Of Giants and Ice (Ever Afters, The)

by Bach, Shelby

“I think they’re coming back,” the shortest triplet said, looking at the violet door with gold lettering.

  Sure enough, Sarah Thumb and Mr. Swallow came flying out. The crowd parted under her, and Evan Garrison and his two Companions hurried through. Each of them carried a green pack, all looking very pale. Evan was still biting his nails.

  “That was way faster than normal,” Chase said.

  “Maybe they’ll at least send them someplace cool,” said the shortest triplet. “Maybe Atlantis.”

  “Atlantis?” I said, so loudly that a dozen people turned away from Evan to stare at me. My face burned.

  “That’s right,” Lena said softly. “It’s a Fey realm, like Avalon and the others, hidden from humans. Sarah Thumb showed you a map, right?”

  She definitely hadn’t. Apparently, my orientation hadn’t covered everything.

  “But how will they get there?” I whispered, as Evan and his Companions passed us.

  “The Door Trek system,” said the tallest triplet. “Of course.”

  “Don’t tell me,” Adelaide said sarcastically. “Sarah Thumb didn’t tell you that either.”

  I frowned, not sure if she was mocking Sarah Thumb or me.

  “It’s a transportation system, faster than the Fey railway. It’s simple if you have a door and something to tie you to your destination,” Lena explained quickly.

  “You know, like how we got to Yellowstone,” said the triplet with darker hair.

  “I wonder,” said Lena thoughtfully. “Where was the last White Snake Tale? And when?”

  “Muirland. Ten years ago,” said Puss-in-Dress. “But only one of the Companions came back. There weren’t enough animals to complete the tasks.”

  Sarah Thumb landed on the Director’s podium, and the soon-to-be questers assembled themselves in front of her. As the crowd started to quiet down, Lena whispered, “And when was the last successful White Snake quest?”

  No one answered, and butterflies in my stomach morphed into a tight, anxious knot.

  “Evan, Russell, and Mary,” Sarah Thumb said in the same formal tone she had used before. “The time has come for you to venture into the Fey realm to complete Evan’s Tale. We wish you luck, courage, and cunning on your journey, and we bestow upon you these three rings.” The rings glowed electric blue, dangling from a silver ribbon in Mr. Swallow’s beak. They looked a lot like party favors from a laser tag birthday party. “If at any time during your travels you find yourself in a fatal situation, twist your ring around your finger three times and think of this courtyard. You’ll find yourself here.”

  As Evan reached up and took the rings from Mr. Swallow’s mouth, the whispers started up again.

  “When was the last time EAS gave out the rings of return?” Lena asked Kelly and Puss-in-Dress.

  “Not since The Yellow Dwarf,” the cat replied. “That one is always supposed to end badly.”

  “Two years ago,” Kelly added. “They must be worried about this one too.”

  “It’s long for a quest, right?” said the triplet with darker hair.

  “The standard time period for a White Snake Tale is five to six weeks,” Lena replied in her tinny, reciting voice. “The third longest quest of all, which only increases the Character’s peril.”

  Since so many people were talking, I couldn’t hear what else Sarah Thumb told the three travelers, but pretty soon she and Mr. Swallow led them out. Some of the students patted Evan on the back and waved good-bye mournfully, as if they never expected to see the questers again.

  Even Chase sounded sympathetic. “Who knew such a dumb Tale could be so dangerous?”

  “But why?” I asked. “These are fairy tales we’re talking about. Don’t they all end with happily ever after?”

  The tallest triplet shuffled his feet. Lena and Kelly looked at each other and didn’t answer. Chase shoved his hands in his pockets, and even Adelaide looked uncomfortable.

  “They didn’t take her,” said one triplet.

  “They don’t take everyone,” Puss-in-Dress reminded them. “Usually, no one younger than twelve.”

  “Too scary,” said the other two triplets together.

  “But Rory faced a dragon. That shows guts,” said Lena, and if I had felt less nervous, I would have smiled.

  “Must’ve been the other new kid. The boy. He looked freaked out the second he got here,” Chase said, and everyone nodded.

  “Are you going to keep me in suspense?” I asked, half-joking, mainly because I didn’t want anyone to guess I was starting to freak out myself.

  “No.” Puss-in-Dress leaped out of the girl’s lap, her white tail lashing. “Your orientation isn’t over quite yet.”

  “I’ll take her,” Chase said quickly.

  “Me too.” Adelaide’s smile looked way too sympathetic to be real. I wondered if there was any way I could request the feline tour guide instead.

  “You guys go tell Miriam,” Chase added, and Lena watched us go anxiously.

  Adelaide led the way across the courtyard in the setting sun. We came to an old-fashioned door made out of dark wood, black ribbons hanging off its frame and rippling in a wind I couldn’t feel. With Adelaide on the lookout, Chase pulled out a skinny metal tool and picked the lock.

  My heart banged in my chest, and I gripped the hilt of my sword tightly in my sweating hands.

  Finally, the door swung open. “You’re not scared, are you?” Chase whistled a loud cheerful note, and torches flared from bronze fixtures hanging from the ceiling. “It’s just a wall.”

  The wall was made out of marble, five times as tall as I was and as long as the dragon George had killed the day before. It was covered in names, columns of them etched into the stone and gilded, like the markers you see sometimes in national monuments.

  “This is the memorial to the Failed Tales,” said Adelaide gravely.

  Chase scanned the last column. “It looks like seven Characters have died on ‘White Snake’ quests in the past century.”

  A lump clogged my throat.

  “Stop it, Chase. You’re scaring her,” Adelaide said. “Rory, it’s not that bad.”

  But there were so many names—thousands.

  “Most of the deaths in the last few centuries happened in the war,” Adelaide added. “It’s really been so much better since the Director started implementing all of her new policies. She’s the reason why we take Companions on our Tales now. Safety in numbers, she says. Instead of being executed if you Fail a Tale, your Companions help you escape. That kind of thing.”

  “And we rehabilitate a lot of the villains nowadays,” Chase added. “That helps too.”

  That wasn’t comforting. It just made me worry that Rumpelstiltskin could still be a problem.

  “Yes, before the Director started, we lost three out of five Characters. Now, the death rate is . . .”—Chase examined the wall thoughtfully—“less. I’m pretty sure.”

  Then they left me.

  I stared up at the wall, counting names. My gaze stopped at the last column, only half-full, and even though I didn’t want to, it was easy to imagine “Rory Landon” in the same curly letters.

  • • •

  I was still stunned when the bell rang again. Time to go home. I walked back out to the courtyard on leaden legs.

  I didn’t want to know that over half of all Characters Failed their Tales. I didn’t want to think about how many of us might die. But I couldn’t stop a little voice in the back of my head from screaming, And you still want to go back for Day Three? Are you nuts?

  Right before I reached the red door, Ellie caught up with me and pushed an envelope into my hand. “With all the excitement, we almost forgot to give you this. The Director wanted to make sure you had it before you went home.”

  “Thanks,” I said automatically and headed through the dark hallway.

  But I definitely wasn’t crazy. Which meant that I needed to figure out how to explain all this to Mom and Amy.

  I trudged out to the
driveway.

  Behind the windshield, Amy scanned the whole place—from the shingles on the roof to the bushes in the front garden—with a skeptical frown. She clearly didn’t think it looked like much.

  Amy wasn’t alone in the car. Mom sat in the passenger seat. She never came to pick me up.

  Suddenly, it clicked: Maybe Mom was a Character. Maybe she had come to get me, because she knew that I would be really freaking out after orientation.

  I dashed across the yard, over the sidewalk, to the car, and threw open the back door. “Mom, I—”

  “Shh,” Amy said quietly.

  Mom pointed to the cell phone on her ear with an apologetic grimace.

  “Interview,” Amy mouthed. “EW.”

  Or maybe not.

  “I can’t tell you how much I enjoy working with Mike,” Mom said into the phone. That meant she was promoting the film from three moves ago, which would be released in a week.

  Sighing, I threw my backpack on the seat and climbed in, closing the door as quietly as I could. It figured. Mom couldn’t get out of work early unless she had some sort of PR excuse. Her world didn’t revolve around me.

  Of course I was going back. I couldn’t remember the last time people saw me and not just my parents’ daughter whenever they looked at me.

  If I didn’t go back to EAS, where would I find any real friends? School? Yeah, right.

  So, I just turned the envelope over. It was addressed to “Aurora” in gold calligraphy. I made a face (no one ever called me by my full name) and opened the letter.

  Dear Ms. Aurora Landon,

  Welcome to Ever After School. We are so pleased that you have joined our fine establishment, and we hope that your time here with us will be both memorable and nonfatal.

  Looking through our records, we can report finding the following Tales in the last five generations of your family:

  • The Boy Who Went Forth to Learn What Fear Was (paternal grandfather)

  • Cinderella (mother of your maternal grandmother)

  • The Garden of Paradise (great uncle of your paternal grandfather)

  • The Goose Girl (great aunt of your paternal grandfather)

  The first one had to be a good Tale, if Chase wanted it, but I would never recover from my disappointment if the most exciting thing I ever did in my Tale was lose a stupid shoe. Even if it was made of glass.

  If you have not already done so, please take a little time this evening to read these Tales in Anderson, Grimm, and/or Lang, as there is an increased likelihood that you will have a similar Tale.

  After a minor divination spell, we have discovered your mother and father have no knowledge of Ever After School’s magic and associated issues.

  So Mom wasn’t a Character. She didn’t know. Which meant trying to explain would suck.

  Should you choose to enlighten them, please ask Ellie for our helpful Dos and Don’ts brochure.

  Best Wishes, and Best of Luck,

  The Director

  As Amy drove through the streets, I was suddenly glad Mom was on the phone.

  It was a good thing I couldn’t tell her now. If I did, she would want a tour, and we would end up at the Wall. Then she’d pull me out of there—and that would be the last time I ever saw Lena.

  The handwriting on the back of the letter was a lot messier, like it had been scribbled hastily. Sarah Thumb had certainly gotten in touch with the Director fast.

  P.S. It has come to my attention that you were present when our administration learned of the Snow Queen’s involvement in the most recent occurrence of “George & the Dragon.” Please refrain from sharing this information with anyone else—here at EAS or at home. If I hear of any difficulty following these instructions, you will join me here in my office.

  It occurs to me now that being new to our program, you cannot know who the Snow Queen is. She was, in her day, a significant threat, and her fame has given her name the same effect as the boogeyman. Such a fearful figure looms large in our imaginations, and we can invoke her to get our children to behave. However, she has now been imprisoned for many years. It is safe to say that she has been defanged. You should consider this incident as something rather like Napoleon sending his hounds from Elba to the coast of France to strike terror into the hearts of those who still feared him. Though she is no longer capable of any real damage, the fear that the Snow Queen inspires would be very problematic.

  I hadn’t even known that the Snow Queen was supposed to be scary. The Wall of Failed Tales freaked me out much more.

  I sighed. There was so much I didn’t know. When I told my parents and Amy, I knew they would have a million questions. Maybe it would be better if I waited to tell them—just until I knew enough about EAS to survive the interrogation.

  One month, I promised myself. Or whenever Dad called next. Whichever comes first.

  I just hoped that it would be enough time. I was ready to stop feeling so scared.

  hen I threw my stuff down the next day, my backpack was so heavy that it shook Lena’s table. She looked up from the inventor’s encyclopedia she was reading.

  “What’s in there?” Lena smiled. “Enchanted Stones from the Garden of Immortality?”

  “Just books,” I said and stuffed my mouth with a forkful of chocolate cake from the Table of Never Ending Instant Refills (I had made one detour on the way). I started flipping through the closest volume.

  Lena peeked into my backpack, reading the books’ spines. “Grimm. Andersen. Lang. Are those all the fairy tale collections in your school’s library?”

  “As many as they would let me borrow,” I said, skimming “The Wild Swans.” The fear that started fluttering in my chest when Chase and Adelaide had shown me the Wall of Failed Tales hadn’t gone away when I went to sleep, or when I woke up, or ate breakfast, or went to school. I had to do something, and freak-out study mode was the best I could come up with. “I want to be as prepared as possible.”

  “That’s dedicated . . . ,” Lena said uncertainly.

  “Incredibly dedicated.” Chase slid into the only empty seat. I didn’t like the way he was looking at me, already grinning—as if he had done something and couldn’t wait for everyone else to find out.

  “Monumentally so.” Adelaide stood directly behind Chase and glanced over my books gleefully. That couldn’t be a good sign either.

  “Well, don’t get too dedicated,” Lena said. “All the sixth graders are supposed to report to Hansel’s training courts in five minutes.”

  “Plenty of time.” Chase rested his chin in his hands. “So, Rory. Why so dedicated?”

  “I’m not going to end up on the Wall,” I said stubbornly.

  Adelaide laughed, little ladylike giggles, but Chase roared, wiping tears from his eyes.

  “I knew I shouldn’t have let them finish the tour yesterday,” Lena said.

  I glanced from Chase to Adelaide, not sure what was going on, but absolutely positive they were making fun of me.

  “Rory, what did they tell you?” Kelly asked.

  “We just showed her the names on the Wall,” Adelaide said.

  “All the names.” Chase smiled so widely his dimples showed.

  Lena turned to me. “First of all, a Failed Tale doesn’t always mean dead. I bet they didn’t tell you that. Sometimes, a Character just gets enchanted or imprisoned during their tale, and we have to go rescue them.”

  “Right, so of all the names up there, only maybe two-thirds died in their Tale,” Chase said smugly.

  I gulped. That was still thousands of dead Characters. “So, what happens if you Fail your Tale and don’t die?”

  “Nothing,” Lena said, which was very reassuring. “You can still hang out and wait to see if you get another Tale.”

  “Sure, but only if you can stand the public humiliation,” Chase added with a smirk. “Remember the ninth grader who Failed ‘The Flying Trunk’ in December? He dropped out by Christmas.”

  “And five years back,” called Adelaide
, “an ‘Aladdin’ Failed his Tale, because he lost his genie. He couldn’t let it go.”

  “I heard he’s still looking for it,” Chase said.

  “But there really haven’t been many Failed Tales recently,” Lena added quickly. “I think only eight in the past decade. The Director has been so careful. You know, since the war. She has all these extra rules and precautions. Like the rings of return yesterday.”

  Now I started to realize how well I’d been duped. “If there have only been eight Failed Tales in the past ten years, where did the rest of the names come from?”

  “I guess we did forget to mention that,” Adelaide said innocently.

  “The Wall actually shows all the names of Failed Tales since the founding of EAS’s North American Chapter,” said Chase.

  “And how long ago was that?” I asked Lena evenly, knowing that she would tell me the truth.

  “Same day as the founding of the United States,” she replied, watching me worriedly. “A Revolutionary Character decided it was her patriotic duty.”

  So, I had seen two and a half centuries of Failed Tales.

  I didn’t know how to react. Horror and fury both seemed like good options.

  “It’s just a little fun between friends,” Chase said, and suddenly anger gained the upper hand.

  “We’re not friends,” I said sharply.

  “So, tell us about it, Rory. Could you sleep last night? Did you have nightmares? Did you—”

  Something about the way he didn’t listen—the way he just kept talking like I hadn’t said anything—sent me over the edge. It happened enough with my dad. I was not going to put up with it from a stupid bully my own age.

  Before I really thought about it, I grabbed a handful of chocolate cake and shoved it in Chase’s face.

  I regretted it the instant the cake smushed. I could practically see the headline now: LANDON & WRIGHT’S DAUGHTER GIVES CLASSMATE A CHOCOLATE CAKE FACIAL. It would be third grade all over again.

  But then I remembered: They didn’t know. Nobody here knew. There was no way that this would make it to the press. It wouldn’t even get back to my parents.

  Then Adelaide gasped a little, and with a surge of triumph, I let myself do exactly what I wanted to do—exactly what Adelaide deserved. I scooped up the rest of the cake and smeared it over her hair.