Mrs. Tiddlebottom looked up at Circe and smiled. “Thank you, dear. I was just about to tell Snow she shouldn’t worry about poor old Mrs. Tiddlebottom. I’m fine, dears. Just fine. I have everything I could ever need. Not very many can say that.”
Circe put the tea tray down and poured cups for the three of them.
“How are your sleeping beauties?” she asked.
Mrs. Tiddlebottom got a sparkle in her eye and seemed to stir from her waking slumber at the mention of her charges. “Oh, they’re just fine. Just fine.”
Circe passed Mrs. Tiddlebottom a cup of tea. “Snow was worried you might be a little overwhelmed now that your memories are coming back. We wanted to make sure you are okay.”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom put down her tea and reached out for Circe’s hand. “Come, sit down with us.” Circe sat on the other side of Mrs. Tiddlebottom. “I remember everything. And I’m fine. I promise. I’m just very tired.” Snow kissed the old woman on the cheek. “You’re such a dear, but really, you girls worry too much.” Circe passed Mrs. Tiddlebottom the plate of little sandwiches. “Thank you, dear. May I ask why you’re really here? Is it about those books? Oh, don’t get me wrong, I know you have kind hearts, the two of you, but this old woman’s fairy tale is over. I’ve done my duty and protected the sleeping beauties, but my job is done, and what I want now more than anything else is to rest.”
“What do you mean your job is done?”
“I mean just that, dears. Primrose and Hazel, they woke up a few days ago.”
“What? Woke up? But how?” said Circe, getting to her feet. “Where are they?”
“They said they were going home, my dear.”
“Home? But how were they brought back to life? How did it happen?”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom smiled. “The flowers, dear. It was the flowers. Didn’t you see them when you came in?”
Circe rushed to the window and gasped at the glowing lights coming from the field. “Snow! Look!” The field was filled with brilliant golden flowers. Their light was so bright Circe could see it reflected on Snow White’s face. “Mrs. Tiddlebottom, where did these flowers come from?”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom laughed. “Oh, those are Gothel’s flowers.”
Snow and Circe looked at each other, thunderstruck. “The magic flowers? But how did they get here?”
Mrs. Tiddlebottom laughed again. “Well, dears, they grew, like flowers tend to do.”
It had been many years since Nanny had visited the Fairylands. She never thought she would return after she had helped her sister rebuild it. But now her life had traveled full circle, coming back to this place after Maleficent’s death.
She felt the loss of her more profoundly there in the Fairylands, the place where she had raised and loved Maleficent like her own daughter. Remembering the wonderful, smart, and gifted girl she had been. Remembering how her sister had played a part in the destruction of the person she had loved most in the world. But taking a page out of Grimhilde’s book, she pushed her feelings deep within her, where they were harder to access. After all, her sister had suffered for her part in Maleficent’s death, and she had been admonished by Oberon. Nanny and the Fairy Godmother had forged a tentative bond—one Nanny was afraid of breaking. So she pushed down her feelings. She put them in a place she didn’t have to deal with just then. A place where Maleficent lived within her, a secret, private place where the little girl she loved could reside without devouring her from the inside.
She almost longed for the days before she had discovered her true identity—the days when she was just Tulip’s nanny, before Pflanze woke her from her long slumber. Things had been so much easier then.
Now, as she looked around the Fairylands, all those feelings she had been struggling to push deep within her bubbled up. For there was her old cottage, and there was Maleficent’s tree house, right where she had left it. The sight of it made her cry. She cried over the loss of her adopted daughter, and she cried over giving Aurora to the three good fairies. She cried for all of it. And she cried for herself. But she had to be strong. She had Tulip and Circe to look after now. Though something told her she needn’t worry about Tulip any longer. She was becoming the woman Nanny had always known she would be. Circe had set Tulip on that path. She was now smart, adventurous, and independent. She couldn’t be prouder of her princess.
Circe was the one who needed Nanny now. Circe was in real danger, because she saw the paths that lay before her. And Nanny thought she knew the road Circe would take. It struck a terrible fear within her heart.
Yes, it was better that Circe was off with Snow White. Better that she wasn’t here while the fairies decided her mothers’ fate. She didn’t think Circe could take hearing one more horrible story about them or some wretched thing they had done in the name of protecting her. She knew the fairies would come to the same conclusions as Circe. The sisters should never be set free. Nanny knew Circe would never be able to thrive in the shadow of her mothers. She would never be able to reach her full potential if she had to keep cleaning up after the maelstrom of her mothers’ destructive forces. She would spend the rest of her life making amends for her mothers’ foul deeds if they were unleashed on the many kingdoms. The thought was unfathomable.
As Nanny opened her old cottage door, it was like being punched in the chest. The pain of being back there was so alive within her it felt as though this was the place she kept all her secrets, all her pain, all her suffering. It wasn’t within her at all; it was here in this cottage. She knew she couldn’t stay. Not so close to Maleficent’s tree house. Not in the kitchen where she’d fretted over Maleficent’s fairy exams. Not in the place she’d spent the most beautiful and painful days of her life.
“Sister, I knew it was a mistake to bring you back here. I can see it on your face.” Nanny had almost forgotten her sister was by her side.
“You were right, my dear sister. Can I stay with you after all?”
The Fairy Godmother nodded. “Of course you can.”
As she closed the door to her old cottage, and the two fairies made their way to the Fairy Godmother’s home, Nanny tried to leave her pain behind. That was where she had been stuffing all her pain, not deep within herself as she had imagined. There wasn’t room for much else with Maleficent residing there, so her pain lived in her old cottage, and that was where it would stay until she was ready to revisit it. The farther down the path she got, the less severe her suffering was, until she felt it only in the distant familiar way she had grown to live with. This she could manage. She had lived too many lifetimes, and the memories of those lifetimes were too great to carry around with her. Too heavy. She was happy she had a place to put them.
“Did you say we would be meeting with the other council members today, unofficially, to decide how to proceed?”
The Fairy Godmother gave her sister a sly look. “I hadn’t said so, but I was about to.” The ladies laughed.