Of Giants and Ice (Ever Afters, The) (42 page)

Chase loved the attention. Grinning, he dropped into a cross-legged
position. “Starstruck. We’re famous, you know.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I sat down on the roots with my plate in my lap.

“I’m not sure everyone’s getting their facts right, though,” Lena said.

“Rumors abound,” Melodie said solemnly.

“It’s awesome. You know what I heard last week?” Chase asked me. “That you mortally wounded the Snow Queen in a duel. Also, you smashed all her magic mirrors, and my personal favorite: you threw a cream pie in her face.”

“I heard you started that last one,” Lena said to Chase.

I rolled my eyes. “What are they saying
you
did?”

“The story is too violent for your tender ears . . . ,” Chase said.

“They say he got bitten,” Melodie said.

Chase grimaced, so I knew it was true. Then he abruptly changed the subject, which he was good at doing when he didn’t like where the conversation was headed. “I talked to my dad about the Snow Queen.”

I wondered if it had been the kind of talk that involved yelling.

“Solange. I never liked her,” Melodie said in a confiding tone.

Chase licked some fudge off his fingers. “He said that she had more visitors than she was allowed to have. It was the only thing he knew for sure was a no-no.”

“We’ve been spending a lot of time in the Shoemaker’s workshop,” Melodie said.

“I asked the elves about the lists,” Lena said. “They said they only recovered three names so far.”

“And I asked Rapunzel about the Snow Queen breaking out of prison,” Chase said, sounding a lot more serious. “‘Inevitable’ was her exact word.”

I sighed deeply. As much as the idea had freaked me out, I
would kind of miss the chance at having a Destiny. I hadn’t even found out what my Tale was.

“Rory, are you okay?” Lena asked.

“Yeah, you’ve been sighing a
lot
.” Chase was so concerned he even put down his fudge. “Do you have a crush on me too?”

I stared at him incredulously, not sure I had heard him right, and Melodie said, “You are remarkably self-involved.”

Chase looked insulted. “Adelaide sighed a lot right before she said she had a crush on me.”

“She had to tell you?” Lena said, surprised.

I snorted. “That’s totally it. It was the paint on your face. ‘
My heart awakens in sight of your green skin/as clean and warty as a toad’s has ever been—’
” I said in my best reciting voice, and we all laughed.

Even laughing hurt. I already knew that I would miss Chase and Lena the most.

“I’m moving,” I said.

Chase and Lena waited for me to say more.

“Oh,” Lena said, realizing that I wanted sympathy. “That sucks.”

“As in with boxes and moving vans and stuff? I’ve always wanted to try that.” Chase took another bite of his fudge.

“As in leaving North Carolina?” I couldn’t believe they were taking this so well. “As in I can’t ever come back to Ever After School.”

That
shocked them.

Chase’s chocolate fell out of his hand into the grass.
“Why?”

“Did your mom find out about the giants?” Lena asked worriedly.

“Oh, yeah, some parents have a hard time with magic.” Chase made it sound like that was really difficult to understand.

“You need to find a way to come anyway,” Lena said earnestly.
“Your Tale will come no matter what, and they’re
much
more dangerous without support.”

That wasn’t good news. Thinking about facing the Snow Queen alone gave me chills, but I did feel slightly better now that they seemed upset. “How can I? I’ll be in Colorado.”

Chase and Lena blinked at me, not getting it.

“So?” said Chase.

“Wait. Rory, where do you think Lena lives?” Melodie asked.

That was a weird question. “North Carolina.”

“Oh,” Lena and Chase said together, like they understood something I didn’t.

“I live in Milwaukee,” Lena told me.

“I didn’t know there
was
a Milwaukee in North Carolina.” Then I realized what she meant.

“Rory, this is the
North American
Chapter of Ever After School,” Chase said. “We’ve got a whole continent’s worth of Characters here.”

I blinked, stunned. “That’s a long commute.”

“The doors.” Lena pointed to the different-colored doors that lined the courtyard. “They’re our own Door-Trek system.”

“Some of them go places here like Rumpy’s library,” Chase said. (Both Lena and Melodie gave him a dirty look for using that nickname.) “But most of them go to different cities in the US and Canada.”

“The one to Milwaukee is striped green and white,” Melodie said.

Ellie had told me that I would always go through the ruby door like it was important. “Ooooh.”

“Usually, when Characters move, we just pretend EAS is a day-care chain,” Lena explained.

“In a week, the Director or Ellie or somebody will send your mom a brochure with the new location on it,” Chase said. “You can act all excited and be right back here.”

I wouldn’t have to start all over every time we moved anymore. I wasn’t going to lose my friends. For a moment, I couldn’t speak.

I concentrated on
not
crying. It would freak Chase out.

Lena giggled. “Maybe the Director shouldn’t let Sarah Thumb do the orientation anymore. She leaves a lot of important stuff out.”

“Well, now that the disaster has been averted, I’m going to finish eating.” Chase picked up his fudge and flicked the grass off it.

“Jacqueline!” shouted someone.

Lena turned reluctantly.

Her grandmother waved a handbag at her, gesturing her forward and looking very stern. The first thing Lena had bought with her gold coins—besides repairs for Jack’s truck—was a new wardrobe for her grandmother, who couldn’t stop showing it off. She looked very dressed up in a suit of eggplant-colored silk.

“I better go.” Lena stood up hastily.

“Lena’s grounded,” Melodie told us, and Lena gave her harp a harsh look, like she hadn’t wanted this information shared.

“Again?” I said. “Didn’t she let you off the hook for the grocery-money deal?”

“Well, she kind of caught me experimenting in the middle of the night,” Lena said uncomfortably.

“The upstairs bathroom currently shows the main terminal of Grand Central Station,” Melodie told us. “We haven’t been able to fix it yet. I think we used too much rosemary in the formula.”

“Wow, Lena—you’re practically a mad scientist,” Chase said, and Lena looked flattered.

“Jacqueline!” Lena’s grandmother called again.

Lena trotted away. “See you in a few weeks, Rory.”

“You’re going to have to go soon too,” Chase said, sounding a little unhappy about it. “The woman who’s not your mother keeps looking at us.”

I nodded. “Her name’s Amy.”

The weekend was coming. It would be lonely for Chase—stuck at EAS without any other kids, and without his dad. I knew how hard that was.

“Whose Tale do you think will be next? Yours or mine?” Chase said.

“Couldn’t tell you.” Of course, feeling sorry for him didn’t stop me from getting annoyed. He
always
had to be competitive. I guessed I was stuck with it, now that I was coming back.

“Normally, I would say yours, but I don’t know. You’ve got that Destiny to worry about.” Chase stuck another piece of chocolate in his mouth. “It would help if we knew what it was. Your Tale could be part of your Destiny, or it could be separate, or they might even interfere with each other. Hard to tell.”

For a second, I saw ice-blue eyes again. “How am I supposed to know?”

Chase sighed deeply. “I asked Rapunzel that too, but she wouldn’t tell me.”

I didn’t mind if my Tale didn’t come for years. I wanted a chance to grow up a little. To get better at whatever might help me. I looked at the sword in my lap. Before seeing the Snow Queen, it would’ve been a huge relief to know it was magic, but now I wondered if it would be enough.

“Don’t worry, though,” Chase said. “I’ll help you. Lena too.”

I smiled. That
did
make me feel better. “Chase, I’ve been thinking—could you make my sword heavy again?”

Chase’s mouth fell open. He had chocolate on his chin.

“If the Snow Queen really is coming back, I’m going to need all the extra help I can get, right?” I held out the sword. “I’ll practice while I’m gone.”

“Right.” Chase brushed the chocolate off his hands and drew the sword. He turned it end over end three times and said something in Fey that made the hair on my arms stand up. He handed it back, looking pleased with himself.

“Rory!” Amy called. “Time to go!”

Chase scowled. I was touched that he cared.

“Want my fudge?” I offered, knowing it would cheer him up.

Chase grinned and reached for the plate. “I’ll take it off your hands. You might have a good Tale in you after all. Almost as good as mine.”

I grinned, ridiculously happy for a second. “You’re only saying that because I gave you candy.” I waved and headed off to where Mom and Amy were waiting for me, still smiling. For once, I didn’t have to pretend to be happier than I actually was. “Onward! To bubble wrap and packing boxes!”

“Are you allowed to take that sword with you?” Amy clearly hoped the answer was no.

“I’m allowed to have a memento.” I was already lying to them again. Colorado wouldn’t be perfect either. I would have to be careful not to talk about Chase and Lena like I had just seen them, and inviting Lena over for another sleepover would be complicated.

Mom threw an arm around my shoulder, like she always did when she suspected I was putting on a brave face. “You’ll see them again, honey,” she said, as we went off in search of the right door.

“I know,” I said absentmindedly, thinking of my next adventure with my friends. It didn’t matter whose Tale it was.

•  •  •

I had been wrong. At EAS, everyone talks like your life gets started at about the same time as your Tale. But it’s not like that.

Even when your Tale starts, you react to what the world throws at you—finding whatever magical object your Tale names, fighting off whatever villains show up. There’s no problem with that. Sticking to the guidelines might even help you get a happily-ever-after. But that’s your Tale, not your life. With life, you
have
no guidelines. Your life starts when you stop just reacting to what happens, and you start making decisions about what you can do.

Your life starts when you start taking matters into your own hands—no matter how scared you might be.

At least, that’s how it was for me. Don’t just take my word for it.

Go and find your own.

Writing a book is a lot like going on a quest, except you search for the right words instead of golden harps, and you slay plot snarls instead of dragons. But you also get a lot more than two Companions to help you out. Without these people, this book would definitely be a Failed Tale:

Courtney Bongiolatti, editor extraordinaire, whose savvy and vision made this book become all that it could be. I’m so extremely grateful for everything you’ve done. To the people of Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, thank you for giving Rory a home and an enthusiastic welcome! Special thanks to Chloë Foglia, who made the cover
so pretty
.

Joanna Volpe, my rock star agent, who loved and believed in this story from day one. Rory and I would be lost in the cyber slush pile without you and your hard work, and words cannot express my gratitude and appreciation. Sara, Nancy, Kathleen, and Suzie of Nancy Coffey Lit, you guys have been supportive and sweet from Suite 500 to Suite 410. To the extended NCLit crew, your awesomeness knows no bounds. I’m so glad to be part of the club!

Arielle DiGiacomo, old friend, you read it
twice
(and it’s not short!), and I only paid you in ginger chocolate chip cookies. Amanda S., Jennifer A., Nikki R., and Trisha L. all read early chapters and gave me encouragement, just when I needed it the most.

Professor Beth Darlington of Vassar College, this book would not exist without your Fairy Tale course. (I also want you to know that I read every page of this book aloud to catch typos, just like you taught me.) Dr. Waples, writing wise, you pushed me more than anyone: I once gave you a story, and you read it, declared it fine, and then said that it didn’t have enough of
me
in it. That ticked me off at the time, but it was probably the best advice of all—for writing and for life. Angela, I was teetering at the brink of a big change, and when I told you I wanted to leave the city and go write novels, you didn’t even blink. “You will, Shelby,” you immediately replied, with such confidence that I started to feel confident too. Maria, Jena, Laura, Barbara, and Rosemary, I’ll never forget your kindness back when I left to chase a tiny little idea about a fairy tale world.