BLUE

“Pardon?” the Prince said with a small smile, somehow missing Herman’s slip over the crescendo of crickets in the background. 

Or maybe he was just too smitten to notice.

“I figured that would be your name,” I lied and felt a wave of nausea in my chest that makes my head giddy.

Darn her flower petals.

The girl sure has it bad. 

It wasn’t common, but sometimes when our host’s feelings were strong enough, we would feel them as our own. With all the fluttering in Ella’s stomach, I would suspect she ate a bunch of butterflies for dinner if I didn’t know beforehand that she was a strict vegetarian.

The prince’s smile grew wider as he helped me to my feet and guided me into a waltz. Taking that as cue, I slipped to the back of Ella’s mind and coaxed her back to a dreamy state of consciousness. 

Her overwhelming emotions came barreling back, crashed into the front of her mind just as the veil of magic lifted from her. It nearly caused her to lose her balance and stepped onto the Prince’s toes but he merely continued to smile at her. Their hearts slowed to a matching beat, their breaths fell in perfect harmony. Their eyes met and their souls too serenaded in sync. 

Despite everything Lily was worried about, I doubt the Star would ever allow any Mains to fail in their Tales. They were just too precious to Him. 

Unlike us.

We, like the rest of the Sides he had prepared to aid their quests, were dispensable. Easily sacrificed along the way, laying the path for them to their final goals. Completely omissible from the pages as yet another character that merges with the backdrops.

I have no idea how long I sat there in the dark, how many turns and muted songs they danced to until the clock tower’s toll finally reached the void in my ears. 

Dong!

I jerked Ella’s consciousness back to its resting nest and forced her head to snap around, however reluctant she might be to be separated from her Prince’s chest. 

Darn his flower petals. How many bells was that?

My eyes darted frantically to the foliage nearby where Herman kept himself hidden and found the orb of dim green gone. From the way the light of his locket bobbed between the trees a good distance away, Herman was long up and on his way to retrieve the carriage. 

Why have I missed the cue? 

“I have to go,” I said, taking a moment to register the Prince’s alarmed face before peeling away from his arms. Ella fought a silent war with me from inside, struggling to break to the surface again. 

Dong!

Not now, Ella.

“Wait, where are you—” the Prince shouted after me but it faded into the background as I burst through the doors and spilled into the ballroom swarming with heavily scented bodies. Humans, still unaware of the pandemonium behind the closed doors, continued to cling onto their partners and stepped according to the tunes played. 

—until Prince Charming shouted over the music (which stopped entirely after his outburst) and ordered the guards to stop me. 

Gasps erupted from all corners of the ballroom as armed guards filed in from all directions on cue. I felt like a fugitive on the run as they chased after me, shouting indiscernible commands over the ruckus.

Dong!

I placed a hand on my locket and whipped out my wand while another worked to lift the skirt and prevent myself from falling to my ungraceful death. A flick and a few harmless little lumps were formed in the carpeted floor as I passed. 

Even without turning to look, a yelp of surprise followed by a loud crash of armoured bodies confirmed for me that my plan worked. The heavy footsteps pounding behind me ceased to exist, replaced by groans and words of swears. For once, Tink’s signature tricks came in handy.

Dong!

I burst out of the castle, nearly tripping over the hem of the gown while cursing my enchanted locket for its temporary contract. Fifth bell after midnight and all magic cast before would cease to exist. 

Curses on whoever created that rule.

Maybe I wasn’t paying enough attention or maybe I wasn’t really stepping on the shoes. Halfway down the stairs, one of the glass slippers slipped off my feet. I whipped my head around, in time to meet the Prince’s gaze just atop the steps. 

If I were to stop now, we would be busted and all will be over for Ella. No prince was smart enough to differentiate between a fae mom and a witch.

Cursing under my breath, I kicked the remaining slipper into the air, grabbed it with one hand and leapt off the steps. Herman reached in time, yanked the doors to the pumpkin carriage wide open and reached towards me with his free hand. 

“Hold on tight!” Herman shouted and hauled me into the carriage. I slammed into the cushioned seat and the door shut with a bang. With a final warning from Jaq, the carriage lurched forward, throwing me back against the walls. Herman tumbled in, heaving as he pulled himself off the rocking floor.

“That…was…close,” he breathed as he eased into the seat. 

“No kidding,” I sighed the breath I didn’t realize I was holding in as the Prince’s silhouette grew smaller in the distance. My other slipper glittered between his hands.

Dong!

A tremor ran through my limbs as I leaned my head back against the wall of glass. When I returned to my senses, Ella was herself again. Her dress and hair back to its beyond-repair state the moment I returned to my own body. 

“Did all that really happened?” Ella gasped for air as she blinked for the hundredth times in disbelief, back and forth between Herman and me.

Affected by how genuinely overjoyed she looked, I nodded, unable to help the smile that found its way to my still-numb face. “Yes, it really happened.” Sometimes, just sometimes, a flushed face and look of bliss like that made all the trouble worth it.

Or it might be the pouch of fae dust we will receive after completing the task. 

Just saying.

“Oh, hold this for me will you?” I passed her the glass slipper and waved my wand over it, the last of our fae dust of the day drained dry. “Now, only you can fit into this slipper. Anybody else who tries to, will find it too small for them. And don’t step on it alright? It’s still kind of brittle and well, it is glass.”

“Thanks,” she said in glee, eyes sparkling but her brows soon furrowed. “But what will I do with it?”

A Princess will always be a princess. 

“Trust me, you’ll need it,” I smiled the truest smile of the evening and Herman nodded his approval from across the seat. 

It wasn’t in our plan to leave a slipper behind. We kind of planned to leave a note with Ella’s address on it—talk about subtlety, really. But considering that Prince Charming has the other slipper with him now, it shouldn’t be hard if he really wanted to find her. 

Cendrillon wasn’t that big to begin with. Not to mention no shoemaker can ever replicate a glass slipper even if they wanted to. 

And they are destined to be together after all. Even if the King forbids him to find her, the pen will make him. 

Eventually.

The emerald pen in Herman’s hand continued to work without breaking its rhythm, a sign that our last minute change was working out just fine—as long as Lily doesn’t get a wind of it before we bind it in the Library, that is.

 Even the Mother of Fairy Godmothers can’t change whatever had been sealed tight within the Library’s vault. 

We dropped Ella at the gates to her cottage of overgrown ivy. Every trace of spells cast over the pumpkin and rodents erased clean before I waved my wand one last time over her head. 

Gus took one look at its original body and sighed, whiskers quivering as it glanced at its taller friend. Jaq gave him a pat on the back and shared his sigh.

After a good night's sleep, what remains will only be Ella’s memory of her dance with the prince and the slipper that had become the manifestation of their bond. She wouldn’t remember anything about us and our contract. 

It will be as if a plump fae mom had granted her wish for a pretty dress and she had done the rest herself. A Tale completed. As usual.

“That’s a job well done,” Herman beamed, rubbing his nose as we watched Ella ducked through the low threshold to her home, holding out the weathered wooden door for her rodent friends. 

“Not well done,” I corrected. “Brilliantly executed.”