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That was the thing about leaving home, she guessed. Once you’d made your way out into the world, once you’d left the darkness of the cave, it was hard to go back.
Even to make your hair smooth and your eyes pop.
The more Evie thought about it, the more she knew she couldn’t stay in the castle one more second. She’d read all the books and watched all the shows and there was no one to talk to other than her mother, who was only obsessed with the latest cosmetics that arrived on the Dumpster barges, the used tubes of lipstick and opened jars of cream that the Auradon princesses tossed when they didn’t want them anymore.
Even school has to be better than this.
Besides, she could deal with Mal, couldn’t she? She wasn’t scared of her.
Not that scared of her.
Okay, so maybe she was. But Evie was more terrified of rotting in a cave forever. And she was far too young to start working on her own Magic Mirror voice. She shook her head at the thought.
Pretty is as pretty is?
Was that what my mother said?
But what was the point of being pretty if there was no one there to see how pretty you were?
Even the crack on her ceiling was starting to look like the Dragon’s Eye.
Mal stared up at it from her bed, transfixed. She had woken up extra early—even earlier than Carlos and Evie—as she couldn’t sleep, thinking of the quest her mother had all but immediately dispatched her on. Maleficent was like that: once she had an idea in her head, there was no stopping her. It didn’t matter if it was her daughter or one of her minions—she expected everyone to stop and drop and risk everything to do her bidding.
That was the Maleficent way.
Mal knew there was no exception made for daughters, not when you were one of the all-time most villainous villains of the Isle of the Lost. You didn’t get to be number one by being merciful, or even reasonable.
Not when you were one of the evil elite.
Maleficent wanted the Dragon’s Eye back, which was great, and all, and Mal totally got it; but actually trying to find out where it was on the island—now that was something else entirely.
So, yeah.
It wasn’t as if Diablo were any help. All the raven did was caw when Mal poked it. “Where is it, huh, D? If you’re back to life, then it can’t be far, right? But where?” He’d poke her eyes out if she got close enough to let him. That stupid bird had always wanted her mother all to himself; and to him, Mal wasn’t even a threat as much as a nuisance.
Still, it was more than just a bird that was haunting her now.
Maleficent’s threats were hard to shake. As always, her mother knew exactly where to strike. She could find her daughter’s soft spots as easily now as when she had been a baby wearing one on the top of her own head.
Don’t you want to prove yourself to me?
Prove that you are worthy of the name I bestowed on you, Maleficent!
Mal turned over in her hard, squeaky bed, restless.
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Yes, Mal was named for her mother, but her mother liked to say that since Mal had shown so far that she was only a tiny bit evil, Mal could only have a tiny bit of her real name until she proved herself truly worthy of her dark fairy heritage. Which was ridiculous, really, if you thought about it. Mal didn’t exactly have an army of evil resources at her command. She made do with what she had to work with—stolen paint cans, hapless high school kids, a closet full of old mink coats and fur traps. Sure, maybe she wasn’t encasing whole castles in hedges of thorns, but then every villain had to start somewhere, didn’t she?
And if she had let Evie off the hook at the end of the night, that wasn’t her fault either, was it? It wasn’t like you could put a time line on this kind of thing. Good scheming took a little planning, didn’t it?
Mal turned over again.
It was still quiet in the Bargain Castle, which meant Maleficent hadn’t gone out on the balcony yet to harangue and humiliate her subjects. When Mal finally slid out of bed, slithered into today’s purple everything, and tiptoed out of her bedroom, she noticed that the door to her mother’s room was locked, which meant Maleficent was not to be disturbed under any circumstance. She was adamant about getting eight hours of “evil sleep” and recommended a healthy diet of nightmares to keep the claws sharp.
It had worked for her so far, hadn’t it?
Mal brooded on her mother’s warning as she hurried down the crumbling staircase.
