Twice Upon a Time

by James Riley

  The legs disappeared from the water, but Jack felt the air move above him, and he drove the blunt end of the trident up, catching the invisible Sea King in the stomach. The King landed hard, the sword slashing out again, and Jack dodged, barely escaping the deadly blade.

  “Here’s where I end your pathetic little story,” the King said from right behind Jack.

  The sword came down just as Jack thrust his trident up behind him, capturing the sword in its tines. He twirled the trident, ripping the sword from the Sea King’s grasp, then kicked backward, his foot hitting something hard and sending it flying, even as his sword fell from the air into his hand.

  As the Sea King landed, fully visible now, Jack held the sword to the King’s chest, trying to hide how fast his heart was beating. “No one ends my story but ME,” he said, then cursed silently at how stupid that sounded.

  Despite being an idiot, now that the sword was back in his hand, Jack felt stronger, faster, more energetic… and more aware of everything. What was the sword doing to him? Had the sword been changing him this entire time without him even realizing it?

  And why didn’t that scare him more?

  “LISTEN to me,” Jack said again to the Sea King. “Your daughter, she’s somewhere out here! No one kidnapped her, she came with us to help save the fairy queens!”

  “LIES!” the Sea King yelled.

  “Why would I lie?!” Jack shouted back, his face exploding with heat as something in him just snapped. He growled in frustration and had to fight the urge to just start punching the idiot merman until he listened to reason. “The Wicked Queen WANTS you up here! She wants you on land, where you’re weaker! That’s why she sent an army here, to wipe you out!”

  The Sea King started to say something, but Jack yelled over him. “NO! You don’t get to talk anymore! You know why your daughter left the first time? Because she was in love with a human! No one made her come up here! The Sea Witch didn’t convince her! SHE wanted to be with a human! SHE wanted it, not humanity, not the people in this castle, HER! And now you’re about to lose her again because you’re too stupid to know she’s making her own choices!”

  The Sea King’s eyes burned white, and his face twisted into a sneer. The water around him began to boil, and Jack had to leap backward to avoid getting burned.

  Maybe he’d pushed it a little much.

  “YOU… ,” the Sea King said, the water rising to lift the King to a standing position, the trident Jack had used glowing white hot as well, somehow in the King’s hand, though he’d never reached for it. “YOU!”

  “No, Your Highness,” Jack told him, noticing something right over the Sea King’s shoulder. “Her.”

  The most amazing voice began to sound from beneath the waves, harmonizing with the sounds of battle on the shore. The song was familiar, but the Piper’s pipes, as magical as they were, couldn’t compete with the voice of the little mermaid princess.

  “Meghan?” the Sea King said, the rage draining from his face. “What… what are you singing?”

  “It’s fairy queen magic,” Jack told him, lowering his sword. “She learned it from the Sea Witch, and she’s using it to take us to the Fairy Homelands.”

  “FINALLY!” May said as she, the pirate monkey, and Phillip arrived and jumped off their creature. The monster, now freed of the humans at its reins, leapt for Phillip, but the prince easily grabbed the reins and looped the beast’s front and back paws together in midair, crashing it to the ground without really hurting it.

  The song grew louder, and Jack could see Meghan swimming just beneath the waves as the world began to swirl around them. This was it. They were finally going back!

  “Meghan,” the Sea King said. “You would leave me again?”

  “I wouldn’t worry about that,” growled a voice a moment before a wolf the size of a horse slammed into the Sea King from behind. The Wolf King’s teeth latched on to the Sea King’s throat and bit down hard.

  “NO!” Jack shouted, too far away.

  “The wolf is mine!” Bluebeard roared, leaping into the fray.

  And just like that, the armies of mermen and goblins, the beach, the ocean, and the castle all swirled away into nothingness.

  Jack, May, Phillip, Meghan, Bluebeard, the Sea King, and the Wolf King all dropped to the ground hard, just feet away from the largest, thorniest vines Jack had ever seen.

  And there, waiting with a smug smile for them all, was Lian.

  “Oh, so close!” she said, her smile getting wider. “But close only counts in horseshoes and dragon fire.” And with that, Jack looked up to see a flight of black, red, and green dragons off in the distance, heading straight for the Fairy Homelands.

  CHAPTER 41

  You said they wouldn’t be here until sunset!” May screamed indignantly.

  “Wait, you’re telling me I tricked you into thinking you had more time than you did?!” Lian said, leaning calmly against the silver gate. “That doesn’t sound like me. Does it? Oh wait, it totally does!”

  “There is still time to end the spell,” Phillip growled as he pushed himself to his feet.

  “Nah,” Lian said, kicking her legs out joyfully. “But I really should thank you for bringing me the one person capable of performing fairy queen magic, delivered straight to my waiting hands, and without me even lifting a finger. Not to mention a mortally wounded Sea King and my Queen’s granddaughter, all together, just for me.”

  “Don’t take more credit than you deserve,” the wolf growled, standing over the wounded Sea King. “I played my part here as well.”

  “Sure, big guy,” Lian said, rolling her eyes. “You did great, doing your whole wolf thing.”

  Jack slowly pulled out his sword and aimed it at her. “Phillip’s right. There’s still time.”

  “Oh, is there?” Lian asked, her smile widening. “It couldn’t possibly be that I outwitted the great Jack the Thirteenth, son of Jack the Giant Killer and grandson of Jack the Hero of the Cursed Bucket. There’s just no way I could have beaten THIS Jack, not when he comes from such noble and fine stock!”

  Lian stepped forward, completely unconcerned about Jack’s sword tracking her every movement. “And can we just go over all the ways you’ve helped me in the last two days? You freed the children of Hamelin from Pan’s spell, leaving Pan with no one to play with.” Lian smiled. “Well, until my Queen gave him some rebel prisoners. The Land of Never is the perfect jail, since no one can leave without the permission of their jailer. And Pan’s happy now, with so many new friends to play with. Oh, and who else was there? Our favorite pirate-prince?” She grinned at Bluebeard, who glared back at her, strangely silent. “Why, it must have taken so much effort to convince him to take you to the Sea Witch. I mean, he’s only been trying to get her help for, like, fifty years!”

  Jack’s throat tightened as he began to see Lian’s hand in everything they’d done. Every taunt, every dare… Lian had goaded them right into where she wanted them to be, and to do what she needed them to do, including—

  “Which led to war!” Lian shouted, her eyes wide in almost wonder. “I can’t believe you were able to start a war between merman and human! Do you have any idea how long the Eyes had been working toward that? And you just waltz in, steal the mermaid princess, and accomplish in hours what we’d been working on for years!” She shook her head in amazement as the roaring of dragons got closer. “Your talent for serving our Queen really does know no bounds, Jack!”

  “I do not serve her,” Jack growled. “Not now, not ever!”

  “See, there’s where you’re wrong,” Lian told him, absently pulling out her own sword. “The Queen’s old Magic Mirror told her. One of you,” she said, pointing at Jack and Phillip, “will join her, betraying your little princess. The other will die by the Queen’s hand.” She laughed. “Did you really have to think that hard about which would be which?”

  “That will never happen,” Jack said softly.

  “Keep on believing that,” Lian said.
“Though if I were you, I’d probably delude myself too. Honestly, Jack, this doesn’t bring me any pleasure—”

  May snorted loudly.

  “I’m just satisfied at a job well done!” Lian continued, ignoring May. “This doesn’t make me happy, humiliating you like this, outsmarting you at every turn, playing you for a fool over and over….” She paused. “Okay, it makes me a little happy, if by ‘a little’ you mean ‘a lot.’ But that’s not the point. The point is, the fairy queens and anyone who knows their magic need to die. So let’s start with her.”

  And with that, faster than Jack could see, Lian turned and leapt at Meghan, her sword aimed right at the mermaid’s chest—

  Only to hit Jack’s sword instead as he leapt to block her.

  “Oh, you want to fight,” Lian said, smiling wider. “Really, Jack? That’s really what you want to do? ’Cause I promised I wouldn’t hurt you, but if you’re not giving me any choice…”

  Jack took a deep breath, sighed, then stabbed five times in rapid succession at her in five different spots.

  Each one missed like she had never been there.

  “Oh, I think that officially qualifies as you asking for it,” Lian said softly, then dropped low and kicked her foot out, sweeping Jack’s legs out from under him. Before he even realized he’d fallen, Lian had her sword pressed to his throat.

  Had they really gotten this far only to fail? Jack glanced silently at May, who was inching her way over to Meghan. The mermaid had her eyes locked on her bleeding father, while Bluebeard was slowly circling the wolf.

  None of that mattered, though. Not with Lian here.

  “Jack’s right,” Lian said, her eyes locked on him. “You can all just stop your maneuvering. You’ve lost. Just let it go.” She disappeared almost faster than Jack could see, kicking Bluebeard into the sleep spell and then swinging around to grab Phillip’s arm and throw him in as well, returning the sword to Jack’s throat before he could even move.

  The prince and the pirate both hit the spell barrier almost at the same time. Bluebeard instantly went limp, snoring before he hit the ground, while Phillip…

  Phillip stayed wide-awake as he landed, hard. The prince’s eyes went big, then immediately shut as Lian glanced over to make sure he’d landed inside the barrier. Hadn’t he? He must have. He was well past the spot where Bluebeard had landed, being much lighter than the pirate. But how was Phillip not asleep?!

  “The funny thing is,” Lian said, “I knew the mermaid wouldn’t be able to sing on land. So I gave you the one thing she’d need, thinking I was being almost too obvious! But you of course chose the hard way instead, and had to get her back into water, wasting what little time you had before the dragons came.”

  “What’d you give us?” May asked. “Besides, you know, a blinding headache every time you open your mouth?”

  “The pipes, you idiots,” Lian said, shaking her head at their stupidity. “I left them on the Piper’s tree stump! You even took them with you! They’re magic, as Jack knew. He almost cast a spell himself before you guys went into the Land of Never, but apparently it never occurred to him that if he could play them, so could someone with actual magical and musical talent.”

  Jack flashed May an embarrassed smile while she just smacked her forehead.

  “It hardly matters,” Lian said, nodding at the dragons. “But still, pretty pathetic, guys.”

  “The spell,” Meghan said, her eyes on Bluebeard. “It feels… familiar. It’s fairy queen magic, isn’t it.”

  “Someone’s got an ear for music,” Lian said, turning to the mermaid.

  “Even the fading harmonies of a musical spell,” Meghan said softly. “It… it was meant to be a spell of death for someone, but… but it’s been modified. The fairy queens must have changed it, lessened it… turning it into a spell that merely puts the victim and anyone near her to sleep.”

  “This is all fascinating,” Lian said, “but it’s far too late to cast a counterspell, if you even had the power to begin with.”

  “Oh, I don’t,” Meghan said, finally looking up. “This spell was too great for the fairy queens themselves. I would never have had the power to break it.”

  May let out a defeated groan as she slowly dropped to the ground, looking exactly like Jack felt.

  “Which is why it’s fortunate that the fairy queens added a means to break it,” Meghan continued. “All one would have to do is wake the girl at the center of the spell, and the spell would be broken. So simple, actually… once you know how.”

  “That’s the beauty, though!” Lian said, stamping her foot excitedly. “No one can get close enough! If they try, they get hit by the spell themselves and fall asleep!”

  “You’re right,” Meghan said. “If only the fairy queens knew that someone would be along, at some time in the future, to find the girl and wake her up. But it’d have to be someone special, someone they knew was meant to be close to that girl…”

  “The prince!” the wolf growled.

  Lian whirled around to see what the rest of them already saw: Bluebeard lying alone in the sleeping spell.

  Phillip was sprinting as fast as he could directly toward the enormous vines surrounding the Fairy Homelands.

  CHAPTER 42

  NO!” Lian shouted, and began to move so quickly she almost disappeared from Jack’s vision. Instantly he was on his feet, running as fast as he was able to.

  Which still wasn’t fast enough. There was no way he could catch her before she caught up to the barely moving prince.

  But he did have something that could.

  Without a thought about what he’d do later (or at least without a second thought), Jack whipped his sword horizontally right at Lian’s legs. As hard as he threw it, the sword still barely managed to catch just the tip of her heel, knocking one foot into the other and sending Lian sprawling forward onto her hands.

  Her spill gave Jack enough time to catch her, which turned out to be a bit of a problem, given that the girl he’d just caught now had both his sword and her own in her hands.

  “Oh, Prince Phillip?” she shouted over her shoulder, both swords aimed at Jack. “I’d stop if I were you. Otherwise I’m going to kill your friend right here and now.”

  Phillip hesitated, then slowed to a stop, turning around to look at the situation.

  “Phillip, GO!” Jack shouted. “I can handle this!”

  “You have no weapon!” Phillip shouted, taking a step back toward them.

  “I don’t care!” Jack shouted. “Don’t you get it? You’re the only one who can fix this! You’re the hero, stupid! Go do the hero work, while I take care of Little Miss Isn’t So Clever here! GO!”

  Phillip paused again, then turned back toward the vines.

  Lian sighed. “I’ve never met a royal who can follow simple instructions.” And with that, she stabbed at Jack with his own sword, then threw her sword directly at Phillip.

  There was no time for a word of warning, no time for anything. Lian was just too fast, and nothing could possibly stop the sword as it flew straight and true right at Phillip’s back—

  Until an urgent, vibrant musical note sounded from behind them. A shimmering hand of crystal smashed down right on the sword in flight, pushing the sword straight to the ground mere inches from Phillip’s back.

  And just like that, Phillip disappeared into the thorns.

  “NO!” Lian screamed again, and turned her fury onto Meghan, now holding the pipes May had just given to her.

  The wolf roared, then grabbed the pipes out of the mermaid’s hands with his teeth and bit down hard enough to break them apart. “You have accomplished nothing!” he growled at them. “The prince won’t have time to break the spell, for the dragons are already here!”

  Jack glanced up to see that the Wolf King was correct. Blotting out the sky were dragons of black, red, and green, some with riders, most without. The riderless dragons seemed wilder, more willing to fight, but the dragons with riders seemed to be he
rding the rest toward their goal, the goal they had now almost reached. It was only a matter of seconds before the fire started.

  “C’mon, Phillip,” Jack whispered, glancing between Lian and the wolf, but neither seemed interested in fighting. Like him, both were watching to see who would win, Phillip or the dragons.

  The dragons drew closer and closer. They were right on top of the Fairy Homelands now, and several seemed to be ready to breathe fire.

  “Now would be a good time, Phillip!” May screamed.

  “He’s too late,” Lian said in an odd tone. Jack glanced at the Eye, but her face was unreadable beneath her hood. “He’s just too late.”

  A tiny movement caught Jack’s eye from beyond the silver gate. Had Bluebeard just twitched?

  And then it was too late. The dragons reared back, then dove forward, letting loose a torrential hailstorm of fire, searing everything with an all-encompassing heat that was almost unbearable even at a distance. The thorny vines blackened and shrank away under the flaming onslaught, revealing the most beautiful city Jack had ever seen. Soaring spires painted with colors that had no name, crystal sculptures entwined with trees and bushes, a central pool that looked to be nothing more than water made from a starry sky…

  It all burned.

  May stepped closer to Jack, her mouth hanging open, no words coming. Jack knew the feeling. It was all he could do not to fall to his knees and cry.

  “Phillip,” May said, tears streaming down her horrified face. “He… he was in the middle of that.”

  Lian turned around, the fire burning behind her, and glanced at Jack, her eye suspicious. “That’s true. There’s no way the prince could have survived that, is there?”

  The wolf growled low. “The fairy queens would have been worthy foes. It is… unfortunate that they had to be dealt with in this way. But what the Queen commands shall be.”

  “As the Queen commands,” Lian said, her voice still suspicious. “Well, I guess it’s time to get you two back to the Queen. You take the girl. I’ll get Jack.”