Descendants: To Kill A Dragon

Chapter Sixteen

A/N: Yes, I know Evie has a shard of the magic mirror. Fairy Godmother, however, does not know that.

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That afternoon, Ben and Jane ate with the four at their table in the cafeteria, and the two from Auradon were amazed at how they cooked with food that was half-expired and by all rights, would have been thrown out in Auradon. That was how it ended up over here, after all. Lunch was french onion soup, with toasted bread on top. It rivalled even the meals made in Auradon proper, which boasted some of the best cuisine in the world.

"Exquisite, milady." Ben exclaimed. "It's amazing what you can do with simple ingredients."

"It's amazing what you can do when it's a necessity." Mal replied icily. She hated his condescending tone, because his parents were the ones who put them in this rotting hell with no food or clean water! And she knew she had to be nice to Ben, because he was their only hope for getting off of this pitiful rock, but for evil sakes, it didn't mean she had to like it.

For dessert, they had chocolate chip cookies, baked with the ingredients Ben himself brought over.

Into the batter, one of the goblins dropped a single tear, taken from the cheek of Evie herself, who wept for the children who were still hungry, for the young mothers who died having babies they couldn't plan for. She wept for Mal, who would never grow wings and horns, her birthright, stolen from her by her birth beneath the barrier.

That anguished tear was bottled and chilled, and kept for weeks, waiting for the day when it would be used in a love spell.

And that day was today.

"Thank you." Mal said to the goblin who put a cookie on the plate before her. Ben dug in immediately, and grinned as he savored the taste. Of course Ben's cookie was memorized, and kept seperate from the others. Mal had paid her kitchen staff a good bonus for this, and if they had any doubts about giving a magic cookie to the prince of Auradon, those hesitations were lost after Ben's earlier display in the kitchens. There was no love lost, between him and the goblins.

A love spell was the kind of thing that didn't require excess magic to be poured into it. The magic came from the ingredients. Thus, like many of Evie's potions, it worked just fine under the barrier (and it didn't hurt that Mal was so powerful that the barrier could never keep her magic back for long.) As Ben finished eating his cookie, Mal relished the look of love that came over him. Jane had taken a small notepad from her pocket, and she was writing, not noticing the change.

"I think I love you." Ben suddenly blurted out, drawing the shock (however false it might be) of everyone at the table.

"I think I always have," the prince continued, rambling, with flushed cheeks and wide eyes. "I used to dream about you Mal, before I ever saw you. We'd walk together in a meadow, and dance."

"Ben?" Mal asked, raising an eyebrow, voice sweet with sympathy. "A-are you feeling alright?"

"No, I'm not. I think I'm in love with you, Mal. Madly, stupidly, in love with a married woman." Ben murmured, looking feverish.

"That's okay, I don't mind sharing." Evie smirked, but the other three villain kids knew that what she really meant by that was biding her time. She could live with pretending to share Mal with Ben, because one day Mal would hand her his kingdom on a silver platter.

"Mal, come back with me. Come back to Auradon. I'll show them how good you are!" Ben exclaimed, reaching forward to clutch Mal's hand.

"You know I can't do that, Ben." Mal explained, with false sadness in her every word. "Without me, this place would fall apart! Don't you care about my subjects, prince?"