Chapter Text
A man hovered above the forest, one arm outstretched, green magic glowing at his fingertips. The Evil Queen grinned wickedly at him and vanished into thin air as he attacked her with his magic.
He lowered his hand and looked around in a panic, trying to figure out where she would appear. He suddenly felt breath against his ear and froze.
The Evil Queen began to laugh, her sinister laughter sending chills down his spine as she appeared behind him. She raised her hand, gathering all her magic into it, and prepared to strike him directly in the neck.
But just as her hand shot upward, she froze, feeling herself being pulled backward.
She looked behind her and saw the second man gripping a mirror tightly in his hands. The mirror was sucking her inside.
She frantically tried to fight against it and escape, but the mirror was stronger. It completely swallowed the Evil Queen, trapping her inside.
The man released the mirror and let out a relieved breath. The one who had been hovering in the air sighed as well and gave his brother a brief smile.
Then his brother set the mirror aside and rose into the air. They exchanged a nod.
He pulled a book out of the bag slung over his shoulder. Its pages were blank, and its cover was black and completely unremarkable.
Using magic, they made the book float in the air and opened it. Slowly reciting a spell, they held the book in place as it began absorbing the dark magic swirling through the air.
The book gathered all of the Evil Queen’s curse into itself-the magic that had already spread throughout the world.
But then the book began shaking violently in the air.
The brothers exchanged confused looks, unsure of what was happening, when suddenly the pages began tearing themselves out of the book and swirling around them in an uncontrollable, powerful vortex.
The brothers tried to stop it, but nothing worked.
The pages came together again, weaving themselves back into a single book. It slammed shut, and its black cover became covered in golden patterns.
A keyhole appeared along its edge, with dark purple energy swirling inside it.
One of the men cautiously reached out to touch it, but the book suddenly flew open to the first page, making him jerk his hand back.
They exchanged another confused look and cautiously stepped closer.
The first page contained all the major events from the Evil Queen’s life: how she had sent a huntsman into the forest to kill Snow White, how she had given her a poisoned apple, and how she had eventually been imprisoned in a mirror chamber.
But the most horrifying part was the line at the bottom of the page meant for a signature.
Beside it was the name of the Evil Queen’s newborn daughter.
The brothers stood there in horror.
//
Raven stands in front of an enormous palace which, judging by its size, is twice as large as her family’s palace. She takes a deep breath, exhales, and repeats the process for several minutes.
Finally, she walks through the entrance gates into the palace gardens.
This is Ever After High the school where she is now going to study and prepare to become the next Evil Queen. On her final year, she will have to sign the Storybook of Legends at Legacy Day, thereby accepting her fairy-tale destiny.
She walks up the enormous staircase into the palace-like school building and finds herself in a long hallway with white walls decorated with gold. Trees grow along the walls, and a red carpet stretches across the floor, leading toward a staircase where the hallway splits into several narrow corridors.
She stops with her purple suitcase in hand, looking around with wide eyes and her mouth slightly open.
Suddenly, an upside-down head appears in the air in front of her.
It turns toward Raven and flashes her a bright smile.
Raven jumps backward in fright with a startled scream.
A girl is standing on the ceiling. Somehow, she jumps down onto her feet and smiles at Raven, adjusting her hat.
She is short, with short hair of several different colors.
Raven blinks, trying to recover, as the girl starts circling around her, bouncing slightly while firing off a stream of questions.
”Hi! Why did you get scared? Who are you? Whose daughter are you? Wow, your hair is so cool! Is that a guitar case? Do you want some tea?”
Raven awkwardly steps away from her, grabbing her suitcase and the case containing her guitar.
She gives an awkward little laugh.
”Uh… who are you?” she asks.
She grips the suitcase handle tightly as the girl finally stops talking and claps her hands.
”I’m Maddie! Madeline Hatter, daughter of the Mad Hatter!” she exclaims.
She takes off her hat and pulls an enormous table, a teapot, and several teacups out of it.
Raven stares at her in shock, trying to figure out how all of that could possibly fit inside such a tiny hat.
”Figures,” Raven mutters sarcastically as Maddie pulls out a chair and gestures for her to sit.
Raven reluctantly sits down, cautiously eyeing the teapot as it begins floating in the air and pours tea into the cups all by itself.
She looks from the teapot to Maddie.
”What is the similarity between a crow and a writing desk?” Maddie suddenly asks, handing her a cup of tea.
Raven takes it, furrowing her brows as she thinks about the question.
“I don’t know? There’s no similarity between them. What’s the answer?” Raven asks, taking a sip of tea.
It tastes like ordinary tea, but apparently someone added honey to it.
Maddie smiles and shrugs.
”I don’t know,” she says completely calmly.
”Then why did you ask if you don’t know the answer yourself?” Raven asks, becoming even more confused by Maddie’s behavior.
”How should I know? Maybe you knew, so I asked…” Maddie begins rambling.
Before she can continue, another upside-down head suddenly appears.
Raven gets startled again and abruptly stands up, nearly falling over.
Maddie and the new girl look at her as if Raven is the strange one here, rather than them.
The new girl jumps down onto both feet. She is also short, with white hair, and she wears a hat too, though hers is smaller than Maddie’s.
She greets Maddie, pulls out a pocket watch, and says that she is late.
Then she turns into a rabbit and runs down the hallway.
Raven stares after her in surprise before turning to Maddie, silently asking what just happened.
”That’s Bunny Blanc, daughter of the White Rabbit. And, oh… we’re actually really late!” Maddie says, pulling out her own watch before putting it back into her hat along with everything else.
”We?”
Maddie doesn’t answer.
She simply grabs Raven by the hand and pulls her down the hallway.
”The school opening ceremony is about to start!”
But Maddie suddenly stops in the passage between the corridors, where several other students are walking by.
Raven nearly trips because of how abruptly Maddie stopped.
”You never told me your name!” Maddie exclaims indignantly.
Raven lets go of her hand and nervously fiddles with the strap of her guitar case and the handle of her suitcase.
Her eyes dart around the hallway.
Maddie stands there, waiting for an answer.
”Uh… Raven… I’m Raven Queen,” Raven answers quietly, barely loud enough to hear.
Maddie looks at her questioningly.
”I didn’t hear you. Can you say that again? But if you don’t want to, you don’t have to…”
Raven grips the suitcase handle even tighter until her knuckles turn white.
Everyone will find out soon anyway…There’s nowhere to run.
She takes a breath and answers louder than she intended, her voice echoing throughout the hallway so that everyone nearby can hear it—not just Maddie.
”My name is Raven Queen, and I’m the daughter of the Evil Queen.”
She exhales as soon as the words leave her mouth.
Several gasps echo through the hallway.
The students who heard her begin backing away, whispering among themselves. Some give her frightened looks, while others stare at her with open contempt. They all try to get away as quickly as possible.
Raven notices all of it.
She expects Maddie to leave too—to start hating her like everyone else.
But when she looks at Maddie, the girl simply smiles widely and claps her hands.
She grabs Raven’s hand, making Raven stare at her in confusion.
”That’s so cool! Can you do magic?” she asks.
For some reason, her eyes are sparkling, and she looks absolutely thrilled.
Raven nervously smiles and shakes her head, trying to pull her hand away, but Maddie only tightens her grip.
”That’s okay! And we’re late, remember!” she cries, suddenly switching gears and dragging Raven down the hallway again.
//
Raven follows Maddie as she excitedly walks ahead, occasionally bouncing as she goes.
Raven stares at her with wide eyes, as if she is completely insane.
Why wasn’t she scared? Why didn’t she start hating me? She’s pretty strange.
They leave the long hallway and step onto a large terrace on the eastern side of the castle, simply called the East Terrace.
An enormous platform, two stories high, stands there, with staircases made of red stone leading up to it from both sides. Four huge mirrors float above it.
Raven follows Maddie toward the rows of chairs arranged in front of the platform, where the students are taking their seats.
Raven looks around, filled with a slight sense of awe.
However, when she and Maddie walk over to a row and sit down, several students look at them with contempt and move farther away, leaving no one sitting beside them.
Raven sighs and clasps her hands in her lap.
She has placed her suitcase and guitar case a little farther away, not close enough for her to reach them and nervously fidget with their handles.
Now she doesn’t know what to do with her hands.
Maddie can’t sit still. She keeps fidgeting and clapping her hands.
Raven looks at her.
Maddie looks back, presses her lips together, and then grabs Raven’s hands.
Raven raises an eyebrow in confusion as Maddie shakes their hands and practically bounces with excitement.
”This is so hexciting!” she exclaims.
Raven sighs.
”Of course. I’m starting to think you find everything hexciting,” Raven rolls her eyes and tries to gently pull her hands away.
”Because everything around us is hexciting!” Maddie simply replies, letting go of her hands and finally sitting up straight.
A soft smile spreads across Raven’s face.
This girl is something else.
Ceremonial music begins to play, and all the noise dies down.
The students turn toward the platform and sit up straight in their chairs.
They watch with awe as the ceremony begins.
A middle-aged man steps onto the platform, his hair already slightly gray.
His image is reflected in the enormous mirrors, and everyone looks toward them.
The man, dressed in a dark blue coat, steps up to the podium and greets all the students of Ever After High.
”Welcome to Ever After High! I am Milton Grimm, your headmaster. I’m glad to see you all, and it is a great honor for me to be part of your journey toward accepting your fairy-tale destinies!”
He begins giving a speech about how important it is to follow one’s destiny.
Raven sits in her chair, frowning as she listens.
When he finally finishes his horribly boring lecture, he introduces their teachers, and each of them gives a speech as well, wishing the students either good luck or bad luck, depending on who is speaking.
However, while Raven is listening to Baba Yaga’s speech, she accidentally glances toward the headmaster, who is standing behind Baba Yaga.
For some reason, he is looking strangely in Raven’s direction.
Raven frowns and looks back at Baba Yaga before glancing at the headmaster again.
He is already looking away.
‘I probably imagined it,’ Raven thinks, trying to focus on what Baba Yaga is saying.
//
When the ceremony ends, all the students head to their dormitories.
Messages from the school arrive on their MirrorPhones, showing them the locations of their rooms.
The girls head toward the left wing of the palace, while the boys leave for the opposite wing.
Raven walks alongside Maddie.
She looks ahead with a frown, occasionally glancing at Maddie, who calmly walks beside her, humming to herself with a slight smile on her face.
Eventually, they stop.
Raven needs to continue down the hallway, while Maddie needs to go in another direction.
This is where they have to part ways.
Raven looks uncertainly at Maddie, her expression becoming sadder.
Maddie looks at her with a wide smile.
”I think it’s the other way,” she begins. “So, I’ll go then? See you, Raven.”
Maddie takes half a step back and waves at her.
But Raven grips the suitcase handle tighter and looks down at the floor again.
Maddie immediately stops.
For the first time since Raven met her that day, her expression becomes concerned.
She walks over to Raven and takes her hand, gently stroking it.
”Hey, what’s wrong, Raven? What happened?” she asks.
Raven looks directly at her, and her eyes begin to glisten.
Maddie’s pupils widen.
”Maddie, are we friends now? Do you really want to keep talking to me? Why aren’t you scared and running away? Everyone runs away,” Raven says.
Her voice trembles slightly as she says the last sentence.
She looks away as her eyes begin to water, a blush appearing on her cheeks.
Maddie smiles softly and places her other hand over Raven’s.
”Well, I’m not everyone!” she simply says.
Raven looks at her in surprise again.
Maddie gives a little laugh.
”I don’t care what people might think. I mean, I’m the daughter of the Mad Hatter, after all.”
”Are you saying that being friends with me is madness?” Raven asks with a smirk, finally managing a small, slightly sarcastic smile.
Maddie’s face breaks into another wide grin.
”Well, that’s not what I said. But I’d be happy to be friends with you because it’s so exciting to be friends with someone everyone is afraid of and who doesn’t have any friends except you.”
Raven raises an eyebrow.
She doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
”That’s… quite an unusual way to support someone.”
Maddie’s hat suddenly lifts slightly with a jingling sound.
She pulls out her watch, and her eyes widen.
”Tea time! I’m late!”
Maddie puts the watch away and steps back from Raven.
”It was nice meeting you, Raven! I’ll definitely see you later! And yes! We’re friends now! You’re not getting rid of me!”
Maddie runs off, and Raven smiles after her.
”Well, she’s strange, but she’s nice.”
Raven heads toward her room, happy that she has made at least one friend at this school, even if she is a little strange.
//
Raven walks through a wide hallway toward the door at the very end.
The walls are gilded and decorated with bright tapestries, while a dark red carpet covers the red oak floor.
She stops in front of enormous double doors with two handles. They are white and decorated with golden patterns.
Raven takes several deep breaths, trying to calm herself down.
Finally, gathering all her courage, she pushes the doors open and enters the room, dragging her suitcase behind her.
She finds herself in a small hallway without any doors that leads directly into the room.
She slowly walks forward, looking around, and stops when she sees a girl standing inside the room.
She has snow-white skin, blue eyes, and blonde hair falling in soft waves.
The girl smiles sweetly at her.
Raven stands there in the middle of the enormous room, confused and unsure of what she is supposed to do.
Should she smile back?
”I’m so happy to finally meet you, Raven Queen! I’m Apple White, daughter of Snow White, the one you’re supposed to poison, and your roommate! I’m so excited for the moment when we fulfill our story!”
Apple exclaims, crossing her fingers and looking at Raven with dreamy eyes.
The suitcase handle slips from Raven’s hand, and the suitcase crashes loudly to the floor.