by Sarah Noffke
“So?” Evan retorted and pointed at the meats. “Is that fair? You know that dried prosciutto is my favorite.” He batted his eyes at her, and the cyborg softened slightly as her gaze darted between the platter of meats and Evan.
“Yeah, fine, have some meat,” she acquiesced. “Also have some fruit. It won’t kill you, you know.”
Evan darted forward, grabbed a slice of prosciutto, and stuffed it into his mouth. Talking with his mouth full, he said, “I don’t know. I think it might. I hear there are bugs on fruit.” He shook his head and glanced at Wilder. “Oh, think of all the innocent bugs you’ve killed when you’ve eaten fruit. You’re a murderer.”
Wilder picked up a broccoli floret and took a bite. “It doesn’t count if I don’t know about it.”
Evan went to reach for another piece of meat, but spied the challenging look on Trin’s face, redirected his hand to a pile of strawberries, and grabbed one. “Oh, look a strawberry. It’s red like meat. Fleshy like meat.” He took a bite and stifled a grimace as he chewed. “But tastes nothing like steak.”
“I was thinking of making watermelon steaks on the Expanse at some point,” Wilder offered. “You know, we could build a bonfire out there and grill up watermelon or cauliflower steaks.”
Evan put the half-eaten strawberry on the plate in front of him and shook his head. “You are the worst person ever to live. If I didn’t know that you’d struggle to make a friend, even with new blood coming into the Castle, I’d ditch you from my friends list.”
“So you’re my friend out of pity?” Wilder sounded amused.
“Yeah, sorry the truth had to come out this way. I mean, and it was a lack of options thing. Proximity also worked in your favor.”
Wilder laughed, not at all offended. “Now you’ve got new mates you can try and impress with your…” His voice trailed off, and he scratched his head. “I mean, I’m sure they’ll like that you’re…” Wilder glanced at Sophia. “I’m sorry, I’m drawing a blank on any redeeming quality of Evan’s. Can you please remind me of one?”
Sophia pretended to think while plucking another grape from the bunch. “Well, as far as people go, he’s very much…alive. When he speaks…it’s out loud. Oh, and when he enters a room…he’s present.”
Trin laughed and shook her head as she made for the kitchen. “Good one.”
“Hey.” Evan snapped his head in the retreating cyborg’s direction. “I thought you liked me.”
“I do,” Trin sang. “That’s why I can laugh at you.”
Wilder and Sophia joined in, chuckling at Evan’s expense.
“Hey, you Trin, are cute and fun, so you can’t laugh at me,” Evan warned.
“Thank you,” Trin called from the kitchen.
“You’re welcome,” Evan replied over his shoulder.
“I’m cute,” Wilder argued.
“I’m fun,” Sophia added.
“Those are your opinions,” Evan stated. “You’re safe as my friend for a little longer, Wilder. I’m not going to buddy up with the infant dragonriders yet. I think it’s better not to get too friendly with them since they need to regard me as a leader who they respect and admire.”
“How drugged up are you going to have to get them to accomplish that?” Wilder asked.
Evan shook his head. “You’ve started to take me for granted after all these years. People love me. Look at Pink Princess. She was obsessed with me when she first got here and kept trying to get my attention.”
“I believe I threw a knife at you my first week to get you to stop bullying Quiet when you stole all the pastries,” Sophia offered.
“I know, you had to pretend to care about the little guy so you had a reason to stalk me,” Evan gushed. “It was really cute. Then I turned you down, and you settled for Wilder.” He winked at his friend. “You’re welcome, mate.”
“Thanks!” Wilder chirped.
Evan leaned forward. “Are you worried that your gal is going to dump you now that there are more choices at the Gullington?”
Wilder grabbed a carrot and smiled at Sophia. “I would worry more that she’d dump me every single day because she’s the best gal in the world.”
Sophia smiled back at him fondly. “That won’t happen because you’re the best guy, and no one is as lucky as us.”
“That’s so true.” Wilder took a bite of the carrot. “We should start that charity we discussed.”
“Which one?” Evan asked.
“One where we raise funds for all the sad people in the world who aren’t us,” Wilder responded. “The rest of the planet doesn’t know what it’s like to be so happy. It’s impossible that they could.”
Evan pretended to gag. “Okay, I take it back. You and Sophia are the worst humans ever. As a pair you two outdo everyone.”
“Thanks!” Wilder stated.
“You’re not at all welcome.” Evan tapped the table in front of Sophia. “You said you needed my help with something. If it’s making it so other people can tolerate you or your boyfriend, I don’t have those kinds of magical powers. No one does, I’m afraid. Not even Mama Jamba.”
“I’m good,” Sophia stated. “Yeah, my sister needs help retrieving a genie’s bottle from the bottom of the ocean. I hoped that you and Coral would help out.”
“This sister of yours,” Evan began. “Is she cute?”
“I heard that,” Trin called from the kitchen.
“I’m asking for a friend,” Evan replied.
“She’s Liv Beaufont,” Sophia stated. “You know, the Warrior for the House of Fourteen that brought down the barrier when we battled the Rogue Riders at the elfin homeland.”
Evan shook his head. “Don’t recall that.”
“She helped fight the cyborgs when they invaded the Gullington,” Sophia added.
“I was too busy looking at Trin to notice anything else,” Evan stated.
“Thank you,” the cyborg sang from the kitchen.
“You know it’s all about you,” Evan replied.
“Anyway, it has to be important, or Liv wouldn’t ask,” Sophia stated. “Can you please help out?”
“Well, since you’re begging.”
“Asking,” Sophia corrected.
“I’m supposed to devote my time to training the newbies,” Evan stated. “I can probably pull away for a little if you know where the genie’s bottle is.”
“I have a map that should make it easy to find.”
“Fine.” Evan stood from the table, still eyeing the cheese platter longingly. “Then let me know when you need me to save your butt, and I’ll come to the rescue. In repayment, you and your horrible boyfriend have to sit at the far end of the dining hall table so I don’t have to look at your faces while I eat.”
Wilder grinned and patted Sophia on the arm. “I didn’t think this day could get any better.”
Sophia leaned into him. “When you’re us, it always can since we’re the luckiest people in the world.”
Evan shook his head, mock revulsion on his face as he made for the entrance hall. “The worst. The ultimate worst two people on the planet and I have to share my castle with them.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Wilder and Evan strode off to the Expanse, leaving Sophia alone in the Castle. She was waiting on Mortimer to give her leads on the Rogue Riders. She knew that tracking down criminals was a long shot, but Plato had reinforced the plan, so she figured it had merit. Other than that, she didn’t have other ideas for how to deal with the Rogue Riders.
With all the guys out on the Expanse training, it left Sophia alone in the dining hall, looking at all the artfully arranged food Trin had laid out. She pulled out her phone and messaged her sister.
“Evan is on board to retrieve the genie’s bottle,” Sophia typed. “I have the map from Ru. Let me know what you want to do next.”
“Jump into a ravine,” Liv responded a few moments later.
Before Sophia could reply, another message from her sister came through. “Oh,
you meant about the genie’s bottle. Yeah, let me get back to you on that. That’s too stressful for me to think about right now.”
“Is everything okay?” For the second time, Sophia sensed that things weren’t okay with Liv.
“Well, there’s an avalanche of rocks speeding in my direction, so not really,” Liv responded.
“So when you said you want to jump into a ravine…”
“It was literal,” Liv replied.
“Be careful,” Sophia warned.
“I will, but I have to dive right now.”
“Isn’t jumping into a ravine going to get you buried?” Sophia had to ask.
“No, it’s how the fairy godmother I saved earlier told me to get out of danger. There’s a tunnel down there. I have to get to it…”
“Okay, message me later when you’ve survived.”
“Copy that, Love Bug. XOXO.”
Sophia lowered her phone, feeling like everyone had a job right then but her. She often found herself in the middle of these lulls between missions where she waited for a lead to come in. Sophia knew it would be smart to use the time to conserve energy, but it was difficult for her to sit around when she sensed that she could help the world to be a safer place.
Suddenly, something that Liv had mentioned occurred to Sophia. She didn’t know why she hadn’t thought of it before. Yes, Mortimer was a godsend. Yes, she had eyes and ears looking for signs of the Rogue Riders. Still, she didn’t know why she hadn’t thought of this option until then. It should have been a no-brainer.
Sophia eyed the little cakes and confections on the dining room table before her, tempted to grab one for the road. However, she remembered that where she was going, she wouldn’t need to fill up on dessert. That she could do once she got there.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Happily Ever After College didn’t look anything like how Sophia remembered it. The grounds were still lush and green, and the temperature was perfect, reminding Sophia of a warm spring day with a mild breeze carrying hints of floral aromas. However, whereas the college’s grounds used to be manicured like a school campus with a lawn and sidewalks, now it resembled more of a forest.
Large oak trees with long hanging branches dripped luscious leaves and blossoms of every color. The grounds weren’t even and filled with flat green grass. Instead, they bumped and rolled with many tree roots and other plants obscuring the path.
Everywhere Sophia looked, there was something to delight the senses, whether it was strange flowers in a rainbow of colors, or mushrooms growing from the ground that were the size of a bread box, or the large owl that blinked at her from inside the hole of an immense tree.
Mist rolled across the ground, making her think it was either early morning or right before sunset. It was hard to tell under the forest canopy.
In the distance, she could just spy the outline of a building through the trees. It didn’t resemble the red brick building that used to be there and was the center hub of Happily Ever After College. There was a sliver of the old building still intact, Sophia observed as she moved through low-hanging branches and approached the college, the view becoming clearer through the trees.
The new Happily Ever After main building, or at least what Sophia guessed it was, looked like ten different whimsical buildings were stuck together and made to look like one. The center part was pink with columns and tons of windows. Along one side were multiple different pastel buildings that reminded Sophia of the townhomes one found in San Francisco, except these were all glued to each other to make one. Around the other side was a clear turret that rose to the top of the building with a large spiral staircase that Sophia could see going all the way up to the rooftop, which was seven stories up.
It was like something out of…
“A fairy tale,” Sophia whispered, nearly laughing at the realization.
“That was the idea,” a familiar voice said at Sophia’s back.
She turned around to find her fairy godmother Mae Ling gliding through the air on a tree swing.
Sophia hadn’t noticed the two ropes or the small board attached to the tree when she walked by. She definitely hadn’t seen Mae Ling swinging from the large oak tree, her feet gliding through the air as she leaned back while holding onto the ropes for support.
“The college…” Sophia looked around, every moment noticing something else that was new.
Mae Ling smiled. “We were overdue for a renovation.”
Sophia noticed a toad hopping through the grass at Mae Ling’s back, making its way for a notch in the tree's base. “Is this a result of the toxic slime? Did the college not recover?”
“It did,” Mae Ling answered. “In so many ways. It’s like when a storm comes and pulls the front porch off your house, and you realize that you didn’t like it in the first place. The storm did you a favor, and now you can build things the way you want them.”
“Oh, so the green sludge pulled the front porch off the college, and this is how you really wanted it?”
Mae Ling nodded and fondly looked around at the enchanted forests. “It makes a lot more sense. The old college was the result of an older generation of fairy godmother professors. They were a little more regimented than the current faculty. I would venture to say that we’d lost some of the whimsy over time.” She shrugged and continued to swing. “I get it though. My predecessor wanted to combine the virtues of fantasy with the logical factors that often surround love. However, it’s often those same factors that pose challenges to true love’s destiny, so Willow and I saw no reason to continue to embrace the old ways. Instead, we’re going back to our roots.”
Sophia drew in a breath, smelling both chocolate chip cookies and gardenia blossoms at the same time. It was an intoxicating aroma. “This is whimsical. The new building…”
Mae Ling giggled. “You like it? We couldn’t decide on the architecture. All the professors submitted building ideas. At the end of the day, Willow put them all together into one so that we’d all be happy. Who says you can’t please everyone?” Mae Ling pointed to the pink part of the building with columns and plenty of windows. “That one in the center was mine. I don’t think you can ever have too much pink.”
Sophia nodded. “I would have to agree with you there.”
“One of the many reasons we get along,” Mae Ling gushed with a smile.
“So the college is good then?” Sophia asked. “After the evacuation and the damage caused by the toxic sludge?”
“I think we’re better than ever.” Mae Ling leaned back as she continued to glide through the air. “We have a new college that nurtures our purpose. Before, the old one was nice and open, but it was overly manicured, and that doesn’t promote the right message. We’re about creating love here and that never blossoms if pruned too much. No, the best place for love is in a fertile forest where trees grow on top of trees and seeds are allowed to be scattered on the wind, rather than planted by a gardener.”
Sophia smiled, enjoying the sentiment.
“Furthermore, we learned some valuable lessons,” Mae Ling continued. “We tried to engineer a love potion, and now we remember why that doesn’t work. You can create spells that encourage love, that provide the right environment for it to flourish, that support its growth. Under no circumstances can you make love happen.”
“That makes sense.”
“Well, it does to you, and it does to me now, but over time, we need these lessons as reminders,” Mae Ling informed her. “I think returning to an environment that’s organic and whimsical will be good for the fairy godmothers. We’ve already benefited.”
“How is that?” Sophia asked, and in the distance, she heard giggling and saw shadows moving through the trees.
Mae Ling indicated that direction with a nod. “We’re playing again. It’s been ages. We got so bogged down in curriculum and regulations handed down from the head office that we forgot who we were. As fairy godmothers, we help our charges, but it’s not through discipline but rather thr
ough creative expression. If we aren’t enjoying life, then how do we expect to lead others to a life they love?”
Sophia suddenly felt infected by the spirit of the grounds and wanted to frolic and play in the woods, maybe swim in the babbling brook she heard not too far off and catch the fireflies that buzzed around through the trees. Although she wouldn’t keep the fireflies. Maybe she’d dance around them.
Suddenly, she felt like she’d passed out and awoken in some sort of nirvana. She shook her head, feeling intoxicated. “This place truly is a new kind of magical.”
Mae Ling nodded and slid off the swing. “All thanks to you.”
“I’m glad I could help.”
“Now, it’s my turn to help you,” Mae Ling offered, striding in front of Sophia and indicating that she follow. She led her through the trees dividing the forests and the college. In the thick branches hung little paper lanterns of every possible color, shaped like various flowers.
Sophia expected that they were headed for the college, but Mae Ling stopped before that and waved her arm. At first, Sophia didn’t know what the sparks of magic that fell from Mae Ling’s arm did, or the sound of a bell that followed. However, a moment later she noticed that a tree stump had risen from the fog and ferns, and sitting on top of it was a tea tray, a series of desserts, and little fairies who went straight to work pouring and stirring and slicing.
The tray was breathtakingly beautiful and also looked scrumptious. Sophia was suddenly glad that she hadn’t filled up on the food at the Castle. Although Trin’s desserts had looked delicious, these were heavenly.
Mae Ling swept her arm through the air again, and two neighboring tree stumps rose, offering the perfect stools so they could sit at the table for tea. “Shall we?”
Sophia grinned, grateful that she’d thought to visit her fairy godmother. Now she had to hope that Mae Ling could offer her some help.
She nodded and sat, and almost immediately as if sensing her thoughts, her fairy godmother said, “I’m glad you came to see me, but I must let you down straight away and inform you that I can’t give you any information to help with the Rogue Riders.”