"Any indication how long she's been out?" The headmaster's gruff quiet voice pulled Raven out from the cottony muddled darkness of her mind, she felt someone gently running their knuckles over the short hair on her head in a soothing manner, it felt comforting.
"Quite a while." Giles whispered back. "And she left in a hurry, found a lot of books hidden behind a bunch of mirrors and a handwritten manuscript for a new book about micro-talismans. Odd thing though, many of the mirrors closest to the study are all blocked from the mirror realm, it's as if somebody has put privacy spells on almost all the mirrors in the school, and I found this big row of mirrors spelled for the monster dimension I asked one of the interns that were studying under Clawstorm and they said that she left for a year's vacation sabbatical to enjoy since she discovered a way to escape the mirror realm. I believe that it was a day or two after I got back and you had that informative little chat with her."
"Then who was that standing in the distance all this time?" The Headmaster's voice sounded incredulous. "I know that I was talking to something!"
"That was the mannequin that had been stolen from the village all those weeks ago, she dressed it up in her dress and crown." Giles supplied helpfully.
There was a smacking sound like someone hitting the palm of their hand to their face.
Raven bravely cracked open her eyes, squeezing them shut again with a pained little mewl when the light from the magic circle and the glowing object sitting on a stand in front of her hit her sensitive eyes.
"Raven?" The Headmaster asked, her name falling from his mouth so naturally that it took a moment for Raven to comprehend the oddity of it.
"M' head hurts…" Raven whines weakly. "From the inside, something ran through it the wrong way, it's all sore."
"Are there any words still flying around?" The Headmaster asks gently, Raven senses someone kneeling down beside the platform she was laying back down on.
Raven concentrates, burying her face slightly into the pillow under her head. "One or two every so often… those aren't from my head though, they're… from outside… what- what are they?"
"They're from the Book of Legends." The Headmaster explains. "Someone tried to destroy it so it's using you and your magical abilities as a conduit for it's power to flow from it's old form to it's new one."
"It's using me to save itself?" Raven squinted and blinked rapidly at the glowing object on the pedestal, once her eyes had the chance to adjust she could clearly make out the torn and ripped leather cover, the bits of pages hanging in limp torn shreds, the shattered jewel that used to shine proudly on the front cover and-
"Are those teeth marks?" Raven asked in shocked bewilderment.
"Yes." The Headmaster's tone was slightly miffed. "We think that a particularly vicious creature tried to eat it."
"But I left the Book in Apple's care, there is no way that she'd let anything happen to it… I mean sure she's been having some serious reconsiderations of her destiny after she found out about all the bad stuff her parents did but… the Book never did anything to her." Raven gazed at the object pityingly; missing the wide-eyed looks the brothers were giving each other.
"I probably shouldn't have told you two that." Raven groaned, the soreness in her head obviously affecting the mental filters from her brain to her mouth. "Forget I even said that I beg of you. My mind's all jumbled up and sore so don't take anything I might say seriously."
"If you have the presence of mind to say that then it makes it kind of difficult for us not to take you seriously." Giles snorted. "Just a heads up."
"What was the last thing you remember?" Milton asked, deciding that the girl wasn't in the right state to press on anything destiny related at the moment.
Raven scrunched up her face and gingerly tried to remember through the sore throbbing in her head.
"We were fighting… it was the worst fight that I've ever had with you. You and Giles had nearly given me a heart attack when you snuck into the castle and we… we just started yelling the moment we saw each other. Did you even try to ask about our whereabouts properly before you decided to-" Raven winced and whined in pain when her raising voice caused a sharp pain to strike across the backs of her eyes. "Sorry." She whispered painfully. "I need to try not to get so worked up."
Milton took a calming breath as well. "They told us that you and your friends were no longer students at Ever After, they handed us the transfer forms and sent us on our way. We found a bunch of flying carpets that somebody left outside, gave our escort the slip and… I'm certain that you can guess the rest."
Raven was silent for a moment. "Why did you do that? I thought that… maybe you would be relieved to have me gone? It's not unheard of for characters from the story Alice in Wonderland to stay in Wonderland and not attend Ever After High, that's what the previous generation did so I know that it wasn't about Maddie, or Kitty, or Lizzie… am I wrong?"
"You were the one that we had wanted to find." Milton admitted.
"Why?" Raven asked her voice cracking. "I'm one of the worst students you've got… the only good thing I've ever done for this place's bottom line was to marry Faybelle and offer up a better villain for the Evil Queen role. Isn't that all that matters to you-?"
"No!" Milton exclaimed making the witch flinch back. "No." He repeated in a softer tone. "There is more to this than the stories… my brother and I found out about some of the problems your kingdom is having, and your mother-… we just saw your mother fighting off a very bad man, a warlock named Kline… you probably already know that he's part of a group that has been hunting… your people. We are worried child, this is going to sound odd coming from me, but this is something that is far more urgent than the fairytale issue!"
"He's hunting me people and my family." Raven corrected her voice wobbled as she blinked back tears. "A witch hunting his own kind, what kind of sense does that make?"
Milton took another deep breath before continuing. "You told me once that your grandmother had been injured…"
"They poisoned her." Raven breathed.
"What?" Milton spoke, shaken. Giles tensed inhaling sharply.
"There was an attack on our lands, they had sent a very large rock that had fallen from the sky, it would have hit one of our cities but my grandmother and some parliament members were able to erect massive shields to bounce it away from our lands. But as a result they had all been left unconscious, defenseless for a period of time, somehow the bad guys found out about my mother and her side career… my mother had invented something while she was at school in this other dimension… w-we found evidence that somebody over there had sold the bad guys a twisted modified version of her invention, and while my grandmother was vulnerable they swooped in and poisoned her. They cursed her with illness if she were to ever set foot onto her own lands- but… but she-" The girl tried to control the sobs that were trying to break free from her mouth.
"Our lands are connected to our family bloodline." Raven explained. "Thousands of years of protections and defenses can only be accessed by our DNA, the clan has been there so long that the land and us have evolved to rely solely on each other, grandmother could not just leave it defenseless, I was too young to handle the full scope of the magic our lands have and my mother had gone off to try to frighten the enemy into submission by becoming a real Evil Queen, so she put a second curse upon herself, permanently bonding her powers to the land so that if needed she could give up the last of herself to protect us again if another attack ever happened. She was really sick for years because of it… it wasn't until recently when they figured out how to lift the first curse off of her, but she's still very weak."
Milton bowed his head, his lips pressed together in a thin line.
"The micro-talismans." Giles breathed.
"You know?" Raven sniffed.
"We've done our research." Giles confessed. "And it's not that difficult to put the pieces together.
"We had no way of protecting ourselves." Raven stated in a nearly pleading tone. "We are not under the protections of fairytale law but because we are a fairytale kingdom the Grand Coven could not come to our aide if we were attacked again, and because of my mother and the weak state of my grandmother the High Council of Witches refused to lend us aide unless I gave up the throne, bit the poisoned apple before it ever got near Apple White, and succumbed to whatever they demanded of me after they smuggled my unconscious body away and after they settled on my punishment."
Milton bristled.
"Was the councilman who suggested this by perchance a man named Tomak?" Giles asked wearily.
Raven nodded miserably. "He's the senior councilmember and the head of the honorable affairs court, his vote made the decision to hold my family's name under dishonorable reprimand a slim majority."
"I bet he did." Milton nearly snarled clenching his fists as he remembered what he had overheard while his daughter had fought the warlock's son.
"And then you decided to rebel." Giles concluded.
"It was the only option I could think of to escape that fate." Raven admitted. "I did not know who to trust or who had the capabilities to be of any use to me here at Ever After so I kept silent and prayed that things would work out eventually… and then a few months ago I found out a way of legally regaining my family's honor by marrying into an honorable villain family and… here I am."
The witch noticed an odd box being held in her loosely crossed arms. "What am I holding?" Raven asked before the Headmaster could question why he hadn't been an option for help for the witch.
The Headmaster breathed, forcing himself to be calm, he cleared his throat, focusing at the issue at hand. "The replica of the Book your mother had forged was of very good value, and although not the real thing, it does have all of the functions and magical necessities that the real Book has- had, after I had it scrubbed clean of all if it's initial information I had it sent back here for further study… when the old Book was damaged we cast a circle to keep all the information safely in and to keep it from flowing all into you, we took a gamble that your mother's Book could hold all of the original's words… and so far it seems to be doing so, with some room to spare." The older man noted with a touch of pride in his voice.
"The Book is alive." Raven realized. "It has memories and names of all those people, so many personalities living in one place it has to have formed some form of… sentience or life."
"Very good." The Headmaster smiled kindly, proudly. "How did you know about its memories?"
Raven bit her lip indecisively; eyeing the way Giles was whistling innocently and concluding that he had not told his brother about how he had gotten his speech back. "I…I've been… inside the Book's memories before…" She said truthfully. "It's a long story, and I was just a little girl at the time… my mother hid the two of us there after… after the bad man that nearly killed you two earlier in Wonderland… tried to-…" The witch swallowed thickly. "I had been drugged, I vaguely remember that there was a ritual of some sort, he had spoken my funeral rights and my back hurt a lot, but then mom came, they fought, and we escaped somehow into the Book's memories. I… don't remember much, but I do remember my mother, talking with one of the memories… they helped her patch me up."
Milton felt a stab of pain and cold fear in his chest. "Your mother had mentioned something about an assassination attempt on your life…" He trailed off, swallowing down the lump forming in his throat.
"Why is the Book of Legends coming to me for safety?" Raven asked. "My head may be a little jumbled and it hurts to think, but I distinctly remember starting the whole Rebel thing, I would think that it'd be afraid of me. And besides I thought that only the Servants to it, your family line, could do… well just about anything with it."
Milton took in a sharp breath. This was it; this was the moment of truth. "…You and your mother are Grimm descendants." He admitted holding his breath for a reaction. "That's why it came to you."
There was a pause.
"Huh." Was all that Raven had to say about the matter before shrugging lightly. "Well I guess that makes sense."
"It does?" Milton asked weakly.
"Well… I know that my family has loomed witches with several Charming clans over the years, it's not that much of a stretch to imagine someone having an affair with one of your ancestors." Raven shrugged again causing Giles to chuckle behind his hands while Milton just stared at the girl. "So how far apart are we removed? Six times? Or was it farther back from that?"
Milton ran his hand through his hair. "No… we're… a lot closer in relation than that…" He coughed. "I'myourgrandfatheractually."
"Could you repeat that? My head's too foggy to decipher." The girl requested.
"He said that he's your grandfather." Giles supplied helpfully making his brother cringe.
"Oh okay." Raven hummed blissfully until the words actually sunk in; that's when her eyes shot open as wide as they could go. "Eh… what?"
XXX
"This is it?" Faybelle asked staring at the large, but lone duffle bag full of clothes lying innocently on Raven's former bed.
"Heartbreaking isn't it?" Apple sighed in exasperation. "She said that she'll be spending most of her time catching up on witch studies so she'll only really be needed to wear her new uniforms for the majority of the time, she even sent her two official ballroom and character representing dresses back to her father's estate. I don't think that she's planning on ever wearing those ever again, the only fancy dresses she has is her wedding dress and this outfit she got right after she came back from the first round of marriage rituals to you."
"Please tell me she wasn't planning on wearing those ugly t-shirt and boy short combinations when she was not in school." Faybelle groaned.
"She was planning on wearing those ugly t-shirt and boy short combinations when she was not in school." Apple stated flatly.
"Downright criminal." Faybelle grimaced. "Please tell me that you-"
"Hex yes I did." Apple swore unzipping the duffle bag and unfolding one of the light casual dresses that she had replaced the witch's t-shirts with. "Last night while she was sleeping I switched those out with some of these! She can't complain because they are fashionable, sensible, not full of holes, and stain resistant. All the things that those crimes against fashion aren't."
"How long is it going to take to convince her that she doesn't have to constantly prepare to live life on the run, or to live in the middle of nowhere? Her pet dragon has more things to wear than she does! And Nevermore tends to like to go around naked most of the time!"
"Two suit cases and a duffle bag… she must have already packed everything else while I had been getting ready this morning." Apple pursed her lips as she cast a glare at said objects. "And it looks like most of the stuff in the suitcases are books, photographs, her brewing supplies, and Nevermore's stuff. Even the cauldron was small enough to fit into one of them."
"So technically she's all packed?" Faybelle observed. "But we just got here five minutes ago!"
"She really doesn't want anything to do with Evil Queen regalia, so this is it. This is everything that she considers hers." Apple sighed, looking around at everything else, the dark and foreboding things that she had gotten for Raven back when the witch first moved in. The princess felt a sense of overwhelming embarrassment when she looked at the objects now, none of it fit Raven's personality or preferences at all. It was all just a projection that the princess had placed upon that side of the room, a dollhouse to put Raven in, dress her up, pretend that she was someone- something else…
"I can't believe she let me do this to her." Apple groaned, half hiding her face into her hand.
The fairy stared at the princess in contemplation. "We still have three hours until we are scheduled to rescue my wife. Three hours with nothing to do but to hang out with each other…"
"Let's get our girl." Apple decided as she headed for the door.
XXX
"I'm… your grandfather." Milton repeated nervously, holding his breath.
Raven stared at the man; the reflection of lights in the surrounding area shining off her eyes the same way it would a cat's.
Milton bit his lip and stared back.
Raven seemed to pale as she continued to stare.
Milton braced himself for the shouting.
"Are you sure?" Raven croaked out hoarsely.
"Very." Milton nodded weakly.
"Grandmother is going to kill me…" The girl whimpered in fear.
"Pardon?" Milton asked.
"So… you're not going to yell at him?" Giles asked dodging his brother's swatting hand.
"It's not uncommon for humans to try to avoid claiming paternity or Evil Queens to simply not tell the humans that they were fathers, that's just a fact of life in my family, hence why there are no Queen-Charming's in the family trees, but grandmother told me specifically never to tell my grandfather that he was my grandfather if I ever found out who he was and here I go unknowingly not only doing just that, but also admitting to his face that grandmother never really got over him and that she still loved him!" The witch squealed fretfully covering her face in her hands. "You never knew until… when was it? It had to be that coin incident right? You had no idea before then?"
"None whatsoever." Milton swore. "But I can't say that I'm not happy about it. Surprised, and very shocked, but still very happy to be honest."
"You are?" Raven croaked confused, pulling her hands down from her face.
"Very." Milton assured placing his large hand over her two small ones. "I… know that you've had to be very brave in recent months. I'm proud of you for enduring all of that."
"Who would have imagined that my grandfather would be practically under my nose this entire time." Raven chuckled weakly. "Hi."
Milton smiled back, his eyes misting over. "Hello granddaughter."
"He found out about it unintentionally." Giles informed usefully. "I'm sure your grandmother will forgive you."
"I'm not so sure that she'll see me spilling all of her most top secrets to him as something to just let slide." The girl bemoaned tragically.
"This is also true." Giles nodded.
"Brother!" Milton admonished before turning back towards his newly acquainted granddaughter, a question coming to mind. "So you're saying that if you had found out about me before I found out about you and your mother, you would have kept this a secret from me?"
"Yes, no… maybe? It all depended on whether or not I decided to stick to Queen tradition or go with my father's family human values, but at least I would have made absolutely sure to keep what is between you and my grandmother completely your business." Raven sighed feeling tired.
"I suppose that's fair enough." Milton hummed, squeezing the girl's shoulder in an effort to comfort her. "A lot better than what I had feared actually."
"It explains why you have been following me around… kind of a relief actually." Raven admitted.
"He was gathering up the courage to tell you." Giles assured. "He wasn't being creepy just a worrywart."
Milton sighed despairingly.
"You're in danger." Raven whispered hoarsely after a quiet pause. "My grandmother… she never wanted to keep mom a secret from you, but she had to, they made her, they said- they said that-"
"They'd kill me if she ever got near me." Milton nodded. "I've had the time to read over that folder you left for me."
That stunned the witch. "How long have I been… where am I?" Raven asked, looking around curiously.
"You're back at school, you've been out for a few hours." Milton informed gently. "It takes a while for the Book to transfer power."
Raven looked down to the new Book that she was holding, to her surprise she found that her skin and her mother's book were glowing slightly, the Book was illuminating a pale moonlight white color and she had a thin sheen of purple covering her skin, her tattoos shining a golden light from their painted on lines.
"What was Miss White doing in Wonderland?" Giles asked suspiciously.
"Nothing wrong or illegal now that the curse is gone and she did nothing to get into trouble for." Raven's wide eyes blinked at the man innocently.
"Uh huh." Giles said not convinced. "And you gave her the Book to look after?"
"She could have been startled by some flying creature like a jabberwocky or something and dropped it." Raven theorized. "It could have landed on someone… or something, people over there really don't like it when stuff falls on them."
"Why is Miss White rethinking her destiny?" Giles tried again.
Raven sighed through her nose. "Complicated family stuff mostly… that and she found out that there were some… discrepancies between the story of Snow White she had been told as a child and the, um, actual historical events."
"Does this have anything to do with how Giles got his speech back and why Miss Cheshire has been boasting to anybody that will listen that she defeated three angry bears with her bare hands?" Milton asked, casting his brother a flat look.
"I had a talk with the original Snow White in the Book's memories." Raven explained. "Daring… he got to see inside my story…"
"Yes, well every family has discrepancies in the stories told and the historical events." Milton shook his head. "It's nothing to get bent out of shape over."
Raven cringed. "Snow White married a necrophiliac and the Evil Queen wasn't evil at all, she just wanted to bring her unwed pregnant step-daughter back safely. She got killed for her troubles."
"Oh." Milton winced.
"Daring had it the worst though, the magic mirror memory showed him… images of the necrophiliac. He's still seeing a therapist over it." Raven hummed guiltily.
"You mentioned Apple had complicated family matters, is everything all right for her at home?" Giles continued unrelenting and concerned.
The way that the witch cringed and bit her lip was all the answer that the men needed.
"I… can't tell you without her permission." The witch said at last. "And I have to be leaving soon anyway. I'm sorry."
"You're not going anywhere. The events from today prove that things are too dangerous." Milton denied with a firm shake of his head. "I know that I may not give the impression of it, but I do care about the safety of you and the rest of my students beyond their fairytale obligations… even if you were coerced in your time of crisis to marry away your title." The old man looked at the girl pointedly.
Raven's eyes widened. "How did you-? Faybelle…" The witch growled. "She just couldn't resist boasting could she?"
"She left a card in the folder." Milton told her in mock cheer. "Claiming you as her stolen maiden wife and declaring her fancy new title. By the way after all of this is done you and I are going to sit down and you are going to explain what had caused you to feel like you had to go that far to gain such a powerful ally, no tricks, no Headmaster and student politics, just a talk between a worried grandfather and his granddaughter all right?"
"I had very dire reasons to go that far I assure you." Raven promised.
"I know that you do." Milton smiled sadly. "I'm starting to see that you've had good reasons for everything you've done in the past."
"Faybelle is soooo much trouble when I get my hands on her." Raven seethed.
"You don't have to take on these people all by yourself Raven." Giles reminded gently. "We are no slouches when it comes to these matters either you know."
"The Thorn clan is shipping me off to Hathor Witch Academy, the one in the Middle-Sea region." Raven sighed apologetically. "Even if I wanted to stay, which I do, I can't! It's a miracle that they let me stay here this long! And besides that, my grandmother works there and a significant majority of my cousins are there too. You'd have to declare yourself as my grandfather to get at least some grounds to get me to stay here without a major fight and in doing so you might as well paint a giant target ring on your forehead for the bad guys!"
"Then I'll just declare my rights only to the Thorn clan, and even if I can't manage to convince them to let you stay, they can't deny you free reign to your ancestral homes and territories to return to anytime you wanted." Milton pointed out. "Ever After High and the Grimm estates are all as safe as Hathor Academy, the only difference is that it's neutral territory here, the Thorn clan holds no influence over you."
"You're willing to do that?" Raven asked so hopefully that it almost broke Milton's heart.
"Just sit tight and I'll contact the Thorns after I return the Queen of Heart's calls, I dare say she thinks that I kidnapped you." Milton chuckled sheepishly.
"I think that I'd better call Apple and assure her that I'm fine and more importantly not kidnapped right away." Raven breathed in a terrified tone. "We agreed a long time ago that she's only got a four to five hour waiting tolerance for me to disappear and find my own way out after things get crazy and she knows for a fact that I am in not danger of lying dead in a gutter somewhere before she-"
"Raven? Raven if you're somewhere in here yell and we'll get you out! I can take on the Grimm brother's no problem! I have a bat and I'm not afraid to use it!" Apple's voice shouted out almost on cue, several banging sounds and Faybelle laughing out; "Geeze are you secretly strong! I'm starting to actually like you just a little bit!"
"What in tarnation?" Milton murmured. "Giles quit hiding under that desk and help me deal with this." The older man hissed to his younger brother.
"Nope. I don't feel particularly suicidal today!" Giles whispered, not ashamed whatsoever. He had watched over some of the goings on of the school on his enchanted mirror down in the library so he knew how scary Apple White could be when she was in a mood.
Raven struggled to sit up only to find that her body was distressingly unresponsive. "Help me up and hand me a phone." Raven pled to her grandfather.
Milton patted her head reassuringly. "I can take care-"
"I know you can, but please trust me when I tell you that I can probably settle this and avoid a fight or people getting into trouble." Raven assured. "I'm trusting you so please try to trust me too."
Milton hesitated before sighing in defeat.
XXX
"I'm not being held against my will! You can cease your rescue mission!" Raven said first thing when Apple answered her phone and both she and Faybelle popped up on screen.
"You're glowing." Faybelle observed. "Are you under a spell?"
Raven rolled her eyes. "If I was under a spell I would be smiling creepily and breaking out into song about how much I want to become the Evil Queen."
"People break out into song when they're under a spell?" Apple asked.
"Only if they're trying to alert their friends that they are under a spell." Raven explained quickly. "Most spells are designed to allow any embellishments that support the caster's master plan. Which I can assure you I am not so if you and Faybelle can pretty please back off your siege of the Headmaster's offices that would be fantastic!"
Faybelle raised her brow. "You aren't a student anymore, he has no right to hold you here." She reminded.
"He's not holding me against my will." Raven tried to assure. "He's actually making sure that I'll be okay after… it's kind of difficult to explain… they think that somebody tried to eat or kill the Book of Legends and for some reason it had decided that I would be a pretty good temporary outlet for it's magical information. The Grimm brothers had to bring me back here to…" She looks over to her grandfather for help.
"Purge your system and redirect the magic into another artifact." Milton intoned helpfully.
"Right, they're helping me by doing that." Raven leaned further back against the bench holding her upright. "And that is why I'm glowing, I'm still being purged of the Book's magic."
Apple bristled. "Are you saying… that the Book of Legends is- is using you as a host? Like a parasite?" She demanded.
"Apple, Faybelle I am fine." Raven emphasized. "I promise to check in every hour until I've got a clean bill of health from the Grimm brothers, just please stop whatever you are currently planning because I am in no danger of being locked in a tower!"
"How can we be sure he won't do that?" Hunter's voice called out from the background.
"How many-? No never mind I don't want to know. Just trust me on this all right? I am fine and I am not being held against my will." Raven assured in the most persuasive tone that she could summon with a hoarse voice.
"We want to see you." Faybelle piped up.
"You can after the Book has finished with me, I don't know when that is but I will call the both of you when it is all done." The witch swore. "Just please wait a bit until then?"
Neither princess nor fairy looked happy.
"Please?" Raven asked again.
"We'll be back in two hours, we will be expecting to see you then, and we will be expecting that once an hour call." Apple told the witch sternly.
"I'm sure that I can convince the Headmaster to comply." Raven assured. "Thank you both, I'll call you later, bye." The witch said before hanging up.
"Actually they could have been allowed in here to keep you company." Milton informed his granddaughter. "And enough of the Book's powers has been cleaned out of you that it is safe for you to leave the magic circle.
"Yes but if Faybelle were to be present I'd have to tell her, as per our transparency agreement, that you are my grandfather and that you were planning on giving me an option to return to this school, she would have warned her family, who want me to stay in places under their control, and they would have legal obstacles prepared for you the second you called them. And I'm pretty sure that while you were busy arguing with the Evil Fairy my wife and Apple would have used the opportunity to smuggle me away." Raven told the elder man. "You've just been bought two hours to get the drop on my in-laws, I'm willing to give this trusting you business a try."
"…You are definitely Elenore's granddaughter." Milton chuckled shaking his head.