"Am I the only one that remembers that we left a planning meeting in the study hall at lunch time?" Hrafn grumbled to himself as he sat down at a table with Briar, Maddie, and Lizzy. Rather than eat any of the food on offer here, he pulled out the mutton, lettuce, and tomato sandwich he'd grabbed from the Castleteria back before this not-so-little, entirely inadvertent adventure had begun.
"Just so long as you eat up," Maddie insisted, digging into her vinegar and oyster surprise. "We've still got half the day ahead of us."
"If the second half is like the first half, it should be pretty easy," Briar said with a smile.
Hrafn groaned.
"What?" Apple asked as she and Kitty sat down to join them. "What's the matter?"
"Okay, I'm going to lay this out, because clearly none of you have been taking any kind of Villainy classes," Hrafn said, a hint of a growl in his voice, just to make sure they were all paying attention, because this was something that could go very badly, and he was surrounded by damsels. Kitty and Maddie less so, but Maddie was too carefree and Kitty enjoyed just about every kind of fall-out too much to be wary.
"What do Villainy classes have to do with anything?" Apple asked, horrified.
"Well, in Villainy we covered the Law of Foreshadowing, for a start," Hrafn said. "Now, do you remember, back in the study hall, asking about the Wonderland school system? Hmm? And where are we now?"
"No way that could have been planned by... whoever is after Lizzy's mom," Apple denied.
"We had started a Quest by that point," Hrafn said, "and the Law of Foreshadowing falls within the Purpose of Plot Ephemera that Heroes and Villains are subject to, and which Villains are taught to manipulate in order to make life harder for the Heroes. If no one had said anything about Wonderland School, then we'd have been facing and fighting whoever has it out for the Queen of Hearts in some other manner."
"You mean, they could be here? At the school?" Lizzy asked, eyes wide.
"Probably in charge of it," Hrafn said, "given how afraid Mr White Rabbit was of the Vice Principle Principle. Sorry Lizzy, but I don't think we're going to be able to be excused early to go and see your mother."
"Oh dear," Lizzy said softly.
"Okay, so why did you groan like that when Briar said, um..." Kitty looked over at Briar, having not caught all of what the other girl had said.
"I said if the second half is like the first half, it should be easy," Briar supplied.
"That is what Professor Badwolf calls a Fateful Temptation. This guarantees and has guaranteed effects under the Murphy's Law of Causality," Hrafn explained. He probably shouldn't be telling these girls about this. This wasn't stuff that Heroes or Damsels got taught. He knew. He'd taken all kinds of classes.
"I'm almost afraid to ask, but... what does that mean?" Briar asked.
"In this case? That one: somebody who can dictate the ease or difficulty of the rest of the school day heard you say that. That two: it will not be alike and it will be harder. Don't forget, Wonderland doesn't do metaphorical," Hrafn reminded them.
"And things here can get pretty tricky," Kitty added.
"If they get too tricky, we'll just figure them out," Apple declared, determinedly up-beat. "Every puzzle has a solution."
"Oh, what a clever way to put it," a new presence declared. A girl about their age dressed like a jester, a white diamond over one eye the way Lizzy had a red heart over one of hers, but the other eye hidden by a swirl of hair. "Mind if I take a seat?" the girl asked, and proceeded to sit on the table, between Hrafn and Lizzy. "Kitty, Madeline! It's such a treat to see you back in Wonderland," the girl continued, shifting so that she was lounging on the table, a smug sort of satisfied smile on her face.
The expression was not at all returned by Maddie or Kitty, both of whom normally had a smile ready for just about everyone.
"Everyone, meet Courtly Jester," Lizzy presented unhappily. "You might say she's a bit of a wild card around these parts."
"Oh, why if it isn't little Lizzy Hearts," Courtly said as she rolled over to face the girl, then slipped off the table, bells jingling, and walked around to Lizzy's other side. "You know, I didn't even notice you sitting there, right next to me."
That? That was definitely a taunt.
"This is your future queen you're talking to!" Lizzy snapped.
"Oh? Are you now?" Courtly purred, a cruel smile on her face and a wicked gleam in her visible eye.
Hrafn wondered if any of the girls that he was sharing a table with realised that such a remark and attitude was the mark of a person intent on changing something, drastically. Granted, he'd never done that, and there weren't a whole lot of villain-type people attending the same classes as these girls at Ever After High. Likely, they had no idea at all. Knowing and being friends with 'Rebels' was one thing, hanging out with out-and-out Future Villains was another entirely.
Which, based on what he'd just been telling the girls a moment ago, meant that Courtly was probably the Vice Principle Principle, and the person intent on overthrowing the Queen of Hearts.
"So, Courtly, are you a student here at Wonderland High?" Briar asked, hoping to break the tension.
"I'm the Student Body President," Courtly said, grinning wider than Kitty. "You might say it's my business to know what's going on around here. Speaking of which." Courtly whipped around to face Apple. "Who are you?"
"Hi, ah, hi I'm Apple White, this is Briar, that's Hrafn," Apple supplied nervously. "We're from Ever After High."
Courtly tweaked at the giant bow in Apple's hair.
"And you're here because?" Courtly probed with an air of superiority and false disinterest.
"Well, it's -" Apple started.
"Red Knight's fault," Hrafn cut in. "Lizzy got an invitation from her mother to attend her birthday spellebration, and I managed to get us through the barrier between worlds. We were on our way there when the Red Knight accosted us and said we unless we had a hall pass from the Vice Principle he was bound to bring us 'back' to a school half of us had never seen before. Very confusing."
"Oh?" Courtly asked, and casually cartwheeled around the table to try and loom over Hrafn where he was sitting.
"Nothing against the school, the classes are fascinating, but not really what we're used to," Hrafn assured the girl politely, and was glad that they were saved from any further conversation with the probably-villainous Courtly by the bell going off.
"Oh, there's the bell," Courtly observed, and hopped up onto the barrier around the mezzanine they'd been sitting on. "Well, it really was so interesting meeting you all," she said, and jumped backwards with a jingle of her bells. She landed on a giant floating puffer-fish. "Good luck, in your classes."
~oOo~
"Hrafn, why did you lie to Courtly like that?" Apple asked as they headed for their next class. "It's wrong to lie."
"I didn't lie," Hrafn denied. "I didn't tell the whole truth, but everything I said was true."
"I was thinking maybe we could have asked Courtly for help," Apple said. "I mean, if she's the Student Body President, maybe she could help us get a meeting with the Vice Principle, help us get hexcused from classes for the rest of the day."
Hrafn palmed his forehead. Had Apple not retained any of what he'd said about how the Vice Principle was probably the person who was planning on over-throwing the queen? And okay, maybe to Apple that didn't make sense, but Hrafn was the one who had taken Villainy classes and Cross-Cultural References Class. A little trust, maybe?
"I am rather grateful to Hrafn for speaking as he did," Lizzy stated. "I would not care for word of a plot against my mother to reach the ears of Courtly Jester."
"If you want to keep it quiet, we'll keep it quiet, but right now?" Briar said, a grin on her face as she raced ahead of them into their next class. "Let's do this!"
"I have a good feeling about -" Hrafn cut himself off. "Chess?" he moaned. "Oh man, why did it have to be chess?"
"It's not that bad," Apple insisted. "Once you know the rules, you just have to think ahead."
A barrier popped up around them, and everybody except for Hrafn was lifted up inside of it. A viewing platform, so that everybody else would have a view of the chessboard.
"Ooh, sorry," Apple said, genuinely apologetic. "I didn't see that one coming."
The Red Rook slid up to them, his upper turret on level with the raised platform.
"Logic and illogic, strategy and tragedy, I am your instructor," the soldier of the Red Rook presented himself, giving a polite bow. "Hrafn Queen," he said, slipping down from his turret to a window level with the only boy in the group. "Time for your quiz."
"Wait, Hrafn's... a queen?" Apple asked, confused.
"That's what it sounded like," Kitty agreed, equally puzzled.
"Hrafn did say that technically that prophecy that Mr White Rabbit told us would still apply, that part about six girls? Maybe that's what he meant?" Maddie suggested.
"He's been wearing a crown since he arrived at Ever After High, so he was always some kind of royalty," Lizzy said. "Though... his being called a queen is certainly odd. Even by Wonderland standards."
"Do I get to know what I'm being quizzed on?" Hrafn checked as he was whipped away from the girls and onto the chess board proper.
"As a future queen, you will take the part of the White Queen," the Red Rook instructed, once again at the top of his tower. "White Queen, step aside."
"I never get to play," the giant chess-piece woman complained as she picked up her skirts and left the board.
"Hrafn Queen, please take your position on the board," the Red Rook called down.
"Okay," Hrafn agreed. He was frustrated at being called Hrafn Queen, to say nothing of being called a future-queen, but decided it was better to just go along rather than kick up a stink about how he was being addressed. Priorities. Also, technicalities. They had to graduate from Wonderland High, after all. "Scuse me, comin' through," he said as he stepped between the pawns.
"Ready, begin!" the Red Rook said, and his tower whipped back to its starting place on the chess board.
"Alright, Wonderland. Chess or un-chess?" Hrafn muttered to himself. "Ugh, he said logic and illogic, strategy and tragedy, assume un-chess."
"Hrafn! The pawn in front of you! Move it forward two spaces!" Apple called down.
"All pawns, two-squares advance, march!" Hrafn snapped out as loudly as he could. "Order of White Queen!" he added quickly.
The entire row advanced.
"What? You can't do that! It's against the rules," Apple objected.
"Un-chess!" Hrafn yelled back.
"Un-chess?" Apple repeated, incredulous, as the Red Queen bypassed her pawns entirely and used her staff to knock one of the pawns off the board.
"Maddie?" Briar entreated. "Can you explain this in a way that makes sense to those of us who weren't raised in Wonderland? And, for that matter, how Hrafn knew what to do?"
"Oh, Hrafn learned about un-chess when he was Student Council President and helped us organise all those wonderful Wonderland Tea Parties last year," Maddie explained happily. "In un-chess, you can make any move you want, so long as it is not a chess move."
Hrafn was at a serious height disadvantage in this chess game, but he moved out onto the board anyway.
"Red Knight to Bishop seven!" the Red Queen ordered. Now, that sounded like a chess move, but it wasn't a square on the board that the knight could reach in a single move in a traditional chess game.
"Chase Redford," Hrafn recognised.
"Sorry about my mom," Chase offered, lifting his visor enough to be seen through.
"Mothers are mothers, you do the best you can," Hrafn commiserated politely.
"Yeah. So, uh, sorry about this, but I really do have to -" Chase lowered his visor, "- attack you," he said, voice distorted by the visor as he raised his sword.
"And that's a real sword," Hrafn recognised softly.
"Rules are rules," Chase added apologetically, and brought his sword down.
"Not while I still stand," the White Knight declared, interposing armour-clad body between Hrafn and Chase.
"My Darling Hero," Hrafn said softly.
"Just so, my Queen," the White Knight, who was definitely Darling in disguise, teased right back, equally quietly.
"Stop talking, and attack! Attack!" the Red Queen screamed.
"As you command, Mother," Chase agreed, and brought his sword to bear against the White Knight once more.
"My Queen, I have blocked the attack, your move," Darling said, voice seriously distorted by that visor.
"Un-chess, any move at all, White Knight versus Red... I command that this battle is now a Dance Off!" Hrafn declared.
"A what?" Darling asked, stunned.
"Oh, brilliant move by the White Queen!" the Red Rook in charge of the class declared, his tower no longer in its corner. "Drop da beat, yo!" he said, and turned up a couple of turn-tables. His tower shrank down, a pair of giant speakers popped up, and spotlight started swirling.
"Dancing?" Chase squeaked as he put his visor up. "That... that's not what I've trained for."
Hrafn smirked. That was kind of what he had been counting on when he made that move.
"Use your imagination. Come on ladies," Hrafn called to the girls up on the viewing platform as two card-ramps flowed out and down to either side of the former chess board, now dance floor. "Chess boards are for chess pieces, but everyone is welcome on a dance floor."
"Wahoo!" the girls all agreed as they slid down the ramps.
"Let's see what you've got," Darling the White Knight taunted through her visor.
"You can do this Chase," the Red Knight said to himself, and dismounted from his chess-piece steed, which quickly vacated the dance floor. His first move was stiff and under the music they could all hear Chase counting the beat to himself.
"Oh please," the White Knight scoffed, and started dancing. Compared to Chase's attempt, this was smooth and flowing. It was clear right then that the White Knight had a lot more practice dancing, though Hrafn was pretty sure he'd never seen Darling dance like that before. The armour was probably why though.
"Seriously?" Chase asked, before taking his turn. He wobbled a bit in the middle, but he recovered.
Hrafn had to bite his lip to keep from laughing when it was the White Knight's turn again. Those were Daring's dance moves!
"I'm doing it!" Chase cheered himself as he tried something a bit more complicated. "I'm doing it!"
He wasn't doing it. Chase over-balanced completely – which in full plate armour, was not a good thing for staying upright. He fell right off the dance floor.
The music stopped with a scratch of the record.
"The Red Knight has fallen!" the Red Rook declared. "You pass!"
"That White Knight sure has some moves," Briar said, impressed, as the girls shared a celebratory group hug – with Hrafn in the middle of them all.
"I am really glad they showed up," Hrafn agreed, careful to not reveal Darling to the other girls. If she'd wanted recognition, she would have hung around. Instead, the White Knight had disappeared as soon as the Red Rook declared that they'd passed.
A clanging bell rang.
"Oh dear, the time is two o'clock and here are the announcements," Mr White Rabbit's voice came over the speakers. "The Vice Principle has declared that next Thursday shall fall on a Wednesday, the tortoise shall stop mocking the turtle, and Hrafn, Lizzy, Apple, Kitty, Briar, and Maddie's schedules have changed. You will report immediately to Tea Time one-oh-one."
The floor promptly opened up beneath them all.
~oOo~
It was one of their less gentle landings, and the room was dark until a large spotlight clunked on above them. As well as the spotlight, the screams and cheers and applause of a crowd that wasn't there could be heard. Before, with a click, it was cut off.
"Welcome class," greeted... it had to be the March Hare. Taller than the White Rabbit, dressed in a manner more alike to Maddie's father than the White Rabbit, and of course, this was Wonderland, so certain characters were more likely than others. He was also holding a button on a wire that dropped down from the ceiling. Probably the source of the canned audience sounds.
"I see you're ready," the March Hare said happily, releasing the button to hop over to a chord that also hung from the ceiling. "Tea Time has commenced!" he declared, and jumped, grabbed the chord, and let his whole weight pull it down.
Water started flowing in from under foot.
"What is this? Meow! What's going on?" Kitty meowed fretfully. She did not want to get wet.
"This is never how tea time works," Lizzy denied.
"Where are the bread-and-butterflies?" Maddie asked worriedly, "and there are no chairs to switch places."
"Wonderland doesn't to metaphorical but it does do puns," Hrafn said. "We're in a container. A square container. He's making a cube of tea, probably to have with a cup of sugar. Okay, that's the pun. Didn't get us out, so what's the metaphor?"
"Whatever it is, figure it out quickly," Apple implored as the tea reached knees, then thighs.
"We're in a container. Another word for a container, especially a square one, is a box. We're in a box. We have to figure out what's going on. We have to think. We're thinking inside a box. The way to get out... Think outside the box!" Hrafn said, yelling his final conclusion to the others, even as he vanishing from within and appeared on top of the box with a gentle, purple-and-blue poof.
He was even dry, which, considering the tea had been at shoulder height when he had made that vital realisation, was very welcome indeed.
One after another, the girls followed his example.
"We did it!" Apple cheered.
"And just in time too," Maddie said, smiling again. "You never want to let your tea steep for too long."
As well as their real laughter, the March Hair added his canned laughter.
"You pass!" the March Hare declared, grinning and giggling himself. "Now I'm off to find a cup of sugar for my cube of tea!" he said.
"Told ya," Hrafn managed to quip. "Wonderland puns."
The March Hare pressed the other button on his little remote that had previously provided him with the sounds of an appreciative audience, and the next thing they knew, they were somewhere else.
~oOo~
"Ah!" Apple yelped. "We've shrunk!"
"Either that, or the school has gotten huge," Hrafn countered.
"Yes," Lizzy allowed, "it is sometimes a bit hard to tell which."
Then a giant shoe almost stepped on them all.
"That is it!" Lizzy said, at the end of her (metaphorical, don't go looking for it) rope. "I think it's high time we saw the Vice Principle."
"Uh, no," Hrafn reminded her. "Vice Principle Principle is probably the one trying to overthrow your mother, and we are currently in said person's power as students at Wonderland High. Yes, it's frustrating, but we just need to finish out the day. It was two o'clock when we finished the un-chess game, right? So it has to be nearly three, and that means school will be over soon and we'll have graduated and won't be in the Vice Principle Principle's power any more."
"Either way, what are we supposed to do now?" Briar asked.
"Well, this is the only door we can reach," Maddie said as she approached, yes, a door. "So clearly it must be the right one to use!"
With the way everything else had been going that day, that sounded about right.
The corridor beyond the door got more cramped as they continued up its length, and the door at the other end had to be crawled through.
Unfortunately, to Hrafn's mind, that door led to the Vice Principle Principle's office. As well as that, upon checking the watch dangling from Kitty's tail, it was minutes until three o'clock. Whether that was fortunate or not, Hrafn wasn't sure.
"Minutes until three o'clock, all of the classes we've been to, we've passed, is this the part of the day where we get our graduation certificates?" Hrafn voiced hopefully.
"Oh, you'd like that, would you?" Courtly demanded as the Vice Principle Principle's chair swung around, revealing her in the seat of power.
Hrafn cracked his knuckles in a way familiar to the girls with him, but rather than a lot of sparkles, a single claw-shaped flame extended, pulled a book off the shelves, and dropped it into Hrafn's hands.
"According to the school rules," Hrafn said as he read thumbed through the pages. "School is in session only one day a year. Students who pass all of their classes on that day graduate at the end of the school day. The school day ends at three o'clock." He shut the book with a snap. "Rules are rules."
"Hm," Courtly hummed, a vague hint of a smile on her face, not at all the bright grin from when she'd met – and taunted – them earlier in the day.
"I'm confused," Apple admitted.
Hrafn resisted the urge to tell her she was always confused. It would have been an unfair and unkind exaggeration. Apple was only confused when things didn't fit with how she thought the world worked, and she had a fairly good grasp of most of the things that were logic-based and didn't require any kind of creative thinking at all.
"Courtly is the Vice Principle?" Apple asked. "I thought she was the Student Body President."
"It's in the school by-laws, if you ever bothered reading them," Courtly said dismissively. "As Student Body President I am also acting Vice Principle, and as the Vice Principle, I'm also the Principle. See? It's a matter of principal."
"Then you can help us!" Apple said.
"No, Apple," Hrafn cut the girl off sharply. "Don't bother asking Miss Jester for help. She won't give it."
"What?"
Courtly grinned wickedly as she crossed the room and pulled a lever, revealing a large clock. A clock that had just ticked from eleven-oh-one to eleven o'clock. It was running backwards.
"Well, would you look at that. It's only eleven o'clock in the morning, and as you said, school doesn't let out until three. It never gets out at eleven," Courtly said, a sinister gleam in her eye.
"Time is going backwards?" Apple yelped. "But that's impossible!"
"My clock is all that counts in this school, and my clock says..." Courtly took hold of a lever on the side, and her refined accent was dropped in favour of something much more... cockney. "It will never be three o'clock!" she declared, and she pulled the lever, laughing.
Like a slot machine, three dials spun until they each stopped on a caricature of Courtly's face.
"That's cheating!" Kitty protested when the backwards spinning hands of the clock-face finally stopped at eight-thirty.
"My mother will hear of this!" Lizzy insisted.
"Your mother?" Courtly taunted, cartwheeling onto her desk. "What do I care about your mother? She won't be Queen much longer."
"Why, it's almost as if -" Maddie said, giggling at first, stopping suddenly when she realised. "It's almost as if you want the plan to overthrow her mother to succeed," Maddie accused.
For a moment, Courtly just stared at them all with a blank look on her face.
"Of course I do!" came the sudden, angry outburst. "Because it's mine!"
"You?!" Lizzy exclaimed. "You're the traitor?"
Hrafn was pretty sure he'd explained the really high likelihood of that being the case, maybe not of Courtly as a person, but of the Vice Principle Principle who it turned out Courtly was, back during lunch.
"You think you're sooo special because you were born to become a queen," Courtly mocked, and cartwheeled off the desk. "But, you forget," she said as she tapped the tip of Lizzy's nose. "A joker can be whatever she wants!" Courtly declared, dancing around, grinning madly, her bells jingling with every move she made. "A joker becomes a queen, it happens all the time! A joker becomes a queen, it happens all the time!"
The girls shared confused looks, while Hrafn (book of school rules still in one hand) folded his arms over his chest and looked back at Courtly with as blank and bland a look as Courtly had given Maddie just a few moments earlier.
"Ugh, don't you ever play cards?" Courtly demanded, frustrated by their lack of reaction.
"Sure," Hrafn allowed, "but something we do in Ever After before we start just about any card game? We throw. The jokers. Out."
Courtly looked properly incensed at that. "Security Cards!" she summoned with a yell.
A shuffle of card guards riffled out behind them, and another pair of cards stood either side of Lizzy, who had been separated from the group.
"Escort these girls back to their classes," Courtly ordered, "where they will spend the rest of their lives!" She topped off her ominous indictment with some manic cackling.
Hrafn was pretty sure that Professor Badwolf would have given her a B plus for it, if Courtly had been in his General Villainy class. Cackling was hard to get just right, after all. Still, it was a good effort. Hrafn wondered if maybe he was a little too detached from the situation he was actually in, if he was thinking like that. Then again, Courtly had said 'girls', and he wasn't one, for all that he'd been called a future-queen by that Red Rook.
"Um..." Maddie, Kitty, Apple and Briar looked over at Hrafn.
"I think she's running on the same technicalities that were mentioned but not hexplained earlier," Hrafn said, arms still folded over his chest. Yes, the situation didn't look good. No, he wasn't actually all that particularly bothered. He was still holding onto the book of school rules and by-laws.