understand morning people. At least Cerise had the decency to quietly leave the dorm to get it all out of her system with a pre-sunrise run. Raven wondered if their neighbours could hear Apple through the walls.

Before Raven could dredge up enough willpower to push herself out of bed, she spotted Apple’s reflection in her white and golden vanity. Apple was cycling through various facial expressions, first practicing a smile, then a perfect princess pout, a gentle furrowing of her brows, then looking sideways and tapping the side of her chin like she was in deep thought. She repeated the motions again and again.

“What are you doing?” Raven asked.

Apple jolted in her seat. “Oh, I thought you left to get dressed.” She laughed really quickly and awkwardly, not at all like the first impression Raven got of her as a put-together princess. “Sorry, I’m just practicing my facial expressions.”

Raven blinked. “Your what?”

Apple suddenly looked a lot more self conscious. Her smile faltered for a second, and she started fiddling with the blonde streaks in her hair. “Oh, you know, like when you practice the way you’re going to say things so that you say them in the right tone and volume and voice. Or when you practice doing facial expressions so that your eyes aren’t too squinty or you’re not showing too much or too little teeth when you smile. Or making sure that if you’re ever going to be confused, that you won’t do so in a way that causes wrinkles, but still looks natural…”

Raven had never thought about any of those things in her life, let alone practiced them. She vaguely remembered Cedar asking her one time if moving all the tiny muscles in her face would come naturally to her once she became a real girl, and the best answer that Raven could give her was that it was just something one learns over time. She supposed Apple was similar to her friend in that way, but for Apple it wasn’t for having an unmoving wooden face; rather, having been sequestered away in her castle, receiving home-schooling instead of getting to socialise properly.

Apple looked away. “Oh, haha, nevermind…”

“Sorry, forget I said anything.”

With that, Raven got ready for the school day, picking her outfit, styling her hair, and applying edgy, alternative makeup.

She made her way to the cafeteria, relieved when she spotted Cerise already at a table. At this time of day, it was practically empty, save for the ogre cook and a few other early risers. Raven waved at her friend. Cerise looked up and nodded at her, bacon fat dripping down her chin, before continuing to wolf down her protein-rich meaty breakfast.

Raven grabbed her own breakfast, opting for a lazy, flavourless cereal, but livening it up by using chocolate milk. She plopped herself down opposite her friend.

Cerise stopped shovelling food in her mouth just long enough to say, “You’re up early. What did summer vacation do with the Raven Queen I know and tolerate?”

Raven rolled her eyes and chuckled. “Love you too, Cerise. I’m up for a little blonde reason called Apple White.”

“Ahh.” Cerise licked the barbecue sauce off her fingers, not letting a single morsel go to waste. It was a wonder that such a petite girl could eat so much food. “Maddie told Cedar and I. I take it you survived your first night with Little Miss Fairest?” She said that last part like Raven was getting into a brawl with a fully mature dragon.

“She decorated my side of the room.”

Cerise snorted. “Yikes. What a control freak.”

“Maybe. Overeager, moreso. How about you?” Raven asked. “I didn’t see you at the party last night… or Maddie, for that matter. ‘Twas just Cedar and I, a lonely pair.”

“You are so dramatic. No, it was just too loud. I could hear it from several floors away, even with a pillow over my head. Not my idea of fun at all. But I thought Maddie was with you last night?”

“Did somebody say my name?”

Maddie had somehow popped up in between the two girls. They both jumped in shock. Raven had no idea how she managed it– she hadn’t even heard Maddie walking towards them. Cerise quickly reached up to adjust her red hood, pulling it a little down her forehead.

“Where did you come from?”

Maddie giggled. “Where do any of us come from? For all you know, you could be a figment of my imagination.” She pointed a finger at Cerise. “Or you. Now I’m imagining you dancing. Are you dancing?”

“No,” Cerise said, stifling a laugh.

“Then I guess you aren’t from my imagination. Everyone would be dancing in imagination-land.”

Raven leaned forward, swallowing some cereal. “Say, Maddie, where were you last night? I didn’t see you at the party.”

Maddie clapped her hands and giggled. “I had the absolute pleasure of tea-ing cups with the most interesting, mysterious old man. Why, he spoke Riddlish! I didn’t sleep a wink, chitting the chat. I think because we can’t return to Wonderland, Wonderland is simply coming back to us. Isn’t that wonderful?”

“That’s great,” Raven said, figuring her friend had swapped to Riddlish since absolutely none of that made sense.

“Hey, that was completely sensical.” Maddie took out a tray of biscuits, a teapot, a cup and saucer, some milk, and sugar out of her hat, making a nice tea arrangement on the cafeteria table. “Morning tea time.”

More students began to stream into the cafeteria as more woke up. As always, there was a clear royal/commoner divide. The princes and princesses sat with each other, bathed in the morning sunlight streaming in through the window. The commoners got the worst seats, the ones closest to the bathrooms, the bins, the ones in the shadows. While the girls chatted, Raven spotted Cedar following Blondie into the cafeteria. Blondie always set a brisk pace, her curls bouncing with each step, as if she was still chasing a scoop even now with a bowl of porridge in her hands. She stepped over to the royals table, and was about to put her food down when Duchess Swan glared at her and quickly put her purse on the free seat. Blondie’s shoulders drooped, but Cedar simply led her to their table instead, which was interesting. Blondie didn’t usually sit with their group, often turning her nose up at Raven. They were having a very heated conversation. Cedar was waving her arms around expressively since her face couldn’t move, and it wasn’t out of excitement. Blondie was glaring back at her.

“This is just plain, teenage debauchery,” Cedar was saying, sitting down opposite Raven. “Kitty wants attention, what part about that don’t you get? That’s why she spiked the punch bowl. If you post that on our mirrorcast show, then whatever punishment Headmaster Grimm gives her was worth the effort.”

“This is news.” Blondie slammed her food on the table. Some porridge splattered into Maddie’s hair, but she didn’t notice. “It’ll teach people to keep an eye on their drinks.”

“Please, a PSA that doesn’t drag Kitty into this would do the same thing. We should just be discreetly handing the evidence in to Headmaster Grimm and let him discipline her. Otherwise, we’ll embolden her.”

“Well maybe that would be good for views,” Blondie retorted.

“I can’t believe you.”

“Our viewership has gotten lower over the summer break, if you haven’t noticed. I’m just being practical. If we lose our monetisation, then we can’t pay the subscription for your little editing app.”

Raven shot Cerise a look, like yikes, not this again. Cerise gave her a wince in return.

Cedar and Blondie seemed to have daily fights about their mirrorcast show. Cedar was all about the truth, facts, and doing what was right. Blondie was also a fan of the truth, but also drama, scandals, the kinds of headlines that no one would dare scroll past. As much as they butted heads, Raven knew that they would be over it within a few hours. The two girls needed each other. They had actually run separate mirrorcast shows back in their first year of high school, but neither “No Nose Grown” or “Just Right” were even remotely successful. Cedar did great editing and focused on important topics in her video essays, but she was camera-shy and would forget her scripts. Her mirrorcast show practically consisted of five-second intervals all stitched together to make twenty-minute long videos. Blondie had a great TV host personality and went out into the field, unlike Cedar, but she was rash and impulsive. She would cram three different topics into a single, incoherent four-minute video, which was so jumbled that no one who watched the show knew anything more than when they started. But when they decided to do a collaboration exposing that the student council election process was rigged, they were suddenly drowning in success. It was only logical that the next step was to combine their shows into Nose Just Right. They balanced each other out, not just with their skills, but with their focuses. There was never too much idle gossip, and there was never too much depressing facts about the state of the world. It was, well, just right.

“You’re a sellout.”

“Am not!”

Before the argument could get any worse, though, an announcement rang throughout the school. “All Legacy Year students, please make your way to the east terrace for Legacy Day practice. Don’t dawdle.”

Dread pooled in Raven’s stomach. Being a nervous eater, she quickly shovelled the rest of the food into her mouth. Maddie practically had to pull her out of her seat away from the cereal.

“It’s okay, Ravey-poo. We’ll be done before lunch!”

The girls made their way to the auditorium, Raven more reluctantly than the rest. Maddie was skipping and cartwheeling and frolicking all across the hallways and the footpath, colliding with many other students on her way. Cedar and Blondie continued their debate, with much arm waving and yelling. Cerise was withdrawn into herself, practically hiding in her hood. Raven walked alongside her, finding comfort in the amicable silence.

When they arrived at the auditorium, they took their seats in the back corner. Raven hoped she wouldn’t be noticed. The more eager students took their seats at the front. Raven slouched low in her seat.

Up on the giant stone stage that towered over the students by at least two stories, crowned by two staircases, stood the headmaster at the podium. His eyes swept over the students, before landing on Raven. She felt like she was frozen in her seat, like she couldn’t even breathe, until he looked away.

Once the students had all piled in, Milton Grimm cleared his throat. “Welcome to the second day of orientation week. As a reminder to anyone that may have been falling asleep during the orientation speech–” he shot a pointed look at Briar Beauty, who was texting on her phone, “– class starts next week, so it would be absolutely prudent if you all made sure that you are all sorted. Now, onto the topic of business. While Legacy Day is still a few weeks away, I want you well prepared. It is an Ever After High tradition for our second-year students to climb these storied stairs, stand at this fabled podium, and practice declaring your destiny. On the actual Legacy Day, when you say your name, your magical key will appear. You will insert it into the Storybook of Legends and turn it thirty degrees clockwise. Then stand, shoulders back, and declare your destiny to the world. If your parents have special abilities, you will inherit them the moment you sign. Though, of course, we won’t practice with the actual Storybook of Legends.” He slapped a thick book onto the podium. “Today, we’ll be using a book of entirely reasonable school rules. Who will go first?”

Apple White jumped to her feet with a raised hand.

Milton Grimm smiled down at her. “Very well.”

Apple practically bounced her way all the way up to the top in excitement. “I am Apple White, and I pledge to follow my destiny as the next Snow White.”

“Perfect. Next!”

“I’ll go next.” Ashlynn made her way up. “I am Lynn– Ashlynn Ella, and I will follow in the footsteps of my mentor, Cinderella.”

In front of Raven, Duchess Swan crossed her arms and scoffed. “Wannabe princess.” Faybelle Thorn laughed at that.

Raven rolled her eyes. She didn’t understand why some people looked down upon legacies passed down through mentorship rather than by blood. Destiny ran its course just the same. Ashlynn deserved to be there just as much as the next person. Perhaps even more so– Raven couldn’t think of many people who so represented the ideals of their stories as Ashlynn did.

“Next.”

It seemed the royals were making a statement, being the role models to the rest of the student body, or perhaps it was like this every year.

Duchess got to the podium, shoulders back like she was ready to dance, feet pointed outward like the ballerina she was. “I’m Duchess Swan, daughter of the Swan Princess, and I promise to follow my destiny…” She took a deep breath. “Living out the rest of my life as a swan.”

“Very good. Next.”

Raven zoned out through a line of students getting their happily ever afters: Briar, Daring, Blondie, Rosabella Beauty, Hopper Croakington II, Justine Dancer, and even Lizzie. A boy with dark hair and glasses made his way up. Raven thought she knew everyone at the school, but apparently not this boy.

He tripped before getting to the top, and cleared his throat. “My name is Dexter Charm– should I be using my full name? Sorry, my name is Dexterous Charming, and I’m going to be, well, I guess one of those princes that rescues a damsel princess or maiden…” He turned back to Milton Grimm. “Um, excuse me sir, how am I meant to know which role I’m destined for? It’s so clear for everyone else, but I have no idea.”

Milton Grimm shook his head. “All will be revealed on Legacy Day. Next!”

Raven thought that was weird and vague. Dexter seemed to think that too, because his shoulders slumped slightly as he walked away.

A number of commoners, including the future villains, started to volunteer as well.

“Ramona Badwolf,” said a girl with wolfs’ ears, inspecting her claws. “Future Big Bad Wolf.” She zeroed in on Cerise in the crowd, and smiled, but it wasn’t in a friendly, human way. She bared her teeth in threat, as a wolf does. “I’m gonna get you, Cerise, and your little grandma too.”

Beside Raven, Cerise snarled back up at the girl, before quickly clearing her throat.

Up next was a pink-haired girl in glasses. “Hi, I’m Ginger Breadhouse– well, actually, Ginger Witch now. I promise to follow my destiny as the next candy witch, and bake delicious treats… and also cook children.” She added that last part quietly, looking a bit green, and ran off the stage.

Eventually, everyone had gone until it was just Raven left. She was hoping that they would all be so bored that they would fall asleep by then, but when Milton Grimm called her name, everyone’s eyes were on her. She wiped clammy hands on her dress as she walked towards the podium. It was so silent that her every step seemed to echo. Her heart felt like it would beat out of her chest.

This should have been fine. She was meant to be pledging for a future twenty or thirty years away, not one that would start next year. She stood in front of the podium, looking out at the crowd as she took a deep breath to buy time.

Her eyes landed on the prince Dexter. He had been the only one brave enough so far to ask a question, not even the Wonderlandians, whose destinies were all up in the air since they couldn’t reach Wonderland. She thought back on what her grandmother said, one way or another.

“Um, I have a question.” Raven turned back to face Milton Grimm, who already looked unhappy. “What if I don’t want to make the pledge?”

Milton Grimm frowned, and stepped forward, like a predator stalking his prey. “This is a good question, that will serve as a lesson for all.” The way he said it made it sound like it was anything but. “The last person that defied their destiny was your mother, the Evil Queen. And what happened? She stole the Dark Fairy’s destiny, cursed Wonderland. But it is worse than that. Every change to even a single story has a ripple effect. Time and destiny go hand in hand. When destiny changes, time speeds up. And when big changes are made, like what your mother did, big changes happen, faster than we can keep up with, faster than we can control. Why, when your mother cursed Wonderland, the world as we know it revolutionised. In the span of a few years, people invented coal-powered machinery. Factories. The steam engine, telegraphs, automobiles, the telegraph, electricity, the mirrorNet. More than I can count. Changes that should have taken place over hundreds of years, in a safe, controlled manner, exploded into the land of Ever After faster than we can keep up with. It is only with a nice clean decade of people following their destinies, that we are once more in a period of peace. That we won’t advance out of our control, advance ourselves into the ground. And following your destinies will keep us all safe. But if someone were to not sign onto their destiny entirely, foregoing it all? Time is a delicate force. It would completely unravel, and we would all cease to exist. But if you right your mother’s wrongs, and follow your destiny, Raven, then you could fix time itself.”

Raven raised a finger. “But–”

“No buts,” Grimm said sternly. “Finish this practice so we may all go to lunch.”

Raven’s face was burning and her palms were practically dripping from the humiliation of being told off like that in front of her peers. No, she hadn’t been told off. An example had been made out of her. Her very existence was a warning to everyone else.

She took a deep breath, telling herself that it wasn’t Legacy Day, not yet. That this wasn’t real, just practice. “I’m Raven Queen… and I will be the next Evil Queen.”

Before she could be dismissed, she ran off the stage, down the stairs. Not one to be shown up, Milton Grimm quickly dismissed everyone to go to lunch.

“Raven! Hey, Raven!”

In the throng of students milling out of the auditorium, a hand closed around her wrist. Raven turned to face the prince from before, Dexter Charming. His crown was slightly lopsided.

“For what it’s worth, I think it’s pretty brave what you did back there,” he said.

Raven didn’t know what to do or say. She smiled at him, and it was a genuine one. “You too.”

“What? Me?” Dexter said. “I didn’t do anything.”

“You spoke up.”

With that, Raven pulled her hand from his wrist and walked away, trying to look for her friends.

“Wait!” Dexter said.

Raven turned back, looking at him questioningly.

He scratched the back of his neck. “Wanna hang out sometime?”

Raven laughed. “You’re weird, Dexter. Most people don’t like to talk to me. I’m the daughter of the greatest evil that there ever was, remember?”

“No, I’m serious,” he insisted. “I think we might have a lot more to talk about than you think.”

Raven tried to think of a reason not to, but she had none. There was a silent promise in his words, like there was more to the prince that meets the eye. She nodded. “Yeah, okay. That would be cool. But, you know, I gotta go find my friends now. Will you be here on the weekend?”

“Ahh, shoot,” Dexter said, looking skyward like this was the fault of some god. “No, my siblings and I are going back home for the weekend. Next week?”

“Sure. I’ll catch you later, then.”

Chapter Text

Apple looked down at the text she had received with a frown. “That’s weird.”

“What’s up?” asked Holly O’Hair.

Holly, daughter of Rapunzel, was the hairdresser at the Tower Hair Salon. Apple was finally at her long-awaited hair appointment. The dye had already started fading, making it look almost grey instead of black as ebony. Although Holly wasn’t great at responding to her own name, she was a miracle worker. She convinced Apple that the black-and-blonde streaks were a bad look, and that she should instead go for either a peekaboo look, or two-tone dyed hair. Apple opted for the peekaboo look, preferring a full head of black hair, with a small layer of her familiar blonde hair hiding away. Just because she would become the next Snow White did not mean she had to completely replace every part of herself to be more like her mother. At least, not yet. So Holly had used a hair-dye remover to wash it all out of Apple’s hair, and was currently painting on some new, heavy-duty dye.

Since the twin daughters of Rapunzel had fast growing hair, Apple had absolute faith in Holly’s ability, even though she usually wouldn’t trust anyone but her own maids to do her hair. Holly’s hair was short and edgy and purple, and it somehow stayed that way despite the rate at which her hair grew. Apparently, it grew one foot long per week, and her roots didn’t even show.

But Holly’s skills didn’t just lie in hairdos and haircuts. Holly had a knack for chatting, and very quickly, made Apple feel like they were the best of friends. She felt that she could confide anything in her.

“Oh, this is weird,” Apple said. “My mother has told me that there will be a carriage waiting for me outside, but before I left for school she told me that I wasn’t to return home so that I could prepare for my destiny.”

“Mmm, strange.”

Apple frowned, and looked at Holly’s reflection in the mirror. “What’s your destiny?”

“Me?” Holly met her eyes in the reflection. “I don’t have one. My sister Holly– wait, I mean, Poppy.” She laughed, though the humour didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Why would I get our own names mixed up? That’s so weird. Anyways, Poppy is the one that’s destined to be the next Rapunzel.”

“I know, she’s in the tower with the witch.”

“Right.” Holly nodded. “But I’m a spare. I have no destiny. I mean, maybe if there’s a spare princess role, then I could be that. But if not, I’ll be here, styling hair.”

“But doesn’t it make you sad?” Apple asked, trying not to furrow her brow in confusion. “Not having a destiny?”

Holly laughed. “Not at all. I would be much more upset if I was locked away in a tower, with no freedom to even keep my hair at whatever length I want. Nah, I love what I do. Being here, being a hairdresser, makes me happy. And being the next Rapunzel makes Poppy happy. I wouldn’t change that for either of us.”

“But you could be like Beauty and the Beast,” Apple said. “Rosabella’s mum was also a spare, but she’s now the heroine of a brave new fairytale, that Rosabella gets to be the first to inherit.”

Holly just smiled. “Who’s to say that this couldn’t lead to me becoming like that? I don’t mind either way. If I become a part of a new, legendary fairytale, so be it. But I like doing what I want to do, so I’m not about to go search for a fairytale that needs a role to be fulfilled, or go out of my way to try and become legendary myself.”

“Do you ever miss your sister?” Apple had no siblings of her own. She’d asked her father for one once, but he’d just shrugged and said that it wasn’t something that destiny allowed their family. Still, Apple often found herself wishing for one. She imagined it would be like having an automatic best friend. She couldn’t imagine being apart from someone as important as that.

Holly sighed, looking a bit bitter. “Yes, of course. But you know, that’s just the way things work. At least, the courts mandated that it would be cruel and unjust that twins would grow up apart. Since being sent to the tower when she was twelve, we’ve had yearly visitation. Let me tell you, that witch is so creepy. But we also get to send letters to one another.”

“When I was home-schooled, our mothers insisted that I become pen-pals with Poppy,” Apple said. “You know, to help her adjust. She used to hate her destiny. She would complain in every single letter that she wanted out of the tower, that she wanted to see the world, and do whatever she chose. It was a dangerous way of speaking, for a firstborn child. But suddenly, once she turned thirteen, she changed her tune. She loved destiny, and everything about it.” Apple looked into Holly’s eyes. “The way you talk reminds me of the way she used to be as a kid.”

Holly stiffened. “Where are you going with this?”

“Raven talks a lot like Poppy used to,” Apple said. Holly took a breath, and smiled. Perhaps Apple had just imagined the discomfort. “I’m sure that I’ve got nothing to worry about, but I want to be prepared. What caused your sister to change her mind about destiny?”

Holly drew her gaze away from Apple’s face in the mirror, focusing on dying her hair again. “I… well, I guess she just grew up and faced her reality.”

Apple was relieved. All she had to do was get Raven to face her reality. Really, the headmaster had already done that during Legacy Day practice. She had nothing to worry about. She would just watch Raven, make sure she didn’t develop any concerning opinions or beliefs, and everything would work out completely well. She would still get her happily ever after. Everyone would.

For the rest of the appointment, Apple told Holly about how after Legacy Day Rehearsal, she joined multiple clubs. This included starting a campaign to become the Royal Student Council president, followed by joining the Charming Charity Club, the Royal Debate Team, and the School Activities Committee. All would be important to prepare her for a future in politics, she explained.

Holly held up a mirror behind Apple’s head, giving her a view of her hair from the back. “What do you think?”

“I don’t even recognise myself.” Apple’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. She swept her hair to the side, watching the blonde underlayer flick into view. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. She almost looked ready to fulfil her destiny. “You made me look beautiful. Thank you.”

Holly shook her head. “No, Apple. You were always beautiful.”

Holly’s bright purple hair was bold and different, not the classical princess look. Apple hadn’t actually liked it at first, though she didn’t say anything out of politeness. It had grown on her, over the course of the appointment. She didn’t understand it herself, but she was able to find an appreciation for it.

“You’re beautiful, too.”

With that, Apple paid and Holly started cleaning up. When Apple made it outside of the tower, her usual limousine was waiting for her. Not as traditional as her mother’s carriage, but it was the symbol of a modern princess. It was sleek, elegant, and efficient. All things that Apple wanted to be. She tried to politely needle some information out of her chauffeur, but he was just as clueless as she was, only having the directive from the queen. Her two bodyguards were silent as statues, which wasn’t out of the ordinary for them. They were primed to spot any threat to the princess and protect her at once. Idle chit chat, even with Apple herself, would distract them.

When they arrived back at the palace, Apple was greeted by her mother’s maids instead of her own. Greeted was being generous, though. Two young women simply grabbed one of her arms each and ushered her into the house. Neither responded to any of her questions, and Apple resolved herself to silence. The second the doors of her bedroom were closed behind them, she was stripped of her clothing. Apple stifled a gasp as they pulled another gown over her head like she was a doll to dress up as they liked.

“You know,” Apple said, struggling against them, “I can really do this myself.”

The maids paid her no heed as they started lacing up her corset. A maid emerged from her walk in closet with an apple-green cloak, embroidered with glittering songbirds. Then the maids rushed her out of the room once more, pulling the hood of her cloak half over her eyes.

“Where are we going?” Apple tried again as the maids took her to an unfamiliar part of the castle. They took her down what she assumed was a servant staircase, which wound down and down and down. She was starting to feel as if the stairs were getting steeper and the walls were closing in on her and the shadows were becoming darker, and she tried to convince herself that it was just her mind playing tricks with her. Finally, they arrived at a wooden door which creaked open when pushed. A draft chilled Apple to her bones even with the cloak.

The underground room was lit by torchlight, unlike the rest of the castle’s electric lighting. The stone walls, floors, and ceiling reminded her of her captivity as a child, and her heart seized in her chest. Her mother’s maids pushed her forward, and she continued walking.

Further into the cave-like basement, inexplicably stood a horseless carriage. Unlike the family carriages and limousines, this one was plain and wooden, completely unassuming.

The coachman opened the door. There stood her mother in a navy evening gown with red accents. She wore a blood-red hood, and a white gold mask.

“Mother!” Apple said. Instead of waiting for the coachman’s help, she rushed into the carriage, wrapping her arms around her mother. She nearly cried in relief when her mother hugged her back instead of pushing her away. These mere two days was the longest stretch of time that Apple had ever been without her family. “I missed you so very much.”

Snow White nodded and leaned back as a clear end to the hug, her hands on Apple’s shoulders. “Your hair is adequate.”

Apple tried not to feel disheartened at that. “Thank you, mother. What am I doing here? I thought I was to spend all my weekends at school.”

Did you miss me as much as I have missed you? Apple silently asked.

“You will return to school after this event.”

“What’s it about?”

The queen gave Apple a serious look. “You are not to utter a word of this to anyone.”

Apple didn’t understand. Every event she had ever gone to in her life had been highly publicised. She couldn’t imagine what would require this level of discretion. “Of course, mother.”

The queen leaned out the door. “It’s time to go.”

Apple heard a harsh whip, and suddenly the carriage was moving. This was nowhere near as comfortable as anything else she had ever ridden in. It was bumpy, but not in the predictable way that horseback riding was. Her back quickly became sore. It had been so long since she had ever been in such an uncomfortable position.

“Every year, in the weeks between Legacy Day practice and the real event, we royals host a very important event. It determines the future state of all kingdoms. Unbreakable bonds are formed. After Legacy Day, this is the most important event of the year. This year, we are hosting the event, which is why it’s absolutely necessary that you attend.”

That didn’t seem like something that couldn’t happen within the public eye, but Apple bit her tongue. She knew better than to question her mother. She never had a reason to. Snow White was a woman that was rarely wrong, if ever.

They must have still been using the fastest steed in the kingdom, because they arrived at the Spring Palace shortly after. There was already a line of nondescript carriages being tended to by stable people. Apple didn’t understand why they were here, this palace was never in use at this time of year.

From the folds of her cloak, Snow White produced a white and golden mask. “Put this on.”

Apple did, and then the two of them glided gracefully into the castle. Judging by the distant sound of chatter and cutlery clinking, everyone had arrived a while ago. In the walk all the way to the amphitheater, Apple realised what was bugging her, what felt off. There were hardly any servants, and they all wore different uniforms. She saw some in the cream uniforms worn by the staff at Apple’s castle, some in the white uniforms of the Charming palace, the lavender of the swan kingdom, and so on. That didn’t exactly make it feel like her family hosted the event.

They arrived in the auditorium, and all the chatter ceased immediately. She searched the crowd, and everyone seemed to be dressed the same as her and her mother. But more than that, there wasn’t a single teenager in the crowd. She had never been to an event that didn’t host even a single other person her age.

Her mother dragged her along to the stage. Apple quickly folded her hands in front of her and looked down, the spotlights blinding her.

Snow White cleared her throat. “Welcome to the Annual Destiny Bidding.”

Apple frowned. She had never heard of such a thing.

“We have a long night ahead of us, so without further ado, let’s start the bidding with the most important fairytale of them all: Little Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. One thousand gold, am I hearing one thousand gold?

Apple had to stop her jaw from falling open. She was beginning to feel as if she was in a fever dream. The other royal families were… buying their sons’ place as her prince charming? She had very intentionally not given not much thought to who he would be, but this had to be wrong. Wasn’t she meant to one day find true love? Wasn’t that what her whole story was about?

How would true love’s kiss work if it was bought?

Various royal couples began placing their bids, but none placed as high as who Apple could tell was clearly the Charming family, and they bid on Daring’s behalf.

“Going once… going twice… perfect!” Snow White announced, banging a gavel. “Daring Charming shall be the prince of destiny. Next up, the Little Mermaid…”

Apple peered into the crowd, glad that for once she wore her contact lenses. She was quickly understanding what was going on, but she couldn’t see Rapunzel. She felt flustered. How would Holly ever get a destiny as a princess if her own mother didn’t show up to bid? In her mind, Apple started cycling through the stories of princes and princesses in her Legacy year. Briar’s own prince wouldn’t be born for another century. She saw that Sleeping Beauty and her husband weren’t there; none of their sons had reached Legacy Year yet. Ashlynn’s legacy was passed down by mentorship, whereas the legacy of her own Prince Charming was passed down by blood, so Cinderella’s firstborn son would be her prince. As she had no other children; she also wasn’t there.

A few bids went by. The role of the princess from the Frog Prince, filled. The role of the prince from the Little Mermaid, filled. Even though the bidding for Beauty and the Beast started at a mere one hundred gold, not a single offer was placed. Apple wondered if it was to do with the humiliation of their son becoming a beast, or if it was to do with the risk of breaching into a brand new fairytale.

The very last bid of the night was one of much fanfare, for Darling Charming to become a princess that gets saved from a dragon. Apple noticed such bids were not spent on Dexter. As the Charmings went higher and higher against a competing family with a spare daughter, Apple noticed movement out of the corner of her eye. She followed the movement, and her gaze landed on a balcony at the top left of the hall. A lone figure stood there with his hands behind his back. Apple realised with a start that it was none other than Milton Grimm.

Chapter Text

As a wooden girl, Cedar could not breathe. Despite that, she could make noises that sounded like it. So it wasn’t that she was so annoyed that it tightened her chest until it forced the air out of her lungs in a huff; more so that she couldn’t keep her frustration bottled up inside with no outlet. Making the sound of a sharp exhale made her feel just a little better.

People thought that since Cedar could not feel anything physically, that she also couldn’t feel things emotionally. It didn’t help that her face was unmoving, save for a bottom jaw that only moved up or down– no smiles, no pursing her lips, no frowning, nothing of the sort. Her facial expression was also stuck in whichever form she painted it into. When she was younger, she always painted on a smile. Her father always said that it was important to greet everyday warmly, after all. But the kids in spellementary school had always made fun of her for it. Nowadays, Cedar typically painted herself with a neutral expression. She found it a lot more versatile, and had learned how to better convey the full range of her emotions with hand gestures and non-verbal cues. Plus, she gets called a freak a lot less these days.

The truth was, the wish that brought Cedar to life meant that she felt her emotions as strongly as everyone else. But people thought that it didn’t matter if they treated her in a way they would not treat another person, because she was just a puppet girl made out of wood and screws. And more than that, as the daughter of Pinocchio, she must be a liar.

That morning, Cedar had a terrible fight with Blondie. They had reached the first weekend of Legacy Year, and they still hadn’t completed their mirrorCast special interviewing each of the members of the Snow White fairytale. The only person remaining was Raven Queen.

“I need you to arrange an interview with the future Evil Queen,” Blondie had said as she filled her bowl high with porridge that morning.

“She has a name,” Cedar said.

“I need an interview with Raven Queen,” Blondie corrected with a roll of her eyes. “This whole thing of her getting her destiny early is completely unprecedented. Actual, established news outlets have been trying to reach her, but have been blocked by Headmaster Grimm. But we’re students. When we get the scoop first, that makes us the source that they all have to cite. Our mirrorcast show will be the next big thing because we have an advantage that no other journalists have.”

“We already have an advantage by being the only reporter that has access to Apple White,” Cedar replied. “Isn’t that enough?”

“That would be good, but we could be the best.”

“Well, maybe I don’t care about being the best,” Cedar said. “I care about journalistic integrity.”

Blondie gasped. “I care about journalistic integrity.”

In hindsight, Cedar might have gone too far, but she couldn’t stop. What she thought was the truth came flying out of her mouth. “No, you don’t, or else you’d lay off. Raven is going through a lot right now, and I’m not going to take advantage of that. All this would do is upset her more. I would apologise, but I’m really not sorry about looking out for my friend.”

Blondie looked at her, hurt. “Am I not your friend too?”

Cedar sighed. “Of course you are.”

“Then please.” Blondie gave her an imploring look. “I need this. Royals get thrust into greatness just by being born. People like us, we have to work hard and make sacrifices.”

Cedar folded her arms. The screws that served as her joints poked her forearms, one of the many times it was a blessing instead of a curse that she couldn’t feel. “I won’t do it.”

Blondie bunched her hands into fists, her knuckles white. “Then if you’re going to ruin this story, find another one! A better one! Or I’ll find someone else who’ll convince Raven to give me an interview.”

Which led Cedar to where she was now, stomping through the woods in search of a scoop so big that Blondie would have no choice but to drop the idea of a Raven interview. Cedar sighed. Who was she kidding? There couldn’t possibly be a scoop bigger than that. She doubted even a wish to the Blue Fairy could achieve this.

She heard two voices up ahead. Cedar cocked her head to the side in curiosity. She cycled through a list of people she knew in her mind as she started creeping along the trees, trying to figure out who it could be. Most of the students at Ever After were more likely to spend the weekend in Book End, not the forest. She knew Cerise enjoyed the woods, but only in solitude. Sparrow and his Merry Men had a treehouse in the woods, but she didn’t hear the sound of his band, so it couldn’t be him. Cedar figured Hunter could be practicing hunting, given his destiny, but she was pretty sure he was vegetarian. Out of the royals, Ashlynn often posted pictures of her nature hikes, so she was a likely contender; Daring could be in search of a beast to vanquish; and Rosabella could be speaking with those that society deemed lesser.

But Cedar was not looking for ordinary. She was looking for news-worthy topics, so she had to hope it was something much more exciting than any of those options.

Cedar burst into the clearing. Her jaw fell open at the sight.

Hunter and Ashlynn, a commoner and a royal, were holding hands across a log table. A romantic picnic was splayed across it, with a green-checkered tablecloth, a few candles, some vegetarian sandwiches that had been cut into cute little shapes like hearts and flowers. A crown made of daisies sat atop Ashlynn’s head. On the tree behind their little setup, was a carved heart and the inscription “AE + HH 4EVA AFTR”. And the blood had drained from both their faces.

It was completely undeniable what Cedar had just walked into. This was the exact kind of dramatic scoop that she was looking for, and Hunter and Ashlynn knew it.

“It’s not what it looks like!” the pair exclaimed in sync.

If Cedar could have raised a disbelieving eyebrow, she would have. “Right.”

Hunter hung his head. Ashlynn turned away from him, folding her arms like it would protect her from being caught. They both seem to have accepted that there would be no convincing Cedar of anything otherwise.

For many commoners, they could choose whether or not to court someone, and who they liked. It was perhaps one of the only luxuries they were afforded. Royals had to marry their destined prince or princess. Ashlynn herself was still technically a commoner, but she would become a princess. She was risking her entire future by choosing the huntsman. Cedar empathised with her. If it was a choice between becoming a real girl and her friends, Cedar would pick her friends in a heartbeat, regardless of how much she longed to be human.

Which led her to an interesting dilemma.

“Please,” Ashlynn said, clasping her hands together, as if she might start begging. “You can’t put this on your mirrorcast show. This would jeopardise everything. I could have my scholarship rescinded, my destiny rescinded. It would make life much harder for Hunter, too.”

She glanced at Hunter, who gave her a soft, reassuring look. Cedar thought it was very sweet, which only made her choice much harder.

“I– I don’t know.”

Cedar didn’t want to ruin Ashlynn’s and Hunter’s relationship by exposing it to the world of Ever After. But if she didn’t get back to Blondie quick enough, Blondie would go ahead and interview an emotionally-fragile Raven, one of her best friends. Cedar would do anything for her friends, but would she be able to get another girl kicked out of school for it? She would be robbing Ashlynn of her future. Neither option seemed even slightly better than the other.

So she paced the length of the forest clearing to think, which probably wasn’t making anyone feel better. Ashlynn and Hunter sat back down at their table, neither taking an eye off Cedar, like she was a tiger that might pounce at any moment. Ashlynn frantically twirled and untwirled her hair, while Hunter sat ramrod straight and as stiff as a board. Cedar tried not to notice.

After about ten minutes of this, it seemed Hunter could take no more of this, because he spoke up. “I don’t get what there is to think about. You either tell others, or you don’t.”

“You could lie,” Ashlynn suggested. “Cause, you know, that’s your story.”

Cedar stopped in her tracks and turned to face the couple. “Let me make one thing clear. My dad is not a liar. The whole point of our story is learning the value of truth and honesty. He became selfless. This is why he was turned into a real boy. My dad’s my role model. I’m not going to lie about this. I don’t want to.”

She traced her fingers over the patterns she painted on her arm when she was bored. Cedar wondered what her father would do. Was an omission of the truth a lie? Was she directly responsible if she simply told Blondie and let Blondie choose whether to follow this scoop or not?

Cedar let out a frustrated groan and plonked herself down on the grass. She wanted to be good. She wanted to become a real girl. But both options felt she was sacrificing one for the other. Both were selfish. Cedar wanted to bang her head against a tree. It wouldn’t do anything other than make a satisfying thunk. Fleshy people tended to find that very startling though, so she opted not to.

Ashlynn’s face twisted into concern. She got up from her seat, and knelt down on the grass beside Cedar. “Are you okay?”

Cedar sighed, drawing up her knees to her face so that she could wrap her arms around them, hiding her expressionless face. Since truth was such a fundamental part of her story, she spent a great deal of time trying to understand it. Every time she finally thought she got it, something new came in and tossed her back to square one. As a child, the truth was just a fact. It was either correct or incorrect. And she would only say the things she saw as correct. By the time she got to middle school, she understood that there was a correct time and a place for the truth. If she didn’t like something, especially if it was something that someone else cared about, she didn’t need to be blunt about it. She didn’t even need to say anything at all.

Her first year at Ever After High was where it became tricky. She set out making her mirrorcast show, No Nose Grows, because she wanted to use the truth to make a difference. She probably learnt more about truth in that year alone than she had in the rest of her life.

Truth is power. Those who knew it, had it. Cedar held the power now, being the only one that knew that Ashlynn and Hunter were secretly dating. But exposing the truth to her had always been about upsetting the power balances held by others. That was why she originally set out to expose the bias in the royal student council election the previous year, the one that had originally set Cedar on her path of a combined mirrorcast show with Blondie, back when she was shiny-eyed with a thirst for justice. If she exposed Ashlynn and Hunter, what power balance was she shifting?

Blondie wasn’t like her, she realised. Blondie wanted the power and affluence that came with knowing the truth. Cedar saw how she enviously looked at the Royal table in the cafeteria.

Cedar sighed. “I don’t think the truth was ever so complicated back in my dad’s day.”

“What’s wrong?” Ashlynn asked gently.

Cedar knew what she had to do, and that it was the most difficult option at hand. She took her mirrorPhone and stylus out of the compartment she had carved into her wooden forearm. Her phone began to ring as she waited for someone to pick up.

“So?” came Blondie’s voice from the other end of the mirrorPhone. “You found something?”

“I quit the mirrorcast show.”

Cedar hung up quickly, just in time for Ashlynn to let out a loud gasp. Then, without warning, Ashlynn surged forward, throwing her arms around Cedar. Her whole body froze. No one ever hugged her. Her wooden body couldn’t offer the same warmth, softness, or comfort that a human body could. Ashlynn may as well have been hugging a pillar, but she didn’t show even the slightest sign of discomfort. Hunter leapt out of his chair and raced to their sides.

“Thank you,” Ashlynn said, and a tear dripped from her eye onto Cedar’s cheek. “We owe you everything.”

Cedar shook her head. “You owe me nothing. I needed this reality check. I don’t recognise who I became.”

Ashlynn parted from Cedar and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Cedar, you’re a real girl. You always were, and always will be. Being wooden never had anything to do with it. Your body may not change like mine, but you change. And if that’s not human, I don’t know what is.”

Too impatient to wait any longer, Hunter picked Ashlynn up, and spun her around in a hug. The two laughed, and when he set her down, they shared a tender kiss on the lips. Even when the kiss ended, their arms stayed locked around one another in a sweet embrace.

For just a moment, Cedar could pretend that the tear rolling down her wooden face was her own.

Chapter Text

The first two days back at Ever After High were the loneliest– but of course, any school day would always be the loneliest for Lizzie Hearts.

It was incredibly jarring, the events that led up to the closure of the Wonderland borders. One minute, Lizzie was playing croquet with some card soldiers. The next, the Royal Garden was in chaos, Kitty appearing out of nowhere to whisk her away and push her into a rabbit hole. She found herself very ungracefully sprawled on the floor of an unfamiliar clearing, with the most uninteresting green grass instead of the familiar purple hues of Wonderland. A man who called himself Headmaster Grimm stood over her, arguing with the Mad Hatter and Her Majesty the White Queen in a language Lizzie couldn’t understand. The next thing Lizzie knew, she, Maddie, and Kitty were enrolled in Ever After High, and shut off from everything and everyone they knew. Lizzie hadn’t even begun to emotionally processed that she was in a land far from home, and there she was, being forced to attend a place of education that operated more than one day a year, in a language she didn’t understand, with rules that were entirely sensical– which is to say, nonsensical for the average Wonderlandian.

Both Kitty and Maddie picked it up in stride. With her jovial personality, Maddie managed to make friends by the end of the first period. Lizzie hoped she could at least keep Kitty to herself, her anchor in an unfamiliar land. But Kitty seemed to have other plans.

“The cat should like the gentle thorns for a long length nap, so how is it the mock-turtle become hare to yap?” Lizzie had asked her in their native tongue during something called midterms during their first year.

Kitty had seemed to find home among the troublemakers and the miscreants of Ever After High, slinking around with the likes of Duchess, Faybelle, and Sparrow. Lizzie tried to follow the other royals for the sake of not being alone, but they didn’t understand one another. There was always a momentary look of pity on their faces. Often, Lizzie felt more like their pet than their friend.

Kitty simply replied, “Those that grin travel before more travel, and thus know that words are to unravel.”

Which was entirely unhelpful. Lizzie had never been a traveller before becoming a refugee. Her mother simply made all the corners of Wonderland come to her, and to speak their dialect. The little time of her royal tuition dedicated to Wonderlandian dialects easily had to be the most frustrating part of being a princess. But at least other Wonderlandian dialects were just as nonsensical, unlike the language of Ever After.

Summer vacation, once a source of anxiety for Lizzie having no home for her to return to, had instead become a welcome change. Her Majesty the White Queen, who had also managed to escape Wonderland, had offered to make arrangements for the two girls to stay at Ever After High during summer vacation. Instead, the Mad Hatter offered the girls rooms in the apartment above his new Wonderlandian tea shop. It was a breath of fresh air for Lizzie. Finally, things made nonsense again, and best of all, she had her Wonderworms all to herself.

But with the new school year, Lizzie was becoming worried. They had all assumed that with the best magic users in the world, that the curse on Wonderland would be fixed by Legacy Day, and the borders would be reopened. With the borders still closed, their very existence was at stake, and it was Lizzie’s sacred duty as future queen to keep her subjects safe.

“I hereby declare the Wonderlandian Council of Ever After High session number 63 to begin,” Lizzie said.

The three girls were sitting criss-cross-poison-apple-sauce in the school’s croquet court. Previously, croquet had never been a sport offered at Ever After High, but the conclusion of the Wonderlandian Council’s 7th session meant it was now an official school sport. While the girls couldn’t return to Wonderland, they could at least bring a little bit of Wonderland to Ever After.

“Exactly, Narrator.” Maddie beamed up at the sky. “I usually only hear you when Raven’s around, what’s the occasion?”

Lizzie glanced at Kitty, who shrugged lazily. Even by Wonderlandian standards, Maddie was as mad as they come, and Lizzie wouldn’t have it any other way. In her opinion, Maddie made the school feel just a little bit more like home.

“Why, thank you,” Maddie said. “That really is the sweetest thing.”

Lizzie cleared her throat. She had to show good leadership skills, and do what her mother would. Though none of her cards of advice had anything anywhere near close to helpful for their situation. “If we can’t stay on topic, it will be off with your…” She quite liked Maddie. She wouldn’t part her friend with the rest of her body. “Hat.”

Kitty giggled.

“And there is to be no giggling or laughter or anything off the sort. Off with your smile!” Lizzie took a deep breath. “Wonderland is no longer Wonderland.”

Kitty frowned. “That is neither sensical nor nonsensical.”

Maddie clapped her hands and started bouncing. “Ooh, what a fantabulous riddle. What is something if it is not sensical or nonsensical?”

Lizzie banged her hands on her knees as her mother would, if her mother was ever so disrespected by a foreign land as to be forced to sit on the ground. “This is not a game!” she yelled. “Our futures are at stake. Your futures are at stake.”

Kitty faux-yawned, covering her mouth with purple-manicured nails. “Now you’re beginning to sound like our teachers.”

Lizzie felt her face become hot, the anger within her bubbling to the surface and mixing with something else, something she refused to acknowledge. She stood up, remembering an important lesson from her mother about being above her subjects, not below, and certainly not in between. “Wonderland is no more. Have either of you ever taken History of Evil Spells?”

The two girls had to crane their necks to look up at Lizzie. Both shook their heads.

“I took it last year,” Lizzie said, putting her hands on her hips, “because someone has to figure out the Evil Queen’s curse on Wonderland. Tell me what the curse was like.”

Unlike her friends, Lizzie never saw the curse firsthand. She had been locked away in her room to stay safe. Even when she was rescued, she was teleported straight from the palace to the last rabbit hole. But out of all her Wonderlandian friends at Ever After, Lizzie was the only one to come face to face with the Evil Queen herself.

She remembered approaching the throne room and throwing the grand double doors wide open, her heels clacking against the checkered tiles of the floor.

“Mother,” Lizzie said in Wonderlandian, “where are my personal guards? I feel quite exposed without them. And where are my tutors? I can’t attend to my royal duties without them.”

But as she got closer to the towering throne, something was wrong. The Queen of Hearts usually looked as if she had stepped straight out of a royal portrait, with more regality and majesty than even any paintbrush could achieve. Only, her hair was an untamed Bandersnatch’s mane, her gown a wrinkled mess, two shoes that didn’t match, and her crown was nowhere to be seen.

Her mother vibrated in a frenzied way, like she had had too much caffeine, both her legs bouncing as she rubbed her hands up her arms. “I fired them. All of them. Can’t trust them. Can’t trust anyone! Only her. My advisor. My trusted advisor.”

The Queen of Hearts had never had an advisor of any sort. If a monarch needed an advisor, then they weren’t much of a leader at all. Lizzie looked to the right side of the throne, where stood a woman with the piercing golden eyes of a hawk, platinum white hair, high cheekbones chiselled out of solid marble, skin that seemed devoid of blood. The golden gaze froze her to the spot, a commanding aura that seized Lizzie’s limbs and stole her breath right from her chest without so much as a spell cast.

And it wouldn’t be the last time Lizzie was face to face with that visage. Just days later, on her first day of school, she came across the Evil Queen’s daughter. She was a mirror image of her mother, save for the purple eyes, down to the platinum blonde hair. It was as if the Evil Queen herself had been aged down to a teenager. All she could do was let out a shriek of alarm and run away.

She later admitted to Kitty about how alarmingly similar the two looked. Lizzie suspected that Kitty passed on the message to Maddie, who absolutely would have blabbered to Raven Queen, because the very next day her hair was a vibrant purple. When Lizzie stared at her, mouth agape, Raven simply shrugged.

“I needed a change.”

And they never spoke of it ever again.

Maddie cocked her head to the side. “Are you done flash-backing?”

Lizzie jutted out her chin and crossed her arms. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Well, Alistair said it was snowing in the Jubjub Forest, and the trees started growing apples,” Kitty said. “And when I was catnapping in a tumtum tree, it suddenly became that of ebony wood.”

“Funktastic little vests suddenly turned into sensible corsets,” Maddie sighed. “And the Jubjub birds and dodos all became ordinary songbirds. It was so ensadenning.”

Lizzie nodded. “Something that you learn in History of Evil spells is that magic makes both good tools for charity and good tools for evil because if you’re strong, the spells cannot be undone. You can manage and counter the effects, but it will never truly be gone. Most spells are only undone because of true love’s kiss, but that won’t work for a land. A land isn’t a person, and it doesn’t have a true love. Everyone knows this. The very wonder itself has been cursed. And when wonder is un-wondrous, it is no longer Wonderland.”

“Ooh, ooh, I know this one,” Maddie said, putting her hand up as if she was in class. “In Riddling last year, we learnt about this silly little boat called the Ship of Theseus. But they switcheroo parts of the ship with new parts of the ship. The question is when it stops being Theseus’ ship. It wasn’t a riddle, so much as it was a treadmill for our brains.” She suddenly lost her smile and looked down. “Oh.”

“Yes,” Lizzie said, noticing Kitty’s ears and tail also drooping. “Wonderland is no more, and now we are stuck in a wander-land. So… we need to figure out a solution, or we will all cease to exist.”

Kitty frowned. “Are there any heirless destinies we could take? There are many cats, princesses, and paupers in fairytales.”

“That won’t do. Even if there were heirless destinies to be adopted, we’d be expected to conform to Ever After rules,” Lizzie said. “It was difficult enough to convince Grimm to let us use a bit of our Wonderlandian magic here. I can’t imagine he’d let me be anything more than–” Lizzie shuddered– “a damsel in distress, or you two as anything appropriately mad. I’d almost rather disappear.”

“Theseus,” Maddie said.

Both of the girls looked at her like she was mad– which she was. But there was a rhyme to her madness. Neither of them counted her out.

“I didn’t think of this, because no one in class agreed with me,” Maddie said slowly, “but I thought that it was more important to figure out when the ship became the ship of Theseus first.”

She looked imploringly at Lizzie and Kitty. For once, Kitty looked engaged.

“Go on,” Lizzie prompted.

“Well, obviously, the ship becomes Theseus’ the second he owns it. So, by following that logic, the ship is no longer Theseus’ when he no longer owns it, once it is someone else’s, even before any single part of the ship is replaced.” Maddie smiled proudly.

Lizzie turned the words over in her mind. She herself was in the Ever After debate club. She could see why the simpleminded Ever Afterlings would reject the idea– it was so simple. And simple people liked to make things complex. It just made nonsense. But Lizzie had no ship, and she was no Theseus. “What are you saying?”

Kitty gasped. “You mean that Wonderland is where the Queen of Hearts is.” She looked deeply into Lizzie’s eyes. “When you sign the Storybook of Legends, Wonderland is here.”

Maddie giggled. “We just need to find it. It’s already starting to come back to us. I met the most interesting old man that speaks Riddlish.”

Lizzie once again felt like she was about to burst into tears, but this time it was from a warm, overflowing joy that threatened to leak out of her like a broken pipe. “All I wanted–” she sniffled– “all I wanted was for you both to be safe. I was so afraid it would be impossible.”

Kitty shook her head in disapproval, but her signature grin was on her face. “Clearly someone hasn’t been doing her homework and thinking of six impossible things before breakfast.”

Lizzie let out a strangled laugh, choked by tears.

“Actually, I just remembered something that I think is important,” Kitty said. “Follow me.”

And with that, she disappeared, leaving only her cheshire smile.

Cerise didn’t run, she soared. Her feet flew across the ground, the cold morning wind cutting into her face. The wind pulled at her hood, trying to tear it from her body, and would never succeed. Her heart pumped and pumped and pumped as the forest blurred past her eyes in splotches of green and brown. Cerise never felt more alive than this.

A familiar scent reached her nose moments before something crashed into her back. Cerise let out a strangled gasp as she tipped forward, the ground rushing up to meet her face, hands flailing to absorb the impact. Two arms wrapped around her waist.

They rolled a few times on landing, a tangle of bodies. The second they slowed enough for Cerise to regain her bearings, she shot back up to one knee, bracing her other foot against the ground to pounce at a moment's notice, even knowing who it was.

Her older sister stood over her, holding a hand out to her. “Dad’s called a family meeting.”

“There are better ways to tell me than that.” Still, Cerise took her sister’s helping hand and stood up, letting her dust off her hood.

All Ramona did was smirk. “Race you.”

The two ran.

The romance between their parents was a forbidden one, having been enemy clans for more generations than anyone knew. If a single soul were to learn of the truth, that Cerise was one of two forbidden children that should never have been born, the consequences were unfathomable. Their mere existence was the highest order of illegal, violating laws woven into the very existence of the land of Ever After. While the family could live a secret life during vacation, during school the girls could only meet their parents in the Dark Forest. It was dangerous, home only to the most fearsome of creatures. But as half-werewolves, it was practically a second home to the Badwolf-Hood girls.

The two girls skidded to a stop in the clearing, surrounded on all sides by jagged trees that looked as if they would come to life and devour them. In the center, stood their parents– Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf, Raoul.

Their father’s face was in his hands, and he was sobbing. “I cannot eat my own daughter.”

It felt like the world had been flipped upside down. Cerise had never seen her father cry before. Her mothers arms were wrapped around him to console him, saying soothing things too quiet for even Cerise’s wolf ears to pick up.

Raoul’s ear twitched. His fur all stood on end, hackles raised. When he saw it was just his daughters, he sniffed violently, like it would suck away his despair. And visually, it did. The snot was suddenly all gone, a clawed hand smeared the tears out of his eyes, and he stood firm and strong. If it weren’t for the droopy tail between his legs, Cerise would have been none the wiser. Her mother hung onto her husband’s arm, concern in her eyes.

“Hey, girls,” Red said tenderly, her own eyes shining with unshed tears. “I missed you both.”

“I don’t get it,” Cerise said, crossing her arms. “I thought that we were just going to watch for signs of Grandma becoming ill before we did anything.”

Cerise felt like they had already had this discussion back during summer vacation. Their parents' plan had originally been to run away to Wonderland before destiny could catch up with them, the laws of fairy tale magic and destiny itself worked differently there. Perhaps, the entire family would not disappear for not following their destinies. It was where their parents had eloped and had their honeymoon, after all.

But that was before the Evil Queen cursed Wonderland and all the borders were shut down.

Now the plan was just to wait. The story would never start until Cerise was sent with a gift basket for her grandmother, meaning that Red Riding Hood would get to decide when the story began. She could buy time until they finally figured out where the whole family could be safe.

Raoul let out a weary sigh. Even in his wolf form, he seemed to age twenty years at that moment. “Things have changed. If Headmaster Grimm can fast track Raven’s destiny, she can fast track any of ours.”

“We may not have time,” Red jumped in. “Ramona, tell me again what Raven said during rehearsals?”

“She didn’t want to follow her destiny.” Ramona looked at her manicured acrylic nails like she didn’t care, which Cerise could see right through. Ramona always got her claws done when she was stressed, and Cerise had seen her near Barrel O’ Nails Salon at least three times in the last month.

The previous year, Ramona had tried to get herself expelled so that she wouldn’t have to follow her destiny. Even though she would disappear, it would at least mean some other werewolf would be given her destiny, and family wouldn’t have to eat family. Or so she told them after leaving the headmaster’s office. The whole family was horrified by this. Fortunately, Milton Grimm had only given her a year-long suspension, forcing her to go to a reform school before coming back to Ever After to repeat her Legacy Year. If they signed their destinies, and Cerise’s future child signed theirs, then Ramona would have to one day eat both her own mother and Cerise’s child before being killed for that very act. As for the Big Bad Wolf… if everything went ahead as destiny foretold it, then it wouldn’t be long before Cerise no longer had a father. Whether or not they followed their destinies, there was no winning. Someone always had to die.

“I’d probably be asking the same questions as her if my destiny was fast tracked,” Ramona continued.

“If they can fast track destinies, what is stopping them from starting our story the day after Legacy Day?” Red said. “We don’t know what we’re walking into this year.”

Ramona started pacing. “We need to figure out options. Is there some kind of spell or potion that can de-wolf us? Dad and I would never be able to follow our destinies if we were no longer wolves. Grimm would have to find someone else. None of us would die.”

Cerise could barely believe her sister’s words. To stop being werewolves would be like cutting off their arms. But, if the alternative for her father and sister was death… no, Cerise couldn’t even think of it.

Red looked away. “The only person I know that would be strong enough to do it is in mirror prison.”

Cerise winced. She forgot that her mother was roommates with the Evil Queen back in high school. While she loved Raven, she hated the Evil Queen. Twice, her family had a chance to escape their fates, and twice, the Evil Queen withheld it from them as an unintended side effect of her own crimes.

“Wait.” That train of thought gave Cerise an idea. “What about Raven? She’s the Evil Queen’s daughter. She has magic. Would she be able to–”

“No,” Raoul said. “Just the other day, the villainous staff and I were discussing her capabilities. Baba Yaga herself said that her power and current level of mastery leave much to be desired. Anyway, I don’t think it would be right to ask her. The poor girl is going through enough right now.”

“We could send the kids to Neverland,” Red said, bringing the conversation back. She was furrowing her brow as she always did when trying to remember something from her time in high school. “Upon arriving in Neverland, children are stuck at that age, down to the very second. Destinies have never started the second someone signed the Storybook of Legends, meaning the kids have time. So if they can never reach the age that their destinies are meant to start, they’re not technically going against their destinies. They should… they should live.”

Ramona frowned. “But you wouldn’t be able to come with us. And without us here to carry out our destinies, you’ll both disappear.”

“That’s a sacrifice any parent would make, cub,” Red said, eyes becoming shiny with tears. “You could have a better life.”

“No, I won’t have it,” Raoul said with a growl, exposing his teeth. “I want you girls as far away from Ever After as possible, but not there. Neverland is a dangerous place. Everything there wants to kill you. Pirates, erratic fairies, jealous mermaids, and don’t even get me started on that Pan kid and his Lost Boys.”

Ramona exposed her canine teeth. “We’re Badwolfs. We can take ‘em.”

Red placed a soothing hand on her husband’s shoulder. “But they wouldn’t disappear for not following their destinies. Or at least Ramona won’t die when she reaches our age. Isn’t that worth it?”

Raoul let out a huff. “As a last resort.”

Cerise, however, hadn't stopped thinking about Raven. “Hey, when you sign the Storybook of Legends, you’re meant to inherit your parent’s powers, right?”

“Yes…” said Raoul, looking at her expectantly.

“So just going off what Mum said, if we have time after signing before our stories actually start… Raven would have her mum’s full power, wouldn’t she? What if right after we sign, she could de-wolf us? None of us would disappear or die that way.”

After many disappearances and reappearances of Kitty Cheshire, she finally came to a stop at a well. Lizzie stopped in her tracks. She knew exactly where she was. It used to be Bunny Blanc’s rabbit hole, the very one she used to send them to the safety of Ever After. It had since been filled with soil and topped with a well when the borders to Wonderland were closed.

“Yay!” Maddie exclaimed. She began to cartwheel over to the well.

Lizzie took a deep breath, and walked over to where it all began.

Against the cobbled stone walls of the well, sprouted some Wondodendrons.

Chapter Text

It felt weird for Raven to not have the option to go home for the weekend, as she had every year at Ever After High. When Apple mysteriously disappeared on Friday night, she and her friends decided to have a sleepover in Cerise’ and Cedar’s room, where they caught up on what they all missed from each other’s lives during summer vacation.

Since arriving back at the dorm room before dawn on Saturday, Apple had been acting strange and skittish. Raven figured that she had probably just snuck out for reasons that were absolutely none of her business. A question had been floating around in her mind, but she figured she would wait until Apple was no longer so jumpy.

On the morning of the first day of class, as they both got ready, Raven steeled her nerves and spoke. “Hey, Apple, you wanna get breakfast together this morning?”

Apple dropped her hairbrush and squealed. “Oh, Raven, I would love nothing more! I will admit, I was worried for a moment during Legacy Day rehearsal, but I just knew it would all work out. I’m so happy that you’re embracing your destiny.”

Then, unexpectedly, the girl surged forward and threw her arms around Raven’s neck. Raven let out a strangled gasp, and awkwardly pat Apple on the back.

“Yeah, uh, it’s nothing,” she said quickly. “But I’ve got some questions? My grandma didn’t tell me much, and I figure Grimm will be a royal pain–”

“Yes!” Apple said, barely listening to her. “We must go at once.”

Apple sped through the rest of her morning routine, before taking Raven’s hand and practically speed walking through the halls. Raven was expecting for the other students to run in terror of her– since Legacy Day practice, they had a habit of doing that. But it was like walking hand-in-hand with Apple short circuited their brains. Princess Apple White, holding hands with the girl destined to be her murderer. They didn’t know whether to fawn over Apple or scream at the sight of Raven, so they just froze on the spot with trembling legs. Apple didn’t seem to notice, chirping out hellos and smiling at everyone they passed.

Apple led Raven over to an empty table in the sunny part of the cafeteria. Raven watched in confusion as Apple sat down, and began to set up a cutlery set from inside her purse.

Raven frowned. “Apple, I’m not sure how it works at your castle, but here we have to get our meals from the lunch lady.”

“Whatever do you mean?” Apple said.

Just as she said that, a group of her adoring fans plopped four different plates onto the table in front of her. “We didn’t know which breakfast you wanted, so we got all of them!” said a blonde boy with a bob haircut.

Apple giggled. “Thank you. I very much appreciate it.”

Raven rolled her eyes, but secretly wondered what it would be like if she had her own groupies. Whenever her grandmother talked about high school, she described how the spawn of all the greatest villains followed her and obeyed her every command, but that was more out of fear. Pure adoration… no, Raven couldn’t even begin to imagine that.

“I can’t possibly eat all of this,” Apple said as she pushed over three bowls to Raven, “so why don’t you take one of these?”

Raven tried her best to give Apple a genuine smile, but it came out more like a wince. She was going to get her own food, but she figured it would be rude to say no to the princess’ leftovers. “Thanks.” She spooned some porridge into her mouth, a voracious appetite always forming when she was particularly anxious. “So, Apple, all I’ve really been told about my destiny is that I’m taking my mum’s, and that I won’t have to marry your dad. How does it all work then?”

Apple delicately dabbed the corner of a napkin on the side of her lips, and smiled. “It would indeed be quite messed up if you had to marry my dad. Instead, my parents will adopt you, because they are ever-so charitable.”

Raven nodded as she swallowed down some more porridge. That didn’t sound too bad, but she feared she had not yet heard the worst of it. She suddenly had a horrible thought. “Apple… on what grounds are your parents adopting me?”

“Because you’ll be an orphan. It’s out of the goodness of their hearts.”

Raven dropped her spoon. The cafeteria seemed louder all of a sudden.

“I’m not an orphan.”

Apple reached across the table, placing a hand over Raven’s. Her expression was kind, but rather practiced-looking. “Raven, for our destiny to play out, your grandmother is going to die.”

Raven’s stomach dropped. Is this why her grandmother had been so affectionate with her before she left for school? Is this why her grandmother refused to let her back home during the school year?

“I managed to negotiate you out of that.”

This was all Raven’s fault. Raven was supposed to marry Apple’s dad, and her grandmother had sacrificed herself so she would not be subjected to such a fate.

“I can see this is troubling you–”

Raven stood so abruptly that her chair clattered to the floor. “I have to go.”

She ran out of the cafeteria, tears blurring her vision. People jumped out of the way of the future Evil Queen. All but one.

She collided with someone and fell to the floor.

“Oh, I’m so sorry. Raven, are you okay?”

Raven dragged the back of her hand across her eyes, smearing away the tears so she could get a better look. The blob of colours turned into Dexter Charming. He was leaning over her, holding out a hand. She took his hand, and he helped her to her feet.

“I’m fine, I’m fine.”

His deep blue eyes searched hers, full of worry. Full of concern for her. She didn’t understand how a prince could care about her feelings, and now of all times, when all she wanted to do was hide away from the world.

“Dexter.” Daring Charming swooped in, throwing an arm around his neck and dragging him away. “Perhaps you need better glasses. That’s not a damsel in distress, that’s a witch.”

“But she’s technically a princess,” he said.

While Dexter was distracted, she ran away.

Apple had never had so many worries in her life. She already had demands of school, navigating a court of teenagers, the bombshell that was the Annual Destiny Bidding, and figuring out how to console an upset Raven. But after breakfast, Headmaster Grimm pulled her into his office and had essentially asked her to spy on Raven. Everything was spiralling out of control, and she had too many responsibilities pulling her this way and that.

She took a deep breath, reminding herself that this is just what being a queen would be like. All of this was just preparation. She would come out of this mess better for it.

Apple had been too busy in Crownculus to have time to spare a thought on this, but Damsel-In-Distressing was just the class she needed to start addressing each of these problems. The girls were in a meadow, with four crystal-clear glass towers set up.

“There are so many princesses this year,” Madam Maid Marian said as she paced among the girls. “I want you all to pair up.”

Apple looked to her friends, but Briar and Ashlynn had already picked each other. She felt her heart pang. She thought that they were her best friends. But of course, they had a whole year at Ever After High to become closer before Apple started at their school. She wasn’t used to not being someone’s first choice. Briar and Ashlynn shot her apologetic looks, and Apple gave them a smile.

“Would you like to be partners?”

Apple looked at Darling, and the Destiny Bid flashed into her mind. Twelve hundred gold for Darling to become the princess from The Three Dogs. Apple wondered if she knew.

“Of course,” Apple said with a smile.

“Everyone has their partners? Good. Translocation app!” Madam Maid Marian said, pointing her mirrorPhone at Apple with no warning.

Her stomach flipped, and she was suddenly up high in one of the towers. The other princesses began disappearing from the meadow and reappearing in the other towers. Darling appeared beside her in a shower of sparkles.

“Today, we have a guest princess,” Madam Maid Marian said into a megaphone. She turned on the MirrorBoard she’d wheeled out– like a chalkboard, but a screen that could be written on.

Poppy O’Hair’s face appeared. She had so much auburn hair that it filled the entire screen. She waved. “Hello everyone. Can you hear me? Can you see me?”

“Yes, we can,” Madam Maid Marian said. “Excellent. The lovely Princess Poppy O’Hair has been in her tower since she was twelve years old, as you all may know, in accordance to her destiny. Why don’t you share with the class your experience?”

Poppy smiled. “It was certainly a period of adjustment. There are two very important things a princess must do. The first is to keep from getting bored in a tower, and the second is to get the attention of a prince to rescue you. For the first, an active imagination is every princess’ friend. I like to exercise my imagination through storytelling. I would love to one day become–”

“Yes, Poppy. A girl can keep happy for years on end, so long as she has her own imagination to entertain her.”

Poppy quickly nodded, looking a bit confused about being cut off. “There are many methods of getting the attention of a rescuer. In my story, I sing. For others, it could be–”

“I’ll stop you right there,” Madam Maid Marian said. “That’s the second part of the lesson, and I would like the girls to figure that out for themselves. Princess Poppy, you are of course welcome to join us. Now, everyone, please take a few minutes using your imagination to entertain yourselves.”

Apple pushed aside the sudden pang of nostalgia she got from seeing Poppy, a reminder of her homeschooling days, to focus on the lesson. The princesses sat down criss-cross-poison-apple-sauce and closed their eyes.

“You’ve been looking stressed,” Darling whispered. “What’s wrong?”

Apple felt her cheeks grow warm. She thought she was doing a good job at hiding that. None of their classmates had noticed, not even her own best friends. She didn’t know how Darling managed to figure it out. Apple was beginning to understand that the delicate princess was a lot more observant than she let on.

“Well, a lot,” Apple said. “I’ve upset Raven. She asked about how our destinies are meant to work, since, you know, she’s taking over her mum’s destiny, and…” She looked imploringly at Darling. “Do you promise not to say this to anyone else? I don’t want it to end up in the tabloids.”

“Of course,” Darling said. “I swear on my life, I won’t tell a soul.”

Apple felt relieved. She knew it was petty and immature to be jealous of Briar and Ashlynn picking each other over her, but it was nice to think of Darling as hers in the way that Briar and Ashlynn were each other’s.

“Raven’s grandmother is meant to die, and then my parents will adopt her,” Apple said. “That’s how our story will work. But I didn’t give her the consideration she needed when I told her. I’ve had my whole life to adjust and to know that my parents will die, but she doesn’t have much time left before her grandmother dies. I… I wanna make her feel better, but I don’t know how.”

Darling hummed in deep thought. “What happened to the original story? Where an Evil Queen marries your dad?”

Apple thought back to summer vacation, the many meetings she went to. It was attended by Hunter’s father, as well as the parents of the seven dwarves. “Well, her grandmother thought that was too cruel. She originally tried to become my Evil Queen, but Headmaster Grimm said that she had already completed her destiny with my mother. And besides, she’s too old to be considered the Fairest in the land, only for me to take that from her. So then she said she would sooner die than let her teenage granddaughter marry my father. And Headmaster Grimm said, ‘If that’s what you wish.’ And so the former Evil Queen gracefully accepted her fate.”

“Oh, wow,” Darling said. She was quiet for a few moments. Apple worried if she told her too much. Then, “There are other reasons that Raven’s custody could change, right?”

Apple frowned. “What do you…” Her eyes shot open. “Darling, you’re brilliant!”

Raven somehow managed to pull herself together to get to her General Villainy class. She dragged her feet down the stone stairs, avoiding the rats and the spiders that scurried along, all the way down to the dungeon. She opened the door, but a sudden draft ripped the doorknob from her hand, and it slammed into the wall with a loud bang.

“Excellent work, Raven,” Mr. Badwolf said. “Everyone, take note of her villainous entrance. That late arrival and dramatic door slam was truly some of the best I’ve seen.”

Raven stopped herself before she could tell him it was an accident. That would just be more trouble than it was worth.

“Please, take a seat, but keep in mind that I would prefer timeliness in the future.”

Raven looked at the circle of her classmates sitting on stools. There was Faybelle, who she already knew hated her guts; Ramona Badwolf, daughter of the teacher and was notoriously in reform school the previous year for bad behaviour and had just threatened one of her best friends the other day; Sparrow Hood, who Raven caught stealing her jewellery at least five times the previous year; Lizzie Hearts, a friend of Maddie’s but with an awfully bad temper; and the sweet, pink-haired girl in the corner with a box on her lap. If Raven remembered correctly, that was Ginger Witch, daughter of the Candy Witch, and she herself seemed like a very nervous girl.

Raven sat down beside her, dumping her bag on the floor between her legs so that Sparrow wouldn’t get any ideas.

Mr. Badwolf cleared his throat. “Welcome to General Villainy. Unlike many of your other teachers, I, like you, have not yet fulfilled my destiny. I signed my destiny many years ago, waiting for the next Little Red Riding Hood to be born.” He and Ramona shared a glance, Raven figured because the latter would inherit her destiny from the former. “This year, when she signs the Storybook of Legends, we will all embark on our Legacy journeys together. Some of you, like me, will even have to wait an extended period of time before you get to fulfill your destinies.” His gaze landed on Faybelle, then Ginger. “For some of you, your destiny may seem up in the air due to circumstances beyond your control.” He looked meaningfully at Lizzie. “And for others, your destiny may have even been fast-tracked.”

Finally, he looked deep into Raven’s eyes from across the room. As she shrank into her stool, she wondered if he could smell her doubts about her destiny.

Mr. Badwolf started pacing the length of the room. “Regardless of when you must step into your evil parent’s role, it is my duty to shape all of you into the villains you must one day become, to preserve the existence of Ever After itself. You are the lucky students entrusted with such a delicate, important role. Now please, let’s go around the room and introduce ourselves and our destinies to one another, starting with Ramona.”

Ramona yawned. Her arms were crossed, and she was somehow reclined on her stool. It felt slightly inauthentic, almost as if it was rehearsed. “Ramona Badwolf. Got an appetite for little girls and little old grannies.”

Mr. Badwolf nodded approvingly.

Sparrow Hood didn’t speak. His hat was pulled low over his eyes.

“Sparrow.”

Sparrow shot up with a start. Had he been asleep? “Oh, uh, yeah. What’s up?”

“Name and story, please,” Mr. Badwolf said through gritted teeth. It seemed he regretted his choice in career path, and Raven couldn’t blame him.

Sparrow hit a chord on his guitar. “Sparrow Hood– son of Robin Hood.”

Mr. Badwolf plugged his wolf ears, wincing. “Put that blasted thing away or you’ll have detention.”

Sparrow quickly set down his guitar. “By the way, mister sir, why am I in this class again? I’m a hero.”

“You may be a hero in your story, but your actions themselves are typically considered villainous. To be prepared for your story, you must know how to steal and swindle, which are taught in this class, not some pompous class like Heroics 101 for the princes.”

Sparrow threw up a peace sign. “Cool.”

“I don’t know what that hand gesture means, but you will not be doing it in this class, young man.”

Ramona barked out a laugh.

Faybelle Thorne flew into the air on her turn and took out her pom poms. “I’m Faybelle Thorne, daughter of the Dark Fairy. I’m cursing babies and taking names! Give me an F!”

Mr. Badwolf growled. “Next.”

Faybelle drifted back down to her seat, muttering, “Spoilsport.”

Lizzie Hearts stood up next. “I am Elizabeth Hearts, daughter of the Queen of Hearts. If someone doesn’t figure out how to fix the Wonderland Curse and return me back home, it’ll be off with your heads!” She started coughing. She quickly produced a water bottle from her book bag, took a swig, and then popped in a lozenger. Lizzie sat down. “Ah, much better.”

Mr. Badwolf sighed. He was known for his temper tantrums, but he never needed to fix his throat after one.

Ginger smiled, and opened up her box. It was full of donuts. “Hi everyone, I’m Ginger Witch, but I think you all knew me as Ginger Breadhouse last year. I baked some donuts for the class. Would anyone like some?”

“Ah, how wonderful, Ginger,” Mr. Badwolf said. “Already baking disguised treats, even when your own destiny is so far away.”

“Oh, no Mr. Badwolf, these aren’t poisoned or anything. I just wanted to share with the class.”

Without warning, Mr. Badwolf stepped forward and batted the box out of her hand with a paw. Sparrow quickly retracted a hand and shoved a whole donut in his mouth while the teacher wasn’t looking. Ginger’s mouth fell agape in shock.

“I will have none of this baked goodie nonsense in my classroom,” Mr. Badwolf growled. “You are villains, not little village idiots who amount to nothing in their lives. Act like it. Raven, you’re up next.”

Raven stood up, wiping her clammy hands on her dress. Her classmates either looked at her with awe or revulsion. She didn’t want either, wishing she could instead fade into the shadows of the classroom. Raven absolutely did not feel up to this today. “You all know who I am. For the record, I didn’t ask to have my destiny fast-tracked like all the gossip blogs and magazines say I have.” She had read a lot of hurtful articles over the weekend, some so bad that it made her want to hurl. She sat back down.

Mr. Badwolf snarled. “You’re all a bunch of useless little do-gooders. All of you brats should have been sent to reform school like my daughter, by now. If you’re all going to be in your rebellious phase, then fine. You can all pair up. If you don’t want to be like your parents, then you’re going to learn the art of your partner’s trade, and teach them your own. Show me that you’ve got a basic level of understanding of the other villain’s method, and you’ll have passed this lesson.”

Raven looked at Ginger, and Ginger looked at her. They nodded in unison. Partners.

“Sorry about your donuts,” Raven said sincerely. “They smelled delicious.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it. I should’ve known better than to bring them to an evil class.” Ginger leaned in to whisper, “I saw what you did on Legacy Day. I just want you to know… you’re not the only witch that doesn’t want to follow their destiny.”

Raven’s mouth fell open. Everyone else seemed, if not enthusiastic for their destinies, at least accepting of their fates. “I thought I was the only one.”

“You were the only one brave enough to speak up.” Ginger put her hands over Raven’s. “I really admire you, Raven.”

Raven smiled. “You know, my mum’s always told me about the importance of having a coven. We can have each other’s back in the hardest year of our lives.”

For the first time since knowing her, Ginger didn’t look nervous. “I’d like that.”

Apple paced back and forth in front of Headmaster Grimm’s desk during lunch, skipping a meal at the cafeteria all together. This was too important.

“All that’s necessary is that Raven comes to live with my family,” she said, combining two hands like one was her family, the other Raven. “It doesn’t matter how, right? After all, it was permitted for her to be adopted into the family, not marrying my father.” What she didn’t add was that Milton Grimm seemed to hold the very power necessary to tweak– not break– their destinies. The Legacy Bidding proved it. “I think it’s incredibly cruel for Raven to have to lose her grandmother. She has already lost decades of freedom before she was even meant to follow her destiny. But what if instead, my parents seized her from her grandmother? We could announce that there are concerns of child abuse, or neglect! Then she would be a ward of the state. And as per the charitability of my family, we take her in ourselves. Then the rest of our destinies can play out as it’s meant to. Isn’t it perfect?”

Headmaster Grimm fixed her with an unfamiliarly steely gaze. “How very idealistic of you, Princess Apple. However, it cannot be done. Her destiny is already set in stone. Had this been suggested earlier, I would have considered it as an option. However, it is too late. The former Evil Queen must die. Is that all?”

Apple tried not to sigh. “Yes, Headmaster.”

“Then you better get back to lunch.”

“Thank you, Headmaster Grimm.”

She closed the door gently behind her. She had never been unable to make amends before, never been unable to fix the problems plaguing someone else. Apple White didn’t know how she could ever make it up to Raven.

Chapter Text

Raven ignored the shocked gasps as she marched right up to the Royal table in the cafeteria. After all, she was technically royalty. She had every right to be there.

Even Dexter himself was looking up at her, mouth agape. There was a bit of food on the corner of his mouth. Somehow, Raven didn't find it off putting. Seeing a Royal looking even a bit unfairest was kind of comforting. “Um, hey, Raven. What’s up?”

“We need to talk. You got a minute?”

“I have thirty,” Dexter said with a matter-of-fact smile before wincing. He scratched the back of his head. “Sorry, bad joke.”

Raven cracked a smile. “It’s fine. I know a place.”

Dexter quickly got up off the bench, taking his tray with them. He dipped his head forward like a bow. His crown slid an inch down his forehead. “Lead the way.”

Whenever Raven wanted to be alone, she went to the school roof. It was so high up that its only visitors were birds, and the occasional cleaning fairy. The perfect place to get away.

It was where she led Dexter now.

She pushed through a door and walked out, the stairway walls replaced with a brilliant view of a blue sky painted by swirling clouds. Flocks of pigeons and ravens gathered about the roof, some nests balancing precariously on the roof’s ledges, or on the branches of the magnificent tree that grew out of the school itself. Below them, Book End sprawled out away from their school. Beyond that, the Enchanted Forest.

Magic meant a lot of things in this world. Although Raven had powers of her own, she had always held the belief that views like this were the real magic.

“Whoa,” Dexter whispered in awe, his jaw hanging open. “This is amazing.”

“This is my favourite place.” Raven sat down on a free space of the ledge, letting her legs dangle over the edge. She swung them, the winds gently shifting her skirt, letting her heels collide with the wall.

Dexter lowered himself down beside her. “I can see why.” His eyes swept over the view before turning to her. “So, what did you want to talk about?”

“I…” Raven took a deep breath, beginning to twist her rings around her fingers. “I found out something horrible. About my destiny.”

Dexter winced. “Do you have to marry Apple White’s dad?”

Raven shook her head, trying to fight back the sting of tears that threatened to form. “No. Something worse.” She locked eyes with Dexter. Though he was staring at her in horror (and she didn’t blame him– before this week, she wouldn’t have been able to imagine a worse fate than marrying a middle aged man before her twenties), but she found herself staring at the colour of his eyes. She had never noticed what a deep shade of blue his eyes were– like a twilight sky. She didn’t know why, but she considered telling him about the fate of her grandmother. Of course, not even her closest friends knew about that yet. It would have been silly to tell this all to a boy she hardly knew. Raven quickly looked away.

“People refuse to tell me what’s going to happen in my destiny. My grandmother said hardly more than a few words. Headmaster Grimm won’t even let me ask questions. And Apple… Dexter, she’s so nice. She waited for me to return to the dorm when I was out late, she sets out towels for me before I shower, she gets me breakfast in the morning. I couldn’t poison her. I don’t even think I could poison Faybelle Thorne. It’s all too soon. I thought that if I had, like, another thirty or forty years to prepare, then I’d be able to get used to the idea of being evil. Maybe something would happen that would make me hate her. But I don’t think I can. Is that weird?”

Dexter’s brows were creased with concern for her. “Not at all. I actually think that it’s really brave that in a world that consistently tells you that you are evil and should be evil, that you choose to be good. I really admire that.”

Raven didn’t know whether to smile or to cry. Part of her felt a sense of relief to hear that there was someone out there that noticed her struggle– in a way, her friends were so close that they didn’t see her evil heritage at all, she was simply their Raven. But Dexter stood both close and far away enough to see the whole picture.

The other part of Raven was wracked with guilt. If she only acted good because she enjoyed being recognised for it, was she even truly good? It felt selfish, in a way, to clutch onto the shreds of praise she received for what were supposed to be selfless acts.

“Thank you,” she finally managed to get out, feeling as if her throat was closing up.

Dexter gave her a soft smile. “This isn’t even close to a similar situation, but I think I can kind of understand what you’re going through. I don’t even know what my destiny will be, but I’ve spent my whole life preparing to face it, some unknown challenge. Princes rescue their princess of destiny, and then they get married, and then they become king and queen of a kingdom. That’s what I’ve been told my whole life. But I don’t want to marry someone just because destiny says so. Call me a romantic, I don’t care. When I marry someone, I want it to be because I’m truly in love with them. I want it to be a choice. I mean, that’s how all of our stories started right? People truly falling in love, and not because destiny bound them to it.”

Raven cocked her head to the side. For once in her life, she didn’t feel so alone. “You know, all of my friends know exactly what their destinies are and how they’re gonna play out. I didn’t really think about whether or not other people even know what their destinies are.. I would never have guessed it would be the royals, too.”

Dexter quickly shook his head, waving his hands. “Don’t get me wrong, I still have it good and all, since most of us are at least guaranteed a happy ending. But, uh, yeah.”

Raven scooched herself closer to him. Dexter let out a sudden gasp and reached out an arm, ready to catch her in case she fell. He seemed to relax, then tense again upon realising that she wasn’t falling. Raven winced. She was still the daughter of the most evil witch in the land. Perhaps she shouldn’t sit so close to princes, no matter how nice they were. She figured he probably only tried to save her as a reflex forged from years of preparing to be a fairytale hero.

“So, how would you feel about finding out what your destiny is now?” Raven asked, leaning back slightly to try and move out of his personal space and put the prince at ease.

Dexter chuckled, scratching the back of his neck. “Well, that’s impossible, isn’t it? We have to wait until Legacy Day.”

Raven looked at him slyly, a smirk playing at her lips. “You know, a lot of the teachers complain I’m not being evil enough. Don’t you think it would make them really happy if I, for instance, broke into the headmaster’s office and cracked open the Storybook of Legends? Especially if I corrupted a polite little Prince Charming to do it, of course.”

Dexter suddenly looked away, his cheeks red. Perhaps she went too far.

“Of course, I’d also check your destiny while I’m there,” Raven said.

“That’s a great idea,” Dexter said quickly. “And I think I know just how to do it…”

After suffering through two more classes, it was recess– the second best opportunity to get to the Storybook of Legends, given Headmaster Grimm would be eating with the rest of the faculty in the staff room.

Raven popped her locker open. It wasn’t as she had left it after lunch. On top of her pile of books lay a neatly folded note, marked by some creases from being wedged between the slats of her locker.

She had half a mind to toss it straight into the bin without looking at it. Judging by what her grandmother had told her, it could be hate mail… or a threat. But curiosity got the better of her, because she unfolded it.

In the lavish, curling penmanship of a royal, it read: “You’re not the only one.”

Raven frowned. That was weird, but she didn’t have time for that right now. She tucked the note away in her pocket before grabbing her Coat of Infinite Darkness. Not wanting to be evil or even much of a delinquent in high school, she never had plans for using it, but the Evil Queen Dowager advised it was best to keep it in her locker. It was a family heirloom, passed down from Evil Queen to Evil Queen, able to turn its wearer invisible.

“So?” came a prying voice. “Are we doing this?”

Raven shut her locker, the snakeskin cape in her other hand. Blondie Lockes stood on the other side, and she was tapping her foot, arms crossed.

“You only blew up my phone all weekend,” Raven said sarcastically. “Yes, you can interview me.”

Blondie scoffed. “Looks like Cedar quit the show for nothing.”

Raven frowned, confused. “Cedar quit the show?”

“Yeah, ‘cause of you. That’s a good friend you’ve got.” She looked off to the side, unable to look her in the eyes.

Suddenly, it made sense. This time, Cedar was fighting with Blondie because of her. And she hadn’t even mentioned it at all. Just to protect Raven’s feelings. She needed to talk to her about it, but not now. Otherwise, she’d have to wait for lunch the next day, and there were only so many weeks before Legacy Day arrived.

“I know,” Raven said. “Look, can we get this over with? If it’s not an interview now, then it’s an interview later, and I don’t want to just keep dreading it.”

“Of course,” Blondie said, fumbling with her mirrorPad and her cornflower blue microphone. Raven instinctively reached out to help, but Blondie quickly drew away, clutching her belongings to her chest.

“Actually…” Raven tapped her finger at the corner of her lip, as if she had just come up with something. “I’ve just thought of a better place for this interview. One that would be just right.”

“Ooh, what is it?”

Raven bit back a smile. It was a well known secret that the Lockes were drawn to anything that seemed even mildly inviting– whether it was the home of three unsuspecting bears, or a scoop. She didn’t think that setting the snare would be so easy. “In front of the Storybook of Legends. I mean, that’s what this is all about, isn’t it?”

Blondie hummed like she was in deep thought, but her nostrils were flared the way they always were when she found a good scoop– whether that be of porridge, or gossip. Raven had this in the bag. Not wasting a second, Blondie set a quick pace towards the headmaster’s office. Raven struggled to keep up.

“That does sound just right. I’m sure Headmaster Grimm won’t mind. Oh, it will be perfectly fitting for the Snow White Legacy Day piece I’m doing.” She had a dreamy, far, far away look in her eyes. “You know, that cunning mind would work great in the marketing industry… well, if you weren’t evil.”

Raven winced, and breathed a sigh of relief as they arrived at the headmaster’s office. As naturally as she breathed, Blondie took a hairpin from her hair and inserted it into the keyhole. With a click, the doorknob gave way, and the two girls went in.

Too easy, Raven thought.

She glanced over to the Storybook of Legends. It sat upon an elegantly carved mahogany display stand. She suspected that a previous Gepetto had had a hand in its craftsmanship. A tempered glass cover glistened over the book, with a golden keyhole at the bottom. She didn’t know that would be there.

Raven began to follow Blondie around as she set up, pretending to take an interest in helping her set up a tower of books so that the mirrorPad would be at their eye level during the interview. As she moved about, she checked drawers while Blondie wasn’t looking for a set of keys. None could be found. And here she was hoping that Headmaster Grimm had simply left the keys lying around.

Raven stepped behind the camera while Blondie repeatedly slid the curtains open and closed again to varying degrees. “Hey, Blondie, the light is causing a glare on the display case. You, like, can’t at all see the Storybook of Legends.”

Blondie finally finished fiddling with the curtains. “Oh, that’s not just right. We need natural lighting ‘cause that’s better than artificial. I’ll just take off the glass.”

Raven smiled. She had heard many complaints from Cedar that it always took forever to start filming since Blondie needed every single detail to be perfect. She was glad that it came to good use, before immediately feeling guilty. It made her feel as if she only saw her friends as assets, the kind of thinking that probably spurred her mother on her dark path. She couldn’t be like that. As soon as she could, she would apologise to Cedar for going behind her back.

“Okay, that’s just right,” Blondie said. She grabbed Raven by the shoulders, took some time to position her in front of the camera, before setting herself up. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and then put on a just right smile. And to complete our Little Snow White Legacy special is the girl you’ve all been waiting for: Raven Queen, daughter of the Evil Queen, who as you all know was slain after her poisoning of Wonderland.” Raven tried not to show her discomfort at this as Blondie continued, “As such, the most unique phenomenon has happened this year. Raven is fast tracking her destiny, becoming the Evil Queen to Apple’s Snow White instead of to Apple’s future daughter. So tell us, Raven, how do you feel to be the first ever student to take her mother’s destiny before she ever got to have the chance of fulfilling?”

Raven began to twist her rings around her fingers, trying her best to look at the beedy black eye of the camera instead of ogling the Storybook of Legends. “Well, it was certainly unexpected. I’ve… come around to it.”

“That’s excellent,” Blondie said. “Since your destiny requires more… technical skills, but you no longer have the chance to graduate, how do you imagine you’ll learn all the relevant material to your story on time?”

“The teachers have me on an advanced schedule. They’ve cut out all of the classes that won’t set me up for my story to make extra time for the ones that do– no more Geografairy, Beast Care and Training, or Grimmnastics… though no more running laps is a nice bonus.” She let out a chuckle that was not reciprocated by the host.

“Are you ready to embrace your destiny? To become the next Evil Queen? To poison the beloved Apple White?”

Raven glanced at the time. Only fifteen minutes left of recess, so if Dexter hadn’t otherwise gotten caught up, it would mean–

A ding sounded from Blondie’s mirrorPhone. Raven arched a brow.

“Just a quick sec, and we’ll get back to the interview,” Blondie said as she took her phone out of her pocket. “I’ll cut this part out in editing, don’t worry.” She looked down at her phone and gasped. “Oh, my fairy godmother! Cerise Hood and Ramona Badwolf are having a full out brawl in the cafeteria! I gotta run! I’ll text you when it’s time to continue this!”

She collected her things, before leaving the office without a second glance. The second the door slammed shut behind her, Raven immediately looked to the exposed Storybook of Legends. The leather cover was old but well maintained, waxed recently to look shiny and new. The gold embellishments glimmered in the sunlight.

Raven tried to peel the cover back, but it wouldn’t budge. Then, remembering Legacy Day practice, she held her hand over the book. “I am Raven Queen, daughter of the Evil Queen, and I pledge to follow my destiny.”

Nothing happened. She frowned. The magic of the Storybook of Legends was stronger than she realised, and she figured that it must only open on Legacy Day. But if that was the case, why weren’t they able to practice with it the previous week?

Raven tried a number of magical passwords that would crack open a magical child’s piggy bank, to no luck. Milton Grimm had been powerful enough to send her mother to mirror prison, so she didn’t know why she thought any of those would work.

That sparked a thought in her mind. Since most technology had only appeared within the past few years, it was likely that age wasn’t the only similarity that Milton Grimm had with her grandmother, who set her mirrorPhone password as password. If Milton Grimm set the most obvious answer, what would it be?

Raven cleared her throat. “I, Milton Grimm, descendant of the Brothers Grimm, wish to open the Storybook of Legends.”

Magic crackled through the office, and a golden key appeared in the air. Raven snatched it, wary of how little time she had left, and inserted it into the Storybook of Legends. Upon turning the key, the book flipped open as if blown by a gust of wind.

Raven smiled to herself. Now she was getting somewhere.

As she flipped through to the Q’s, she noticed something strange. The signatures in the Storybook of Legends only dated back as far as the Class of Classics– she couldn’t find her grandmother Emmersette Queen’s signature, nor that of Hackett Hunter, Hunter Huntsman’s grandfather. She suspected if she flipped all the way back to the Whites, it would be the same. But that couldn’t be right, since Raven’s great-grandmother would have had to sign the Storybook of Legends.

She landed on her own page, but it didn’t burst to life to show her her story, like she had been told. That must have either been directly tied to her lineage, or was one of those things that could only happen on Legacy Day. All there was on the page was a brief explanation of her story– which Raven already knew. She even tried flipping to Dexter’s story, but there was nothing more than the vague concept of him rescuing a princess.

Raven sighed, blinking quickly to ward off the sting of tears forming in her eyes. She had imagined this moment, finding out that her grandmother didn’t have to die for her story to play out, or that maybe it would even happen exactly as it was predetermined– her mother would somehow break out of mirrorPrison and marry Apple’s father, and Raven wouldn’t have to worry about a faraway destiny until Apple’s future child was born… no, that would be ridiculous. It would be cruel to once again subject the Land of Ever After to her mother once again. But that didn’t mean her grandmother had to die. She could put up with marrying King Snow… right?

Raven aimlessly thumbed through the Storybook of Legends, landing on Witchy Brew Yaga’s signature. She shuddered at the mere thought of the girl. Once upon a time, the granddaughter of Baba Yaga probably would have been in the coven with Raven and Ginger. She used to love watercolour and unicorns, not at all the picture of a witch. But during the previous year’s Legacy Day, she bawled her eyes out as she signed her destiny, committing herself to a never ending binding to destiny. First, as the current Baba Yaga’s granddaughter, she would have her husband stolen from her by a maiden. Then, once her own mother became Baba Yaga she would be Baba Yaga’s daughter, helping her mother trap and cannibalise other human beings, before finally aging into the role of Baba Yaga herself.

At least for Witchy Brew, she would get to spend as much time helping young heroes escape perils as she did attempt to eat them. Raven would live the rest of her short life evil before dying a horrible death.

Raven flipped back through the book, certain that she had missed an older section where everyone’s great grandparents’ signatures were supposed to be. She finally found a page more yellowed than the rest. Her very heart stopped in her chest.

This page, unlike every other, had no signature… and most important of all, was a fairytale that Raven had never heard of.

The bell chimed loudly, and the hallways were suddenly abuzz with dozens of footsteps, rushing towards their destinations. Raven quickly shut the Storybook of Legend. She heard keys jangling outside of the office. She placed the glass case back on the pedestal. A key clicked inside a lock. Raven swung her Coat of Infinite Darkness on just as the door swung open.

She stopped breathing. Milton Grimm’s eyes seemed to bore into her own. She double checked the placement of her coat, making sure she was invisible. Then Milton Grimm stepped away from the heavy door. Raven quickly ducked under his outstretched arm as he slowly closed the door behind him. She stood in front of the office for the count of five, frozen on the spot, convinced he would come back out and yell at her once he locked up the Storybook of Legends again. When he didn’t, she bolted.

Apple was exhausted from a day of running around the school in search of Raven. Princesses weren’t meant to run– not unless they were escaping danger or searching for a prince to rescue her. So naturally, upon seeing her becoming increasingly frantic, Darling, her brother, and a number of other princes and heroes formed search parties so that Apple could tell Raven the bad news. Only, because all the boys were so busy helping her, there was no one to save poor Cerise from Ramona Badwolf.

Apple’s hair was downright frizzy by the end of the day, and when she still couldn’t find Raven after class, she resigned herself to completing her homework. Raven couldn’t run away from her forever, right? Teachers did bed checks on school nights. Now that she thought about it, perhaps getting into a little bit of trouble would be good for Raven. Once she got a taste for rule breaking, she would surely go down a path of evil, and Apple’s destiny would be safe.

As she entered her dorm room, she heard the faintest of crinkles beneath her feet, so quiet that only the most delicate of princess ears would be able to detect it. Apple looked down. She smiled as she stepped off the paper and picked it up. Perhaps the note would offer her some kind, encouraging words to never give up.

Sure enough, it read: “We’re on your side.”

Apple frowned. Despite being written in the unmistakable curling font of a royal, the note wasn’t addressed to her. It was addressed to Raven.

Before she could ruminate on who the mysterious sender could possibly be, the door opened. Apple stuffed the note into her pocket, not wanting to be caught snooping.

“Oh, Apple,” Raven said, letting out a sigh of relief. “You gave me a heart attack. What are you doing just standing there?”

“Oh, nothing,” Apple said quickly, already feeling a bead of sweat forming at her temples. Princesses were kind and honest. She felt as if she would burst into flames. “Just waiting for you.” She remembered her endeavor during lunchtime. Now seemed as good a time as ever to share it. “I wanted to tell you that I asked Headmaster Grimm if you could become a part of my family in another way. Regrettably, he said your destiny was already set in stone. I’m so, so, sorry. I can’t imagine how hard that will be.”

Raven looked away, wrapping her arms around herself. “Look, it’s fine. I’m not the only one losing my family when our fairytale begins.”

Apple felt a pang in her heart, but she had long since made her peace with the knowledge. “I know, but for you it’s different. I wanted to fix it, I wanted–”

“Apple.” Raven looked up, capturing Apple in her velvet purple gaze. Apple was transfixed by her eyes. Before Ever After High, she had never met magical beings with unnatural hues. “Have you ever heard of the Tale of Two Sisters?”

Apple had heard of every fairytale in all the lands. She dug back into her memory, only to realise–

“No.”

Even after saying it, she couldn’t comprehend her own shock. She knew every fairytale, why didn’t she know this one?

“What about a fairytale role called the Beautiful Sister?”

Apple opened her mouth, then closed it again. She shook her head. Her mouth was becoming dry. Why didn’t she know these names?

Raven scrutinised her, like she was trying to decide whether she was telling the truth or not. Then, “Goodnight.”

Without another word, she went into their ensuite. The rush of water sounded from the other side of the bathroom door.

Apple moved to her bookshelf. If the only thing that would make Raven feel better was knowing the Tale of Two Sisters, then she would ensure that Raven would know it.

Chapter Text

Apple had never done a so-called “all nighter” before in her life. She always studied in a timely manner, with regularly scheduled breaks to give her brain a break and allow herself a mental refresh, as was the scientifically proven most optimal way to keep her mind sharp and bursting with energy, synapses firing away lighting-fast as she solved all of her problems.

This was nothing like her castle tutoring. Raven had spent all night listening to moody music with an overpowering, tortured electric guitar, so loudly that it burst right out of her headphones and clawed invisible talons against the very walls of her eardrums. Sullenly hugging her pillow to her chest, curled up in a nest of blankets, this wasn’t the Raven that bobbed her head to her music and danced about their room.

Apple thought it would only take a matter of minutes to learn about the Beautiful Sister from the Tale of Two Sisters. Only, minutes turned to hours. After every search engine failed her, she was borrowing books on the mirrorNet from various online libraries, anonymously diving into public forums, and even trawling through university level thesis papers. Even as her eyelids became heavier than boulders, her eyes became drier than a desert, and her mind begged her for sleep, she persevered. She felt oh, so close.

Yet she didn’t even notice as the morning sunrise peeked through the window. Not until her roommate woke up and pulled the curtains shut.

Apple blinked quickly against the sudden darkness, her eyes begging for relief.

“It’s too early for you to be doing homework,” Raven said with a yawn as she climbed back into bed.

“Not homework.” Apple continued typing away, ready to try her luck at video essays. “Raven, how did you hear of the Tale of Two Sisters?”

Raven paused mid way through pulling her sleep mask back over her eyes– were witches allergic to sunlight? It would certainly explain how Raven somehow sensed the sunlight even through her sleep mask.

Apple shook her head, trying to rein her focus back in. She had vaguely noticed that the longer she stayed up, the more scattered her thoughts were. What was she thinking of before?

“I snuck into the Headmaster’s office to get a look at the Storybook of Legends. There was an unsigned page.”

Apple snapped her laptop shut. She suddenly felt rejuvenated. But she had no time to have a small celebration that Raven was being sneaky and breaking the rules. “For the Beautiful Sister?”

“Would I be trying to find out about her if it wasn’t?”

“I’ve been researching that story and that character all night,” Apple said, feeling a buzz from deep within herself. “I’ve found no trace of their existence at all. I think it’s really clear what happened to her.”

Raven winced. Apple’s heart sank at the sight of it. She thought Raven would be happy once she found the truth.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Raven said, a little too quickly. “We don’t know what could’ve happened to her. She might not have disappeared.”

Apple slowly put the pieces together as to why Raven was so upset. She felt a sudden horror. “Raven… you weren’t trying to find out if you could go against your destiny?”

“No… Well, no, not at first.” She pulled her blankets up over herself, like she wanted to hide, or perhaps desired comfort. “I just wanted to see if it was really set in stone that my grandma would have to die in order for our destinies to play out. If I had to marry your dad, and she would get to live, then I would be okay with it. Really.”

To Apple, it sounded like she was only trying to convince herself. “Then what? You didn’t see your destiny?”

Raven shook her head. “I think we only see it on Legacy Day. But Apple, if there’s any way that I can do this where my grandma doesn’t have to die, I have to take it.”

“Raven, she disappeared,” Apple said, as gently as she could. “And so did her story, and everyone that was in it. That’s how destiny works. If you don’t sign your destiny, then your grandma will disappear anyways. And so will the rest of us– me, Daring, Hunter. And then because Hunter disappears, then so will Cerise Hood, and Ramona Badwolf. And she’s meant to be the Big Bad Wolf in the Three Little Pigs– so then they disappear too. Don’t you see? If you don’t sign, it causes one, big knock on effect that will devastate the world. And like Headmaster Grimm said, time itself will unravel.”

“Maybe she didn’t disappear,” Raven said, no longer looking her in the eyes. “Maybe she ran away because she didn’t want to drown her little sister. Maybe she got away, and then the rest of the people in her fairytale got to live out the rest of their lives as they chose, without having to be bound by destiny.”

Apple couldn’t think of anything more horrifying. She knew the dangers better than anyone about the dangers of not having a safety net. But still, she said, “Then what would it take to convince you otherwise?”

The day that Snow White and the Good King took their daughter on her first royal parade was supposed to be a grand one where they felt nothing but pride. And at first, it was.

On that unsuspecting morning, a royal float harboured them from the large drawbridge of the kingdom’s upper ring to the very centre of the round, apple-shaped kingdom. Little Apple White found herself warmed all the way down from her little toes up to the very tip of her head, beaming at her adoring fans as she waved and blew kisses. They cheered her name, reached their arms out towards her like they wanted her embrace. Apple felt like the most cherished little girl in the world– and she was. Her parents even let her throw coins to the crowd, which was even more fun than feeding the ducks of a pond.

All too soon, the exciting part of the parade came to an end. The float came to a slow stop, and then little Apple was being led off the float and onto a wooden stage by her security detail. Then she was forced to stand idly by her parents’ side, smiling all the way until her cheeks hurt. If only then, had she the appreciation for public forums as she did now, she would have been spared the pain and terror yet to come.

Instead, boredom made its home in her mind, tangling itself down her spine, branching out to each of her limbs, until she was almost as buzzed as the Queen Bee. Her itched for the little games her royal tutors had set up to teach her concepts such as mathematics or literacy, her bones seemed to want to jump right out of her body and go back to her waltzing lessons– anything that was not listening to numbers and policies and laws that made no sense to her little elementary mind, while standing as still as could be. Even an afternoon nap was beginning to sound more enticing than farmers complaining about… taxes? Apple hadn’t the slightest clue what that even meant.

So she leaned closer to her kind and gentle mother, giving a gentle tug at her hand to get her attention. “Mummy, I’m–”

“I’m busy right now, darling,” Snow White said through the gritted teeth of her smile. She turned her attention back to the farmer on his knees before her. “Yes, good sir, I hear your struggles.” With a sideways glance at Apple, who had started fidgeting again, she added, “Be still.” She nodded sympathetically as the farmer continued to moan and wail. “Of course. I completely understand. May I suggest…”

Apple held her hands behind her back where no one could see them. She tried bunching them into little fists to keep her entertained, seeing how hard she could do it. But she remembered her tutors’ lectures on the impoliteness of appearing restless, so she folded her hands neatly over the front of her gown before she could clench them so hard that she would vibrate.

Even so, she wanted to rock back and forth on her feet. Whistling had a certain appeal, having only learnt how to do it a few weeks ago. She spotted a small, dirt-stained child in the crowd whose eyes were turned down as he twiddled his thumbs. Oh, how she wished to be moving. Apple found herself entranced with his fiddling until his eyes snapped up to look at her. She blushed as she looked away, remembering it was rude to stare.

Feeling as if she might explode if she had to stay still for even a second longer, Apple turned back to her mother. “Mummy?”

“Please ask your father,” the queen said quickly, before looking to the blacksmith. “Yes, I am already well aware of the plight of the kingdom’s blacksmiths. Rest assured, there are already plans underway to lower tariffs on metals to ease the cost of…”

Apple looked up at her father: tall and imposing, weathered by wrinkles and grey hair unlike her fairest mother, yet retaining a handsome and strong air about him. “Daddy, I’m bored.”

His eyes were vacant, likely reminiscing about the weekend’s bookball game. “Yes, sweetheart.”

“Can I go play?” she asked.

“Sounds nice, dear. Now shh.”

Apple grinned. Perhaps she would join the bored little boy in the crowd and play with him. The castle was woefully devoid of children save for diplomatic visits from other kingdoms; Apple’s best friend was the gardener.

She tip-toed off the side of the stage, careful not to disturb anyone as a loud, angry man was dragged off the stage by the royal guard. Apple was about to breach a crowd before she got distracted by a merchant peddling shiny, round balloons. The little boy broke free of the crowd, running towards the merchant, clutching what must have been a coin to his chest. Apple was delighted. Perhaps they could play with their balloons together.

As she walked around the outskirts of the crowd, some turned their attention to her.

“Aww, look at the little Princess!” an old, wrinkly man remarked.

A pudgy villager with a baby on her hip turned to her companion. “Isn’t she so cute?”

“Just the sweetest little thing!” her bony friend replied.

Apple beamed, and gave them her best curtsy. “Thank you!”

She looked up into the sky, looking for the bobbing balloons over the heads of the crowd. She couldn’t see any. The balloon merchant was gone. She whipped her head around, spinning around– there! He was making his way to the alley. Apple skipped towards him, not wanting to miss out on the joyous occasion of a balloon. Balloons weren’t allowed in the palace, not even in the nursery wing, since there were too many open flames and pointy chandeliers and sconces. But there were no such flames or pointy dangers out in the courtyard, surely her mother would permit it just this once.

“Excuse me?”

Without hesitance, Apple ran through the mouth of the alleyway. The sun was suddenly blocked out, casting them in shadow. The balloon merchant seemingly hadn’t heard her, walking deeper into the alleyway still, so she called out again.

“Excuse me, sir?”

He suddenly turned around. Upon seeing her, he gave her a toothy smile. Apple found that his crooked, yellowed teeth were quite similar to that of many of the palace servants. Unlike the castle staff, one of his incisors had been replaced by a golden tooth. Apple quickly looked back up at his beady eyes, remembering it was rude to stare.

“Ah, if it isn’t the young princess,” the merchant said. He held out a balloon towards her, the pretty shade of a juicy, red apple. “Would you like a balloon?”

Apple smiled and curtsied. “Why yes, thank you, that is ever so kind.”

She took the string he handed her, and admired how the balloon bounced when she tugged the tether. Apple let out a giggle.

“How very polite,” the merchant said, and from the folds of his cloak, produced a vanilla cupcake with strawberry frosting. “Please, take this. Such a polite little princess deserves the sweetest reward.”

Now that Apple thought about it, she was quite hungry. All of that standing around and being bored really sapped the energy out of her. As if agreeing with her, her tummy let out a rumble.

She took the cupcake. “Thank you, kind sir.”

“Enjoy…”

And that, she did. After delicately nibbling away at the cupcake, a sudden wave of vertigo hit her. The world tilted sideways, and her legs gave out from under her. Her eyelids became heavy, unnaturally heavy. Where did all of her energy go?

The world went dark. It was completely unlike the gentle drifting off of falling asleep. One minute, her mind was there; the next, gone. No gentle dreams or claustrophobic nightmares seized her mind as it did when she fell asleep. It was simply the incomprehensible, unfathomable state of nothingness. Only momentarily, as if she had only blinked.

But it was clear that somehow, more time than that had passed. Rather than being curled up in her father’s lap in a rumbling carriage, or wrapped up in a mass of lush blankets in the palace nursery, Apple lay with splayed out limbs on a harsh, ice-cold stone floor. Her limbs ached with every movement, like her soft tender flesh itself was delivering her a message: she had not been placed on the ground. She had been thrown, unceremoniously, like a bale of hay.

Apple sat up, eyes darting wildly about the room as they adjusted to the darkness, trying to make sense of her surroundings. The room was square shaped, the length of each wall roughly equivalent to that of Apple’s height. A threadbare potato sack in the corner.

Only a pinprick of light cut into the room, through what she realised was a keyhole. Apple was trapped.

No. She had been kidnapped.

Raven hesitated as she and Apple came to a stop in front of Madeline Hatter’s room, which she shared with none other than Kitty Cheshire. While she knew that Maddie had nothing but love for her, she couldn’t say the same for the other Wonderlandians. After all, her mother had poisoned their homeland, forcing them to become refugees in a realm completely unlike their own. She already knew that the fearless Lizzie Hearts used to be afraid of her. Going to a Wonderlandian’s bedroom felt like a kind of intrusion, even if she didn’t set foot inside the door. Felines in particular are most territorial, so breaching Kitty Cheshire’s room felt like poking a hornet’s nest.

Before Raven could ask for another second, Apple simply reached over her shoulder, about to knock on the door, before it fell open beneath her hand. Apple quickly retracted her arm and smiled.

“Good morning!” Maddie beamed.

“What– Maddie,” Apple gasped as she tried to hide her shock, unused to Maddie’s unpredictability in the way that Raven was.

“Aww, Raven, you truly are the delight-most friend!” Maddie threw herself forward, wrapping her arms around Raven. Raven chuckled, the nerves leaving her body, and hugged her back.

“How did you know we were coming to see you?” Apple said.

Maddie clasped her hands together. “Why, I suddenly heard the narrator, of course. They’re narrating quite loudly. It woke me up.”

Apple arched a brow. “... Of course.”

At least she was taking that in stride. Raven lowered her tone. “Hey, you wanna go to the cafeteria for an early breakfast?”

She glanced into Maddie’s room, spotting Kitty stretched out over a rug. Even asleep, she had that signature grin on her face. Then, in a shower of sparkles, she disappeared, reappearing slumped over Maddie’s desk chair, without stirring in the slightest. But Raven figured that was easily explained away by the illogical Wonderland magic. She was afraid that chatting too loudly by a girl with feline senses would quickly wake her up.

Maddie nodded empathetically. “Yes, it really is quite nonsensical how she does that in her sleep. It’s gotta be one of the only things that makes nonsense about Ever After. But don’t worry, nothing can wake her up in a catnap. Now, which ons are going?”

Ignoring Maddie’s newfound ability to seemingly read her mind, Raven leaned closer, in case someone was listening in. One could never be too careful. Apple followed suit. “You’ve never heard of the Tale of Two Sisters, right?”

“Nuh uh, silly, I heard of it yesterday when you told me,” Maddie giggled.

Raven laughed. “That’s not what I meant. Before I told it to you, you had never heard of it.”

“Yepper-doodle-doo. But to be fair, the fairy tales popular here aren’t exactly popular in Wonderland.”

“Of course,” Apple cut in. “Look, Raven mentioned that you’re really good at riddles. But I think that the Beautiful Sister from that fairytale disappeared. If someone doesn’t sign their destiny, where would they disappear to?”

“Why, silly, they would disappear to where they aren’t.” Maddie booped Apple’s nose.

Apple frowned. “Well, yeah, of course it would. I’m pretty sure that’s how disappearing works, but where would that be?”

It was Maddie’s turn to frown. “To where it wasn’t. That’s what Kitty does. She wasn’t in my chair, so she disappeared from the rug to my chair.”

“But–”

“You’re not making sense to her,” Raven told Apple. After a long time of being best friends, she knew it was better to present the entire problem itself as a riddle if they wanted to understand each other.

“You know me so well!”

“How would you try to figure out where someone disappeared to after not signing their destiny?”

Maddie hummed in deep thought, tapping her cheek. “Do you think they actually disappeared, like what Headmaster Grimm said happens to people that don’t sign?”

“I– I don’t know. No. No, I don’t want to think she really disappeared.”

“I don’t see how that’s helpful,” Apple said, crossing her arms.

“Mhm. And do you think they were a student here?”

Raven shrugged. “Let’s assume they were.”

“Well, then, they had belongings,” Maddie said. “If they didn’t disappear disappear, but did disappear, I don’t think all of their belongings disappeared. Perhaps those would have a clue as to where they disappeared to.”

“Oh,” Apple gasped. “The Lost and Crowned Office. We passed that on my tour of the school.”

“I didn’t even know we had a Lost and Crowned Office,” Raven said.

Maddie clapped her hands in delight. “This was fun.”

“Thank you, Maddie.” Then, turning to Apple, Raven said, “Lead the way, princess.”

In the windowless room, it was impossible for Apple to keep track of how much time had passed. It simultaneously felt like seconds, minutes, hours, or days. During that time, she fended off horrid rats, cockroaches, and some creepy crawlies that she couldn’t even identify.

All the while, a hunger grew in her stomach, a sensation she had never experienced before and only had described to her by the occasional maid or tutor. Her bones ached, joints cracking with each movement, and her body seemed to wither away until she was but a gaunt creature. Her hair became slick and oily, while her clothing and skin was torn up by the rough edges of the stone floor. How was Apple supposed to be the fairest in all the land like this?

She hoped rescue was imminent. Even though she was supposed to rely on a Prince Charming, she wanted nothing more than for her father to swoop in to rescue her, for her mother to hold her in her arms while she cried and reassured her that she was going to be alright, that she would never face something so unexpected and scary ever again in her life.

She had never been alone before. In the palace, she was always surrounded by people, from the very second she woke up, until she fell asleep at night. Even then, that wasn’t loneliness; rather, the closest imitation of it. There were still guards stationed at her doors and windows, protecting her from even her worst nightmares, as her parents told her.

In a way that she had never realised before, being constantly surrounded by people was like a nice warm blanket. Only now, she had nothing, for she wasn’t even allowed to speak without being yelled at. The only companionship she had was listening.

From the other side of the heavy wooden door, Apple heard mens’ voices. Sometimes they spoke casually, discussing drinks or meals. Sometimes they were angry and yelling about things that Apple didn’t understand. Sometimes they dreamily discussed the luxurious future that they had ahead of them. Other times, they appeared scared that someone was going to catch them.

At first, Apple tried to befriend them. Instead of reciprocating her politeness in turn, they banged on the door, rattling the entire thing, roaring at her to be quiet… or else. Apple had scampered back to the corner of her cell, huddling by the potato sack. If she let out so much as a whimper when rats bit her, they yelled at her. If she cried out for her parents when she was tired, they shouted at her. The first time they brought her water, they even threw it in her face when she didn’t show enough appreciation for it. Apple couldn’t figure out the right things to do like she could in the palace; when to speak, when not to speak. It seemed like she could never do the right thing, and she would only get punished.

The nicer of the two men eventually did bring her a replacement glass of water, making sure to inform her it was only because, in his words, “The conditions of the ransom are that you’re safe… well, relatively speaking.”

Apple’s blood ran cold, but she managed to let out a quick, “Thank you,” as he closed the door.

She gulped down the water like nothing before in her entire life. What she usually thought of as a boring drink in comparison to apple juice or hot chocolate, at that moment seemed even more precious than any supposed elixir of immortality. Her dry, scratchy throat was instantly relieved.

But Apple had no time to revel in it, for she immediately placed the cup down so she could press her ear to the keyhole once more.

The scary men’s conversation had continued, this time about how they couldn’t wait to be out of that place– as if they were the ones locked in the dungeon, not young Apple. She put her back to the door and slid down to the floor, pulling her knees up to her chest. She was the princess. Everyone loved her, that’s why everyone came out to see her first royal parade. She couldn’t understand why anyone would do this to her.

There was a knock.

Apple pricked up at the sound. It wasn’t on her door, for it didn’t shake beneath her back. It was coming from outside. The men that kidnapped her didn’t even knock when they came in and out of the building.

“Finally,” said the meaner of the two men outside the door, his voice becoming more distant as he walked away. I was just beginning to think they’d let their precious princess…”

Was this a rescue? Apple jumped to her feet, and started banging her little fists against the heavy door. “Help! Help me! Somebody, please!”

“Shut it–”

There was a series of loud sounds: a crash, yelling, the clanging of metal. Two thuds, followed by groans. Then silence. A few moments passed, then the familiar jangle of metal keys reached Apple’s ears. She quickly backed away from the door so that it could swing inwards.

The sudden light was harsh on Apple’s eyes. She blinked quickly.

“The princess is here!” the knight in front of her announced.

He quickly stepped to the side. Apple looked around him. The two men that had held her captive were on the ground, rubbing their heads. Her parents stood in the middle of a bare room, flanked by knights.

“Thank goodness you’re okay!” King White said, opening his arms. “Are you hurt?”

Apple rushed toward him, hardly believing her eyes. He caught her in his arms, lifting her into the air, and squeezing her. There was a sound like a whining puppy. Apple looked around, trying to figure out where the dog was, before she realised the sound came from herself.

“Daddy, it was so scary,” she sobbed.

His large hand stroked her hair. “I know, sweetheart, I know. You’re okay, now. You’re safe.”

That only made Apple sob louder.

“Knights, you are dismissed,” Snow White announced.

Her guards looked at her hesitantly, but they left the room for the outdoors, where sunlight streamed in, so unlike the little dungeon she’d been kept in. Apple vaguely heard the exchange of coins in the background. Then Snow joined them, wrapping her arms around the both of them.

“It’s okay now, mummy’s here,” she cooed. “But we need to understand how this happened so we can make sure it never happens again. There was a script. We rehearsed the parade dozens of times to ensure it would go off without a hitch. What happened, my sweet?”

Apple began to cry harder. Now she felt that her father’s tunic was completely soaked in her tears, but she couldn’t help herself. She blew out some snot on her father’s cloak. “I’m sorry. It’s all my fault, mummy. The talking session went longer than it did in practice, and I left. I’m sorry. I’m sorry!”

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, baby. It’s okay. Mummy’s here.”

“No!” Apple scrunched her father’s tunic in her hand, hyperventilating so hard that she was beginning to get dizzy. “It’s my fault. I’ll never go off script again. I’ll always do what I was supposed to do.”

“Yes, baby. That will keep you safe. We will keep you safe, now and forever.”

Apple was later told that she had been hidden away by those horrible men for three days. Three days, yet it felt like eternity. And even though her scrapes all healed up as good as new, and she was filled up with as much food and water as her heart desired, and she was cleaned up and put into new clothes, those three days changed her forever.

Apple needed to reach her destiny. Destiny guaranteed her safety. For unlike her kidnapping, when she didn’t know if anyone would find her, destiny assured her that she would be delivered safely from each and every one of those dangers.

The Lost and Crowned Office was beneath the Charmitorium on the dungeon level. Unlike Raven, who took all the evil classes on offer, Apple had never been to the school dungeon level. Cobwebs gathered at the corners, cold drafts cut through them unexpectedly. Apple held her breath, trying hard not to think of how very familiar this dungeon seemed. She listened out for rats, and did her best to ignore the darker it got the further they got from the natural light of windows.

She reminded herself of her destiny, that she would be safe. Only a few more weeks, and Apple would get to sign the Storybook of Legends. And once this little search proved futile, Raven would resign herself to her own destiny, protecting the entire fairytale world. In her own way, Raven would be a hero. Apple decided that if destiny had already been tweaked since Raven would be her Evil Queen, rather than her mother, then surely Apple could make the smallest adjustment. She wouldn’t have to execute Raven by red hot iron shoes in the story. It wouldn’t be fair after the sacrifices she was already making. No, instead, Apple would sentence her to be imprisoned in the nicest part of the White castle, making sure the iron shoes would be as lukewarm as possible. Raven loved dancing, after all, she did it in their bedroom often. Dancing in room temperature iron shoes, while heavy, wouldn’t be nearly as bad a fate as destiny laid out for her, right? And besides, Apple’s own future daughter wouldn’t get to inherit Apple’s destiny if Raven didn’t survive long enough to have a child to become her Evil Queen… unless Raven had a distant relative, somewhere. Still, Raven didn’t deserve to die a teenager merely for the crimes of her mother.

“Apple?” Raven called from behind.

Apple looked up and turned back around, snapping back to the present. She was several paces ahead of Raven.

“You’ve gone past the Lost and Crowned Office,” Raven said, gesturing at the door in front of her.

Apple tried to play it off casually with a laugh. “Oh, whoops. I guess I was just lost in thought.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

Apple followed Raven into the Lost and Crowned Office. Immediately, her mouth fell open in shock, in a completely un-princessly manner. “Whoa…”

The Lost and Crowned Office was more like a warehouse floor. The office was the size of a ballroom as far as she could tell, with floor-to-ceiling shelves that were overflowing with cardboard boxes. As she moved closer, she found that atop each box sat a clear plastic label in the shape of a crown, with names inscribed on them in black marker.

“We really don’t have the time to search all of this,” Apple said in relief. “We should head back. The cafeteria is opening for breakfast soon.”

Raven walked along one of the shelves. “Aha! It’s written in alphabetical order of surname. The Beautiful Sister would have to be in the ‘S’ section. I’ll find this in no time, c’mon.”

Apple sighed as she followed Raven deeper into the Lost and Crowned Office, Raven’s head poking in and out of rows at random as she checked the letter. Finally, they got to the S’s and cut into that row, weaving up and down.

“There we go,” Raven said triumphantly, sporting a smile for the first time that day. “Bella Sister. That has to be her.”

Apple came to a stop beside her in front of a box that was practically the size of a suitcase. When Raven opened it, what must have been a century’s worth of dust rained down on them. The two girls waved their hands, coughing on the dust until it finally settled.

The two girls peeked inside. Much like the exterior, the inside of the box was also filled with dust. Raven swept it aside with her hand, and the two girls began sorting through Bella Sister’s belongings: textbooks, neatly folded clothing, ancient shoes.

“This seems like a lot of stuff to leave behind,” Raven said.

Apple winced. “I think it’s obvious what happened to her.”

“Maybe she ran away?”

Apple shook her head at Raven’s optimism. Even when the truth was staring her right in the face, it was like she didn’t want to see it. “Raven, she disappeared.”

Raven sorted through the textbooks before picking out an old, leatherbound journal. The leather cover was cracked and peeling. When Raven flipped it open, the pages looked more yellow than the porridge the cafeteria served. There was a torn strip of paper at the very front of the book, a jagged edge like crocodile teeth. Someone had ripped out a page. As Raven flipped through the book, they found that the only page that had been used was one with a sketch of a tree with quite a bit of personality. It was a stout trunk with only two expressive branches. Apple was fairly certain she had seen many trees like that. In the centre of the tree, there were black knot holes like eyes and a gaping mouth, like it was crying out for help. The artist had drawn an arrow pointing to the larger hole.

It seemed to be some kind of message– cryptic, and meaningless, since the artist was long gone.

“You know,” Apple said, “no one’s ever said that everything a person owns disappears when they do. Someone probably moved all of Bella Sister’s stuff down here once she disappeared. Is this what you needed to see?”

Raven nodded, all previous triumphant attitude gone. “I guess so.”