Author's Note: Moving forward a little now, in case you haven't noticed by now we'll be focusing on Apple and Co's adventure with fairy tales and the undead. We'll get to Raven and Morgan's adventures at a later date. So for now, Read, Review, Favorite and Enjoy!
Chapter 56: I am Not Snow White
Sparrow, as well as a great many students were staring in shock mouth's agape at Baba Yaga who had just said something spectacular, something that she would not be able to take back, not now not ever.
"I'm sorry but could you repeat that?" Sparrow asked on the behalf of the rest of the students.
"The undead monster who has been bombarding the school is the original Evil Queen Grimhilde Konigan." Mrs. Yaga repeated in a annoyed tone of voice.
"Yeah we got that part but... are you sure?" Sparrow asked his face scrunched in confusion.
"Ignoring the fact that they have the same name in the same time period, look at the photo." Mrs. Yaga held up Sparrow's phone with the picture of Morgan and the creature that she had been talking to. "Doesn't she look familiar?" When you ignore the fact that the Undead was mostly dressed in improvised clothes, that length of branches wrapped around her head looked like a crown, and that mass of grass which had been torn off the lawn and woven into clothes looked like a dress or a robe. More than that, that robe was tied with rusty old chains and she had boards nailed down to her body, like someone wanted to make sure that she would stay down, even if she came back as a undead. Unfortunately it seems that they failed miserably in that regard. "You understand now don't you?" Mrs. Yaga stated in a wise tone of voice. "All of the evidence only makes sense, the power that matches Morgan and her daughter, the great length's that she was put through to ensure that she wouldn't get back up again after she was put down, her appearance reminiscent of a queen of the undead, the time period this place must have come from." As if to emphasize the point, Mrs. Yaga pointed to the figure Morgan was talking to in the picture. "The only logical explanation is that this person is the original Evil Queen."
"Well we're screwed." Sparrow stated letting out a sigh.
"If someone like that has teamed up with Queen Crazy then we should seriously consider running away." Kitty pointed one of her hands outside a window. "Most of the bone and armors have been wiped out already, and the rest aren't feeling so well." Indeed, the armored undead were wandering aimlessly fighting among themselves having outlived their role in their story. "I bet we can sneak right passed them."
"Don't count on it." Briar was sitting at the back of the lounge, her head was slumped over for a while now, so everyone just assumed that she had fallen asleep again, but it looked like she had been in some pretty deep thought. "Those things are just like us aren't they? They're stuck in their story, and without it they've become something different, more dangerous." Briar looked up to face the group. "Saying that these things are useless without their stories is the same thing as saying we're useless without our stories. The way I see it, we have too options, mutually assured destruction, or we fight." The image of a person that Briar admired appeared in her mind, backed by the looming silhouettes of those who are not willing to take no for a answer. "We fight for the right to live the way that we choose, we fight like Raven."
"Keep it in your head little ones." Giles stated sitting in the chair next to Milton, a good sized chunk of the transfer ceremony had already been completed. "We cannot abandon my other half and the young talker of animals who holds the secrets of our enemies."
"A good speech. Now if I could direct you people to our one saving grace." Mrs. Yaga held up Sparrow's phone again. "Our biggest enemies, Blue Beard and Grimhilde are dead already." They died here, if they wait long enough then they will be killed off, if they're lucky, then that means that they might even kill each other. "Anyone want to find out how they died?"
It took Apple a while to realize that she had been knocked out, when she woke up she found that she was back outside of the castle. Someone was using their lap as a pillow for her and Apple got back into a sitting position after a few moments.
"Evil Queen?" Apple asked expecting the familiar form of the woman who has been guiding her through the madness of this book.
"Her name is Grimhilde." A all too familiar voice stated in a sour tone as if offended. Looking around Apple saw herself, staring at herself with a displeased look on her face.
"You're me!" Apple stated in shock. "I am Snow White." Indeed, like the other 'characters' that Apple had encountered inside of the book thus far the doppelganger in front of her had her name, 'Snow White,' written in clear print on her, in her case her arm. "That is the name you people gave me, though I prefer it in my native tongue Schnee Weiss."
"Weiss? That's my mom's name." Apple stated looking surprised.
"White White." Schnee had to inhaled for a moment before exhaling for another. "Mother I've given birth to a legacy of air heads." Schnee opened her eyes to glare at Apple. "What are you doing here?" Schnee less asked and more demanded.
"Ah, a curse is threatening my friend's lives, we think one of the previous Evil Queen's know how to break it." Apple explained simply.
"Cute. Finish the damn story already so that I can get this latest round of hell over with." Schnee stated in a threatening tone of voice.
"The Ev..." Apple was going to say the Evil Queen but she immediately stopped herself, she had to remember that before she was a character in a book she was a actual person. "Grimhilde was a lot more helpful then this."
"'Grimhilde' died before she ever got the chance to sign the book, she died over three hundred years ago and not one single part of her survived. What you were talking to is the idea of the 'Evil Queen' that you people have built up in your heads over the past three centuries. The answer to all of your problems, the great enemy that by defeating you will be guaranteed happiness for the rest of your lives." Schnee only seemed to get angrier as the conversation progressed.
"You sound... rather mad about this." Apple stated with a sad tone in her voice.
"I have been trapped inside of this eternal hell for three hundred years, stuck in a cycle repeating the same mistakes over and over again with the same stupid doe eyed look on my face watching as a result of my actions the person I loved and cared about most in the world dies over and over again, for the privilege I must experience the same agonizing torment over and over again while watching you people glorify this miserable rotten life I have lived." The look in Schnee's eyes was someone who was broken, and had been broken, over and over again, and had simply reached the point where they had given up on ever being treated differently. "Just a peak of curiosity, someone caused a bit of damage to the book a few decades ago. I'm wonder how that was going? I had assumed that when the book collapse in on itself a while ago that it had finally died I would be released from this living Hell. But now that does not seem to be the case."
"Oh. Ah..." Apple kinda felt bad about the role she played in accelerating the book's repair now. "Before I came in here, the others thought it would be bad if I got trapped inside of a broken book, so they started looking for a way to fix it." Apple took a look at her surroundings, the cracks which had plagued the book and some times harassed her path through the book were gone. "By the looks of things, I think they succeeded."
"Pity, I was looking forward to dying." Schnee stated letting out a resigned sigh. "Alright time to get this latest round of hell over with."
Schnee's facial features suddenly did a one eighty turn from a jaded and cynical young woman to a happy wide eyed teenager. The scene that followed played out nothing like Apple had imagined it had when her mother told it to her when she was a child, a charming prince visited the castle of the Evil Queen one day on business, played in this case by a facilely of Daring Charming and a entourage of faceless extras. Based on the look on her face, Schnee was smitten in a instant.
"Blue Beard." Grimhilde stated in a displeased tone of voice, appearing from within the castle itself. "I thought we agreed that you were going to meet my forces at the border."
"I thought a immediate face to face meeting was necessary." Blue Beard stated shrugging his shoulders. "Your mirrors are... unsettling."
"Very well." Grimhilde gave a roll of her eyes and used her staff to direct the group inside of the castle.
"Blue Beard?" Apple asked her face scrunched in confusion.
"Your Prince Charming is Blue Beard?" Schnee's face twisted in horrific anger.
"HE IS NOT MINE!" Schnee spun around and grabbed Apple by her collar and slammed her against a wall. "And if you have even the slightest comprehension of who you are talking about you will never mention that name in front of me again!"
"I'm thinking that I don't..." For one thing this reaction was very different from what Apple would expect of talking about someone's true love.
"Then how do you know that name?" Schnee asked lowering Apple down to face to face.
"One of your step mother's descendants dragged his soul back to the surface and sent him to kill all of my friends using a curse invented by one of Grimhilde's earlier descendants." Wordlessly, Schnee dropped Apple to the ground.
"Speak to my mother's mirror, if it's one of their curses then that is where you will find the answers that you seek." With that the propagator of the White family line turned her back on her distant descendant.
"Wait!" Only to be stopped by Apple once more. "One of the Grim's hid something inside of the book in pieces, it cursed his son and I need it to uncurse him."
"There are many things hidden inside of the book, why should I help you?" Schnee asked glaring down at Apple, who could only reply with silence. After all how can she ask for a favor from someone whose misery has fueled the thing that has held the world together for three hundred years. "Find your damn curses by yourself." Saying that Schnee apparently went back into 'Doe Eyed Princess mode' and reentered the castle, Apple soon following behind her.
"Schnee, go to your room." Grimhilde stated in a uncompromising tone.
"But mother!?" Schnee replied in a whiny sort of tone.
"Go to your room." Schnee gave in to her mother's strict tone and went up the stairs to her room, Blue Beard watching her all the way along.
"So when are you going to marry off your daughter to me?" Blue Beard asked a look of pure lust on his face.
"When she is of appropriate marriage age I will allow her to date, she will form a meaningful relationship and then marry at a time of her choosing." Grimhilde stated in a uncompromising tone of voice. "Preferably with someone who is not ten years older than her." Blue Beard simply shrugged his shoulders as he got down to business.
Meanwhile Apple sneaked into Grimhilde's study where she saw a full length mirror leaning up against the wall.
"Uh... Mirror Mirror on the wall..."
"Oh great." Suddenly the familiar form of Schlechtester appeared in the mirror. "One of you again."
"Uh... say what?" Apple asked legitimately looking taken aback.
"Lemme guess, one of Grimm's minions?" The Magic Mirror stated rolling her eyes. "Please inform that old man that I have no interest in helping a Grimm, now nor ever." The Magic Mirror stated in a tone filled with hatred.
"What makes you think that the Headmaster sent me?" Apple asked legitimately intimidated by the mirror's glare.
"That stupid rhyme was their invention!" The Mirror snapped eyes glowing with a deep seated rage. "The men who demonized my master!"
"The first Grimm brothers." Apple stated eyes going wide with realization. "It's become quite clear to me that certain embellishments have been made with the Book of Legends. I'd like to know the truth now. I'm up to when Schnee first meets Blue Beard."
"Don't say I didn't warn you. Tell me something how does your society feel about rapists and serial killers?" The mirror asked checking for imaginary dirt underneath illusionary finger tips.
"I'm going to regret asking that aren't I?" Apple asked looking up at the mirror rather dejected.
"Oh I hope so." Suddenly the image of the person within the mirror disappear, in her place Apple was greeted with the sight inside of a tomb of some kind. Over all the tomb seemed to be quite lovingly preserved, though Apple found her eyes on the naked form of Daring, thrusting his hips back and forth. Apple found herself momentarily confused by the image, she knew what that action meant but didn't know why Blue Beard was doing it there, until that is she spotted the headless mummified corpse of a woman laid out in front of him.
"MMM!" Apple immediately went for the nearest window and emptied her stomach contents over it.
"Good to know common decency is still a thing three hundred years from now." Apple sluggishly made her way back to the mirror and pulled over a chair so that she could sit down in front of it.
"Can you just... tell me what happens next instead of showing it?" Apple asked looking like she still might be a little sick.
"Blue Beard's pent up lust didn't stop with my master's wife, not five minuets after he finished buttoning up his trousers did he proceed to seduce her daughter, young Schnee then innocent in the ways of men fell prey to his blatant lust. By morning he had fled these lands and she was with his child." The mirror stated in a lecturer's tone of voice.
"What happened next? In the version I recall Snow White had been taken out to the woods by the queen's huntsman to be killed, based on what I've seen that was a lie." And it was Snow White too, a fictional character based on a the life and misery of one Schnee Weiss, not the actual person herself, it was important that Apple keep the two separate inside of her head because they were vastly different individuals.
"When Grimhilde discovered her fourteen year old daughter's pregnancy she immediately demanded the location of Blue Beard so that she can have him take responsibility, I instead showed her the violation of her wife's corpse he performed. After that she loudly declared in detail her plans to hunt down and horrifically maim the person in question. Schnee, head over heels for the man and ignorant to the violation of her mother, grabbed the fastest drake she could get her hands on and ran off for his lands. Grimhilde hired a mercenary, a local self proclaimed monster hunter to chase her down."
"The Huntsman, that I remember from the story." Apple stated snapping her fingers.
"Do you now?" The Magic Mirror clapped her hands together, suddenly Apple felt like she hit fast forward on her mirror pad.
In the next room Grimhilde and Blue Beard talked in indecipherable chipmunk while moving around the room at blurring speeds before parting ways with the coming of night. When morning came seconds later Grimhilde was screeching at the top of her lungs and stormed into her study demanding to know where Blue Beard was, was shown the sight of him violating her wife's corpse, before she blew a hole into the nearest wall and storming off, a second clap of imaginary hands ended the movie on fast forward snapping Apple to attention.
"I'd follow her if I was you." The Mirror intoned in a surprisingly helpful tone of voice.
Apple quickly chased after Grimhilde into the castle's throne room, there Grimhilde was sitting on her throne, her posture and way she simply owned the look invoked in Apple's mindset the image of a supreme ruler and she found herself resisting the urge to bow.
"I will be brief hunter." Apple turned around to face the Huntsman, played in this instance by Hunter Huntsman, one of Daring's classmates in the hero course and boyfriend to her cousin Ashlynn. "My daughter has had her heart stolen and thusly has fled into dangerous territory chasing after it." Grimmhilde steeple her fingers together and glared into the Huntsman's eyes. "I don't know you but I do know your reputation, anyone who can go toe to toe with a Ulfheonar should find little difficulty disposing of such creatures. Bring her home to me."
"It shall be done my Queen." The Huntsman stated in a cocky tone of voice. Grimhilde didn't notice because she let out a sigh of relief and entered deep thought about some topic or another, but the Huntsman stumbled as he turned around and left for parts unknown.
"Oh that's not good." Apple went to chase after the Huntsman and soon saw him climbing aboard a horse. "Uh excuse me." Apple touched the horse in a effort to stop the Huntsman and instead felt something soft as the spot where she touched the horse glowed gold. "What the...?" Apple reached into the horse again and grabbed something inside before pulling it out, at the same time Apple was swallowed in a explosion of golden light. Apple suddenly found herself inside of deep woods, neither the Huntsman or his horse was any where to be found and that concerned her a great deal. "Well now what do I do?" Apple asked sighing to herself.
A boney hand lowered a tea cup to a table inside of the Wonderland Habadashery, drinking tea was little more than a formality for her at this point in time, being undead the liquid just dripped down her rib cage without leaving impact. However it gave her something to do while her two would be conversation partners were busy, the younger one had been put to sleep by the elder, her mother, apparently a precaution to keep her from running off. The mother on the other hand was getting dressed and showering, by the looks of things she hadn't be able to do either for the past decade. Finally ready for a conversation the mother sat down across from Grimhilde the first Evil Queen.
"I know who you are Dark Lord. Those whose lives you have ended know your name, you have sent many down to our realm." Those cold dead eyes peered into Morgan's soul as she stated her next remark. "You seem to be under the impression that I can help you."
A flash of light briefly echoed throughout the room and both individuals looked to Raven, Morgan walked over, picked up something that looked like a mirror, whispered into it before smashing it under a rock.
"I am looking for a old friend of yours. That stupid old book was very informative, so while I do know that you were part of a tribe of mages before you were a Queen, I don't know where they are now." Morgan stated looking the dead Queen in her face.
"And what do you want with my tribe?" Grimhilde asked steeple fingers together.
Author's Note:
Zwei Eis: Thank you, it's nice to know that I'm appreciated.
DJ: Information that only someone who was alive three hundred years ago can know.
Wade: Pretty much, and thank you. Luckily Mira went waaaaayyy too over board with the protective spells.
Charlie: It will work, but at a price.
