Raven Queen, Daughter of the Evil Queen
"We protect the dreams of children and help preserve a sense of childhood innocence and magic as they begin their journey into enter adulthood. Without us, without Fairytales, there is no imagination, there is no magic, no Happily Ever After," Headmaster Grimm says, his steely eyes looking out at us, locking in on every one of our faces.
Headmaster Grimm's annual speech draws to an end and I feel my stomach rumble with anticipation.
"In closing," he clears his throat, "I'd like to ask of each of you to keep your heads high and make the very most of this school year at Ever After High. Strive to make it the very best yet, and don't let last year's mishaps affect you; it's a clean slate, and Legacy Day students, please try to stay out of trouble." He smiles curtly and vanishes.
I feel sick. This is the year of Legacy Day, the day when I must pledge to follow my destiny to become the next Evil Queen of the entire magical world. Every fairy tale will be staring at me, expecting me to accept the role that was handed to me with my birth.
But it isn't not fair. I don't have a Happily Ever After waiting for me in the end, just darkness, a twisted path of evil that I've dreaded since I was nothing more than a fable.
I tentatively stand and lock eyes with Maddie; she crosses her eyes and sticks out her tongue; she hurriedly stifles her burst of giggles into her polka-dotted gloved hands.
Smiling, I make my way through the crowd towards her. The Three Little Pigs scurry when they see me and scream when they bump into Kitty Cheshire; she grins mischievously and disappears, her grin hanging in midair for a moment before disappearing with an airy pop. All the Wonderlanders have an air of lunacy to them and it tends to frighten the younger fairy tales.
"Grimm's speech was especially gloomy," Maddie says, drinking from her teacup. She seems to have an endless supply of fine china stored somewhere in her hat. She's explained to me before that magic connects it directly to her room back in Wonderland, but I can't imagine she has that many tea sets lying around, even if she is the heir of the Mad Hatter legacy.
"Isn't it every year?" I ask, remembering the previous years of solemn warnings and veiled threats for good behavior. Yes, I do believe Grimm is the perfect name for our Headmaster.
She stops and taps her chin three times.
"You're right!" she laughs, twirling a finger through her curls; her hair coils like a spring, bouncing back into messy perfection.
Maddie won't have a problem taking the pledge on Legacy Day. She's naturally giggly and whimsical, and I can only assume the touch of eccentricity will grow in the future. She's superbly effervescent, and I have no doubts she will make an amazing Mad Hatter.
"Shall we have some tea?" she asks excitedly, her gray eyes shimmering wildly.
"Sure," I smile.
I'm grateful to have her as my best friend. She's kind and non-judgmental, which is a rarity when it comes to associating with me, the supposedly "Evilest of them All". Without her friendship, I'd never had met Kitty or Lizzie Heart, although Lizzie does take her role as the next Red Queen of Wonderland very seriously. She relishes in the idea of being a powerful woman in a genre dominated by male heroes.
"If one of those heroes in training tries to take my throne, it'd be OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!" she'd said passionately, her lips curling into a positively wicked grin. I can't even imagine the thoughts that bubble in the stewing cauldron of her mind. I shudder thinking of the horrors to come for the next Alice.
But she has a point. By not being a Princess, I get to avoid classes that highlight the necessities of being a Damsel in Distress or how to properly wear a tiara. In the era of mirror blogs, I wonder why our respective tales haven't evolved, haven't changed in order to instill better values into the pliable minds of children.
"Cedar! Over here!" Maddie waves Cedar Wood over and pours me a cup of jasmine tea. "Sugar, cream?" she asks, readying her spoon. She's managed to pull an entire garden table from her hat, with matching white iron chairs.
"Both, please," I say. I stir my tea gently, letting the scented wisps of steam caress my nose. Maddie has a talent for making the best tea around.
We're sitting under a serenity tree and the summer leaves are beginning to give way to the colors of fall. The courtyard at Ever After High is full of them, and watching them change on the first day of autumn is almost dreamlike. One day the green shades flicker away, replaced by vibrant reds and oranges.
Cedar Wood takes the seat next to mine and smiles, taking a sip of her prepared tea. She's a shy and introverted girl that I wouldn't have met, again, without Maddie. As the next Pinocchio, she strives to tell the truth as she's embarrassed by being thought of as a liar.
I wonder what Maddie and Cedar would say if I told them I didn't want to take the pledge. Over summer break, I was looking through some of my mother's old books that she keeps hidden away in the cellar. It was in their pages that I learned about "choice" and "creating your own destiny". These ideas were supposed to just be myths, but what if there was some truth to the legends?
What would happen if I didn't take the pledge? What would change? Everything, I suppose. I wouldn't just be changing my destiny, but Apple White's, too, and Daring Charming's. For the good of the fairy tale community, I know what the right decision is. But my heart and my head are conflicted.
A loud boom shakes me out of my thoughts and I jolt to my feet.
In the distance, we can see a tuft of smoke blooming from Book End, a small shopping village connected to Ever After High. My ornately dressed classmates begin gathering in courtyard, blinking up at the sky as the smoke gets thicker and more menacing. They gasp and scream when another explosion spurts fire into the air, accompanied by an earthquake that knocks me to my knees.
"What's happening?"
"What was that?"
"A fire!"
"Is it a dragon? Here, at Ever After High?"
"Someone call the Knights in Shining Armor!"
Maddie and I look at each other, and I can see the worry in her eye. Book End is a safe place. The smoke is dark and heavy, and already forming into something.
"Is it the Evil Queen?"
My stomach flips and my face burns red. My mother would never do this, never put me or my friends in danger. Cedar rests a hand on my shoulder and tries to reassure me with a smile, but her dark eyes are heavy with fear.
It's madness on campus. Fairy tales are running left and right, into the castle or the surrounding small buildings when another bang rings in the air. Fire begins painting the clouded sky orange and red.
Maddie grabs my wrists and starts running.
"Come on, Raven!"
The smoke from Book End stretches, long finger-like strands inching towards the school, like hands reaching for something. My heart clenches and I'm filled with the uneasy sense that it's me it's after.
Everything is happening so quickly.
You can stop it, Raven, you have powers, you have magic, a small voice whispers in my head. I shake the thoughts away, still running, feeling my lungs ache.
No. Every time I try to do good with it, it backfires and only gets worse.
Cedar screams when the darkness approaches and begins to fall like rain. It's oily and slick in appearance and forms and twists, rising to it's feet. I look back and see that it's something else entirely, a black creature, twitching in the sight of the sun. We've all stopped to stare at it, then at the jousting team, the school's resident group of strongest and most promising hero-to-be's. They feebly hold up their swords, cringing away from the little beast.
"What is it?" I hear someone shout.
"Oh no! It has Duchess!"
Duchess Swan cries out, and I throw back a glance; the creature grabs her wrists with almost lasso-like precision with it's outstretched arms.
"Oh peas and crackers!"
Maddie stops running and reaches into her bag; she pulls out a saucer and flings it at the creature; the glass shatters against its head and it screams, giving Duchess and opportunity to escape. She releases another, a look of determination on her small face.
Ivory Rabbit, daughter of the White Rabbit, thumps her high-heeled foot into the ground in a fast, hard rhythm, and the earth cracks like lightning, causing the creature to lose it's footing. It hisses at her, enraged. In a fluid movement, it spits inky black liquid at her, but she kicks up the earth, forming a barrier.
Maddie spins butter knives in between her fingers and hurls them at the creature. The metal absorbs into it. Undeterred, she reaches into her bag for forks and spoons, treating them carefully, as if they are great weapons.
The Wonderlanders are the only ones crazy enough to fight it, to try to hold it back before the Knights arrive, and the school is silent in the face of the battle.
My heart thumps in my throat and I feel my fingertips tingling with magic. I could hurt Maddie, my spell could rebound to devastating effects.
There's a loud clicking as Ivory launches a golden pocket watch at the creature; it detonates like a grenade and the beast breaks apart, spraying ink in a directions before reforming.
In a flash, Lizzie rushes through the castle doors, her face twisted by anger. Her red and black hair look like fire and smoke trailing behind her, whipping with the breeze.
"Off," she shouts, holding a playing card in between her fingers; it catches fire from Wonderland magic, "with your head!"
She sends it flying and in an instant, the dark creature dies, it's small head soaring through the air and crashing into the ground, evanescing into the breeze, like ashes.
With it's death, the smoky sky turns blue and the rumbling from Book End stops.
The campus is silent for a moment, faces staring in awe as Lizzie smirks, tidying up her gown and pulling her long hair back. She throws a look at the jousting team and glares.
"And you call yourselves heroes?" she snarls, picking up her skirt and making a royal exit, chin up as she enters the castle.
My heart thunders in my chest as she waltzes away, the students breaking into applause and cheers. I'm a coward. I could have stopped it, could have tried to at the very least.
"Raven, Raven what's wrong?" Maddie asks, snapping her fingers.
I blink. "No-nothing."
I stare at the spot where the creature had died. There's nothing left, no smoke, no vapor, not even a shadow printed into the ground.
What was it? Where did it come from? I've never seen anything like it before, not even in my copies of Dark Incantations or Beasts of the Forest. One thing I know for sure is that that thing hadn't been alive before the fire that struck Book End, it had been created from the smoke, but by what?