Cold Hearted (Villains 8)

“Mark my words, Fairy Godmother,” said Circe. “Your sister will be back one day, and she will take her rightful place! And we will sing and dance in the ashes when the Dark Fairy destroys the Fairylands! This, too, has been written!”

“There is no Dark Fairy, Circe. As usual you and your sisters are talking nonsense,” said the Fairy Godmother.

“Oh, there will be, and one day when the stars are not right, she will destroy you for all the harm you have caused in the Many Kingdoms.” The room shook as Circe spoke.

“That is enough!” The Fairy Godmother waved her wand to create a swirling vortex behind the sisters. “I told Nanny years ago we would regret setting you loose on the Many Kingdoms.”

“What do you mean?” asked Lucinda, her head cocked to the side.

“Yes, what do you mean?” asked Circe, raising her hands and causing the room to shake so violently now the walls were starting to crack, and the frozen ladies and gentlemen were toppling over.

“We demand that you tell us what you mean,” said all four sisters with one voice.

“Tell us now or we will destroy you!” Circe added, her eyes filled with rage.

Now it was the Fairy Godmother’s turn to laugh. “Oh, please. This is my domain. You have no power over me here. We are in the princess’s chapter of the story.” She put her hands on her hips and had a satisfied look on her face. “I have had enough of witches. The last thing I need is to contend with the likes of you on this night of all nights. Now leave this place at once, or I will send you to Hades’s domain where you belong!”

“Send us there,” said Lucinda, smiling.

“I think he’d be happy to see us,” said Circe, laughing.

And with that, the Fairy Godmother blasted Circe and her sisters backward into a swirling vortex.

“There!” she said with another twitch of her wand, and the vortex closed. “That was quite enough of them!”

“Where are they? What have you done with them?” cried Lady Tremaine.

The Fairy Godmother smiled. “Never you mind. It’s time to get back to your story now, dear. Let’s forget this ever happened and get my Cinderella married to her prince,” she said, waving her wand. At once, the ballroom sprang back into action. Anastasia and Drizella made their way back to their mother while the music played, people danced, and courtiers continued to announce each eligible maiden to the prince.

Lady Tremaine felt strange, as if she had momentarily fallen asleep. The last thing she remembered was being scolded by her daughters for fidgeting with their dresses and feathers.

“All right, my dears, I’ll stop fussing. I think they are about to announce us,” she said. And like that, as if she had summoned it, their names were called. As Lady Tremaine escorted her daughters to be presented before the prince, she knew this was their last chance at freedom.

The mother and her daughters curtsied before him. But instead of smiling graciously, the prince rolled his eyes, and in that moment Lady Tremaine knew in her heart that she and her daughters would be trapped in the Many Kingdoms forever.

It was then Cinderella came gliding into the ballroom, looking as if she had just stepped from the pages of a fairy tale book. All eyes in the room turned to her. Lady Tremaine hardly recognized her, and she could tell Anastasia and Drizella didn’t either, but it was their stepsister who arrived just in time to steal any chances they may have had with the prince.

“Where did she get that dress?” Lady Tremaine asked through clenched teeth, watching her daughters fumble their way through their curtseys. But the prince was no longer paying attention. His eyes had moved past them, focusing only on Cinderella. Anastasia and Drizella hadn’t even finished straightening up from their curtseys when he stood abruptly, making his way right past the sisters, who looked so foolish just standing there in front of the empty throne.

As Lady Tremaine watched the prince go to Cinderella, she felt her world crumbling around her. She had lost everything. And now the girl who had betrayed her would have everything, everything Lady Tremaine had desired for herself and her own daughters. She hated Cinderella more than ever; she felt it like hot bile churning in her stomach as she stood there watching the prince kiss Cinderella’s hand and then lead her to the dance floor, her silver dress gliding around her gracefully. It made Lady Tremaine sick to look at her.

This was supposed to be her happily ever after, and Cinderella had taken it from her. Everyone was in awe of Cinderella, crowding the edge of the dance floor, and she realized her daughters had made their way from the throne to join those clustered to see who was dancing with the prince. She didn’t have it in her heart to tell them it was their stepsister. She hoped she could spare them this final humiliation at least while they were in public.

“Do we know her?” asked Drizella.

“Well, the prince certainly seems to,” said Anastasia. “I know I’ve never seen her.”

Drizella crouched down to get a better look. Lady Tremaine muttered in agreement, lying while formulating a plan to keep Cinderella from marrying the prince. She would hide her away in the basement! She thought it was a brilliant idea, and she couldn’t wait to share it with her daughters once home.

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As Drizella and Anastasia craned their necks to get a better look at this mysterious beauty, Lady Tremaine followed the dancing couple to the edge of the dance floor. She pretended she was also curious about the dazzling young woman with whom the prince was so smitten. As she clutched her brooch, she felt her heart grow cold and hard. And she knew what she had to do. She would make sure Cinderella would never marry the prince. If she and her daughters were going to be forced into a miserable life, then she would make sure Cinderella would, too. The girl would suffer for dashing all her dreams.

It had been many years since that fateful ball where the prince fell in love with Cinderella. The memory of that night still filled Lady Tremaine with rage. She would never forget the day Cinderella slipped her foot into the glass slipper and was spirited away to the castle to marry her prince as the entire kingdom rejoiced in celebration. Everyone, that is, except the Tremaines.

They never did escape the Many Kingdoms. As the château decayed over the years, so did Lady Tremaine’s mind. We watched from our magic mirror, wishing there was something we could do to help the lady and her daughters, but the Fairy Godmother’s magic kept us from interfering. It’s not often an antagonist in a fairy tale story lives to see the end of the princess’s story, and we knew it must have been a misery for Lady Tremaine to know Cinderella was living a glorious life as the fair and kind queen she became.

We had hoped in those early days that we would find a way to help the lady and her daughters, but magic took us down new and unexpected paths. Like everyone else, we forgot about Lady Tremaine, tucked away as she was in a prison fashioned by fairies, locked in Cinderella’s childhood home. Doomed to become crueler and more gruesome as the years passed, and how could it be otherwise? She had watched her life slip between her fingers. She had moved to another world to be with a man she thought was in love with her, only to find he was using her for her money and would trap her in her own home and make her fear for her life and for the lives of her daughters. Her whirlwind romance had turned into a nightmare.