Apple sighed despairingly as she gingerly hung the shiny apple-shaped ornament up on the fake tree she had built out of her float.

"What do you mean something is wrong with the Book of Legends mysterious all-knowing stranger who lives at the bottom of the school?" Hunter asked with very, unusually wide eyes and a tone that sounded more than a bit off, the display causing Giles to bite his lip to hold back laughter and Maddie and Ashlynn to make sporadic motions at the boy for some reason.

But that didn't matter to Apple, because all that she could focus on was the fact that she had just been told that the Book of Legends, the artifact that held all the fairytales together was off somehow and if it wasn't working correctly then…

"Could this mean that if we fix it the real name of my real intended villain will be revealed?" Apple held her breath, her heart aching with slowly growing hope.

Giles nodded and babbled something about horses but Maddie nodded slowly, understanding the older man's words. "Anything might be possible…" The Hatter stated with an odd carefulness. "But we won't know unless we check it out."

"Oh yes!" Apple cheered right up hopping up and down and clapping her hands.

"But as the tinker always insists it is best not to get your hopes up too high Apple-bee." Maddie's voice was only this side of politely scolding.

Apple deflated.

The blonde princess sighed again as she was drawn back from the memory.

Maddie may be right in that Apple should not get her hopes up so high, for all she knew Faybelle really was her villain now and that girl and her mother who had saved her from the well had either disappeared already or… or maybe they hadn't and they just didn't want to be apart of the fairytales any-

No! That couldn't be right… could it? No, no it couldn't because… well they all had to follow their stories didn't they? After all Apple was born to be the fairest maiden of them all and despite the teensy little hiccup of her, having blonde hair… and having side interests in things that were more on the academic side rather than just strictly maidenly interests and princess obligations to running a kingdom… and what with her looking more and more like her dad than her mom as the years passed… and the whole glasses thing, plus the fact that in the middle of the night in her quiet private dorm while laying in bed she did kind of feel a little cheated that she couldn't inherit her own birthright and kingdom without having to marry a prince first- what was her point again? Oh yes! The point was that Apple was born for the role of Snow White just like the real Evil Queen was born specifically for the role of poisoning her mom!

…Except she didn't poison her mom, the real Evil Queen disappeared and left the Evil Fairy to steal that role for herself.

And if Apple was being honest with herself, really truly honest, she could see herself grudgingly admitting that if the Real Evil Queen and her daughter were still out there somewhere and had not disappeared even after all this time… then maybe they were never in danger of that fate in the first place and if they didn't want the role then…

But Apple still couldn't bring herself to let go of her need to have that little witch-child that she had met that day be the one to poison her and give her the happy ending that she always wanted but was terrified that… her defects would prevent her to get.

Because when Apple had met that little witch she was utterly bewitchingly perfect and after she had found out that witch was her true destined villain Apple had wanted no one else to play the role of her villain.

Years ago while visiting the forest villages with her mother to better learn how to smile and wave properly to the common people in order to boost her personal image Apple had been a very bad little girl and wandered away from her mother's entourage when the adults had all been busy with boring grown up stuff when she saw a butterfly and had decided that chasing the insect would be more fun than standing quietly and still at her mother's side like she had been told to do since little princesses at her age were to be seen and fawned over but not heard or acting all rambunctious. Her mother had said that only bad little princesses spoke at the wrong times or wiggled in their seats to the point of distracting the adults when they had important things to discuss.

But Apple had been too young to really understand much less care about why acting so proper was so important, she had been bored and she had wanted to play.

And that's when she saw the butterfly flap past.

So Apple being a bad girl had snuck away from her mother and followed the butterfly into the forest where she eventually came upon a crumbling small round stone wall that led to a weird hole in the ground and when she leaned over the edge she could see a curious light moving around at the bottom.

Apple soon found that she had leaned too far over the edge of the stone wall of the well, for in the next moment she lost her balance and came tumbling down, screaming in terror as she dropped…

Only to end up safely landing on someone who had been at the bottom already.

Apple had never gotten the small witch-girl's name, something that Apple would kick herself for years and years later, but the dark haired girl hadn't seemed to see fit to offer hers nor did she seem offended when Apple had rudely declared herself; "I'm Apple and I'm the fairest princess in all the world, my mom said so!" without asking for the witch-child's name so at least there was that, and there really that much time for it because once the oddity of landing on someone randomly at the bottom of a well wore off Apple started to get scared, the light that she had seen at the bottom had vanished and no matter how loudly or for how long (less than five minutes Apple later calculated when she was older) she had called out neither her mother nor her guards came to get her.

After Apple was too out of breath to shout any longer and began to cry the witch-girl slowly lowered her fingers from her ears and had hugged Apple so sweetly, rubbing Apple's back and using a purple handkerchief to wipe away Apple's tears, singing softly in a language that Apple didn't understand but was immediately comforted by.

"Wha- what if we can't get out?" Apple had sniffled, clinging to her new friend desperately. "What if they never find us? This isn't like the fairytales at all! I'm in so much trouble, what kind of maiden does a bad girl thing and just… wanders away?"

"I thought that maidens were supposed to get themselves into trouble and wander away in the fairytales." The witch had grunted under the strength of Apple's hug. "Isn't that how they are able to get themselves the happily ever after? Get into trouble and have someone save them?"

"Yes but you need to have a villain to have a good fairytale!" Apple had despaired, not having heard at that point very many fairytales aside from her own and therefore was unaware that there were, in fact, several stories that did not have a villain in them (humpty dumpty for example and Humphrey was rather relieved about that seeing as he currently had a steadily growing phobia-of-Faybelle and really wouldn't know what to do with himself other than scream and runaway if he did have a villain like Faybelle in his story). "And my mom says that the Evil Fairy is a horrible replacement for the real Evil Queen so as long as she's around Snow White will never get a proper story!"

"…I'm not too sure about that…" The witch had coughed cagily. "I've heard that the Evil Fairy was very creative in- oh hey don't cry, look if you'll loosen my fingers a bit I'll see about getting some light down here okay?"

"The real villain to the story of Snow White was supposed to be cunning and bewitching and evil and super powerful in magic!" Apple continued to sob into the other's neck as the witch had tried to move her trapped hands from Apple's front. "She had been perfect for the role born right into it and then she disappeared, she's gone forever and I-"

There was a flash of light and Apple looked up in surprise to see that the witch's freed hand was glowing.

"Listen, I may be a very… pathetic villain, I wouldn't know what to do even if I wanted that kind of role, but I can do magic, and I do know the way out, so would it be alright with you if for once the witch in the story saves the princess while also giving her the proper happy ending? Because I may not be apart of a fairytale, but I do hate it when maidens are scared and crying… it shouldn't be allowed for a maiden who has so much to be happy about be all sad and scared of being alone in the dark." The witch spoke both apologetically and earnestly.

"But I'm not alone." Apple realized out loud, everything in her little worldview suddenly feeling right and just how it should be for the first time since the day she had finally understood why her mother snapped at and about the Evil Fairy so much. "You're here with me."

The long dried up well had turned out to be, when Apple looked around in the witch's glowing light a part of an ancient underground cave that some hermit years and, years ago had drilled a hole in the roof of and had drained dry the underground lake that the two girls had been standing in the remains of this whole time.

It had been utterly magical, Apple remembered as they walked hand in hand through a natural stone tunnel formed from millions of years of having water flow through it, through the glow of the witch's hand the rock had glittered more prettily than all the jewels in the palace (and that was saying something), the shapes that the rock had been carved into were both alien and fascinating, and the old drawings on the cave walls, created by people and civilizations long forgotten in time made Apple gape in wonder for what was depicted on the walls wasn't the kind of art that she'd ever seen and it was odd in an absolutely fantastic new sort of way.

"Little black bird? Birdy! Birdy where are you?" Voices had floated into the cave and the witch had to pull a reluctant Apple away from the amazing drawings on the cave walls.

The Evil Queen didn't look that evil, even while wearing a traditional witch's hat and strange clothing the woman looked just like a normal person to Apple's initial first impressions and to this day it was rather difficult remembering the woman's face because she had at that point been so ordinary and plain that Apple lost much interest in her the moment her new friend had introduced the woman as her mother.

"She didn't do nothing to you did she? Cause I've heard Fay say some stuff about the crazy things that these people in the villages get up to and she said that there was a lot of flagrant debauchery amongst the plebeians!" Apple's first impression of Briar, her new witch friend's older foster sister was a little more memorable however.

"You sound like my grandma." Apple had observed in that blunt sort of way little children are ought to do, while the Evil Queen had been busy using her magic to clean and fix Apple's dress. "You talk all proper and with long words just like she does. Do you come from Ever After too?"

For some reason Briar had been horrified by something that Apple said. "I am certainly not! I am not at all proper like you citizens of this fairytale land are!" She declared, acting like fairytales were a plague to be avoided at all costs, as a silently laughing Evil Queen shooed the three children along.

"You've got the right voice for it." Apple had persisted kindly, grabbing onto both the hands of the Evil Queen and her new witch friend, trying to soothe over whatever wrong that she had committed with Briar who was glaring at Apple from the other side of her foster mother. "And the words sound right too, you sure sound like you are from around here."

"That's my fault I'm afraid." The evil Queen had chuckled. "I used to go to school here you know, so all the long words and the accent got transferred to my kids, I'm sure that you learned how to speak so politely from your parents too kiddo. Am I correct?"

Apple had puffed out her little chest in pride. "My mom is the fairest of them all! Of course I'd learn to be just like her!"

"Oh I'll bet she is. I can tell by the way that you walk and talk that your mother is very fair and had taught her daughter well to become just like a fair princess…" The Evil Queen trailed off, looking past the trees to the clearing separating the forest from the village. "Oh! Er… be quiet kids it's the queen and her people up ahead, I don't think that she'd like being disturbed by a family of witch-"

"Mom!" Apple had cheered and ran towards her mother, who had noticed that Apple had disappeared a few minutes prior and was beginning to get worried as she looked around for her child.

Things had happened very fast after that, Snow White had caught a glimpse of the Evil Queen, recognized her, and started to run past Apple and towards the witch even as said witch and her family hastily made a quick retreat in a swirl of purple magic.

Apple put the last finishing touch onto her float and sat down gloomily over the side of the platform.

She had never told her mother about the cave, the ancient paintings, or the purple handkerchief she had still been in possession of with a curly R embroidered into it with silver colored thread, didn't have the chance to get much out aside from admitting that she fell down a well and that the Evil Queen and her daughter had helped her to get out, plus the fact that the Evil Queen still thought that Snow White was the fairest of them all and super awesome because Snow White had looked so very scary at that moment and Apple wanted to make her mother stop looking at her like that... which did work, kind of, Snow White stopped looking scary but she had ended up crying instead.

As time moved on and all the adults were going into a frenzy of excitement Apple decided that maybe keeping the cave a secret would be for the best, it was special after all, it was the place where Apple had met the most perfect villain in existence for her story, even though the witch didn't seem to believe that she'd make a good match for one. She was a person so perfect that Apple just couldn't see anybody else that she'd trust more to give her the proper happy ending that… she might not get if it wasn't done right.

"Oooh glad that you're thinking about the most important part of the story." Faybelle jeered as the fairy walked by, breaking Apple out of her thoughts."Although instead of an apple I was thinking… maybe I'd try to poison you with toxic smoke from a lit candlestick, you know to give a little variety to the boring old story eh?" The Fairy waggled her brows as she continued on to her own float, which sported an evil looking mirror, a cauldron with toy children trying to crawl out of it, a spinning wheel, and a big plump papaya skewered upon the overly large needle of said spinning wheel.

Apple saw red.

"Don't even count on it Faybelle Thorn! The only villain I'm going to allow myself to be poisoned by is the daughter of the real and true Evil Queen!" Apple shot up to her feet as she roared after the fairy.

"Don't count on it princess!" Faybelle cackled in merry delight, every inch of the fairy's swaggering gait indicating that she had every bit of confidence in her words.

"We'll just see about that." Apple growled lowly, glaring furiously at the hated papaya fruit.

XXX

The items in Milton's pocket felt like heavy weights needing to be gotten rid of, and he would have earlier while the students were distracted and if his secretary was able to open the box! He needed to buy some time and he needed the students to believe that maybe Miss Thorn was not the right one to hold so many fairytale roles!

"You having some difficulties there Headmaster?" Faybelle deadpanned politely.

Said man startled, his fingers slipping from the lit of the stone box he had been attempting to open out of frustration more than out of necessity now that his plan had been foiled.

"Miss Thorn… I can see that your mother left you… prepared…" The man glowered down at the professional looking tall black chief's hat sitting innocently on the fairy's head, the new charmed fur lined wool woven black caplet with silver embroidery and an attached small scrying crystal ball charm caged elegantly with metal wire being used as the clasp at the stiff collar, and…

The Headmaster's scowl deepened. "Where did you get that?" He demanded darkly, pointing to the spellbook under the girl's arm, the same spellbook that used to belong to Clawstorm Queen when she was in school, he knew that it was filled with notes, ideas, and of course, spells of both the witch's own creation and of spells that would be the most useful for an up and coming Evil Queen.

She had showed so much promise and dedication, what went wrong?

Faybelle looked down at the book, blinking in false confusion. "My box where my mother had left it for me."

"You know what I mean Miss Thorn." The Headmaster glared.

Faybelle sighed a put upon sigh. "The people in charge of the Breadhouse and Queen estates couldn't hold on to everything for more than five years so my mother took the liberty to store all of her late classmate's belonging, may their souls rest in peace, and while she was looking through it all she came across some things that I'd need when I got to this point in my education." She cast the Headmaster a jaundiced look. "My mother did get legal permission from the surviving family or the estate holders for everything sir. There is a stack of legal files back in my box proving that it is such if you really want to go that far."

There was a bladed edge hidden within the wounded tone and look in the girl's eyes, Milton could sense it, could see that through the girl's quick glance away from him that she was pointing out the wide, sympathetic looks pointed her way and the looks of annoyed distain directed at him. There were many students at his school who were contemplating very seriously to defect from the fairytales and an even larger population of their parents who were either encouraging their children to do so or were currently breaking ties themselves or both! The rate of divorce/ separation/childlessness/out-and-out abandonment of long-term fairytale duties, amongst the alumni of the school was increasing alarmingly the longer the Evil Queen was sighted but not caught.

It was all very unexpected for him, the first few years after Clawstorm Queen and some of her graduating class had disappeared the number of fairytale characters who had been growing a bit lax in their interpretations of the stories suddenly became very strict about everything… more fairytales began to disappear here and there and fears were running higher and higher for nearly half a decade, but when it was discovered that the Evil Queen was in fact alive and well… the situation began to slowly but surely reverse itself, almost as if there were a driving force behind it all.

Milton had enough accumulated allies to know the rumors, of characters led by Evil Queen who had elected to banish themselves in order to either avoid story obligation or to keep their children from having to go through a fairytale, that somewhere right under his nose sympathizers to Clawstorm Queen were quietly converting to new and dangerous ideas but no matter where or how hard he searched he just could not find the source to all of this!

And then there was the issue of Faybelle Thorn and her mother. He didn't know the extent to their involvement in all of this, and he despaired being able to prove anything if he dared to leap to conclusions, but they seemed to be thriving on all of this madness! The Evil Fairy not only profited greatly from some key characters disappearing but she also gained allies in places that simply did not make sense to him, he had little doubts that she knew more about what happened to the real Evil Queen than what she was letting on, but between her own spies in the school and her daughter doing her utmost to encourage and gain sympathy from the rebellion faction in both the school and in the alumni he had soon found that any attempts on his part to keep things under tight control were slowly but surely being slipped away from his grasp.

He glanced around for a brief moment at all the unattended boxes in the Hall of the Ancestors that were supposed to have students, the next generation of stories, standing in front of them, opening them up and receiving the gifts from their parents, watched over by the stained glass figures of their origin ancestors.

When his gaze came to that of the original Evil Queen his fingers found a firm grip on the Queen family's designated box and tugged fruitlessly at it, trying to get it to open.

"Very well miss Thorn, go back to your box and wait for the rest of your class to finish with theirs." The man gritted out as politely as he could but to his embarrassment the girl had already been halfway across the hall, making him, the Headmaster of the school, feel as though a superior had just dismissed him!

"It's empty." Miss White's disappointed voice drifted to Milton's hearing, she was holding the lid to Pinocchio's box. "This makes the third one, I don't understand it Ashlynn, why are some empty while others are shut so tight that they won't open? It has to mean something right?"

"The older ones are sealed shut Apple." Miss Ella pointed out gently. "I'm sorry but I don't want you to get your hopes up only to be disappointed again, and… I can't help but notice that it's only the boxes with people who were the first to disappear that are sealed shut, meaning that it's most likely that as time moves on…" Miss Ella trailed off.

There was an awful silence from the blonde princess.

"Does that mean… that when the box is sealed… that it's too late for them?" She whispered in horror.

"Or it just could be that they've been able to officially break free from the Book of Legends." Miss Cheshire snorted while rolling her eyes. "Come on Apple, unlike you, the Book of Legends can't afford to hold out hope that future heirs will magically appear to take up the torch, it has to find new characters to play the roles, it needs to adapt before our generation and all the generations coming in behind us become of age. Most likely the Book and this place has realized the true facts of the situation: the Evil Queen is never coming back, Clawstorm Queen has moved on from fairytales for good and will not be back to willingly turn back the clock to old times."

"No… no it can't be!" Miss White shook her head in grief. "It has to be her, my-my real true villain has to be-"

"Me princess." Miss Thorn sounded annoyed. "Your real true villain is me, whether you want it to be or not."

Except Milton knew that characters didn't just disappear if they refused to be apart of their story, they had to go somewhere…

He felt the underside of the stone lid more carefully, if he paid clos attention then maybe… yes! There it was, a small bump that was not stone!

Miss White sounded panicked as he took the opportunity at everyone's distraction to look under the edge of where the lid met the box. "But it can't be! I don't want-"

"Well too bad!" Miss Thorn snapped. "Or Too good as this situation may turn out to be, after all what kind of future queen would you make if you got accustomed to everything just being provided for you and everyone and everything being forced to bend to your will all because you whined and cried and acted like such a spoiled brat? Having one or two things that don't go your way will only be the best for you. Starting with our story, which will by the way have elements that no one will expect coming and will be something that people will talk about for generations if I do say so myself. It is my job now to bring more culture appropriate elements to this seeing as how it is going to be my family that will take up the responsibilities of three separate stories from now on!"

Glue! Milton internally rejoiced because there was a bead of dried glue here! Somebody had come by at some point and glued this box shut!

Now the question was why? And more importantly; where they trying to hide something? Maybe? Surely they didn't just glue the box shut to make it seem like they were dead, after all an empty box would have sufficed surely!

Oh he had missed something because Miss Thorn was stalking away angrily and Miss White was in tears, oh dear, and he could hear murmurings about the young fairy "having a point" and "what is Apple's problem anyway? Faybelle is just trying to do her best and here Apple goes being so mean about it all" from many of the other students.

Oh dear, it would seem that he'd be subjected to yet another call from the queen, really he did not know how the woman knew when her daughter was having difficulties being liked by the other students but it seemed as though whenever Miss White stumbled either himself or the girl's teachers would be getting a call from the "concerned parent" in question and… well it was not Milton's place to be critical of the fairest of them all, especially where her parenting skilled came into play.

His secretary would have to field that call anyway, because tonight Milton was going to take a more investigative look into what the glued shut boxes were hiding…