“Well, then, there’s no point in hopping with both feet,” Maddie said cheerfully. “I’ll start you. Ready? On your mark, don’t sleep like a sloth, a loose goose will vamoose!”
“Go?” Raven and Cerise asked, both unsure how to translate the Riddlish.
“Yes!” cried Maddie.
Cerise and Raven took off. Maddie hopped on one foot and was quickly left in their dust. She laughed merrily as she scampered with a squirrel. She was in no rush to reach the finish vine.
But Cerise was. Her powerful legs surged her forward. Her red cloak flapped as she darted around trees, pivoting into the turns. Raven worked hard to stay behind her friend, keeping time with the soft thuds of Cerise’s brown boots. Cool air filled her lungs, and the heavy weight that had settled into her stomach since the start of Spring Break began to dissolve. The faster she ran, the happier she felt—as if she could outrun the odd feeling that had mysteriously invaded her body.
Raven increased her speed. Soon, she was running alongside Cerise. This was spelltacular. Her heart hammered in her chest and her breathing was ragged as she set her gaze on the finish vine.
I can win this.
The thought almost stopped her in her tracks. What story did she think she was in? She could never-ever-after beat super-athletic Cerise.
This race isn’t fair. Raven debated whether she should quit. Cerise was half wolf! She wasn’t even panting.
No! I’m not a quitter. I can run faster. I want to win!
Raven pumped her legs harder. Sweat trickled down her forehead. They were neck and neck.
Am I being mean?
Raven worried that it was bad-spirited to want to beat Cerise. This run was supposed to be for fun.
It’s more fun to win.
Competing voices filled Raven’s thoughts. No longer paying attention to the race, she tried to untangle her conflicting feelings.
Ooof! Cerise suddenly stumbled. Raven looked back and saw her friend get right back on her feet, so feeling confident Cerise wasn’t hurt, she sprinted forward as fast as she could and crossed the finish vine first.
“Woo-hoo! I won!” Raven waved her arms in victory.
“Congrats!” Cerise wrapped her in a sincere hug. “That was a hexcellent run!”
“Great job, girls!” Mr. Badwolf crouched on a large rock. Raven hadn’t realized he’d gotten back from his walk and had watched the race. He ambled over and clapped both girls on the back. “Cerise, great speed as always. Raven, that was quite a performance.”
Raven grinned. “This is the first running race I’ve won since nursery-rhyme school. I didn’t think I had it in me to run so fast!”
“Raven!” Mr. Badwolf guffawed. “Your speed alone didn’t bring victory. You remind me so much of your mother as a girl. We went to school together, you know that? Win by any means necessary. That was your mother’s motto, too. Take down the competition. Trip ’em, if you have to! That’s the true mark of an evil winner!”
Raven replayed the race in her mind. What had she been doing when Cerise stumbled? She couldn’t remember. She’d been trying to quell her dark thoughts. Had she done something bad to win? Had she tripped Cerise?
“Who won?” Maddie hopped toward them.
The weight in Raven’s stomach grew heavier. What should she do?
She took off running. She wanted that happy feeling to return.
“Raven! Come back!” her friends called.
She plunged even deeper into the woods, running as fast as she could.
But there was no outrunning her destiny.
She was turning evil after all.
Diary Entry
I’m sitting under a little wooden bridge. It’s dark and quiet down here next to the shallow stream. I’m sitting here and trying to sort this all out.
All signs point to me being evil.
1. Every good spell I’ve done has gone bad.
2. I almost let the Hoods eat poisoned pie.
3. I tripped my BFFA and sabotaged our race.
But I still feel good inside. How’s that even possible? Can I be a good person and sometimes do wicked things or have wicked thoughts? What if I can’t stop what-ever-after is happening and I become pure villain?
I can’t even go there. I’d give anything not to be evil. I’ll never eat another thronecake again. I’ll live the rest of my life under this bridge!
Actually, it’s not so bad down here. A little damp, maybe. That’s so weird. Why am I thinking about living under a bridge?
Cerise and Maddie found me here after I ran away. Cerise tracked me with that super-sniffer of hers. Now they’re patiently waiting for me to finish up writing in you. They know I need to get my crown on straight!
I told Cerise how bad I felt that I had tripped her. Cerise told me not to worry about it, that she’d bumped her knee the other day and had been feeling a little wobbly, so it probably wasn’t even my fault. So that explains why I was even able to keep up with her, but, Diary, what if I really did trip her?
I told my friends that I was worried I might really be evil and that I’ve been feeling confused about my destiny.
Then Maddie pointed out that I’ve been confused about that ever since my first day at Ever After High.
She’s got me there, Diary.
I tried to explain that this was different. That I had this weird feeling. Maddie and Cerise listened (they are such great friends!) and Maddie even had some advice for me. She told me that everything made perfect Wonderlandian sense to her: I’d done a double backflip back because I’d taken a huge leap forward on Legacy Day, and now I had to front flip back over to the side of good.
In other words, according to Maddie, I have to do a front-flip-full-twist.
A front-flip-full-twist? Is she serious?
I can barely do a cartwheel.
I’m doomed.
Spell you later,
Raven
know you keep saying nothing is impossible,” Raven told Maddie. “But, trust me, I royally stink at gymnastics.”
“When I couldn’t do the hurdles in Track and Shield, I practiced and practiced until I conquered it,” offered Cerise. “You can just practice the front-flip-full-twist.”
“I could.…” Raven thought about what Maddie had said earlier. She needed to get back to the side of good. A smile slowly spread across her face as she formulated her plan. “I have another way. From now on, I’m going to do only good things. I’m going to be so off-the-script good that I’ll conquer any eviltude that tries to come my way.”
“In Wonderland, we like to play If I Didn’t while enjoying a pot of jubjub tea!” Maddie did her own flip. “In other words, good triumphs over evil in The End.”
“Problem solved.” Cerise stood, knocking her head against the wooden planks. “Can we get out from under this bridge now?”
“Why are you under a bridge, anyway?” asked Maddie.
Raven shrugged. “I have absolutely no idea. It just seemed like a nice place to hide out and think.”
On the way back to the cottage, Raven complimented her friends. She picked up the litter left behind from their picnic. She gathered nuts for the chipmunks. She focused on doing good, good, good. When she spotted the plump, ripe raspberries on the bushes near the cottage, she knew what to do.
“These berries are the perfect gift for Red to make up for the ants. We can make berry jam!” Raven said excitedly, before realizing she didn’t know how.
Raven turned to Maddie. “I’ve never made jam before,” she admitted.
“Ooh, tea-rrific! There’s a first time for everything! And a third, sixth, and eighth!” Maddie declared.
The three girls lifted the hems of their dresses, piling on berries until the fabric sagged under their weight.
“My mom mushes berries with a wooden spoon in a bowl to make jam. We’re going to need a lot of bowls. Or”—Cerise pointed to an empty wheelbarrow near their vegetable garden—“what about one ginormous bowl?”
&nbs
p; “Hex yeah!” cried Raven. They dumped all the berries into the wheelbarrow. “Should I go inside to get spoons?”
“Spoons are so last chapter. Today is totally about toes!” Maddie pulled off her mismatched shoes and socks, rinsed her bare feet with the garden hose, and climbed into the wheelbarrow.
“Have you flipped your crown?” Cerise gripped the handles to steady the wheelbarrow so her friend wouldn’t fall.
Raven pulled off her socks and shoes, rinsed her feet, and scampered up beside Maddie. The berries felt cold and gloppy between her toes. They held hands and danced until the fruit was pulverized into a pulpy sauce.
“Next we cook it with sugar on the stove.” Cerise seemed surprised by how much she’d picked up from all those afternoons at the kitchen table, watching her mother cook. “Jump out. I’ve got this.”
Cerise helped her friends out and rolled the wheelbarrow through the back door and into the kitchen.
“I want to cook, too!” Raven hurried in behind her. She paused for just a moment, remembering her last adventure in a kitchen. She quickly pushed that thought to the back of her mind and rushed into the kitchen. From now on, she would only do good!
“Jumpin’ jelly donuts!” Maddie stood in the doorway and clapped her hands over her mouth. “Look what you did, Raven.”
Bright-red berry-juice footprints covered the floor, staining the polished wood. Raven had forgotten to put her shoes back on.
“Ugh! My good is turning all big bad again.” Raven couldn’t believe it. She’d tried so hard. “Don’t worry, Cerise. I’ll clean it before your mom gets back.”
Raven wiggled her fingers at the floor, ready to spark some magic. Then she balled her hands into tight fists. She’d tried that path already. Magic wasn’t going to get her back on the side of good. She turned to the sink. “I’m going old-school this time—a sponge, a mop, and lots of soap.”
When Red entered later, she was met with two surprises: a shiny, clean kitchen and jars of delicious, homemade raspberry jam.
In the cozy kitchen, they gathered around the small table. Raven sat back in her chair, enjoying the warmth from the nearby fireplace and the laughter as Maddie delighted them with stories and riddles. Raven watched Cerise and Mr. Badwolf’s teeth flash as they chewed their meat vigorously, both leaning with their elbows on the table and both talking with food in their mouths. She laughed as Red and Cerise both trustingly fell for Mr. Badwolf’s trickery and smiled as both took special care to refill her water glass and offer second helpings.
It dawned on her how much Cerise had inherited from both her parents, in looks and personality.
“I baked a fairytale desert for each of you,” Red announced after the girls had helped clear the dinner plates. “Mini-thronecakes. Cerise’s is cherry flavored. Raven’s is dark chocolate. Maddie’s is a pineapple upside-down.”
“Can I eat it upside down?” Maddie balanced her head on the seat of the chair and raised her legs in the air.
“Eat any way you want. It’s my mother’s recipe. She used to bake mini-thronecakes for me to bring to my grandma.”
“And we all know how that story turns out!” Mr. Badwolf gave Red a mischievous nudge. “I guarantee these thronecakes are the most spelltacular ones you’ve ever tasted!”
“I had the most marvelous thronecake the day we left school for Spring Break.” Raven reached for her fork. “I don’t know what flavor it was. It tasted like all my favorite foods rolled into one. Isn’t that hexcellent? But it did make me feel woozy and dizzy when I ate it. Probably too much sugar.”
“Really?” Mr. Badwolf’s ears perked up. “Who gave you that thronecake?”
“Maddie, I think.” Raven turned to her friend. “Curses! I didn’t say thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. It wasn’t from me.”
“Then it must’ve been Apple. A little white box was on my bed when I got back from the Castleteria,” Raven reported.
Maddie flipped to her feet. “Wait a spell. Something is topsy-turvy. I saw Faybelle right outside your room that day, and she was holding a little white box.”
“Faybelle?” That didn’t make any sense. “Why would she give me a secret thronecake?”
Diary Entry
“The thronecake may have been cursed.”
Did you hear that, Diary? Cursed! That’s what Mr. Badwolf said—and if anyone knows about curses, it’s him. He teaches General Villainy!
I excused myself from the table to go to the bathroom. I needed a minute to think this through.
Why would Faybelle want to curse me?
Sure, we’re not BFFAs, but we’re not enemies, either. I know she’s against my choice to not follow my destiny, but unlike others, Faybelle has told me outright. I respect her honesty. I figure that she chose her story, I’m writing a new one, and everything’s cool.
Maybe it’s not.
What I don’t get is: Why does she care so much? My choice only affects me, Apple, and—I guess—my mother.
Oh hello!
Now it’s all adding up.
A cursed thronecake has the Evil Queen’s fingerprints all over it. And the little card that said EAT ME! I remember cards like that in my nursery-rhyme school snack bag.
My mother and Faybelle are working together to curse me.
Was it a curse to turn me wicked? Is that what my mother was talking about during our mirror chat? Is that why all my good is going bad? Can the curse be reversed?
I hope so!!!!!!
I have so many questions, Diary.
Fingers crossed that Mr. Badwolf has answers.
Spell you later,
Raven
aven returned to the table and poked her thronecake with her fork. Molten fudge seeped from the moist dark chocolate cake, but she couldn’t bring herself to take a bite. Had Faybelle ruined thronecake for her forever after?
“How difficult would it be to curse a thronecake?” she asked Mr. Badwolf.
“It depends on the difficulty of the curse. My friends and I once cursed a milk shake back in our day at Ever After High. Made our teacher croak like a frog uncontrollably whenever a student raised her hand—and the kids in that class asked a lot of questions!”
“But is there a curse that would make me evil that could be done to a thronecake?” Raven asked.
“Make you evil?” He raised his bushy eyebrows. “You were born evil.”
Raven sucked her breath in through her teeth. “I don’t think I was. I know my mother is the ultimate evil, but I’m not like her. At least I thought I wasn’t, but since I ate that thronecake, I’ve been feeling, well, grumpy, mixed-up, and a little bit evil.”
“And she smells weird, too,” Maddie added. “Like a mixture of broccoli and old coffee.”
“Seriously?” Raven was even more horrified. She was jumping into a shower right after dinner!
“You don’t say.” Mr. Badwolf pressed his fingers together. “That changes things.”
“What does it change?” asked Cerise.
“There’s an obscure curse I know of, designed to ignite evil, but it only works fully if the recipient possesses true evil in her core. The thing is, this curse is meant to be used on… well… trolls.”
“No worries, then. Raven is not evil, and she’s not a troll,” Red concluded.
“Trolls often smell like broccoli and old coffee, in my experience,” Mr. Badwolf informed them.
“Whoa!” Raven jumped out of her chair. “Are you saying I’ve been turned evil and into a troll?”
For a moment, the room began to spin. Raven gripped the back of the chair to steady herself. How much was one princess supposed to take? She had planned on kicking back this week—so much for a relaxing Spring Break!
“Don’t worry!” Maddie patted her hand. “You don’t look like a troll. You just smell like one.”
“Oh great. Troll odor!” Raven sighed.
“But she was sitting under the bridge,” Cerise whispered to Maddie. “She had bugs in h
er hands, and she’s been grumpy.”
“That’s not proof. I once almost caught a fly with my tongue, but that doesn’t make me a frog,” Maddie whispered back.
“Um, hello? I can hear you,” Raven reminded her friends.
“I doubt anything is happening,” said Mr. Badwolf. “That curse is in an old book that is hidden safely away in the Vault of Lost Tales. No one can get that book.”
“See?” Red smiled. “It’s just a coincidence.”
“When you say no one, does that include the Evil Queen?” Raven asked warily.
“The Evil Queen?” Mr. Badwolf snarled. “Well, she’s the hexception. The Evil Queen finds ways to get what she desires.”
“Well, she desires for me to be evil just like she is,” Raven replied, collapsing into the chair again and hiding her face in her hands. She didn’t like the way this was coming together.
“But you’re not evil!” cried Cerise. “You’re not cursed. This is crazy.”
“I hope I am cursed, because then I’d know what was going on. Otherwise, I’m becoming who I was born to be. What if I can’t choose my own destiny ever after all?”
“You can write your own story,” Cerise insisted. “My parents did it, and look at our happy family.”
“You have the best family, Cerise,” Raven agreed. “My family, well, we’re much more complicated.”
Cerise snorted. “You don’t think my family is complicated?”
“Everyone’s family is complicated in their own way. That’s what makes life interesting,” added Red.
“I wouldn’t trade my family for the world. I like being sweet like my mom and wild like my dad. I like that my parents chose love instead of following storybook rules.” Cerise wrapped Mr. Badwolf and Red in a hug.
Raven was overcome with longing to hug her father. “I miss my dad,” she admitted.
“You should talk to him,” suggested Mr. Badwolf.
“He’s so busy.” Raven swallowed hard. “He doesn’t have time to listen.”
“Have you told him you really need to talk to him?” asked Maddie.
Ever After High Page 5