CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
THE RETURN
Falling through the portal again is just as nauseating and gravity-defying as it was the first time. Filomena wonders if anyone ever gets used to interworld travel. She didn’t have the Pied Pipe to unlock it this time, but she did remember the melody that unlocked the heart in the tree and did a reasonable job of whistling it.
Just as before, another tree vomits her out into Never After. She looks around. Yup. She’s back on the familiar hillside that looks over almost all of the kingdoms. Except this time there’s a darkness in the sky, the flowers look muted and limp, and even the air around her feels tense, as if something is just about to happen. She hopes she hasn’t arrived too late.
She finds the marked trail that leads to Vineland, and as she journeys back toward Zera’s cottage—which she hopes is still standing—she thinks about what her parents told her on the drive to the portal.
“You see, honey, we didn’t adopt you through the normal channels,” Dad began.
“Darling, we found you under a tree!” said Mum.
“A tree?”
“In a little basket.”
“There was a letter,” said Dad.
“Shoot—I forgot to grab it.”
“A letter?”
“From whoever left you there. It said that … well … it said that we had to take care of you. You were a gift to us. But that we had to keep you safe, because there were evil creatures that would come looking for you.”
“Like what kind of evil creatures?”
“Ogres, wasn’t it?” asked Dad.
“Witches, too. And trolls?” added Mum, tapping her chin.
“And you believed this letter?”
“Well, better safe than sorry, yes?” said Mum. “And, well, also if we believed what it said, it meant we could keep you. And we wanted to keep you so badly.”
So that was why. It explained their neuroses, their overprotectiveness, their suffocating, overwhelming love and fear. They’d been warned. They’d been given a task.
“Oh, and that thing on your forehead? That was on the letter, too,” said Mum. “I knew I’d seen it somewhere.”
“And you’re okay with all of this?”
Dad turned around when they reached a stoplight. “It’s not a question of whether we’re okay with it or not. We trust you.”
Her parents walked her all the way to the Heart Tree. Mum was trying not to cry, and Dad was frowning.
“Group hug!” said Filomena. They embraced fiercely, in a tight circle that no one wanted to break. At last, they let her go.
“Just—be safe, kid, okay?” said Mum. “We don’t know where you’re going or what you have to do, but know that we love you. Be brave. You are more than you seem, and you know more than you know.”
“And come back to us,” added Dad.
“I promise I will,” said Filomena fervently.
One last smile, one last hug, and she was gone.
She forgot that Zera’s cottage is glamoured and that she isn’t immune to it. Is it just through those trees, or is she standing right in front of it? It’s hard to tell—everything looks so different. Many cottages are still charred from the ogre attack. Some are no longer standing. Everything in Vineland looks different, sadder, uglier, and ruined. It also looks mostly deserted.
A few villagers trudge by, but no one can tell her if Jack and Alistair are still around, or where Zera’s cottage is. Most of them eye her suspiciously as they hurry away.
Finally, the Cheshire Cat on his mushroom takes pity on her. “It’s over there. Right in front of you. Just knock,” the cat says, blowing a smoke ring.
She thanks him, and he gives her an enigmatic smile before disappearing.
She’s standing in front of nothing, but she forces herself to knock. She raps against a solid door; she just can’t see it.
She knocks again, louder this time.
From inside, someone yells, “I’m coming, already! Hold your hairs!” just before the door swings open, revealing a stunned Alistair. “Filomena?”
“Alistair!”
“You came back!”
“I had to!”
Alistair gives her a huge hug and doesn’t let go for a while. Filomena is grateful for his kindness. “Where’s everybody?” she asks when Alistair breaks the embrace.
“Zera went to find her sisters,” says Alistair. “But Jack’s…”
“Here,” says Jack, who’s leaning against a wall and regarding her with a cool expression on his face. “So. The prodigal daughter returns.”
“Hey to you, too,” she says, just as aloof as he is.
Alistair looks from one to the other. “Now, now, let’s not fight. Filomena’s back, and that’s a good thing!”
Jack shrugs as if he doesn’t care either way. Filomena decides to ignore him. “Look, I have a lot to tell you guys. First, my parents know I’m from here. There was some kind of letter from the person who left me under a tree in front of their house. It said ogres and trolls would be looking for me. Second, something went wrong with the books when I left. The story changed.”
“In what way?” asks Jack, raising an eyebrow.
“Well, um, you died,” says Filomena. “You didn’t become you.”
Alistair claps his hands over his mouth. “I knew it!”
“What?” asks Filomena as Jack glowers.
“When you left—something happened to all of us,” Alistair tells her. “We all went dark.”
“Huh?”
“Popped out of existence, I think. When you left, when you rejected the mark. It’s like we were never here.”
“Really?”
“Remember how I told you Never Afters can perish, but there are rules that govern our existence? That our demise is not something we’ve come close to experiencing yet?”
She nods.
“Well, we’ve experienced it now. One day we were here, and then—poof!—we weren’t. We just popped back right before you arrived.”
“If you guys are back, maybe the book’s back, too.” She removes the first volume and feels such a huge wash of relief over her. “It’s okay. Look. You’re still on the cover.”
Jack finally snaps out of his gloom and picks up the book with a wry smile. “Is that what they think I look like?”
The books are back to the original version, at least for now. Returning to Never After changed things for the better.
“Remember how I told you we’re in the thirteenth book? We’re all part of the story. We have to figure out how it ends,” she says.
“Happily, I hope,” quips Alistair.
“I’ve read all the books,” Filomena tells them. “I think I know what to do to defeat the ogre queen and her army. We need to be prepared. We’ll each need armor, a helm, and weapons. Dragon’s Tooth swords that can cut through anything, like the one Zera had that killed the ogre general.”
“Where are we going to get all that stuff?” asks Alistair.
“The books say that the most powerful weapons are forged and made in the Deep.”
“You mean, where the dragons live?” asks Jack.
“Yes.”
“Um…” Alistair seems reluctant.
She looks at both of them, exasperated. “What are you guys waiting for? Let’s go! We’ve got kingdoms to save.”