by Shannon Hale
It holds for two seconds before the shield breaks apart into thousands of letters spelling over and over again: R A V E N S U S E L E S S S H I E L D…
“Now, that’s just rude,” says Raven.
Apple is back on her feet and they run for the bridge, the crashing wave nearly upon them.
But it stops again, held by a second shield. The Evil Queen has stepped off the bridge.
“Hurry, fools!” she shouts.
Her shield lasts only seconds longer before bursting into a storm of letters.
But it’s enough. They manage to run up the slope of the bridge as the wave crashes behind them. Raven turns in time to see the lava drench the ruined library, flooding its crumbling chambers. As the lava recedes, it leaves behind a library-shaped structure completely made out of words.
L I B R A R Y, L I B R A R Y, L I B R A R Y, L I B R A R Y, L I B R A R Y…
As Raven peers closer, she realizes the large letters are made up of even smaller letters: S P I R E, W I N D O W, W A L L, B R I C K, B O O K, B O O K, B O O K, B O O K…
The white stone of the island itself is not unmade, remaining solid under the splashing and sploshing lava. But the lava never fully recedes. The low-lying island stays almost entirely underwater—or under-lava, so to speak.
And the Shadow High island is so close that if Raven could stand on the library island, she could probably leap from one island to the next and discover for herself what awaits there.
The fog of the Margins is as thick as an ogre’s breath. Raven hugs her arms around herself and shivers. Through the fog, she can see the outline of the great black building in the middle of that island. The shape reminds her of Ever After High. It’s a school—it’s definitely a school.
Shadow High.
WAIT A SENTENCE! THIS HAS GONE FAR ENOUGH. Mom. Dad. I need to know. What is that lava? Why is the world in pieces? What is Shadow High?
AAAH!
Can you please—
AAAH!
…stop flipping out long enough—
AAAAH!
…to explain it to me?
Whew. Ugh. Bleh. Okay. You’re right, Brooke. Sorry. It’s time. This history is so dangerous, Narrators usually learn about it only after they’ve graduated from Narrator High.
But you should know now, Brooke, even though it might already be too late to stop what’s happening. Once upon a time, long, long ago, in the land of Readers, the First Author made up the very first story. She used a chisel to inscribe the story in stone. It was such a good story that people kept reading it and retelling it. And that awakened a kind of magic.
The best kind of magic! The characters in that story came to life! Not in the Readers’ World, but across the Fourth Wall in the World of Stories. And as the centuries marched on, whenever the Readers told and retold stories, their characters came to life. Soon the World of Stories was full of characters—and their children, and their children’s children.
Each character lived in the land devoted to his or her kind of story. There was a land of adventure stories—pirates and ninjas and explorers traveling through new places. There was a land of science-fiction stories—rocket ships and outer space and adventures with aliens!
There was a land of mythological stories—gods and goddesses meddling with human matters, ancient creatures crawling out of deep pits. There were lands of holiday stories, romance stories, superhero stories, epic fantasy stories, mystery stories, Wonderland stories—
And… I guess there were lands of monster stories and fairytale stories?
That’s right. They were all together in one big, beautiful World of Stories. And it was the Narrators’ job to keep telling the stories of the characters in this world. Some Narrators believed the characters should keep living out the same stories the Readers first wrote down, and some Narrators believed characters should be free to live their lives however they chose. I’m one of the former; your father is one of the latter.
But there was a third kind of Narrator. She called herself Ms. Direction. She believed that the Narrators should have more power, that they should decide what happened in the stories. So she founded a school to teach other Narrators her way. They learned how to not just narrate what characters were doing but to also force the characters to do what the Narrators wanted them to do.
Shadow High…
That’s right, Brooke. To control the stories, these Narrators created a magic that unmade the stories, breaking them down to bits, believing that they could then take the pieces and build new stories. Ms. Direction was powerful, but even she couldn’t control what she had begun. The Unmaking magic erupted like lava from a volcano. First it unmade her school, and then it began to flow all over the World of Stories, unmaking everything it touched.
In order to stop the flow of the Unmaking lava, the rest of the Narrators had to break all the rules. First they sought out and retrieved the chisel that the First Author had used to write the First Story. It was an object of great power. Then one brave Narrator volunteered to leave the Land of Narrators and journey into the World of Stories to Shadow High. He used all the power of the Narrators and the characters to enchant the chisel with a great magic. When he hammered the chisel into Shadow High, the spell broke the world. The different lands cracked and moved away from one another, becoming continents and islands. Now the Unmaking that was flowing from the volcano at Shadow High could fall harmlessly into the trenches of the Margins, the spaces between the lands.
The World of Stories would be safe as long as it stayed broken and the lands separate from one another. That Narrator sacrificed his own life to hammer that chisel into Shadow High’s island, keeping it still and away from the other lands at the center of the World of Stories.
Narrators tried to erase all references to Shadow High from books. As the years passed, most characters didn’t know that the World of Stories had ever been unified. They assumed the stories about other lands were just made-up tales. But when the characters from Ever After High and Monster High began to reach out to one another, the lands started to shift, to feel that pull to reconnect.
That caused the tremors.
Exactly. And when the Evil Queen found the Lost Library and got very near Shadow High, a fail-safe in the ancient spell caused the World of Stories to break again, this time into even smaller pieces. And so the Margins reached right up to the edge of Ever After High.
The Evil Queen found an ancient book that the Narrators couldn’t erase. It mentioned a powerful “key” holding Shadow High away from other lands, and she used her magic to pull it loose. Now that Shadow High is free from the spell of the chisel, it is indeed like a magnet, pulling all the lands together again.
The Margins are narrowing. The Unmaking is rising in the trenches between the lands. Soon it will flow over all the lands as it did over the Lost Library. If we can’t stop it, the entire World of Stories will be unmade.
Wait, Dad, do you mean that nowhere is safe? But what about over the Fourth Wall?
In the Readers’ World? Characters cannot live there. No one from the World of Stories could make that journey.
There’s still hope! I may not have graduated yet from Narrator High, but I know a lot of stories, and I can see how this one goes. It’s an adventure story, with both mystery and magic. The group of characters—two monsters, two daughters of fairytales, one child of Wonderland, plus an evil villain—must travel to the mysterious and dangerous Shadow High and replace the chisel. Once the chisel is back, the lands will stop coming together and the Unmaking lava will stay safe down in the trenches between lands. I’d better tell the others.
Well, we already have. At least, I’m pretty certain Madeline Hatter has been eavesdropping on this entire conversation.
Yessiree, Bob’s your uncle! Whew! There was a lot of information in this chapter.
Hi, Maddie! Yeah, it was pretty information-heavy. Narrators call it exposition.
Well, I call it a head-scratcher. World of Stories? First chisel
? Ms. Direction? There’s just too much going on! But I think I got the basics: Find Shadow High. Put back the chisel. Save the world. Right?
You got it, Maddie.
Okay, I’ll tell Raven and Apple and everyone what you said. Though I may add a few jokes. Jokes make everything better. Even news about how the entire world is going to end unless we hurry over foggy, mysterious bridges to an evil island and find some kind of a hole? To put a chisel in? And somehow that will fix everything?
I like knock-knock jokes best.
Hey, Brooke? Knock, knock.
Who’s there?
Interrupting Narrator.
Interrupting Narrator wh—
AAAH EVERYBODY IS PANICKING HURRY WITH CHISELS BLAAAAAAAGHHH!!!
Good one, Maddie.
Thanks, Brooke!
THE MARGINS. THAT IS WHAT THE EVIL QUEEN and Maddie said the fog parts are called. Now that Frankie knows what it is, she scans the fog as she goes, studying it, eager to understand it. The space between “stories.” Between lands. The Margins is a place where new stories, new universes, might one day come to exist. Fascinating! She peeks over the edge of the bridge they’re walking on. The lava is higher than it was an hour ago. Scary! Fascinating… but also scary! So many emotions that the ends of her hair frizzle and her fingernails buzz.
Ahead, through the mist, Frankie spots another fork in the bridge. She hooks the wire powering the compass back to her bolts and turns the contraption on. Now, instead of Maddie’s teacup, the chisel is fitted in the compass’s spinning mechanism. The gears grind as the device spins. She didn’t build it to hold something as heavy as the chisel, and she worries the compass will break. But so far it’s holding, and the glowy green arrow points them to the right fork of the bridge. The way to Shadow High.
There go her goosebumps again.
After directing the group to the right, she powers down the compass and watches the chisel’s spin slow to a stop.
“I don’t understand,” she says. “How can a little chisel be big enough to anchor down an entire island, let alone keep all the lands of the world apart?”
“How can a little key be big enough to open a large door?” asks the Evil Queen, walking beside Frankie, always one step ahead. “Or an acorn big enough to grow an oak tree? Why, you don’t even think twice when overnight a magic bean becomes a beanstalk that carries you to the land of giants in the clouds.”
“I would think twice,” Frankie mumbles.
“Wait… that beanstalk thing doesn’t really happen, does it?” asks Draculaura.
“No way. It makes no scientific sense,” says Frankie. “Besides, how would a big, heavy giant walk on clouds without falling through?”
Maddie laughs. “Hah! I love you guys! Next you’ll be asking how puppets can talk!”
The Evil Queen ignores them. “Small things do great things all the time. Just look at me.” The Evil Queen bats her eyelashes and puts her hands coyly beneath her chin. “Would you ever believe that sweet little me would one day rule the entire world?”
“Nope,” Maddie says cheerfully.
The Evil Queen glares daggers at her.
Maddie frowns. “Oops, was that one of those ‘there’s only one right answer’ quizzes? I prefer oral reports.”
Frankie shoots a glance at Draculaura to see if she’s remembering their failed class presentation, and how it was all Frankie’s fault. But Draculaura is ambling along beside Raven and chatting like they’re old friends. Frankie sighs.
“You walk in front now,” the Evil Queen tells Frankie, falling back into step with Raven. “I’m tired of hearing that disgusting wheezing noise next to me. It makes my skin crawl.”
Frankie shivers again but scolds herself for it. In the Margins, the Evil Queen’s magic is gone. Technically, she is just a grumpy lady in an extravagant outfit. And perfect makeup. Also she is pretty tall. But she is still scary. Fascinating!… But scary.
“You mean breathing, Mother?” Raven says. “You don’t like hearing Frankie breathe?”
“Oh, don’t be tedious,” the queen says. “I don’t like hearing any of you breathe.”
“Maybe she needs earplugs,” Maddie mutters to Raven. Then, yelling at the queen, “Maybe you need earplugs!”
“I don’t understand you, Mother,” says Raven. “If you don’t like us, why did you save our lives from the wave of lava?”
The Evil Queen sighs. “That was my ‘hexplaining obvious things is hexhausting’ sigh, if you didn’t pick up on that. I didn’t save all your lives, daughter. I was just trying to save—never mind.”
“How many different kinds of sighs do you think she has?” whispers Maddie. “I’m guessing twenty-three.”
“I’m fine walking in front by myself,” Frankie offers with forced cheeriness.
“Breathing is a sign of life!” says Raven. “Living things breathe, breathing things live! The sound of breathing should bring you joy, if you have any heart at all!”
“You bring up an interesting point, my little grump-toad.” The Evil Queen gestures to Frankie and Draculaura. “Why are they breathing at all?”
“Um,” Frankie mutters, “I’m alive. Experts agree. I’ve heard it said. ‘She’s… she’s alive!’ Like that.”
The Evil Queen gestures to Draculaura. “This, over here, is a vampire,” she says, sounding like she’s lecturing a small child. “And this, over here, is a zombie.”
Frankie whirls to look behind her, worried one of the Zomboyz is tagging along.
“She means you,” Apple whispers, stepping up beside her.
“But I’m not a zombie,” Frankie says.
Apple shrugs. “The Evil Queen says weird stuff sometimes. She called me an Ambling McIntosh once.”
“What does that even mean?”
“No idea,” Apple says. “She’s called me lots of names. There was also Fruitspawn,” Apple continues, counting on her fingers, “Little Miss Undertow, Moldy Sock Puppet, Snowflake, and Fate’s Toadie.”
Frankie laughs, then covers her mouth. “Sorry. I’m not laughing at you. It’s just… those names are nuts.”
“They are,” Apple agrees. “I want to laugh each time, but I’m always too scared of being roasted alive or turned into a frog or something.”
“I don’t get it. If she’s trying to insult you, wouldn’t she want to say something that makes sense?”
“I don’t know,” Apple says. “But the way people say something means something.”
“You’re right,” Frankie says. “It almost doesn’t matter what the words are; if they say it like they, I don’t know, think they’re better than you? Or it makes you feel like you’re worth less than they are? And that they’re disgusted you even exist? It’s not hate, exactly, but—”
“Contempt,” Apple says. “Insults hurt, but so does saying things that should be nice but in a way that sounds scornful. Like ‘your hair looks… fableous?’”
The way Apple pauses before fableous and implies a question at the end makes Frankie brush her fingers through her own black-and-white hair just to make sure it’s okay.
“Or calling someone princess,” Frankie says. She had been using that word from the first time she met Apple, and not in a particularly nice way. At first Frankie thought it was a kind of joke, because who really claims to be a princess? She felt out of place, and Draculaura was getting along so well with Raven, and here was Apple, this perfect girl who was also a princess and clearly thought monsters were terrible. So Frankie crammed all her “you think you’re so special; you’re not better than me; you’re just a faker” feelings into the way she said that word. Princess. Now electricity surges through Frankie, turning her mint-green cheeks a pale pink.
“Or monster,” Apple says. “The way I’ve been saying that word to you is… wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” they both say at the same time.
Apple pulls Frankie into a hug that almost pops a seam at her shoulder.
“Do you smell that?”
Frankie asks.
Apple releases her. “It wasn’t me.”
“No, not that,” Frankie says, looking around. “And not smell, exactly…”
“Just stop it, already!” Raven is yelling, still arguing with her mother.
“I’m just saying you shouldn’t hang out with them too long,” the Evil Queen says. “They’re bound to eat you, steal your shoes, drink your blood, whatever. It’s in their nature.”
“That’s a common misconception, actually—” Draculaura begins.
“They are nice!” Raven shouts. “And they are my friends!”
Frankie’s eyes widen as she realizes what she smells. Or senses. There is lightning nearby, and a lot of it. Until now, there’s been no weather of any kind in the Margins, but her ears are good at picking up the crackle of electricity. It’s almost like electricity whispers to her: Hey, Frankie, just hanging out inside the wires in the walls, no worries, or Having a keen time circling inside this battery—wheee! or Right above you, girl! I’m tired of this cloud, and I’m coming down!
She was hearing it now, except instead of polite conversation, the lightning was shouting like two armies on either side of the bridge. AARRGGHHH!
“Look out!” shouts Frankie. She shoves Raven and the Evil Queen away just as imaginary lightning crackles out of imaginary clouds, zapping Frankie in a way that doesn’t feel imaginary at all. Her bolts buzz; her hair lifts. She smiles and can feel her teeth shudder. Refreshing, actually.
“Whoa,” says Raven. “Thanks, Frankie.”
“Okay, Sparky and Sparky Junior,” Maddie says, cartwheeling between Raven and her mother. “Let’s separate you two.”
“Great idea, Maddie,” Apple says, eyeing the clouds. “How about Frankie, Raven, and I take the front, and you, Draculaura, and, er, Her Highness guard the rear.”
The two Queens scowl at each other over Maddie’s head.
“Cool!” Draculaura chirps. “I’ll tell you all about vampires! My dad is thousands of years old, you know?”