Twisted Ever After

by Celeste Thrower

  TWISTED EVER AFTER

  A Collection of Fairy Tale Retellings

  TAMARA ROKICKI CELESTE THROWER A.M. WHITE ASHLEY MCLEO CARLA REIGHARD ERIN CASEY KELLY N JANE J MCCARTHY TARYN NOELLE KLOEDEN JACI MILLER MARCIA SOLIGO N. TERRY ROSS TUOHY AUDREY HUGHEY

  Copyright © 2019 by Tamara Rokicki

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  All contents of this collection are purely the imagination of the authors and in no way reflect real people or life events.

  Publisher: The Otherworld Publishing, founded and owned by Tamara Rokicki

  CONTENTS

  SNOW AND FEATHER

  BLUEBEARD’S WIFE

  A THOUSAND DIAMONDS

  THE WITCH AND THE WOLF

  THE SCORNED FAIRY

  RED MOON

  UNDER THE SEA

  MEGARA’S DISCORD

  RIDE THE STORM

  NEVERLAND: THE IRON FORTRESS

  A TALE OF SOULS AND GOLD

  ENGRAVED ISOLATION

  RETURN TO WONDERLAND

  BLOOD IN THE WATER

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  SNOW AND FEATHER

  BY TAMARA ROKICKI

  A RETELLING OF THE BELOVED CLASSIC: SNOW WHITE.

  Photographer: Lecia McDermott

  Model: Tamara Rokicki

  Little Snow was the prettiest princess of them all. With fair skin and ebony hair, she shone with sweetness, purity, and beauty. Her hair was silky and smooth, and her eyes the color of the sunset on a brilliant summer day.

  She was also an imposter.

  My mother did give birth to her, sure, but truly I was the firstborn she had wished for. I was the child that stirred in her womb while she sewed at the window, wishing for her perfect baby girl and imagining her to be the spitting image of her dreams.

  Except I wasn’t. I wasn’t the fair-skinned, feminine, subdued child she had wished for. I was wild-hearted, often unkempt, riding on my wild stallion, Uga, late into the night, then coming back home with ripped and muddy hems.

  I didn’t remember an awful lot from those early years with my mother the Queen, but I did remember the night she sent me away, with a packed bag, a gray cloak draped over me, and a maid to see me to my destination. Mother sent me to the Wildlands where I would no longer remind her of the shattered dream of the perfect daughter she had desired. She pretended to reassure me my leave would be temporary, that I would return once I had learned to be more like a fair maiden, a proper and educated young woman, but as she turned away, I didn’t miss the way she placed a loving hand over her swollen abdomen. My replacement was on the way and I needed to disappear before her arrival.

  Needless to say, I never saw Mother again.

  I cried for hours as we rode through the storm to reach the Wildlands. There everything was dark and slumbering. The maiden from court left and returned to the palace, while I remained under the custody of the Monniken Priests.

  The Monniken Priests. A strange, ominous group of monks living in the Wildlands. At first, I had been terrified of them. The priests were a small population of men, with no women in sight, until I arrived.

  At the tender age of nine years old, naturally, I was terrified of being the only child--a female child. But very soon I realized that the Wildlands, although dark, quiet, and misty, didn’t harbor any violence. The Monniken Priests had seven leaders, ageless and eternally wise. They didn’t speak much to each other, and even less to me. At first, they had looked at me with confusion and even contempt. But being I was the princess of a neighboring kingdom, I assumed they took me in out of pity.

  Soon they realized they had to tutor me, at least in the ways of their culture, so each of the seven leaders decided to mentor me in different areas.

  Although the Monniken Priests gave me access to their humongous library, with assigned lectures on science and literature, and disciplined me in the skills of mathematics in the form of applied practice, they were more focused on other subjects.

  The metaphysical, to be exact.

  These are the supernatural arts I began studying.

  Telepathy, taught by Priest Onar, who insisted that this power is harnessed first and foremost during sleep, when our brain waves are easily manipulated and coaxed into reaching others.

  Self-Awareness, taught by Priest Shamar. He stressed the importance of paying attention to one’s physical body and all responses from outside factors. He had me monitor every single physical response to the world, from increased heartbeats during a stressful situation, to a simple sneeze during an episode of hay fever.

  Clairvoyance, taught by Priest Ahma. Quiet and reserved, he didn’t speak much, and only taught in applied works. We used runes and a scrying orb and worked on honing my senses into the future.

  Universal Creativity, taught by Priest Jappot. He was a happy fellow, constantly donning a warm smile on his face. His take on creativity took art to the metaphysical level, explaining that imagination and art unleashed a side of our magic that allowed the other supernatural arts to become in sync. Basically, his instructions were the most fun and least rigorous. We spent days in the woods, where I’d meet woodland fairies and help them build little homes out of sticks and leaves.

  Clairaudience, taught by Priest Ghol. This was by far the creepiest of the arts, as it focuses on the ability to hear vocal messages from the world of spirits. Ghol was a temperamental priest, prone to fits of anger. Once, Priest Jappot explained to me that since he was a young boy, Ghol had heard hundreds of voices in his head, day and night. It seemed he was an enormous vessel between the world of the living and the world of the dead, and that spirits hungrily used him to seek out those they’d left behind. This gift was more of a curse, Jappot reminded me every time I’d stomp out of a session with Ghol after he’d scolded me about something insignificant. A curse that caused a heavy burden on the priest, who never had a moment of peace.

  Psychokinesis, taught by Priest Nanar, an air-headed fellow who often jumped from one topic to another. He was a brilliant instructor, but often his training ended in some disaster. Psychokinesis was a broad art, which meant using my brain to make objects move with the power of the mind.

  The last art of all, and the most important one, was also the hardest. Personal Power. Taught by the Head Monniken Priest, Kaan, it was based on the foundation of spiritual awakening, a personal, deep and exceptionally challenging journey. Unlike the other arts, Personal Power was a self-discovered gift. One could only be instructed and shown many roads to self-discovery, but ultimately no teacher could figure out the individual power one possessed.

  And neither could I for many years.

  Fourteen years went by and each day brought me closer to embracing my new life and existence in the Wildlands, and away from the palace life I had once known. I grew happier and felt my place among the priesthood was truly my destiny. One morning, I planned to speak to Head Priest Kaan. I would ask him to turn history around by making me into something no one had ever been before in the history of the Wildlands.

  The first female Monniken Priestess.

  I knocked on his door, a large arched surface made of onyx. His deep voice rumbled from the other side, beckoning me inside. I pushed open the heavy door and entered his quarters. Priest Kaan was a modest but wise man, and his surroundings displayed that perfectly. My gaze trailed to the incredible book collection extending from floor to ceiling, occupying the left side of the quarters. All of these books were mostly studious in nature, as Kaan didn’t read much in the form of ente
rtainment. A student all life long, he pored over alchemy, ancient runes, advanced philosophy and more.

  But what drew my attention, more than the books and the scent of incense filling the room, was the hooded man standing next to Kaan. I could barely make out his features but his expression seemed stern as he observed me walking in.

  “Navena, there is some news,” Priest Kaan began. Any other person would worry about his distant and somber demeanor, but after living here for so long, I knew this was his normal composure. Even so, something stirred within me, the presence of the hooded stranger putting me on edge. My studies with Priest Shamar had taught me self-awareness, and my changing heartbeat, increasing with each step I took toward the stranger, told me he bore ill news. There was something else, too. Outside of the priesthood in the Wildlands, I had never seen an outsider. Something about him oozed with mystery and the unknown, and I yearned to know more about him.

  “This is Kassandros,” Kaan introduced. “He brings news from home...your home.” Kaan appraised me closely with his warm, brown eyes. I wanted to tell him the Wildlands were my home, but I knew exactly what he meant. My home, the original place I had come from, was the Kingdom of Sarr, where I was born and raised for nine years before being sent away by my mother.

  “What is this news, then?” I asked coldly, trying to avoid eye contact with the hooded man. His gaze, partially shadowed by his mantle, sent a shiver down my spine.

  “It’s about your sister,” Kaan continued, his arms crossed solemnly in front of him. “She is in danger.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him. My sister. To this day I had never heard, or cared to know about, the child my mother gave birth to shortly after my exile. She had been my replacement, my mother’s hope that her next child wouldn’t be an utter disappointment. How fortunate had my mother been to give birth to another girl, hopefully this one a perfectly poised princess, like she had always wished for?

  “It appears your father has remarried and the new Queen has taken a huge dislike to the princess.” Kaan’s voice was leveled, but it shot an arrow through my heart. A wave of shock rumbled through me, as I tried to make sense of what he had just announced.

  A new Queen? My father had remarried?

  “I don’t understand…” I muttered.

  Kaan looked at the hooded man, his brow line relaxing as if unsure on how to explain the situation. The man nodded at Kaan and then slowly peeled his hood back. What came into view was a black haired man in his mid twenties, and with a dark, overgrown stubble. He was tall and broad shouldered, his features angled and handsome.

  “Princess Navena,” Kassandros began, his addressing me as royalty making me uncomfortable. I hadn’t been addressed as such since I had left Sarr, and to be honest I never felt like a true princess in the first place--at least not in the way my mother had expected me to be. “It is true. Your father remarried a few years ago. The Queen, your mother...she died.”

  It took all of my strength not to crumble on the floor. I swallowed a lump and told myself that my mother had sent me away. She had abandoned me because she couldn’t accept me for who I was. Why did the news of her death pierce my heart, then? Why did I feel anything instead of just numbness toward her?

  “We heard about a sudden sickness sweeping the nearby kingdoms a few years ago,” I said, clearing the frog in my throat, and my gaze holding Kassandros’s, refusing to let tears roll down my cheeks. “I suppose the Queen succumbed to it.”

  Kassandros shook his head, his gaze lowering to the ground. “The Queen died fourteen years ago in childbirth.”

  The room spun lightly, the walls shaking around me for a moment. The child my mother had desperately wanted, my replacement, the perfect girl she had desired more than anything, had caused her premature death. Part of me wondered if this was fate avenging the way she had tossed me aside; the other part mourned the injustice of it.

  “Why are you here?” I asked.

  “We need you to come back to our kingdom. We believe the new Queen, your stepmother, is trying to kill your sister.”

  We cut through the marshland that waited outside the Wildlands. Kassandros and I trekked through the perilous marshes, with only a bag slung over my shoulder. I still felt unsure on why I had to return to the kingdom that had so willingly shut me out.

  Kassandros filled me in on the current situation but most importantly answered one burning question: why did I need to go back to the kingdom with him?

  Apparently the new Queen had some particular skills. At first, everyone had dismissed the rumors, smitten by the new Queen’s beauty and charm. But as time went on, the royal staff started to notice strange occurrences. Selfish and cruel, the Queen used dark magical arts to inflict pain and punishment on whoever disagreed with her. Eventually, her cruel methods ignited rumors of the Queen’s brutality and spread throughout the kingdom of Sarr.

  My father, now ailing from sickness and weakened by it, worried about the state of his kingdom and what his new wife would do to his daughter. That’s when he remembered his oldest daughter, the one his first wife had sent away to the Wildlands. It was well known that the Monniken Priests practiced and taught magical arts, and even though Sarr had long banished the use of magic, now faced with the Queen’s dark conjuring, he felt they needed to reciprocate with a similar weapon: Navena, the princess who had been trained in magic.

  Kassandros and I continued to navigate through the shadows of the land, inching closer and closer to the Kingdom of Sarr. I had questioned Kassandros on why we couldn’t use horses, but apparently the new Queen had spies everywhere, even in the form of feathered creatures and beasts, and that horses galloping through the marshland and entering the kingdom would be spotted easily. Two hooded figures on foot had a better chance of going undetected. For that very reason we walked through the thickest part of the bog, nearly falling in the muddy waters a time or two. Luckily Kassandros appeared to be skilled on foot, and his quick wits and action prevented our death.

  "So my father now needs me," I mocked, wiping a streak of mud off my face.

  "You’re his last hope," Kassandros explained. "His only hope."

  "What can I expect to find once we get there?" I inquired. I struggled to remember my homeland after so many years in the Wildlands, no longer familiar with the place I had left behind. I still could envision the large palace, the drafty corridors and wide ballrooms that had been my playground. One thing I remembered most vividly was the small forest behind the castle, the evergreen woods where my stallion and I would gallop at neck breaking speeds. I missed those days. They had been days filled with freedom, where the sun light shone down through the canopy of trees, warming me to the core, and the breeze, warm and inviting, ruffling my hair.

  "The Queen has gone mad with power and contempt for the people of Sarr," Kassandros reported. "She has infused a magical sickness over the fields and orchards, where most of the crops and fruits have been touched by her poison. Those who are weaker in nature don’t last very long.”

  I swallowed the bitterness building up in my throat, distressed at the condition of my homeland, and finally asked the question burning in my mind. "And what of my little sister? I didn’t even ask what her name is."

  “Snow.”

  I stopped and turned to face Kassandros. “Snow? That is her name?”

  “The Queen had dreamed of her one winter morning, during the thickest snow storm Sarr had ever seen. She often told during her pregnancy that she had an epiphany while sewing at the window, peering outside the wintery landscape. The needle stabbed her finger and droplets of blood fell on the snow covered window sill. It was then she felt the child stir in her womb. Your sister.” Kassandros continued trudging the marshland, carefully avoiding a thick patch of reeds springing up from murky water.

  “And why is little Snow in danger?” I asked, resuming my walk behind him.

  “Your stepmother has taken a huge dislike to her. Some say that she’s jealous of your sister.” Kassandros glance
d at me from over his shoulder.

  “Why would she be jealous?” I chortled, although I felt like a hypocrite. I couldn’t deny the slow burning jealousy I myself felt for Snow, the girl who replaced me, and I hadn’t even met her. Still, why would the Queen be jealous of her stepdaughter? Was she a constant reminder of her mother, the deceased Queen?

  “Snow is becoming an exceptional beauty,” Kassandros clarified. “People have noticed. Rumors of her fairness and charm are traveling from kingdom to kingdom, and apparently the Queen is not happy.”

  “So how exactly is Snow in danger?” I nearly tripped over a broken limb lying on the ground, but Kassandros caught me before I fell flat on my face.

  “She’s banished her from the palace hoping that she’d perish on her own. But somehow, she knows she still lives. She wants her killed.” Kassandros held my gaze, a chill spreading through me.

  In the last fourteen years, living in the Wildlands, I had never thought much about appearances. I was taught that self control, kindness, patience, and mastering the balance between the magical arts were the real purpose and key to happiness. Looks and even time itself, eventually run out.

  I contemplated this for a long moment. Vanity had not been a part of my life, perhaps the very reason Mother had sent me away in the first place. She had wanted a pretty child, with tidy clothes, pale skin, perfectly brushed hair, and rosy cheeks. It seemed she had finally gotten what her heart desired when Snow was born. But if my sister was that beautiful indeed, then her beauty had also betrayed her. For her perfection attracted more than compliments and awe. It had angered the Queen and earned her a death wish. How ironic that the perfect child’s beauty had turned out to be more of a curse than a blessing.