My Epic Fairy Tale Fail

by Anna Staniszewski

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  As I made my way toward the glass mountain, I passed dozens of people getting ready for the festival. The vibe in the village was somber and resigned, as if everyone had given up. I couldn’t say I blamed them. If I lived in this place, I’d probably feel defeated too. Ilda seemed to feed off everyone’s crushed hopes.

  When I got to the mountain, the sun was high in the sky, which meant that the festival had already started. This time, as I got ready to climb, I was a little more prepared. I pulled a length of rope out of my bag and tied it around my waist. Then I looped the extra rope at my hip, hoping it would be long enough to make my plan work.

  After stretching out my fingers and ignoring the aches and pains from the last time I’d attempted this crazy task, I got to work. This time, climbing was much easier, mostly because my mind was on what I was doing. Everything else faded away until I was just focused on finding one foothold after the next.

  Within a few minutes, I reached the same ledge I’d fallen off the first time. I glanced up at the perfectly smooth rock face above me. I’d gone as far as I could go. Now all I could do was wait.

  And wait.

  And wait.

  The sun was starting to get lower in the sky, which made my stomach clench. I was running out of time. What if this didn’t work?

  I found myself composing little rhymes in my head to pass the time, ones that were about ten times worse than anything Melissa had ever written. Next time I heard one of her songs, I’d try not to be so judgmental. If I ever saw her again, that is.

  As I pushed that thought out of my head, I heard a sound from below. The last thing I wanted to do was look down, but I couldn’t help myself. A crowd of villagers was coming toward the mountain. They were covered in mud and some of them still had animal parts: a horse’s tail, a donkey head. No doubt Ilda had sent them here so they could see me mess up.

  A minute later, Ilda rode up on the Monsterooster. Sure enough, she had dressed it up in a bonnet that perfectly matched her sparkly purple sweater. The witch looked completely ridiculous and yet totally in control. She started ordering people to set up a stage, probably so she could have everyone watch as she turned me into a hunk of cheddar later.

  Seeing how miserable the villagers looked, how filthy and defeated, made determination sweep through my whole body. Ilda expected me to fail, but I’d promised these people I would help them. And that was exactly what I was going to do.

  Finally, my ears picked up the sound I’d been waiting for: Skree! Skree! Skree!

  I’d never thought I’d be glad to see a murderous bird charging at me, but it was all part of my plan. My crazy, potentially suicidal plan.

  I grabbed the rope and held the loose end up like a lasso. As the bird drew nearer, suddenly I heard another sound coming from below: Clang. Clang! CLANG!

  “Fair maiden, do not fear!” I heard Sir Knight call. “I’m coming to rescue you.”

  Perfect. Just what I needed.

  “No!” I cried, as the clanging drew closer. “I don’t want your help. Turn back!”

  But he wouldn’t listen to me. Either that, or he couldn’t hear me over the sound of his ridiculously loud armor.

  I tried to forget about the knight and focus on the task at hand. The bird drew closer and closer. As it swooped at me, I tossed the lasso into the air and—success! The rope wrapped around the bird’s neck. The beast shrieked and started to pull up. Since the other end of the rope was tightly fastened around my waist, the bird couldn’t go anywhere without taking me with it.

  For a second, I was flying! And then—

  Clang!

  Sir Knight grabbed on to my leg. “Do not fear, maiden! I’ll protect you.”

  “Let go of me!” I yelled as the bird flapped its giant black wings, straining to rise into the air. The knight was ruining everything. I tried to free my leg, but he held on tight.

  Slowly, the bird managed to climb upward with me dangling from its neck and Sir Knight dangling from my leg. Boy, was he heavy. I felt like I was being dragged down by a boulder filled with boulders.

  “Hold on, maiden!” Sir Knight called.

  “You hold on,” I said, since we were too high up now for him to safely jump down. “I have a plan. Just stay out of the way!”

  We got higher and higher, gliding along the gleaming mountain. I tried not to look down, and I tried to ignore the distinctly oily smell coming off the bird’s feathers.

  As the ground started to feel seriously far away, I closed my eyes, hoping I was right and the bird would take me to the top of the mountain. Fingers crossed that today wasn’t the day the bird decided to keep going into the clouds to see what was beyond them. I hadn’t remembered to pack my spacesuit.

  Finally, just as I’d hoped, we reached the mountain peak and the bird started to skim along it. The glass here was so thin and sharp that it looked like it could easily slice me in half. I didn’t know how there could be a magical object up here—wouldn’t it have slid off?—but I grabbed a knife out of my bag and got ready to slice through the rope at the first sight of anything that looked promising.

  We hadn’t gone far before the bird suddenly dove again. As we lurched forward, the rope cut into my waist, making me gasp for air. I glanced down to check how Sir Knight was doing—just in time to see him lose his grip on my leg and drop like a hunk of metal.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “No!” I yelled as the weight on my leg disappeared.

  I strained to look down, expecting to hear Sir Knight’s armor hit the mountain. But instead, I heard something else. Squawking.

  What the—?

  As we got lower, the source of the squawking appeared. Directly below me—perched along the very tippy-top of the mountain—was a huge nest with several couch-sized baby birds snuggled inside. The chorus of chirps was louder than a marching band.

  I needed a second to spot Sir Knight in the middle of the feathery chaos. The birds had him pinned down, clearly thinking dinner had arrived. Luckily, their beaks bounced right off his armor. Ping. Ping. Ping.

  The knight might have been all right for the moment, but how was I going to get him out of there?

  As the mama bird got lower, I saw Sir Knight manage to scramble to his feet.

  “Maiden!” he called over the nearly deafening chirps. “Are you all right?”

  I had to hand it to the knight. Even when his life was in danger, he still made sure the damsel he was “saving” was all in one piece.

  “I’m fine!” I called. “Don’t move.”

  He said something back, but at that moment the mama bird let out another ear-piercing skree! In response, the baby birds started chirping back even louder. I was afraid my ears might pop from the noise.

  Sir Knight was still trying to tell me something, but it was no use. Finally, he started waving his arms, and that’s when I realized he was holding some sort of object.

  A gleaming goblet.

  I stared at it like it was made of gold…which it was. That had to be the object Ilda wanted me to find. Why else would a goblet be at the top of a mountain?

  “Don’t move!” I yelled. “I’ll get you out!” If Sir Knight tried to climb out of the nest on his own, there was a good chance he’d just go tumbling down the mountain.

  The mama bird was about to land in the nest, and I knew we were running out of time. If the knight and I were underneath her when she landed, we’d be crushed. My only hope was that we could steer the mama bird back down the mountain somehow.

  “Sir Knight!” I called. “The minute you can reach my leg, grab on!” I mimed the action, just in case he still couldn’t hear me.

  After a minute, he waved, which I hoped meant my message had gotten through. He crouched like he was getting ready to jump, while still batting the hungry birds away.

  The mama bird fla
pped her wings as she prepared to swoop into the nest, and I was finally low enough for the knight to jump up and grab on to my leg again.

  I waited for him to jump, but nothing happened.

  “Jump!” I yelled.

  He was yelling something back. I strained to hear and finally made out one word: “Jump!”

  Wait, was he trying to get me to jump down into the bird nest? That was crazy! Then we’d both be stuck. And unlike him, I didn’t have full-body armor to keep me from becoming bird food. I’d just have to hope I wasn’t delicious.

  “No, you jump!” I tried to mime with my free hand while still holding on to the rope.

  The knight gestured wildly as the bird got lower and lower. She circled, probably trying to figure out what to do about the very shiny new bird that had suddenly appeared in her nest.

  “Jump now!” I cried.

  Finally, the knight appeared to get the hint. He worked his way over to the edge of the nest and waited for the mama bird to swoop past. Then he crouched and jumped—

  Only to trip and fall right out of the nest.

  “Sir Knight!” I cried as I heard him hit the mountain slope. Crash!

  Without thinking, I grabbed my knife and sliced through the rope keeping me tethered to the mama bird.

  For a second, I just free fell, and that second was more than long enough for me to realize what a stupid thing I’d just done. Instead of climbing on the mama bird’s back or finding some other way to control her so I could rescue the knight, now I was going to plummet to my death along with him. Anthony would never let me hear the end of it.

  Then my knee slammed into something, and an instant later, my entire body hit the side of the mountain. I started to slide along the glass like a squeegee. I was alive!

  Below me, I heard Sir Knight’s armor scraping the side of the mountain. I couldn’t see if he was all right, but I prayed that he was all in one piece.

  As I kept sliding down the mountain, I started going faster and faster. At this rate, I’d go splat when I hit the ground. I had to figure out some way to slow down. But everything was happening so fast, and I was totally out of ideas.

  Suddenly, something shiny came into view below me. It was Sir Knight! Before I could call out his name, I slid right past him, and—

  “Ugh!” I cried as something yanked me up by the back of my shirt.

  “Hold still, maiden,” I heard Sir Knight say. “I have you.”

  I craned my neck and realized Sir Knight was holding on to my shirt with one hand and hanging on to his sword with the other. Somehow, he’d managed to embed his sword in the side of the mountain.

  When I glanced down, I saw that we were only a few feet above a ledge that was wide enough to stand on. If Sir Knight hadn’t caught me and I’d kept going at top speed, I would have smacked right into it. Ouch.

  “I will lower you down to the ledge,” the knight said. “Then I will follow behind you.”

  “Okay,” I called. I felt myself slipping lower and lower until my feet were almost at the ledge. “You can let go now.”

  I dropped down, just managing to catch my balance to keep from sailing over the side. Then I inched along the mountain to give the knight room to land. A minute later—Crash!—he came down on the ledge beside me.

  “Are you all right, maiden?” he said, flipping up his helmet. Ding!

  “Yeah, I’m fine. Thank you. You—” I almost laughed. “You saved my life.” Those were definitely not words I thought I would ever say to Sir Knight, but they were true. Maybe he wasn’t a total joke after all.

  The knight shrugged. “All in a day’s work, my lady. Now, I shall climb down the mountain. Then you may jump, and I shall catch you in my arms.”

  “Um, that’s okay. I think I’d rather just climb down, too.” Sir Knight had redeemed himself by catching me once, but I wasn’t crazy enough to let him try it again.

  The knight looked a little offended, but he didn’t argue.

  Finally, after what felt like an hour of climbing backward, the ground mercifully appeared under my feet. I flopped onto the grass, feeling flattened and exhausted.

  After a minute, Sir Knight climbed down too and came to sit next to me. We’d ended up on the opposite side of the mountain from Ilda and the villagers.

  “Are you all right?” I asked.

  “Certainly,” Sir Knight answered. “Why wouldn’t I be?” I had a feeling that even if he’d been swallowed by a whale, the knight would have still claimed to be fine.

  “Any chance you still have the goblet?” I asked, knowing it was a long shot.

  Sir Knight’s eyes widened. “Do you even have to ask, maiden? Of course I was able to rescue the goblet. I am a knight!” He pulled off his helmet and fished around inside. Then he held up the goblet in triumph.

  I didn’t bother asking how Sir Knight had managed to cram both his head and the goblet into the helmet at once. All I cared about was that he had the third magical object.

  I could have cried with relief as I put the goblet into my bag alongside the spray bottle and the metal fly swatter. The sun was still a good way above the horizon, which meant I had plenty of time before the curse ended. Maybe I could really pull this thing off.

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  After I managed to convince Sir Knight that I was okay to walk and didn’t need to be carried—now that would be humiliating—we headed toward the stage on the other side of the mountain. In truth, my knee was aching from its collision with the glass mountain, but I ignored the pain. I’d have time for injuries later.

  As we got to the stage Ilda had set up, we saw her announcing the winners (and losers) of the events. When she spotted me, all in one piece, her usual fake smile turned into a grimace.

  “Ilda!” I said, pushing through the crowd toward the stage. Everyone fell quiet and stared at me as if they couldn’t believe I was still alive. “I’ve completed your three tasks. Now you have to lift the curse.”

  As I rushed onto the stage, something like concern flickered across the witch’s face. Then she laughed and said, “Nonsense. No one can complete the tasks.”

  “But I have.” I glanced at Sir Knight who was standing behind me. “We have.”

  “Didn’t anyone ever teach you it’s wrong to lie?” she said, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

  “I’m not lying. Look!” I opened my bag and held up the goblet. But something was wrong with it. Instead of shining as it had earlier, it was cracked and crumbling. In fact, it wasn’t made out of gold at all. It was just plaster painted to look like gold.

  “What is this?” said Ilda, grabbing the goblet from me. The minute her hand touched it, the plaster crumbled into pieces. “Are you trying to trick me?”

  I stared at the pile of dust at my feet. “I don’t understand. I completed the task. You wanted the object from the top of the mountain, and I brought it to you.”

  “You brought me a fake,” said Ilda. She turned to the crowd. “Do you see what adventurers do? They cheat to get what they want. They don’t care about people like you. They only care about glory.”

  The crowd turned to glare at me, all their previous suspicions back even stronger. People booed and hissed. I caught sight of Jack’s thin face in the crowd. He looked heartbroken. I didn’t care what the other villagers thought, but I couldn’t stand the thought of him being disappointed in me.

  “Lies!” said Sir Knight, stepping forward. “We retrieved the goblet together. It’s the real thing.”

  I appreciated the knight’s effort, especially since his trembling knees showed he was still afraid of the witch, but it was no use. He wasn’t terribly popular with the people of the village, and I didn’t think I could do or say anything to prove Ilda wrong. And that was, after all, what she wanted.

  Suddenly, I realized how clueless I’d been.

 
“The tasks were a lie from the start, weren’t they?” I said. “You never intended to give the kingdom its magic back. You just wanted to play a little game.”

  “How dare you accuse me of such a thing?” said Ilda, but I could see the amusement on her face. I was right. That had been her plan all along. The tasks were impossible because they were fake. Everything I’d done had been for nothing.

  I marched over and stood face-to-face with the witch. “So that’s it, then?” I said. “You’re taking the last of the magic and there’s no way to get it back?”

  “Now, Jenny, don’t be a sore loser. If you had completed the tasks—”

  “Stop lying!” I yelled, feeling ready to burst. “I’m sick of your games. Just tell me the truth!”

  Ilda stepped back, and for once she actually looked a little afraid. She grabbed at her necklace, and that’s when I spotted them. The purple gems dangling from the silver chain. They’d been hidden under the witch’s gaudy sweaters, but now I could see them clearly.

  “Where did you get that?” I whispered.

  Ilda blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “The necklace. It was my mother’s. Where did you get it?”

  “Oh, this?” she said, pulling it out so I could see the string of purple gems that perfectly matched those still in my jewelry box at home. “It was a gift. Your mother gave it to me.”

  “Liar! She would never do that. Give it back!” I lunged forward and tried to grab the necklace, but Ilda managed to sidestep me.

  Just then a mighty howl echoed from somewhere nearby. “Arooo!” Everyone froze, even me.

  The howl came again, fierce and angry. I turned to see Ralph the wolf standing just past the crowd. A few feet behind him was the giant boulder he was cursed to always be attached to. Somehow, he’d managed to drag it all the way here.

  His eyes looked almost red and there was froth around his mouth. At first I thought his narrowed eyes were focused on Ilda. Then I realized he was staring down the Monsterooster.