5 Reasons to be Happy:
1. I'm actually alive and I haven't died or been put on life support or joined the illuminati guys I am okay I've just been on a very long break
2. I'm finally updating after approximately a month and a half huzZAH
3. I just finished up my sixth show (third lead woop woop) and it went so so so well. The cast was so much fun to work with, and I became attached to my character very quickly. Unfortunately, I have really really bad post-show depression at the moment :(
4. My readers have stayed dedicated and patient and beautiful and I want to thank each and every one of you for being so fantastic.
5. On April 2nd, I turned fifteen, and I spent the whole day in my pajamas. Swag money.
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Here's chapter twenty three, aka "Leah is a fucking mess, and Ivy and Anna contemplate the meaning of love".
~~~~~~~~~~
"Watch out!"
Leah's first instinct was to heed King Adam's warning, covering her ears and lowering her head, just barely avoiding another showering of tinted glass. Jagged fragments of gold and red, reminiscent of multicolored stars, smashed against the floor with a headache-inducing trill, a coexistence of delicacy and danger.
"Are you alright?" A question that had been asked more times than necessary, to which Leah nodded in response, hesitantly lifting her head.
"I'm fine, Adam. Are you?"
A nod, civil and obedient.
"Good. Let's continue, then."
The group had spent the previous few minutes turning corner after corner, stepping through hallways glossed in darkness. Each individual light source had been extinguished, providing more evidence towards the theory that this intrusion had been planned. Thankfully, King Adam had spent countless nights parading around various wings of the castle in darkness thicker than this, and knew each corner perfectly- which still didn't excuse the fact that Leah had put herself in incredible danger.
Every so often, another window would shatter, or another array of footsteps would echo from further down the hall, or another icy laugh would descend upon the room. And the anxiety- the anxiety was both dreadful and desirable at the same time. Leah felt her veins start to burn, and each individual nerve cell throbbed in anguish, drunk on the belief that something gruesome was about to occur. Leah found the sensation to be utterly euphoric.
"Are you sure that you don't want to turn back, my friend?" Odelia questioned. "After all, you-"
"No." Leah shook her head. "No, I- I can't."
That was a lie. She could, definitely, turn back- it would have been easier for her to spin on her heel and flee rather than stay within the sight of danger. However, she couldn't bring herself to fight the disgusting sense of fascination that had bloomed within her chest, poisoned flowers whose elongated stems had coiled themselves around each bone in her ribcage.
Leah had been born with a passion for danger, and she hated it.
"Mother?"
And, just as quickly as they'd bloomed, the flowers died, and the pounding sense of euphoria came to a halt.
"M-Mother? Where- Where are you?" The voice was frantic, searching- each little syllable was a trembling hand, attempting to reach out and grab something. And the hands grabbed Leah.
"Aurora?" Leah's tone was soft, questioning rather than calling.
Adam had gone perfectly still, raising his sword in defense, and the three fairies had their wands at the ready, spells of all kinds accumulating atop their tongues.
Adam cleared his throat, muttering something about a trick or a spell. However, Leah paid little attention. Her blood had turned to stone, and her mind was elsewhere, singing with only one thought- Aurora, the final strand of hope in Leah's world that had remained uncut, was in danger.
The first step was the hardest to take, as it normally was. After that, though, everything came easily. Leah was running, ripping through curtains upon curtains of darkness, holding up the front of her skirt as not to trip. Odelia was calling, pleading, the hallway echoing with distant cries of "come back", which were instantly overshadowed by Princess Aurora's agonizing screams and shouts of distress. The Queen of Elia didn't know where she was going, slamming herself into wall after wall after wall, knocking into paintings and decorative vases of all types. One thought overrode all others: find the source of the sound. Follow the noise. Get to Aurora.
Her search, if you could call it such, led the queen towards a single door painted in sunshine gold- a hue which matched Aurora's hair- that had been left ajar. Without contemplation, Leah pushed against it, stepping into a tiny room flooded with shadow.
Immediately, the torture-induced wailing ceased, and silence descended upon the palace, carrying with it heavy bundles of terror. Leah heard the door croak to life and click into its proper place against the wall, though she wasn't the one who had touched it.
The elderly queen froze, allowing her heartbeat to grow steady, though the itching feeling that she wasn't alone had made it quite difficult to find a moment in which she could calm herself. "A-Aurora?"
"Fondest greetings, your majesty."
Leah reacted instantly- a scream, a jump, a startling throb of the heart. The closing of her throat and the uncontrollable twitching of her fingers proved that the euphoric sense of fright which she secretly craved had returned once again.
The voice, frigid and hostile and everything that evil was defined by, belonged to the mistress of all villainy.
"Oh, come now, Leah," Maleficent teased, her voice adorned in bitter chuckles, "why the frightened expression? After all, aren't I the very same young maiden whom you banished without thought so many years ago?" The villain was there, Leah could tell, but she was hidden amongst the dark- two eyes of washed-out yellow came into focus, but the rest of Maleficent, the olive skin and beast-like horns, remained concealed.
"Y-Yes." Leah attempted to swallow, yet remained unsuccessful- her throat was too tight. "Yes, you- you are."
"Mmh? You believe so? Most people think otherwise." Then came another tightly-strung medley of high-pitched clinks and squeaky groans- the sound of something shattering- causing Leah to grit her teeth and cringe. "Oh... Oh, I do hope that Queen Belle didn't need that vase. Such a shame, really- it was a pretty little thing. Empty, however. Just as most pretty little things are."
The inordinate waves of terror had been swapped out and replaced with pinches of rage. What had Maleficent come for? To play with Leah, to hoard her time and patience? "And- And what is it that you've come to me for?" the queen demanded. "Not t-to waste my time, I'm- I'm sure."
"Oh, no, Leah, of course not- though it is quite enjoyable to provoke feelings of anger, especially in the mind of one as noble and composed as yourself. Or so your kingdom believes." The pair of luminescent eyes narrowed, expressing distaste. "Is it fun, Leah? To spread deception? To trick such a large number of people? To lie?"
It took a few moments for Leah to find a suitable response. Terror had made itself all too comfortable, acting as a powerful restraint. She couldn't move, swallow, breathe- Maleficent's very presence had rendered her dumb.
"I have n-never lied to my subjects, and I- I do not plan on doing so in the future. To lie to the people whom I govern would be simply immoral."
"Ha!" Maleficent shouted, to which Leah felt her thighs turn to rubber. "How funny you are!"
"And what is it that you believe I've lied about?"
"Most everything!"
"I don't quite understand-"
"Don't you dare act as though you don't understand." Maleficent paused, clearing her throat, taking a moment to assess Queen Leah in all that she currently was- without bravery, without hope, without a crown. "As of right now, the citizens of Elia couldn't ask for a better queen. The blind little fools. Oh, how I pity them, each and every one." Sarcasm, in its most simple and horrifying form. "They've been brainwashed into believing that their lovely Queen Leah is nothing but kind and compassionate and strong. Information which is utterly false. Not one person within the boundaries of your kingdom knows the truth. Isn't it your responsibility to let them in on the little secret? You are, after all, their queen."
The truth. Nowadays, it seemed as though a truth was nothing more than countless opinions, all stacked atop one another, a lie with thousands of individual layers. "Tell me, your excellency," Leah croaked, "what is this so-called truth?"
"You ask for the truth?" Leah couldn't see Maleficent's face amidst the dark- however, she could tell that the green-skinned woman had been smiling. "The truth, your majesty, is that you are as far from purehearted as a woman can get. You are a villain, and you always will be."
Villain. The word coiled itself around the queen's heart and squeezed. "I most certainly am not a-"
"How many lives have you taken thus far, Leah? Ten? Twenty?"
The queen froze, all inner activity coming to a halt- her heart grew still, her blood turned to ice, her mind stopped producing new thoughts.
She knows. She knows of Ursula's curse.
The realization shouldn't have come as such a surprise- Leah had been told countless times before that Maleficent had eyes and ears hidden away in all corners of the world. Still, it frightened the queen that something that she'd tried to hard to keep hidden was known by the most notorious of all villains, who was infamous for doing terrible things to perfectly innocent people.
Then again, so was Leah- though she wasn't known simply for her murders.
Fifty two. Leah had taken fifty two lives, and each had provided constant torment.
"Every year, the number increases. It's getting more and more difficult to conceal your magic, isn't it? And your past- you have many woes, don't you, your highness? Each one has contributed to the hardening of your soul. Each night comes along with another emotional breakdown. Tear after tear after tear. Ah, yes- you exist upon the brink of destruction. And this time, the destruction will be yours as opposed to mine."
"I cannot reverse the spell which was cast upon me, and you know it." It was a complete miracle that Leah had found the voice with which to speak. "My darkness is a curse, not a choice, unlike yours. I've done everything I could to conceal it, while you have embraced your pain." She swallowed. At any given moment, Maleficent could strike, and Leah would be reduced to a lifeless sack of bones and blood. "The villain here, Maleficent, is you."
"Yes, that's true- however, I'm not the only one. Soon enough, Leah, you will crumble. The breakdowns and the stolen lives- they will become too much for you. And the results, well- the results will prove to be catastrophic."
"Is this why you've come? To warn me about a fate that will never come true?"
"I've come," Maleficent responded, "because I can." A snicker, a sound reminiscent of the snapping of twigs or the crack of icicles, causing Leah's pain to grow more agonizing. "I want my daughter, Leah. I want her in my palace, under my supervision. Because, for once, I am in the right and you are in the wrong. And if you believe that you can so easily corrupt her with the belief that I am the one who deserves to be murdered, well, you and the fairy have been existing in a constant lie. She is too powerful. She is too intelligent. And once the two halves of The Twisted Chain are reunited, she will be your undoing."
Before Leah could part her lips to respond, there was an all too familiar flash of green light, illuminating the room for a mere second- there was a sloppy assortment of words written across one of the walls, smeared in a wet substance of deep crimson, and even after the darkness laid back into place, Leah could feel each letter chiseling itself into her skull.
"The Night of the Fiery Moon is coming early this year."
That, as Leah would never bring herself to forget, was the night in which all magical powers were at their maximum strength. That was the night in which Leah's magic was set loose. That was the night in which Leah would be forced to fulfill her death quota.
Queen Leah was unaware of the full effect of her magic. She couldn't comprehend how thirsty her powers had grown.
~~~~~~~~~~
~ Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, France ~
"I can't believe you, Ivy."
I looked up, somewhat startled- hadn't the redhead been snoring when I entered the room? "Hmm?"
Anna, who looked polished and washed up and still as far from princess-like as you could imagine, parted her lips. Her eyelids fluttered, reminiscent of butterfly wings, and her nose was pointed directly towards the ceiling, as though she were still ridden with drowsiness.
"I said," she repeated, "that I can't believe you." A pause, as though she expected me to know what she was talking about.
My brows puckered, and the skin surrounding my eyes crinkled. "Okay. I still don't know what you-"
"Calling me dumb because I was putting my sister's danger above my own? Insulting me because I care about somebody?" She wasn't screaming- she no longer possessed the strength to. The healing incantation which Fauna had used had rendered the princess weak and dangerously close to exhaustion. "Why would you say that?"
I lowered a pearly tooth into my lip, drawing the tiniest fraction of blood and licking it up just as the princess lifted an eyelid. "Anna, I don't want to argue-"
"I don't either. I- I just want an answer."
An answer. She hadn't demanded the truth- she'd demanded an answer. Any answer. But I wasn't going to lie to a girl who'd just had an arrow forced out of her arm, was I? I wasn't as vile as that.
"I mean, if I were in your shoes, I wouldn't have been thinking about anyone but myself. When you're in that much pain, you can't think about anyone else. You literally can't. But you did. You thought about someone else." Another pause, one of several. Anna shut her eyes once more, and for a moment, I feared that she had succumbed to her aching desire for sleep. "You completely ignored your own pain. How? How did you do it?"
"Ivy, have you ever loved anyone?"
Her words took me by surprise, slamming against my heart and leaving dark imprints. The question hadn't been spoken- rather, it was sighed, like a held breath, a string of words that Anna had been keeping under her tongue, saving for the right moment.
"Yeah." I swallowed. "Yeah, of- of course I have. Hasn't everyone loved somebody?"
"You'd be surprised." Three words that would break anybody's heart.
Where was the hyperactive girl who had met me in my bedroom earlier that day? Where was the bubbly princess who just wouldn't shut her goddamned mouth? Had we left her behind? Was she still in the palace, cowering under the dining table?
"Love is... putting someone else's wants in front of your own. I think." The skin surrounding Anna's nose formed wrinkles. "No. No, that's not how it goes. Love is... is-"
Anna had a sole definition of love, something that she'd most likely heard as a child and had carried around with her for years. My definition, however, wasn't so stony and unchanging.
Love, as I'd come to learn, was nearly two years of loyalty and dedication, like the sun's eternal dedication to the Earth. Love was the one instance in which he chucked a rock at my window in order to awaken me and ended up shattering the window instead. Love was the guitar that I'd purchased for his seventeenth birthday, the one that I found laying against a coat rack in the tiniest thrift store in town, caked in dust and wispy splotches of dirt. Love was summer, at two in the morning, when the world was tilted on its side and the bottoms of my feet were bright red and aching, and he carried me home. My ear was pressed to his chest, and I fell asleep to the gentle thrumming of his heart, a single note on a guitar set on a constant loop. He had once said that it would beat only for me, and I had told him that being cliché wasn't going to get him anywhere.
Love was Keaton. And Keaton was polished wood and the pitter-patter of pebbles showering against warm glass and lips that reeked of aging wine.
"Look, Anna, I get it. You're saying that love is when you care about someone more than you care about yourself. But-"
"No! No, that isn't what I'm saying at all. Ivy, you're missing the point. Love is putting someone else's needs above your own. A friend of mine said that once. And my sister was in danger- she still is in danger. And when you love somebody that much, your own pain doesn't matter compared to theirs. And if you don't understand that, then, you know, I don't think that you've ever really loved anyone before, because-"
"I've been with my boyfriend for almost two years. I think that I know what love is-"
"You can be with somebody your entire life, and you can still never learn anything about love."
An all too sudden pause. Anna hadn't opened her eyes.
Fights. Arguments without clear points over things that would have meant nothing to us a year earlier. I'm right, you're wrong, and to prove it, I'm going to raise my voice and avoid eye contact with you, because I love you and I care about you more than I care about myself, and this is the way that relationships are supposed to work, right? Waking up the next morning in a pool of sweat and acting as though nothing had occurred. Pretending as though the awkwardness wasn't suffocating me. Repeatedly denying the fact that I was losing him, because I wasn't, and there was always the possibility that things would return to the way they used to be. A continuous cycle, a labyrinth- but all labyrinths have exits, and I'd spent too many lazy days and sleepless midnights searching for ours.
I wanted to fix things, and he did, too. That was one thing that we shared- a desire to fix ourselves. I wanted to go back to the nights on which I used sharp liquor to enhance my emotions rather than to bury them. I wanted to hold on as tightly as I could for as long as I could. I wanted to hold onto Keaton until I was totally sure that he had left.
That's what love is- not giving up.
"Love is not giving up."
"Is that all?"
"No. There's more." There was always more. There was always an "and".
The arched door at the end of the room croaked to life, opening, allowing a tiny figure to shuffle in. "No news from the palace yet," Fauna informed, to which Anna let out a strained moan. "I know, your highness, I know- I'm worried, as well. But I'm sure that it'll all turn out alright." Fauna's positivity was both astounding and repulsive- the soft curvature of her lips, the relaxed and gentle tone in which she spoke... You'd only find a personality similar to hers in a Disney movie. "With powers as strong as your sister's, I'm quite certain that she'll be leaving the castle without a single scratch. As for you, however... Well, it appears as though the arrow left more damage behind than I had first believed."
"What do you mean?" Anna questioned, uneasiness seeping into the deepest corners of her face.
"Your arm- erm, how do I put this lightly...? The tip of the arrow was infused with a special potion. The Sharptongue Potion- have you ever heard of it? It's very similar to poison- the only difference is that it kills the victim slower and more painfully."
I twitched, an unsettling cringe stapling itself to my face- Anna, meanwhile, looked utterly devastated. Mouth hung open, eyes the size of teacup saucers, cheeks a repulsive hue of green, as though she'd been issued a death sentence- which she had been, basically.
"Thankfully, the potion hasn't had enough time to set in yet, which means that it can be extracted using magic."
Anna breathed a sigh of relief, allowing her eyelids to droop. "Goodness, Fauna. You had me frightened for a moment. The extract-ation- or whatever you call it- that won't take very long, right?"
"It should be almost painless. However, it definitely won't be easy. It's usually performed by two magical beings rather than one, depending on their skill. And since I'm the only magical being here, it may not- well, it may not work. We may have to wait until one of my sisters is sent-"
"I can do it."
For a moment, I didn't think that I was the one who had spoken. I'd heard a different voice, and had barely noticed that my lips had been parted. However, Fauna and Anna's disbelieving sets of eyes, varying in hues but matching in expression, proved that the words had, in fact, been mine.
The tiny woman swallowed, ridden with hesitance. "Princess Ivy, I-"
"Everyone keeps saying that I have magic in my blood- right?" Magic. I felt my heartstrings sew themselves together, my stomach pulling itself into unbearably tight coils. "And you need two people. So, by that logic, I can help. I should be able to-"
"Thank you for the offer, your highness, but you don't have any experience with magic," Fauna pointed out, giving a disproving shake of her head. "I don't wish to be rude, but procedures as complicated as this take years of experience-"
"So? Walk me through it. Tell me what to do." Burning. My skin was burning. Boiling. Searing. Hot pans, steamy diner kitchens, seat-belt buckles on warm evenings in August.
"Magic isn't that simple, Ivory. These things require practice-"
"Well, this can be my practice. Right now. We'll practice with this." The words had tripped over my bottom teeth before I could catch them, and I could feel myself physically shaking. How's this for putting someone else's needs above your own, Anna?
The winged woman's answer was somewhat shocking. "Alright. I'll walk you through the procedure." I lifted an eyebrow- wait, what? "If anything goes wrong, I'll send for one of my sisters."
"Oh, God," Anna mumbled, drenched in pure stress.
"Now, Anna, everything's going to be alright," Fauna consoled- however, judging by the fairy's stiffened tone, it didn't seem as though she were very convinced of her own statement. "Just- Just lay back and relax. We have it under control."
"I think that I'd rather die from the potion."
And I was left standing in the aftermath of my own stupidity, totally blinded, unsure of what it was that I would be doing or how I would go about doing this. My legs were shaking, and it felt as though there were a fire raging beneath my skin.
"Come, Ivory- I'll make the final preparations, and we'll begin."
~~~~~~~~~~
"So, do I get a wand, or something? Or am I just supposed to-"
"The only branch of magic which requires a wand is fairy magic. You, quite obviously, are human- and, as such, all that you need is already provided for you."
"And what would that be?"
"Your bare fingertips and your tense of determination- if you possess such a sense. Oh, I'm simply being silly, Ivory- surely you do."
My lip was gushing blood, the skin having been split at each individual crease. "Cool. Great. Wonderful." Damn it.
Fauna held onto her wand as though it were her offspring, as though it were a source of oxygen- fingers coiled around the butt end, her grip tight and unfaltering, providing steadiness and support. I was reminded of the way in which Keaton would take my hand, the way that our fingers intertwined, our palms joined together, my thumb stroking his knuckles. Passionate, supportive, unfaltering.
I had no time for such thoughts- however, they didn't appear to be taking a permanent leave at any time in the near future.
Fauna met eyes with me, and the weight of reality descended upon me like a fallen curtain. "I'll talk you through the procedure, Ivory. There's no need to fret. All you need to do is simply follow my lead."
"You say it like it's easy."
"As long as you remain focused, it will come easily." Fauna's tone of voice, however, said otherwise- an awkward assortment of cracks and mutters which lingered within the narrow space between terror and anxiety. No room for air, no room for relaxation, which was strange to me- the words "Fauna" and "frightened" didn't belong in the same sentence. No, the fairy was far too innocent for such emotions.
"Princess Anna? Your majesty, are you quite ready?" the green-dressed fairy lowered her head, staring at the princess, who looked as though she'd been thrust into a corner that she couldn't find a suitable way out of- a crinkled nose, chewed-up lips, cheeks deprived of any color.
"Are you sure that this will be painless? I mean, I don't really want to brag or anything- because that's the complete opposite of what I want to do, especially at a moment as nerve-wracking as this- but I'm a princess. Don't I deserve highly skilled doctors or people who've been practicing magic for years and years and years as opposed to a girl who's had zero experience with-?"
"Anna, if you don't get this done right this minute, you'll die. I'm the only other person here who can possibly do this. Stop whining. This will go a lot faster if you stop whining. Please."
Anna lifted her crinkled eyelids, staring at me with puckered brows and disproving eyes. Why? The one word that her expression translated to. Why?
I didn't know why.
The procedure began with a somber bob of Fauna's head. "Your majesty, in order for this procedure to work as planned, you must follow my lead, as well. Please, stick out the arm that's been impaled and keep it elevated."
The redhead did as she had been told- obviously, the arrow had long since been removed, and in its place was a tiny line of reddened flesh, puffed up and parted like two slender lips, exposing a second, deeper layer of tissue covered in blood. A mere glance at her wound, as small as it was, was enough to trigger a cringe.
"There. Not so bad, is it?" Fauna questioned, attempting to shed positivity upon an already hopeless procedure.
As though rehearsed, the fairy pressed her wand to Anna's forearm- instantly, hundreds of lengthy, branch-like projections glowed to life, coming from deep underneath Anna's flesh. Veins, several of them, each branching off of the next and splitting off into smaller vessels- tiny strings of light, like flashlights beneath bedsheets, lightbulbs under water. Admittedly, they looked somewhat intriguing and, for the most part, unsettling.
"Just as I suspected," the winged woman mumbled. "It hasn't spread as far as it could have."
"Listen very closely, Ivory, for this next step is one that you must take alone." Way to put pressure on me, Fauna. Yeah, smooth. "First, you must squeeze the wound shut, which shouldn't be so difficult to do, considering its size. Simply press against the surrounding pieces of flesh and pull them in so that they're puckered- you understand what I'm saying, right? Do you need me to re-explain?"
I shook my head. "No. No, I think I understand."
I did as I was told, pulling Anna's wound shut and pressing my fingers against inflamed, puckered flesh- I was internally cringing the entire time, handfuls of chills and nerves gathering at the back of my neck. Her skin was cold, but not to the point at which touching it felt similar to touching ice.
"Now, dear, listen carefully. Once I give the word, you are to shut your eyes- do not take your fingers off of Anna. Next, take a few moments to think about what you're attempting to accomplish- what do you want to do? Why have you volunteered to help me? You must clear your mind of all thoughts, and only think about answering that one question. Once you've reached an answer, pull your fingers upwards, but keep them in the same position that they are in right now- during which, you will let go of Anna's skin. If all goes well, you will feel as though you are tugging on a warm string. Do you understand?"
No. "Yes."
"Perfect. Let's begin. Close your eyes and think."
I dropped my eyelids, hit with an insane amount of pressure to keep myself still despite the chills and the nerves.
What did I want to do? What was I trying to accomplish? The answer, as of then, seemed simple:
I want to cure Anna.
I pulled, allowing her skin to slip from my fingertips- nothing. No change in temperature, no sudden noises or movements- the world remained as still as it had been before. I kept my eyes shut, waiting for direction from Fauna.
"Try again, my dear. Think- think deeper. Think about your motivation."
My motivation? I want to keep Anna from dying. I tried again, squeezing reddened skin together and pulling upwards, half-expecting something miraculous and unbelievable to occur, half-expecting nothing. And I was faced with the latter- nothing, save for a disappointed mumble from a princess who, even in the magical equivalent of surgery, couldn't stop making noise.
"That's quite alright, darling," Fauna consoled- I opened my eyes, unable to find the tiniest morsel of frustration hidden within her face, not even crammed into the deepest wrinkles, as though she were saving all doubts and disappointment for a much later attempt. "Think, Ivory, think- what is the motivation behind this? Why did you volunteer to help Anna in the first place? What are you trying to prove?"
Prove. I was trying to prove a lot of things, but I didn't know how I'd be able to boil each of those things down into a single sentence. However, I wasn't feeling defeated just yet- there weren't many things that I'd given up on in the past, and I certainly wasn't going to give up on my first attempt at seeing myself do something related to magic. As frightened as I was, my curiosity dominated all other emotions.
"Love is putting someone else's needs above your own... And when you love somebody that much, your own pain doesn't matter compared to theirs. And if you don't understand that, then, you know, I don't think that you've ever really loved anyone before..."
I want to prove to Anna that I can put someone else's needs above my own.
I tried a third time, shutting my eyes and pulling upwards- this time, I was faced with a slightly different result. Once I let go of Anna's flesh, I felt something pressed between my fingertips- thin, like a chunk of straw, and warm, the surface of a lightbulb.
"Oh! Oh, that's it, Ivory, that's- that's it! Just like that! Oh-"
I lifted an eyelid ever so cautiously, and what I saw kicked me into shock.
There was a string coming out of Anna's wound, a single thread of silver, emitting a dulled glow, the same color as Anna's illuminated veins.
Naturally, I yelped, a result of shock in its purest form, and pulled my hand away. What was it? Was it a vein? Had I been pulling one of Anna's veins out of her body? Promptly, the string was sucked back into Anna's arm, as though it had never really been there at all.
"Damn!" I swore- a high-pitched whisper, a few notes short of a squeal.
Fauna parted her lips and released a breath that I didn't know she had been holding in. "Oh, no need to fret, Ivory, we- we just have to act quickly. Now, remember, do not think of anything else. All but a single thought should be on your mind. Keep thinking about what you're trying to accomplish- your real, true motive. Dig deep, darling, dig deep. And you must keep your eyes shut tightly, regardless of what occurs- and, above all, keep pulling."
I want to prove to Anna that I can put someone else's needs above my own. I want to prove to her that I'm not selfish.
A fourth attempt, this one harboring more promise- I pulled, and there it was again, the thin string of warmth, triggering a numbness within my fingertips- this time, however, I kept my eyes shut tightly, tugging with as much delicacy as I could muster.
I want to prove to her that I know what love is. I want to prove to her that I understand how to love someone and where love comes from and that love doesn't have one sole definition. I want to show that love keeps changing.
I want to teach this girl what love really is. I want to expand off of her beliefs and add onto what she's been taught. I want to teach. I want her to learn. I want her to listen. I want her to shut her mouth.
"Open your eyes."
I did as I'd been ordered. Anna's wound had sealed itself up, her veins no longer alight and glowing, and between my fingers I held the ending of a lengthy, luminescent string of silver.
"Don't move a muscle." And I didn't, keeping myself as still as I possibly could, staring with widened eyes and a heart that simply couldn't calm down. What am I holding?
Fauna gave her wand a couple flicks to the left- a miniscule glass vial appeared within the crook of her thumb, to which I nearly jumped. Ever so carefully, the fairy snatched the string from between my fingertips and lowered it into the vial, sealing it tight with a cork just as miniscule. "There. I'll make sure to dispose of the potion before I fall asleep."
The potion? I felt my throat constrict beneath my skin. Had I just pulled a substance deadlier than poison out of a princess's veins?
I turned from the glass vial to Anna- a capsule filled up with a deadly substance and a princess who was bubbly and charming and had a mouth that never closed itself. Two complete opposites, coexisting in one room.
Wide-eyed and fascinated, doubting her own doubts, Anna mumbled, in a voice no louder than my own weighted breaths, "You did it."
"That's what love is, right? Putting someone else's needs above your own." I offered her a quick shrug, considering giving a wink, as well.
Maleficent must have been proud of me, whoever she was and wherever she could have been.
~~~~~~~~~~
Question of the chapter: Favorite Disney fanfic(s) on wattpad?
My answer: Disney Prep by squishyfishies, who is the actual queen of the Disney fandom on wattpad as well as the alpha female of the "Disney in school" fanfic genre.
I absolutely love every single one of you guys. You make me so happy. Kisses and hugs all around. :D
~Leslie