Ever After - Ella Enchanted AU

Ever After - Chapter Five

"A felon in my own family!"

Marinette cringed as her step-mother's strangled cry echoed through their living room. The older woman had collapsed dramatically upon their sofa while Marinette stood awaiting her punishment. Naturally, it had been Dame Mendeleiev who had had to come to the jail to release her step-daughter in the place of her father. Marinette had been forced to listen to the dame's horrified chattering over everything from Marinette's appearance to her atrocious behavior on the way home. She pressed her hand to her forehead as she stared up at the ceiling. "I could die from embarrassment."

From where she sat folding laundry, Marinette caught Tikki muttering haughtily under her breath. "Promises, promises."

The young girl tried not to laugh at the comment when Dame Mendeleiev suddenly sat up, pointing an accusatory finger at her. It was times like these that Marinette could truly see how she and Chloe could be related. Their mutual love for the dramatics was uncanny. "You are an absolute disgrace."

Why do I have a feeling she's been waiting to say that since we met? Marinette sighed to herself, hoping that if she just took whatever verbal battering the dame had further in store that this would all be over quickly. After the day that she had experienced, Marinette wanted nothing more than to go up to her room and sleep for a week.

Tikki pushed the laundry off to the side on the dining room table, pushing her chin into her hand with the roll of her eyes. Marinette had never known Tikki to be so standoffish to anyone, but it seemed like it had become her default mood whenever dealing with her new mistress and her demanding daughters. "Did you ever think that she might have been put up to it? Marinette typically isn't one to do something so outrageous."

"Tikki's right, Mother," Chloe crooned from where she sat with Sabrina in the breakfast nook, flipping through a magazine with the prince's face plastered on the cover. She flipped the page with an innocent expression that looked out of place on Marinette's snarky step-sister. Chloe set aside her magazine and rose to hover at her mother's shoulder alongside the couch. "We were there, after all. It really wasn't poor Marinette's fault. She was forced to do all those absolutely horrendous deeds."

Marinette's eyes narrowed in her step-sister's direction. Surely this couldn't be a confession, Chloe would never be that forth coming with information, especially if it ended up incriminating her. Her heartbeat had started to pick up. Marinette suddenly felt like she was being cornered and she was not enjoying the experience.

Dame Mendeleiev looked from her daughter to her step-daughter quizzically, her hands folded on her lap as she stared down Marinette. "So, Marinette, who put you up to it?"

Marinette's answer was on the tip of her tongue, fully prepared to expose her wicked step-sisters for the troublemakers they were when Chloe rounded on her. She had moved from her mother's arm to perch at the mantle just behind Marinette. Marinette's heart seized in her chest when the young woman whispered a sneering command into her ear. "Tell her it was Rose."

"Ro - " Marinette's voice caught in her throat as she stamped down her every instinct to obey and accuse her friend. No, Marinette wouldn't allow Chloe to do this, not after all the mayhem that she had already inflicted that day. But still, the gift compelled her to lie against her better judgement.

Dame Mendeleiv's long pale fingers tapped impatiently on her knee as she stared down the dark haired young woman. "Well? Im waiting. Tell me who's to blame."

Hot tears pricked in Marinette's eyes as he voice squeaked out barely above a whisper. "Rose."

She saw Tikki instinctively flinch where she sat, knowing a lie when she heard one right off the bat as Dame Mendeleiev took it hook, line and sinker. She jumped to her feet with a huff, taking her fan from the table beside the sofa and waving it about her as she shrieked once more. "Rose! I might have guessed such mischief from a halfling."