[Half/Time 01] Half Upon a Time

by James Riley

  “Perhaps we could find Merriweather,” Phillip said. “Once she has healed herself, she might transport us to the palace.”

  “And how long would that take?!” May said, whirling around on Phillip. “My grandmother doesn’t have that kind of time!”

  From behind, a deep rumbling startled all three of them. Jack whirled to find Malevolent laughing softly to herself.

  “I thought I told you to be quiet,” he said, narrowing his eyes.

  “You said to stop screaming, young lord,” the dragon said, and laughed harder. “Poor little humans … can’t find their way to one of their own castles.”

  “Jack, if you don’t shut her up …,” May warned.

  “You will what?” Malevolent said, her mouth pulling back into a smile, revealing her disgustingly sharp teeth. “Poor little princess. If only you had a way to the Palace of the Snow Queen, your grandmother might have yet lived. But now …”

  “What do you know about it?” Jack said.

  “Why, nothing, of course!” the dragon said, with an indignant hiss.

  “She knows something,” Phillip said, and Jack nodded.

  Jack climbed onto the dragon’s back and took the magic reins in his hands again. “Answer me truthfully,” Jack ordered her. “Can you take us to the Palace of the Snow Queen?”

  Without struggling in the least, the dragon responded. “Of course,” she said. “Though I will not.”

  “Yes, you will,” May said, grabbing the Mirror and shoving it into Jack’s grandfather’s bag. “Wolf, help me get Phillip onto her back.”

  “I tell you, I will not help,” the dragon said again. Jack stared at her suspiciously. She had to know he could order her. Why give them the idea in the first place?

  “Mellifluent, you will transport us all to the Palace of the Snow Queen,” he said. He paused, then added, “Including yourself.”

  That did it. “There is no reason for me to go!” Malevolent said furiously, sounding as if she wanted to scream but still bound by Jack’s earlier command. “The spell doesn’t allow me to go along—”

  “Are you lying?” Jack asked quietly.

  “… Yes!” Malevolent hissed, and her whole body shook so hard Jack almost tumbled off. “I will transport us all, little human, but I swear on my last breath I shall hunt all of you down, and your mothers shall cry when they hear tales of what I’ve done.”

  “Right, right, mothers crying, whatever,” May said, pulling herself up behind Jack, then turning around to help pull Phillip up. After they’d secured the prince, May reached down to help up the wolf, but the animal, still in human form, hesitated, a growl rumbling in the back of his throat. Suddenly, Jack remembered the wolf’s earlier words.

  “You said she betrayed your mistress,” Jack said to the wolf. “She betrayed Snow White somehow, didn’t she?” The animal just stared at him, not responding. “That explains how she knows where the Palace of the Snow Queen is,” Jack continued. “She’s been there before. Is that true, Mellifluent?”

  “Yes,” the dragon hissed. “I have been to the palace. And I will take you. But only if you release me after I do so!”

  “So you can hunt us down and make our mothers cry?” May said as the wolf slowly climbed up behind Phillip. “Not likely. You’ll be lucky if you make it out of this alive.”

  “Oh, I will live,” the dragon said. “Believe me. And we will meet again, much sooner than you think.”

  “Right,” May said. “Whatever you say there, Puff. We’re all ready to go, so let’s get a move on!” And then she kicked her heels into the dragon twice. “Giddyup!”

  The dragon hissed again, but didn’t move.

  “What’s the hold up, Malleable?” May said with another kick. “I’m serious, let’s go!”

  “I … cannot … move,” Malevolent growled furiously, “until the young human—”

  “Oh!” Jack said. “Sorry!” May smacked him on the back of his head, but he let it go. “Okay, Mellifluent, you can move … but only enough to get us to the Palace of the Snow Queen. Got it?”

  Then Jack kicked the dragon too, just for the heck of it. He figured that might not be the smartest idea, but frankly, it was just too tempting to resist.

  The dragon hissed in rage, but began chanting quietly. The entire room started to shimmer in time to Malevolent’s harmony, a rainbow of colors melting in and out of their vision.

  Jack shuddered with excitement. They were finally going to rescue May’s grandmother!

  Except … it occurred to him that they’d been so focused on finding May’s grandmother, they’d neglected to think about who they’d have to face to rescue her.

  The Wicked Queen.

  Now Jack shivered for a different reason. Jack, May, Phillip, and the Wolf King—the four of them were going to personally face down the Wicked Queen? They were going to fight the woman whose armies had conquered half the world, the woman who would have ruled over the entire world if not for Snow White? This was the woman whose dark spirits and demons terrified people everywhere at just their mention, the woman who controlled armies of dragons purely by the strength of her own magic. This was the woman whom the greatest heroes in the world had failed to defeat.

  This was the woman who waited for them in the Palace of the Snow Queen.

  As the blackened walls of the room melted into a blinding white cloud of snow and cold, Jack had just enough time to wonder if any of them would make it out alive before everything went dark.

  Chapter 38

  Jack woke up facedown in a snowdrift, and for a second—before the cold cut through his shock—he wondered exactly how many times he was going to be knocked out during this quest. Then the shock wore off, and his attention shifted immediately to the fact that he couldn’t feel most of his body, and that he’d never been so cold in his entire life.

  All around him the wind swirled and eddied, spinning snow into whirlwinds of wintery blankness. As a result, Jack couldn’t see more than a foot or two in front of him. Beyond that, it was as if someone had dropped a curtain of pure white. More important, though, Jack also quickly discovered that besides being blind, he also couldn’t move. He glanced down and quickly realized why.

  He was sunk up to his chest in snow.

  “Hello?” he screamed out to the nothing all around him, but got no reply. He tried to kick his feet, but neither of his legs would move. After a bit of shifting, he was able to pull his arms out of the snow, then free his lower body through a combination of pushing with his arms and creating toeholds with his feet.

  Soon he found himself lying on top of the snow instead of beneath it, completely exhausted by the effort to free himself. “Hello!” he screamed again, trying to be heard over the biting wind, but again received no response.

  Where was May? And Phillip and the Wolf King? If nothing else, he should have seen the dragon, as enormous as Malevolent was. How had they ended up separated?

  Jack dropped his stinging hands back onto the snow, then pushed himself to his feet—at least, as well as he could in the snowdrift. Once he was sure of his balance, he stumbled forward, exposed hands buried in his underarms to try to regain some feeling. His face was also exposed, but there wasn’t much he could do about that; besides, the rest of his body wasn’t exactly a whole lot warmer.

  “Hello!” he screamed a third time, but still heard nothing. Then a thought occurred to him. “Mellifluent!” he yelled out at the top of his lungs. “If you can hear me, get over here!” If she heard and was still under the control of the reins …

  Just like that, the ground shook as a monstrous shape plowed through the snow toward him. The shape was just a few feet from him before he could fully make out that it was Malevolent … not that the dragon seemed to be stopping. Instead, she rushed toward him at full speed, snow flying wildly around her, a vicious smile on her face.

  “Stop!” he screamed at her. “That’s close enough!”

  The dragon swore in multiple languages, but did c
ome skidding to a stop, the snow piling in front of her as she did, knocking Jack right off his feet.

  “Where is everyone?” he asked her as he worked through the tedious process of getting back to his feet.

  The dragon snarled, then growled, “They are all foundering, just as you were.”

  “Well, rescue them, then!”

  The dragon stared at him, then dropped her head and began to chant her musical magic. Just like that, Jack could hear the ever-present howling of the wind had stopped. The reason why became readily apparent: Surrounding them in every direction was a dome of green light crackling with lightning.

  The dome seemed solid, yet Jack could see through it to the wind swirling on the other side. The dome wasn’t just keeping out the wind, Jack felt heat emanating off it.

  “Thank you,” he said to the dragon, who just glared at him with murder in her eyes. He decided to ignore that for now, and started searching the area for the others instead. As it turned out, none of them had been too far away; the wolf had landed closest to Jack, just over a hill of snow from where Jack had woken up. The Wolf King was awake and had even managed to dig himself most of the way out, so Jack helped finish the job as fast as he could.

  Next, Jack and the wolf found May, who had somehow managed to avoid being buried in the snow, landing on the sheltered side of a snowdrift. It looked like May’s fairy had been thrown from her perch when they’d arrived, but had snuggled back up into the princess’s hair to try to stay warm. Jack quickly woke May, and she seemed to be fine, if freezing.

  They found Phillip, or more accurately, his shoes, at the top of another enormous pile of snow. After some digging, Phillip emerged in one piece—at least relatively, considering he was still wounded from Malevolent’s torture. May and Phillip were completely numb, but the heat of the green dome quickly helped, melting the snow from their clothes and warming them up.

  “We’ve definitely found the snow part of the palace,” Jack said when they’d all regained feeling in their extremities.

  “So where is it?” May said, glancing around.

  “Mellifluent, show us the Palace of the Snow Queen,” Jack ordered the dragon, who for once complied without arguing. She chanted a few more words, and the green dome opened on one side to allow a tunnel to stretch forth. As they watched, the green-light tunnel extended farther and farther, finally stopping at what looked to be twin tornadoes of swirling wind and snow.

  “That is the entrance to the Palace of the Snow Queen,” Malevolent said. “The walls are made of snow, the windows and doors formed by the wind. I have transported you here, now I demand that you release me!”

  “Nah,” Jack said absently, staring with the rest of them at the doors to the palace. How could someone open a door made of wind?

  Phillip stood up and brushed the remaining snow from his pants. “Well, my friends,” he said, “it appears that we have reached the end of our journey. With a few more steps, we will finally rescue Snow White, the beloved grandmother of Princess May.” He smiled. “I am actually surprised we made it.”

  Jack almost laughed. “Me too, honestly,” he agreed. “Not that we’re done or anything, but … wow.”

  Even May grinned. “I can’t believe we’re finally here,” she said, a strange look on her face.

  Jack put a hand on her shoulder. “Ready to rescue Snow White, Princess?” he asked, and now he couldn’t help smiling too.

  She stuck out her tongue. “You’ve got no idea.”

  Jack nodded, finding himself much more excited than he would have expected. This must be how it feels to complete an adventure. No wonder so many tried it. It was intoxicating!

  “Can you make it?” Jack asked Phillip, who’d limped over to stand next to the princess.

  The prince winced a bit, and even that seemed to be painful for him. “I am hurt, I admit, but I would not miss this.”

  Jack stopped for a moment, then slapped himself in the head. “Mellifluent!” he said. “Heal Phillip!”

  The dragon let loose a stream of obscenities, this one small act seemingly the last thing she’d ever be willing to do. Finally, though, the magic of the reins overpowered her will, and she chanted the spell under her breath. Before their eyes, the bruises and cuts faded from Phillip’s body, and he stood up straighter, a smile coming over his face as he did. Even his clothes had been repaired.

  “Those reins really are quite useful,” the prince said happily.

  Jack nodded, looking from Phillip to May, and suddenly he felt the need to say something profound. “You know, this might be the last time we three are together without things going crazy, so I just wanted to say—”

  “You can have a good cry later, girls,” May interrupted. “Time to go!” With that, she broke into a run for the green-light tunnel, leaving Jack staring after her with an open mouth. Phillip looked at him, shrugged, then sprinted after her. Jack grinned and shook his head, then ran to catch up to the other two.

  As Jack reached the green dome’s tunnel he could just make out the outline of the palace on the other side, an enormous castle that didn’t look built so much as sculpted from snow, carved into place by whatever forces had designed it. Spirals of ice erupted from the snow walls on either side of the wind doors, gleaming with terrible beauty in the light of the green dome. The walls themselves loomed higher than Jack could see, carved to resemble stone. Besides the white color, the only thing giving away the fake stone was the fact that the snow was so dense and smooth it actually glowed.

  “This place is incredible,” Jack said, almost breathless from the sight.

  “How do we get in, then?” May said, staring at the two tornadoes in front of them.

  Before Jack could even open his mouth to respond, the tornadoes began to slowly pull away from each other, separating enough to open the way into the palace.

  And there, in between the two doors of wind, stood someone dressed all in green.

  The Huntsman grinned widely. “Well, then,” he said. “I hope you didn’t have too much trouble finding the place?”

  Chapter 39

  Jack didn’t even pause at the sight of the Huntsman. Instead, he leapt forward, yanking his sword from his back with both hands as he sprinted straight at the man blocking the entrance to the palace. The Huntsman pulled out his own axe, ready for Jack to swing at him.

  Except Jack never swung. Midway through his run, Jack whipped his arms forward and threw his sword end over end right at the Huntsman.

  The man’s eyes went wide with surprise and he ducked under the sword, bringing his head down to the level of Jack’s shoulder just as Jack’s momentum crushed the two together with a loud crack. Both dropped to the ground, Jack clutching his shoulder in pain but smiling, the Huntsman clutching his head in pain and moaning.

  The larger man shook it off quickly and jumped back to his feet with a fierce growl, only to have Phillip slam the broadside of the Huntsman’s own axe right into the man’s face. The blow threw the Huntsman backward, knocking him to the ground again. He landed hard on his back, the air whooshing out of his lungs.

  Before the Huntsman could even take a breath, a shadow covered his face. The Huntsman blinked and looked up to find May standing over him, the point of Jack’s sword at his throat.

  “We’re ready to see my grandmother now,” the princess said calmly.

  There was a pause, and Jack briefly wondered if it could be that easy.

  “No,” the Huntsman said, his eyes twinkling maliciously.

  “I’m sorry?” May responded incredulously, pushing the tip of Jack’s sword into the man’s throat until a dot of red blood appeared. The Huntsman swallowed as the sword bit into him, its white glow lighting his face eerily. Yet again, he refused.

  “She’ll do it, you know,” Jack told him. “Is this really worth your life?”

  “That’s right,” May said. “I’ll do it!” She nodded to Jack, who nodded back.

  “You have no idea what you’re playing with,�
� the Huntsman said. “If she finds out you have his sword …”

  “We’ll worry about that,” May told the Huntsman. “You worry about the fact that this thing’s getting heavy.” With that, she lifted up the sword so it hung about a foot over the man’s neck. Then she dropped it.

  Jack could have sworn the Huntsman’s eyes popped right out of his head before May caught the sword an inch above his neck. “I could do this all day,” the princess said with her half smile.

  The Huntsman winced. “I’ll take you to your grandmother, all right?” he said. “Just let me up!”

  May nodded, backing off a little to give the Huntsman some room … and he swept his right leg up, kicking May’s hand hard enough to send the sword flying from her grasp. A second later he was back on his feet with a grin.

  “You kids are so gullible,” the Huntsman said, chuckling. He put a toe under the axe Phillip had dropped, then kicked the weapon up and grabbed it in midair. “Did you really think it would be that easy?”

  Jack sighed. If only.

  “I’m glad you kids finally figured out where we had your dear old gran,” the Huntsman said, casually twirling his axe in front of him in a figure eight. “I thought you’d never get here.”

  “Shows what you know!” May shouted. “We didn’t figure it out! The Mirror told us!”

  “Good one,” Jack murmured to her.

  “I’m useless without my sarcasm,” May said, shaking her head.

  The Huntsman took a step forward. “So!” he said happily. “Who’s first?”

  Jack and Phillip both moved toward the giant of a man, but he kept them at bay by swinging his axe in a large arc, all the while keeping himself between May and the sword, which lay on the ground a few feet away. “Did you really think you could take me down like that?” the Huntsman asked incredulously. “It was just so easy to let you think so, thereby trapping you in the palace without all that fuss we’ve had the last couple of times we met.”

  “Trapping …?” Jack said, then spun around to look behind him just in time to see the twin tornado doors whirling closed. And now, between them and the door appeared seven small, ugly creatures, the same ones that had attacked May in her home. Each one hefted a nasty-looking pickaxe, and each one looked ready to use it.