by Joan Holub
Snowflake looked at her wand in surprise. Could it talk? But then the sprite Jack Frost appeared, hovering in the air outside her castle window. It was his voice she’d heard.
She stepped back. “Ice melts — that’s all there is to it,” she replied.
“Not necessarily. Not if you stay on this island and use your powers to stop it from happening, Your Snowiness! I mean, Your Queenliness!” To her astonishment, he touched down on the windowsill and bowed low to her.
Snowflake sent him a quizzical look. What in Grimmlandia was he talking about? “I’m not a queen. I’m just a girl.”
“Wrong! I know what I’m talking about. My test found you,” Jack Frost said confidently.
“But even if you’re right about me being a queen — and I really do think you’re mistaken — I can’t spin straw into gold. I already tried.”
“Bah! That stuff about finding someone to help me create gold was only a cunning trick of mine,” said Jack Frost. “Your principal could turn that straw to gold on his own, the fool. He just doesn’t know how to use his own power, which between you and me is fueled by, guess what? His anger! Ha-ha-ha!”
He spun around in the air until he became a giddy blur, then righted himself and got serious. “As for your gift, it’s obviously snow and ice. And mine’s frost. Working together, we could be invincible! We’ll turn Grimmlandia — and maybe even the Nothingterror and other realms yet to be discovered — into wintery lands that we’ll rule!” In his excitement, he did a loop-the-loop spin in midair, leaving behind a corkscrew trail of glittery frost.
Growing anxious, Snowflake rolled her wand between her fingers. “Wait. I don’t get it. Your test …”
“Haven’t you guessed who you are?” he went on before she could finish. “Here’s a hint. You’re a fairy-tale character, an evil one.” He paused dramatically, then blurted, “The Snow Queen!”
Snowflake gasped and stumbled back a step. “The evil Snow Queen?” She’d heard the Snow Queen’s tale long ago in school, but had never actually read it herself. She’d sort of forgotten about it. Her heart hammered in her chest. Could it be true? “No! That can’t have anything to do with me. I’m a nursery-rhyme character,” she protested, shaking her head. “Maybe not a good one, but nothing as villainous as the Snow Queen, I’m sure.”
“Read my lips,” said Jack Frost. Speaking slowly and loudly, he said, “You. Are. The. Snow. Queen.” He did a little happy dance on the newel post at the top of the stairs she’d created, then slid down the stair banister and back up it again. Whee!
In her eagerness to convince him (and maybe herself, too) that he was wrong, Snowflake stretched the truth a bit. “I know for a fact that I’m the horrid girl in the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow rhyme. You know how it goes? ‘There was a little girl / Who had a little curl / Right in the middle of her forehead / And when she was good / She was very, very good / But when she was bad — she was horrid.’ That’s me!”
Jack Frost stood firmly on the banister and folded his arms. “Nope. Just look around you. Your icy powers prove I’m right. There’s no mention of ice or snow in that nursery rhyme. Besides, I make it my business to know about all evil characters. You’re the Snow Queen from the Hans Christian Andersen tale.”
She cocked her head. “It’s not a Grimm fairy tale?”
“Humpf! And you can be glad of that. I’m no fan of those talentless Grimm brothers. They didn’t include me in their tales, and they locked me in a snow globe!” Jack flitted closer until he was directly in front of her nose. “So what do you say, Queenie? Shall we work together so I can … um, I mean you can rule as you’re intended to? C’mon. Turn to the evil side — it’s so much more fun than being good.”
She didn’t want what this sprite was saying to be true! “No! No! No!” As she spoke, she accidently waved her wand in emphasis.
Screech! Crunch! Chunks of ice began moving here and there to create new features inside the castle. These weren’t cute features, either, but strange and creepy ones. Were they born of her unsettled feelings? Or from her true nature? She shuddered as stalactites with monstrous faces formed on the ceiling and icy cobwebs wove themselves in high corners. She could feel her emotions slipping and sliding out of control. With his terrible news, Jack Frost had completely erased her pleasure in what had been, up to now, a perfect afternoon.
Just then, Dragonbreath called to her from outside. “Hey, Snowflake! Want me to add some more windows?”
Snowflake took great gulps of breath, trying to calm down as she went to the window again. There, she leaned out to see Dragonbreath on the ice below. “No, that’s okay. Maybe later,” she called back.
“Steer clear of him,” Jack Frost advised from somewhere behind her. “Dragon fire is dangerous. Remember how he melted that door in seconds flat?”
“But that was only to help me,” she protested, turning to look at the sprite as he floated above the banister.
“Still, if dragon fire can do that to your castle, imagine what it could do to you and your icy powers. Not to mention to me!” said Jack Frost, fanning the flames of fire fear in her mind.
This sprite was kind of right. Dragonbreath was all about fire, and she was all about ice. Talk about opposites! They weren’t good for each other at all. They shouldn’t be friends.
Dragonbreath had helped her today, but if he ever wanted to, he could melt whatever she built with a single puff of fiery breath. Which made him especially dangerous to an architect whose material was ice. No wonder she had always feared fire!
As she fretted, Jack Frost drifted happily around the inside of the castle. “This place will be the perfect lair for us to operate from,” he said, returning to her after a couple of minutes.
“Lair? I don’t need a lair because … because I’m not a villain!” She thrust out her arm, showing him her wand. “I — I have a magical charm, and they only come to those who’re good of heart!” Still, deep inside, she feared Jack Frost was right. Because the tale of the Snow Queen … well … much as she hated to admit it, it fit.
“Haven’t you ever heard of an evil charm?” he asked. “Like Ms. Wicked’s crystal ball or her mirror, for instance?”
Was he right? She supposed it was proof of her true nature that she’d accidentally transformed her beautiful castle into something awful — an evil lair!
Totally freaking out now, Snowflake threw her snowflake wand at him. “Take it! If it’s evil, I don’t want any part of it. You can have the wand and go be evil on your own!” With those parting words, she ran down the ice stairs and out of the castle. Her slippers turned into skates again, and she zoomed off past all the laughing, playing students.
Anger and self-pity rose in her as she sped toward the swan boats. Why did this have to happen when things had been going so well the past couple of days? She’d been wrong to forget her number one rule and start getting to know and like some of these students. Those budding friendships would soon wither and die when everyone found out who she really was.
Her cheeks were flushed, and her heart was galloping away. “Calm down, calm down,” she murmured to herself. Nothing good ever came from letting her emotions spiral out of control. She sensed that if she couldn’t get a handle on them, something ghastly was going to happen.
Mermily came skating toward her. “Where are you going to in such a hurry?” she asked with a smile.
Obviously, that girl had no idea who she was talking to. Before Snowflake could warn her to get out of her way, it suddenly began to sleet. Everyone gazed up at the sky. The freezing rain was only falling over the island, she realized. She had a bad feeling about this. A bad feeling that whatever this meant, it was her fault!
“We’ve got to get out of here!” she told Mermily. Cupping her hands around her mouth, Snowflake yelled to the other students. “Get off the island. It’s not safe!”
Mr. Hump-Dumpty’s big eyes went wide. She felt bad for worrying him. But it worked like a charm.
“Scramble, everyone! Off
the island!” the egg teacher boomed, waving his arms wildly. “Everyone eggxit to the boats. Eggscape while you can! Danger! Danger!”
Snowflake and Mermily rushed for the icy shore along with everyone else. Meanwhile, the freezing rain fell faster and faster. Cries of “Ow! Ow!” sounded as the sleet struck the skaters.
Snowflake started to help those around her into the swan-shaped boats. The moment they stepped off the island, the skates on their feet turned back into their original footwear. She guided Cinda into a boat, but was startled when the girl jerked and cried out, putting a hand to her cheek.
Prince Awesome rushed over to Cinda, asking, “What’s wrong?”
“I — I don’t know. It felt like something stung me,” she told him. “It was just the sleet, I guess.”
Snowflake stared at Cinda in concern … and watched the girl’s blue eyes glaze over. Just like Mary Mary’s had back in the garden. What did it mean?
“Want me to take you up to the office of the Doctor, the Nurse, and the Lady with the Alligator Purse when we get back to GA?” Awesome offered kindly.
In spite of how upset she was, Snowflake let out a nervous giggle. Because the Lady with the Alligator Purse was a funny name for a member of the Academy medical staff.
“What are you laughing at?” Cinda demanded, glaring at her. “You think my injury is funny?”
“Huh? No!” said Snowflake.
“No one would think that,” Rapunzel tried to tell Cinda.
“Are you okay?” her roommate, Mermily, asked. She tried to give Cinda a hug, but Cinda pushed her away.
“Oh, just leave me alone, all of you!” complained the glass-slippered girl. “And by the way, I don’t like the nickname Cinda. It’s Cinderella from now on!”
With that, she jumped out of the boat and dashed off, leaving them all bewildered. After settling herself in a swan boat only big enough for one passenger, she rowed for the Academy on her own.
Prince Awesome rubbed the back of his neck, looking worried. “She’s not usually like that,” he commented to Foulsmell as the two boys climbed into the boat Cinda had abandoned and pushed off into the river.
Exactly, thought Snowflake, though she still didn’t know what to make of the change that had come over Cinda. And Mary Mary before her!
She hopped into a boat with Rapunzel, Red Riding Hood, and Mermily. The minute they shoved off, the sleet stopped. Along with at least a dozen other student-filled swan boats, they rowed across the river toward the opposite bank where Grimm Academy stood. As they paddled, the girls in Snowflake’s boat discussed Cinda’s weird behavior.
Was it my fault? Because I laughed? Snowflake silently worried. Or maybe that had nothing to do with it. What if being an evil character meant you rubbed everyone the wrong way, no matter what you said or did? She didn’t want to be the Snow Queen. Once again, she wondered how these girls — and everyone else at GA — would react when they found out her fairy-tale identity.
After they landed on the shore near Pink Castle, she watched Awesome catch up to Cinda, er, Cinderella. The two of them headed for the school drawbridge.
“Maybe he can talk to her and figure things out,” said Rapunzel, nodding toward the pair.
“Yeah, maybe they had a fight or something earlier and she was already on edge and waiting to snap,” Red Riding Hood suggested as they climbed out of their boat.
Snowflake didn’t think that was it, however. After all, Cinderella now had the same glazed look in her eyes as Mary Mary. And as everyone filed back into the Academy, she heard some other students arguing or acting oddly and noticed that their eyes had become glazed, too. Had they been struck by those icy shards, like Cinda? And was it possible that Mary Mary had somehow been struck by a shard that day in the garden? Could Snowflake’s icy evil Snow Queen powers really be causing this change in behavior?
Although she had come to really like her fellow students, she vowed to steer clear of them all in the future. For their sakes as much as hers. She wouldn’t go to the Great Hall with everyone tonight to eat dinner. She would just hang out in her library hideaway and hope that would stop her from stirring up trouble — however unintentionally — from now on.
Speaking of the library, she wondered what that bunny had gotten up to while she was away. Had he been doing okay all day in her room? Or had he destroyed the place with his teeth and claws?
After hurrying into the school, she found the library again in two shakes of a bunny’s tail, still on the first floor. Someone had left the door ajar, and she reached for the plain brass knob, eager to give it a twist and check on things. The knob morphed before she could sneak inside.
“Not so fast,” snipped the goose-head knob. “It’s riddle time. You’re my best customer lately. What gives? Why are you spending so much time in the library?”
“Is that the riddle?”
“No.”
“Well, please get on with it,” she replied. “I’ve got stuff to do in the library. Private stuff.”
The knob huffed and muttered something that sounded like, “Nobody ever tells me anything.” Then it said more loudly, “Okay, here goes:
“Within my two walls are adventures galore.
Your two hands can unlock my door.
What am I?”
Two walls? What had only two walls? Snowflake wondered to herself. Searching for ideas, she looked around the hall. Aha! She snapped her fingers. “I know. A hallway!” she replied.
The knob gave a haughty sniff. “Wrong. Don’t be so literal.”
With an impatient sigh, she held her palms close together, trying to imagine they were walls that had adventures between them. Hearing footsteps just then, she turned to see Prince Foulsmell coming down the hall. He was holding his Handbook open and reading what … school rules? Class assignments? Or a story … like maybe an adventure story? The two sides of the Handbook’s cover … weren’t they kind of like walls?
She looked at the knob, unsure. “Is the answer ‘a book’?”
Snick! The goose head turned back into a regular brass knob. She’d been right! After pushing through the library door, Snowflake paused in the C aisles for cheese, crackers, and cashews for herself. Then another stop in Section D for dandelions and dill to feed the bunny. And lastly in Section F to grab a book of Hans Christian Andersen fairy tales.
However, when she got back to her room, the bunny was nowhere to be found. She searched high and low. Finally, she heard a soft, little sneeze. A small feather floated out from the lowest part of her bed.
Getting down on her hands and knees, she peered at the bottom mattress. There was a hole in it! The bunny had burrowed inside it and made himself a snug home.
“Come on out,” she called gently. “I brought you something to eat.”
She set the dandelions and dill in a dish by the entrance to his new burrow. Not waiting to see if the bunny would come out to eat, she climbed up on the top mattress. Munching cashews, she opened the fairy-tale book and began to read “The Snow Queen.”
After a minute or two, she heard the bunny thump across the floor to begin munching his dinner, too. A bit later, she heard scrabbling sounds. She glanced over the side of the mattress and saw that the bunny was running circles around her bed.
Abruptly, he stopped and did the weirdest thing. Boing! He executed a wacky jump-twist movement that sent him straight up in the air. Upon landing again, he went racing around and around the bed a few times more, boinging every now and then. At the top of his boings, the tips of his ears reached as high as the mattress she was lying on. The sight caused her to roll with laughter, and she put a hand over her mouth to stifle the sound, just in case Ms. Goose (or anyone else) was nearby.
“You want to come up?” she asked the bunny, since it seemed clear he was trying to reach her with all those boings. The bunny gazed up at her as she went down and picked him up. After setting him on her mattress, she climbed back up. He snuggled against her side as she lay on her stomach and went on
reading. He was good company, she decided. And she could certainly use a companion now that she was going to have to keep to herself as much as possible.
“This is the tale of ‘The Snow Queen,’ ” she read aloud to him in a soft murmur. “It’s about a girl named Gerda who has lots of adventures. You don’t really hear much about the Snow Queen even though the tale is named for her. The main stuff she did is try to make Gerda’s friend — a boy named Kai — go live in an evil castle where he had to move puzzle pieces around forever and ever.” She patted the bunny. “It’s a pretty weird story. Interesting, though.”
She flopped over on her back, and the bunny hopped onto her stomach. Oof! When she decided to let him stay, he grew bolder. He put his head under her hand and gave it a nudge.
“Are you telling me you want to be petted?” she asked, feeling a little tug at her heart. Naturally, he didn’t answer. But she petted him, anyway. “I have to warn you that I might be evil,” she admitted to him. “I might be as dangerous to you as Wolfgang or Dragonbreath. Or worse even.” She hoped not, though, because she couldn’t stand the thought that she might accidentally do something to hurt this sweet bunny.
“Unfortunately, “The Snow Queen” tale does feel like it fits me,” she whispered sadly. “Still, I don’t exactly feel evil. Guess that doesn’t mean I’m not, right?” After all, since she could cause ice and snow to form, it seemed highly probable that her magic had caused the strange sleet on the island earlier. Sleet that might be responsible for the glazed looks and out-of-control emotions that had beset Mary Mary, Cinda, and other students. Gulp! What if her evilness was catching somehow?
Maybe the principal and Ms. Jabberwocky had suspected she was the Snow Queen all along. Had they only been waiting for her to confirm their suspicions? Would she soon be kicked out of the Academy for causing trouble, like what had happened at her last school?
“Maybe, but I’m here now,” she murmured to the bunny. They burrowed under the covers together. She really liked this little fuzzy-eared guy. If she got kicked out, would she be able to take him with her? No, that wouldn’t be fair to him. He needed a safe, permanent home, and who knew where she’d wind up?
