Gabrielle - After Happy Ever After

“Morning!” he said cheerfully.

Ivy looked and saw the sun was coming up. She was surprised she hadn’t waken herself. She could never sleep in past 7:00 AM at the latest and usually woke around 6:00, a fact that annoyed Danielle to no end, she knew. “Yep, it is,” she said, yawning and stretching as was her morning custom.

Faolan watched her with a grin. “Early riser?” he questioned.

Ivy nodded, still yawning. “Every day of my life if I’m not terribly sick,” she said when she was finished.

Faolan glanced back at Randal who was still sound asleep. He changed his crouched position into a more comfortable sitting one. “Sweet dreams?” he asked.

For a moment, Ivy was worried she had been talking in her sleep again. “Why do you ask?” she asked in a too high voice, her eyes wide.

“No reason,” Faolan said. “Huff, you just seemed very…pleased?”

Ivy coughed to cover her embarrassment. “Um…yeah. I guess,” she said, turning her face away. Faolan had been in her dream. It had been a good dream. But she didn’t want him to know that. “And you?” she asked finally, regaining her composure, “Did you get any sleep?”

He nodded. And this time he seemed a little embarrassed. “Yeah. A little,” he said cryptically, looking down at his hands.

They both were silent for a long uncomfortable moment. Ivy suddenly remembered she was sitting on his coat. “Oh! Here,” she said, pulling it out from under her and giving it to him.

“Thanks,” he said, balling it up in his hands and looking around for a place to put it. It wasn’t very cool and he really didn’t want to wear it.

Ivy saw what he was looking for and pulled over her backpack, which she had ended up using as a pillow. “You can put it in here, if you want,” she offered. “I can fit just about anything in this backpack.”

Faolan gave the coat to her and raised one eyebrow. “Oh? Is it magic?” he asked, watching her rummage around in her backpack until she had a space big enough for the coat.

“No,” she said, stuffing it in. She smiled at him. “I’m just good at stuffing things in.”

Faolan shifted a little where he was sitting. “Do you think…could you make that thing make music again? It was pretty,” he said quietly.

“Oh, sure,” Ivy said, digging out her CD player and her case of CDs. “What do you want to listen to? Oh, wait! You don’t know the singers. Well, you can still pick a type of song. You like slow or fast songs? I only have country, sorry. I don’t really listen to anything else.”

Faolan thought out his answer more carefully than Ivy thought the question warranted. He finally locked his gaze on her and said, “Maybe a slow song.”

Ivy couldn’t help but stare back at him. She finally broke her gaze away with another fake cough and buried her face in the CD case, looking for a song. She always liked playing songs that fit with the situation. It made her feel like she was in a movie or a TV show. She looked for a song that would fit now.

She couldn’t decide between two songs. One fit all too well, but she was a little embarrassed to play it. She decided to let Faolan choose.

“You want to hear a guy or a girl? That’ll narrow it down,” she said finally.

“A girl. So you can sing along,” Faolan said without a moment’s hesitation.

“I can sing to guys, too,” Ivy laughed. “It just sounds weird!”

“Maybe I can learn the words and I’ll sing the guy’s song. But not now,” Faolan said, still looking at her.

“Okay,” Ivy said, quickly returning to looking at the CD’s. “I guess it’s Wish, then.” Ivy put in the Sherrie Austin CD. She went to the last song on the CD. She turned up the music a little because this song was very quiet and she wasn’t great at singing that soft.

“Last night in a dream
An angel came to me.
She granted me one wish
Then she asked what it would be.
Did I wish that we all could live in peace?
Did I wish for an end to poverty?
No, I wished it away so selfishly
When I wished that you would always love me.”

Faolan seemed to like this song. He brightened a little and smiled softly. Randal was awake by now, too. He was listening, but not with half as much interest as his brother.

“This morning when I woke I found myself in pain.
Though it was just a dream, I was so ashamed.
Did I wish that we all could live in peace?
Did I wish for an end to poverty?
No, I wished it away so selfishly
When I wished that you would always love me.
If I could only dream that dream once more
I wouldn’t make the same mistake that I made before.
With my one wish, I’d wish for three wishes more.
I’d wish that we all could live in peace.
I’d wish for an end to poverty. And here’s what my one last wish would be:
I’d wish that you would always love me.
Oh, I’d wish that you would always love me,” Ivy finished.

Faolan was looking at her even more intently. He took her hand in his, looking right in her eyes. Ivy opened her mouth to say something.

“That would never work, you know. You can’t wish for more wishes,” Randal piped in, breaking up the moment.

Faolan growled under his breath at his brother. Ivy smiled and rolled her eyes, withdrawing her hand from his. She looked at Randal. “That’s what I’ve always thought. But I didn’t write the song,” she said with a shrug.

“I wish you had,” Faolan said so quietly she almost didn’t hear and wasn’t sure she was supposed to.

“Well,” Ivy said too loudly, getting to her feet, “you want to hear something, you should listen to my friend Danielle sing Wide Open Spaces. Or the two of us singing Shedaisy.”

“I’d like to,” Faolan said, rising as well. “I bet you sound great.”

Ivy shook her head to dismiss the comment. She looked around and saw that the sun was completely up. “’Bout time we started on our way, hmmm? I’ve got a castle to reach, you know,” she said, trying to keep the mood light.

“Right,” Faolan agreed. His stomach growled loudly at that precise moment, letting all three of them know that it was time for breakfast.

“You want some of my jerky?” Ivy offered, digging the bag out of her backpack. She passed it to Faolan who took some and then gave it to Randal. Randal took a big piece and gave it back to her. Both of them sniffed the jerky curiously before biting into it. They looked so much alike at that moment and were almost perfectly in sync and it made Ivy laugh. Which caused both of them to look at her curiously. Ivy just laughed harder and shook her head. “Come on. Let’s go,” she said.

Virginia had been walking all morning. She had woken up feeling very sick. She had thrown up once, depleting herself of the only food she had had. When she had felt well enough to continue on her journey, she had become ravenously hungry. She felt she could have eaten like Wolf.

“Was that morning sickness?” Virginia wondered out loud. She hadn’t gotten a chance to read up on pregnancy at all. She had wanted to. She was worried enough about her baby without being clueless as to what was happening inside her.

Virginia felt a kick and doubled over in more surprise than pain. “Oh, my god!” she cried, wishing that Wolf was there. Virginia rubbed her stomach. “Oh, baby. It’s okay,” Virginia said softly. “Be good until Daddy’s here.”

Virginia tried to remember what she had read in that book back in Central Park. The one about wolves: all she needed to know. If only she could remember what she needed to know! The gestation period of a wolf, what was it? She could almost see it in her mind. Virginia closed her eyes and let her mind go blank, waiting for the information to resurface. “Two months! That’s it! Two months,” Virginia exclaimed. If her baby was part wolf, would that affect her time carrying it? A person was nine months, but a wolf was only two. Oh, she needed Wolf! He had to know. Virginia tried to stop thinking about it and concentrate on where she was going. She had to be nearing the swamp. Then, she just had to go around and to Wendell’s castle. That easy.

“Nothing’s ever easy in the Nine Kingdoms, Virginia,” she said to herself grimly.

Danielle was tired of listening to Breena. The fairy meant well, but Danielle really wasn’t paying attention anymore. Fact was, she had tuned her out after about the first five minutes. Kind of like she did in class. Which would explain a lot of her grades.

“So after that war the trolls remained pretty passive for as a whole for a good period of time. Well, for trolls anyway. But it’s common knowledge that they hate Wendell and his kingdom for taking part of the Third Kingdom,” Breena continued, chatting away about as fast as she flapped her wings.

Danielle nodded absently. To distract herself and to keep herself from dying of boredom, she concentrated on Wolf. Her new-found knowledge of his bloodlines explained a lot of his earlier behavior, now that she thought about it. Why had she never wondered at the way he had acted around the witch before? She couldn’t be that dumb, could she? Maybe she should be a village idiot.

Danielle jogged a few steps to put her even with Wolf again. She had seen his back almost the entire time they had been walking. She was getting tired of it. He was still pretty distracted. Worried about Virginia, most likely. Danielle had guessed from her appearance that Virginia was pregnant. But now that she thought about that, too, she began to wonder what Virginia thought about having wolf blood in her baby. That had to be a little scary. Virginia was from the “Tenth Kingdom” after all, just like she was.

“You shouldn’t worry so much,” Danielle said to Wolf and ignored Breena’s indignant huff as she realized she was being ignored.

“Why not?” Wolf asked, a little startled as her voice broke through his own reveries.

“’Cause. Everything’s gonna work out. It has to. We’re the good guys. The good guys always win,” Danielle said confidently. “It’s in the handbook, you know.”

“What handbook?” Wolf asked, confused.

“The Good Guy and Bad Guy Handbook. I’ll demonstrate,” Danielle said, glad to get both their minds off the present. “Okay, so when the good guy gets captured the bad guy has to put him in some kind of machine that will kill them, but then he has to leave. And the machine/trap thing has to be easily escapable. And the good guy has to say, ‘You’ll never get away with this!’ and then the bad guy, he replies, ‘I already have!’ and laughs maniacally. And then he leaves and the good guy gets free or his sidekick saves him and they chase down the bad guy, have a huge fight scene, and then they win and the bad guy gets locked up. See?” Danielle asked.

She had been bouncing all around the path before Wolf, demonstrating dramatically the different aspects of the standard plot to every comic book and cheap movie. Danielle had always had a thing for acting and the theatre. She was a dramatic person and liked to pretend. Wolf was watching her with amusement. It was a strange occurrence when he wasn’t the one bounding around.

“I see,” Wolf nodded. “But what if the bad guy wants to be a good guy?”

“A good point,” Danielle said. “Then, you have a dramatic stand-off where the bad guy throws down his weapon and begs for mercy.”

“And what if the good guy says no?”

“Then, his sidekick or someone else talks to him in a touchy feely moment and gets the good guy to say yes. That’s how it works,” Danielle explained.

“And if the bad guy lied?” Wolf asked, enjoying this distraction.

“That happens sometimes, too. He is a bad guy after all. Then, he attacks the good guy when his back is turned and the fighting continues,” Danielle said with a shrug.

“And what if the good guy isn’t really a good guy, but is only made to seem that way by prejudiced people and there really is no good guy and the story ends in tragedy?” Wolf asked.

Danielle looked at him curiously. “You got a name for that one?” she asked.

“Little Red Riding Hood,” he said.

Danielle nodded solemnly. “Then, you throw down your fairy tale book in disgust and demand why that stupid, bratty girl had to do that to the wolf and wonder if there were ulterior motives behind the story. And you be disgusted at how the little girl would marry a woodsman at least twice or three times her age,” Danielle said.

Wolf smiled. “Oh.”

“You want to hear some more?” Danielle asked.

“Sure,” Wolf agreed.

Breena sighed on Danielle’s shoulder. Danielle could tell that the fairy thought this was completely stupid, but Danielle didn’t care. No one was keeping Breena here.

“Okay. First, no one named Jaja can be a good guy. Second, spandex can cause chaffing and certain people shouldn’t be allowed to wear it…” Danielle began.

“Do any of you know where you are going?” Wendell demanded, irritable again.

“Yes,” Cinnamon said shortly.

“Really?” Tony asked, raising one eyebrow. “When did you plan on telling the rest of us?”

“When I pick up a scent,” Cinnamon replied, not letting Tony or Wendell’s annoyance faze her.

“Do you smell anything yet?” Maive asked.

Cinnamon shook her head. “Too many scents. My nose isn’t strong enough to get past them to any of the others,” Cinnamon said as a way of apology.

“If we can find some water, I can scry,” Maive said.

“There’s a brook nearby,” Wendell supplied moodily. “I didn’t mind being a dog compared to this. At least no one could step on me. This is horrible.”

Tony sensed that Wendell was sinking into another depression like the one he had had in Kissingtown and beyond. He didn’t want that to happen again. “It’s okay, Wendy. Don’t worry. We’ll get you back to your old self in no time,” Tony said.

“Not if she’s the one working the magic!” Wendell croaked angrily. “You keep her away from me, Anthony! We should go find a competent witch and get her to turn me back.”

“I’m really sorry, Wendell. I am. It’s just…making up spells on the spur of the moment has never been my strong point,” Maive apologized.

“Nice of you to tell me now!” Wendell raged.

Cinnamon clamped her hands over her ears to block out her three companions. She bounded a ways ahead of them, sniffing away, looking for Wolf, Virginia, or the girls' scents. The girls would be the hardest to find. She had only smelled them briefly and the smells had been old.

“Some motley group we are,” Wendell continued, depressed again. “One bumbling idiot, one incompetent witch, a half-wolf, and a king who’s now a frog. We’re all going to die.”

“We are not going to die!” Tony said. “I’m never keen on dying. I don’t plan to change my mind now.”

“No, he’s right,” Maive cried, sinking into Wendell’s depression as well. “We are going to die. And it’s all my fault. If I could get a stupid spell right it might not be so bad. I’m a terrible witch. I don’t even know why the Council sent me.” There were tears welling up in her eyes.

“No, no. Not you, too,” Tony said. “Listen, both of you. Feeling sorry for yourselves won’t get us anywhere.”

“But…” Wendell and Maive both started.

“He’s right. Now both of you shut up and let me concentrate,” Cinnamon growled. The force of her growl made everyone quiet. Cinnamon let herself smile for a moment, then went back to trying to find the right smells.

Ivy stopped at the bank of the river and looked over at Faolan. Did he have some kind of plan on how they were going to cross this? Or did they have to swim?

He saw her looking at him and smiled in that way people do when they know something you don’t.

“What?” Ivy asked. “How are we going across?”

“Just wait,” Faolan said and ran off into the woods.

“What’s he…Randal, what…?” Ivy looked to Randal for an explanation.

Randal shook his head, but his eyes were bright with excitement as he waited for whatever his brother had in mind. Apparently this was as much a surprise to him as it was to her.

After about ten minutes had passed and he hadn’t returned, Ivy started getting worried. Where was he? Suddenly, Ivy heard a shout from out on the river. She turned and saw Faolan in a small row boat on the river. He waved at them, grinning, and steered the boat towards the shore.

“How on earth did you pull that off?” Ivy demanded.

Faolan shook his head. “Doesn’t matter. Come on, let’s go,” he said.

Ivy lifted Randal up and helped him into the boat first. Then she climbed in after him. “I can take an oar if you want,” she offered.

“No, no. I’ve got it,” Faolan said, pushing them off with an oar and starting to row again.

The current pulled them down the river a little, but Faolan got them across. Ivy wished he had let her take an oar. For all that sometimes it might not seem like it, rowing a boat, especially against the current, was a lot of work. She knew that if she asked he would say no, but she could tell from the sweat he was working up that he was having a little trouble with it. She was glad when they hit the other shore.

“You really should have let me help,” Ivy said, jumping out of the boat first and helping Randal, and then Faolan, out.

“I got us here,” he protested, wiping his sleeve across his forehead.

“Yeah, you did,” Ivy said, looking around. “Where is here?”

“The Fourth Kingdom.”

“I know that! Where in the Fourth Kingdom?” Ivy asked.

Faolan shrugged. “I’ve actually never been to the Fourth Kingdom before. Randal and I snuck across the Second Kingdom border into the Third Kingdom. It’s almost impossible to get across the Second and Fourth border, thanks to Queen Riding Hood,” Faolan explained. “She’s got all the bridges swamped with guards and more guards posted all along that portion of the river. We never would have made it that way.”

“Why are there so many guards?” Ivy asked.

“She doesn’t want us leaving,” Faolan said, shrugging. “Maybe it’s just another excuse to shoot wolves. I don’t know. I only know what I saw.”

“Why do you want into the Fourth Kingdom, then? Is it worth all that?” Ivy shook her head in confusion.

“King Wendell put out a royal pardon of wolves in the Fourth Kingdom. So far, it’s the only kingdom where we can’t be shot on sight. I don’t want Randal in a place like that,” Faolan said, glancing at his brother.

“What about your parents? Where are they?” Ivy asked.

Faolan busied himself with the boat although there was nothing to be done about it. He coughed and didn’t look up when he replied. “They were killed. The queen’s soldiers and a group of men from one of the villages found them too close to the village and killed them,” he said.

Ivy heard a whimper from Randal at that. She looked back at the little boy and saw that there were tears welling up in his eyes. He saw her looking at him and quickly turned away, wiping his eyes. Ivy looked back at Faolan. He had seen his brother, too, and looked even sadder because of it.

“I…I’m sorry,” Ivy stumbled. She had never been good at things like this. But she knew she had to do something. “Uh…” she couldn’t think of a single thing to say and silently cursed herself. “I’m really sorry.”

“It’s all right. It’s past,” Faolan said.

Randal looked at him with wide eyes. He looked surprised. And hurt. He turned and ran away from them.

“Randal! Randal, come back here! I’ve got to go get him,” Faolan said quickly to Ivy and ran off after his brother.

Ivy started running after them, but stopped. She should probably leave them to themselves.

“Randal, what is the matter with you?” she heard Faolan’s voice. Ivy pulled some leaves out of the way and saw that Faolan had caught Randal. She started to leave, but stayed.

“You don’t even care anymore!” Randal cried accusingly. “You’re too busy with…”

“Randal! You know that’s not true!” Faolan interrupted. “I care a lot. Do you think that I don’t miss Mom and Dad, is that it? Well, you’re wrong. I miss them terribly.”

“You do not,” Randal said and Ivy could hear him sobbing. She felt a pang of guilt for causing this.

“I do, Randal. I do. But I can’t bring them back. Nothing can. We have to move on,” Faolan insisted.

“I want Mom!” Randal cried.

“Me, too, Randal. Me, too,” Faolan agreed quietly.

Ivy decided now would be as good a time as ever to make her presence known. She made a show of stumbling through the bushes and looking surprised to find them there. Randal was crying and Faolan was holding him. Ivy regretted her decision of intruding. Too late now.

“Are you okay?” she asked. She knelt next to Randal and patted him on the head. “It’s okay, Randal. Shhh. Don’t cry,” she added.

Randal shoved Faolan away and latched onto Ivy. Ivy’s eyes widened in surprise and she looked at Faolan over Randal’s head. Faolan looked hurt, now. He glanced at Randal, then backed up a pace.

“Hey, hey. It’s okay, Randal, it’s okay,” Ivy said quietly. Randal sniffed, then began whimpering. “Randal. I’m sorry. It must be very hard. But you know what? I’ll bet that your mommy and daddy are in a special place right now,” Ivy said, trying anything to comfort the little boy.

“Really?” he asked, looking up at her.

“Um hum. And where ever they are, they’re watching over you and your brother. And when they see you cry, it makes them sad, too. They don’t want you to be sad, Randal. They’re in a good place now. Don’t cry for them, Randal. They would want you to get on with your life. They wouldn’t want you to be sad all the time,” Ivy said, just blurting out everything that came to mind.

Randal sniffed and wiped furiously at his tears. He looked at his brother, then at Ivy. Then, he ran off.

“Randal!” Ivy called, rising to go after him.

“Leave him,” Faolan said quietly. “You helped. I could tell. He just wants to be alone.”

Ivy looked at Faolan. He was staring off at nothing.

“But did I help enough?” she asked, looking right at him.

Faolan looked at her and saw she meant him. He smiled shakily. “I’m okay. Randal took it really hard, though. He's still not over what happened.”

“I wouldn’t be either,” Ivy said, looking off in the direction Randal had gone. A moment later, a small howl broke the quiet. Ivy knew that it was Randal. Ivy had never heard anything so sad and mournful. It brought tears to her eyes. And Ivy wasn’t one to cry easily.

“I want to help him, but I don’t know what to do,” Faolan said quietly.

“It was my fault. I never should have brought it up,” Ivy shook her head.

“No. It’s my fault. You couldn’t have known. I should be able to handle this better. Randal probably hates me right now.”

Ivy wished fervently that she was better at this sort of thing. She wanted so much to make both of them feel better. “He doesn’t hate you. He just feels a little betrayed. You grieve on the inside and to him it seems like you’re not. He doesn’t understand,” Ivy said. She understood. That was the only way she knew how to grieve. She had never been the kind to openly cry. She had been the kind to cry when she was alone and she was sure no one would hear her. Or not cry at all. “Let’s stay here for a while,” Ivy suggested. Evil witch or no evil witch, she wasn’t going to leave Faolan and Randal like this. And neither of them was ready to go on yet. Evil would just have to wait.