A/n: The bug that wasn't letting me see how many views I had gotten and any comments posted for my stories seems to have been fixed! (I hope).

I think that I've forever convinced my brain that the Headmaster should be Raven's grandfather, the thought of him suddenly finding out and being thrown for a loop is just hilarious, and the awkward conflict it creates is just… too funny.

My head-cannon of Faybelle (which apparently diverges a bit from the actual cannon Faybelle) is kind of a cross between a dominant sarcastic villain and an intelligent strategist who only lets a select few into her life and sort of feels like she needs to take care of them in her own special way, she is always plotting, planning out potential schemes that would end up benefiting her the best, highly competitive, and possessive in a uniquely fairy sort of way, if you read up on old fairy folk tails you will find that fairies as a general rule do not like it when somebody encroaches on their stuff.

It's going to be interesting to write about Faybelle and her web of influence vs. Apple and her web of influence clashing on all sorts of levels since I'm making both girls in this fic sort of leaders to their own Royal sub groups of Ever After High school, I'm thinking that Apple would have the support of the royalty Royals and heroes, and Faybelle would have most of the villain Royals or gruffer Rebels on her side, while Raven and her usual band of Rebel friends and acquaintances become sort of the unintentional middle ground that both Apple and Faybelle are trying to tug over to their side to gain leverage as they attempt to gain access to Raven's heart.

Let the cold war begin.

XXX

Raven clutched her phone anxiously to her chest; she had just received a hext from the Headmaster's office, she could guess why he had asked her to come down; and she was not too thrilled about the potential reasons why.

"Are you sure you're alright with being the unseen third party Kitty?" Raven asked the air as she walked down the hall. "More likely than not this is just going to become another senseless argument."

Kitty's eyes flashed into visibility above Raven's head. "Only if you let it be, sometimes more meaning can be stated from clearly showing that you have had enough and walking away." The cat-girl pointed out before vanishing once again.

Raven contemplated the other's advice; Kitty did have a point, most of the time she found herself trying to explain her motives to the Headmaster who had a tin ear when it came to actually listening to her.

She just wanted to put the Evil Queen destiny and anything even remotely related to her mother behind her, was that such a difficult thing for people to understand? She was so not in the mood to have yet another talk with the Headmaster about it, the last time she had talked with him she had told him nothing but the truth, explained her reasons clearly, and yet he still stubbornly overlooked very key issues and continued to insist that she become the one thing she despised more than anything on the planet.

Raven steeled herself as the secretary shooed her into the Headmaster's office.

"Hello? I got a hext telling me that I needed to come here on urgent business?" Raven sighed tiredly at the ground, trying to sound polite despite her distaste over this whole experience.

"Oh Raven how could you?" Apple's hurt voice made the witch look up, she was greeted by a sight that told her that she was not the only one asked to attend this newest attempt to "shame Raven into submission".

"Apple? …And Daring, oh goody." Raven deadpanned, feeling something in the back of her mind snap.

She narrowed her eyes towards the Headmaster sitting importantly at his desk, the golden wishing well coin placed at the center for her to clearly see.

"Oh dear, I could have sworn I had disposed of that in Professor Rumplstiltskin's classroom!" Raven faked surprise. "How did it get here?"

"It was Lady Baba Yaga's classroom, and the more important question is why did you try to dispose of this in the first place Miss Queen?" The Headmaster's disapproving voice demanded.

"No, I'm pretty sure that the more important question is how you knew where I had disposed of that." Raven's face slipped into her best unreadable poker-face as she began walking towards the Headmaster's desk, ignoring the prince and princess who were now watching her in concern. "I didn't tell anyone save for Faybelle where I was planning on disposing with that coin, can you, Headmaster, perhaps tell me why I get the feeling that I have been followed for most of the day?" The witch stopped just in front of the headmaster's desk where he coughed guiltily, knowing that he'd been caught.

"Raven!" Apple hissed in reprimand.

"Perhaps you could tell us why you were just going to throw the coin away?" Daring jumped in, trying to keep a fight from breaking out.

"Yeah Raven, why would you do that?" Apple demanded. "Even if your mother is not everyone's favorite person she's still your mother." The princess scolded.

"Only by blood!" Raven barked, her mask slipping just enough to show her anger as she faced the wide-eyed princess. "She may have birthed me and therefore that technically makes her my mother, but it does not make her my mom! She was more concerned with her schemes of making the world suffer for the hurts she could never get over or seek help so that they could heal. You weren't there while I was growing up Apple, she didn't see me as a daughter, just a tool she could use so that she could hurt others to make herself feel better! She never cared about me enough to consider the ramifications that her actions against the world would have on me and my family and she certainly did not care enough to leave anything in that box for me!"

Raven placed one hand on the Headmasters desk (though she held enough control not to slam her hand down) and turned to the surprised man with her phone held up in her free hand. "I had just gotten a message from my grandmother, asking me if I had opened the box and if I liked the wand that she had left for me, because my mother couldn't be bothered while she's too busy plotting her escape from wherever prison she's currently rotting in."

The Headmaster went a little cross-eyed as he stared at the message in question; he then grimaced when his gaze turned to the incensed witch who was currently giving him a very wintery smile.

"You wouldn't happen to know where that wand may currently be… would you Headmaster sir?" Raven's tone was sickly sweet.

With a defeated sigh the Headmaster gave up the fight while he was already so far behind, he opened a drawer and produced a long elegant wooden box. He handed it to Raven, unwilling to look her in the eye.

"Headmaster Grimm?" Apple gasped scandalized. "How could you?"

"The better question is; why he thought he could get away with it." Raven snorted, putting her phone away. "After all it was just the other day when you told me that you went to school at the same time as my grandmother, and that you… "knew" her, surely you would have recognized her favorite wand, the one she received from my grandfather their first year here." The witch stated, opening the box to show off an elegant silver wand of an organic twig design with spells written in sand-calligraphy etched all along the handle.

Milton tensed and froze, staring wide-eyed down at the wand that he had given Elenore their first year at Ever After, back when it had been an academy, not a high school.

"Your grandfather gave your grandmother that?" Daring asked; trying to distract everyone since the situation seemed to have been diffused and he wanted it to stay that way.

"She never really got over him." Raven sighed sadly. "I don't know much about him but the most I've been able to gather over the years from little tidbits she lets slide every once in a while… They grew up together apparently, childhood sweethearts, she loved him, and she thought that he loved her enough to get over the stigma there was back then for a human to be in a relationship with a witch, but as it had turned out; love wasn't enough to keep him around, he left her in order to pursue the possibility to gain a pretty human wife of some sort of noble status so that he could gain a title or something."

"I thought that most of the students who went to Ever After back then had some sort of noble title in their background?" Apple spoke up in confusion. "Things have changed, now that the scholarship program exists and the locals who live in the surrounding forest are allowed to send their children here."

"I asked the same thing, my grandmother told me that while my grandfather's family were highly influential and wealthy… for some reason they weren't considered nobles." Raven shrugged, taking out a sealed piece of parchment and dropping it onto the desk before closing the box, then picking up the wishing well coin off of the Headmaster's desk before she turned away, not noticing that the man himself had stopped breathing and was looking her over with increasingly widening eyes.

"He just left her with a baby to take care of?" Daring asked incredulous. "What kind of horrible person does that?"

"Oh he never knew he was a father." Raven assured as she walked some distance away from the Headmaster's desk, with her back to him she missed Milton nod in agreement to the girl's statement, he certainly did not ever even suspect...

"His blatant disregard for my grandmother convinced her that she could not bear the heartbreak of him both casting her aside along with her child, that and she was starting to doubt that between his ambitions and his need for reputation would make him a decent father at all if he did accept my mother as his child, so she went far away for her pregnancy, she and her allies covered her tracks by inventing a whole bunch of rumors about her "promiscuity" that were sure to get back to him so that he would never be the wiser." Raven shrugged nonplussed. "It worked, she never heard a peep from him ever since."

"By the way, you can hide or burn that letter when we're done here if you want. Normally I would take care of things like that myself but I don't want to chance such sensitive information coming back to cause my grandmother trouble." Raven called distractedly over her shoulder to the Headmaster, more concerned with staring contemplatively at the coin in her hand. "My grandmother said that she had decided to include the real name of my grandfather in it but… I hardly doubt that, if he's still alive, he'd want to know about me, and I think that enough time has passed that it doesn't matter anymore, I've stopped being curious about his identity a while ago so really it is all for the best-… hey Apple, do you still carry around that wide-mouthed water bottle in your purse?"

With shaking hands the Headmaster slid the letter towards himself, almost tenderly tracing the black official seal of the Queen family with a finger before sliding his thumb under the paper flap to open it.

Taped to the inside of the letter was a smaller folded note.

The Headmaster hesitated.

"Raven, what are you doing with that coin?" Apple asked but she got her answer a moment later when the room erupted in a bright light.

"What in the kingdom was that?" Raven cursed, blinking the spots out of her vision.

The witch tensed, her senses picking up on something that she hoped to never have to be in the same room with ever again.

"I know this spell!" Daring grinned jovially. "It produces a column of light that you can project three dimensional images on, very handy to view all sides of my handsome face in specially compiled photographs." The boy waggled his eyebrows at the two females.

"And when a large object, such as that coin, is put in water, enough of the spell is released to uncover things hidden behind a magical glamour, such as a certain previously hidden uninvited student." The Headmaster drawled irritably as he looked at a now visible Kitty standing beside his desk. "Miss Cheshire, would you mind explaining to me why you are here?"

"We've got more important things to worry about." The cat-girl growled, her eyes wild and her hair nearly standing on end.

"Apple, Daring, get behind me." Raven ordered firmly, taking out her grandmother's wand and standing protectively in front of the two blonds. "Kitty, do you sense what I sense?"

"As if I'd ever forget the stench of the Evil Queen's vile magic." Kitty spat, looking around the room wildly as she edged towards Raven.

Recent events in the last few minutes may have given Milton a reason to believe that the world had just been turned on it's end, and that he had made some rather foolish choices in his youth, but he was far from being dimwitted enough to let his personal problems interfere when both a witch's senses and a animal-kin's instinct were set off to danger. "Miss Queen, what is it that you sense? Please tell me." The man ordered all business.

Raven licked her lips. "It's… it's my mother's magic sir, and a strong concentration of it, enough for me to practically smell it, it must be a spell of hers or something of the like, and a powerful one too." The witch motioned to the area where the Headmaster was sitting. "You'd best get away from there sir, I can't pinpoint the exact location but it seems stronger from over there."

The Headmaster stood up, pocketing Elenore's letter as he stepped forward.

"Are you far enough along in your studies to preform a search spell?" He asked as he stood next to the trembling witch.

"I'm not sure." Raven admitted. "It's not until recently that my magic has been able to work right…"

"Work right?" The man asked.

"Somebody put a curse on Raven so that she couldn't use her magic for anything but evil deeds." Daring informed, making Raven wince.

"It was awful, they had to strain her blood and everything!" Apple tattled, giving Kitty an odd look when the cat-girl kept making silencing motions. "There were these super tiny talismans and-"

"I'm sure that the Headmaster doesn't need the exact details, but thank you anyway Apple." Raven said quickly, she already dreaded the fact that the princess had probably told the entire school by now, but the way that the Headmaster was looking at her made her immensely nervous. "And I'm cured now, happy ending, I just need some time to catch up on my non-evil magical practices. Now can we please get back on track?"

"The spell in the coin won't hold up for much longer." The Headmaster murmured, eyeing the retreating glow that came out of a plastic water bottle. "Miss Queen could you direct your magic into the wand? No spells are necessary."

"Like this?" Raven asked as the script etched into the handle started to glow a very pale purple along with the pointed tip.

"Yes, excellent, now I'm going to come up beside you and grab your hand alright?" The Headmaster warned as he wrapped his large hands around the hand wielding the wand. "Good, now hold it while I use academic magic to weave the spell…"

Raven's eyes widened in awe as she watched the spell take shape at the end of the wand, she could feel something gently, but carefully so as not to be too intrusive, pick at the ends of her magic and form it into the desired shape.

"I'm going to release it now, so you might feel just a little jolt." The Headmaster warned again, quietly taking one of his hands off of Raven's and leaving it to hover behind her back. "Ready? One, two, three!"

Raven yelped when the spell released and she was jolted backwards, if the Headmaster were not there and ready to hold her up she would have fallen to the floor.

"How did you know how to do that?" Raven asked impressed despite herself.

"When they teach academic magic the instructors hire magic-user volunteers to teach us how to bend naturally occurring magic in the air." The Headmaster stated as he eyed the ball of purple magic flying around in search of the source of the strongest dark magic in the room.

All eyes widened when the ball shattered a protective case and hit the Book of Legends, toxic green magic bubbling out of the surface of the cover like oozing puss from a wound.

"What…?" Raven whispered weakly her shaking getting worse.

"Stay here." The old man ordered as he approached the shattered bookcase.

"No… she couldn't have…" Raven whimpered her eyes wide.

"Raven?" Apple hugged the witch from behind, arranging the other girl so that Raven was brought flush against her. "What's going on? Has the Evil Queen done something to the Book of Legends?"

"Impossible…" The Headmaster murmured in horror. "This can't be…"

"That's not the Book of Legends." Kitty hissed disappearing before reappearing standing atop the Headmaster's desk. "This is a forgery." The cat-girl confirmed glaring at the fake-Book that the Headmaster couldn't seem to take his eyes off of.

XXX

"We need to put together an emergency survival kit for the both of you!" Raven commanded, dragging a wide-eyed Daring and a concerned Apple behind her into her and the princess's dorm.

"Raven you need to calm down." Apple begged trying to hold the witch still while Raven moved agitatedly around the room.

"How?" Raven demanded holding up one of her old t-shirts to Apple's frame to see if it might be able to fit the princess. "You heard the Headmaster admit that forgery must have been around since before our signing, it has your and Daring's birth names, do you have any idea what kind of power that the Evil Queen would have over you if she got her hands on it?"

"One, I am not wearing that. Ever. And two, she isn't going to get her hands on it, because we found out about it, and now the Headmaster can do something to make sure that nothing bad happens." Apple reasoned, snatching away yet another ugly shirt that she swore she had thrown away several times by now and throwing it over her shoulder before hugging Raven close.

"It's all going to be all right, your mother can't reach anybody from prison and I'm not going to let anybody try to hurt you for the things she's done… and Daring isn't going to let anything happen either, right Daring?" The princess soothed, very gingerly running her hands over Raven's back.

Unbeknownst to both her or Raven the zipper on the back of the witch's dress got caught on one of the princess's gloves and had been pulled down, exposing Raven's scarred back to a wide-eyed Daring, who had moved behind the witch in order to pat her shoulder.

The boy's mind shut down as he blinked bewilderedly at the sight of the witch's back. There were scars there, raised lines of pale skin that had healed over years before, the initial appearance of them wasn't horrendously shocking per se but it was enough to give the prince pause, and ask himself why the skin on witch's back wasn't smooth… and then that is where his brain finally realized that he was looking at scars, old ones.

"Right Daring?" Apple side kicked the boy's shin making the prince break out of his shocked stupor.

"Of course!" The boy yelped in pain. "It would be improper of me to stand aside while a friend is in danger."

Sensing that he was not supposed to be seeing what he was seeing the prince moved to hug the witch from behind, discretely attempting to disentangle Apple's glove from the dress zipper as he tried to get his brain back on topic.

Raven shook her head. "But what if she escapes? She might try to take the two of you out to get to me! What if-"

Daring almost had it… almost…

"That's not going to happen Raven!" Apple exclaimed, taking her hand from the witch's back a split second after Daring had untangled her glove, while the prince let out a sigh of relief Apple had cradled Raven's face into her hands.

"Everything will work out for you." The princess swore. "You aren't alone anymore, I- I mean, we are going to help see you through all of this. You're our villain Raven, and we respect you for that."

"It's much more complicated than that." Raven sighed tiredly looking down and away from the princess's eyes. "The dishonor affects more than just me, it very well might affect you in an adverse way if I were to sign the Book."

"How so?" Daring asked, momentarily distracted from his task to figure out a way to zip up the witch's dress without letting anyone else know that it had been pulled down. "What dishonor are you talking about?"

"Fairytale villains have this honor code that they have to abide by, her mother broke that code with her crimes bringing dishonor onto Raven." Apple explained quickly.

"It's more than that." Raven broke free of the princess's grip on her face with a turn of her head. "My grandmother's integrity has been brought into question, if my father's identity became public knowledge his and his family's lives would be at stake, current relations with political allies and tradesmen to my maternal kingdom is hanging by a thread, other honored houses are not allowed to recognize me as an equal, the only reason why I hadn't been cast out of the line of succession was because the Queen lands are incredibly agriculturally profitable and the people never recognized my mother as their ruling monarch in the first place, that and the Good King is currently ruling over his and the Queen kingdoms as if they were one, bringing a stable environment for the common people to live in… you guys could also be facing issues with your political and trade relations from other witch's states if I were to become your villain…"

"Then we won't do trade with them if they insist on being so inflexible about it." Apple stated firmly. "It won't be a big loss, your lands produce the most and best magical plants and other items that we import already so it's nothing to worry about. And isn't all that way far into the future? Right now we should focus on where the real Book of Legends is before we worry about all that kind of stuff in the future."

"Where should we start…?" Raven muttered to herself. "I'd feel much better if we knew where the Book was rather than have to worry about it getting into the wrong hands…"

Daring started rubbing the witch's back, hoping to seem inconspicuous as he tried to inch the zipper up bit by bit…

"Of course!" Raven exclaimed, startling Daring's hand up, zipping the zipper all they way closed.

"I need to talk to Maddie." Was all that the witch said before fleeing the room.

"Come on Daring!" Apple ordered jogging after her roommate.

Daring's phone beeped, warning him that he was going to be late for a previously arranged engagement.

"I can't, I'm going to be late for a date with Sandy… or was it Sara? At any rate, if you get the chance could you ask Raven if she'd be willing to help us out with the bookball game?" The prince asked, following Apple out the door.

"Raven doesn't pay bookball." Apple looked at him strangely.

"But she can use magic! And she's not a maiden so I wouldn't be breaking the hero code of conduct for allowing her to play." Daring exclaimed with a hopeful sparkle in his eye. "She's the only non-maiden that I know of that might be strong enough and willing enough to help us beat the giants. I tried sending Ginger and Faybelle hexts to see if any of them were interested, but Ginger said that she was going to be busy baking sweets for a fundraiser on Friday, and Faybelle… declined… in a way that made it clear where she'd stick the bookball if I ever tried to get her involved with this sort of business again…"

"I get the picture." Apple grimaced waiving her hands to get the boy to stop. "I'll ask her Later." She promised as she turned to catch up to the sprinting witch.

XXX

"What is the meaning of this?" Faybelle demanded with venom as she stomped up to Kitty while the cat-girl was trying to make her way back to her dorm. "I have just gotten an emergency update from that Blondie's mirror-blog thing saying that you, Raven, prince annoying, and princess prissy, all saw that the Book of Legends in the Headmaster's office, the one that some of us signed, was a fake! You seriously expect me to believe this?"

"That's because it is." Kitty growled back hotly. "If you don't believe me then all's you have to do is wait for the Headmaster to make his official announcement, or better yet, ask the fair one yourself, we all know that she'd never lie about something like this, nor would Raven."

"Why would anybody go to the trouble of creating a believable forgery of the Book of freaking Legends?" Faybelle snapped, still disbelieving.

Kitty looked up and down the mostly empty hall, but just to be safe she motioned the fairy to follow her into an inconspicuous corner. "When has the Evil Queen done anything the easy way?" Kitty hissed quietly.

"She-?" Faybelle gaped appalled.

"Yes she, now if you excuse me I need to get back to my dorm so that I can be useful for when my darling hatter needs to talk our witch down from running away when Raven swings by with her princess and prince to try to whisk Maddie off as well." Kitty said briskly beginning to move away.

"Run away?" Faybelle took hold of the other's arm before she could get by.

Kitty rolled her eyes. "Oh don't act like that wouldn't be an obvious course of action that she would take."

Faybelle was silent for a moment, her expression calculating.

"The moment you have the time to discreetly talk to her, send her to my room for the night." The fairy ordered.

"And why should I?" Kitty asked coolly.

Faybelle shrugged. "Because she is to be my wife, she is an investment that I am keen to get to know so that our marriage may start off on steady ground."

"The "investment" part is what's got me a little reluctant." Kitty narrowed her eyes. "In Wonderland we don't need to go through all of this hoity-toity roundabout political nonsense, if Raven were a Wonderlandian all that she would have to do is declare war against her mother and train hard to become strong enough to off with the evil one's head once and for all and have a celebratory tea afterwards like a civilized person. This whole mess here with people carrying on about dishonor you can't fight your way out of, and getting all hung up about the fact that there was one bad apple in the family… that's all just so childish! And it's all a waste of time!"

"I will take care of her." Faybelle swore lightly, drawing a guess as to why the other was so vexed.

"Because she's an investment right?" Kitty spat in distaste.

"And she will be my wife." Faybelle pointed out. "You don't have to like it Cheshire, it's just the way things are run here, and since Raven is not a Wonderlandian there really isn't much she, or you can do to change this outcome."

"Your right." Kitty sneered, yanking her arm away. "I don't like any of this. I had better not hear any complaints about you from her." She snarled before stomping away.

XXX

"So do you two think that this Giles person might know something?" Apple asked hopeful.

"He's been in the school archives for ages doing nothing but research, he might know at least how to locate it. Right Maddie?" Raven turned to her oldest friend.

"It's definitely worth a try!" Maddie grinned at the witch while offering a cup of tea to her. "And maybe you can have this all done and gone before we have to leave on Friday after class."

"Leave?" Apple asked.

Raven's eyes widened. "Oh kingdoms I'm sorry Apple, with everything going on I've completely forgotten to tell you, you see I've got some… secret family matters to attend to over the weekend and I'll have to leave right after class day after tomorrow. I'm so sorry I didn't tell you sooner but honestly it completely slipped my mind."

"Secret family matters?" Apple repeated sounding hurt.

"I would tell you about them if I could, I swear Apple." Raven reached for the princess's free hand with her own. "But please understand that when it comes to my family… I can't tell you everything. It's nothing against you but the less people who know about our personal whereabouts the safer my father and his family will be."

"We… who is this we that Maddie was talking about?" The princess demanded softly.

"Maddie, Kitty… and a person or persons that I cannot identify to you. The business we are conducting is… it's going to go on for a while so don't be too surprised if I have more of these trips that I have to go to, away from the school, and that I can't breath a word to you about. I'm sorry if I'm leaving you out but it has to be this way." Raven told her, looking at the princess with pleading eyes. "Again, if it were just me involved I'd tell you everything in a heartbeat, even if you did not completely agree with matters or were opposed to everything being done… but it isn't just about me, and I need to keep those other people in mind, please forgive me but I can't tell you anything about what is going on."

"You're talking about this business so seriously." The princess was looking at the witch in mild alarm, her hand squeezing Raven's with a force that almost hurt.

Raven bit her lip. "That's because it is a serious and… delicate issue." The witch sighed unable to look the princess in the eye.

"And you can't ever tell me what this is? Ever?" Apple asked sounding almost betrayed.

"Oh you'll find out about it eventually." The witch chuckled bitterly. "But… not yet. Just… n-not yet."

"This isn't something that's going to end up hurting you is it?" The princess demanded with an unusual protective fierceness. Mental images of that priest who partook in ritualistic self-mutilation and Raven's back combining, making the princess wonder if part of this whole dishonor thing involved some sort of ritualistic flogging. "Because if it is you can just forget about whoever you're trying to protect with your silence, I will not stand for you to be hurt! Tell me the truth on this Raven!"

The witch seemed to be taken aback by the other's tone, Raven blinked at the princess for several long moments before shaking her head and giving Apple a rueful smile. "It may hurt emotionally for me towards the end but once everything is all said and the story has come to an end… you might forgive me then." Raven said cryptically.

Before Apple could ask what the witch was talking about Kitty materialized right behind the princess.

"As touching as all this is; you-know-who has asked that you head over to their dorm tut sweet Raven." Kitty informed, watching the way Apple leaped back startled, in slight amusement.

"Ah… you mean… that person, person? The one I'm going to… you know…?" Raven coughed awkwardly.

Kitty grimaced. "Unfortunately. Do you need backup?"

"Thank you but no thank you Kitty. I can handle them." Raven smiled gratefully.

"You sure Raven?" Maddie asked skeptically. "The secret one is… tricky by nature as well as in design… and you never know when you may need someone to dump ice water onto any… situations."

"I'll be fine Maddie." Raven giggled a little. "You've been reading that book I gave you on those old witch folktales again haven't you?"

"I can't believe that you found that in the library." Kitty scoffed. "Lots of those stories have such of an erotic tone to them, I can't believe that they aren't banned with the amount of prudish maidens and princes prancing about."

Well none of the non-evil Royals will be caught dead reading those books because they believe that it is improper for a protagonist to be reading about antagonist witchy and fairy culture." Raven snickered.

"Sounds awfully racist…" Kitty pursed her lips.

"It's not racist!" Apple protested with an indignant sniff. "It's just not done is all. It's improper to be studying about roles that do not apply to you."

"That explains a lot…" Kitty looked at the princess as if she had deciphered something about the blonde.

"Indeed." Maddie agreed.

"Bye guys." Raven waived as she closed the door.

Apple made to follow after the witch.

"You aren't going anywhere." Maddie told Apple serenely when the princess made a move towards the exit.

"And why not?" Apple demanded cagily.

"Because you'll follow Raven, and the only one allowed to follow anybody around is me." Kitty bragged, appearing in Apple's path.

Apple scowled at the two, realizing that for once the Wonderlandians meant business.