Fairy Tale Wedding (Book One: The Road to Ever After)

Chapter Twenty

Lady Jacqueline's head jolted upright, her skin crawling at the sound wafting up from other corridors of the castle. She shook off her disgust with a sneer. The sound was laughter and how it made her blood curdle. Lady Jacqueline ripped open the window of her tower study/laboratory/war room, and looked over the glassy stone, down to the promenade around the courtyard to glare at the mirthful pair.

Below, Princess Adeline and Lady Jacqueline's son, Jarryd, walked around the stone wall, deep in conversation, risking the nasty weather for a touch of air, fresh or otherwise. Lady Jacqueline sucked her teeth in disgust. How dare they get along so swimmingly, and where anyone might hear or see? Her fingernails tried to sink into the stone tower, breaking into even more jagged edges in the process. She hated any sight or sound of happiness...especially of joy shared between a man and a woman. Looking at her grown son, perhaps for one of the first times really looking at him, Lady Jacqueline's memory flashed to other scenes, connecting like a magnet to episodes buried deep in the shadowy past. The smiles on the two young adults' faces were not wholly unfamiliar to Lady Jacqueline's life experience.

A masculine name rose to her tongue. A name she had not uttered for almost twenty three years.

Before the name could escape her lips, Lady Jacqueline hissed it out of her mouth with spit and fury like a cornered cat. She flew away from the window after slamming it shut, her tail of black hair swinging into the air to tangle around her neck and chest. The dark lady ran back into the depths of her chamber and away from the blossom of hope below.

She returned to the map of Fairy Tale rolled out across her massive table. The scrolled parchment was held down by four candlesticks, each made of volcanic rock in the shape of a snake slithering up from an apple. The map, though an antique, had not been given the tender loving care it deserved for preservation. Instead, new borders and names had been scrawled across it in red ink. This map no longer represented Fairy Tale as it was, but as Lady Jacqueline's tyranny believed it ought to be. She grinned over her plans for Once-upon-a Time and Ever After, giving the kingdoms a petting pat with her fingers. So soon they would be under her control.

But then, the wicked smile washed off the enchantress' face. Her purple eyes darkened and her pale flesh grew even more fluorescent, if that was possible. These physical reactions were the effect of a psychological stimulus. As she read her rewriting of Dark and Stormy over the crossed out imprint, Rainbow's End, Lady Jacqueline felt a smack of emotion flood into her senses. She staggered backwards, falling into a spike-encrusted chair. Jacqueline looked upon this map a million times before with no such drama. But today was different. The upcoming events of the wedding and inevitable rescue attempt, along with the brief viewing of Adeline and Jarryd giggling together were enough to revive dead recollections in Lady Jacqueline's mind.

Lady Jacqueline, as powerful as she was with her dark magic, could not resist the images of former life any longer. The name that tried to come forth a moment before found new strength. The violent enchantress opened her lips a slit and muttered,

"Ian."

Her vision of the stone room blurred and washed away, as if rain swept a realistic chalk drawing off the pavement. Her eyes beheld former environs. A palace of pastel colours, where servants skipped and danced to their duties and songs floated from room to room gleefully, subtly. She saw the throne room once again, full of winsomely attired courtiers, always smiling, bedecked with jewels and youthfulness. They mirrored their king – a young man with bright eyes and limber majesty; a monarch that bubbled with good humour and grace.

And always at the king's side stood his handsome brother, the second son of a royal line, an eternal prince whose only purpose was to uphold his sibling's cheer and authority.