The Deal

At first Apple was too surprised to speak; out of all the things Rotbart could have asked for in exchange for dancing lessons, cooking lessons were the last thing she expected.

"...You want me to teach you how to COOK?" She finally said.

"Yes."

"But...WHY?! You don't need to cook!" She protested.

"Au contraire. I may be a powerful sorcerer, but I have to eat like everyone else." Rotbart explained smoothly. "And shockingly, not everyone can have four-star kitchen staff at their beck and call like you, princess."

"But...wouldn't Ginger be a better choice?" Apple suggested nervously. Everyone knew that Ginger Breadhouse was the best cook in the entire school.

"I could ask her." Rotbart said. "But she didn't ask me for ballet tutoring. Besides," Rotbart continued, "Isn't cooking kind of a thing for Snow Whites?"

Apple gulped. Rotbart was absolutely right. Except for one little thing:

Apple White couldn't cook.

At least, not well. Cooking Class-ic had been her least favorite subject, hands down. And NOT because she was constantly afraid of being poisoned, as she claimed to everyone. She hated it because she wasn't a born cook like her mother. On top of being a beloved monarch, the most gorgeous woman around, and a wiz at cleaning, the current Snow White's culinary skills were on parr with the great spellebrity chef Jack Horner. And so it had been for all the White rulers.

That is, until Apple White took Cooking Class-ic during her freshman year. It didn't take long for her to realize that this was not a part of her destiny she was going to excel at. Despite her best efforts, nearly every dish she prepared had a way of tasting vaguely toxic. Luckily for Apple, Raven had also been in that class and everyone quickly assumed that she poisoned Apple's dishes out of spite (and for practice). And even though Apple knew it was wrong, she didn't attempt to correct her teacher and classmates and quietly stood by while Raven protested her innocence.

Out of pity for being constantly "persecuted" by her villain, the teacher wound up giving in Apple an "A." And Apple maintained her perfect 4.0 GPA and never darkened the door of a kitchen after that (she had quietly convinced herself that the dwarfs would be fine with takeout).

But now she either had to try to teach her antagonist the one thing she was terrible at or deal with twenty-something prima ballerinas' disdain and whole bunch of whiny rebels' criticism.

If it was anything less than the latter, Apple would have never agreed to the former.

"...Fine." She said.

"Hexcellent. Meet me in the school catacombs at 8:00 tomorrow, and we'll get started." Rotbart told her. "See you then, princess." Then he hung up.

Apple stared at her phone for several moments. And wondered just what the hell she had gotten herself into.

Rotbart couldn't help grinning he put down his phone. He knew perfectly well Apple couldn't cook and he knew all about the Cooking Class-ic fiasco. He had heard Raven's side of it long ago and his ex-girlfriend Kitty, who had also been at that class at the time, confirmed it (she just hadn't bothered to defend Raven since she enjoyed the chaos).

Sure, he would help Apple become a better dancer. Under his tutelage, she'd easily become the best damn ballerina out there. Nonetheless, he was going to enjoy making her squirm. He didn't want to lose his villainous touch, after all. And he wasn't going to torment her just in terms of making her clean for him or drop-kicking her out of her comfort zone.

He immediately set off to find some spiders for his first dance lesson.