Descendants 3 (H.S. & C.S.)

Chapter 17

Every villain has her lair, if I were Sleeping Beauty's son, where would I hide? And yes, I know my mother would know the answer to that question. That helps me how?
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In Ashton's dorm room, Sabrina stretched out on the lavish bed and flipped through Ashton's journal. She leafed through the pages, reading the private thoughts Ashton had recorded in his loopy cursive handwriting. Ever since Harry arrived at Auradon Prep, Ashton had felt invisible at school. And at home, her family acted like she'd let them down. Sabrina scanned another page. Ashton was humiliated and heartbroken when Cole publicly declared his love for Harry. Sabrina has assumed Ashton was some privileged rich boy, but maybe it wasn't that simple.

Sabrina was absorbed in Ashton's journal when Harry and Calum ran into the room out of breath. "He's nowhere in campus," Calum panted. They'd checked the cafeteria, searched the tourney field, and even rummaged around in the library. Ashton had left a long trail of pink fog and sleeping students in his wake, but the sorcerer himself had vanished.

"Found his diary," said Sabrina. "And dang, did you ruin Ashton's life."

Harry was starting to feel kind of bad. "Okay, so did you find anything in there that we don't know. or . . ."

"He hangs out at Fairy Cottage. You know where Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather hid her mom from your mom," Sabrina told Harry. The pirate leader rubbed her hands together and booted with evil glee.

"Yes, ha ha ha, the irony is not lost on me," said Harry.

Sabrina lifted her head form a poufy down pillow and ran her fingertips along the dreamy silk comforter. It was all so luxurious. "How could anyone with this bed ever be unhappy?" she wondered aloud. Kids on the Isle were lucky if they had a bale of hay to sleep on. Sabrina herself had spent a night sleeping on the hard wood planks of her pirate ship.

Calum nodded silently and thought. Note to self: every VK gets a great new pillow and comforter. He added it to his long mental to-do list. Thanks to the future King Harry, Auradon would soon to be home to every villain kid who wanted to live there. Calum smiled at the beautiful thought. Of course, there was so much to do to get ready for the new students to move into the dorms. Speaking of whom . . .

Navia had been busy pilfering through Ashton's vanity, and she swiveled around, proud to model her new image. "Okay, how do I look?" she asked, striking a pose. She wore several gold bangles, three strands of pearls, and Ashton's signature bluebird tiara. With Navia, more was more.

Calum looked her up and down. "Okay, but the tiara stays here," instructed Calum.

"But he's bad," Navia said, pouting.

"And we're not," replied Calum.

Navia removed the tiara with a disappointed sigh.

Mentoring all the young VKs who'd be moving from the Isle wasn't going to be easy, but there was nothing in the world Calum would rather do.
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Meanwhile, Michael, Justin, Louis, and Ross trudged down an overgrown path deep in the Auradon forest. They called out for Cole. Nick sniffed around the trees for any signs of the king. Ross, who was in his own little joy bubble, scarfed down tiny red berries directly off a bush. "These things grow everywhere," he said with doltish wonder, popping another one into his mouth. "Hey, we should play that icebreaker. Um, Michael, I like the way that you can bounce around and jump off things," he said with a mouthful of fruit and bright berry juice dripping down his chin.

After years of stealing rotting food from rickety stalls and foraging through dumpsters for dinner, Ross was in paradise. "This is free, right?" he asked, plucking off two more handfuls of berries.