Back at Cook's home, Raven stared at her mother's letter, still closed from the day before. Nevermore approached, worried, rubbing her head against the arm of her mistress, who smiled slightly and caressed the little dragon's head.
Raven was still angry, but much less than she was a day ago, and this had allowed a hint of curiosity to make its way through her thoughts. What had her mother wrote in that letter? Why now was the right moment for Raven to read it? Was it possible she could find some kind of revelation, something that shed new light on the Evil Queen, that could give a logic explanation about her behavior ...
"No," Raven Queen firmly said to herself, "I must not to fall for it. I know mother and I know myself. Surely it will be some trick to convince me to come back to her, it is typical of her, she manipulates people for her own gain, even her own daughter. If I read her message, it's likely that she would be able to make me come back. But I swore I wouldn't do it, neither for her ... nor for anyone else." The girl sighed, finally averting her eyes from the letter.
Her father's words came back to her: You also had friends there, and you left them behind without thinking twice. She hadn't wanted to admit it to the Good King, but in the last days, she found herself thinking about the same thing. Was she really angry with Madeline, or Cerise, or Cedar? And Darling? It was annoying that they hadn't listened to her earlier, of course, but when Snow White makes a decision, even the most messed up ones, it is natural to think that she knows what it does. She must have a plan, that's what they probably had thought. When they understood that she didn't, instead of accusing Raven like the rest of the school, in a spell they were already by her side. In short, did they deserve to be left behind so brutally ?!
Probably not, but ... did she really have the strength to go back and endure everything that she had escaped from? Raven doubted it. Especially after Apple, of all people, had been willing to sell her to the Evil Queen in order to have her Happily Ever After ... of course, in the end she had made the right choice, and, in the first place, all had started from the pressures caused by having a mother like Snow White, but ... was this enough to still trust her?
Sense of guilt and fear were twisting in her soul, distressing her as much as the anger had tormented her during the last period at Ever After High.
Raven Queen returned her attention to the letter from the Evil Queen. It was less stressful.
-/-
Apple White walked into the Headmaster's office with an unsettled look.
After a hurried greeting, Snow White had called a first meeting between her, the Grimm brothers and ... her daughter. When the door closed, all of them settled in the room: Milton on his chair-throne, with Mrs Trollswort by his side; Snow White at the center of the room, therefore of the attention; Giles on the sidelines, clearly disinterested in the what was happening and more concerned about throwing wastepaper in the bin.
"So, honey," Snow White began, with the usual grace, "I guess there's no need to explain why we're here today, right?" "Does it have to do with finding Raven ...?" Apple asked, alarmed. "Precisely!" Milton intervened, but immediately shutted up by the look of the Fairest of Them All. Once again, the queen returned, with her usual smile, to address her daughter: "As her roommate, you obviously knew Raven Queen better than anyone else. Maybe you could know something and give us some ideas about where she might have went! "
"Actually, is Maddie, I mean, Madeline Hatter, who knows her very well, she's her best friend."
"Sssure, but ... um ... you see, it would not be wise to ask to those who are clearly on the side of the fugitive, right? You should know better, dear!"
Even just her mother's tone had became unsufferable to Apple; "And what makes you believe that I'm on your side in this, mom?!" the blonde princess blurted out instinctively. Snow White widened her eyes, not expecting such an answer from her daughter, the perfect Royal. Apple herself was surprised, but that didn't stop her: "I have no idea where Raven is, and even if I knew it, I would leave her alone! We've already given her enough problems!" Snow White tried to stay calm, but her giggle revealed a certain nervousness: "C-come on, Apple, it's about ... saving our traditions! Our Destinies! Your Destiny! Right, gentlemen?" Milton started to nod eagerly, while Giles just narrowed his eyes, suddenly interested. Apple clenched his fists: "I won't fall for that this time." She replied, stoically.
Once upon a time, Apple would have never even thought about turning against her mother: the woman who, literally, she wanted to become. Once upon a time, when she didn't know how far she was willing to go to defend her position. The worst part was that Apple herself had lowered herself to those same levels, persuaded by her parent. The only difference was that Apple was ashamed of it.
We are different! Apple had realized when Snow White had shown to be interested only in popularity. Now more than ever, it was time to prove that.
Before Snow White or Milton could reply something, the attention of everyone was attracted by the sudden appearance of Courtly Jester where right some time before was Ms. Trollsworth.
-/-
N.N .: Ok, hold on, we clearly missed something.
B.P .: I rewind a little!
-/-
Snow White's arrival at Ever After High was much more flamboyant and unnecessarily noisy than the last time. Having made know her presence at school since the beginning, unlike when she had reintroduced dragonsports, she had thought it was a "good" idea to entering with style. Red carpet unrolled once out of the limousine, paparazzi from all the most important newspapers wanting to catch a photo of her, the trumpets of his dwarfs valets ... in short, the VIP full package.
It would be smarter to handle these deals silently, instead of shouting about it randomly, Courtly Jester had thought, keeping the shapeshifting card between her fingers.
When the news of the Fairest of Them All throughout Book End and surroundings, Hiram had updated her on the plan, instructing her to get into action exactly when Snow White would have cross the door of Ever After High. She had no idea what he had in mind, but in any case her task hadn't changed. She had already bounded, gagged and hidden Miss Trollsworth, in order to take her place. The plan was to approach the Headmaster and at the first occasion taking Grimm's mirror-ring. He himself would have handed the artifact to the one he would've thought being his secretary: among the many tasks of Trollsworth, there was also the cleaning of the ring.
Peeping from behind the wall, Courtly saw Milton Grimm running to welcome Snow White. The jokeress passed the card in front of her face and at the same time she stood right in front of the Headmaster. "Ms. Trollsworth!" The man thundered. "Where did you go? Come with me!" Courtly nodded, emotionlessly. Say ... Hadn't she got a little too easily convinced by Hiram's words? A guy who she had just met? She knew first-hand how easy it was to manipulate other people: at Wonderland High she had been able to have the full collaboration of Chase Redford, by relying on his devotion to the rules, and this despite the knight, like everyone else, trusted her very lit ...
"Aw, to hex with that!" she told herself, shaking her head. She was in the game, she had to play.
-/-
"... but if even Little Miss Perfect can think with her own head, I can't be lesser wise!" Courtly exclaimed, seemingly talking to herself. Before anyone in the room could ask her something, the joker noticed all the eyes on her and cleared her throat: "Ok, I don't know how much time we have... buuuut there's this weird dude who wants your heads and he asked me to take the ring of the headmaster at first it seemed a good idea to me but now I dunno if it's the best thing and in short before thinking about how to punish me I would focus more on how to deal with the psycho who hides himself in the area around Book E... "
A chill ran throughout the room. Literally: layers of frost, clearly due to some magic, were quickly covering the office's walls, also blocking the door.
"What a disappointment." Murmured a voice behind everyone, a voice known only to Courtly. Turning around, the jester found herself face to face with his ex-partner, along with a bizarre, very small girl, with light blue skin and white hair, a strange scepter in her hands. A satisfied grin decorated her face, a face the jester was sure she had already seen somewhere.
"I wanted you to being part of all this, but it's evident that deep down in yourself you can't be anything other than a slave. Jackie, here, I trust won't disappoint me." Hiram said, scornful "Luckily I never leave anything to luck. Or did you think I was exclusively counting on you for this siege?!"
Courtly realized that the ice was now imprisoning her feet and those of Apple, Snow White and the Grimms. Hiram approached Courtly, who was afraid of being punished on the spot. But the boy just took from her pocket on the skirt the parchment he gave her the day before. How did he know it was there?Who knows. The tiny girl who apparently was named Jackie, on the other hand, had already snatched the mirror-ring from Milton after a brief quarrel with the man. She then handed it to Hiram, who put it on his finger and unrolled the parchment. He smirked at Snow White and Apple, and then commented: "Let's write the conclusion of this tale, once and for all."
-/-
F.N.: Jackie? As Jackie Frost?! Hadn't she been imprisoned along with her brother, after the Epic Winter mess?
M.N.: That's right! But when did Hiram free her?
Hiram Patchfield: Yesterday, while you people were focused on Apple White. It was very easy to sneak into the castle on the Top of the World with my powers, freeing her and convince her to help me with my cause. Especially when I promised her that she would have the power of winter back in her hands, albeit for a while. As for Northwind, I admit it wasn't nice to leave him behind, okay, but Jackie told me that he wouldn't have been very useful and, well, by seeing him, I had to agree...
M.N..: Would you stop interrupting us?!
F.N.: Maddie and Kitty are enough already, thank you very much.
H.P.: My apologies, I exaggerated, it's true. It's kinda a side effect of the powers I obtained. You'll know more later. Now I'll stop, they're giving me strange looks 'cause by their point of view I'm talking to air.
-/-
Ignoring the puzzled stares of Snow White, Apple and the others, Hiram returned to focus on the parchment.
When he started to reciting the spell, in an incomprehensible language, the greenish veins on the boy's gray skin started to get more and more glowing, until the room was dazzled. Suddenly, with a roaring sound, the light exploded and poured into the ring. Soon after, the mirror on the wall behind the principal's desk lit up in the same green light. To be honest, every single mirror (almost) in the school was lighting up in the same way.
"Good." Hiram commented, "The whole mirror system is under my control. From here," he continued, approaching to the Headmaster's mirror, behind the throne-chair "I can see in any corner of the school, and even beyond. It's like having thousands of eyes. I can see anywhere, hence localyzing my toughest targets. Jackie!" Upon being called, the little snow girl approached eagerly, unstably holding the scepter, way too big for her tinier hands.
"Don't. Make. Mistakes." Patchfield firmly warned her. Jackie Frost nodded, grinning. She aimed the scepter towards the reflecting surface and set off a wave of icy wind. The magical cold passed from mirror to mirror, directed towards the targets by Hiram and his magic, channeled through the ring.
Within a few seconds, Baba Jaga and any other senior magician on duty at Ever After High had been immobilized by a grip of mystical frost.
Satisfied with the result, Hiram turned to Jackie, snapping his fingers. The scepter levitated away from the girl's grip and, magically, disappeared between the folds of Patchfield's cloak. "Couldn't I keep it a little longer ...?" She implored, under the impassive gaze of the gray-skinned young man, who answered: "I prefer not to take risks. Remember how it ended last time? Now go give the signal to the others." Pouting, Jackie turned into a coquette and flew out of the office window.
-/-
Left alone with his prisoners, Hiram looked at them with spite: "It was waaay too easy." At that moment, several bangs were heard at the door, which, after some time, magically disappeared. "Talked too soon."Patchfield commented, annoyed.
The three Charming brothers made their triumphal entry into the office: Daring, Dexter and Darling, all armed with the sword. The former was in one of his plastic pose, the second was massaging a shoulder and the third was staring Hiram with determination. Along with them, however, there were also the two old guys whom Apple and Milton Grimm recognized as those who had went after the Headmaster until the day before. By seeing them, Hiram's gaze turned into disappointment. The Charming meanwhile had placed themselves in front of the hostages, to protect them.
"I met the gentlemen this morning, during my training." Darling started to explain, before noting the shocked look of Milton and Snow White "We'll talk about my un-princess-ness once will be out of danger, okay? Anyway, they warned me about one of their mad students who would have attacked the school ... " " We tried to warn you, Headmaster Grimm, to no avail " one of the mysterious duo intervened, instantly melting the ice that imprisoned principals and Royals with a vortex of golden magic. "So we looked for the nearest paladins." Concluded the other, helping his colleague in the magic of melting.
"... Congratulations, you managed to get there too late anyway." Hiram growled, poisonous. Darling noticed that the apparition of his ex-mentors had instilled in the lad a certain amount of hesitation. "We want to keep you from making the biggest mistake of your life." One of the said; "You're still in time to stop." the other added. The boy didn't let fooling himself by their imploring tone, and continued to look at them with hostility: "I had already made clear my point. If you don't want to accept it, it's just your problem."
-/-
B.P.: It's our chance to know more!
N.N.: I'm on it!
-/-
Hiram had lied to Raven Queen on one thing: his family.
The Patchfields weren't any different from any other inhabitant of the Snow White's realm: faithful, adoring, tragically naive about their lady's opportunism. Stephen, his father, worked on the fields, while his mother, Heather, raised the animals. Hiram, along with his sister Samantha, helped both. It was obviously a hard life, but they did not complain. The affection they felt for each other was enough to endure, and even overcome, any adversity given by their social status. They had even had a lot of satisfactions, so much so that theirs had been recognized as the best farm in the area; they were convinced that they were contributing to something greater, a belief occasionally fueled by the many pep talks Snow White gave, whenever she decided to make a tour of her domain.
Hiram himself dreamed of nothing but continuing his parents' work under the guidance of the Fairest Of Them All, whose he was (like everyone else around there) a great admirer. All in all, it was a life that could have been called happy.
But it was a happiness built on appearances, and when they broke, they broke the magic.
And Hiram's heart.
-/-
When the Evil Queen decided to go off the script, she didn't hesitate to attack her nemesis's homeland. Snow White had sensed the danger and ordered the population to remain sheltered at home until the end of the danger.
Unfortunately, it wasn't enough: the Patchfield farm was one of many to fall under the foot of the Evil Queen's army. Raided everything that was interesting to them, the pack of monsters had set the house on fire, with the Patchfields trapped inside. Stunned by the flames, Hiram reawakened some time later in the middle of the grass, battered but alive. Behind him, the incinerated ruins of his house, collapsed on itself while it was burning.
There was no one else around there.
-/-
After the Evil Queen retired, Snow White made a huge donation to the country's orphanage, so that it could welcome all the young survivors of that absurd chaos. Hidden himself almost immediately after having get back to his senses, fearing that the dark army could've return, the child learned shortly after about the ceremony in honor of the refurbishment of the shelter house.
Arrived there, he was about to make the crowd know about his presence, but, looking towards the stage, the blood froze in his veins.
Something, in the way everyone looked at Snow White, with the other orphans on the sidelines and quite far from the queen, convinced him to move away from that scene as quickly as possible.
With the speed given to him by fear, Hiram reached the borders of the kingdom at nightfall, and jumped on the first cart who was passing.
He did so for several times, until he arrived in the mystical land of Avalon.
It was a real surprise for the master wizards of the academy, when, removing the straw from the cart, they found themselves in front of a shaky and malnourished boy. After hearing the story of the young man and discussing for a long time among themselves, the deans unanimously decided to take him under their protection, raising him and, since they were in a place of knowledge, teaching him the secrets of their ancestral magic arts.
Years passed, and Hiram seemed to have overcome the trauma of his past, leading a quiet life as a promising magician apprentice ... until that fateful day.
-/-
Avalon wasn't so isolated from the rest of the world as many people believed, in fact, the wise enchanters of the place thought it was necessary to keep themselves informed as much as possible about the events beyond their lands. Ever After, with all its peculiar traditions, had been among the topics of greatest interest for centuries, especially after Raven Queen had refused her Destiny.
The news of the dragonsports reopening, therefore, had immediately attracted the attention of the entire academy, including Hiram, who had few but vivid memories of those games.
In the main hall, through a voluminous crystal ball, masters and students had witnessed, in live, the opening ceremony of the arena ... and the entrance of the Evil Queen. Needless to say, anxiety and anger immediately took possession of Hiram by seeing the woman who had ruined his childhood, but what completely broke the boy's self-control had been Snow White: leaving that crazy hag free ?! What was wrong with her?!
In following the developments of the affair the situation didn't get better, not even when the Evil Queen had been locked again.
He remembered how he had felt when he had saw the Fairest Of Them All putting the orphans in a corner, many years ago. He finally understood why he had wanted to escape: it was all a game for her and those like her. And who cared if anonymous characters like the Patchfields were going to suffer the consequences, no one would ever read about them.
"Well," Hiram decided, "I'll make them read about us. I'm gonna write my story and those of all Ever After's commoners. With the ink I'll extract from the Royals' filthy corpses! "
-/-
A simple wizard apprentice, no matter how talented, could hardly hope to win against an entire kingdom.
Kept in the deepest parts of the catacombs under the academy, the forbidden spells were known to exist only to the old masters and the most renowned students. Hiram, belonging to the second category, had already been able to conduct research, for purely theoretical purposes, on some of them. But his change of pace made the use of that knowledge mortally concrete.
There was a ritual, through which Hiram could have converted his own grudge into mystical energy. The price to pay was to sacrifice the user's own Wonder, the very essence of a person's feelings and identity.
Ripping away from his body everything he was, Hiram welcomed the green and poisonous mark of hatred on his now colorless skin.
Too late, his mentors realized what was happening, being able only to watch helplessly as their pupil went away, determined to return to his childhood home with the worst intentions.
-/-
N.N. & B.P.: …
M.N.: G-get back to the present, ok…?
-/-
Hiram wasted no time and summoned two giant snakes, made entirely of green magical energy.
The Charmings promptly rushed towards them, without imagining that it was exactly what their opponent wanted. In a flash, the snakes shrank, to the three brothers' disappointment, and then in a spell they grew larger again and wrapped around the princes. Darling, however, was quick enough to escape the coils and cutting off the head of the beast which had captured Dexter. Daring managed to free himself by dazzling the enemy with his smile.
Hiram, meanwhile, had went towards his two former masters, summoning a third snake, larger than the previous ones. The monster slammed the two on a corner, knocking them out. The gray-skinned boy then turned to the Grimm brothers, who in the meantime were taking Snow White and Apple out of the office, with Courtly following them.
The escape of the group was interrupted once reached the main hall, in the most shocking way: an humoungous crowd of peasants, millers, farriers, in short, commoners, blocked every possible escape way. Among them, Jackie Frost stood out with an excited expression. Behind them, Hiram's derisive voice announced his arrival: "I bet you didn't realize my ... associates had already entered in here."
-/-
The boy summoned a lot of little snakes, which surrounded the fugitives. Then, going towards it, he waved a hand to his army: "Look at them, Snow White. You obviously don't know them, but they know you. They praised your, served you faithfully, and in return they were ignored and manipulated. But now they have enough."
The Fairest Of Them All scanned all those faces. Not one of them looked away, no one seemed to be ashamed of what they were doing. When she noticed a pair of his bodyguard-dwarves in the crowd, the queen could no longer hold herself back: "Pouty! How could you?! " she snapped, scandalized.
"My name is Frank." the dwarf coldly replied.
Apple, alongside to her mother, with greef in her heart, recognized that too many mistakes had been made. Milton wanted to say something, if only to gain back some credibility, but Giles covered his mouth with a hand, aware that the situation was already bad enough. Courtly, looking at the crowd, perfectly shared their feelings, but at the same time she felt something was definitely off.
"Ever After High is the beating heart of the injustice that spreads through this entire country." Patchfield resumed, "Once we'll have done here, no one will dare put us down ever after again."
"Get straight," the jokeress addressed him, wanting to understand "exactly what should you finish?" In response, Hiram gave her a small smile, coated with a hint of bitterness. Then he turned his gaze to the hallways, from which the Ever After High students were coming, armed as best they could.
The three Charming brothers, who had clearly managed to slay even the last snake, led the crowd. Blondie Lockes, behind them, was recording everything with a Mirrorpad, probably to let the rest of the kingdom know what was happening. Faybelle had an intrigued expression, looking at Hiram, who quietly greeted the new arrivals: "We were waiting for you."
Daring stepped forward boldly, chin out and declaring with a proud voice: "Give up right now, you scoundrel! You'll save yourself a loud humiliation, considering that none of your henchmen can hope to compete in a fight! Hexpecially against myself!"
Patchfield narrowed his eyes, turning for a moment to his allies, who seemed quite offended by the prince's words.
"As usual, you underestimate us." He then retorted; "That's what will put The End to your stories."
Apologize for the long wait, once again. this time I really hoped to posting it earlier. Sigh.
Expect the next chapter for Easter period or shortly after.
Bye!
-Blitz