Chapter 2

Come On, Get Happy

“Nice going, Maxine!” grumbles a goblin boy struggling to carry a heavy box of cannon powder down the hall. “Now I have to go to the Witches in Disguise: How to Recognize Your Enemies lecture. I heard it’s four hours long!”

“Sorry!” Maxine says for the umpteenth time. We are heading back to our dorm rooms to clean up. I guess she can feel us looking at her again because she turns our way and frowns. “I got scared, okay? I thought Gilly was going to get hurt.”

That’s not possible. Flora added the code word after Rapunzel and Harlow’s first battle drill ended with an ogre smashing a month’s supply of fruit and vegetables to smithereens because he suspected the harpy he encountered in the pantry closet was the real deal. (We’re still eating apple-turnip mush for supper every night. Yuck.) There was recently a harpy attack at Royal Academy so I get the kid’s confusion, but fairy be, there are posters everywhere.

“But you know she can’t!” Jocelyn is growing impatient. “It’s a drill! We have them every week! There are posters telling people about the drills so there’s no confusion!”

She points to the castle wall that just appeared in front of us, causing us to take a left turn instead of going straight. On it is a scroll with pictures of various weapons, spells, casting books, and an ominous shadow that looks a lot like Rumpelstiltskin.

DON’T BE GRIMM—BE PREPARED FOR BATTLE!

Drills held weekly. All illusions are interactive, but unable to harm you! However, in the event of an emergency, yell Goldilocks, and the battle will stop immediately.*

*Students who end Professor Harlow’s simulation do so at their own risk.

Jax balances his battle plans and maps in his arms. “They really need to take the asterisk off that sign.”

“But Gilly looked so unhappy!” Maxine tries again. “When Anna appeared, I…”

“I’m fine!” I snap a little too quickly, and everyone in the hallway looks at me. I take a deep breath and turn to Maxine. “I know you were just trying to help me. That’s what friends do.”

Maxine sniffles. “Thanks. You’re such a good friend, Gilly. I…”

“Even though, you knew it was just an illusion,” I can’t help adding.

“A scary illusion!” Maxine continues with a shudder. “Everyone is so doom and gloom. All we talk about are attacks, and weapons, and poison apples. Can’t we have fun anymore?”

Kayla snorts. “Fun? You want to talk about having no fun? How would you like to live with a mother who has to lock herself away all day and all night, waiting for information about Rumpelstiltskin’s story to come to her?” Her wings pop out and flutter before disappearing again. (They get wonky when she gets upset.) “I finally get my mother back, and now she has no time for me! It’s all about that book!”

“Well, that book is important,” Jax reminds Kayla. “If we have any hope of stopping him, we want to know what he’s planning for Enchantasia.”

“Not going to happen,” Jocelyn says in that cheery manner of hers. “One villain with magic is bad enough. Two is impossible. The kingdom is done for. That’s why my sister is leading battle drills. Best we can hope for is some of us make it out of here alive without getting our houses blown down.”

A sprite flying next to us bursts into tears and flies away.

“Jocelyn, stop it!” Maxine chides. “You’re scaring them.” She calls after the sprites, “Don’t worry! We’re safe at FTRS! Everything is going to be fine!”

“Liar,” Jocelyn mumbles. “We’re doomed.”

Maxine turns purple, looking angrier than I’ve ever seen her. She waves one of her huge hands in the air. “I’m not lying! No one knows what’s going to happen next! All we can control is today, so why not be happy and enjoy yourself while you can?”

“Here comes the speech,” Ollie whispers, and I bite my lip.

Bless Maxine’s heart. She wants everyone to be happy, but it’s tough. I want to say Look around! We’re a kingdom under attack. No one’s happy.

A new hallway opens, and I can see the circular staircases leading to the boys’ and girls’ dormitories right ahead of us. Students covered in mud wearily stumble up the steps to change uniforms, but Maxine blocks our path.

“When I was a wee ogress, we were in the height of the Troll War,” she tells us. “Our home in the hillside was destroyed in an attack, our extended family scattered, and Father had to go off to fight. It was just me and Mother.” She looks off in the distance, drool dripping down her chin. “I was so sad, but then Mother took me to a meadow to pick some flowers, and we made a bouquet to put in our new home. Sure, it was the underside of a bridge, but she tried to make it feel special. When it was safe to go outside, she’d take me to a lagoon to hear mermaids sing, or we’d hike to Mount Olimundo to have berries that we would whip into the best dessert around. Sometimes we’d even go hunting for typhiras during a summer thunderstorm.”

“You went looking for a typhira?” I snort. “They’re not real, Maxine.”

“What’s a typhira?” asks Kayla.

I shudder. “Supposedly they’re nasty little things that hate school kids and love to cause mischief…but they’re just a legend.”

“They are real!” Maxine insists. “Father saw one once. He said it was kind of cute.” She grins. “He said they’re unique looking, like me!”

“Cute? They practically took down one of the ships I was on by making one of their freak thunderstorms,” Ollie says.

“You saw one?” Maxine sounds more excited than alarmed. She turns to Kayla. “They can make storms with their minds!”

Jocelyn sighs. “Maxine, you’re dreaming. Even the most powerful witch has a tough time conjuring up a storm with her mind.”

“The typhiras can do it!” Ollie insists and his cheeks flush. “I mean, you wouldn’t want them to make a storm on purpose. Ours happened by accident. We had one unknowingly locked up in one of the trunks I plundered from a village. You know, back when I did that sort of thing. When we let it out on the ship, it went out of control and conjured up this huge storm. I thought the lightning was going to crack our mast in half!”

“So where is this mythical creature now?” Jax says with a smirk.

“It got blown off the ship in the wind it created,” Ollie says with a shrug. “And the storm died down.”

“How convenient,” I say under my breath.

Maxine sighs. “You’re so lucky. I’ve always wanted to see one make a storm. But we never found a typhira. Even so, Mother and I had grand adventures, and soon I was happy again. I missed Father, our home, and our friends, but Mother kept me distracted, and suddenly the war didn’t feel so close to home anymore. I remember I asked Mother why she did this, and she said, ‘Maxine, the world can be a scary place, but we’re okay and we need to celebrate that. No good comes from crying all the time. The more good you put out in the kingdom, the more good comes back to you.’”

“Someone get me a violin,” Jocelyn says. “Next you’re going to say, ‘Love conquers all.’”

“Love does conquer all!” Maxine insists.

“Not always,” I remind her, thinking of Anna.

“Yes, but…” Maxine starts to say, and Jocelyn shushes us.

“Do you guys hear talking?” Jocelyn snakes away from us and moves to a hallway that opened up behind the dormitory staircases. “I think that’s my sister talking.”

“Aren’t they getting ready to teach class?” I ask. “Professor Sebastian said something about a final review for tomorrow’s test.”

“Ugh! I haven’t even started studying,” Jax says, and I look at him in surprise. “I was working on maps for the next battle drill.”

“Shh!” Jocelyn shushes us again. “Listen!”

We hurry after Jocelyn. Harlow, Flora, Rapunzel, Professor Wolfington, and Blackbeard (who is carrying a mirror with Madame Cleo’s image on it) are hurrying into Madame Cleo’s detention room. The door shuts behind them with a click.

Miri’s voice comes over the magical loudspeaker system. “Reminder! Class will resume in five minutes. All teachers are in their rooms waiting for you, which means if you’re not already seated, you’re going to be late!”

“Get your story straight, Miri,” Ollie jokes. “These teachers aren’t ready for class.”

Kayla flutters to the door of Professor Wolfington’s classroom and gasps. “Guys, look! Wolfington is in there! Didn’t we just see him go into the detention room?”

We rush over to the doorway and peek in. There is Professor Wolfington, in all his hairy glory, standing at the magical chalkboard pointing to information about a quiz they’re having that week in History of Enchantasia. He says something about which pages to study in our course books, and we duck back out. Hans Christian Anderson, what is going on?

“That’s not him,” Jocelyn says. “Watch his feet. He’s a hologram. It’s one of my sister’s favorite bait-and-switch tricks. Projecting herself elsewhere so no one can know what she’s really up to.” She rolls her dark eyes as she pushes her long, black tresses behind her ears. “I’ve gotten pretty good at it myself, but she caught me sneaking into her potion lab the other night when I was supposed to be in bed. I was trying to pinch a tiny bit of rhubarb gingersnap for this face cream I want to make, but she said no. She’s so stingy.”

“Could she project that many teachers into their classrooms?” Ollie asks. Jocelyn shrugs. “That is impressive. If I could do that, I would never have to go to potion lab with her again!”

“Harlow must have a really good reason to call a meeting,” I point out. Jocelyn and I look at each other. Oh, this is too juicy to ignore. As the hallway begins to shimmer and fade away, the two of us dive into it. Maxine begins to protest, but soon follows with Jax, Ollie, and Kayla.

“I don’t know if this is a good idea,” Maxine says worriedly. “Last time I was stuck in there, Rumpelstiltskin tried to drown us in Madame Cleo’s tank. I’ve avoided detention ever since.”

“You’re not in detention now, silly,” I remind her. “We’re spying. You’ll be fine.” Maxine doesn’t look convinced.

Ollie places his eye over the keyhole. “Oh yeah, the whole teaching staff is here. And the royal court is here too. Even…wait a minute, is that Princess Rose?”

“Let me see!” I push Ollie out of the way to get a better look. The others are also jockeying for position.

It is Rose! She’s standing next to Princess Ella, listening to something Headmistress Flora is saying with large hand movements. I need to get in there.

“How are we going to get past them?” Jax asks. “They’re right by the door.”

Jocelyn has her ear up to the wood. “I can’t hear a blasted thing. It will take way too long to come up with some sort of cloaking spell.”

“Or a diversion,” Ollie says. “I mean, we could blow up the door with a spell, but then they’d all run out and that would defeat the purpose.”

“Guys?” Kayla tries.

“What if it was just a teensy explosion?” I suggest. “Or we knocked and ran so they had to open the door?”

Ollie scratches his chin. “I like that. Or I could go back and get my bag of magic tricks and create my own illusion of a sea serpent busting through Madame Cleo’s tank and then…”

“Guys!” Kayla points to the door. “They’ve moved. You don’t have to blow up the door. We can just…” She picks the lock with a tiny pin from one of the green crystals woven into her hair. “…walk in.” The door clicks.

“Nice move,” Jocelyn says appraisingly.

“Once we’re inside, we have to be really quiet and find somewhere to hide so they won’t see us,” Jax reminds us. “Somewhere near the door.”

“The wood cubbies!” Jocelyn suggests. “We should be able to fit inside them. Kayla just has to tuck in her wings, and Maxine needs to make sure she runs to the ogre-sized one.”

“I still think we shouldn’t be snooping around,” Maxine says. “If the professors think there’s something we need to know, they’ll tell us.” She brightens. “Hey, maybe they’re planning a party! We haven’t had one in so long. It would really lift everyone’s spirits.”

“They’re not planning a party,” Jocelyn says dryly. “Now come on!” She slowly turns the door handle then slips inside. One by one, we silently follow, staring at the large tank of water in front of us. Madame Cleo resides primarily in a large fish tank in Fairy Tale Reform School, but on occasion she goes out. The tank has tunnels that connect to the nearby lake (where Blackbeard’s ship is anchored) and the river that leads to the sea. Lately, she’s been here, giving a lot of detention to students who aren’t following safety protocols in the wake of Alva’s statue being stolen. Right now, the room is empty. They must have moved into her private quarters, which are in another tank behind this one so we’ve got the room to ourselves. This is perfect!

The tank glimmers in front of me, full of silvery fish water, weaving through seaweed and milling around the rocks that speckle the sandy bottom. I pause momentarily. What if the fish tell Madame Cleo we’re here?

Nah. Who knows if they can even talk like she can. Mermaids are entirely different from fish, aren’t they? And no one else seems worried. Ollie and Jax have already slipped into their cubbies, Maxine is squeezing herself into the giant-sized one with Kayla’s help, and Jocelyn is choosing between two centered in the middle. She waves me over.

“Gilly, take this one!” she whispers. “It’s free.”

“Okay,” I whisper back and slip inside just as I hear talking again.

Fairy be, what is that smell? Bologna? A liverwurst sandwich? I look at the hook to my left. Eww…gross! It’s someone’s gym socks! No wonder Jocelyn gave me this locker! When I get a hold of her…

Wilson, my mouse, slips out of my uniform pocket and begins to squeak in annoyance. I’m sure he can pick up the scent too. “I can’t do anything about it,” I tell him. “Hold your nose and let’s hear what they’re saying.” I strain against the wood door to listen while holding my nose, which is not very comfortable.

“Well, what would you have us do, Princess? Sit back and do nothing?”

Harlow. I can tell by the tone of her voice. Plus, she’s being condescending, which is so her…and Jocelyn.

“I didn’t say that, Harlow,” Princess Ella says diplomatically. “We appreciate all that you and my stepmother are doing to keep the students safe.”

“Safe and prepared!” Harlow cuts in.

“Aye! We’re using all of the best safety measures,” adds Blackbeard. “Me ship has a new crow’s nest where a pirate is on guard twenty-four hours a day to watch for any funny business.”

“All the doors and windows have been magically enforced, and we’ve added charms around the school, not unlike the ones Rumpelstiltskin once used to keep everyone out,” Flora says. “But ours are stronger, thanks to Harlow.”

“I am constantly in my lab whipping up new potions that can be used for both disarming Alva and for keeping his squad at bay should they ever penetrate our walls, but the children must be prepared,” Harlow continues. “Tell them, Rapunzel!”

“I agree!” Rapunzel says, to my surprise. “Alva is not to be messed with. You don’t know her the way I do. She’s tricky and manipulative in ways Rumpelstiltskin is not. Combined, they pose a deadly threat and Fairy Tale Reform School’s students must be prepared. That’s why I have the RLWs—”

“Raz,” Ella cuts in, “that’s all well and good, but you have to understand the parents’ perspective. They’re worried for their children! They want them to come home. This week alone we’ve received thirty-two letters from parents of students at Royal Academy pleading with Headmistress Olivina and the royal court to allow them pardon during this time.”

Harlow snorts. “Royals are such wimps.”

I start to laugh, but stop myself. I know it’s wrong…but it is funny.

“We have had no such letters sent to Fairy Tale Reform School, I assure you,” Harlow tells her.

“Well, that’s not entirely true,” Professor Wolfington says. “I’ve had a handful. Just yesterday Gillian Cobbler’s mother wrote her, imploring her to come home as well.”

How does he know that?

“But she’s not going,” Flora reminds him. “She hasn’t asked us, and I doubt she would. She’s the picture of calm during drills, and she’s growing into a fine leader.”

“A leader with a cloudy relationship with her sister, the poor dear,” Madame Cleo interjects. “I see stormy seas ahead for that family.”

“So why did you call today’s meeting?” Rapunzel asks. “I have classes to teach that my hologram can’t possibly handle.”

“Of course, we should get going,” Snow begins. “We got some intelligence from someone Rose used to, well, associate with.”

The room is quiet.

“I’m not in allegiance with them anymore, as you know,” Rose says, her voice tight, “but I thought reaching out could be helpful to the kingdom during this time. And I learned…”

Suddenly, I feel as if I’m moving, as if the entire cube is drifting out to sea, but that’s impossible. And yet, I think the row of cubbies is actually being lifted into the air and flown elsewhere. My whole body shifts to the left, and I catch Wilson before he gets thrown across the cubby. I hear a small shriek and know it’s Kayla in the cubby next to me. There’s no way to see what’s going on outside the cubby, but whatever is happening, is happening to all of us. I start to sweat. I want to open this cubby door so badly, but then I’ll give myself away and—AAAH!

The front door of the cubby begins to open, and I grab hold of a hook to hang on, catching Wilson and myself before we fall several feet. I look out and see that the cubbies have been lifted into the air, have turned sideways, and are now hovering over my teachers’ meeting. I’ve been caught. My professors and the royal court are staring up at me, and they don’t look pleased.

Maxine slides from her cubby and drops to the ground, landing with a thud so hard, it dents the floor, but she seems to be okay. Kayla slides out of her cubby next, but with wings she’s able to flutter to the ground. Ollie grabs a hold of one of her legs and let’s go as well. Jocelyn, Jax, and I continue to hang on.

“You can come down now,” Harlow says tartly. “We can see you.”

“No, thanks,” Jocelyn says. “We’re fine where we are.”

Despite our best attempts to hold on, Harlow points her wand at us, and our grips loosen. We are pulled from the cubbies and suspended upside-down in midair. I can move my lips, but the rest of my limbs are frozen.

“Hello, your highnesses,” Jax says. “It’s a pleasure to see you, as always.”

“Jax!” Rapunzel tsks. “How could you? You’re a royal. You’re supposed to be setting an example.” Rapunzel looks at the teachers and the rest of the royal court. “This threat is not a joke. When you’re all ready to discuss things seriously, let me know. In the meantime, I have work to do.”

“Raz! Wait!” Ella calls to her, but she is already out the door.

Rose shakes her head. “If only the children hadn’t interrupted.”

I hate her tone. Plus, I’m still bent out of shape at how she once tricked me. “These kids have done a lot of good for this kingdom,” I point out. I attempt to blow my hair off my face, but it doesn’t work. “We have a right to know what you’re planning.”

“You don’t have a right to know anything!” Harlow rages, and Ollie, Kayla, and Maxine are suddenly lifted off the ground and suspended in midair like the rest of us.

“Thanks, Gilly.” Ollie’s pirate bandanna falls from his head and lands in Madame Cleo’s tank.

“You’re all meddling again! You’re impulsive!” Harlow adds. “Overly confident! You don’t think before you act!”

“They’re not the only ones,” I hear Snow White mutter, but thankfully the former Evil Queen doesn’t hear her.

“Why, I have a mind to… I should just…” Harlow’s hands start to glow red and a fireball begins to form. Snow White and the royal court rush out of the way. I hear Jocelyn sigh and mumble, “Show-off.”

“Harlow,” Professor Wolfington says soothingly. “Why don’t we all take a deep breath and calm down? Princesses? Maybe you’d like to take a break before we continue?” Blackbeard ushers them over to a formal table where tea service is waiting. “Harlow? Why don’t you go to your chambers and conjure a lovely poison spell to settle your nerves?”

“Yes.” Harlow scratches her chin. “That does sound soothing. If you’ll all excuse me.”

“Wait! Sister! Aren’t you going to get us down first?” Jocelyn cries.

“Nope.” Harlow whips her purple cape around. “You’ll fall eventually. You’re over Madame Cleo’s tank, so you’ll be fine.” She slams the door behind her.

“Aye! As long as they don’t get zapped by an electric eel,” Blackbeard points out. “Nasty beasts.”

“Blackbeard, is that any way to talk about one of my fellow sea creatures?” Madame Cleo snaps.

Everyone in the room starts bickering. I’ve never heard them like this before. I blow my purple stripe of hair from my eyes and try to get Maxine’s attention, but she’s too busy looking at the teachers. Even upside-down, I can tell she’s frowning.

Headmistress Flora walks underneath us. “I’m very disappointed in all of you,” she says. “This was a private meeting not meant for children’s ears and with our royal court, no less. You need to stop meddling! Didn’t what happened in Cloud City teach you anything?” We’re all quiet. Headmistress Flora hasn’t been this angry in…I don’t know how long.

Madame Cleo swims into view. Her mermaid fin is a fiery red. “Detention for all of you!” she says, sounding grumpier than usual. “After Harlow feels like letting you down.”

Whoosh!

I free-fall and splash into Madame Cleo’s tank, getting tangled in the bamboo reeds. As all of us swim toward the surface, I can’t help being disappointed. Once again, we find ourselves treading water.