Disclaimer: I do not own Descendants
Priceless
NOTE: So this story was originally inspired by a post made by my wonderful beta elphaba_swan (kindofchaoticgood) on Tumblr.
Essentially, in the book, Rise of the Isle of the Lost (takes place before the second movie), Mal has a bad habit of using a time spell from her mother's spell book when she's late for things. Seems harmless, right, but can anything "harmless" come from Maleficent's spell book?
Anyway, this was originally posted on Tumblr but I cleaned it up a bit and decided to post it here too.
Mal had a list of names that she went through everyday, like a prayer.
(Freddie Facilier.)
She just sat there.
Freddie always just sat there, once mischievous eyes, now seemingly unseeing. Greasy and knotted strands of black and grey hair hung limply around her thin face, framing it in haunting shadows that seemed more alive and responsive than the girl they covered.
Mal could never stay too long in Freddie's room. The shadows, massless as they were, always seemed hostile in her presence, too close, too suffocating, too ready to drag her down to wherever they came from as payment for her sins.
Some days - dark cold days where she felt like she was choking on smoke - she wished they would.
Leaving the tray of food that she knew would still be untouched by the next meal, Mal walked down the hall, feeling knife cutting accusing glares of every non-magical imbued student. Another reminder that the Freddie's shadow friends weren't the only ones who perhaps desired a piece of flesh. An eye for an eye.
Mal cooly walked past them, head held high, golden circlet denoting her rank as the King's Lady firmly in place. She was forced to hold herself above their scathing glares and insulting comments; above their cries for justice, above their poison and assassination attempts. And instead of retaliating, she listened. She listened and empathized
(Jordan.)
She restrained herself from hissing and cursing and unleashing the fire that burned beneath her skin on all of them, those who once called her friend but now who spat on her name. They didn't know her. They never knew her. They at first only saw her as the daughter of their most feared nightmare, wicked and cruel; then as a lady of the court, delicate with too bright smiles that blinded all from how she was screaming inside.
And now...now she was their greatest nightmare reborn. At most, they demanded her blood, one life never being enough to return the many that were lost, but it would be justice! The dragon would be slayed! True love would break the spell and the kingdom would be safe once again!
(Jane.)
Instead, they found a second rate sorcerer. He had been miles and miles away, out of the reach of Mal's accidental curse that even Fairy Godmother had succumbed to. (She didn't know how much she cared for the headmistress and her daughter until they had faded away until nothing was left like many fairies do when they die.) The fumbling sorcerer had bound Mal's powers tight, prickly and hot and suffocating underneath her skin.
She learned to hide how her body ached well. Not even on the Isle did Mal wish for death as much as she did then.
She went to Harry Hook, at her lowest of lows, knowing that in the past the pirate never hesitated to show his complete and utter disdain for her. Harry would do it, she thought hopefully. Harry would kill her. After all, Mal took what was most precious to him…
But when she found the pirate, he waved her off like a pesky fly, turning his back on her as he crouched next to a smaller figure, patiently showing how to tie the simplest of sailing knots, never raising his voice as the once fearsome and passionate pirate queen and sea witch fumbled with knots that she should have been able to tie in her sleep once upon a time.
She had looked at Mal, head titled face blank. "Who is that?" she had asked the pirate next to her, and Mal felt sick to her stomach at the question.
"No one to concern yourself with, love," Harry had murmured gently, tying his own knot. That answered seemed to satisfy her as she turned away from Mal and back towards him.
"And who are you?"
Mal wished she could gouge out her eyes and never have to see the look of agony on the first mate's face ever again. But he didn't rage, he didn't cry, he just gently tugged on one of her braids replying with a voice so heartbrokenly adoring, "Harry. Your Harry."
The teal haired girl who both was and wasn't his beloved captain nodded again, satisfied, looking down at her messy knot of ropes. She paused, once more before asking, nose scrunched up in confusion, "And what's my name?" she asked not with confidence, not as an anthem but as lost soul drifting at sea, not knowing where North lay.
Mal had turned away before she could even see the way hope died on the former first mate's face, running like she always did when things got too tough or hard for her. The scene too intimate. Too heartbroken.
All her fault. All her damn fucking fault…
(Uma.)
Mal never meant…This wasn't supposed to…
"You did this," Carlos had once whispered weeks ago, face expressionless as he went back and forth between feeding Evie - too gray, too quiet, too lifeless - and tucking in the blankets over Jay - face pale and parchment thin, eyes seemingly forever closed. He had turned to face her, a shadow of the once bright and friendly and encouraging boy she once knew. Something though had broken inside Carlos, like a damn breaking deep into something under so much pain and anger that not even Cruella had pushed him far enough to evoke such rage.
"You knew that your mother's spell book was dangerous! That every spell in it was meant for evil! And you still used it!" Carlos spat nastily, the other two occupants of the room unaware of the two most important people in their lives breaking, hurting each other. "And for what? To go back in time whenever you tripped and made an idiot out of yourself? Or to go back a few minutes when you just needed that strawberry smoothie before class and didn't want to be late? Or when you couldn't fucking own up to your own shit and just how much of a fucking disaster you are! Are you happy? Are you happy at how you destroyed our family?"
(Jay.)
(Evie.)
"I'm sorry" Mal had whispered tears streaming down her face. "I am so, so sorry Carlos!"
A dark laugh that sounded eerily too much like his mother's left Carlos's mouth as he slowly applauded her. "Oh lookit here, guys" he sneered with fake shock turning towards Evie who looked so pale and gaunt and Jay whose chest barely moved. "She does know how to say sorry. I think I can speak for everyone when I saw we all thought you were deathly allergic to apologies."
Mal shook her head, voice breaking. "Don't do this, C. Please! You're all I have left. We're...we're family!" Mal begged. "I can fix this!"
"Like you did with Ben?"
(Ben.)
Mal looked at him, silently begging him to understand. She tried to push away memories of a boy with a too kind smile and eyes that had so much hope for the future. She tried to push away thoughts of a boy who began to fear his memory when it went from 15 minutes that couldn't be remembered to whole days forgotten. Who after months of this, fear and self-doubt invited him to fall several stories out the window of King Adam's tallest tower.
At that the haunting memory of a boy too good for her, Mal started sobbing, unintelligible sounds coming out as she attempted to beg with Carlos to not leave her alone. To not turn his back on her too.
The boy chuckled again, a dark hollow sound as he returned to his caretaker duty, ignoring how she crumbled inside.
"Thought so," he said as he wiped the drool from Evie's mouth.
(Freddie Facilier.)
(Jordan.)
(Jane.)
(Uma.)
(Jay.)
(Evie.)
(Ben.)
Mal had a list of names that she went through everyday.
The list of names was always growing both with names that she was very familiar with and with those she had never heard of before, never set eyes on them, never would get to know them as they were before. Names that wailing mothers carved out into her brain until their voices went raw.
And despite all that, despite the many statements, apologies, donations, penance, and libraries filled with rare spell books she went through, there would be seven names she herself would mourn daily.
After all, their names were all she had left of them.
(Freddie Facilier.)
(Jordan.)
(Jane.)
(Uma.)
(Jay.)
(Evie.)
(Ben.)