Little Red Cinderella and the Three Beanstalks

You will need strong magic to face her. Good luck.

The enchantress’s words lingered in the air, like the echo of a ringing bell.

“Rikki,” Ezu said in a low voice.

“I know,” I replied. “We don’t have any magic.”

It was the same problem we’d faced with Queen Ravena, Snow White’s step mother. We were bringing knives to a gun fight. Blasters to a lightsaber duel, spears against muskets.

But maybe, just maybe, we were bringing a slingshot to a battle with a giant. David beat Goliath, and a couple of hobbits brought a ring to Mordor, and Harry Potter beat Avada Kedavra with Expelliarmus.

Okay, so most of my examples of the underdog coming out on top were fictional, but I tried not to think too hard about that.

“We don’t need magic,” I said, squeezing Ezu’s hand reassuringly. “We don’t. If we did, if only magic can defeat her, then why us? Why would we be the ones chosen to put a stop to the sorceress at all? There are probably a thousand other people with better qualifications than us out there, princes with entire armies, witches with unimaginable power, the youngest sons of worthy tailors or kind and honest maidens whose good natures lead then to success and reward. But for some reason, we were the ones chosen to do this. So we must have something, some kind of advantage, that will give us a fighting chance.”

Ezu obviously wasn’t convinced, but we had come this far, and there was no point in turning back now. We had made our decision a long time ago. “Alright,” he said. “I’ll follow you straight into hell if I have to.”

“Hopefully you’re not doing just that right now,” I replied, unable to keep the grimace off my face.

Ezu drew me in for a tight embrace, and we just stood like that for a long time, holding each other. I knew neither of us wanted to let go, and we could have just stood there for another hundred years, but we were only putting off the inevitable. Eventually we broke apart, and drew our swords.

“There’s a saying from ancient history where I’m from,” I said, facing the door that seemed so innocent and inconspicuous, “that slave warriors would say to their emperor before battling to the death. ‘We, who are about to die, salute you’.”

“That’s stupid,” Ezu said. “I’d have told the emperor to fuck off.”

“It was more complicated than that,” I replied, a tiny bit testily. “I was trying to have a serious moment and say something profound before we head into quite possibly the last fight of our lives.”

“Well, maybe don’t quote warrior slaves who were doomed from the beginning?”

“Fine. How about… don’t shoot until you see the whites of their eyes?”

“I’m attacking the second I see that woman, I’m not going to stand there like an idiot so she can fling spells at me from a nice safe distance.”

“Four score and seven years ago-”

“Let’s just get on with it, maybe?”

Well, those words were as good as any to face our probably deaths on. I shrugged, and reached out to touch the door handle, cold and slightly greasy. I turned it, found it unlocked, and pushed it open.

The immediate impression I was given of the room beyond was stuff. It was packed full to bursting with an incredible amount of stuff for such a small space, and it took me a few seconds to pick out the individual objects I was seeing.

The stone floor was covered from corner to corner in thick, intricately patterned rugs, though you could only see bits and pieces of them underneath all the furniture that crowded the room. There was a massive ornate four poster bed at the back of the tower, covered by a faded and dusty brocade canopy. The mattress was piled high with dozens of silk and damask pillows, the covers crumpled and dirty. Beside the bed was a huge vanity covered in countless little pots and jars and smears of cosmetics, the mirror partially obscured by layer of fingerprints in white face powder and crimson rouge. On the other side of the bed was a worn, high backed armchair and a low table with clawed feet, on which sat a tarnished tray of finely wrought silver tea things, beautiful once but now dull and colored by patina. There was a claw-footed porcelain bath tub as well, crammed right up against a a bookshelf filled with leather bound books, all quietly gathering dust for a century. There was water in the bath, discolored by repeated use, an oily film settled on the surface.
There were other things too, piles of fine china and leaning marble sculptures; cracked glass jugs with gilt-bronze filigree; embroidered foot stools and frayed chaise lounges; a long unused writing desk; A set of four hand carved chairs upholstered in velvet; a wardrobe that took up almost an entire wall by itself, the doors flung open to reveal piles and piles of gorgeous dresses, shoes, stockings, girdles, and corsets tossed carelessly in a heap on the floor of the wardrobe, only a few hanging up properly. There were almost a dozen tables ranging wildly in size, every available surface covered in gilded clocks, music boxes, filigree snuff boxes, ivory fruit knives, jewelry, empty bottles of perfume and porcelain tea pots.

It looked as if the Sorceress had demanded that every single object she owned or thought was of worth be carried to and crammed inside this room, as if she had been determined that her imprisonment would at least be a luxurious one.

But the impression it all gave wasn’t one of luxury. Despite the only window in the room having no glass and allowing a constant supply of fresh air, the small space still stunk of unwashed human. It was strangely hot inside, the air stale and musky. All of the objects in the room, which had surely once been some of the finest examples of wealth in the land, were broken or stained or faded or worn after a hundred years. It was pathetic, in a way that just made me feel very tired rather than contemptful.

The room was so full of crap that we didn’t see the Sorceress at all at first. It wasn’t until she rose from a huge golden throne shoved deep into one corner behind half a dozen rolled up rugs leaning against one wall that we spotted her. She wore a dress that I recognized as being “old fashioned” in the current tastes of royalty, poofy around the waist and sleeves and made of a thick blood red fabric, heavily embroidered with gold. It too was had been worn almost to pieces, the stitches coming loose, dark stains under her arms from sweat, wrinkled and lumpy and sagging in the wrong places. She wore her hair down and loose, thick ropes of greasy black hair pushed back out of a face that, despite the squalor she lived in, remained young and smooth and haughtily regal.

“How did you get in here?” she demanded, her voice high and cold, leaping to her feet and advancing towards us. Ezu and I raised our swords immediately, and the Sorceress stopped dead, eying the gleaming tips uncertainly. “Who are you?” she asked, more cautiously now, but her tone was still demanding, still held the unyielding quality of a queen addressing her inferiors. “How did you get past my… Is the enchantress…” She didn’t seem able to finish the question, and a look of wary fear came into her oddly colorless eyes.

I wasn’t about to tell her that the enchantress who had kept her trapped for so long was gone, so I jumped on the previous.

“Our names are Sir Ezu Erikson and Lady Rikki Collins,” I said as firmly as I was able, using the titles graciously granted to us by Prince Charming for the first time, “And we’re here to put a stop to you.”

“Put a stop to me?” the Sorceress said, her eyes narrowing. A series of conflicting emotions flitted across her face, fighting for dominance. “You, put a stop to me? Even if you could, what is it you mean to put a stop to? What am I supposed to have done? I have not left this tower in…” she trailed off, an expression of uncertainty flashing across her face, but she shook it off quickly. “In many, many years.”

“You—you did terrible things, you starved your people, had even more executed, you tortured and killed and bankrupted the entire kingdom-”

“Were you there?” demanded the Sorceress, and she seemed to swell in defiance, drawing herself up so that she stood tall, taller than either Ezu or I. “Did you witness with your own eyes these things you claim? You are but a child, you were not there in those days gone by. You do not know what you speak of, you only repeat foul lies that my enemies have spread in my absence!”

“That’s not true!” I protested, but I felt my conviction waver, just for a brief moment.

“We know the terrible things you’ve done,” Ezu added with a snarl, advancing a step towards the Sorceress, leading with the tip of his sword, “and we know that you’ve been trying to escape, to regain your power so you can spread your evil!”

Again, the Sorceress seemed to focus on the word “escape”. “How did you get in here?” she demanded again. “My step-mother guards… how did you get past her?”

“She didn’t keep the good out, only the evil in,” I said. “You were afraid of her power, even in death, and she stopped you from leaving, she forced you up here. But she lets us in, because we came here to stop you before you can bring misery down on anyone else.”

The Sorceress’s eyes narrowed into slits. “She… didn’t? You mean she doesn’t,” said the witch.

I fumbled, caught by surprise, and the Sorceress leapt upon my moment of weakness.

She gave a shriek of glee, throwing her head back to expose her long, white neck. “She is gone! I felt her growing weaker, and I have finally broken her! The warden is gone, I am freed from this prison!”

“No!” I shouted, but the Sorceress hardly even looked at me, she only waved one of her hands a force like an invisible wrecking ball crashed into me, sending me flying into the open wardrobe where I collapsed in a heap on the pile of clothes.

“Rikki!” Ezu cried, and he ran across the room to help me up.

“Forget about me,” I grunted, wincing as I sat up. “We can’t afford to get distracted, we have to focus everything we’ve got on stopping her before she can escape. If that means one of us dies, then so be it.”

Ezu wasn’t going to leave me, but I pushed him off. “I’m fine!” I insisted. “Stop her, or we’re both dead anyways!”

She was already at the door to the stairs, throwing it open. She gave another screech of indescribable pleasure to find the way unguarded by her tormentor of a century.

She was cut off mid-jubilation however as Ezu tackled her from behind. The only reason they both didn’t go tumbling head first down the stairs was because the Sorceress grabbed the door frame at the last second, just sending them both smacking hard into it instead.

By then I was on my feet again and ran over to where they struggled on the floor, and I raised my sword above my head to strike at the witch when an opening presented itself.

I only just barely managed to avoid stabbing Ezu clean through, when the same invisible force as before blew him right at me like a cannon ball.

The Sorceress staggered to her feet, as as Ezu and I sat up at looked at her, in that moment she was terrifying to behold. Her face was contorted with fury, red and blotchy, the veins in her forehead popping and the tendons in her neck straining.

“You dare lay a hand on me, your rightful queen?” she hissed, her voice the buzzing of a thousand angry hornet. “You dare lay even a finger on me?!” And this time she screamed it, and invisible wind springing up from nowhere and whipping her black hair and her skirts around her, as if she was caught in the center of a hurricane.

Within seconds the entire room was getting sucked into the whirlwind, ceramic vases and heavy metal serving trays spinning around and around the tiny room, nearly braining us each time they passed by. Ezu and I were blown back by the sudden wind and almost sucked into its cycle as well, but Ezu hit one of posts of the four poster bed and grabbed onto it tightly with one arm, grabbing me by the hand as I spun by with the other. We clung to the bed, unable to do anything else, as the tornado picked up speed and power.

It was almost impossible to see the Sorceress standing in the center of it, obscured as she was by every flying piece of inane luxury she had insisted on surrounding herself with. With every second the tornado increased in ferocity, but it seemed to be tightening, localizing upon the point where she stood in the center of the room. The pressure on Ezu and I lessened just a fraction and I thought it might be running out of power, but then I realized that that wasn’t true—it was just refocusing; it was going up, not out.

The roof of the tower creaked and groaned, and then a crack suddenly split it right down the middle, the wooden beams splintering like chopsticks. The very stones of the tower began to rattle, mortar between the bricks coming loose, and I became suddenly afraid that she was going to bring down the entire tower with us in it, which we certainly wouldn’t survive.

But then without warning, the entire roof was ripped off the tower, along with half of the wall on the side of the window, and it was sent spiraling through the air like a huge demented frisbee, landing somewhere hundreds of feet away in the forest. Half of the room’s contents were blown out as well, sucked into the air by the sudden change in air pressure.

Without a confining space to contain it, the whirlwind swiftly dissipated, and Ezu and I collapsed onto the bed.

The Sorceress was laughing, had thrown her arms out wide and was spinning in a circle and laughing with her head thrown back. “Free, finally free! I’ll make that old bitch pay for what she did to me, stealing my thrown, my kingdom, turning my people against me! But now she’s dead and gone forever, and I’ll show her what a REAL queen is!”

“Ezu,” I gasped, trying too catch the breath that the whirlwind had sucked right out of my lungs.

“I know,” he grunted, pushing himself up onto his elbows, his hands clenched tightly into fists. “She’s too powerful for us.”

“No,” I said, and I pointed out the hole in the wall, to the ruins of the castle courtyard down below. “Look!”

There stood an army—that was the only way I could really describe it, even though it obviously wasn’t all the same army.

I saw soldiers in uniforms, and I could pick out one, two, three different uniforms among them. Some I recognized well, those were the soldiers we had fought alongside when rescuing Snow White. At the head of their numbers stood their prince, and I saw Roland too, good old Roland who had helped us convince the prince to lay siege on the Ravena’s castle. And who else beside him, but those damn dwarves, all seven of them, on fat little ponies perfect for their size, all in armor and wielding swords of their own. And there was the Hunstman, who I almost didn’t recognize in human form, and Jameson, Ravena’s ex-captain of the guard who had tried to spare my life in a battle to the death.

At the head of the other two battalions were Prince Charming, Cinderella’s guy, and reliable, surprisingly helpful Prince Justin.

But it wasn’t just them, it wasn’t just trained soldiers appearing out of the forest like, well, like white knights to the rescue. To my utter astonishment, I saw the Black Thief and two or three dozen of his men, their ranks loose and unformed, their horses rearing and wild compared to those of the soldiers’, but looking every bit as ready for a fight.

And then a moment later I saw why the horses looked so wild. Flanking the army on either side were wolves, forty or fifty wolves, some on all fours, many standing on their rear legs, all snarling and snapping with hackles raised. One of the wolves, I couldn’t help but notice, was wearing pants, and looked exceedingly familiar. Alfred, of course, and all of his buddies from the Big Bad Wolf Liberation Front.

It was all the people we had met and befriended on our long journey, all of them showing up at the eleventh hour to fight for us, with us, for their world.

And at the head of it all, standing on a pile of collapsed stones from a long fallen castle, his sword held aloft and giving the battle cry to charge the tower, was Jack.

I almost began to weep with relief, but Ezu brought me back to reality.

“Rikki, come on, while she’s distracted,” he breathed in my ear, trying to drag me off the bed.

And the Sorceress was indeed distracted, for she had caught sight of the army almost as soon as we had.

“What?!” she screeched. “What is this? Who are all these peasants? Treachery! Treason! Traitors to the crown, all of you! Execution, death to saboteurs!”

Ezu and I came up behind her, one of us on either side, raising our swords to drive them down into her neck and back.

However, the roof was gone from the tower, exposing us to the elements, and the sun was behind us. She saw our shadows cast against the floor in front of her, and she turned just in time. My blade was swing wildly to the right, and I came within an inch of slicing Ezu’s ear clean off, while his own sword passed between my arm and torso, the way you would fake being stabbed in a school play. The sorceress clenched her fist and we both were forced to the floor, drawn down as if by some inescapable magnet.

“I can see I’ll need to deal with these issues one at a time,” she snarled, looking down at us like insects she’d crushed beneath her heel. Leaving us struggling to remain power over our own bodies, she turned back to look down at the army below, which had begun to rush towards the castle. The sorceress waved her hand, and the black, thorny vines at the base of the tower trembled, and then burst into growth, spilling out and up at an alarming rate. The door way that lead into the tower was swallowed completely, and if anyone had even managed to reach it from the outside, they would have found the the vines and climbed inside, completely filling the stairway.

Then she gave another wave, and for a brief moment, nothing at all happened. Then there was a trembling beneath the feet of those who had come to our aid, and without warning, hundreds of skeletal figures burst from the earth.

Every victim who had been executed under the Sorceress’s orders had been buried in a pauper’s grave in that courtyard, and now they rose, macabre puppets willing to fight for her long after their death, after their flesh and clothes had rotted away.

Our friends and their soldiers fell back in surprise and fear, not expecting anything like this. The skeletal soldiers clawed their way out of the dirt and fell in rank and file, and began to advance on our allies.

Jack lead the charge, and with a few swift slashes of his sword, he turned three skeletons into heaps of bones.

Encouraged, the others followed suit.

The skeleton soldiers fell easily; they were not armed, they didn’t seem entirely aware. But very quickly it became clear that this wasn’t going to be as easy a fight as it had seemed at first.

The dead men were not afraid of sword or axe. The did not flinch, they did not retreat. They marched relentlessly forwards, not even noticing at the skull of the individual standing beside it was cleaved in two. And once they were broken to bits and pieces, that still wasn’t enough to stop them from coming. Skeletons that had been hacked in two dragged themselves using only their arms forwards, grabbing the living by the legs and ankles. Dismembered arms crawled through the dirt blindly searching for human flesh to dig bony fingers into. Decapitated skulls gnashed their grinning teeth at anything that came near, sometimes sinking into distracted boots or wolf paws or the hooves of panicked horses.

The Sorceress watched the battle for a long moment with pleasure, while Ezu and I looked on in horror.

But then I suddenly remembered other skeletons I had recently come across, and the deal I had struck came to me.

I had been planning on using it as a trump card, as a way of over powering the Sorceress if it turned out that Ezu and I didn’t stand a chance against her on our own. But now, now I had to use it to help our friends. Fight fire with fire, they always said.

“Ghosts of the mansion in the Grimm Woods!” I screamed, not sure how exactly I was supposed to summon them but hoping that if I just shouted it loudly enough, they’d head. “Uphold your end of the bargain! Fight the Sorceress’s skeleton army, and protect the my friends!”

The Sorceress spun around with a snarl, and she kicked me hard in the stomach, knocking the wind out of me.

“Don’t touch her!” Ezu screamed, fighting hard against the invisible force that held us down.

“What did you just do?” the Sorceress demanded. “What ghosts? Who did you summon?”

It didn’t matter that I had no breath, or inclination, of answering her, for the spirits in questions suddenly materialized just then. Down below, in the middle of the battle, all the ghosts we had faced during our night in the manor seemed to solidify out of thin air: hundreds of huge black cats the size of leopards, and snarling, slavering hellhounds, the hulking men we had bowled with who now used their femurs and skulls as crude clubs, and the huge old man who appeared in the middle of them all, his axe drawn and swinging before he had even become completely solid.

“You’re a witch,” the Sorceress hissed at me, so livid that she was turning purple. “I did not suffer my step-mother to live, to challenge my powers. I will not suffer the likes of you, you pathetic little girl.”

“You’re…” I grunted, pushing myself up onto my elbows, straining so hard that sweat broke out on my brow. “You’re rusty.”

“What?” she demanded.

With a huge effort of will, I broke free of the restraints of her binding magic and threw myself at her legs, sweeping them out from under her and bringing her crashing to the floor.

She fought like a wildcat, kicking and scratching and trying to grab me by the hair, seemingly forgetting entirely about her magic for the moment. I took an elbow to the mouth which sent my head spinning, and my mouth quickly filled with blood. I didn’t stop though, or let go, and somehow I managed to climb on top of her. I got one solid punch in, right in her stupid, evil face, and it damn near broke all the fingers of my hands.

“You’re just a spoiled brat,” I said thickly, blood and saliva dribbling down my lips and chin, “who got off on hurting others, and couldn’t bear not being the center of attention. I hope you’re happy, because you’re about to get exactly what you deserve.”

My insult seemed to hurt her worse than my punch. The Sorceress unleashed a wild shriek that reached a banshee’s pitch, and white hot bolt of electricity blasted from her hands as she pushed me in the chest, sending what felt like a million volts of energy blowing through me.

I went flying off her like a rag doll and hit the ground hard. The room still seemed to be spinning even though I’d stopped moving, and I could smell burning and feel the smoke that was curling off my skin.

I thought I heard someone call my name, but the ringing in my ears just wouldn’t let up.

Slowly, gradually, my vision began to steady, and I could make out two forms struggling together.

The Sorceress was back on her feet, and so was Ezu, having broken free from her enchantment moments after I had. White blasts of lightning were still exploding from the Sorceress’s raised hands, but her aim was wild. She was a witch yes, but she had been a princess first, and she had never been trained in fighting, especially not in close combat. Ezu was right up in her face, easily avoiding her flailing bursts of magic and forcing her back towards the gaping hole in the wall.

Her back hit what little barrier that remained between the tower wall and the hundred foot fall to the ground below. She paused in her assault to look down over her shoulder, and real fear came into her eyes.

Ezu brought his sword back, and then started to ram in forward, straight into her chest.

At that moment she looked back at him, and one slender, pale hand shot out, striking one last explosion of lighting from her palm in a desperate attempt at defense.

The lighting hit the sword and was sucked up the length of the metal. Ezu gave a cry of pain and dropped it, and it fell to the ground, a useless corkscrew of twisted, melted metal.

Ezu and the Sorceress stared at the fallen sword for a moment. Then their eyes snapped back to each other. Ezu’s hands flew out as if to grab the Sorceress, but she was too fast for him. She made a snatching motion in the air and the same force that had sent me flying across the room in her first attack seized Ezu and pushed him past her, over the side of the tower.

I heard him screaming as he fell a hundred feet, into the thorns below.

I wanted to scream his name, but my throat was raw and voiceless after being struck by her lightning blast. I could barely push myself onto my knees. I was clear across the room, and I couldn’t stand, not yet, not after the blast she gave me. I definitely couldn’t get to her before she noticed, before she could stop me.

I didn’t even bother to pick up my sword again. My hands shaking so badly that I was sure I would fail, I unslung the bow Justin had provided me with for hunting from across my back, and pulled out a single arrow from my quiver. If I missed, I wouldn’t have another chance anyways.

The bow was too big to use sitting down, and it took every ounce of willpower I had to drag myself up, leaning heavily against the wall to keep me standing.

The Sorceress was still standing there, leaning over the edge of the broken tower wall, looking down at the place where Ezu had fallen, looking down at the battle raging below. I notched the arrow and tried to pull it back, but I didn’t have the strength. My arms were shaking so badly that I knew I’d never be able to hit her, even if I could have somehow managed to draw the arrow.

I let the bow to the floor, and I followed after.

On my hands and knees, I began to crawl, until I reached about halfway across the room. That was when the Sorceress heard my pathetic shuffling and suddenly whirled around, her eyes shining with a kind of sick excitement.

“Ah, I almost forgot about you, little witch,” she said, licking her lips like a snake tasting the air. “Your friend is gone. Did you see that? Did you see what I did to him? He was going to kill me, but I put a stop to that. Did you love him, little witch? I think he loved you, you should have heard the things he was saying to me, the names he was calling me. Ah well, at least it’s over for him now. He won’t have to watch what I do to you.”

I pulled the pack I wore off of my back, reaching inside as the Sorceress advanced.

“Fuck you, lady,” I gasped, and I pulled out the Book and chucked it right at her.

She was startled and sort of jumped to the side to avoid the huge hardback, and I used that brief moment of distraction to throw myself at her, the arrow I had failed to draw still clutched tight in my fist.

I grabbed her by the front of her dress and pulled myself halfway up by my grip on the fabric, which in turn jerked the Sorceress down to my level. I rammed the arrow straight up under her ribcage, right into her heart.

We were frozen in that position for what felt like an eternity, me kneeling at her feet, her standing but bent over so our faces were almost touching. Her eyes had gone very wide, and I noticed how pale of a blue color they were for the first time, the same color as a glacier.

Then she shoved me roughly away and staggered backwards, staring down incredulously at the arrow shaft sticking out of her torso. She touched it gingerly, and her fingers came away wet with blood.

“You… you stabbed me,” she gasped.

“I hope you’re ready to face every soul that died on your orders,” I snarled. “I’m sure they’re all waiting to meet you again.”

She looked at me, real fear contorting her face. It was probably the first genuine fear she had ever felt in her entire life.

“I… I don’t want to die,” she said, in a very small voice. “I’m afraid.”

And then she fell down dead, stained with blood that was, for once, her own.