Half Upon a Time

by James Riley

  They were trapped.

  “And to think!” the Huntsman said. “I spent all that time hunting you down, girlie, when I should have just waited here!”

  “We might be trapped,” May said, faking confidence, “but this isn’t all of us!”

  “Who else … oh, you mean the wolf?” The Huntsman laughed loudly. “After the last time, I’d be surprised if he was fool enough to face me again!”

  “Count me a fool, then,” said a voice from behind them. Jack turned around again just as the wind doors exploded into thousands of little breezes. Filling the now empty doorway was Malevolent, still in dragon form, with the human Wolf King riding on her back, reins in hand.

  He quickly dropped the reins, then leapt down from her back, landing directly on two of the small monsters—dwarfs, they looked like. Without even a pause, the wolf kicked those two hard enough to send them flying into the snow walls, where their helmets crashed into the snow stone with loud gongs.

  Two others leapt for him, but the wolf jumped straight into the air, leaving the dwarfs to collide below him. He came down on top of the second pair of dwarfs, knocking both to the ground. He reached down slowly to pick up an axe in each hand, twirled them around for a moment, then launched both right at the Huntsman.

  The Huntsman knocked the pickaxes straight to the ground with his own axe. “Are you challenging me?” the Huntsman asked disbelievingly.

  “I hardly think it will be a challenge,” the Wolf King said, an evil smile on his face. “You caught me unaware the last time we met. Do you dare fight me face-to-face this time, coward?”

  The Huntsman returned the smile. “I think we both know the answer to that,” he said, as dwarf arms grabbed the wolf’s cape from behind, yanking the animal off balance. “You see,” the Huntsman continued, “I would face you man to … well, dog, but why take the chance when I can take you down underhandedly?”

  As the wolf fell backward he pushed off with his feet to land hard on the dwarfs behind him. The one remaining dwarf drove its axe toward the wolf’s face, but the wolf kicked up, knocking the axe into the air and the dwarf off balance. By the time the Wolf King caught the axe, he’d slammed the dwarf back against the snow wall, knocking it out. “I believe it is time you took that chance,” he said to the Huntsman.

  The Huntsman shrugged. “I’ve faced worse.”

  “The real question is,” the wolf said, a large grin playing over his face, “have you been distracted by worse?”

  The Huntsman frowned, then spun around, his axe at the ready.

  Unfortunately for him, Jack, May, and Phillip were gone, the wind door on the opposite end of the courtyard blowing wildly as it swung open.

  Chapter 40

  Behind them, the Huntsman bellowed in rage, a roar that ended abruptly as the wolf let out his own howl. Jack didn’t bother looking back; whatever was happening, the Wolf King was on his own. If the wolf could keep the Huntsman distracted for long enough, the three of them might actually have a chance to find Snow White and get out alive. Of course, there was also the Wicked Queen to deal with, but Jack was trying to stick to one thing at a time.

  It didn’t help, therefore, that the hallway beyond the courtyard ended in a room with three different doors.

  “Nothing can ever just be easy!” May shouted in frustration.

  “Should we split up?” Phillip asked.

  Jack nodded. “May, you go right,” he said to the princess. “Phillip, you go straight; I’ll take the left. If you don’t find anything, come back and follow someone else.” Jack pushed Phillip toward the center door, but grabbed May by the shoulder. “Here,” he said, giving her the witch’s knife. “You might need it. Just remember—”

  She snorted. “Yeah, it cuts everything but people. You know, I so had a sarcastic comment ready there.”

  Jack smiled, then gently pushed her toward the door on the right. After watching the other two leave the room, he turned and ran through the left-hand door.

  Jack found himself in a long passageway with multiple doors on either side, each of which he ignored for the time being, as at the end he saw a spiral staircase going down. Hopefully, Snow White had built her castle like any other civilized person would have done, putting the dungeon underground.

  He took the stairs two at a time, doing his best not to slip on the snow stone the stairs were made of, despite the fact that the snow seemed as dry as rock. As Jack passed floor after floor he realized that he was so deep in the castle now, he’d be absolutely no help to May or Phillip if this was the wrong direction.

  And it was. The stairs abruptly ended in a solid wall of ice, a wall he plowed right into, smacking his head against it with a loud conk.

  “Owwwwwwwww!” he yelled, stumbling backward to trip on the step behind him. He landed hard on his bottom, and for a second, he wasn’t sure which hurt more, his rear end or his throbbing head. And then the shock of the impact wore off, and he quickly declared his head the winner as sharp pains spread like lightning bolts through his skull. This brought on an even louder scream, one that, in his frustration, he didn’t bother holding back.

  As the pain gradually subsided Jack pushed himself to his feet and stared angrily at the offending wall. Who in their right mind would ever build a wall smack in the middle of a stairway?!

  “You assume there is such a thing as a right mind,” said a voice from behind the wall.

  Jack instantly froze, and not from the cold. He peered more closely at the wall, and realized he could just about make out a shape on the other side: a dark, almost human shape.

  “Who’s there!” Jack called out, trying not to hope.

  “Just an old woman, dear,” the voice said. “Someone in need of a little help, in fact.”

  Jack smiled in spite of himself. “Right!” he yelled through the wall. “I’ll get you out of there, just hold on!” He felt all over the wall, pushing here and kicking there, but nothing gave—there wasn’t a crack anywhere in the ice. “Um … do you have any suggestions for how I could go about doing that?”

  In response, Jack could have sworn he heard a sigh. “It’s not a natural wall, dear,” the voice said. “Do you happen to know any magic?”

  “No,” Jack yelled back. “I mean, I have some magical stuff, but if you’re asking if I can do magic, as in actually cast a spell, then no.”

  “That’s all right, dear,” the woman said kindly. “Unfortunately, while I do know magic, I cannot use it. My captors have seen to that. Still, there is a way—”

  “Great!” Jack yelled.

  “Try not to interrupt, dear.”

  “Right!” Jack yelled back. “Sorry!” What was he doing? He could barely get a word out! And why? Because he was talking to Snow White? Well … yes! He was talking to Snow White!

  “No need for apologies, child,” the woman said. “First, let me explain our problem. Despite its appearance, this wall isn’t just frozen water—”

  “It’s not?!” Jack blurted out. He reached out and touched it again, just to confirm that it did still feel like ice. “What is it, then?”

  “Frozen ice dragon’s breath,” the voice said. “That being the case, I’d recommend not touching it.”

  Jack involuntarily took a step backward and almost tripped on the stair behind him again. “Um, right!” he shouted. “Is it a problem that I’ve already touched it a few times?”

  “Only if the dragon is still alive, dear,” the woman said. “Let’s hope it isn’t, shall we?”

  Jack winced. “Uh, yes,” he said. “And I’ll just, um, not touch it again.”

  “A wise decision,” the woman said. “Now, listen carefully, for the spell to break this wall requires a powerful will as well as absolute concentration. You must explicitly follow every instruction I give you. Do you understand me, child?”

  “Pay attention,” Jack repeated, shifting his weight from foot to foot in anticipation. “Got it!”

  The woman laughed. “My child,” she said,
“you must be truly blessed to have survived this long. Now, are you ready? Listen carefully, for we shall not have another chance. To break a spell of this magnitude would normally require centuries of study. Unfortunately, we have maybe minutes before you are discovered, so we will make do.

  “There are three things to watch for when performing the spell I am about to teach you. First and foremost, you must be careful to protect yourself. This magic will open your mind to spirits beyond the natural world, and many of those spirits would like nothing more than to take over, if you let them. You must be careful to retain control at all times.

  “Second, we will be breaking a dragon’s spell. There is a large chance that by doing so, every dragon within a thousand miles will hear it and come running in an instant. If that happens, I suggest that you beg for mercy: Some dragons keep human pets. Not many, but a few.

  “Finally, and most importantly, since you have never attempted a magic spell before, and given the forces that you will be unleashing, there is a small chance that you will simply—how should I put this?—cease to exist. By that, I mean you will completely disappear from this and every reality, both now and for all time. In this last case, I admit things would look bad. Still, you won’t exactly be around to see it, so there’s always that.”

  Jack blinked a few times, his mouth hanging open. “Ah,” he said finally, snapping his jaw shut.

  “Do you understand what I have told you?” the woman asked.

  “Yes,” Jack said. He stood up straight, sighed, drew his sword, and plunged it straight into the wall of ice dragon breath.

  The blade sank in without an ounce of resistance all the way to the hilt, leaving a trail of a thick white vapor in its wake.

  The entire wall shuddered for a moment, then a large crack abruptly split the ice from top to bottom. As Jack held tight to the sword more and more cracks appeared, vapor escaping from each one.

  Jack kept the sword in the wall for a moment longer, then yanked it out quickly. The wall shuddered again, violently this time, cracks jutting out from the main breaks until the entire wall of ice was riddled with fractures. For a moment, it appeared as if the wall might still hold … then, with a sound like a sigh of defeat, the entire wall collapsed into a heap of thick, white vapor.

  “Child!” the voice exclaimed in surprise. “What did you do?!”

  Jack tried to see what lay beyond the vapor, but couldn’t make out anything yet. “I really didn’t like the sound of never having existed,” he said, even now blushing as he spoke to her, “so I took a chance. And I know what you said about it not really being ice, but my sword’s cut through some pretty strong stuff before, so—”

  “Your … sword?” the woman asked. “Step forward please, young man. I must see the sword that did this.”

  “What about the ice dragon breath?” Jack asked warily, staring at the thick, white cloud in front of him.

  “It should be quite harmless by this point,” came the reply.

  “Should be?” he asked indignantly.

  The woman sighed impatiently. Not really wanting to push it, Jack quickly closed his eyes and jumped through the fog. Other than a tingling over his skin that felt like he’d been splashed with ice water, he made it through the fog in one piece.

  As he emerged on the other side Jack opened his eyes. There, seated on a chair of ice was a woman, her back perfectly straight, her hands resting comfortably on her knees. Despite her captivity, the woman looked like nothing less than a queen on her throne. Even the enormous iron boots locked over the woman’s feet did nothing to dispel the regal image.

  She was quite beautiful, as well: The woman’s jet-black hair had only a few streaks of white playing through it, and her face seemed to have been barely touched by age. That was, every part of her face except her eyes. There, Jack found a depth he didn’t dare stare too deeply into, for fear of being lost. He’d seen haunted eyes before, often in the gazes of veterans of the Great War, but this woman’s eyes were far beyond haunted: These eyes held a full-blown supernatural invasion within them.

  But this was her! This was the woman he’d seen in his grandfather’s Story Book: This was May’s grandmother! Jack almost fell to his knees in relief. He had found her—rescued her!

  Only, the woman’s dark eyes were focused intently on Jack’s sword.

  “My child, where did you get that?” May’s grandmother asked quietly.

  Jack shifted back and forth, far too conscious of every inch of his body. “I, uh, found it. Someone gave it to me.”

  The woman’s gaze shifted to look Jack in the eye. His squirming stopped abruptly, frozen by her stare. “This is his sword, child,” she said. “To be given it … he must have done so.”

  “Yes … uh, yes, ma’am,” Jack stammered.

  The woman’s look doubled in intensity. “The owner of this sword is dead, Jack. Are you aware of that?”

  Jack managed to shake his head no, almost dropping the sword to the ground while doing so.

  And then the intensity in her gaze disappeared, replaced by a desperate sadness. “I apologize, dear,” she said, her voice tired. “I hardly meant to scare you. It’s just … I was quite surprised. At one time … but that’s not important.” She gestured at the iron boots on her feet. “Might you be willing to help me with these?”

  And just like that, Jack was back to being the gawking boy, awestruck in her presence. He quickly tried to pull off the iron boots, without any luck. “What are these?!” he asked her as he yanked on them.

  The woman smiled. “I think my captors fear my meager magic, dear. Iron dries out one’s magical wellspring, in a manner of speaking. By forcing me to wear these boots, they have made me quite powerless.” She smiled gently. “Still, at least I was not forced to dance in them.”

  Jack smiled stupidly at that. “Right, that would have been bad,” he said, having a bit of trouble thinking clearly. “How do I get them off?”

  The woman gestured slightly at his sword. “That should work as well on these as it did on the wall.”

  Jack nodded his head over and over. “Right!” he yelled enthusiastically. He bent down, located the locks on either side of the boots, and whacked each with the blade. One slice was all it took, and a moment later, Jack helped the woman step gently out of the boots.

  “Ah,” she said, stepping forward with a grace Jack would have thought to be physically impossible. “That feels wonderful.” She held up her fingers, and a small red spark danced between two of them. “Truly wonderful,” she repeated.

  Jack just stood there, grinning like an idiot.

  “Are you all right, dear?” the woman asked, looking closely at him. “I know you must have been through quite a bit on your way here to rescue me.”

  “A little,” Jack said, toeing the snowy ground. “But nothing you should worry about, of course.”

  “You are modest. And courageous,” the woman said with an approving nod. “Admirable qualities … as long as you know when to use them, and when other traits are called for.”

  “I usually do,” Jack said, barely able to look at her. “But I’m having a little trouble thinking right now. I gotta say, I’m pretty intimidated.”

  The woman laughed. “That’s sweet, dear, but believe me, you have nothing to worry about.”

  “You’re … really her,” Jack said to the woman, dropping to his knees and bowing his head. “You’re Snow White!”

  The woman smiled the smile of a true queen. “Please, call me Eudora, dear.”

  Chapter 41

  “Now,” Eudora said, “do get up, Jack. May will soon find herself in quite a bit of trouble, if I am not mistaken. We must hurry.”

  Jack picked himself up off the snow floor and dusted himself off before something occurred to him. “Um … Miss Eudora? Ma’am?” he asked shyly. “How did you know my name?”

  May’s grandmother patted his cheek, smiling gently. “I knew you were coming, dear. I’ve been waiting for you for a long tim
e.” She glanced down at the sword in his hand. “And yet, you still manage to surprise me.” She gazed at him fondly, and he blushed. “Now,” she said, “let’s go rescue that granddaughter of mine, shall we?”

  As May’s grandmother—Eudora—moved to climb the stairs, Jack couldn’t help noticing how her time in the dungeon had seemed to weaken her. He could see it in her every step, in each move she made. As they started up the stairway he silently offered her his arm, which she took with a slight nod.

  “You’re quite the little gentleman, aren’t you, dear?” she said to him, and he smiled politely, even if he’d have normally argued the point. Though Jack never would have believed it of himself, he was completely at a loss with this woman. Her presence was just so … so powerful!

  With Jack’s help, the two managed to make it most of the way without too much delay. However fast they went, though, it wasn’t nearly fast enough for Jack. “We might still be quite a distance, Your Majesty,” Jack said as they paused for a moment’s rest. “Maybe I should just run ahead, if May’s in trouble?”

  Eudora shook her head, breathing harder than he’d have liked. “You alone are simply not enough,” she told him. “I need to be there, as well. But I am still weak.” Abruptly, she stopped and looked Jack up and down, as if sizing him up. “It occurs to me, though, that there are other options. If you are willing, child, I could use some of your youthful strength—just enough to give me the energy to deal with these matters. Nothing you’d miss for too long, of course.”

  “Whatever you need,” Jack said, without even thinking about it.

  “Such a pleasant boy,” the woman said with a sympathetic smile as she reached out a hand to touch Jack’s chest.

  For a brief moment, nothing happened. Then, out of nowhere, Jack almost fell to his knees. All of his strength, his energy, seemed to be flowing right out of his chest and into Eudora’s hand, which burned the skin over his heart as if it were on fire. Spots began to pop in front of Jack’s eyes, and the bright white of the snow walls began to blur, but just as he thought he would black out, May’s grandmother removed her hand. The drain on his energy stopped immediately, and whatever was left flooded throughout his body.