The Last Ever After by Soman Chainani
Vanessa glared harder at Honora, who was ruffling Stefan’s hair, until Honora noticed Vanessa through the window. Vanessa quickly pretended to be doing dishes.
“Needless to say, Vanessa saw no such Goodness in Honora, and thought of her only as an Evil witch. Vanessa spent most of her days plotting how to tear the witch and Stefan apart, before she hatched the perfect plan. For what better way was there to get closer to her true love than to make friends with the witch?”
The cottage vanished around them, instantly replaced by the town square, where Vanessa and Honora walked hand in hand through the lanes, as Stefan traipsed beside them.
“And Honora, who was just as affable as Stefan, was more than receptive to a new best friend. Meanwhile, Vanessa finally had her chance at the boy of her dreams . . .”
Vanessa scooted closer to Stefan on the path and smiled up at him . . . He shifted away, ignoring her.
“Only there was one flaw in Vanessa’s plan: Stefan didn’t like her. And there was nothing Vanessa could do to change that,” Professor Sader declared.
The town square melted away and now Vanessa was kneeling in the graveyard at night, near the Forest’s edge, praying into the darkness with clasped hands.
“So young Vanessa did the one thing storybooks taught her to do when you love someone who is out of reach. She wished into the Woods for a magic spell that could help her win her one true love.”
The scene started to evaporate around the two girls.
“Yet Vanessa’s isn’t the only love story that matters in this fairy tale . . . ,” Sader’s voice echoed.
Phantom colors melted in around them and now they were in the School Master’s tower, as the masked sorcerer flew in through his window, carrying a young, attractive woman in his arms, with short brown hair, big, beautiful eyes, and tanned, gangly limbs.
“Because while Vanessa prayed for Stefan’s heart, the School Master was trying to win Callis’.”
Agatha choked on her own tongue. “Callis?” She ogled the woman’s elegant posture, olive-brown locks, and bright, freckly skin. “But that can’t be Callis. It doesn’t look anything like—”
Something hopped out of the woman’s black dress onto the floor.
A tiny, bald, wrinkled kitten.
Reaper.
Agatha blanched.
Merlin had told her part of this story—that the School Master sought her mother’s love—but the woman in his arms didn’t look anything like her mother . . .
Or did she?
For as Agatha looked closer at her wide, lucid eyes and long nose, she started to see bits and pieces of her mother, like a sculpture that had been deliberately altered.
Something floated back to her that Merlin had said her first time in the Celestium with him . . . something about Callis being quite pretty, before Tedros snorted incredulously . . .
Agatha watched the School Master bring the woman deeper into his chamber, Reaper pattering beside her.
It was her mother.
But then why didn’t it look like her?
She broke out of her trance, for Sader had already moved on.
“The School Master was curious about a new teacher, Callis of Netherwood, who the Storian had chosen for its latest tale shortly after she took a position teaching Uglification at school. According to the Storian, Callis had long dreamed of finding her one true love, even though she taught at the School for Evil. In truth, Callis was having doubts as to whether she was Evil at all. So when the School Master took a shine to her—a School Master everyone thought was Good at the time—Callis saw her way out. A chance to switch sides to Good and find her true love at last.”
The masked School Master pulled a golden ring from his pocket and took one knee before her. Slowly she reached for the ring . . . and stopped cold.
For now, as she looked closer at the ring, she could see the inky, black streaks swirling beneath its gold, like a poison waiting to latch on to its wearer.
“Until she realized what the School Master really was.”
The scene flashed to Callis fleeing through the dark Woods in the rain, a bald, wrinkled kitten wrapped in her arms.
“She held him off for a night, but the next evening after classes, she made her escape. She had to warn Merlin that he’d been right about the School Master being Evil and using her as a weapon against Good. All Callis had ever wanted was real love, and instead she’d found a villain trying to use that love to start war. She cursed herself for not accepting Merlin’s help when he’d tried to see her at school. There was no time to find the wizard now. Once the School Master realized she’d escaped, he’d surely find and kill her, since she’d discovered the secret behind his mask. Except there was nowhere to hide that he wouldn’t find her. Nowhere that he didn’t have power over . . .”
Callis suddenly stalled, hearing a chorus of low, urgent whispers floating in the wind.
I wish.
I wish.
I wish.
“Like all witches, Callis could hear the pleas of those truly desperate enough to pay a price. Yet this wish wasn’t coming from the Woods, but beyond it, where the School Master had no power. Callis wouldn’t ask a price for choosing to answer this wish, she told herself—only a chance to turn the page and live a life free of Evil. Answering this wish would be her very first Good deed. And so a witch who dreamed of her one true love followed the wish . . .”
Callis tracked the whispers to Necro Ridge and an unmarked, open grave at the top of the hill. She dug through the bottom of the empty grave, Reaper helping her, deeper, deeper, deeper . . .
“. . . all the way to a girl in the Reader World, dreaming of her one true love.”
As Callis came out the other side of the grave, she found herself in Gavaldon’s graveyard, standing in front of a dark-haired girl kneeling in the weeds. Slowly Vanessa looked up at Callis and smiled, knowing her wish had been granted at last.
All at once, Sophie and Agatha were back in the School Master’s tower, as the masked sorcerer studied the open storybook on the altar table, the Storian frozen above it.
“During this time, the Storian had been writing Callis’ fairy tale, but when she vanished, the pen went still, as if it’d lost the connection to her. Suspecting he’d been betrayed, the School Master commanded his stymphs to find Callis and bring her back to him alive. But when they didn’t retrieve her and there was no sign of her going to Merlin’s side, the School Master assumed Callis was dead. His suspicions were confirmed when the Storian abandoned her fairy tale and moved on to another. To the School Master, Callis’ story was over and forgotten.”
The scene disappeared and the girls were in pitch-darkness, Sader’s small figure levitating over them.
“But unlike the School Master I had the power of sight, which meant I could see what happened after the Storian stopped writing. For unbeknownst to the School Master, Callis wasn’t dead and her story wasn’t over. Not in the least.”
Sophie and Agatha glanced at each other, shaken.
“After leaving school, Callis wanted nothing to do with Evil or witchcraft ever again. But she hadn’t given up on her dreams of true love. Seeing how safe and quaint Gavaldon was, she harbored fantasies of starting over and finding a new start as a Reader,” Sader went on. “Yet, she still owed Vanessa a wish, since choosing to answer that wish had given her safe haven from the School Master. Callis promised herself it would be her very last deed of magic before she settled into ordinary life. And so she made the love potion that Vanessa had desperately wished for. But Callis warned her: it would only last one night, for matters of love were too delicate for magic, and use of a love spell for any long-term goals would only lead to the unhappiest of endings. Magic always had its price.”
A new scene melted in and Sophie and Agatha were in a crowded pub, as Stefan caroused with his friends.
“Vanessa paid no heed,” Sader said.
Stefan put his drink down on a table and a hooded shadow slipped by and poured
“She tricked Stefan into drinking the spell and he instantly fell in love with her. And even though the spell soon wore off, as Callis had warned, the potion had a far more enduring effect. For it wasn’t long before Vanessa knocked on Stefan’s door and told him she was bearing his child. Which meant by Council Law that he had to marry her.”
The scene changed to Honora and Stefan arguing heatedly on Honora’s porch.
“Furious, Honora broke ties with Stefan. How could he betray her trust? And with her best friend, no less? Stefan swore it was black magic. He had no love for Vanessa, and when he’d returned to her house to confront her, he’d noticed a strange houseguest huddling in her room. It was she who did it, he told Honora. The stranger. He could see the guilt in her eyes. That witch had cast a spell over him—he was sure of it! How could Vanessa do such a heartless thing? Trap him into marriage with a child? An innocent child? He feared the spell would backfire somehow. . . . But Honora wouldn’t listen. Stefan begged her not to give up on him, but it was no use. No matter what he said, Honora didn’t believe his story and wanted nothing further to do with him. So Stefan took his story to the Elders instead.”
Now the girls were outside in the square at night with a mob of onlookers, watching Callis tied to a torchlit pyre, as the three bearded Elders presided from the stage.
“The Elders believed him, for Stefan had always been a beloved son. Moreover, the Elders had been leading witch hunts for years, searching for anyone who might be responsible for the child kidnappings that continued to happen every four years. So when Stefan pointed his finger at Callis—a strange, unmarried woman they’d never seen in town before—the Elders finally found their witch.”
The executioner reached for the torch over Callis’ pyre. Sophie and Agatha could see Stefan at the side of the stage, glaring at Callis as the executioner lowered the flame to the wood sticks under the witch. Callis’ face flooded with tears of terror and regret; she’d tried to do one last act of magic in exchange for the chance at a life of Goodness and love and now she’d be slaughtered as an Evil witch instead. As she wept for the mistakes of her life, the flames spreading under feet, Stefan watched her, his own face beginning to soften.
“When he saw her in that moment, a human-hearted soul just like him, Stefan realized he didn’t have it inside of him to be responsible for another’s death,” said Professor Sader. “Though he still believed Callis was a witch, he recanted his story and agreed to marry Vanessa in order to save Callis’ life. Per the Elders’ conditions for sparing her, Callis had to move to the graveyard and stay out of the townspeople’s affairs forever. She could never marry a man from town, never have a shop in the square or a house in cottage lane . . . but she would keep her life, even if it was a loveless one. As would Stefan, who in the process of saving her, had doomed himself to a loveless life with Vanessa too.”
Agatha couldn’t breathe, watching Stefan free Callis off the pyre. “The debt,” she whispered. “That was the debt she owed him.”
Sophie shook her head. “But she looks so different from your mother, Aggie.”
“So does yours,” said Agatha.
Both girls turned back to the story as the scene melted into a lavish, sun-drenched wedding at the town church. Stefan stood at the altar next to a pregnant Vanessa.
He’d never looked more miserable.
“Stefan married Vanessa, while Honora’s parents soon forced her to marry the odious butcher’s boy. Now Vanessa had everything she’d always wanted. Her one true love and his child on the way to keep him. The girl he once loved married off and out of their lives. A perfect fairy-tale ending. Or so she thought. Because Vanessa hadn’t counted on one thing . . .”
The church dissipated and now the girls were on Graves Hill in the middle of the night. Grim-faced, Stefan shoveled dirt to fill the last of two small graves. Vanessa watched him, weeping.
“Stefan’s fear that the spell would backfire came true. Vanessa gave birth to two boys. Both born dead.”
The scene shifted and Sophie and Agatha were back where they began: in Sophie’s cottage, lit by a red sunset, with Vanessa glowering through her kitchen window. Her eyes were on Stefan in a hooded coat, hustling down the lane, before Honora snuck him into her cottage.
“In the years that followed, Vanessa tried everything she could to have a child with Stefan, but her efforts failed again and again. Soon, Honora suspected that Stefan was telling the truth all along: Vanessa had tricked him into marrying her. With Honora just as unhappy with her husband as Stefan with Vanessa, Honora and Stefan began to see each other in secret once more.”
Brightness leeched out of the scene and now the girls were in Agatha’s house on Graves Hill, watching Vanessa fuming at Callis.
“Vanessa visited every doctor in Gavaldon, who all agreed she’d never have a child. Enraged, she returned to Callis and demanded a new potion that would help her bear Stefan’s baby. Unless she had his child—a child that could prove their love was real—Stefan would never believe in their marriage. Callis refused, insisting she was done with magic forever and just wanted to keep to herself, per the Elders’ orders. But Vanessa threatened her: she said she’d go to the Elders and tell her she’d cursed her to never have children; that she was cursing other townswomen as well; that she was the one responsible for the kidnapped children . . . Callis knew then that there was no stopping Vanessa. Her only choice was to help her.”
The scene skipped ahead and the girls watched as Vanessa drank a smoking black tonic from a wooden bowl.
“Callis warned her that magic could not force the union of souls into a child, as love does, just as magic could not force true love itself. Try to unite two souls into one child through magic and you would only split those souls even more,” said Sader. “But just as before, Vanessa didn’t listen, determined to have Stefan’s baby. And soon enough, a healthy child was growing inside of her.”
Night fell darker over the house. Vanessa was in painful labor now, as Callis comforted her.
“‘The Miracle Child,’ the doctors named it. Vanessa promised Stefan it would be a boy as handsome as him. Seeing Vanessa carrying his child again and how much it meant to her, Stefan tried to give his wife another chance. In his heart, he knew sneaking off to Honora’s was wrong, for they’d both taken wedding vows to other people. Besides, it didn’t matter what Vanessa did in the past; they were about to be a family. She was his wife now and forever and that meant if Vanessa had his baby, he would love it and its mother as much as he possibly could. Stefan even let himself name the child before it was born: ‘Filip’ after his own father,” said Sader. “And in time, the night came where Vanessa finally had Stefan’s child, thanks to the secret power of Callis’ magic. Only it wasn’t a boy at all. It was a fair, luminous girl that looked just like Stefan.”
Weak and sweating, Vanessa stroked the blond, beautiful girl in her arms, before she suddenly felt strong pains again—
“But just as the witch predicted, the souls of Stefan and Vanessa never fused, for there was no love between them. Each soul produced its own child, which meant Vanessa delivered not one baby, but two. This second girl, then, looked nothing like Stefan. Instead, she looked just like her mother.”
Vanessa gasped as Callis held out the baby: raven-haired, with bulging big eyes and a hideous face. Vanessa recoiled in disgust, shoving it back at the witch.
“She ordered Callis to dump the baby in the Woods and leave it there to die. She could never take such an ugly child home to Stefan, she scoffed, before bundling up her beautiful, blond daughter and hurrying off, sure that everything between her and her husband was about to change,” said Sader. “But Callis, who only saw beauty in the girl Vanessa threw away, kept the child for herself. She named her Agatha, which meant ‘Soul of Good.’ Finally, after so many years of loneliness, Callis of Netherwood had found her one true love.”
Callis glanced int
“To ensure no one asked questions as to whether she was the child’s mother, Callis gradually transformed herself over the years, using her Uglification skills to look more and more like Agatha. Soon the villagers began to notice Callis’ child lurking on the hills, a practical duplicate of her. The Elders asked Callis questions, of course, but she gave no answers, and in time, the town simply shunned the young girl just as they shunned her mother.”
Morning streamed through the house’s rickety windows, as black-haired, sallow-skinned, scraggly Callis read storybooks to her black-haired, sallow-skinned, scraggly daughter.
“When new fairy tales appeared in Gavaldon year after year, with Good still winning every story, Callis began to question whether she had it all wrong. Perhaps the School Master hadn’t been Evil at all. She even wondered: had she made a mistake by not taking his ring? As the years went by, she began to wish that her daughter would be taken to the School for Good and Evil so that Agatha could have a future filled with magic, adventure, and love, instead of being trapped in a lonely, ordinary life because of her mother.”
The scene flashed to Stefan in his cottage, sitting at the dining table with Vanessa and young Sophie. He was eying his three-year-old daughter warily, no tenderness in his face.
“Meanwhile, as young Sophie grew, Stefan had an instinctive stiffness towards her. He tried so hard to love her: taking her to Battersby’s for cookies, reading her storybooks at bedtime, smiling when passerbys said his young Sophie looked just like him. . . . But deep down, all Stefan could see in his daughter was Vanessa’s soul.”