AN~
Sabrina H: Way to be a well-rounded reviewer! ...It seems like some of the best reviewers are the ones who don't log in. I'm glad you like it!
The speed-thing: I'd LOVE to update faster. Unfortunately, I'm a senior in High School, which involves a lot of homework and college searching and interviews and applications and scholarship stuff and... bleh. I'm also involved in my school musical, which is two weeks from now, and I'm in three other extracurriculars and want to spend some time with my family and friends, so my writing time, especially for fanfictions, which are kind of just practice writing, is limited. I'm sorry, I'll try to speed things up, though. The length: it's not really as long as fanfiction thinks it is. This thing's word processor is kind of... weird. It counts funny. Character Development... umm... well, I don't really know how to describe it. I don't know where my characters come from. Just... remember to keep them human, I guess. Make sure they have flaws, and likes, and dislikes, and something they're good at. There's a book I used in eighth grade that had this whole list of questions to answer about your character to make sure they were a real person, but I don't remember what it was called (sorry, not helpful) I suggest having someone ask you questions about your charater, and if you can't answer them, then your character isn't developed yet.
MarG Z: Thanks for the complement!
Sabrina Lee: (Man, lots of anonymous reviewers named Sabrina. Good, well-rounded reviewers, too.) I made both Sabrina and Daphne everafters because eventually, otherwise, Daphne would get old and die, and Sabrina would stay young. I was debating it for the reason you mentioned, because, yeah, it is a bit much, but I took a review poll, and most people seemed to be in favor of Daphne becoming one, too. Overdramatic-ness: Did you mean that part of the story, or the whole story? Because I can try to fix it if it's just that part, even though I like it, and if it's the whole story, I'd like to know what parts, why, and how you suggest I fix them. :)
"Ummm... what do we do now?" Daphne asked, landing on the top of the house and morphing back to her human form so that she could speak.
"We need to get the house upright!" Sabrina shouted as the Scarlet Hand ran at them. "Then we can escape!"
"Can you put up a shield before we do that?" Puck asked, sounding worried. "Then we can get it up without an issue. And you could just leave the shield up while we go home."
"Working on it." Sabrina responded tersely.
A shield flickered into being around them, its faint glow stopping the soldiers around them. Nottingham looked at it angrily, then started beating his fist against it. Red watched in terror as the shield rippled slightly.
"Don't put me down!" She hissed at Puck, gripping his arm.
Puck grinned at her. "Relax, Red. We'll be out of here in a minute."
"Maybe longer." Sabrina called from the ground next to the Chickenhouse's legs. "The ropes are a mess. We may have to cut them off."
"So do it, Grimm!" Puck snapped.
Sabrina nodded, and she suddenly had a long silvery sword in her hand, ready to begin cutting the house free.
She'd barely begun when Daphne hissed and said, "Stop," with such force that Sabrina listened, for once.
"What is it?" Red asked, not taking he eyes off the barrier and the people behind it.
"That's a vine." Daphne pointed. "A live one, too. You can't cut it."
"Can you, like, make it go somewhere else, then?" Sabrina asked, "Or make it ungrow or something?"
"I can't make things 'ungrow.'" Daphne said haughtily. "Nature doesn't work that way! I can try to..." She trailed off, her face screwing up in concentration. A few minutes later, she made a face, then said, "I can't make it move. It's stuck on something outside your barrier."
"Probably tied it to a tree." Sabrina muttered something naughty under her breath, then sighed. "I can't untangle it while the house is lying down. And I don't think it can stand up on its own. House?" She tapped the building in question on its large and rather disgusting chicken leg. "Can you go all chicken for me?"
The house shuddered, but nothing happened.
This time it was Puck who cursed, much louder than Sabrina had.
Daphne shot him an offended look. "Watch your language!" She snapped at him. "I'm nine! I shouldn't be exposed to that sort of stuff!"
"Can we hurry this up?" Red asked worriedly. "Nottingham is making the barrier move. And he's getting other people to help him, and it's moving more..."
Sabrina looked at the barrier for a minute and said, "Sorry, I wasn't concentrating."
The barrier stopped bending, but it continued to ripple.
"Make it stop rippling!" Red complained. "It's really creepy."
"I can if you want me to..." Sabrina said, "but the more power I put into making it stay perfectly still, the less power I have to keep it going for a long time. And the slower the house will get back on its feet, because I can't concentrate."
"Fine, it can ripple." Red said quickly.
"Daph?" Sabrina asked. "I think I'm going to have to anti-gravity it so that it can get upright again, but I can't turn it right side up, so I'll need you go guide it. Think you can do that?"
"Course." Daphne said.
Sabrina nodded, and stared at the house for a minute. She looked frightening, holding fire in her left hand and a sword in her right, with the black scar on her firelit face, staring intently at something sheathed in shadow. A small smile graced her cheeks for half a second as the house began to rise, but then the barrier flickered, and Nottingham's hand flew through it.
The house dropped to the ground, and the barrier was back, albeit slightly smaller than before.
"What was that, Grimm?" Puck asked.
"I can't do three things at once!" Sabrina said. "At least, not when two of them are this big! Either I put out the light or something else goes."
"Well, then, put it out!" Red said. "That was way too close."
The fire went out, and the four were left with only the moonlight and the barrier' faint glow to see by. Again, the house lifted off the ground a few inches, and Daphne started to push it, but suddenly Sabrina half-screamed, "Move!" and the house came crashing down.
"Why'd you drop it?" Daphne asked, still backing up.
"I was concentrating on the barrier too much." Sabrina sounded embarassed. "But I was just paying enough attention to it to keep it from dying. I can't do both, guys. I'm sorry."
"Well, we can't honestly expect you to do everything." Daphne said matter-of-factly. "It's not your fault you're the one with all the skills we need."
"Bring the barrier down." Puck said suddenly.
"What?" Red squealed at him, digging her fingernails into his forearm.
"Bring the barrier down." Puck repeated. "Daphne and I will keep them off for long enough that Sabrina can hold the house up and Red can guide it into place. Then you can put the barrier back up while someone else clears the vines off its legs."
"You sure?" Daphne asked.
Puck nodded. "It's the only way. Otherwise we stay here until we can get help or Sabrina passes out and the barrier collapses, and we fight anyway."
"It sounds good to me." Sabrina said wearily. "Daph? Red? You guys okay with it?"
Daphne nodded, then shapeshifted back into an owl, a Great Horned this time, not a snowy, and grabbed her sword in her claw. Red nodded, too, more slowly, and Puck put her down, drawing his own sword.
"You let me die, fairy boy, and I will not be happy." Sabrina warned him, then turned to the house.
Puck and Daphne readied themselved, facing the barrier, and Sabrina began to levitate the house. Red pushed the weightless building slightly, and then the barrier shorted out.
Nottingham promptly fell over.
Puck snorted, saving the image of Nottingham face first in the dirt, arms flailing, in his brain forever, so that he could laugh at it on boring nights. But then the rest of the squad was running at him, and he was too busy fighting them off to think about anything else.
The next few minutes were a blur for all of them. Sabrina and Red were trying frantically to get the house back on its feet, despite the fact that the vines seemed to be actively working against them. They made progress, slowly but surely, until someone from the Scarlet Hand jumped on top of the house and started dancing, which almost made Red knock the house onto its side. Sabrina had to kill his own gravity to make him stop. The sight of one of their comrades floating about aimlessly kept the other Scarlet Hand members from trying the same thing.
Daphne and Puck fought off assailant after assailant, Puck sometimes fighting five people at once, both of them trying desperately to keep Sabrina and Red free.
When the house was finally upright, the barrier blinked back into existence. Most of the Scarlet Hand were outside of it, because Sabrina made it considerably smaller, but there were still a few inside with them.
"Shove them out!" Sabrina yelled to Puck and Daphne, who were both still fighting the soldiers. She demonstrated, picking a dwarf and pushing him outside of the barrier. "Just be careful you don't fall outside with them!"
Puck complied faster than Daphne, who first shifted into a bear, then let her eyes adjust before pushing the last two soldiers outside the barrier.
"That was easy." Red said brightly.
Daphne and Puck glowered at her.
"We're not done yet." Sabrina pointed out. "We still have to untangle the vine-thing..."
"Do we have to do it in the dark?" Puck asked pointedly.
Sabrina caught another fireball just so he could see the glare she threw at him. "Fine. Whatever. It's not like I'm keeping you safe or anything."
"Yeah, and who exactly was it that couldn't do more than one thing at once?" Puck asked, pointing at her. "Not me, that's for sure."
"I'm doing two things right now!" Sabrina snapped.
"Guys." Daphne interrupted. "Can we just finish up and get out of here? Please?"
"I am." Red pointed out, because she was, in fact, untangling the vines. "But I could use some help."
Daphne went to Red's aid, and Sabrina was about to, but she stopped before she'd taken five steps. "I shouldn't help. That thing like, eats people's magic or something. And we need mine right now."
"Point taken." Puck sighed and went to help the two girls.
It took a good fifteen minutes for the trio to get the house clear of the vines, and another five for Sabrina to tweak her barrier so that it would roll around the house without crushing any plants. Then they were off. Red was directing the house, on the rare occasion that it needed directions, because Sabrina looked like she was about to fall asleep.
When they finally got home, all the lights were on, and Sabrina muttered wearily, "Do you guys realize just how much trouble we're going to be in?"
Daphne shrugged. "Let's go in and get it over with."
"One issue." Red said quietly.
"Wassat?" Puck asked.
"They followed us home." Red pointed.
Sabrina rubbed her temples, sighed, and said, "I'll just put a barrier around the entire house, then. What's one more thing? I'm already going to pass out as soon as I lie down."
"Maybe you can, like... disconnect from it?" Puck suggested. "Stop feeding it energy once you decide exactly how you want it?"
"How exactly do we want it?" Daphne asked.
"No one can go in who has any intent to harm any of us." Red suggested. "Can you do that?"
Sabrina nodded wearily, eyelids drooping. "Done. It's big enough that we still have the yard and the basement, but it doesn't really go into the woods that much. And I'm... free." She swayed a little, then leaned on the wall.
"They noticed we're home." Red said. "We should get out."
"Right." Puck nodded, pushing Sabrina towards the door. "Come on, guys. Time to face the music."
Once they'd reached the ground, they stood in a line, Sabrina leaning slightly on Daphne, and stared at Henry, who looked like he was having an apoplexy.
"What were you thinking?" Henry exploded. "You left without asking permission, didn't even leave a note, came home way after dark, and brought the Scarlet Hand with you! You could have been killed!"
"We wanted to talk to Chaming." Daphne said, stepping forward. "And then we kind of got ambushed on the way home. But we got out of it!"
"And look at Sabrina!" Henry snapped, pointing at his older daughter. "She's dead on her feet!"
"Was this your idea?" Veronica asked Daphne, sounding slightly calmer than Henry.
"And Puck's." Daphne nodded, stepping forward. "But, yeah."
"And you left because...?" Henry trailed off, a look on his face that was part exasperated, part expectant, and part furious.
"She wanted to tell Charming to name his army the Emerald Foot." Red said quietly, after waiting several moments for Daphne to supply an answer on her own.
"She what?" Henry stared.
Daphne stood there, a few steps in front of the others, with her head held high. Sabrina, who was leaning on Puck now that Daphne had moved, was almost proud of her sister, and would have been more so if it wasn't for the fact that she was so very, very, very wrong.
"Daphne, we're in a war." Veronica said. "I don't know if anyone's explained this to you, but there's a strong chance that we could all die at any time. I understand that you're a child, and that this is hard for you. I know that, if you were a normal girl, you'd never have to worry about this. And you're the youngest, so it's understandable that you'd be less aware of the danger. But you've proved that you can be responsible in the past, so we've given you a fairly free reign. However, today you acted utterly irresponsible, immature, and thoughtless. Jake, Briar, and Bella have been out looking for you since we noticed you were missing. Your Grandmother had to call us home because she couldn't find you, so none of us got what we wanted done today. We were out searching, too, but we met up with Snow about an hour ago and she told us where you'd been. Do you realize how worried we've been? We thought you were dead, Daphne. Dead. Do you have anything to say for yourself?"
Daphne seemed to shrink a little with each word, but she still refused to look away from her parents. Finally, once Veronica was done, she muttered, "I'm sorry."
"I'm afraid sorry isn't good enough." Veronica said, sadly. "You're grounded."
"What?" Daphne gasped.
"You heard me." Veronica repeated. "You're grounded. No leaving the yard except to go to school; or accompanied by your father, myself, or Granny; or in an emergency."
"For how long?" Daphne asked, sounding a litle pitiful.
"Until you've proven that you're responsible and can take the war seriously." Veronica responded. "It's for your own good, Daphne. You'll be safer here."
Daphne stared at her mother, her mouth forming soundless protests.
Puck clapped her on the shoulder. "Tough break, marshmallow." He said. "She's got a point, though."
"Exactly." Henry spoke up. "Which is why the three of you will be grounded as well."
Sabrina snapped her head up, no longer sleepy. "Wait- I fought against this trip the whole time! Why am I getting grounded?"
"Because you should know better, too." Henry replied. "All of you. You're older than Daphne. You should be judged by the same standard, if not a harsher one, than she is. And you may not have had the idea, but you still went."
Sabrina sighed, and gave in. He did have a point, and she was too tired to argue. "Right. I'll be upstairs in my room, sleeping away my captivity."
"Come on, you three." Veronica said to the others. "You've got a lot of explaining to do."
