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“I THOUGHT YOU LIKED me!” Rachelle shrieked. Though she had no control over her body, it seemed her mouth was working fine. “I thought you were my friend!”
Medea laughed as the flames leapt from her wand, licking Rachelle’s neck. “My dear, that’s what I thought as well... until you escaped from the castle and joined my enemies.”
“I just wanted to go home!” Rachelle cried. The flames were singeing her neck, burning. “I just want to go home!”
Aurora exchanged glances with Lyric, who looked every bit as worried as she did. Then she looked to Noxor for answers, but he was powerless to move. With hostages at her side, Medea knew they couldn’t act against her.
“You’re an evil woman, Medea!” Meg shouted.
“Oh, do you think so? Thank you, I’ll take that as a compliment.” Medea smiled at her recently freed captives. “Isn’t it tragic, ladies? You reunite with Aurora, and then you get to watch me kill her right in front of you! What could be better?” Medea turned to Aurora. “That is, I’m hoping Aurora is the one who dies. Princess Rachelle could be your substitute, if that’s what you want.”
Aurora raked her hands through her hair. “No, Medea, don’t. Don’t hurt her! Please... let’s just... let’s just think about this...”
“Oh, I’ve already given it plenty of thought!” Medea exclaimed. “If you step forward and submit yourself to me, I’ll let go of Rachelle.”
“Submit myself to you?”
“Walk toward me. Tell your friends to stay where they are. It’ll be your life in exchange for Rachelle and the child. You’re the only one who has to die, Aurora. Anything else would be a waste of life.”
Aurora looked to Lyric again, but he didn’t say anything. He simply shook his head. Then she looked at Noxor, Meg, Mary—no one had an solution. There was only one thing she could do.
“Alright, Medea,” Aurora conceded. “Alright. You can have me.”
“Don’t,” Lyric whispered. “Don’t do this.”
“You can have me,” Aurora repeated. She walked across the room and stood in front of Medea. “Just let them go.”
“Actually...” Medea moved her wand from Rachelle’s neck and pointed it at Aurora. “I don’t think I’ll let them go. I think I’ll kill you first, and then I’ll decide what to do with them.”
“But you—”
Medea laughed. “Does the fact that I’m not letting them go really surprise you that much, Aurora? After I kill you, your friends are going to turn their swords on me. I’ll still need my bargaining chip. It makes sense, doesn’t it? Your problem is... you don’t think these things through. You’re too impulsive, and you’re way to trusting. Now that trust is going to get you killed.”
Aurora winced. She could feel Medea’s wand under her neck, stinging, singeing.
“Say goodbye to your friends, Aurora.”
Aurora’s shoulders fell. She had too much dignity to do what Medea told her to do—to utter an actual farewell. She hoped everyone knew how much she would miss them.
Medea raised her wand, ready to deliver the killing blow. Before she could do so, a little green frog flew out of Greta’s front pocket and landed on Medea’s face. Charmaine clapped his webbed feet over her eyes, and Medea reeled backward. Her wand flew into the air, and her momentary unbalance gave everyone a chance to react. Meg ran forward and grabbed the wand, Lyric ran forward and grabbed Aurora. As they ran for cover, Medea pulled out a second wand, and a trail of sparks shot across the room. Lyric and Aurora took cover under a table, and the sparks exploded against a table leg, narrowly missing their target.
Meg fired back, tossing a spiral of blue-white flames in Medea’s direction. Medea neutralized the spell with a counter spell, dissolving the flames in midair.
Noxor drew his sword and started to close in on Medea, but Medea didn’t have time to deal with him. She pointed her wand at Rachelle, whose wriggling marionette body started to mobilize. Rachelle, under Medea’s control, took an ornamental sword from the wall and started to do battle with Noxor.
“I’m sorry!” Rachelle squealed as her sword clanged against Noxor’s. “I’m so sorry! I have no control over this!”
Noxor blocked Rachelle’s attacks, but he didn’t deliver any of his own. Hurting Rachelle was the last thing he wanted to do. “It’s alright, Rachelle. I won’t hold it against you.”
Mary, unarmed, took cover under the table with Lyric and Aurora.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Mary whispered to them.
Aurora scratched her head. “Okay, but how!?” They watched Medea hurl a magic spell at Meg, narrowly missing her. “Medea’s standing in front of the door. We’d have to get past her!”
Lyric started to pull his sword from its sheath. “I’ll distract her. She can’t hold off me and the magic lady, right?”
Aurora grabbed Lyric’s wrist. “No, don’t... I don’t want you in any danger!”
“Why not? I almost had to watch you get killed!” Lyric exclaimed. “I don’t want anything else to happen to you. If I don’t do something right now...”
“But Lyric!”
He pried her fingers off of his wrist and raised her hand to his lips. As he kissed her hand, he whispered, “I’m really glad I met you.”
“Lyric...”
“Now might not be the optimal time to tell you this, but I really am glad,” Lyric told her. “I’ve had a wonderful time.”
“Lyric!”
They heard a holler from Noxor—Rachelle had lopped off his sword arm. The princess was sobbing as she battled him, grieved over the pain she was causing him. Against her will, she raised her sword and sawed off his other arm. Lyric let go of Aurora’s hand and ran out from under the table. He ran toward Rachelle before she could do more damage to Noxor. Meg, who had been doing a good job of holding off Medea, finally lost the duel. One of Medea’s spells connected, and Meg was lifted a few feet off the ground. Vines were coiling around Meg’s neck, choking her.
Aurora reached into her pocket and clutched the wooden bird. If it was supposed to bring her good luck, she needed it now. Oh please, her thoughts whispered. Oh please, oh please, oh please.
Noxor was armless, Lyric was fighting Rachelle, and Meg was having the life choked out of her. It couldn’t get any worse.
“STOP!” A mighty voice boomed. “STOP THIS AT ONCE, MEDEA!”
Nothing could deter Medea. She kept her wand trained on Meg, choking her.
A hooded figure approached Medea from behind, seizing her by the waist. He lifted her off the ground and shook her. Medea dropped her wand, Rachelle dropped her sword, and Meg fell to the ground, gasping.
“It’s about time you stopped this nonsense, Medea!” The hooded figure spun her around to face him, but he didn’t remove his grasp. “You stupid, stupid woman!”
“Who...?” Medea raised an eyebrow. She had no idea who was addressing her. After all, it had been nearly two decades since she heard his voice.
The man peeled back his hood, revealing a mess of tousled black hair and a familiar goatee.
“Blackbeard!” Aurora exclaimed.
“Richard!” Medea gasped.
Blackbeard grabbed Medea by the shoulders and shook her. “How could you do this? How could you be filled with so much hate after all these years?!”
Medea’s lips quivered as he yelled at her. “Richard...”
“I should spit in your face! It’s the least you deserve!” When he let go of her, Medea dissolved into a puddle at his feet. She wrapped her arms around his legs and wept.
“I’m sorry!” She buried her face against his knees and wept. “I’m sorry!”
“Sorry won’t cut it!” Blackbeard shouted at her. “Sorry wasn’t enough for you, was it? When I tried to apologize to you all those years ago, it wasn’t enough! No matter what I said, you never forgave me!”
Aurora crawled out from under the table, thoroughly perplexed. She just stared at Medea and Blackbeard, trying to make sense of what was being said.
“I was drunk!” Blackbeard shouted. “Pissed to the gills! I wasn’t myself! It was a mistake... but you never forgave me. And all these years, you’ve been making mistake after mistake, and for what?”
“I’m sorry!” Medea wailed. To say she was in hysterics would have been an understatement.
“No, what I did was not a mistake... because look what came out of it!” He bowed his head in the direction of Aurora. “She’s a good girl, Medea. Stop holding our mistakes against her.”
“I love you, Richard!” Medea clung to his legs. It didn’t look like she had any intention of letting go of him in the near future. “Oh, it’s so good to see you! Please don’t leave me! I love you! Please forgive me!”
Richard ignored her; instead, he turned his attention to Aurora. “Hello again.” He smiled at her. “It seems I’m you father.”
Aurora might have fainted if not for the fact that Mary was standing next to her, holding her aloft. “What?!”
“I’m your father,” Blackbeard repeated. “To make a long story short, Medea was my fiancé. I cheated on her with your mother and—”
“I already knew about that!” Aurora exclaimed. “But YOU’RE my father?”
Richard took a bow. “Yes. That’s me.”
Aurora barely had a chance to process the thought before Medea started sobbing again. “I’m so, so, so, so sorry!” She latched on to his legs even tighter. “I’ve been horrible! Please forgive me, Richard! I’ll do anything! I swear! I’ll do anything!”
Richard knelt beside her and wrested her arms from his legs. “I would only forgive you if Aurora forgave you, and we both know that would never happen.”
“After all this time, Richard... after all this time, I still love you! Why didn’t you come to me sooner?!” Medea sobbed. “I-I-I... I wouldn’t have done half of the things I did!”
“Because you didn’t want to have anything to do with me!” Richard hollered.
Medea buried her face in her hands and bellowed. “But that was a long time ago!”
Medea’s weeping was so loud, no one even noticed that Rachelle was crying too. She sat beside Noxor and his severed arms.
“I’m so sorry, Noxor!” Rachelle cried so hard, she could barely draw a breath.
“It’s alright...”
“No it’s not!” Rachelle kept wiping her eyes, but the tears kept coming. “Your arms, I... I can’t even apologize for something like this!”
“It’s alright,” Noxor tried to assure her. “I’m in a little bit of pain, sure, but it’s nothing that can’t be fixed.”
Having overheard their conversation, Charmaine leapt onto Medea’s knee. “I have an idea,” he croaked. “Maybe if you righted some of your wrongs, people would be a little more open-minded about the whole forgiveness thing. For instance, if you lifted the curse you put on me...”
Medea got up so fast, Charmaine flew off her leg. “That’s it!” she exclaimed. “I’ll undo some of the damage! Starting wiiiiith...” She looked to Richard for guidance.
“Don’t look at me! Ask Aurora what you should do!”
Medea turned to Aurora and extended her arms, as if beckoning for a hug. Aurora couldn’t believe her eyes. “My lovely niece,” she whimpered. “Please, tell me what I can do to earn your forgiveness.”
“Nothing,” Aurora answered coldly.
“N-nothing?”
“No, nothing,” Aurora repeated. “I could never forgive you.”
“Nothing?!” Medea looked back at Richard, who responded to her helpless gaze with a shrug. “But surely there must be something?”
“No. You killed Molly. There’s absolutely nothing you could ever do or say that would get me to forgive you.”
“That was an accident!” Medea grabbed her hair and tugged at the ends. Tufts of her hair drifted to the ground. “Adlai wasn’t supposed to kill anyone! I’ll kill him, the bastard!”
“Which would probably be a blessing,” Noxor added with a groan.
When she heard Noxor’s pained voice, Aurora realized something. She had the opportunity to set aside her vengeance for the greater good. After everything Noxor had done for her, it was the least she could do. “If you want my forgiveness, Medea...” she began, “you could start by helping Noxor.”
“What about Noxor?” Medea inquired.
“What about ME?!” Charmaine whined.
“His arms,” Aurora said. “Fix his arms.”
When Medea retrieved her wand from the ground, everyone held their breath for a few seconds. There wasn’t a person in the room who wasn’t at least a little bit afraid she might change her mind and start firing off spells like there was no tomorrow. “Okay.” Medea flicked her wand in Noxor’s direction; in an instant, his arms were reattached to their sockets, and the pain was gone. “That’s easy. What else?”
“Lift the curse you put on him,” Aurora commanded.
“Lift the curse? What curse?” A worry wrinkle appeared on Medea’s forehead. “Oh, you mean that curse! You see, that’s where we have a bit of a problem...”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean...” Medea drew a deep breath. “I can’t just remove a curse. I can replace an old curse with a new one, but I can’t lift a curse.”
Aurora crossed her arms. “So you’d have to curse him again?”
Medea nodded.
“But that would lift the previous curse?”
Medea nodded again.
“You bitch!” Rachelle jumped up and put her hands on her hips. She never thought she’d be brazen enough to yell at Medea, but that’s exactly what she was doing. “There’s got to be something that’s a little less harsh than the curse he’s got on him now, right? If someone falls in love with him, he dies? That’s just too cruel!” Rachelle dropped back down and hugged Noxor, as if to protect him from whatever nonsense Medea might cast on him.
“Less harsh. Hmm.” Medea pensively tapped her wand against her chin. “Judging from how staunchly you defend them, I better hurry up before the old curse takes effect.” She flicked her wand at Noxor and uttered a few indistinguishable words.
Nothing happened.
“W-well?” Rachelle whimpered. “Did you do anything?”
“Uh-huh.” Medea looked back at Richard for approval, but he said nothing. “The new curse is in effect.”
Everyone stared silently at Noxor, as if expecting him to grow horns or catch fire. Or worse.
“New curse?!” Rachelle shouted. “Well, what is it?!”
“It’s similar to the curse I put on Charmaine. If you kiss him, he’ll—”
Rachelle didn’t wait for Medea to finish. She pulled back Noxor’s hood, looked right at his eroded face, and pressed her lips against his. Noxor’s entire body tensed. It was the first time he’d ever been kissed and it was, to say the least, unexpected.
When Rachelle finally removed her lips from Noxor’s, she took his hand and cradled it to her face. “Oh, please don’t die...” she whimpered. “I should have waited for Medea to tell me about your curse... please don’t die...”
He didn’t die. On the contrary, Noxor’s face started to change. The cracks in his face smoothed over, the fleshy red folds retracted, and his sunken eye was pulled forward. A new eye appeared in the empty socket. His hand, which was pressed against Rachelle’s face, was healed of its festering sores and open flesh. A minute later, Rachelle was looking into the eyes of a rather handsome man.
“Oh.” Her mouth fell open. She couldn’t believe her eyes. No one could believe their eyes. “Noxor, you’re...”
He reached up and touched his face, noticing the difference in texture. “What is it? What happened? Why is everyone looking at me?”
“Because you’re... you’re...” Rachelle couldn’t believe what she was about to say, but it was completely true. “You’re cute!”
“Cute?” Noxor repeated the word, which sounded foreign to his ears.
“Yes!” Rachelle reached out to tousle his curly brown hair, which was quite different from the patchy white tufts he was sporting before. “It’s amazing!”
Everyone fell silent for several seconds. Medea wanted to ask for forgiveness again, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Aurora wanted to deny her forgiveness, but she didn’t want to incite Medea’s rage. Meg and Mary wanted to strangle Medea, and Blackbeard wanted to take his old love into his arms. Everyone had their own unspeakable agenda.
Except for Charmaine.
“Excuse me!” Charmaine spoke up again, breaking the silence. “If the ladies are doling out kisses right now, please tell me wheribbit I should queue up!”
They ignored him.
As usual.