So, Mal stole the wand.
A couple of days of being gaslit and seeing how lovely the people of Auradon were wasn't going to change Mal's mind. She'd decided, and she'd made her decision long before Ben had remembered them.
Auradon was nice, she guessed, in a superficial way, but she didn't trust it. She didn't trust the fact that Ben had known that she'd spelled him and done nothing about it. She didn't trust Audrey and Chad, who'd been sniping at them since day one without ever considering the fact that Mal had been in a gang. She didn't trust the fact that Queen Leah saw her, and immediately tried to have her sent back {sure, she probably should have, but, well, wasn't it kind of rude to just assume?}.
The point was, that Auradon wasn't what it said it was, and Mal had chosen her side long ago. Her allegiance was to Jay, Evie, and Carlos first, and her mother second. Kind of. If her mother was the best available option.
So, when the coronation came, and Ben had that large, ugly, plastic-looking crown put on his head, and promised to protect the people of Auradon, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer- it was really easy, to just pick up the wand.
It was like... taking candy from a baby.
And, well, what were they gonna do about it? No one in Auradon knew anything about magic anymore, not even the Fairy Godmother.
So, it was really easy to take the wand, it was really easy, to say that if they didn't comply with her commands, she'd kill all of them. It was really easy to threaten them with her mother, without actually letting her mother go free.
Because Mal knew a couple of things. Not many, but some. She knew, for example, that letting her mother free would be stupid because, well, she wasn't an idiot. Maleficent didn't share. If she let her mother go, there would be any matching thrones or hers-and-hers crowns. But, Mal didn't mind sharing, as long as she was sharing with the right people.
She didn't mind sharing with Carlos, for example. Carlos, who she'd known her whole life, and who she loved, and who'd taught her how to count properly because no one else ever could. Who she spent nights with on her thin, cold mattress on the floor when he couldn't go home because Cruella was acting like... well, Cruella.
And she didn't mind sharing with Jay. Jay, who was... stronger than her, most of the time, but wasn't cruel about it. Jay, who she'd known longer than she could even remember, and who'd snuck in food for her when her mom forgot, and who went against his father's rules to make sure that Evie was okay.
She didn't mind sharing the throne with Jay, or Carlos, or Evie. Evie, who was probably her best friend in the world. Evie, who knew her like the back of her hand, even though Mal's mother who tried to banish her. Evie, who Mal had met with in secret for years, and had become... close with, against her mother's wishes, and knowing the consequences of what would happen if they were caught together.
So, no, Mal didn't mind sharing with Carlos, or Jay, or Evie. So- why shouldn't she? She had the wand, her mother was locked away- their parents were all locked away, and they never had to deal with them if they didn't want to.
So, it wasn't the end of the world if Mal... forgot part of her mother's plan. It was nice, though, to see all the pretty pink princesses and perfect princes of Auradon bow down to her {it was nice to melt that ugly fucking crown down into a crown of thorns and it was nice to string up their boy-king in a perversion of their god}. It was nice to be a queen, next to Evie, and to Jay, and to Carlos. To the four of them, villains' kids, who Auradon had forgotten about, who they'd condemned to a life in prison for no reason other than their parentage.
It was... something like closure. Something like karma. Mal didn't mind it at all {she also didn't mind the mass murder of the crowd at the coronation- sometimes, to make an omelette, you gotta break a few eggs}.
After that, everything was kind of a blur. Mal had the wand. Mal was powerful with the wand, Mal knew how to use the wand without ever having to learn.
The wand was supposed to be a force for good, and in the hands of someone evil, it was very, very powerful. And very, very dangerous.
Evie wanted a palace, so Mal gave her Auradon's palace.
Jay wanted Agrabah, so Mal gave him Agrabah.
Carlos wanted to be free of his mother, so Mal killed his mother.
With the wand, it was easy to give people what they wanted. Easy to take what she wanted. Cause what she wanted- what she really wanted, was to be Queen of the Moors. To take her mother's title. She wanted to be able to walk freely past the wall of thorns her mother had constructed all those years ago.
And when she tried, she could.
It was a nice change, to be more powerful than her mother.
They spent some times like that- Evie in Auradon, reforming the country the way she wanted it. jay in Agrabah, wreaking havoc the way his father never managed. She and Carlos on the moors, rewriting her mother's laws to allow for more freedom {they'd grown up in a cage, was it any surprise that they valued freedom above anything else}.
{The other times, they spent in each other's arms and beds, wrapped up in themselves and each other}.
They didn't free the people of the Isle- they weren't some great salvation or messiah.
They were just selfish, and powerful, and happy.