Crime Scene Investigation: Land of Ever After
Author's note: This is an Ever After High one shot that I wrote months ago but I entered a fanfic writing contest and where I live it means you mustn't post the story anywhere else until the contest is closed so I didn't dare to publish it here but now that the contest is over I'm going to open the new month October with this new short story. (I didn't win the contest but I'm still glad I got to write this story.)
A wish granted is the result of combining a detective story with fairy tales. It happens after the events of Wonderlust at the end of the school year. I hope you like it. :)
A Wish Granted
Mirror lake
Princesses like to flaunt their clothes but it doesn't necessarily have to be frilly dresses meant for a ball, lovely trendy swimsuits work just as well. They are even better if it's sunny June day and you are spending your free time on a beach. The lake, normally calm and looking just like its namesake, was disturbed by a number of ripples as a group of girls, some were indeed royalty, was swimming and playing in it.
These princesses were students of the prestigious Ever After High. All of them were being groomed and raised to one day play major roles in a famous story. You see, dear Reader, Ever After High is a school that is located in the Land of Ever After, the realm of fairy tales and fairy tales are only one part, one genre in the vast and ever-growing storyworld the counterpart of the Reality where you live in. So close to each other, yet so far. No one can cross from side to the other.
Sometimes one or two dove into the water to play with the fishes living there or to see how long they can hold their breath. Darling and Briar were especially daring and competed in diving closest to the bottom of the lake.
In the meantime Zelda was on the beach looking for flat pebbles and was throwing them back in the lake so they would skip on the surface. She was able to make them skip ten times when she didn't try hard. She was ready to aim another one when a commotion from the group of school girls caught her interest. Zelda went to see what happened and soon Rosabella and Duchess have come to her with freaked out expressions: "There's someone at the bottom! It's a corpse!" All three got back to where the others were exchanging confused glances. Darling has discovered the body but even though she longed to be a rescuer there's nothing to rescue when the distressed person dies. So now she was standing in the shallow water helplessly.
Zelda thought about the situation for a second and decided to take the body out and find out if someone doesn't miss a relative who has gone for a swim lately. So the redhead dove in the water and combined her swimming and skipping skills to get to the unfortunate soul. It wasn't a freshly drowned man. Bacteria and little scavenger fishes have taken their bites from him. However it was only lightly tangled in a few strands of underwater flora so the body was relatively easy to grasp. Then Zelda teleported with her dead man to the beach.
Darling came to help her with carrying the dead weight and commented: "Oh my Grimm, the guy's heavy." "But he looks so scrawny and the fishes have already eaten some of his flesh off," Duchess inspected the corpse from a safe distance. "Someone fetch a policeman," ordered Zelda.
Soon a gingerman clad in the uniform of an Ever Afterian police officer came. For some reason majority of the police force was made of animated gingerbreadmen. You could say that those were some pretty tough cookies, mused Zelda as she watched the police officer coming closer. "I'm sergeant Sugarlump," saluted the gingerbreadman. "Good afternoon, sergeant, I want to report finding a corpse."
Sergeant was a true professional, despite coming face to face with a bunch of princesses and Zelda, who was adopted by the Grimm Brothers themselves, he didn't flinch a finger. Some less collected individuals were prone to outbursts of gushing over the princesses as they were often regarded as celebrities and not simply as future rulers. The baked policeman wrote everything about their discovery down and urged them to come to the station if they or they friends find something else. Then the sergeant called some subordinates to bring the body to the morgue where it will be examined before giving it a proper burial.
Before the police left, Zelda talked to the sergeant privately. She asked him if someone hasn't reported a missing person and promised him to look through the school database to check if there isn't a story involved, should he tell her about any missing fairytalers. The sergeant thanked her for help and both parties parted.
"You know what, I don't feel like swimming anymore," said Rosabella putting her glasses on and the others agreed that the business with the drowned man has left them a tad unnerved. So they went to calm their nerves in the village.
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Actually no one is able to cross from the storyworld to reality and vice versa except one type of beings. It's a species that is very rare. They are so scarce that in the world of stories full of wonders, magic and weird creatures there live currently no more than three specimen. All of them live in the Land of Ever After.
The beings have given themselves the name Quills and it stuck. They age very slowly and when they don't perish in a violent way they can live for hundreds and thousands of years. That's the reason the founders of the Ever After High the Grimm Brothers – who deliberately named themselves after the German collectors of fairy tales – are still alive and are capable of working as Headmasters of the famous school.
More than two hundred years later a girl discovered she isn't a common mortal human and decided to stay in the land of fairy tales to develop her abilities. The newest Quill and the youngest Headmaster, still in training, is Zelda Tolkien.
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In the Village of Book End the next day
The Village of Book End is the biggest community in the Land of Ever After. Strictly speaking according to the size of the settlement it was actually a town but the name Village had deep roots so it stuck. With many shops and services aimed at young fictionals and with some of the school staff housing in this area it's practically a part of the school campus grounds. Because of the density of population there is also a large police station and a mortuary. Normally the police investigates small crimes like pick pocketing but they are prepared for serious cases as well.
Sergeant Sugarlump called that he has the list of the missing persons ready and that they are going to perform the autopsy of the cadaver. The headmistress-in-training was invited to analyze the results of the autopsy. Knowing that the autopsy will provide information about the way the victim died and who or what might've killed it, Zelda couldn't refuse the invitation. Frankly she was also curious about participating in science.
Zelda teleported right into the building to avoid drawing unwanted attention. Sugarlump was already there informed by the text message he received before Zelda departed from school. "I've been going through the data from the last five years. There is no other death with unknown cause," said the cookie policeman in official tone. Zelda nodded relieved. That meant that the possibility that there is a serial killer running loose decreased dramatically. It wasn't fully eliminated though.
The morgue had white walls and reeked of chemicals. Not a pleasant fragrance but it successfully covered odor of rotting bodies. There were about five rooms. One for storing dead Characters in cold boxes before they could be buried. One with some steel tables to put the corpses on. The fisher was already there.
The vivisection was lead by an alumni of the Ever After High, that woman had to graduate before Zelda came to the realm of fairy tales so she didn't know her personally. Once in a while a tale of folk or fairy nature requires a Character who is a medic of occupation. That was a good thing because if there wasn't written any story featuring a doctor or two there would be an all time abundance of knights but the land's healthcare would be nonexistent.
The she-doctor and her assistant have opened the body about twenty minutes ago when Zelda was let in. The doctor motioned the headmistress to come closer to the body, her assistant was holding the membranes of lungs with surgical steel tools. Zelda noticed a yellow glimmer coming from the spot where the opened lungs were. The female pathologist said full of optimism: "This may provide some clue to the case."
She took one of the steel holders and moved the lungs' membrane a bit to reveal a hard glistening substance. The doctor took with her other hand some kind of knife and knocked on the yellow mass glimmering under the lamp. It was hard, clinking and it looked like gold. But if it is gold, how did it get inside the poor guy? Who would kill a man with something so rare and expensive? And what kind of murderer wouldn't take it back, such a big lump of gold could buy a comfortable living in this realm. Those were the questions Zelda began asking herself.
First, they need to prove whether it is true gold and not something else. Let's take it to the school, we might want an expert's opinion in that matter, thought Zelda. Fortunately finding an expert will be a piece of chocolate cake because there was only one person that could smell a gold coin in a stack of hay and that person worked in the same school as me.
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Later at Ever After High
Professor Rumpelstiltskin, his days of making deals with millers' daughters long gone, was making his living as science teacher in the Ever After High. Zelda pulled him from the middle of a lesson to empty teachers' room to show him the evidence. His reaction was immediate. When shown the content of the corpse's lungs Professor Rumpelstiltskin started trembling like a drug addict who has gone too long without his weakness. "Gold…gold…," he kept muttering and he reached out his hands to the treasure his employer was holding. He was clearly mesmerized by the beauty of the metal. So much he almost started drooling.
His love for the rare metal was well-known around the staff and student body. For example his idea of detention or earning extra credits involved spinning straw into golden thread. In short he didn't need to say another word it was clear that he wished to have the golden lungs in his possession.
But Zelda firmly stopped him: "I'm sorry, professor, I can't let you have it, it's an evidence in a case. What if it turns out to be murder and the gingerbread police finds your fingerprints? They might arrest you forever after and we don't want to lose an essential part of the school department." That worked, a bit. Rumpelstiltskin was still huffing as if he has just run ten miles and his eyes were glued to the chunk of gold but at least he didn't try to snatch it.
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Zelda went through the database of former Ever After High pupils but no portrait matched the dead body. It must have been a Character from a lesser tale or even a Lineless, a simple villager with elementary education only. Such people were prone to get into trouble, not necessarily involving magic. There was a village near the lake. She will have to start looking there.
She asked the elders if there isn't anyone missing and they mentioned a poor fisher who went out to fish but hasn't come back a month ago. His wife lives in the smallest, poorest house. The house was easy to find. It was in a really bad condition. There was no plaster on the walls and Zelda noticed mildew creeping on the bricks in the edges. The number 19 was written on one wall with white colour. The Quill knocked purely out of politeness because the door was made out of a cloth hanging in a square shaped hole in one of the holes. Inside a middle aged woman, as wide as she was tall with dark hair that hanged around her face in unruly knots, her hands calloused from hard work and bumpy skin on her cheeks, was washing clothes in a big wooden tub. Even with some rich Characters having a magical variation of iPhone called Mirrorphone, only a third of households owned and used something as practical as electrical washing machine.
"Hexcuse me," it was a common habit for fairy tale dialect speakers to add an 'h' sound at the beginning of words that began with an 'ex' syllable. "Madame, did you report that your husband is missing?" asked the Quill once she saw she caught the attention she wanted.
The aging woman has scowled furiously: "That ne'er-do-well, that bastard of a man. He left me in this dirty shed, of course, I had my share of rants around the village." But she didn't go to police. Zelda quickly continued before the woman starts to complain some more: "Could it be your husband was a fisher?"
"A miserable one if you ask. He can't even catch a flu," snorted the woman full of disdain. "I believe we have found your man." The fisherwoman stood up, straightened her back and puffed up her chest: "Where is he? I will beat the living snot out of him. That lazy prick," she rolled up her sleeves and marched to the door. "I think that won't be necessary anymore," Zelda stayed collected and just put a hand on the wife's shoulder.
The headmistress-to-be teleported them both to the morgue. The corpse was still lying on the table, it wasn't even covered with a cloth, only stitched back together. The moment the woman saw the lifeless body of her husband she broke into heavy sobs, tears running down her face disfigured with agony and grief. She took his head into her arms: "Nooo, don't leave me. What shall a lonely hag like me do in a world like this?"
Zelda gave the grieving woman some time to calm down but she knew it won't be enough. Mourning the loss of a loved one is a process for a lifetime not five minutes. Nonetheless she needed answers. If there is a danger lurking in the shadows they have to know. And to get the answers she will have to pry.
"I'm trying to find whoever did this to your man and in order to do so I must ask you some questions first," Zelda tried to sound reassuring but uncompromising. The woman nodded, still clearly hurting but at least she pretended to have pulled herself together. "Did your husband have any enemies?"
The woman shuddered at Zelda's use of the past tense but she didn't break out in another round of sobs: "We're ordinary people. No fancy lords or ladies. Who would wish to rob or hurt someone who doesn't have anything to lose." She looked genuinely confused.
Slowly she remembered something else though. She frowned with concentration: "But there was something… My man used to tell a story... That his father has once caught a golden fish and that it promised him to grant him a wish if he lets the critter free. So he just let it go. The man has supposedly told his own wife that he caught a talking fish and the woman got mad at him. He said she sent her husband to the lake with the wish to become an empress. That's what my husband used to tell. He used to tell that one day he will catch a fish. A golden one. That he will catch it himself. What a heap of dunk," She shook her head having a honestly apologetic look in her eyes, she must have been sorry to waste Zelda's time with the story. The younger woman glanced tenderly as telling the fisher's wife, now a widow, that she doesn't judge her for her babbling.
The woman continued: "I didn't believe him, his family was dirt poor as was everyone in this village, surely whoever caught such fish would ask for treasures. Or a decent house," she added the last one as they appeared in front of her home again and she inspected the mildew crawling on the bricks.
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Mirror lake
Meeshell was a mermaid studying to become The Little Mermaid. She was already able to change her tail into two legs to walk on land so Zelda wondered how her story is supposed to go once it starts, if it hadn't started already, but it wasn't on her mind right now. She asked Meeshell to look thoroughly for a certain fish species. While the sea maiden swam in the lake left and right, Zelda stood on the shore with sergeant Sugarlump. The gingerbread-policeman was filled in about the gold found in the corpse and he himself has interrogated the widow once more. Right now he was waiting whether Meeshell succeeds in confirming Zelda's hypothesis or not.
The mermaid resurfaced and reported what she found out: "Yes, the golden fishes really do live here. It's quite a large population for one lake but this lake is huge and there is only a small number of their natural predators." "Good job," nodded Zelda. The identity of the victim being a poor fisherman, the presence of the Piscis Aureus Desiderabilis, every piece of the puzzle has fallen to its designated place. Sugarlump has finished writing his notes, closed his block with a thump and said: "Looks like we're done here. Thank you for your assistance. Miss Headmistress, Your Majesty," The doughy policeman saluted and returned to the police station.
Meeshell sat on the beach and waited for her tail to dry so she could morph it to legs and change from a mermaid to a bipedal landwalker: "Have you found out what happened here?" Zelda looked into the lake. The water wasn't rippling, it was calm and uncaring. Then the young Quill, who studied as the apprentice of the Grimm Brothers and was preparing to be able to lead the important school for the descendants of the famous fairy tale Characters one day, answered: "Another tale went askew."
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It looked as any other day in the boat for him. At first. He took sips from his flask filled with a cheap liquor, stared blankly at the lake surface and daydreamed about riches. At once something tugged at the rod. The fisher was surprisingly swift and didn't hesitate to pull. He was successful, he caught a golden fish. It was big as a carp and its scales shimmered like morning dew. He snapped out of it when the animal talked to him: "Let me go and I will grant you a wish." The guy smirked hoping the fish would say something like that but he didn't trust the animal fully yet: "What kind of wish?" "Anything. Put me in the water and you will get anything you wish for." He liked those words and put the fish back into the lake.
The golden carp circled the lake before it returned to the poor fisher. It stuck its head into the air: "Now I will grant you any wish you ask for. Have you decided on your wish yet?"
The guy has been picturing this meeting in his head since he was a nursery rhyme barely able to carry his father's fishing rod. He heard this tale numerous times. How the fisher caught the ship, let it go free without asking for anything in return at first. But then he was kicked out of the home. "Don't bother to return unless the fish makes me rich." Then his wife wanted to be a queen, an empress, a pope. Finally the animal got fed up with being constantly bothered and reversed all wishes. This happened before the boy, now a grown up married man, was born.
His father told him how his stupid mother robbed them of the comfortable future they could have had. Truth be told his own father wasn't much better as he let the fish go without granting him a reward first. He will be smarter. He will ask for a whole fortune and won't let his wife ruin his life with her nagging.
"I wish to be rich. I wish to drown in gold," the man guffawed at his own joke dreaming of the things he will buy. "As you wish," said the fish and splashed some water with its tail as it dove underwater. Soon the fisher felt that the breathing became harder and harder. As if his chest gradually tightened. The poor fisherman has tottered on the edge of his boat desperately gasping for oxygen. Finally he fainted and fell overboard, the weight of his filled lungs pulling him to the bottom.
Since the fish was still an animal, it had no knowledge of economy nor did it know the concept of figurative speech. The magical goldfish was simply trying to be helpful and filled the man's lungs with liquid gold which eventually hardened, and as a result the man choked on what he wished for. He was afraid his wife's greed would destroy his happiness, ultimately it was his own greed that led to his demise.
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The screen dimmed, the lights were switched back on. Revealing Zelda standing on the stage talking to assembled body of the Ever After High school. She spent the last hour telling the pupils about the case and how she solved the mystery. When she finished, Milton Grimm stood up clapping: "Thank you, Zelda, for your dedication and good thinking. You have not only uncovered the secret of a tragedy but you also found an undisputable proof that you all should follow your stories."
Zelda shot a deadly glare at her adoptive father. "Otherwise you risk facing bad consequences," finished Grimm. "Bad consequences. Exactly," started Zelda coldly but returned to her previous matter-of-fact tone this time with a hint of snark: "Sad endings can occur whether you are a Royal or a Rebel. What is important is that you should think before you act because magic can backfire easily. Destiny or not, you won't live long if you behave stupidly." She finished with a pointed stare into the audience. She hoped that they will take her words to their hearts because she would rather not investigate their deaths as well. She had to admit that there among the students were some she would regret losing. A lot.
The case was closed. The body and the evidence, the gold in the lungs, were given to the wife of the deceased one to cover the funeral expenses and to ensure that the widow won't end on the street. The concept of legacies – inherited story roles – was by no means perfect but Zelda couldn't help but to think that the mother of the deceased fisher was luckier than her daughter-in-law. She was greedy and her constant nagging drove the goldfish mad, yet she lived out her days with all her family members alive and around her, perhaps getting more than she deserved.
The Quill didn't think there was anyone or anything to blame but the uglier side of everyone's heart, this notion made the taste in her mouth all the more bitter. With this thought in mind she returned to her more mundane tasks as she felt a tugging at heart to do something that would hopefully help someone reach their happily ever after.
THE END