Page 55 of Velveteen vs. The Consequences of Her Actions

“Do they know that?”

Santa looked toward the door. “I certainly hope so,” he said.

* * *

The others were waiting on the porch when Velveteen emerged. Aaron was the first to react. “Well?” he asked.

“Santa’s going to help us,” she said. “Jack, he wants you to take us to the Hall of Mirrors.”

“Papa told you to go to the Hall of Mirrors?” Jack frowned. “That’s odd. He normally wants me to stay as far away from there as possible.”

“That’s what he said,” said Vel. “Do you know the way?” Jackie would have. Jackie had been training to become her mother’s heir for years, had walked through every mirror in that frozen Hall. Velveteen looked at the pale and anxious girl in front of her, and thought that if she shook Winter all the way down to its foundations, she wouldn’t have made them suffer enough.

But it wasn’t Jack’s fault. If anyone was blameless here, it was her. Velveteen tried to remember that, and to swallow her anger.

“I do,” said Jack. She looked uncomfortable. “What are we going to do once we get there?”

“Does it matter?” asked Torrey. The others turned to look at her. She shrugged. “When our dear Lady of the Toybox decides to do something, she rarely consults with the rest of us. She spent too much time a soloist, and no longer remembers how to play nicely with the symphony. What’s to come will come, and the rest of us will go along with it, because we are, for whatever misguided reasons, greatly inclined to follow her.”

Yelena frowned and put her arm around Torrey’s shoulders, gathering the smaller woman close. “You’re really uncomfortable here, aren’t you?”

“Ah, Pol.” Torrey smiled up at her, weary and wry. “Everything in this place is based upon the iconography of a world that is not my own. I love your world, I do, but a girl likes to pretend she’s culturally literate, and every part of my surroundings reminds me that I am not.”

“We’re going to fix things,” said Velveteen. The others turned back to her. She was focused on Jack. “That’s what you want to know, right? What we’re going to do? We’re going to fix things. I don’t know how, and I don’t know what the world is going to look like afterward, but we’re going to fix things.”

“Everything?” asked Jack.

Velveteen hesitated before saying, “If there’s any way to make this all have just…not happened, that’s what I’m going to do. That would mean Jackie would never have needed to save me, and if she didn’t need to save me, she didn’t get erased. Will you still help us?”

“Why did you tell me if you thought I wouldn’t?” asked Jack.

Velveteen shrugged. “I figured you should have a choice, if there’s a chance you’re about to be wiped from existence.”

Jack smiled a little. “I wouldn’t be the selfless spirit of Christmas if I tried to tell you ‘no,’ but I’m not just saying ‘yes’ because of my nature,” she said. “I don’t want to take someone else’s life. There will always be Jacquelines. This world is supposed to have a Jackie.”

“Then lead the way,” said Velveteen.

Jack nodded and stepped off the porch, starting deeper into the village. Torrey followed. As before, Yelena hovered above the snow rather than trying to walk through it, but this time she floated next to her girlfriend, lighting up the air around them.

When Vel stepped off the porch, Aaron was by her side, his feet as firmly on the ground as her own.

She took his hand as they walked, and neither one of them said a word, and neither of them needed to.

* * *

Santa and the Snow Queen were waiting on the steps of the Hall of Mirrors. No one commented on the fact that Santa couldn’t possibly have beaten them there: this was his place, and he was capable of virtually anything.

Looking at the Snow Queen, Velveteen thought she looked even colder than usual. Her aristocratic features were set into a frozen mask of disdain, her chin raised as she looked down her nose at the warm-blooded heroes in front of her. Jack reddened and turned her face away, not meeting the Snow Queen’s eyes.

“Well?” Velveteen held fast to Aaron’s hand as she looked at Santa. “Now what?”

“Now you go inside,” he said. “There is a door. It’s not large, or flashy; it’s not easy to find, when you’re surrounded by so many more interesting things. But it’s there. Find it. Open it. Go through. What you’re looking for is on the other side.”

Velveteen stared. “Seriously? That’s it? ‘Go in there and find a door, and we won’t tell you what’s on the other side, but hey, good luck’? That’s bullshit. What are we looking for?”

“We don’t know,” said the Snow Queen. Her voice was a blizzard, and all of them shivered, even Jack, who was no longer cold enough to withstand her mother’s words. “We are Spirits of the Season, bound to this time, this place, and the door you seek is not available to us. We are not allowed to know such things.”

“What about Jack?” asked Yelena.