Rapunzel Cuts Loose, page 6
part #4 of Grimmtastic Girls Series
“How did you know they’re hunting for treasure?” Rapunzel asked. But when she turned back, the witch was gone. How frustrating! She started to leave, too, but then stopped. Since she was already here, she kneeled to gather handfuls of rampion and put them in her bag. She had a feeling Ms. Queenharts wasn’t going to change her mind about the tarts, in which case Hagscorch was going to keep demanding that she gather some of this stuff. So she might as well gather it now.
“What are you doing?” asked a familiar voice. It was Snow.
Rapunzel whipped around. “Um, how long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough to see that witch you were talking to disappear. I saw you both through the trees,” said Snow. “Careful,” she cautioned before Rapunzel could reply. “My stepmom’s right behind me.”
“Treasure hunting?” whispered Rapunzel.
Snow nodded.
Just then, Ms. Wicked stepped from the trees to join them in the clearing. She frowned suspiciously at Rapunzel. Then she asked almost the same question Snow had. “Rapunzel? What are you doing in Neverwood?”
“Oh, nothing much,” she replied. Thinking fast, she added, “I saw you and Snow come this way, so I followed. What are you guys doing?” She peered curiously at the fashionable handbag Ms. Wicked clutched, figuring it held the fake mapestry and hoping to make the teacher too nervous to ask more questions. Her ploy worked.
“Not a thing,” Ms. Wicked replied, crossing her arms over her bag. “I suppose we should end our stroll and escort Rapunzel back to school,” she said to Snow. She sounded a little irritated that her treasure hunt had been interrupted.
“No — you stay and keep, um, enjoying your walk through the woods,” Snow told her stepmom. “I’ll go back to the island with her.”
When Ms. Wicked eagerly agreed to the idea, the girls headed for the Once Upon River. “So?” Snow prompted as they made their way through the trees.
“Okay, you’re right. That was a witch I was talking to. Obviously.”
“The one who raised you?” Snow guessed.
Rapunzel nodded. They’d reached the river’s shore. As they climbed into the two-seater swan boat she had arrived in, she noticed two other identical small swan boats docked farther down the shore. One was probably Ms. Wicked’s, but who had brought the other one?
“Is she a good witch?” Snow asked as they launched.
Rapunzel shot Snow an Are you kidding? look. “Uh, no. Haven’t you read my fairy tale?”
“Well, yes. I mean, sure, I’ve read it. I know she kept you locked in a tower,” Snow said as they paddled back to the island. “But even though the Grimm brothers took great pains to tell everyone’s story correctly, they still could’ve gotten things wrong. So —”
“They got my tale right,” Rapunzel interrupted. “The tower I grew up in was in that rampion patch back there. But the witch magicked it over to Heart Island last night. She’s up to something.”
Snow gasped. She stopped paddling for a minute. “Do you think by any chance … that your witch could be the … leader?”
“As in the leader of E.V.I.L.?” Rapunzel said in surprise. She stopped, too, and they drifted with the current for a time.
Snow nodded. “Moving a tall stone tower from the forest to Heart Island would take powerful magic. The kind E.V.I.L.’s leader probably has. Maybe the witch and the leader are one in the same.”
Rapunzel and her friends believed that the society’s leader lurked outside the magical wall around Grimmlandia and was somehow guiding E.V.I.L. members in the artifact thefts. So far, only Snow and Cinda had gotten a partial look at this leader, who’d magically appeared to them and then disappeared within a strange mist. A mist that tended to pop up in unexpected places to terrify them.
“I don’t think so,” Rapunzel said, shaking her head. “My witch lives in Neverwood, not outside the wall. And her magic is strong, but it would take super-strong magic to steal artifacts or move a tower. I don’t think she could do it by herself. She paused, thinking. “I guess the Society’s leader could be helping her, though.”
“Yeah, maybe she’s part of E.V.I.L. Maybe she made some sort of dastardly deal to help the Society take over the Academy,” said Snow. “And all of Grimmlandia, too. You know how witches are, always making wicked deals and bargains.”
Yes, Rapunzel did know! A silence fell as both of them began paddling again, thinking their own separate thoughts.
As they neared shore, words burst from Rapunzel, cutting through the quiet. “I did something really stupid. Back when I was six years old, I made a bargain with the witch that I would return to live in the tower and help her with magic the year I turn thirteen.”
“What?” said Snow. “But you’ll turn thirteen at the end of this year!”
“I know,” Rapunzel said miserably. “At the time it seemed like a good idea. It was the only way she’d agree to let me attend Grimm Academy.”
“Well, then, we’ll just have to figure a way out of that deal,” Snow said firmly. “You belong at GA. It just wouldn’t be the same without you.”
As they docked on the island and disembarked from the swan boat, Rapunzel sent her a sad smile. “But the witch thinks the tower is where I belong. She thinks I’d make a fine witch. That I’d be good at doing evil.” Her voice fell to a fearful whisper. “I’m worried that she could be right.” She hadn’t planned to ever tell anyone this, but it was as if she couldn’t stop the grimmawful truth from pouring out of her.
Snow gaped at her. “What? That’s crazy. You can’t let her make you doubt your own goodness!” When Rapunzel shrugged and looked away, Snow put a hand on her arm and spoke urgently. “Listen, Ms. Wicked’s not my real mom and that witch isn’t yours, either. But it wouldn’t matter if they were our real moms. We don’t have to be like them if we don’t want to. You’re a good person. Don’t ever let that witch make you think differently about yourself.” She gave Rapunzel a hug.
Rapunzel hugged her back, happy Snow felt that way. But would Red and Cinda and all the other kids at the Academy feel the same? And what would the witch do to them if Rapunzel backed out on her promise? Get really mad, that’s what. If she truly was powerful enough to move a tower nowadays, maybe she could also do real harm to GA — even if she wasn’t the leader of E.V.I.L.
Just then, Red and Cinda appeared on the dock. “Don’t tell them what we talked about, okay?” Rapunzel cautioned Snow all in a rush. “It’s kind of embarrassing for me. I want to try to solve my witch problem on my own before telling them anything.”
“Okay,” Snow promised uncertainly. “But I’m sure they’d want to help. I mean, they’re our friends.”
True, but Rapunzel didn’t want to take the risk that they might pull away from their friendship with her if they found out the things she’d kept hidden.
When Red and Cinda reached them, Red wrapped her cape close and hopped into a swan boat big enough to seat four. “Ready to go?” she asked the other three girls. She and Cinda didn’t seem to have a clue that Rapunzel and Snow had ever gone off-island, or that they had only just returned from Neverwood.
Snow and Rapunzel didn’t bother telling them otherwise. Instead, they simply joined the other two girls in the boat and shoved off.
“We were thinking we should have a dinnertime picnic in Rapunzel’s room tonight,” said Red, as they began to paddle toward school. “What do you say?” That began a discussion of what to eat, and about the day’s events.
Once they’d docked at the drawbridge outside Grimm Academy, the girls headed to the Great Hall kitchen for picnic supplies. While Snow, Red, and Cinda fetched food from cabinets, Rapunzel darted over to Hagscorch’s icebox. She pulled out some berries for their picnic, and replaced them with the rampion stalks she’d pulled from the witch’s garden. Then she slammed the icebox door shut again. Good riddance!
Later, once she and her friends had finished eating in her dungeon room, they all sat on her bed and talked for hours. About normal stuff, like the gowns they planned to check out of the Grimmstone Library the next day for the Festival Ball and about charms, crushes, and classes, too.
Eventually, Red yawned and asked, “Whose turn is it to keep the mapestry?”
“Snow’s, I think,” said Cinda, as she and the other two Grimm girls prepared to leave.
Snow shook her head doubtfully. “I don’t think I should take it. While I’m pretend-helping my stepmom hunt for treasure, she might snoop in my bag or something. She’s done that before. Besides, she sometimes gives me the fake mapestry to carry and I wouldn’t want to get the two mixed up.”
“I’ll keep it,” Rapunzel offered, and everyone nodded. So when the others left for Pearl Tower, she looked for a place in her room to hide the mapestry. There was a deep, narrow empty space where a stone was missing from the wall by her bed. She set the mapestry far back in the space and whispered a chant she’d learned in Bespellings and Enchantments class.
Dungeon wall of granite stone,
Keep this hiding place unknown.
There was a grinding sound, like rock sliding across rock. A stone magically appeared to cover the entrance to the hole in the wall, disguising the location of the mapestry.
The deed done, Rapunzel threw off her clothes and put on her nightgown. Then she snuggled under her comforter. For a while, she tossed and turned. It was hard to get to sleep knowing that in just two more days the E.V.I.L. Society planned to take over the Academy! Exhausted, she eventually put her worries to bed and was able to drift off.
The next morning, Rapunzel woke to the sound of voices. It was the GA School Board making morning announcements from where they sat upon their carved wooden shelf on the Great Hall’s west balcony.
“Good morning, scholars!” the helmet heads chorused. “Breakfast will be served in the Great Hall in precisely one half hour.” Even though she couldn’t see them, she could hear the soft creak, creak of those five shiny helmets’ visors opening and closing as they spoke. Their voices continued on, piped throughout the school via a complicated system that involved magical tubes. “Afternoon classes have been canceled by order of the great and goodly principal of Grimm Academy so that all festival preparations may be finalized on Heart Island. We bid you all a good Friday!”
Rapunzel pushed off her thick, warm comforter and hopped out of bed, her bare feet sinking into the plush black-and-white checkered rug on her floor. The four cats who’d been snuggled on the bed with her hopped out, too. Mordred was more a loner than the others and had slept high on the windowsill. But now he jumped down to follow her around.
If she had to go live with the witch again, what would happen to her cats? she worried. She couldn’t take them to the tower with her. She didn’t trust the witch not to try to turn them evil, which was exactly what she hoped to do to Rapunzel, of course. Well, she wasn’t going to let either of those things happen. There had to be some way to free herself from their deal!
She padded over to her desk and armoire. There, she got some food for her cats from the small icebox and filled their bowls with fresh water from the pump, which also fed her shower. That was one nice thing about having your own room. The dorm girls all shared, but she had a private bathroom.
In fact, for a dungeon, her room was really cute — in a goth kind of way. Black lacy curtains hung from the window over her bed, and tasseled black, gray, and white pillows of various shapes and sizes were scattered about the room. One of them even had twelve sparkly jet-black jewels sewn onto it — a gift from Snow on her last birthday.
Quickly, Rapunzel donned a scoop-necked long black dress that was patterned with tiny dark-gray polka dots. She added leggings and chunky-heel ankle boots. Although her hair was behaving at the moment, she wasn’t taking any chances. She wove it into six braids, and then wove those together into one long braid at her back. Lastly, she put on a pair of silver half-moon earrings.
By the time she was dressed for morning classes, four of her cats had snuggled back on her bed, and Mordred was again snoozing on the windowsill. She bid them all a soft farewell, headed for breakfast and then, afterward, for her first-period Sieges, Catapults, and Jousts class.
Four days a week, the class was held out on the lawn by Gray Castle. But Fridays were indoor studies. And this morning — surprise! Someone new stood at the front of the classroom instead of her usual teacher. His smile was blinding white, and he had a straight, sharp-pointed mustache. It jutted out about four inches on either side of his face, and ended in curlicues in front of his ears.
“Who’s that?” Basil asked, nodding toward the unfamiliar teacher as he took a seat next to Rapunzel. Most students in this class were boys.
“Substitute, I think,” she replied.
“What a fine-looking class you are!” said the new teacher. “Coach Candlestick is busy at the festival grounds this morning and asked me to step in for him.” He whipped off his top hat to reveal hair that was slicked down from a center part, and took a bow. “My name is Mr. Dickory. Of Barter, Bargain, Dicker, and Deal Auctions and Estate Sales,” he added when he straightened again. Then he promptly passed out his business cards to everyone. “We represent clients from fairy tales, folk tales, and nursery rhymes. I’m sure you’ve heard of our company.”
Rapunzel nodded. Everyone at GA knew of Mr. Dickory and his cousin Mr. Hickory, who’d founded their company together. They were famous for having made many excellent deals, including one to buy a grandfather clock, which they’d then donated to the Academy. It was the very clock that now stood in the Great Hall and was called Hickory Dickory in their honor. A generous donation as well as good advertising for them.
Mr. Dickory rubbed his hands together eagerly. “I don’t know much about sieges, so today, we are going to talk about bad bargains in nursery rhymes. I know this isn’t the usual subject matter for this class, but I think you’ll find it interesting just the same. Now! Can someone name such a bad bargain?”
Students began offering suggestions. “Jack traded a cow for beans that grew a beanstalk,” said Basil.
Yes, that was sort of like what her mom had done, thought Rapunzel. Only she’d traded her own daughter to get rampion!
She was usually pretty quiet in class. But now she sat up straight and her hand shot into the air. This could be her chance to get some advice on how to weasel out of her bargain with the witch, she realized. But she’d have to couch her question carefully so as not to reveal her personal interest in the matter.
“Could Jack have somehow gotten out of that deal? I mean, after he discovered he’d made a bad one?” she asked when called on.
“Interesting question,” said Mr. Dickory, pacing back and forth at the front of the room. “Some bargains are fair and square. Fifty-fifty deals. In others, there’s a winner and a loser. In either case, once a deal is made, it’s final. Therefore, Jack was stuck.” He paused, then added, “However, if my company had been representing him as our client, we would have looked for a loophole. Or some way to strike a new, second deal. One that was more favorable to him.”
As Rapunzel considered that information, the teacher went on with his lesson.
“There are five deal-making Dos,” he announced. “You can apply them to your own deals in the future. But for now, we’ll pretend we’re advising Jack.”
He held up one finger. “Number One! When offered the magic beans, you should appear interested in them, but not too interested.
“Number Two! Talk about what you don’t like about the beans — maybe they’re too brown. Or somewhat wrinkled. Don’t be rude. Just sound unsure.
“Number Three! Wait silently. The bean seller will get nervous that you’ll back out. He might offer a better deal.”
Boing! Just then, a strand of hair popped straight up from Mr. Dickory’s head. He licked the palm of his hand and patted the hair down, smoothing it back.
“Maybe you should try that with your hair if it starts —” Basil began.
“Don’t!” Rapunzel whispered frantically. “Don’t say that W word that rhymes with jiggle. It’ll make my hair start w-i-g-g-l-you-know-what-ing again.”
Basil grinned and whispered back, “Got it.” Pressing his thumb and fingertip together at one side of his mouth, he zipped them across his lips.
“Number Four!” Mr. Dickory was saying. “Ask the bean seller to work with you on the deal. Smile and be friendly. But don’t beg.
“Number Five! Walk away. Don’t be afraid to leave a bad deal. Often, the bean seller will call you back and suggest a better one.”
By the time class was over, Rapunzel was excited. She felt she’d just been handed a set of tools to do a job. Like a carpenter who’d been given a hammer, nails, and a saw to build a house. Although she wasn’t exactly thrilled about the prospect of meeting up with the witch again, she did feel better prepared.
In her next period Threads class, she sat with Snow. As they worked on stitching samplers, Rapunzel thought some more about Mr. Dickory’s suggestions. Next time she saw the witch, would she be able to put them into practice?
“This probably seems like it’s coming out of the blue, but I’ve been thinking about your fear of heights,” Snow said, cutting through her thoughts. “I wonder if it might help to talk to people who work at jobs that are high up, and ask them how they keep calm?”
“Maybe like the tower window washers, you mean?” Rapunzel asked.
Snow nodded. “Or even Jack and Jill. They’re always climbing hills — some even as tall as mountains — and it doesn’t seem to bother them.”
Rapunzel nodded. “I guess it’s worth a shot. Anyway, thanks for trying to help.” She sent Snow a smile and Snow smiled back. It was nice to know that she hadn’t been put off their friendship after learning of Rapunzel’s deepest fear that she might become an evil witch.
She looked over from her own uneven stitchery to study Snow’s neat sampler. There was an embroidered illustration of Grimm Academy in the middle of it. Around the border, Snow had stitched the ABCs. Hmm. The alphabet. Something tugged at Rapunzel’s brain.
