The Nutcracker's Queen

Chapter 7

We didn't stop running until we had reached a small cliff that overlooked the Castle. "Captain, I need to stop. I have to open this, it's important." She tells Phillip who nods, saying that it would be alright because we'd be safe here. Clara opens the ornate silver egg only to find a beautiful music box inside. "It can't be." She mutters softly as I sit next to her. It was a very familiar song, one I had heard many a time, played by Marie on the piano.

She studied it for a moment before she let her hands drop into her lap. "It's just a music box." She says sadly before starting to get angry with her mother. Because her mother had told her that 'everything you need is inside'. But Clara thought she meant the egg, but I knew that Marie really meant Clara herself. But Clara didn't get the answers she wanted and that was the problem here. Answers.

 I shake my head and turn back towards the fourth realm. "I'm going back to my Mother, we have a war to prepare for." I say before I leave the two alone, as Clara talks about going home. I just assumed she was taking the key with her. So, the journey to once again find my mother began again. And I was okay being a traitor to the crown if it meant that I could spend more time with the woman I had been without my whole life.

And when I found her again, I wanted answers. So she told me the story. Of how she met my father and was the first regent to marry. Marie had been the officiant and within a year, they were blessed with my mother becoming pregnant. Sugar Plum, however, had become jealous as my mother had married the man she fancied. My father died due to a poisoning that was meant for Mother Ginger and the baby she had been growing. 

My father wasn't supposed to drink it but he did. Marie had left shortly after and then Sugar Plum banished Mother Ginger. Once I was born, Mother Ginger left me close to the entrance to the Christmas Tree forest about an hour before Marie arrived and found me, bringing me to live with her. I spent more time with her before I realized something. "I have to help them, they're walking to a trap." I say to my mother who nods.

I took Darla back to the castle and met with Clara and Phillip at the entrance. "If I'm right, you'll need me." I say softly as the drawbridge falls. "You also can't feasibly show up without me." I jokingly and Phillip nodded as we were welcomed back into the castle. Sugar Plum rushed Clara the minute she got off her horse. The four of us rushed down to the room that held the Engine where Sugar Plum wasted no time in turning the Engine on.

And she was ecstatic when it worked. "Bring me the Tin Soldiers!" Sugar Plum called to another soldier who brought her a wheely cart with about ten boxes of tin soldiers. "You can't use tin soldiers." Phillip protests and Sugar Plum was quick to try and lie to him, trying to tell him that she could and to not be silly. "You have no idea how they'll behave. They're completely hollow." Phillip continues to protest. 

But she shook her head. "They'll behave exactly as I tell them." Sugar Plum coos back almost passive-aggressively. "The perfect soldier." She adds, bubbling brightly at the idea of hollow soldiers before yelling to for them to put them on the platform. So a Nutcracker soldier emptied one of the boxes of Tin Soldiers onto the glass floor of the Engine. Right under the beam that makes them come alive.

"It's time to think big." She says as Clara joins us down by the hundreds of boxes of soldiers. "Are you sure about this?" Phillip asks her as he looks over at me. I link my fingers with his as Clara nods, trying to remind him that Sugar Plum was trying to protect the other three Realms from the Fourth. Sugar Plum practically slammed her palm down on the button. It wheered and buzzed and made a strange clinking noise. 

Then, once in position, it shot a bolt of electric energy at the little Tin Soldiers that were starting to not look so little anymore. They grew and grew until they were almost a foot taller than Phillip. They quickly came to life the minute the beam stopped making them grow. "Hello, Boys." Sugar Plum says, almost seductively as the three of us stood their with our eyes wide and mouths gaping at the sight of them. 

"They're huge!" Clara gasps out as I grab Phillip's arm to steady myself while Phillip inched himself in front of me so that I would stand behind him. Protected from the Tin Soldiers. "I know, isn't it magnificent?" Sugar Plum asks us I decide to put my foot down. "I order you to stop, Sugar Plum." I tell her, trying to sound authoritative while still trying not to be terrified of her. She gives me an awful smile that looked incredibly fake. 

"Soldiers, attention." Sugar Plum tells the Tin Soldiers and they all climb to the feet and jump to attention. Then she starts giving them orders, including to prepare to march on the Fourth Realm. "I thought this army was to defend us?!" Clara shouts and Sugar Pulm shakes her head a little bit. "Well, attack is the best form of defense, my dear." She tells Clara as I pull Phillip's ear down to my mouth. 

"I found my crown, and it's a secret." I whisper to him quickly before pulling away like I never said anything at all. He glances at me, nods, and returns his gaze to the Tin Soldiers marching around us. "My mother wouldn't have wanted this." Clara all but yells at Sugar Plum and that's all it takes for Sugar Plum to snap back at her. Almost like bringing up Marie to her was the final straw in a whole line of straws. 

"I don't care what your mother wanted. She's not here." She snaps at Clara. Clara tries to order Sugar Plum to stop but all that got her is a laugh right in her face. "Finally ready to play Queen with your Aunt?" She demanded but it was too late. Because Clara had done exactly what Sugar Plum had needed her to. Bring her the key. And now that she had it, Sugar Plum no longer needed myself or Clara. 

"Seize them." Sugar Plum orders the Tin Soldiers. And because she gave them life, they would only listen to her. It was awful. "Traitor!" Phillip shouted at her as he struggled to get to me. "Why are you doing this?" Clara questioned, tears in her eyes. And boy did Sugar Plum have a few issues. "Your mother abandoned us and the man I love marries Mother Ginger. And then she expects us to carry on and play nice." Sugar Plum complained.

She had her own tears and for one moment, I felt sorry for her. But I was dragged back to earth my the metal hand that was squeezing my arm painfully tight. "Well, I don't want to play nice!" She bellowed and my mouth fell open. "It was you." I breathed, getting everyone's attention as I joined the tear party with Clara and Sugar Plum. "You killed my father." I whispered and she glared at me as though I was a stain.

"Your mother married the love of my life and then had the audacity to have a baby with him, not even a year after she stole him." Sugar Plum hissed at me as a tear slid down my face, my legs giving out a little. "The poison wasn't meant to kill him. It was to leave him a widower and babyless...So he'd come back to me." She reasoned and I shook my head, not wanting to believe that she could be so coldhearted. 

"And my Mother didn't do anything wrong, did she?!" I bellowed at her, tears pouring down my face as I struggled against the grasp of the Tin Soldiers. Sugar Plum's awful plan was to shrink the Regents back down to their little toy sizes so that she could be queen of the four Realms. Because a machine that can grow things can also shrink things. "You are horrible." Clara hisses at her and Sugar Plum flips her lid again.

"How dare you speak to your Queen that way!" She bellows at Clara before the guards are called to lock us up. We're shoved into a stairwell with a locking door before the guards shut it and left. But this time, there would be no warning my mother of the impending attack that Sugar Plum was planing for her. It was just us, locked in a room with no way out. So I rushed up the stairs to see if I could fins something to help us.

Instead...I found an observatory...with my father's name ingraved on a plaque.