Originally, the day didn't start too badly. She'd woken up late and tangled up in her husband's arms with her face paint flaking off and her hair crumpled up awkwardly on one side. He'd still been asleep, so she traced his features with her eyes and fingertips until his eyes opened and he came to life beside her.
Breakfast with his parents, like normal, and he'd put the pictures of them that he'd taken the night before on social media to a great positive reception and many people exclaiming "I thought that was you!", "Oh, my kids were right!"
Then, slowly, she'd made her way up to her office for her first meeting with some representatives from Camelot, and at the end of said meeting was when things took a sharp detour.
"Thank you for coming," Mal bid her visitors goodbye and nodded to her guards to open the door. She leaned over the desk to shake hands as the door opened. Lady Genevive gave a little gasp as the hall came into view and Mal looked up to see five very heavily armed guards standing outside her office door. As soon as she looked up, she heard the sounds of gun safeties being put into play, and the guards cleared a walkway for her guests to pass through. A deep weight fell onto her shoulders.
The representatives left and the group of guards entered the room, shutting it tight behind them. Mal sighed and closed her eyes as she fell back into her chair. "Let me guess," She sighed, "This is my introductory course to Heritage Guard?"
"Correct," A guard nodded. The two guards who had already been in the room with her blinked in mild surprise.
Mal examined each of the guards, armed from head to toe with bulletproof armor and with infra-red visors and a very large and imposing gun in each of their hands. "Do I have to have all of you escorting me all of the time?" She groaned and tried to imagine trying to hold a meeting with all of the… seven imposing people in the room.
"Only four," the guard shook his head. The clarification didn't make her feel all that better. "We have to be on-premises with you at all times and we'll have to escort you everywhere. At public events, no one will speak to you without us clearing them first, and yes, that includes your friends, Queen Mal."
"When you say escort me everywhere," Mal began, pinching her fingertips to her forehead as a headache began to ensue, "Do you mean 'everywhere' as in from the palace to anywhere else I go, or do you mean-"
"Everywhere," The guard annunciated. "From your bedroom in the mornings to breakfast, from your meetings to your bathroom breaks, and from your husband's arms into your bed at night. You're not getting rid of us."
Another guard coughed as his side. "Well, that last one was an exaggeration," She clarified. "But we'll search your room each night before you and King Benjamin go to sleep and your office before you're allowed to step in every day. You won't be able to leave your room until we arrive to escort you."
Mal chewed on her cheek and picked up a pen from a jar to absentmindedly doodle on the corner of a report she was supposed to be turning in tomorrow. Hopefully, they enjoyed a little lizard and a rose on the corner of the paper. "I guess I'll know how Ben feels all the time," She sighed.
"You're actually under more security than King Ben," The first guard disagreed. "His Heritage Guards don't have to escort him – just make sure his areas are secured."
Mal closed her eyes. "I'm glad to know I'm important to Auradon now," She decided. "Do you have to sit in on my meetings still?"
"Only one of us," The guard explained. "The rest will stand guard outside." He nodded to the two that were already in the room. "You guys are dismissed, by the way. Sorry, this is court dealings."
Mal's two standard guards stood. One bowed his head towards her. "Congratulations," He greeted.
Mal rolled her eyes. "Yes, I'm ecstatic to be treated like Auradon's Royal Bomb for the next eight-nine months of my life." She extended a hand to shake his and each of her Heritage Guards tensed up. Still, they let her shake his hand and then they all watched them depart.
"What's on your agenda for today?" The leader of the guards asked, leaning forward to examine the calendar underneath her elbow. Mal moved her arm and pushed it forward with a sigh. All seven of the guards leaned forward and began to skim the list. A couple gave disapproving hums. The leader put his index finger down on a slot and then pointed to a couple of other places. "These things will have to be moved to King Ben's schedule as you are no longer eligible to do them. We'll have to organize your schedule with him later."
Mal sighed and decided not to argue.
"When's her next trip out of the palace?" The female guard asked, cracking her knuckles as she continued examining the calendar. Immediately, another guard put a finger down on a slot.
"Visitation with Lizard Maleficent," They announced. "We can handle that, right?"
"Easily," The leader agreed. "The hardest thing to protect her in will be the palace gala on the twentieth."
"About that," Mal sighed, pressing her fingertips to the bridge of her nose. A sudden churning feeling was rising in her stomach. "Ben and I already discussed plans for me to make an impromptu speech that evening, after the presenting. It'll be a five-minute thing to announce to Auradon I'm pregnant. Did he already tell you, or have I been abandoned to fight that battle on my own as well?"
"Where will you be making that speech from?" The head guard demanded with a squint.
"Just from the staircase," Mal exhaled. "I mean, the courts are holding the gala, so Anna will give the little speech thing, and then Ben's going to arrange for her to give him the microphone and we're going to announce it together."
"We can manage that," the female guard proclaimed. "If there's a bad reaction, we'll have to rush her out, but we can handle it."
"It'll work," The first guard agreed. He put a finger down on the 29th – her anniversary day. "This day is blank. Should we be concerned?"
Mal sighed. "Ben and I might be doing something on that day. We don't know for sure yet, so we're both keeping it open."
"We'll discuss it," The guard decided, as if it were his decision and not hers. She wrinkled her nose up. He flipped to the next month and started skimming her upcoming events.
One of the guards reached forward and tapped something on the calendar, and the head guard frowned when he saw it. "What's this 'out with friends' on the fourteenth?"
Mal's shoulders slumped. "That's the anniversary of the day I came to Auradon," She explained as a dark feeling settled on her shoulders – an uncomfortable weight telling her ahead of time that this would not be okay with her new entourage. "Evie, Jay, and Carlos and I always go down to Auradon Prep for the tourney games and then out to the beach to look at the Isle. It'll just be the four of-"
"No," The head guard cut her off with a shake of his head. "Big crowd in a small place and then a wide-open area where you could be easily shot at. No."
"Please?" Mal asked, squeezed her eyes shut. "Even if I have to wear ballistic-proof stuff and I have to have twenty of you on hand, can I please go out with my friends?"
"No," The first guard repeated.
The second one looked up at the head guard. She seemed to be the second-in-command. "It's two places. What if we control where she can view the game from and pick the beach area for them, and block it off?"
The first guard furrowed his face up and flipped his visor up in thought. Mal watched him study the calendar and finally, he nodded approvingly. "We'll consider it," He declared begrudgingly. Mal breathed a sigh of relief and put her head down on the desk. Her stomach was twisting into figure eights like someone was trying to make pretzels out of her insides.
The guards continued examining her schedule and mumbling under their breaths. One took a purple highlighter from her collection and began highlighting events she was out of the palace for, and another began marking things that Ben would have to handle instead of her. Mal could see her Sunday evening with Ben slipping further and further away as they dismantled her schedule. She and Ben would have to put their heads together over the weekend and figure out exactly how much she'd be allowed to balance while this ordeal continued. And that reminded her:
"Evie will be coming up every few Sundays to help me," She informed them. "She and her little daughter Emily. Evie had her baby last May, and she and I are putting our heads together to make sure this thing goes as smoothly as possible for me."
"You have a doctor," the head guard protested.
"Several, actually," One of the other guards muttered under their breath. Mal snorted in agreement.
"It's different having someone who went through it, and who knows me and the way I like to live my life," She tried to explain. "My doctors are going to be helping me stick to the plans she and I are making." She put her fingertips together and watched their faces change expressions. The second guard, who Mal was beginning to appreciate a lot, slowly came to her defense.
"We'll keep them either in the office or the sitting room, and the Queen won't be allowed to leave. We'll search Evie and the child before they come in and watch them closely while she's over." She proposed. The head guard nodded in agreement, and then closed the calendar and pushed it back to her. Mal watched it retake its place on her desk with a blank expression.
She felt the room tilting a little and set her head in her hands with her elbows on the desk before she slowly got to her feet and, head spinning, whispered: "Excuse me please."
"You can't go anywhere!" A guard exclaimed, stepping in front of her path as she stepped around the desk and reached for the door. "Where are you going? Are you – are you sick?"
Mal couldn't answer him as she turned and fell on her knees beside the wastepaper basket in the office. She felt her stomach rushing up to her esophagus and into the basket before an awful burning smell filled the office. "Oh my gosh!" The female guard exclaimed. Mal waved her hand at them, squeezing her eyes shut as she tried to get around the taste of charred ashes out of her mouth. She took several deep breaths and managed to make it back to her feet.
"Hospital," the first guard declared with wide eyes.
"No," Mal declined. "No, no, it's magical sickness again. I just need to go and get my pill for it."
"Pill?" One of the guards sputtered as Mal went to the window and tugged it open. Her stomach was still churning. Dear God, she begged, please don't make me suffer Magical Sickness and any sort of Morning Sickness combined. "Can we allow her to take that?"
"It's on the palace records that I occasionally have to take it," Mal explained, trying to take several deep breaths. "It's just… up in my bedroom."
A knock came from the door and one of the guards leaned forward to check her schedule. "You have a meeting now with the heads of the grounds and the heads of the house regarding plans for the twentieth," he reminded her.
"Oh, let them in," Mal sighed bitterly, taking the trash can and setting it in the back of the room beside the vent. "I'll need… one of you to walk me down the hall to the restroom so that I can wash these ashes out of my mouth, and then… when does this meeting end?" She leaned over her desk to check her calendar as another knock came at the door. "One moment!" She called, putting her finger down on her schedule for today. "Two hours." She closed her eyes.
"Can you tell me where it is?" the female guard asked, slinging her assault rifle over her shoulder.
"I can't," Mal shook her head. "Ben would have to get it for me. I think he's in a meeting too, though, with Arendelle about the Winter Solstice celebration."
The knock came again, and with a sigh, Mal moved to open it. Outside was a crowd of about six people. She stepped to the side and gestured everyone in with her stomach churning. "Sorry for the wait. I'm ready for you now."
The guards watched as the collection of palace staff slipped inside. Three guards slipped outside after they had finished moving in so that the room wouldn't be as crowded. Mal exhaled. "Sorry about the crowd," She apologized. "I'm required to have guards in the room to speak with you." Mal cleared her throat and went to a filing cabinet to pull a manila folder out. "Let's begin."
Mal's phone buzzed against her desk, once again distracting her from going through all of Belle's notes from when they'd called cleaners to come and make ready for the palace last year. It made her smile to see, scribbled on the edge, 'Use excuse so Mal has to wear Evie's dress,' scribbled in Ben's handwriting on the edge.
Speaking of Evie, her best friend had just sent her a selfie with tiny Emily, who had two curly pigtails and was holding a rattle. "Dress-up with my mini-me," the text read.
A smile crossed Mal's face. "She looks exactly like you," She told Evie. Emily's hair was coming in dark blue, which made her godmother extremely happy, and her eyes were a bright and striking blue. Evie had one of the prettiest kids Mal had ever seen.
"She does, doesn't she?" Evie crowed. "I love her so much. But anyway, how are you?"
"I'm finishing up work," Mal replied, glancing down at Belle's assorted Auradon Celebration notes.
"Work?" Evie asked. "It's eight. Go be with your husband."
"He's finishing up work too," Mal replied. "Our schedules have been a bit wonky this week. We were so behind that we used our Sunday Evening to just go through and revamp my schedule to his and his to mine."
"Ouch. Anything you can talk about or is it all National Security stuff?" Evie asked. Mal chewed on her cheek and swallowed.
"A lot of our worries are actually regarding the twentieth celebration. He and I are making a big sort of announcement that evening." She moved some papers around on her desk to check over Belle's floorplan of where decorations would be from two years ago.
"And no talking about it?" Evie asked.
Mal stared at the text. The last time, she'd been so excited to tell Evie. Now, with this one, she didn't want to jinx it. She swallowed. "I can, but I'd rather not if you don't mind. I'll make sure to tell you, Jay, and Carlos about it before the announcement though. How's life for you?"
Mal folded up Belle's files and began hunting around for the decoration registry that one of the household heads had handed her. She lifted her keyboard and a couple of other things and mentally kicked herself for not being as neat as Ben. Mal closed her eyes to think. The meeting had gone over time, she had had lunch in her office, and the papers had been moved to-
Mal stood up and went to the filing cabinet by the window. She opened the top drawer and started shuffling through yellow manila files, looking for the one labeled 'September meetings'. Outside, the sun was slinking closer and closer to the horizon. Mal's fingers were just closing on top of the file when the window exploded inwards, throwing glass into her face. Mal blinked in surprise and looked down towards the grounds. She couldn't see anything, but there was a sound like fireworks and a bullet whizzed past her face.
The door was flung open and her four guards jumped in as a hole appeared in the wall. They only paused for half of a second before moving into action. "Get down!" The female second-in-command demanded, rushing over and yanking Mal by her arm out of the way of the window as her superior dashed to the wall and pointed the barrel of his gun out of the window. Mal was forced onto the ground with the other girl sitting, slightly crouched, over her as she spoke into a microphone on the neck of her vest.
"Red alert, we have an attacker from the grounds shooting into the Queen's office. Shut down the gates." She demanded, flicking the safety off on her gun while keeping it ready in her hands.
The superior guard and one of the others began to exchange fire with the shooter on the grounds. The sound made Mal's ears ring. He, too, was speaking into his vest as he fired. "I have visual contact, suspect in black on the West grounds, about a hundred yards from the palace."
"Permission to remove the Queen from the scene?" The female guard demanded, still crouched over Mal and acting as a human shield in case anything else decided to make a hostile approach to the queen.
"Get her out!" The senior officer commanded and continued to shoot round after round out the window. The sound made Mal's ears ring. Her entire office smelled of gunpowder.
The female guard grabbed her arm and began to help her up. Mal tried to put her feet under her, holding onto her side as it was twisted violently, but the guard shook her head. "You can't stand up," She explained. "If the bullet ricochets off something, we don't want you to be hit."
"I can't crouch," Mal shook her head. Already, hunching her spine was making her side throb. Even if she could crawl, she'd be out for weeks afterward trying to heal her overdone nerves.
The guard shook her head. "Then we're staying here," She decided. She opened her mouth to say more, but alarms began to blare in the palace. Somehow, she could still hear the bullets being exchanged out the window. The guard directed her to cover her neck with her hands and lie down with her face in the carpet. Mal's front began to burn as she tried to keep her breaths slow and steady against the carpet. The tension in her muscles created a terrible throb that pulsed along to her heartbeat. Dust entered her nose, making them burn and clench her chest muscles even more.
There was a shout of pain and the head guard, who was firing out the window, fell back against the wall holding his jaw. Red was spreading in between his fingertips as he tried to apply pressure on the wound. Mal's female guard leaped to her feet. "Viktor!" She screamed and rushed over as the head guard hit his knees beside Mal's still-open filing cabinet. Mal twisted her head to watch as she shoved his hands away in what Mal assumed was an effort to see the wound before she pressed her mouth face-value onto his. Immediately, the blood streaming down his face scabbed over and left a rather ugly, but old-looking wound. A True Love's Kiss.
Mal's female guard jumped to her feet and aimed outside, replacing Viktor's post as they fired at a retreating figure on the grounds. "Suspect is moving towards the West Exits. We have guards closing in from the North and South. Exits are shut."
"Take him out," Viktor ordered hoarsely. He crawled over to Mal and took up a crouch above her, similar to what the other guard had been doing. Mal squeezed her eyes closed. They continued firing outside. One round, then another, and then there was silence. Mal heard the echoes of gunfire outside for a few more seconds, and then all that was left was the ringing of her ears.
"South Side got him. They'll collect the body and brief dispatch. We need to move her out of here," Mal's female guard announced. She bent down and put her hands under Mal's armpits to try and help her up, but pain exploded in Mal's chest. She let out a guttural scream and the guard immediately released her.
"Was she shot?" Viktor demanded in a panic, searching up and down the queen's body for any sign of blood.
Mal's torso felt like it was locking up and twisting. She tried to force her body to relax but found it rigid and immovable. The guards used her arms, locked into her sides, to turn her onto her back, which immediately helped relieve some of the pain. Mal's other two guards came to hover over her as the first two, Viktor and his second-in-command, continued to search her body for any sort of visible wound. Mal was in simply too much pain to tell them that it was all underneath her skin – all old wounds.
"What can we do?" Viktor demanded. Mal tried to move her lips, but it was as if she'd lost control of her entire body. His female counterpart started to speak, but Mal couldn't hear a word she was saying as she tried to at least move her finger. The edges of her vision went fuzzy. Mal barely had time to mourn the signs of her impending unconsciousness before everything suddenly went black and very, very silent.
"Is this going to be your entire reign?" General DoGood growled, pacing behind Ben and Mal's chairs as the court examined the report that had been distributed to each of them. "Every month, something new. We managed to go six years with the only security problem being the King's graduation night and now there's a new would-be-assassinator every other week."
Mal ducked her head down as Ben squeezed her hand. They weren't supposed to be speaking as the court examined the reports, but it was hard when General DoGood's footsteps were pounding into the floor, shaking the table and the chandelier, and making her feel like she was the villain. He paused behind her chair for a heartbeat and Mal closed her eyes as a chill ran down her spine. The sensation left her short of breath. The intense pain she'd been exposed to while on her stomach in the office had left her weak. Once again, she couldn't walk down the hall. Ben was patient, helping her everywhere even when her guards were surrounding her, but it didn't make her feel any less useless.
"It's simply not possible to keep her safe," The General declared, putting his hands on the back of Mal's chair. "She refuses to stay out of harm's way."
"I don't understand how this is my fault," Mal grit out, forcing her eyes closed. "And yeah, you managed six years of minor incidents. I don't understand why all the guards are making mistakes with me now." She turned her head to glance up at the General. Ben's hand, which had been growing warmer as he tried to suppress his tongue, slipped off of hers.
"Your squadron is one of the most highly trained-" The general began, sneering and spitting a little as he spoke.
Mal quickly cut him off. "My squadron proved themselves useful. What I'm referring to is the fact that the assassin was on the grounds at all. You're telling me that first, three delinquents from the Isle of the Lost manage to sneak past an entire battalion spread out on the grounds of a private party and then the outside guards just, what, forgot to patrol that area? Or forgot to ask what the incoming car was coming into the palace ground for? That sounds like either a major stroke of luck for the opposing team or some genius idiocy on ours."
"If anything, you should have seen the plots coming. Wasn't scheming and crime once your pastime?" The General shot back.
Ben snarled as he whipped around. His hand caught Mal's arm on the table as he shoved his chair back and stuck a finger in General DoGood's rather puce face. "Out!" He demanded in a shout. "And don't you dare come back until you figure out how you should be addressing a Queen!" He lashed out with his foot and his chair went skidding across the floor with a clatter. It smashed into the wall and Mal heard a very sharp snap as someone nearby let out a little yelp of shock. The General fumed as he began the trek from hanging over Mal's seat like a reincarnated vulture to the door. As he passed from one side of the table to the other, Ben called after him. "I don't need Generals who can't find their places in my kingdom. Just because you worked for my father doesn't mean you'll work for me. You clean up your act with me or you'll clean out your office and leave because I will never hear you speak to her or any other woman like that again."
The General sent a look of stone over his shoulder, but nothing broke Ben's furious stare of steel. The door opened, closed, and he was gone. Ben planted his hands on the table, still fuming. "She makes a fair point," He announced. "We shouldn't be blamed for circumstances no one could see coming."
"We're not trying to blame you," Princess Anna sighed, sounding dejected. "And while you and Mal both bring a fair fight to the table, General DoGood is also correct. There have been more security accidents with the royal family since Mal lost her title than ever before in your reign. That includes all previous accidents with Uma, Maleficent…" She shook her head. "Your father never even required his emergency guard. Not once."
"In contrast, how much progress has been made over the years?" Mal demanded. "Ever since Ben became King, Auradon-"
"We know," Melody interrupted calmly, firmly. "Ben has been a good and fair king. And you have been a good and fair queen, for the amount of time you've been able to rule." She sighed, rubbing the bridge of her nose. "The purpose of this meeting should not be to incriminate anyone. But our legislative branch rests on our High Royal Family. We need to find some sure way of keeping you two – and Queen Mal specifically – safe."
"Is your chair sittable, Ben?" Anna asked, leaning forward a bit. The back legs of Ben's chair had snapped.
Ben balled his hands up. "I'll stand," He grit his teeth.
Anna examined him with an air of exhaustion and then turned back to the report in front of her. "The problem is clear," She announced softly. "There was a hole in security. The assailant came from the south-side servant's entrance. It's gate-checked with an ID only – no active guards. According to what your guards have been able to discover, he was present in a meeting with you back before you were queen, almost two years ago. We have no other leads as to how he knew what room you were in, but no other windows were shot."
"I was standing by the window and retrieving some files," Mal recalled in a dull, bland tone. "If he had a scope, he might have been able to see my hair, but he would have had to have known where he was looking."
"He did have a scope," Anna confirmed. "The courts will conduct their own investigation of the matter."
"Princess Anna?" Tiana's son raised his hand. "I'd like to extend that investigation to the Guards on the palace rotations. Whoever had knowledge of where the guards would be at what times or what kind of security the palace was enforcing."
"I second that motion," Chad Charming agreed, frowning deeply at his paper. "And this was in your office?"
"Yes?" Mal agreed slowly. She wasn't quite sure where Chad was going with this. Hadn't it already been clarified?
"Where were your guards?" Chad asked. He set his paper down on his stack and folded his fingers together as he looked up the table at her. Everyone's eyes followed. "Aren't you supposed to have four with you at all times?"
"They were outside the room. As soon as they heard the window break, they entered and pulled me out of harm's way," Mal explained. "I'm only required to have four when I'm meeting with someone or being escorted from place to place. I don't need them if I'm alone, with Ben, or with Belle and Adam."
Chad exhaled, pressing his fingertips to his brow, and then stared at Anna. Anna, bless her soul, looked exhausted. She shook her head. "I have no clue," She admitted. "All your protocol was followed to exactness and with the exception of the intruder managing to exploit the unguarded entrance, everything was secure. The public are typically allowed to access the grounds of the palace and the main halls with minimal pestering from the guards. It's been that way for decades. This is the first time there's been a problem of this nature."
"We can't simply continue as-is," one of the representatives from Motuni protested. "The information has already reached the public. The chance of a copycat crime occurring are simply too high."
"There has to be something we can do to increase security," Prince Aziz declared. "She has to be under Heritage Security for about seven more months. It can't be that hard to keep her alive and safe for that amount of time, right?"
"Don't jinx us," Chad grumbled. Mal curled her nails into her hands.
"We won't have any more window problems," Ben informed the room. "I'm having all our windows where we normally are replaced with bulletproof glass."
"What if someone uses the same loopholes when she's, say, on the grounds?" Tiana's son frowned. "Or even at a royal event?"
"She has four guards on hand all the time," Ben pointed out. "Four highly-trained, elite guards. Seven in all but four at every hour of the day. Even at night."
"And those four guards have performed wonderfully, so far," Anna agreed. "Aside from, of course, lack of knowledge about the Queen's medical issues leading to her remerging pain issues. However, King Ben, they weren't enough. She was still attacked. We have to figure out something to protect her."
'Move me out,' Mal thought. 'Get me away from the palace. I don't want to be here anymore.'
"We could put her location under secrecy," Ben suggested. Mal's head snapped up. "She doesn't have to be in the palace. We could move her out to a safe location and keep her out and away from the public for the next year or so."
"That would work!" Mal agreed, nodding to his proposal. And if she was alone in a secure location, that would still be considered 'alone'. Say she was in a small house on the outskirts of Auradon city, out of the way from the public roads. The guards wouldn't have to be around her all the time and she'd be able to go from place to place in her own house without having her entourage. They'd have to be within earshot, of course, but she could pretend she was alone. She could have her space.
"Have her in a different place?" Melody hummed, furrowing her brow. "Well… I don't see why not. We'd have to find a place, but-"
"What if there's a medical issue?" Tiana's son blurted out. "She has to have someone cleared to oversee her pain treatments and right now that's King Ben or one of her doctors. She's fallen before and even now, she can't stand up or sit down without her husband's help. That can only get worse as time goes on."
Silence reigned over the room. Mal's heart sank as she watched Anna nod sadly. Ben cleared his throat. "I could be with her," He proposed. "And then be back here at the palace every morning at the same time."
"No," Anna disagreed. "We can't have the King of all Auradon going into and out of a secure location like that every single day. If anyone gets a lead on you, she'd be exposed. You either stay there with her or you leave her for most of this endeavor, and forgive me, your majesty, but we all already know which one you'll pick." She picked up a pen and doodled on the margins of her report as she closed her eyes a little. "We need you here to pick up her side of things anyways. There'll be more to be done if she can't meet with people every day."
Ben's shoulders slumped and Mal closed her eyes, disappointed. She moved her hand back over to his and squeezed his hand. He didn't respond.
Anna exhaled and straightened up. "The only solution I see is to somehow increase the security we already have."
"How?" Mal's shoulder's slumped. "I already am escorted everywhere and can't even see my friends or go anywhere. What else can you take away from me?"
Ben set a hand on her shoulder. "Again, we have guards on hand at all hours. The windows are being replaced. She doesn't ever leave the palace and everywhere she goes, the rooms are checked. Security is tight enough as it is."
"We could increase ground regulations," Chad suggested. "Every vehicle in and out of the palace has to be searched, with no unchecked entrances."
"The Anniversary Gala is coming up," Ben pointed out. "We'd have to have people start arriving at least six hours beforehand if every car has to be searched."
"They have the technology to search things nowadays," Wilbur Robinson called from down the table. "San Fransokyo has been putting out all sorts of things, not to mention all my dad's things."
"Set up a machine to search cars coming in and out," Melody nodded. "And yeah, no more unchecked entrances anywhere. Maybe we should even have packages leaving and entering the building being searched in case an intruder somehow manages to send something in ahead of time."
"On that note, the mail is already being searched, right?" Chad asked, straightening up a little.
"It is," Ben affirmed, looking tight-lipped about everything. "And we can't wear everyone thin about one accident that is already being worked against to be prevented."
"One accident?" Chad repeated. "Ben, one accident would have been her office being bugged. Or her falling down the stairs once. One accident would have been the catastrophe that was your wedding. You have to acknowledge that she has had more dangerous excursions out of the palace than safe ones."
"That's not true," Ben shook his head. "We've visited Evie in the hospital, she was able to attend Auradon Prep and Evie's baby shower, not to mention the fair a few weeks ago."
"The fact you are counting out these relatively small things is not comforting, Ben," Melody raised her eyebrows. "I agree with all the changes we've made thus far. But… is there any way we can further secure the areas she'll be in? Especially for the upcoming events of the country anniversary gala and the winter solstice?"
"Do you have any wedding anniversary plans you want to make us aware of right now?" Chad asked, speaking mostly to Ben. Even though she'd been a member of the courts since six months after Ben became king and was now the queen, they still tended to address him instead of her.
Mal pressed her lips together. Her stomach was churning a little. She glanced up at Ben, and Ben sighed. "We do… but we're doing it ahead of the date before she's showing more. The day we have cleared is the 29th."
"Will you be out of the palace?" Melody asked.
"Not anymore," Tiana's son interrupted before Ben could reply. "We can't afford to have her leave the palace now, can we?"
Anna made a noise of discouragement and dropped her head onto the table. "No," She groaned. "We can't. I'm sorry, Ben. It's just this year, and next year security won't have to be so tight."
Ben exhaled. "Okay," He conceded softly. "I'll… make some calls." Mal listened to the disappointment in his tone and then got to her feet, pushing her chair out slowly.
"Where are you going?" Chad demanded, jumping up in a panic. Ben grabbed her elbow in a soft grip to keep her beside him.
"I'm not feeling well," Mal grit out. "I'm going to go down the hall to the restroom." She kissed his cheek and then pulled her arm away. Her guards took up stances around her and lead her from the room, down the hall, and towards the bathroom. She waited while they did a glance-over of the restroom, and then shut herself behind the door to slump against the wall by the sink. There, the tears came hot and fast, searing cuts down her cheeks.
Why couldn't things be easy? Why did she have to be damaged and fragile and in danger all the time? She'd thought that getting married would be her happily-ever-after but dating Ben had been nothing compared to trying to stay married to him.
She threw up again – black and smoky and tar-like signaling she needed to work harder to keep on top of her magical sickness now that she couldn't use her magic at all, and then spent several minutes in front of the mirror, carefully erasing all the marks that the tears had left on her face before her guards knocked on the door and she knew her time was up. Vanessa, who was her female guard, examined her sadly as she took up her right side, across from Viktor, Vanessa's True Love. They never showed much emotion around her, but Mal chose to believe that they were just as open as she and Ben were at home. She had to believe that at least one other person's True Love had worked out in the hopes that her own would work.
The guards escorted her back to the meeting room, opened the doors for her, and then allowed her to enter after a cursory glance of the room. Mal stood inside the entryway as the doors were shut, and a deadweight dropped into her stomach.
Ben had taken a seat in her chair and didn't look over at her. He was hunched over with a hand covering his eyes. Everyone else in the room looked like they'd finished debating and discussing, and Melody was even packing up to leave, looking disgusted and uncomfortable. Everyone avoided her gaze, and Mal knew it was bad. Very, very bad.
If it had just been the fact that she couldn't be alone in her office or her bedroom during the day or any other 'alone place', she might have been able to live with it. If it was just the fact that she wasn't allowed to touch or converse with anyone without them being searched, it might have been okay. Or even if it was only that she wasn't even allowed in certain parts of the palace. Unfortunately, it was all that and more.
She couldn't interact with anything that could hurt her – wasn't even allowed to plug a light in. Her clothes were searched before she could get dressed in case they were bugged, her phone was searched during mealtimes in case anyone dangerous had tried to contact her, and even her responsibilities as queen were lifted in favor of keeping her safe. Meaning that not only was she overcrowded, never alone, and always in pain, but also bored out of her mind. Unable to do anything. Unable to help.
Ben, consequently, became scarce. After all, their jobs were a balance mission, and when she couldn't take meetings with more people than she had guards on hand and couldn't go out of the palace and was confined to paperwork, someone had to be there to pick up on those things.
Evie arrived at one on Sunday, but Mal wasn't allowed to see her until almost three. Both Evie and Emily had to be searched and mapped into the palace system before they were allowed near the queen. And, the talk was, Evie wouldn't be allowed to visit much longer – especially if a single one of their meetings happened to go awry.
Mal could tell her best friend was agitated from down the hall before Evie even entered the room. There were pounding footsteps and a general huffing of breath before Evie kicked the door open with her foot and Mal's four guards rose to watch the blue-haired Isle girl enter, balancing the edge of the door with her foot and holding a packet of papers in one hand and the handle to Emily's carrier in the other. "This is ridiculous!" She spat, walking over to set the carrier down by the couch and turning it with her foot. "How do you live like this?"
Mal scoffed without a single legible response. "I don't," She shrugged. "Mine's worse."
Evie's eyes softened a little, but she still looked irritated as she unbuckled her daughter and pulled her out to set on her leg. Little Emily's eyes were rimmed red, meaning she'd probably started crying at some point in the searching process, and Mal was surprised that Evie had managed to stay together at all. She'd expected her friend to completely lose it. Visiting Capital Residence One wasn't exactly a fun experience anymore. People who came through were confused by the sudden increase in security even though news of the window shooter had reached the public. Rumors were swirling - and some of them were true. Some conspiracy theorists were guessing that the reason for all the extra security was that the Queen was now on Heritage Guard.
"How are you?" Evie asked, laying Emily in her lap and then reaching for some papers. "Handling everything okay?"
Mal sighed and shook her head. She pressed a hand to her forehead and closed her eyes. "Ugh, I'm sure you heard about the shooter up here trying to kill me? Everything has been insane since then. Ben is considering firing the general because he keeps getting angry at me for always finding some sort of trouble."
"You don't cause trouble," Evie protested. She began fishing in her bag for a bottle for Emily with a roll of her eyes. "It's not your fault everything seems to happen to you."
Mal shrugged. "Yeah, but it's still happening to me. I mean, Ben went from coronation to now without a single attack or incident or anything. My reign literally started with me being stabbed. And, going before that, I was involved in an accident with the former king, had dozens of protestors show up against me, got pregnant, etc..." She shook her head and felt her spinal column twist. The stress of late was making her even more sensitive. "I kinda see what he's talking about, but the way he's attacking me for everything is unfair. If anything, these people are exploiting his soldiers, so he's more at fault than we are, but every time he gets angry the blame is somehow heaped on us."
Evie sighed. "Well, how have things been with you and Ben?" She asked, laying Emily across her arm and then uncapping the bottle with one hand. She raised the plastic tip to her daughter's mouth and Mal was momentarily caught up in a moment of deja vu. Was she really old enough to take a bottle already?
"I'm pregnant," Mal confided, running a hand for her hair. "That's why, uh, everything is awful." She waved her hand around her as if to further apologize for everything Evie had just hauled her baby through. "Ben's... excited? Worried? We're both, uh, being pretty careful."
"Well, uh, that's great?" Evie looked a little breathless. "I had a feeling you wouldn't have much trouble. And you're, uh, okay? Talking and yeah?"
"We talk," Mal agreed. "But not a lot of time has gone by. He tries to talk about it with me but he doesn't exactly want to think about it a lot. Like, he doesn't want me to bottle it up and he wants to be informed, but he hates hearing about the predictions my doctors are making."
"Yeah," Evie hummed, not really agreeing but only acknowledging that Mal had spoken. "Scary," she whispered.
Mal watched Emily glance around, mainly focusing on her mom, with wide eyes. She rubbed her hands together and then held them out. "Can I hold her for a moment?" She asked.
"No!" One of the guards jumped forward and blocked her hands. "No, no, you can't. What if she has something on her skin?"
Evie's face twisted in insult. Mal frowned. "Wouldn't you have caught it as they came in? They were being searched for two hours - if you missed something on her skin then I think that's an issue all by itself."
"It's possible," Another guard agreed, examining Emily suspiciously. "And even if not, you shouldn't be straining yourself."
"Straining myself?" Mal demanded, voice rising a little. "No, this is ridiculous. You can't stop me from holding my goddaughter. I can't believe - I was raised on the Isle of the Lost! I'm not a princess! Stop treating me like glass!"
"M," Evie reached out and put a hand on Mal's, and it was as if the gates of chaos had opened up. The guards snapped into action, grabbed Evie by the shoulders, and pulled her back. Emily slipped out of Evie's arms and began to roll to the ground, causing Mal to panic and reach out to stop the little girl before she could roll off the couch and hit her head against the coffee table or the floor. Evie shrieked and struggled against the guards as they shouted meaningless, incoherent commands at each other.
"What is wrong with you?" Mal demanded in a shout. "Let her go!"
Evie ripped her arms out of the guards' holds and took Emily up into her arms, balancing her against her shoulder as Emily began to cry. Mal held her hand up, waiting for something to do, and then slowly let her palms fall back onto her knees.
"We told you not to touch her," One of the guards growled.
"She was falling!" Mal snapped. "If she'd hit her head in the wrong spot, then we could be dealing with a whole lot more than crying on our hands. You realize law enforcement officers have been sued for accidentally killing babies by doing just that, right?"
"Better her than you," A guard replied immediately before realizing that it was probably not the best thing to say while the mother was still cradling her sobbing infant. Evie's face turned puce.
The door opened and Mal's other three guards - including Viktor and Vanessa - appeared. "What's going on?" They demanded.
"She touched the queen and we pulled her arms back, causing her to drop the child," A guard who had previously not spoken up explained. "We had previously declined her request to hold the baby."
"This is ridiculous!" Mal hissed, planting her hands on the couch and then forcing herself to get up. "You can't stop me from living my life! You can't keep me away from, well, everything!" As she rose, her back popped twice in sharp cracks that made everyone gasp and reach out to support her.
"If you want to go to the courts and argue your right to keep yourself safe, feel free," Viktor replied, leaning over the back of the couch to examine Emily and ensure she was okay. "It'll be less work for us anyways. We don't make the rules, Queen Mal, we only enforce them."
"We can't allow you to come into contact with anyone not cleared," Vanessa explained. "Ben is cleared, so is Belle. Evie and her daughter are not."
"And Adam?" Evie asked, furrowing her brow. Vanessa shook her head as Mal blinked in shock. She hadn't known that. She wasn't allowed to even touch her father-in-law?
"What was the purpose of those two hours, then?" Mal demanded. "I thought she was cleared?"
"She's cleared for palace entry," Vanessa shook her head. "Not for contact with the queen."
Evie shook her head furiously as if she were arguing with a voice in her head. "This is ridiculous," She declared, leaning down and putting Emily safely into her carrier. "I'm sorry, this is ridiculous. I won't be bringing her back up. She's not even one and she's already a criminal in your eyes. As for me..." She looked over at Mal with an apology in her eyes. "I don't know if it's worth it for me to leave my family for so long to come up and not be allowed to do anything or touch anything... I can barely interact with you."
Mal's heart dropped into her stomach. "Evie..." She trailed off, knowing that it was selfish of her to ask Evie to keep coming up. She wasn't allowed to see anyone - couldn't even talk with anyone anymore. No one could come in and no one could touch her and, god, the Isle of the Lost had never been this constrictive.
Evie shook her head and stood up. "I'm sorry Mal. Let's talk about it later. I want to go home now."
"All of her calls will be listened in on from here on out," Viktor reminded Evie of another rule Mal had forgotten. "Her phone is bugged so we'll receive all her texts and calls for her before they'll be connected to her."
Evie stood motionless, staring at them as if she hoped they would burst into laughter and yell "Sike!". Mal felt like crying as Evie shook her head and then walked away with a huff of disappointment. Mal watched her friend walk away and the guards let her out of the room.
Vanessa reached out and touched her arm. "Want to go up to your room?" She whispered.
"What's the point?" Mal asked softly. "I can't be alone there. Not until Ben gets off tonight." He'd be off earlier since it was a Sunday, but…
Vanessa opened her mouth and then closed it again. Her most open-minded, kindest guard had nothing to offer her. Mal shook her head. "Yes," She agreed. "Let's go up."
Two guards took her elbows for extra support and the other guards took up guard around her. They began the long, slow trek up to her room. Every step twisted Mal's side and caused her to spiral even further into her guilt. When had everything gotten to the point that they were searching babies for dangerous things?
The guards unlocked her door for her and then entered to search it while she waited outside, growing more and more faint. Finally, they allowed her to enter, and one of the officers went to her nightstand to examine her collection of medicines. "Do you need any of these?" He asked.
Mal shook her head. The thought of taking another pill ever made her want to throw up. What had happened to the Mal who'd never needed a doctor? Who hated medicines and who could deal with any pain?
She closed her eyes. "I'm going to use the restroom," She announced, brushing her hands on her hips as if there was some dust or dirt there, and then taking a step there. They nodded, releasing her, and she stepped into the tiled room and shut the door behind her. Then, she clicked the lock as softly as she could.
Finally, alone. Mal closed her eyes and covered her face. What had happened to her? Why hadn't she recovered yet? She used to get beat up all the time on the Isle… used to always recover within a few months. Now… it was like she was a different person.
Mal braced her hands on the counter and forced herself to meet her reflection's eyes. A different person. A different girl. Someone soft and delicate and matronly. A princess. A prissy pink-skinned princess with perfect makeup and a perfect positive attitude. A particular sort of patronizing politician with persistent pains and persevering problems. Perfectly pitiful.
Mal began to hastily open drawers. A cold sweat had broken out on her brow and her brain felt like it was developing running cramps all over it. She and Ben didn't use all that many products – deodorant, cologne for him, hair gel for him, hairspray that they sometimes shared, etc. She had a wide collection of scented lotions and perfumes and bubble baths that people gave her for royal events, but those were all used more by him than by her. Or, if she was lucky, they'd take a shower together and use an entire bottle to flood the bathroom so that – whoops! – they had to clean up their mess together.
Near the back of the under-the-sink cabinet lay a stash of never-before-used products and tools. Extra curling irons in white and gold, pomade in shades that didn't match Ben's hair, rollers, and a couple of unique items such as a curling iron/hairbrush/blowdryer combo. Underneath a random package of light brown hair dye and pressed against the piping that led to the sink, she found a Velcro package. She ripped it open, ignoring the awful sound, and heard a knock at the door.
"Queen Mal?" Someone called. "Is everything alright?"
"Yes!" Mal called back. "I'm, uh, looking for toilet paper. Please hold."
Inside the package were a number of horror tools. Nail clippers and cuticle clippers and a scary silver thing with a flat point that was meant to push extra skin off of your nail were crowded inside. And a pair of scissors. A pair of scissors that she pried out with two fingers and cut herself on. A pair of scissors that she slipped onto her fingertips, ignoring the cut. A pair of scissors that felt balanced and deadly and… right in her hands.
Without really thinking, Mal raised the scissors to her chin and began to snip, snip, snip away at the purple. She squeezed her eyes shut and imagined someone with a deadly stare, with a rigid stance, and with a sharp, powerful haircut. Not princess waves. Not comfort-softened slouches. Not this; not her.
The scissors jabbed into her cheek and took blood with them, but she continued chopping through the thick red liquid. The hair caught in the joint of the scissors, so she yanked a few locks out and then kept going towards her neck, ignoring the grinding and squeaking sounds as they came.
One slip. One drop of her hand and one mistake. The tip of the scissors would go through that one point on her neck and then she wouldn't ever have to explain anything to the soldiers outside. She wouldn't have to explain herself ever again.
She wouldn't even have to explain anything to herself.
Someone tried the door, found it locked, and knocked. It was not a soldier – that much Mal could tell from the sound of skin alone. "Mal?" Ben called from the other side. "What's going on?"
Mal let out a little gasp and lurched to her knees, letting out a little cry as she rushed her torso to meet up with her motion. Ben tried the door again upon hearing the sound. "Are you on the floor?" He asked, probably deciphering her location from the point of her voice.
Mal tried to slide her fingers out of the scissors but the blood had dried on her hands and now they were stuck, feeling heavy and brittle and still so right. She flicked her fingers to remove them and the metal shears went flying across the tiled floor, clattering against the bathtub before sliding into the center of the room with a screech. Mal heard people leaping into action behind the door as Ben knocked again, harder, begging her for entrance. "Mal?" He called.
She ran her hands through her hair. There were damaged ends from the grinding and the twisting and more layers and levels than the Auradon City skyline. Some parts ended around her ears. Others fell centimeters past her chin. She felt like a battered doll. A doll that had been cut open by some cruel and disturbed child who, after ruining everything she had inside of her, had finally come to destroy her image. She was sitting, shaking in a harrowing field of purple that was itching down her shirt and sticking in her blood and-
Something clattered on the other side of the door and a gap appeared between the knob and the wood. They had taken off the handle on the other side and were trying to unlock the door. Mal panicked. "No! Don't come in!" She gasped.
The door opened nonetheless. The guards all had their gazes averted for her privacy but Ben was standing slightly to the side and staring intently at the scene before him. The blood on the floor, on her clothes, in her hair…
Mal couldn't look at him. There was a mess of their products around her and bloody scissors on the floor and, really, what else was there to say? The right side of her hair had been snipped away and the left made for an odd 'before-after' demonstration. She collapsed against the sides of the open cabinets and stared forlornly at a twice-used container of pomade that actually did match Ben's hair color.
"I'm sorry," She whispered. "I was just trying to remember myself."
A few of the guards let out breaths and Mal could see in the reflection of the mirror decoration hanging beside the bathtub that Ben had covered his lower face with his hands, staring through his fingertips as blood continued dripping onto her shirt.
Silence. So much silence and the silence of no one knowing anything and no one knowing what to do. The silence of disappointment and 'how could you have done this' and 'you never would have done this on the Isle' and 'Queens don't do things like this.'
"Take care of her," Ben finally commanded, dropping his hands and closing his eyes. "Treat her cheek and find someone to fix her hair. I'm calling Anna."
The general was slightly less aggressive when he didn't have a room full of men to impress. Mal had always liked office meetings more than committee meetings because they were more similar to how things would be settled on the Isle, except she wasn't allowed to make threats and usually had to sit down. At this particular one, it seemed she was being offered up as merely evidence; a show, a demonstration. They were all sat at a circular table in a grey-painted room with no windows but with one very large portrait of Ben's great-grandpa riding into battle with the same sword that was now kept in a secret safe in their room. It was only her, Ben standing at her left, General DoGood stewing with his arms crossed next to him, Princess Anna across the table from her, and Viktor and Vanessa, who didn't look anything like a couple as they sat with rigid, professional positions.
General DoGood watched Ben drop his papers onto the table; his thesis, his position, his argument. It was about four inches high and had all been assembled in under a day. Mal watched him squint at it and wondered if the man had ever felt anything but rage, suspicion, and defensiveness all his life.
"We need to fix the Heritage Protection Mal is under," Ben declared. "It is unacceptable and I'm using my position to reject it. We're coming up with something new right now."
"You already tried to override it once," Anna mumbled, closing her eyes and rubbing her head. "Unless you have any critical, hard-hitting evidence, we have to maintain it."
"It fails to keep her safe and healthy," Ben announced his position and Mal furrowed her brow. Wasn't that the argument that had gotten her into this mess? Ben gestured to her cheek. "It doesn't account for her mental, emotional, or social health. I have thirty-four individual studies here from all over Auradon that prove people heal better, maintain better physical health, and even are more likely to carry to term when there is a balance between all aspects of health. Most notably, this one from two years ago." Ben pulled a blue folder out of the stack and slapped it into the center of the table. "High levels of maternal anxiety have a significant relation with mental disorders, emotional problems, lack of concentration and hyperactivity and impaired cognitive development of children. Increased stress hormones like Corticotrophin particularly Cortisol and androgens lead to cognitive changes, changes in language development, and may even affect speech in girls."
Mal's eyebrows shot up as he read directly off the page. Only the last few years of training her eyes to legal documents allowed her to understand a single thing in her state of mental frenzy. Was Ben seriously arguing her freedom based on the learning and focus abilities of their future kid?
Would that work?
"Furthermore," Ben continued, finger still pressed against the page as he read. "High anxiety and stress levels lead to strained mother-child relationships and may also damage the nervous system's growth and development. It may give rise to coronary disease and a reduction of heart rate variability." He flipped the packet around and slid it to Anna. "In short, you want a healthy heir to the throne, you're going to avoid adding to her stress levels."
"And what do you propose for her physical health?" General DoGood snorted. "She doesn't even keep herself healthy. She's her own danger! What are we to do if she trips down another flight of stairs or stabs herself through with another pair of scissors?"
Ben shook his head and began sorting through papers for a notebook. "The only time Mal will be interacting with stairs for the next eight or nine months will be the Anniversary Gala. Here's my proposal: She's allowed to go around on floors three and five – the office floor and our bedroom's floor. Those areas are blocked off to anyone not cleared by her Heritage Guard squad. There's bulletproof glass and we can put thumbprint scans on the doors so no one can sneak in. You'll need a password to reach the floors from the elevators. Everything will be searched routinely at night or, in the case of our room, when we're gone. We're going to clear three friends, her goddaughter, my parents, and her doctors to be in direct contact with her. Whenever anyone else is involved, she'll have to have her squad."
"And what if the doctors try to kill her?" the general asked, stroking his chin.
Ben stuck out a thumb to Viktor and Vanessa. "What if they try to kill her?" He asked. "What if I try to kill her? We're not going to guard her against people who hold perpetually no threat. We're going to guard against people we don't know."
"I agree with General DoGood, actually," Anna announced. "You realize that assuming danger won't come from a certain direction is how people get killed, right Ben?"
"What if one of the servants leave something dangerous in those rooms?" Viktor asked. "What if someone manages to sneak through?"
"What if that happens now, even with all the security we have?" Ben countered. "It'd be a heck of a lot more embarrassing for you, for starters. Let's be real, this new system has already almost killed a four-month-old and failed to account for Mal going absolutely insane in her solitude. It'll kill her and I and about seven other people by the time the baby is actually set to arrive if we keep it."
"I'm sorry, are you basing this on our potential embarrassment, her hurt feelings and a perfectly justified response?" General DoGood demanded, standing up and beginning to pace behind his chair. "At the very least, there hasn't been an attempt on her life yet."
"We went months without an attempt on her life," Ben hissed. "There have been two attempts. Granted there were other incidents, but two attempts on her life. Now, General DoGood, none of those 'incidents' occurred within an hour of each other. Under this system, it did."
"I see your points, Ben," Anna declared wearily. "But could it be that you just need more time to settle into a new system?"
"Could it have been that when Elsa froze Arendelle over, you just needed to settle into a new climate?" Ben returned.
Anna pinched her lips together and examined the king with an icy glare reminiscent of her sister. "I think we need to give it at least another week, to ensure things." Her gaze flicked over to Mal. "That doesn't mean you get to randomly attack yourself to try and prove us wrong."
Mal watched Ben's fists clench and a thick forest fire alight in his gaze. "I will take this to the public," He threatened. "And I will publicly prosecute the courts for endangering the Queen of Auradon. Mental health is a huge topic in politics right now… I wonder how many people would decide to stand behind you once I drop the bombshell of what's been going on?" He gestured to Mal's cheek and her new haircut.
Anna stood up, digging her nails into the table. "I wonder how many people would rally for a new queen if you did that? She's already got a cult of doubters tracing her every political move. A villainess's daughter, permanently injured, and now mentally broken."
"You know that's not what'll happen, but I enjoy the vision, Anna. Really." Ben crossed his arms as little growls escaped his throat with the words. "What's next, you'll expose my workday schedule to try and gain sympathy for all the courts do? Good luck with that."
"I could make things difficult for you, Ben," Anna hissed, holding aloft a finger and waving it a little at him.
"You don't want to know what I can do to you," Ben promised.
Anna slapped the table, making Ben's perfect stack of evidence topple a little bit to Mal's direction. "Go ahead and try!" She declared. "You pull too many strings and you'll be running around in circles about your little office, trying to tell people you're not corrupt while everyone already thinks you're bypassing the law for her. I wonder how long it'd be until you're issued an official pause and then the courts gain the advantage."
Mal was reminded of the night of her engagement as she sat and stared at the wood grains in the table. She didn't dare speak, knowing she'd make the situation worse, but wondered what Ben's next move would be.
"Okay Anna," Ben huffed. "Listen here and listen closely. I think I can win this game of legal hoops. I think I hold more sway considering I've had such a long reign of good ruling and the fact most of Auradon doesn't have a problem with Mal and feels sympathy with her. Most of the other royals feel worse for her than they will for you if you try and fight back. But on the slight chance you do manage to outvote me, we're stopping this whole escapade. If you're not going to put my wife's overall health into consideration – not just her safety and her healing – then I will. We'll terminate pregnancy before she lives under these systems for another week."
Mal's mouth fell open with a pop and she leaned forward, ignoring the intense pain, to stare at Ben's face. He didn't glance down at her. He only held a rigid, intense position as Anna's mouth fell open in shock and surprise. "What?" She sputtered.
Viktor and Vanessa's eyes were wide and Mal could tell from their stance alone that Vanessa had taken Viktor's hand under the table. How many times had she done that with her own True Love? Meanwhile, General DoGood's face had broken apart to reveal an expression Mal had never seen on him – fear. Ben had been correct; the social stigma around royal abortions was powerful.
Ben pressed a finger into his stack of papers. "If you don't fix this, we're done. I'm not going to let you destroy her," He declared softly, slowly.
The others wouldn't notice it; they didn't know him. But Mal saw the green tones climb into Ben's cheeks. She saw the hunched position of his spine that he always did when he was trying to not shake, and she saw the broken light in his eyes. If Anna called his bluff, he wouldn't be able to follow through. That meant it would be up to her. Up to her to get rid of the baby that she had actually planned for.
Anna blinked at Ben and then her eyes drifted over to Mal. "You wouldn't," She gasped, staring at her. "Would you?"
Mal shut away her surprise and astonishment at Ben's declaration and then folded her arms across herself and shrugged as if his words had her full support now that she'd thought about it. "I was the one to suggest an abortion back before my coronation," She announced and watched everyone – General DoGood, Viktor, Vanessa, Anna, and even Ben – flinch a little. "I don't see why not," Mal continued. "I mean, so far, I've been pretty lucky about getting pregnant. We could always hold out on the courts for a future to their existence."
"I give!" Anna gasped, taking her hands back from the table and holding them up into the air. "We'll fix it."
"Splendid," Ben sighed, dropping his defenses and slumping into the chair next to her. Mal felt like gasping for breath as, suddenly, dozens of weights were lifted off of her. She reached for his hand and couldn't stop a smile from breaking out as his fingers twisted against her own and he squeezed, hard.
"Are you okay?"
Mal looked up at the question and was surprised to see that, for once, it was not Ben asking. Instead, it was Adam, who looked fairly sick. He had a thin white shirt on and Mal could see medical tape and wires underneath his shirt.
"I am," she affirmed and pushed herself to her feet so she could take his arm and guide him into the room. He took a seat beside her on her and Ben's bed. God, it was nice to be able to touch people again. "How's your chest?"
"It feels tight," Adam coughed, raising a hand to cough into it. "They keep poking things in me." He gave a distant gesture at her torso and then said in a strained voice: "How are your wounds?"
"Fine," Mal assured him. "Today is a good day."
Adam sighed and slumped forward as he put a hand on her knee for balance. It fell a little high on her leg, but her father-in-law took a few deep breaths before moving it back down and Mal knew it had not been meant to mean anything. "I heard someone say that years ago," He muttered. "They were a cancer patient in a hospital I was visiting. Goodness… was Ben even born then? He might have been a baby. But they told me they were having a good day that day and it sounded so poetic at the time. Like they were choosing to have a good day through the struggle. But god, this isn't a choice. It's a war."
"I know," Mal nodded and ran a finger across the old wounds through her shirt. "Today… I can kind of feel the echoes of my heartbeat down my spine. And it's a painful stretch when I move. And when I'm sitting here, it stings. But it's manageable. I mean, I went to work today, so…" She sighed. "I didn't do as much as I should have, but I did what I could."
"I understand," Adam agreed. "Belle keeps laying out outfits for me and helping me along wherever we go. And it's nice, but I also wish she wouldn't and that I could do it without the extra help."
Mal nods along to his words. His hand tightens on her knee a little bit. "Our anniversary is coming up," she whispered to Adam. "And the gala too. We have plans to announce to the kingdom then… but we probably won't be able to go anywhere for our anniversary and I know Ben is bummed out. I just wish… I could be as much for him as he is for me. I always feel like I'm coming up short in our relationship."
"I wouldn't say so," Adam told her. "You do all the work you're allowed and you put things he forgets where he'll remember them. He hasn't forgotten to grab his office keys once since you were put on rest, I know. You pitch in where you're allowed and then more."
"But I can't go anywhere," Mal turned to look at him. "He's got to pick up all my stuff I'm not allowed to do. And I'm not exactly… fun lately. I can't go and do things with him as well."
"I get it," Adam agreed. "But that doesn't mean you come up short. It just means you come up in different ways."
Mal hummed and accepted this with a sigh. "So, what happened to you? Last I saw you, you were walking just fine."
Adam sighed. "Pain just set in," he shrugged. "We're trying to figure out what's going on. I'm in the same boat as you… lots of doctors… we're not sure yet."
"I see." Mal put her hand on top of Adam's and squeezed. "Well. Good luck."
"And to you as well," He nodded.
A knock came from the door. Both adults looked up and Mal smiled to see Ben hovering outside. "You're back," she noted. "Everything okay?"
"Yeah," Ben nodded, stepping in and then reaching for his coat hanging on the door. "We're getting new security cards magnetized so I need mine. Where's yours?"
"I can get it," Mal released Adam's hand and slid off the bed. Her feet hit the ground a little too hard and she almost collapsed when her spine absorbed the brunt of the impact for her. Ben immediately jumped forward to catch her.
"Careful!" He snapped, helping her to balance her weight. "Geesh, Mal, be careful. Just tell me where it is, love, and I'll find it for you."
Mal leaned back against the bed. "I can get it," she gasped. "It's just over-" She broke away from Ben and walked around the bed to where her nightstand was. He, of course, followed her. The drawer slid open and Mal felt around the outer edge until she found the card propped against the drawer walls. "Here," she replied, shuffling around and handing it to him. Ben nodded and tucked both cards into his pocket. He turned to face Adam.
"Are you feeling alright?" he asked.
Adam nodded without changing his expression. Ben looped his arm through Mal's and guided her to sit back down. She didn't protest. Ben put a hand to her cheek and then touched Adam's shoulder as some sort of consolation before he began withdrawing quickly. "Get some rest, both of you," he instructed. "I have to run back up to my office… I'll see you both later."
And he vanished.
Adam sighed and shook his head. "Where have the days gone?" he whispered and replaced the hand on Mal's knee. "I wish… I wish he hadn't grown up so fast."
Mal sighed. "I just wish I could get over this faster, so I can value the time I have left with him."
For the first time in months, they had to rebind her waist. Mal had forgotten how much bandages itched. And this dress, which had been designed to be very comfortable, was not helping matters. It was tight-fit around her shoulders and stomach, which was the reason they'd had to wrap her wounds in the first place – they didn't want the fabric hurting her wounds.
It had been a year since she'd become engaged. And tonight was the gallery repeat. For the first time in nine years of being here, she wasn't opening the party. Tonight, that was Anna's job.
They broke tradition so Mal wouldn't have to go down the stairs and were announced at the base of the steps. Like last year, the room was packed. Thousands of people's heads swiveled as her name was called and Mal saw the nerves of every guard within twenty yards tighten in their heads. She had an entourage of four, who cleared a wide circle around her and Ben. Fifty others were scattered into the vicinity.
On the bright side, she was allowed to leave early this year. She was going to go back to her room after twenty minutes, long enough to do her part, and Ben would come back to join the party. He liked parties enough, and Mal hoped he would have a nice time and that he'd find a few people to dance with and that he wouldn't feel any resentment that she could no longer serve as a very effective dance partner. He assured her that he didn't, but she still worried.
"Princess Anna of Arendelle, representing the High Courts," Cogsworth declared. His voice was shakier than last year. He, too, must be ill.
Anna appeared at the top of the staircase, blushing a little and stumbling as he reached into her pocket for the part of the speech she was allowed to rehearse, not read. Someone handed her a microphone and Mal found herself mouthing the words as Anna opened up the party.
Ben guided her back to the refreshments table and handed her a drink. She tuned out the rest of what Anna was saying as she finished, and then the party began. A few people tried to approach them to talk to Ben. Occasionally, he would let go of her to step out of her circle of protection, then come back after the conversation was finished. Anyone who wanted to talk to Mal was forced to resort to calling from a few feet away.
People were exchanging looks of confusion. Why had she come if no one was being allowed to talk to her? Mal tried her best to keep her smile on her face, but it became harder with every hand Ben stopped to shake and every person who tried to say hello to her. She'd never thought she'd missed having her hand shaken and kissed so much.
About a half-hour into the party, Cogsworth's intercom crackled again. Ben immediately broke off his conversation and took Mal's arm to lead her up to the front. "Ladies and Gentlemen," Cogsworth called. "Your attention please."
Ben helped Mal up one step and then they turned to see the crowds as a guard passed a microphone to him and her. Mal could see how tense they were – how worried they were for this announcement.
"Good evening," Ben smiled and waved out over the scattered crowds. "We're sorry to interrupt your party. Promise it won't happen next year."
People laughed. This was, after all, the same time he'd interrupted last year. Mal squeezed his hand. Ben cleared his throat. "We chose tonight to make a special announcement to Auradon, Mal and I. It's been a year since she agreed to marry me and lots has happened. There's been a lot of mayhem and for us, it's not about to stop."
A guard took a threatening step toward the right side of the staircase. Mal didn't see who was there.
"We'd like to announce that the arrival of the new heir of Auradon," Ben began and gasps echoed around the room. He was cut off by a clattering chorus of excited calls and angry shouts. Then arguments – people began yelling at each other. People were mad that other people were mad, excited, reacting. Ben tapped his microphone. He knew they couldn't drag this out. "Excuse me. As I was saying, the new heir of Auradon will arrive in early June. That is all. Thank you."
Guards seized Mal's arms to forcibly help her off the one step before releasing her. Four more appeared out of thin air, surrounding her as people surged forward with hands outstretched to congratulate them. Mal's hand was numb as Ben squeezed it. They were moving her towards the doors quickly. Ben was helping them – why did they want her out so badly?
They got her into the hall and, instead of taking her back to the elevator, pushed her into a tiny little room which held nothing save a few chairs and a round table. One of the guards began feeling up the back panels of the room, looking for what Mal presumed was an entrance to a secret passage. Passages extended around the castle, of course. The guards had notes on all of them, but she doubted anyone besides the computer – even Ben – knew where they all were. Sure enough, a panel clicked.
"What's going on?" Mal asked.
On cue, a shot rang in the hall. A bullet ricocheted off the wall. Ben pressed his lips together, but none of her guards seemed too concerned. The situation was under control. Mal could hear a shouted argument down the hall over the squawks of the panicked guests. Then her guards hauled someone past the room – a man in dark blue with blood dripping from his lip – and more followed with his confiscated rifle.
"An assassination attempt," Ben mumbled in her ear. "They're screening the crowds and seeing who he came in with and if anyone else is dressed like him. Then they'll let me go in. You can come back too if you want."
"No thanks," Mal's stomach turned as she heard the guards wrestling the crook into the elevator down the hall. That was why they were taking her into this room – they were apprehending him.
"Your Majesties?" The guards asked, stepping aside to reveal a secret box inside the wall. "This is one of the servant's hidden elevators. It'll take you straight up to your hallway."
"Thank you," Ben nodded. He took her hands and together, they stepped into the box. It was a tight fit, but the doors closed behind them and Mal felt the elevator begin to move slowly upwards. It occurred to her that, for the first time in a long time, they were alone. And more than alone, they had had a successful evasion of an accident. The guests had barely even realized what was going on. And their security had worked.
She could feel Ben's grin as it burned through the dark to her. His mouth pressed against her cheek, hot with victory. She began to laugh. Her stomach ached against the bindings, but it felt like a good ache. A success.
She pulled Ben down by the shoulders. His mouth felt even hotter against her own. Her mouth was hot. His mouth was hot. Her skin was hot. His skin was hot.
"Are you trying to convince me to stay?" Ben chuckled as they felt the elevator slow to a stop.
"No," Mal shook her head, and this time felt sure of her response. "Go to the party, Ben. Go enjoy yourself. Go talk to people." She kissed his cheek. "I'll be up here."
The elevator doors opened. Two guards, Viktor and Vanessa, were waiting for her. Mal parted from Ben and smiled. He still didn't look too sure.
"What will you do?" he asked, folding his arms and frowning.
Mal gestured down the hall vaguely. "Well, now that I'm allowed to interact with lead and charcoal, I might go draw a little. You know, do things I'd do if I didn't have to tag along with you to everything, which I don't."
Ben smiled. "I won't be long tonight," he promised. "Maybe an hour or two, then I'll come sit with you while you draw."
"That'd be nice," Mal smiled. It felt like something they'd have done at nineteen, after graduation. Ben would get off work and head down to spend evenings in Mal's room with the door open and his head on her belly as she drew anything that came to mind. Evie would poke her head in to coo and make snappy comments and Ben would chuckle and go through the news on his phone. Not saying anything. Just being near. And this was like that, except it also felt like she was escaping.
She kissed his cheek one more time and then the elevator closed and began to descend again. And she was able to turn back and walk to her room, pretending things were almost the way they'd been long ago.