The jewel in the crown was their handsome son, fifteen-year-old Prince Ben. There had been no fairies at his christening to bestow gifts, perhaps because he did not need any. Ben was as handsome as his father, with his strong brow and chisel-cut cheekbones, but he had his mother’s gentle eyes and keen intellect. He was a golden boy in every way, with a good heart and a winning spirit—captain of the tourney team, friend to all, destined to rule Auradon one day.
In short, he was the very sort of person that the people of the Isle of Lost despised. And, as on the Isle of the Lost, magic was no longer a factor in daily life in Auradon either. King Beast and Queen Belle stressed scholarship above enchantment, exhorting the young people to work hard instead of relying on fairy spells or dragon friends for help. Because Beast was the most powerful figure in all the kingdoms, when he proposed the new work ethic, nobody argued against him. It was indeed a new (once upon a) time for the people of the fabled fairy-tale lands.
But even without magic, life in Auradon was close to perfect. The sun always shone, the birds always chirped, there was never more than a five-minute wait at the DFMV (the Department of Formerly Magical Vehicles); and if everyone wasn’t happy all the time (it’s not as if this were heaven—get a grip, people), everyone was content.
Except, of course, when they weren’t.
Isn’t that always the way?
The kingdom’s various short or fluffy or furry or minuscule—and sometimes animal—sidekicks were causing problems again. Sidekicks United, they called themselves, and they were far from happy. They were, in a word, disgruntled.
“Well, then, how can we help you today? Let’s see.…” Ben wasn’t talking to anyone but a piece of paper—or a thousand pieces. He stared down at the documents in front of him, tapping them with his pen. His father had asked him to lead the Council meeting that morning, part of the training for becoming king in a few months.
As was tradition, the firstborn child of the royal household would take the throne of Auradon at sixteen years of age. Beast and Belle were ready to retire. They were looking forward to long vacation cruises, early-bird dinners, and playing golf (Beast), bingo (Belle), and generally taking it easy. Besides, Belle had a stack of unread bedside reading so high, it threatened to topple over on a huffy Mrs. Potts when she came to take away the breakfast tray every morning.
The complaint wasn’t the only thing on his mind. Ben had woken up that morning from a bit of a nightmare. Or it felt like a nightmare—and it certainly looked like one. In the dream, he was walking around a strange village full of shabbily dressed, miserable people who ate rotten fruit and drank black coffee. No cream. No sugar. No coffee cake to dip in it. The horror! And he had fallen into some kind of ditch, but someone had helped him out.
A beautiful, purple-haired girl who looked nothing like anyone in Auradon…
“Thank you,” he said gratefully. “And who are you?”
But she’d disappeared before he could catch her name.
He went back to the papers in his hand and tried to forget about her.
Ben studied the Sidekicks United complaint—the first of its kind—and his heart beat a little faster at the thought of having to talk to all these people and convince them that there was no need for this level of discontent.
He sighed, until a familiar voice interrupted his reverie.
“Be careful about the sidekicks, son. Sooner or later they steal the spotlight.”
Ben looked up, surprised to see his father standing in the doorway. King Beast looked like he always did, as smiling and happy and fulfilled as on his billboards. All over Auradon, they read Good job being good! Keep it up! King Beast roars his approval!
His father motioned to the stack of papers on Ben’s desk. “Looks like you’re working hard.”
Ben wiped his eyes. “Yeah.”
King Beast clapped his paw of a hand on his son’s shoulder. “That’s my boy. So what is it that they want, exactly?”
Ben scratched behind his ear with his pen. “It seems they’re a bit upset, as they do all the work around here and are hardly compensated for their efforts. If you think about it from their perspective, they have a point.”
“Mmm.” King Beast nodded. “Everyone gets a voice in Auradon. Although you can’t let too many voices drown out reason, of course. That’s what it means to be kingly,” he said, perhaps a little more forcefully than was necessary.
“If you keep raising your voice, my darling, you’re going to crack all the china, and Mrs. Potts will never allow you either a cup of warm milk or a warm bath again.” Ben’s mother, the goodly Queen Belle, arrived in the room and slipped her hand under her husband’s muscled arm (yet another Beastly quality the king still seemed to possess—the strength of a wild creature in the form of a mere man). She was as beautiful as the day she had come upon Beast’s castle, and resplendent in a pretty yellow dress. If there were laugh lines around her eyes now, no one seemed to notice; and if anything, they only served to make her look more appealing.
The second he saw his mother, Ben found himself more at ease. He shy and quiet, his mother gentle and understanding, Ben and Belle had always been two like peas in a castle-garden pod—always preferring to have their noses in books rather than affairs of the state.
“But half the castle staff has signed this petition—see, there’s Lumiere’s scrawl, and Cogsworth’s,” Ben said, his forehead wrinkling. Injustice of any kind was upsetting to think about, and it bothered him that the very people on whom his family depended to keep their lives in running order believed that they had cause for complaint.
“Lumiere and Cogsworth will sign anything anyone asks them to sign. Last week they signed a petition to declare every day a holiday,” his father said, amused.
Ben had to laugh. King Beast had a point. The fussy Frenchman and the jolly Brit would agree to anything so they could get back to their work. Chip Potts, who was known to make a little mischief around the castle, had probably put them up to it.
“That’s the ticket. Listen to your people, but assert your right to rule. Lead with a gentle heart and a firm hand. That’s the way to be a king!”
King Beast extended his own fist, and Ben just stared at it. He gazed down at his own hand, which looked like a small child’s in comparison to his father’s.
Beast pulled Ben up by the arm, closing his hand around his son’s. “There. Strong. Powerful. Kingly.”
King Beast’s hand was so enormous Ben found he could no longer see his own.
“Strong. Powerful. Kingly,” Ben repeated.
Beast growled, then slapped his son on the back, almost sending him flying into the nearest decorative lamp. The floor shook as he strode out of the room, still chuckling.
Queen Belle looked relieved; Beast was not above making a joke at his own expense—though he was much less forgiving when anyone else attempted the same line of humor. She put her arms around her son, drawing him close.
“Ben. You don’t have to be another King Beast. Just be yourself—it’s more than enough.”
“That’s not what Father says.”
Belle smiled. They both knew there was no use trying to explain away his father’s logic, and she didn’t try. “No matter what, your father and I believe in you. That’s why we wanted you to start meeting with the Council. It’s time for you to learn how to rule. You will make a wonderful king, all on your own. I promise.”
“I hope so,” Ben said, uncertainly.
“I know so,” Belle said, kissing his cheek.
As the feather-light steps of his mother faded away, Ben took up his pen and turned back to his pages. This time, though, all he could see was his fist, with the same golden beast-head ring that his father wore.
Strong. Powerful. Kingly.
He clenched his fingers harder.
Ben swore he would make his father proud.
“Well, you look very pleased with yourself,” said Jay as Mal settled into her front-row seat and propped her feet up
on the desk next to her.
“I am,” she said. “I just taught that little blueberry what it means to feel left out.”
“Carlos looked like he was going to have a cow when you told him he was hosting your party.”
“You mean a dog?” Mal laughed, even though the joke was getting old.
Jay elbowed her with a wink before melting away to his desk in the back of the room.
Mal was in a good mood. This class was her favorite: Advanced Evil Schemes and Nasty Tricks, taught by Lady Tremaine, otherwise known as the Wicked Stepmother. Mal was particularly fond of Mean-Spirited Pranks.
“Hello, you dreadful children,” Lady Tremaine said, entering the room with a swish of her petticoats and casting a bored look at the class in front of her. “Today we will embark on our annual class project: Crafting the Ultimate Evil Scheme.”
She turned toward the chalkboard and wrote in earsplitting cursive: The Cinderella Story: Once Upon a Broken Glass Slipper. “As you well know,” she said, as she turned back to the students, “my manipulation of Cinderella was my greatest evil deed. For years I kept her in the attic and treated her as a virtual servant. If not for some horrid meddling mice, one of my daughters would be the queen of Charming Castle right now, instead of that ungrateful girl. And so, the goal of every teacher at Dragon Hall is to train the new generation of villains not to make the same mistakes we did. You must learn to adapt, to be faster, more cunning, and wickeder than ever before. You will spend this year working on an evil scheme of your choosing. The student with the best nasty trick will win Dragon Hall’s Evilest of the Year award.”
The class nodded their heads in unison, each filling with a variety of ideas for awful tricks. Mal scratched her nose with the end of her purple-plumed fountain pen, wondering what her year-long scheming project would be. She looked around the room at her fellow students scribbling away on notepads, brows furrowed, some cackling softly under their breaths. Her mind was racing with horrid ideas, each more horrid than the last. Lock all the first-years in the dungeon? Been there, done that. Fill the hallways with cockroaches? Child’s play. Let a stampede of goblins loose in the slop hall? That would be just a regular Tuesday.…
Across the room, Mal heard a soft giggle. She looked over her shoulder to find that annoying new girl Evie chatting cheerfully with Carlos De Vil as they played with some sort of black box on his desk. Ugh. That girl had nothing to be happy about. Why, hadn’t she, Mal, just told her she couldn’t come to the howler of the year? Mal was slightly disconcerted for a moment, until she realized: the evil scheme of the year was right in front of her.
A twisted smile formed on her lips, and she chewed her fountain pen for a moment before scribbling a page’s worth of notes.
She would show that blue-haired princess a thing or two.
Of course, she’d already told Evie that she couldn’t come to the party, but that wasn’t enough. It was too simple, too blunt. Mal had to be sneaky, like Lady Tremaine had been, pretending to be working in Cinderella’s best interests when she had been doing exactly the opposite.
Mal realized that she’d been waiting years for this chance, whether or not she’d consciously known it. The memory of the “lost” invitation—if indeed it had ever existed in the first place (it was still unclear what had truly happened)—grated on her feelings as sharply today as it had when she was six years old.
A day like that can only happen once in sixteen years.
A day like that changes a person.
A day like that was never going to happen again.
Not if Mal could help it.
And to be honest, Mal wanted to do more than ruin Evie’s day, she wanted to ruin her year. On second thought, maybe keeping Evie out of the party was the wrong move. If Evie wasn’t there, then Mal wouldn’t have the opportunity to torture her to her heart’s delight.
Mal finished writing down her plans just as the bell rang and caught up to Jay, who was all cheer and charm—and by the time they reached the door, his pockets were full of much more than that.
“Hold up,” Mal said as she spotted Carlos and Evie coming toward them.
Evie looked genuinely fearful and Carlos wary as they approached Mal, who blocked the doorway.
“Hey, Evie, you know that party I’m having?” Mal asked.
Evie nodded. “Um, yeah?”
“I was only kidding earlier,” Mal said with the sweetest smile she could manage. “Of course you’re invited.”
“I am?” Evie squealed. “Are you sure you want me there?”
“I don’t want anything more in the world,” said Mal grandly, and truthfully. “Don’t miss it.”
“I won’t,” promised Evie with a nervous smile.
Mal watched her and Carlos skitter away with satisfaction. Jay raised an eyebrow. “What was that all about? I thought you didn’t want her there,” he said, as he deftly stole a rotten banana from a first-year’s lunch pail.
“Plans change.”
“An evil scheme, huh?” Jay waggled both eyebrows.
“Maybe,” Mal said mysteriously, not wanting to give anything away. It wasn’t like Jay could be trusted. “Thieves’ honor” meant neither of them had any.
“Come on. It’s me. The only one you can stand on this island.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said, only half smiling.
“Don’t you hate parties? You didn’t go to Anthony Tremaine’s kickback the other week, and you missed my cousin Jade’s ‘Scary Sixteenth.’ They were off-the-hook, as the pirate posse would say.” He smirked.
“Those were different. Anyway, you need to hop to it. Carlos can’t throw my party alone.” She grabbed his arm. “We need jugs of spicy cider, bags of stale potato chips, sparkling slop, the works.”
Jay peeled the banana and took a bite. “Done.”
“And make sure it’s the good stuff from the wharf, from the first boats. I’ve got a reputation to uphold.”
He saluted and tossed the banana peel on the floor, and they both watched gleefully as a fellow student slipped and fell. Things like that never got old.
Mal smiled, her green eyes glittering a little more like her mother’s than usual. “Let’s go. I have a party to throw.” And someone to throw it at.
Carlos never shied from a mission, and if Mal wanted a howler, there was no alternative but to provide one. There was nothing he could do about it, AP Evil Penchant or not. He knew his place on the totem pole.
First things first: a party couldn’t be a party without guests. Which meant people. Lots of people. Bodies. Dancing. Talking. Drinking. Eating. Playing games. He had to get the word out.
Thankfully it didn’t take too long for everyone he crossed paths with at school, and the minions of everyone they crossed paths with, to spread the word. Because Carlos didn’t so much issue an invitation as deliver a threat.
Literally.
He didn’t mince words, and the threats only grew more exaggerated as the school day wore on. The rumors spread like the gusty, salty wind that blew up from the alligator-infested waters surrounding the island.
“Be there, or Mal will find you,” he said to his squat little lab partner, Le Fou Deux, as they both dissected a frog that would never turn into a prince in Unnatural Biology class.
“Be there, or Mal will find you and ban you from the city streets,” he whispered to the Gastons as they took turns stuffing each other in doomball nets in PE.
“Be there, or Mal will find you and ban you and make everyone forget you, and from this day onward you will be known only by the name of Slop!” he said almost hysterically to a group of frightened first-years gathered for a meeting of the Anti-Social Club, which was planning the school’s annual Foul Ball. They turned pale at his words and desperately promised their attendance, even as they trembled at the thought.
By the end of the day, Carlos had secured dozens of RSVPs. Now, that wasn’t too hard, he thought, putting away his books in his locker and releasing the first-y
ear who’d been trapped inside.
“Hey, man.” Carlos nodded.
“Thanks, I really have to pee,” squeaked the unfortunate student.
“Sure,” Carlos said, scrunching his nose. “Oh, and there’s a party. My house. Midnight.”
“I heard, I’ll be there! Wouldn’t miss it!” the first-year said, raising his fist to the air in excitement.
Carlos nodded, feeling mollified and more than a little impressed that even someone who’d been trapped inside a locker all day had heard the news about the party. He was a natural! Maybe party planning was in his blood. His mother certainly knew how to enjoy herself, didn’t she? Cruella was always telling him how boring he was because all he liked to do was fiddle with electronics all day. His mother declared he was wasting his time, that he was useless at everything except chores, and so maybe if he threw a good party, he could prove her wrong. Not that she would be around to witness it, though. She’d probably be enraged to discover her Hell Hall crawling with teenagers. Still, he wished that one day Cruella could see him as more than just a live-in servant who happened to be related to her.
He made his way home, his mind awhirl. With the guests secured, all he had to do was get the house ready for the blessed event—and that couldn’t be too hard, could it?
A few hours later, Carlos took it all back. “Why did I ever agree to have this party?” he agonized aloud. “I never wanted to have a party.” He raked his fingers through his curly, speckled hair, which made it stick up in a frazzle, a lot like Cruella’s own do.
“You mean tonight?” A voice echoed from the other end of the crumbling ballroom, from behind the giant, tarnished statue of a great knight.
“I mean ever,” sighed Carlos. It was true. He was a man of science, not society. Not even evil society.
But here he was, decorating Hell Hall, which had seen better days long before he’d been born. Still, the decrepit Victorian mansion was one of the grandest on the island, covered in vines more twisted than Cruella’s own mind, and gated with iron more wrought than Cruella’s own daily hysterias.