Back in Evil, Vivi had just been assaulted by a rabid bat.
She let out a startled scream and lifted her hands, shielding her face and trying to bat the thing away. Screeching, it winged around her head for a few moments more and then withdrew, flapping across the room to hang from a hooded girl's pale finger.
"Good boy," she said.
Vivi stared at her, sitting, legs folded, on a bed across the room. She wore a coat with ridiculously long sleeves, a wisp of blonde hair poking out from under the sagging hood. Vivi squinted, making out in shadow a ghostly pale face and piercing green eyes. The rest of the girl's slim body was covered up in long garments, hiding every inch of skin.
Vivi's eyes drifted around the room. It might have been a cozy dorm once, before a cyclone, flood, and fire swept through. The walls were streaked with brown and black scorch marks and the floor was carpeted in ash. Even the once-white sheets of the four beds were stained and the pillows singed.
"What are you doing here," a flat voice droned, and Vivi turned to find another student leaning against the wall, also wearing long, draping robes. Their black hair, highlighted with pink and yellow—strange choice of colours for a student of Evil, Vivi thought, but who was she to judge—reached to their shoulders and hid half of their face with a drooping bang. Their one visible eye was narrowed in a frown, toned, tan arms folded over their chest.
Vivi blinked. "What?"
"Here. In Evil," they drawled, monotone.
"The same as the rest of us," a nervous voice chipped in, and Vivi turned again to find a pudgy student sitting on a third bed against the wall, with long, deep brown hair, pulled back into a ponytail and streaked through with red, dark skin and friendly eyes, shadowed by the darkest bags she had ever seen. She winced. And she thought Arthur needed more sleep.
The pale, green-clad girl turned to her rusted bedframe and hung her bat next to two others roosting comfortably. "Of course, how could I forget. Exchange students between schools this year."
"What?" The plump boy blinked.
"Even if she did belong here, four's too many for a coven. She needs to go," sneered the girl.
"Don't be rude!" the boy cried. "It's not her fault she's an exchange student!"
Vivi, the girl and the other student against the wall stared at him.
"What?" he said.
"Sarcasm," the student against the wall yawned.
The boy turned to the girl, betrayed. "Chloe."
The girl groaned. "And now she knows my name."
"Should we introduce ourselves?" the boy mulled. "She is our new roommate."
"No," Chloe and the third student groaned.
"Well, you already know that's Chloe," the boy said, turning to Vivi, and pointed at the student against the wall. "They're Duet, and I'm Rooster."
"Shut up," Chloe snapped, rather rudely. "She doesn't need to know our names because she's not staying here."
"Then where else am I supposed to go?" Vivi said.
"I've heard Halfway Bay is hospitable," Duet said, nodding out the window at the dividing line between sludge and lake in the moat.
"I know a quick way down," Chloe said, eyes glinting.
"Chloe!" Rooster cried, scandalised.
"What," she snapped back.
Vivi frowned. These students were all her age. They were just kids. They couldn't do anything to her.
She cleared her throat. "Since you all want me gone so bad, do any of you know how to get to Good?"
"Swim," Chloe said, not missing a beat.
"I don't want you gone," Rooster said, looking hurt.
"I agree with Chloe," Duet deadpanned.
"Can I get across the Bridge?" Vivi fought.
"Students can't cross the Bridge," Rooster replied.
"Bodies can though," Chloe quipped.
"We can help you out," Duet said.
Irritation rising, Vivi took a deep breath and turned to Rooster. "Where are the teachers? Maybe I can ask them to help me."
"Oh, they'll help you out alright," Chloe said. "I can't imagine how much fun they'd have punishing a princess for infiltrating the wrong school."
"Can you SHUT UP?" Vivi finally snapped, raising her voice and turning furiously on Chloe. "What is your problem? It's not my fault I'm on the winning side. It's not my fault Evil always dies at the end of your fairytales. And no wonder they do, if this is how you all behave," she hissed, and set burning eyes on Duet. "So if you don't even have the human decency to help a classmate, let alone a supposed roommate, why don't you all do yourselves a favour and go home before you graduate into fairytales and get slaughtered."
The two Evil students gaped at her, looking like they'd just been slapped. Vivi stared them down from the doorway, breathing fire, daring them to challenge her again.
Rooster whistled.
"Told you two she belongs here."
༻·𖥸·༺
Arthur stole down the Honour Tower staircase, boots squeaking on polished glass. To his surprise, the moment he donned the clothes in his basket (excluding the crest-spotted boxers), they had magically shrunk to fit, wrapping snugly around his thin frame; too snugly. The form-fitting trousers and trimmed jacket showed off spindly legs and a slender, feminine waist, features Arthur had previously hidden with his baggy clothing from back home. Looking down at himself, he'd felt strangely exposed in such non-revealing clothings, and thought he'd rather stick his head in a toilet than walk through school like this.
But this was the only way he'd make it to the Welcoming without raising suspicion. He'd tolerate an hour in this awful uniform if it meant getting out of here with Vivi.
When he reached the foyer, tugging uncomfortably at his high collar, he found it completely empty. Giggles and high-pitched chatter echoed down from the two pink staircases. The two blue flights were silent.
Where are all the other guys? Arthur thought anxiously. A man's voice drifted towards him from the back of the foyer and his ears pricked up. He crept towards the sound, towards a pair of tall frosted glass doors, emblazoned in gold lettering:
THE GALLERY OF GOOD
The doors were ajar. He peeked inside.
Two teachers stood inside, a pale man in navy and a tan woman in red, like yin and yang, engaged in heated conversation. Arthur recognised the man as one of the many teachers he saw in the foyer, with short blue-black hair and soulful dark eyes.
"He can't control the Storian, Kay," the man was saying. "He may be School Master but he doesn't have the power to control something so powerful."
"And how do you know?" the shorter woman retorted, glaring with piercing red eyes. "Last student turnover marked two hundred years since Evil's last victory. And we're supposed to believe that and the School Master coming to power are coincidence? He's controlling the fairytales, Eider. He's killing our students!"
Arthur remembered seeing that name on his schedule. Professor Eider Întuneric.
The aforementioned professor paused for a moment, emotion flickering over his face. "It doesn't matter which side wins, Cadence. There are always casualties in a fairytale."
"And for the last two centuries every single one of those casualties has been one of my students," Cadence hissed. When she next spoke, it was quiet and threatening, ruby hair falling forward as she leant unbearably close. "As Dean of Evil I will not let my students be driven to slaughter."
This time, Professor Întuneric didn't flinch. "Then you're welcome to take the issue up with the School Master yourself."
The woman withdrew, suddenly unsure.
Professor Întuneric sighed, turning away from her. "You're being paranoid again. Your charges have every capability of winning their fairytales."
"And yours even more so," Cadence grumbled.
The professor cracked a grin. "Maybe you should be more concerned about my position as Dean of Good playing a part in my school's winning streak."
"You?" Cadence snorted, the ghost of a smile playing around her lips. "I'd be more worried Ptísi's role in the stories than yours."
"You mean to say an extravagant wardrobe isn't an undeniably powerful weapon?" the professor teased, beginning to walk towards the door.
Cadence fell into step beside him, giving him a small shove. "If that were the case, I'd have my own fairytale already."
Arthur jerked back, hiding against the wall as the doors glided open before the teachers. They strolled through together, voices falling to whispers as they transitioned into the foyer, and Arthur glanced back to the tall doors, beginning to swing closed. He slipped through just in time.
The first half of the room was bathed in sunlight, streaming down from a glass skylight, and the second half cast in shadow, lit only by golden sconces high against the walls, with high ceilings and filled with portraits, sculptures, and glass cases. The left wall was painted with a huge mural depicting a dashing prince and beautiful princess kissing at their wedding in front of a golden castle, with dozens of celebrating well-wishers and raining rose petals from above, sprinkled by cupids nestling in clouds. Large golden letters stretched through the clouds, informing Arthur what he was looking at:
EVERAFTER
He frowned. Of course—the ultimate fairytale ending. The weddings and castles written about in storybooks at home had never appealed to him, but he had to admit that this school did an eerily good job of selling it.
There has to be a map or a guide in here somewhere, he thought, and crept towards one of the exhibits, a glass box holding an open schoolbook filled with flowery handwriting. The plaque read: SNOW WHITE, ANIMAL FLUENCY EXAM (LETITIA OF MAIDENVALE). As he ventured deeper into the museum, he found preserved in more glass cases the blue cape of a boy who had gone on to become Cinderella's prince, Red Riding Hood's dorm pillow, Pinocchio's pyjamas; any number of relics from students who had gone on to win their fairytales. Venturing deeper into the museum and farther away from the skylight, he scanned the darkening walls for for a map of the school—and that's when he saw the dead animals.
Dozens of taxidermied animals, mounted on stands; the Three Bears, Cinderella's favourite rat, Jack's sold-off cow, all stamped with the names of students who hadn't been good enough to graduate as human. Arthur turned and saw a pumpkin carriage and a preserved beanstalk, students' names on plaques beneath, and went pale. All these years and he'd never believed; but it was painfully real now. In two hundred years, none of the kidnapped children had ever made it back to Tempo. What made him think he and Vivi would be the first?
Breathless, feeling sick, he hustled out of the collection of students—dead students!—and, desperate to find something else to focus on (or find a map) he drifted to a little corner nook with a string of paintings in gauzy, impressionist colours. As he examined them, he noticed there was something familiar about them. Scanning the line, he finally noticed—they were all paintings of Tempo. He went back to the start, looking at each in turn, finding children frolicking and reading books, set against the same lakeside cottages, the neat gardens, the crooked clock tower . . . until he stopped at the last painting. This one wasn't like the others at all.
In the town square, children heaved books into a raging bonfire, smoke billowing up into thick grey clouds that blocked the sun and contorted into hulking shapes.
A patrol of fairies burst through the tall doors across the museum and Arthur dove behind an exhibit. Peeking out from behind it, he watched as the fairies searched scoped the room, looking for something. The drew closer, closer . . . And just as they reached the back wall, Arthur bolted out from hiding and towards the glazed doors. The fairies screeched, surprised, and darted after him, shooting golden webs from their mouths. He zigzagged between statues and cabinets, dodging the missiles, and finally threw open the doors to a tsunami of pink uniforms—
He saw a flash of purple hair and dove into the mass, ducking behind Annik.
She swivelled in surprise on tall pink heels, identical to the pairs worn by every other single girl in the line. "Hello—?"
"Hide me," Arthur hissed, glancing pointedly over at the doors, where fairies hovered, searching the crowd.
Annik hummed. "Mmm, afraid I can't do that."
Arthur's eyes blew wide, waiting for her to turn him over—
Instead, she grabbed ahold of his arm and pulled him into her side, strolling quickly along with the other girls. Arthur squeaked in surprise.
"You're my date-at-first-sight until we get away from the fairies," she whispered, gliding forward, head held high. Arthur glanced back over his shoulder at the said fairies—they were stopped in their tracks, frowning at him on Annik's arm. Muttering amongst themselves, they turned away. Arthur drooped in relief.
"Thank you."
"It's no problem." She glimpsed the initial on his tie and lit up. "Oooh, 'A'? What is your name then? Austin? Adrien? Anthony?"
"Arthur," he said, glancing back again to check for the fairies, but they were gone.
"Arthur," she mulled, stretching her mouth around the name. "Sounds like a king's name."
༻·?ￂﾷ༺
Vivi had resolved to gathering up her dropped books from the floor and sorting through them before dumping them on the unclaimed bed. The titles were interesting enough:
Best Villainous Monologues, 2nd Ed.
Spells for Suffering, Year 1
The Novice's Guide to Kidnapping and Murder
Embracing Ugliness Inside & Out
How to Cook Children (with New Recipes!)
Truth be told, she couldn't wait to read them—maybe she could take them with her when she switched to Good. Her mind was already buzzing with all the possibilities. Digging in the bottom of her basket, she pulled out a hideous black frock with a starched collar that looked like it had been fashioned out of a bat wing. Was this Evil's uniform? She scrunched her nose in distaste. This, she could leave behind.
"So, where in the Woods are you from?" Rooster asked, awkwardly breaking the silence. Chloe glared at him. He nervously ignored her and continued. "Netherwood? Murmuring Mountains?"
"She's an Ever, you idiot," Chloe snapped.
Vivi looked up from her uniform. "Ever?"
"It's what we call the Good kids," Rooster explained. "Short for 'Ever After'."
"Which makes us . . . 'Nevers'?" Vivi mulled, remembering the lettered columns in the foyer.
Rooster nodded. "That's right."
"Short for what?" she asked, packing the frumpy smock away.
"'Nevermore'," Chloe said. "Eternal solitude."
Vivi raised an eyebrow.
"So, where in the Woods are you from?" Rooster pushed.
"I don't come from the Woods," Vivi replied, slumping onto the unclaimed bed. "People actually live in there?"
"Uh, yeah?" Rooster blinked.
"But what about those birds? The simps—synths—"
"Stymphs?" Rooster asked, and leaned back. "Oh, those come from the Thicket Tumble. People don't really live there."
"Thicket Tumble?" Vivi murmured.
Duet cleared their throat across the room, seemingly curious despite themself. "Not from the Woods?"
They remained unfazed as Chloe turned angry eyes on them. Clearly, she was still miffed about being stood up.
"No, I'm from Tempo," Vivi said, and held up her schedule, her name at the top. "It says on here 'Woods Beyond'."
"Never heard of it," Duet replied, examining their fingernails. "What fairytale family are you from?"
"Distant relative of the Goose Girl," Vivi fired off, wondering if image mattered amongst her Evil peers.
"Oh? How distant?" She had their attention now, their dark eyes fixed on her.
She folded her arms. "Two generations."
"Ah, grandchild then," Duet said, eyes flicking to Chloe, who caught their gaze and grinned wickedly. "Well that's certainly strange."
"How so?" Vivi huffed, irritated.
"The Goose Princess never had any grandchildren," Chloe said, smirking.
"And how on earth would you know?"
The blonde girl rolled back her sleeves and leaned forward, eyes glinting dangerously. "Because my grandmother made sure she wouldn't bare any children."
Vivi scoffed. "Your grandmother? What are you talking abo—"
She stopped, for she'd noticed the bracelet clasped around her roommate's wrist.
A bracelet made of children's bones, stained a pale yellow.
Chloe held it up on her wrist, admiring it. "Plated in gold, it looked just like the Queen's charm, which is how she convinced them she was the Princess." The girl raised her eyes to Vivi, whose blood ran cold. "Granny stabbed her womb through so she couldn't have any children. Wanted to make her watch her take her place and suffer. Should have killed her when she had the chance, and she would have avoided that barrel." She rolled her eyes. "I wouldn't make that mistake."
Eyes wide, Vivi turned slowly to the nightstand by Duet's bed, holding a claw-shaped candle and a small framed painting—a painting of a dark-skinned man sitting on a throne, a beautiful maiden on the floor beside him. Duet's lips twitched. "My father made the same mistake. Always had a weakness for good stories, so he let Scheherazade live as long as she shared her tales—and eventually married her." They gagged. "She poisoned him at the wedding banquet. Served him right."
Vivi whipped to Rooster on his bed and the poster peeling from the wall behind him: a young man in green, walking the plank to sharks in the water below, stamped with bold black letters:
WANTED:
PETER PAN
Dead or Alive
By Order of Captain Hook
"Never really knew my dad," Rooster sighed. "Kept a princess in the galley. Had lots of brothers and sisters growing up, though."
Vivi was hit with a wave of nausea and clamped a hand over her mouth. These kids were from the fairytales. Raised to torture. Born to kill. She was in a school full of murderers.
She needed to get out of here now.
Wolf howls blared outside and her three roommates straightened. "Let's get this over with," Duet grumbled, grabbing a putrid uniform from their bed and slipping it on. It looked like an oily potato sack.
Chloe stood, donning her own black robe, and swished to the door, cracking it open. Duet followed behind and slipped into the hallway after her and into a stampede of students.
Rooster yawned from his bed, stretching and pushing himself to his feet, lazily pulling on his own robes. He walked to the door and then stopped, turning to Vivi. "Aren't you coming?"
"Coming where?"
"The Welcoming. Both schools are meeting in the Theatre of Tales to debrief on the rules and year events and stuff." He nodded at her basket. "Oh, and you better put on your uniform before you come out."
He slid into the stream of students, leaving Vivi alone in the room. She stayed put and fingered her uniform, frowning with distaste, until she noticed a wolf herding students out in the hall, head turned and eyes fixed on her. He reached for the whip coiled at his belt.
Vivi hurriedly shoved the potato sack on over her clothes and scurried past him into the herd of students, keeping her head low on her their way to the joint-school meeting. If she just lasted until the Welcoming, surely she could speak to a teacher about switching schools.
Not that she was afraid of her roommates, or being trapped in a school full of rabid wolves and murderous students.
No, Vivi wasn't scared at all. So she clenched her clammy fists and kept marching.
Vivi: What about the simps?