Chapter 85: Dragon Ladies

Mal woke up the next morning in an especially good mood. There was a sense of excitement in the air, and it was so strong that not even Lily's glares could get this VK down as the teen came down to breakfast. The mistress of all evil was cooking eggs on the stove, while her eldest daughter drank coffee and lazily scrolled through her phone and tried to ignore the unwanted house guest.

"Good morning Mal," Maleficent says.

"Good morning,"

"How would you like your eggs?"

"Fried please," Mal says politely.

"Excellent! It must be a family trait as Lilith and I also enjoy them that way too. There's juice in the fridge for you."

"Thank you," the young girl says, pouring herself some apple juice before sitting down at the kitchen table across from Lily.

Lily looks up at who she's been calling in her head, "the child" and her eyes flash gold for a moment, before going back to her phone.

The VK does her best to ignore the hostility from the person who is supposed to be her sister, but it still made her nervous. She could kind of understand why Lily would be annoyed; here Mal is, a complete stranger from another realm who invades her home and privacy and the two have to treat each other like sisters. It's not like Mal asked for this and she's been more than courteous house guest, plus she and her friends would not be here for that long. It just felt like there was seething anger masked by silence and sarcasm.

The girl from Auradon turns her attention to her "alternate" mother at the stove. It was strange to see any version of her mother doing any kind of domestic duties. Back on the Isle, since Maleficent ruled the place, she had human and goblin servants do everything for her and her daughter. The wicked fairy never had to lift a finger to do anything, but this version is cooking contently for her children. She seemed to enjoy being a "normal" mother.

Once the eggs are finished, the woman serves both her daughters before sitting down to enjoy the meal.

The three of them sit in silence for a few minutes, before the eldest of the women speaks.

"So, Mallary tell me about this Auradon."

"Not much to tell really," the purple-haired teen says. "It's a typical kingdom with kings, queens, princesses, knights and other stuff. I go to school there and everyone's pretty happy. It's not really that interesting."

"Oh, I highly doubt that. I am rather curious about this world as it was completely unknown to any of us here in Storybrooke until you kids appeared,"

"Should we give them a medal then?" Lily mutters, picking at her food.

Maleficent frowns and then turns back to Mal. "But I do hear that you are in love with the King of said kingdom."

Mal blushes slightly and takes a sip of juice to delay the inevitable, but before she can answer, Lily butts in again.

"And your true love's kiss was the cause of all this new magic huh?" she asks. There was a hint of sarcasm there, but not as much. It was as if the oldest of the daughters was genuinely curious about this. It wasn't like Lily had been able to have any kind of stable relationship and the two had not been able to locate her father yet. "You and all your weirdo friends."

And it was back.

"That's what Rumpelstiltskin said," Mal says. "But even now, I'm not so sure that's what happened,"

"Why is that?" her alternate mother asks.

Mal swallows and hesitates. She's not sure whether she should even be talking about this with people who were essentially strangers, but maybe they had some helpful advice she could use. "Because… Ben and I, we hit a rough spot before we came here and…I wasn't sure if I wanted to be with him anymore."

The mother reaches out and touches the girl's hand to give comfort. Again, this surprises Mal because if her real mother saw that her daughter was showing emotion, she'd humiliate and punish her for showing weakness. "Love is weakness, it's a fool's fantasy and no daughter of mine will fall into such a trap!" she'd say. Wonder if this mentality had caused her parents to split up? It was nice that it was not the case with this Maleficent.

"I'm so sorry."

"It's okay, it was a bad fight… I was suspended from the school because I was framed for something I didn't do."

"Ah, the guilty before proven innocent gambit huh?" Lily asks in a voice that sounded slightly sympathetic.

This whole place where "the child" came from sounded sickeningly sweet and pretty awful all around. The bias of being a villain seemed to plague this purple-haired freak and it was something that Lily could relate to... in a very small way. The darkness that had been transferred from Emma, the perfect Saviour, to her caused Lily's entire life to go to hell. No matter what she did, that dark energy destroyed her life and gave her bad luck. She was always treated as an outcast, even by her adopted parents, and resorted to crime to support herself. Even when she and Emma were friends, the darkness drove a wedge between them. Despite her being accepted by the community, she still avoided the heroes and her former best friend because she does not want to live with the label of villain. She had attacked Snow White and David (which was only partially justified as they were the reason for her darkness) and she knew the stigma still lingered. It was strange that there was something that she and Mal had in common and could understand each other on some level.

"Pretty much. The teachers at the school thought I stole some things from a museum, but that was all Uma… the octopus you met. I tried to explain everything but the teachers wouldn't listen. They made me so mad that I did use my magic to throw the coach against the bookcase."

"Nice," Lily complimented. "Show the bastard who's boss" Even Maleficent has to smirk in slight approval.

"They sure didn't think so. I didn't mean to and I didn't really hurt anyone. But then Ben was forced to decide whether to suspend me and he did. He picked the kingdom over me... again." Mal swallows the pain and continues. "I broke up with him in anger… I did technically lie to him, but it wasn't a big deal… I just lied about where I got a book from in the library… and I did steal it, but I didn't do anything else that I was accused of."

"Yeesh, that's tough," Lily says. "But I don't understand why you went back to him then. If some guy had done that to me, his ass would be out on the street."

"It wasn't that simple… Uma and her pirate crew managed to kidnap Ben and threatened to kill him if we didn't come and face them. That's when the whole portal thing happened and how we ended up here."

"Glad we got the cliff notes version, but why did you go to him if he hurt you?" Lily retorts, still stuck on that key fact.

"Lilith!" Maleficent chastises her daughter.

"What? It's true Mom, you and I have been hurt a hell of a lot worse than she has and she runs right back into his arms and has true love's kiss."

"Just because you've been hurt doesn't mean you should let them suffer unrelated consequences," the mistress of all evil answers wisely.

"Then what was the sleeping curse on Aurora for? And the curse on Phillip?"

Maleficent's own eyes glow green with a warning, something that startles Mal. But it was another thing she had in common with this alternate mother.

"I will admit that my past actions have been immature and very petty, but Mallary here chose to do the right thing even if she was mad at him."

Mal nods. "He may have hurt me, but I still care about him and wouldn't let anything happen to him."

"A very honourable thing and something to be proud of."

Lily abruptly gets up from the table and storms out of the house, ensuring to let the door slam on her way out. Maleficent and Mal sit in silence for a few moments, processing the abrupt exit.

"What's her problem with me?" Mal finally asks.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, since I came here, Lily either ignores me or insults me. I don't know what I did to make her so angry… I know me being here is a lot but…"

Maleficent reaches over and grabs the girl's hand again. "Oh Mal, it's not your fault at all. Try not to take it personally. Lilith has had a very hard life and she has a hard time with people in general. She and I were separated for many years and we never had the bond that I hoped that we'd have. She grew up in the Land Without Magic with an adopted family, but when her trust with the family was shattered, she'd been alone since then. While most of what happened to us as a family is not her fault either, she's still healing and struggling to cope with it. Her anger is being misdirected at you and I'm so sorry that you've had to experience it. If it becomes more of a problem, you tell me and I'll talk to her."

Mal stares in the direction where Lily disappeared and sighs. "Okay."

"Okay, now let's finish eating and head to the woods."

A/N: Huge apologies to everyone for the long delay. Get pumped for the next chapter, training montages galore lol!