No Happily Ever After (The Fairytale Diaries #1) (5 page)

Chapter 8

C
hristmas break steadfastly approached.  On Tuesday morning, her classmates were abuzz with numerous sources of excitement.  For one, everyone was excited about the prospect of two weeks off school.  Except Cailyn, of course.  She had nothing much to look forward to except for endless time spent under her dad's watchful eye.  She knew she could invite friends over if she cared to.  But after the chilling incident concerning Jennifer Tide's Likebook profile, she still felt uncomfortable having friends come too close to her father's secret.  Many of her friends were still slightly distant with her anyway, as a result of the foul mood she'd succumbed to for several weeks after discovering her father's secret.

The other excitement was the gossip about the shocking arrest of Zoe Locke.  Most people didn't even know exactly who Zoe was.  She'd always been so quiet; she'd simply blended into the background.  Once news of her arrest had reached the Faraway High grapevine, Cailyn realized she didn't know of a single person that had regularly socialized with Zoe.  She had no idea where Zoe even lived.  She didn't recall ever seeing Zoe's parents at any school function, or if she had any siblings.  In fact, it occurred to her she didn't even remember Zoe participating in any school event ever in their long educational career together. 

Word was that Zoe'd been caught red handed burglarizing the home of the Bar family. Cailyn found the whole thing as sad as it was shocking.  She suddenly wished she'd been nicer to the girl; tried harder to include her or get to know her.  She suspected this whole thing was a cry for attention from a lonely girl. 

Benjamin Bar, as always, had nothing to say about the matter.  But the rumor mill suggested she'd been injured while escaping and was presently in the hospital.  She would be arraigned the following day and everybody was saying she'd end up in juvenile detention.  Cailyn was just as surprised as everyone else.  Zoe Locke was the last person anyone would expect to be a criminal.

Just went to show how one never could tell what goes on behind closed doors.

And finally, the other thing that had everybody so amped up was the field trip.  She and her classmates prepared to leave and be bussed to the Faraway Museum of Natural History and Nature Preserve.  The trip was a part of the long series of study in their science classes leading up to the big science fair that would occur in the spring.  They were to learn about nature, dinosaurs, biology, and the earth that day.  In truth though, no one cared particularly about the museum or point of the trip.  They were all simply happy to have a half day out of school.  They were only a few days out until winter break began, and everyone had lost steam on their studies.  Cailyn in particular was ecstatic to get a change of scenery.

Mr. Pure had almost refused to let her go on the field trip.  If he'd declined, she would've been forced to spend the day at his office.  So she'd begged and pleaded for the permission slip.  She swore she'd stay with her group and be in absolutely no danger.  She was so sick of being a prisoner, as though she were being punished for his crimes.  She accused him of being paranoid.  Finally, he'd relented, repeating firmly that she was to stay with the group.

Cailyn sat excitedly pressed against a cold window pane, staring out at the snow covered roadways as the school bus bumped along toward the museum.  A small smile played on her lips and she existed in her own private world inside her mind.  The noise and banter of her classmates behind her all disappeared.  She forgot all about her father and Aliah Joiner.  She desperately needed a break from everything.  She just needed a little time to herself, to clear her head.

She broke her promise to her father, almost as soon as they arrived at the preserve.

Everyone filed off the bus, through the fluffy blanket of snow, and into the gigantic museum.  Standing bundled in groups in the atrium under a sky light thirty feet above, and surrounded by signage and displays, they listened to their teacher.  Cailyn found it hard to concentrate as she peered around, wide eyed, at a huge dinosaur statue that loomed two stories high in one corner of the atrium.  In another corner was a big reconstruction of Mt. Rushmore. And lining the silver papered walls were giant framed posters depicting every possible manifestation of weather; from rainbows to monsoons. 

The students were told they had three hours to explore independently.  Then they needed to convene in the cafeteria for lunch.  Cailyn didn't have to think twice about what she would do.  She made a beeline for the rear exit to explore the grounds and walk the trails in the woods.   She adored snow.  And she craved the chance finally to get fresh air, be alone, and do as she pleased.

Perhaps if she'd been less excited, less eager to break her father's rules, or more observant…  Maybe she would've noticed the beautiful dark haired woman slip casually in the front door and begin following her discreetly.  But, Cailyn didn’t notice the woman with the black hair, black sunglasses, and rosy cheeks.  She didn't notice her quick steps, or the slight smile playing on her full lips.  And neither did anyone else.

Cailyn wandered out into a huge winter garden of pines and snow covered topiaries.  She giggled melodiously at a gathering of bushes sculpted to look like
Disney Princesses
, thriving despite the piles of fluffy snow atop their foliage heads.  She followed a mosaic tiled foot path that had been shoveled clear of snow.  She noted a few black birds that'd not gone south, flitting about the treetops.  She saw white tailed deer peeking from the mouth of the forest.  She grinned at rabbits, a fox, and several cats tip toing through the snow.  She saw so much life.  But missed the most important thing.

The woman in the long black dress and hooded cloak, still following, not far behind.

So, Cailyn wandered on and on.  She roamed farther and farther from the museum and any other people, not suspecting at all that her care free jaunt was sealing her unfortunate fate.

After quite some time, Cailyn found herself at the opening to the woods.  Faraway forest had always somewhat frightened her.  She peered cautiously into the shadows straining to see, and listening to all the whooshes and groans emanating from the darkness within.

She caught a chill and hugged herself tightly.  Her heart began to pound.  She giggled and mentally chided herself for being scared of the forest that had surrounded her town every day of her life.

Or maybe somewhere inside her, the sick feeling of fear was an awakening knowledge.  But if that was the case, she realized too late.

There was but a tiny pinch as the hypodermic needle plunged into her neck.  Cailyn Pure collapsed heavily into the brutally frigid snow.

***

Her eyes dragged heavily open and the first thing she was aware of was apples.

She lay sprawled on a massive wooden table in a kitchen decorated with apples.  Yellowed peeling apple wallpaper.  Paper thin apple café curtains over the small window.  Ceramic canisters on the messy countertops decorated with apples and small handles on the lids that were…  Apples.

Her heavy head thudded and spun.  Nothing made sense and the only thought she could seem to grab onto was all those apples.  Both quaint and tacky.  Underneath a layer of dirt and chaos.  And there was a pungent smell…

Like rotten apples.

She had no idea where she was.  And then seemingly from nowhere, a petite woman with neatly trimmed shining black hair came running across the room.  She shrieked, and a rusty butcher knife flailed over her head.

Cailyn didn't even think.  She couldn't; the whole thing did not compute.  Did not sink through the mirk and the mire of her cloudy mind.  She just lifted one booted foot off the table, heavily.  Her sluggish movement transpired at exactly the appropriate moment for the dark haired, knife wielding, lunatic woman's face to connect with Cailyn's boot.  With a sickening crunch, the woman bounced brutally backwards and fell straight onto the floor.  There was another unfortunate crunch when the woman's head slammed into the floor, and crimson rivulets of blood spurted three feet into the chilly putrid air.  Though she was mentally confused, sounds came to Cailyn in an odd heightened state of awareness.

So she heard each droplet of blood as they splattered against her, and landed around the kitchen.

Cailyn hauled herself heavily off the table. She found her legs heavy and numb.  She had to force herself to walk, and her steps were clumsy and unsteady.  She stared down at the woman who moaned in unconsciousness.  Her previously pretty face was a mask of blood and brokenness.  Cailyn knew she should understand what was going on.  But she still couldn't quiet grasp it.  She staggered out the back door and into the grey day, finding herself outside a small house in the forest.  Cailyn wandered into the trees.

Each step she took grew slower and slower.  She didn't know where she was going.  Her eyes were incredibly heavy again.  The blackness tried to consume her.

And then, out of nowhere, Benjamin Bar stepped out from behind a tree.

"B…  Be…  Benjamin," Cailyn mumbled, speeding up ever so slightly to get to him.  "Help me."

He gave her a strange dark look.  Then his face broke into a smile.  "Cailyn, are you OK?" he asked, rushing to meet her.

Had she been thinking clearly, she'd have realized the sullen boy's delighted smile was highly inappropriate in the face of her obvious distress.  And that his presence there in the forest was not only oddly coincidental, but actually alarming.  But none of that occurred to her as she stumbled haphazardly reaching for him.

"H…  Help me please," she moaned, slurring badly.

"I live close by, Cailyn Pure.  Let's go to my house, I'll get you help there."

He opened his arms just as she collapsed into them, dead to the world.

***

"Wakey wakey, princess."

Everything was confusing again.  Yet not quite so mind boggling as the last time she'd come to.

"Oh, beautiful girl…  Wake up…"  It was a familiar voice, but it spoke in an unfamiliar manner.  Masculine, but at the same time sing songish.  Childish.

The first thing her eyes focused on was Benjamin Bar, which relieved her.  But then she noticed she was seeing him from behind a series of rusty iron bars.

She sprung awake and sat up.  Suddenly she became aware that she was inside a tiny cell.  It smelled of urine and something else that curdled her stomach.  It had a cold, muddy floor.  On the other side of the bars, Benjamin…  On the other side of Benjamin was a chamber of horrors that certainly had to be a nightmare of grandiose proportions.

Cailyn scurried back into a corner, as far as she could get from Benjamin with that odd look on his grinning face.

He gave one excited clap then clasped his hands.  "Ah lovely, you've wakened," he gushed. "I followed you when that woman dragged you into the trees.  Obviously she had ill intent."  Benjamin tittered maniacally.  "Regrettably for you, Cailyn, I assure you my intent is much much worse."

Cailyn began to scream.

Part I
II

Desperately Seeking Rescue

Chapter 9

I
t boggled the mind of Ella Cinder to think of how folks considered her foster mother, Thelma Dark, to be some sort of hero.  Not only was Thelma a horrible, money grubbing, shrew, her twin biological daughters, Brittany and Lexi were ugly psychopaths.

And that pretty much summed up Ella's life.

It was unclear to Ella exactly how long Thelma Dark had been taking in foster children.  By sneaking glances at the Dark family photo albums, Ella had determined that Mr. Dark had stopped appearing in the pictures when the twins were around ten.  She suspected he may be dead.  Or maybe he'd known his wife and daughters were terrible people, and he'd just run away.  Or maybe they hadn't been terrible
until
he ran away.  Whatever the case, she suspected they'd started "taking in strays," as they termed it, after he was no longer around.

Cash cows.  That's how Mrs. Dark referred to the stream of charges that moved in and out of her home.

Ella was one of the few who lasted more than a couple months.  She was a "lifer."  Only a little over a year remained until her eighteenth birthday and she'd been with the Dark's for three years.  Because she was quiet, docile and compliant, the Dark's allowed her to stay and expected she'd finish her under age years there.

She really didn't know why she never ratted her caretakers out to the authorities.  The veritable slave labor enforced to earn her keep. Her accommodations were shabby at best.  She slept in a tiny room off the kitchen that was barely bigger than a pantry.  She slept on a small cot with nothing but a thread bare sheet to warm her, which rested on a cold stone floor.  Fighting the layer of soot that always migrated in from the kitchen's huge fireplace was a never ending battle.  They kept her there to rise early to do chores and prepare breakfast for the Dark's without rousing them from their comfortable warm beds.  But when social workers came to call, Thelma claimed that Ella slept in one of the many extra bedrooms upstairs.

The amount of household chores they piled on her was insurmountable and often interfered with her ability to keep up with school work.  And she could forget about after school activities or a social life.  As a result, she often made failing grades.  Though Ella was quite beautiful with her delicate features, long blond hair, sparkling blue eyes, and slender shape, she was often perceived as a pretty face and nothing more.  "That Ella is so pretty and nice," her classmates would whisper.  "But she's a bimbo."  They assumed her stupid, because if she ever passed a class, it was just barely.

And any time the Dark's sensed any sort of defiance on Ella's part, that's when she was beaten.  Or starved.  Or tormented in one way or another.  So she'd learned long ago to always stay in line.

She supposed she never told because she feared nobody would believe her.  Other foster kids never stayed long, and Ella never attempted to befriend them.  Most of the kids sent to stay in the Dark home were already broken or damaged in some way, and they didn't want to strike up any friendships.  The rare few that Ella meant who did make nice, she diligently ignored for their own safety.  She felt that if she made friends with any of the other foster kids, that they would be in greater danger.  She simply left them all alone, because as soon as they'd begin to realize how awful the Dark's could be, Thelma sent them packing before they had a chance to complain.  And Ella was left behind with no one who could corroborate any tale she contemplated revealing.

Honestly, she wished somebody in Faraway would just notice.

After all, Ella was a fairly popular girl at school.  Despite the fact that she never attended dances, social events, or invited friends over…  Despite the fact people didn't perceive her as too academically bright…  They liked her.  So it always amazed her that nobody ever noticed the bruises.  The gaunt cheeks, or dark circles under her eyes.  The shadows of cinders accumulated in her clothes and hair.  She didn't want to have to cry out for help.  She just wanted to be rescued.  Maybe by an observant teacher.  Or a stalwart police officer.  Or, in her most sad and lonely imaginings, it was a handsome prince who came to her aid.

When Ella and the Dark sisters began their junior year at Faraway Senior High, the situation that had remained relatively dormant for some time, once again became volatile.

For one thing, Ella became more popular than ever among their classmates.  She flourished into perhaps the most gorgeous girl in school and boys fell at her feet.  Meanwhile, Brittany Dark grew tall, gangly, excessively thin, with very bad acne.  And Lexi grew progressively more obese, wearing a perpetually hateful facial expression with what appeared to be only one bushy frowning eyebrow.  Ella was invited to more and more social gatherings which she could never attend, while the Dark sisters were passed over time and time again.

At home they were in a particularly slow stretch and Ella was the only foster child at the time.  This left her open to abuse from all the Dark women.  The twins invented infractions to punish Ella for.  Even when it was absolutely clear they were lying, Thelma supported them explicitly.  She would sometimes go for days with food being withheld.  Or a backhand would come from nowhere and send her reeling. Any homework she attempted to do, they'd destroy before she could return it to school.  If they let her shower, it was only with cold water.

And with all of this, threats accompanied if she dared breathe a word of her home life to a single living soul.

But in November, everything changed.

Ella was upstairs putting away their laundry when she heard the front door open and Thelma Dark's sugary sweet voice, the tone she reserved for social workers.  Ella's ears perked up.  Somehow she hadn't lost hope that an outsider could come to rescue her.  She heard Thelma chatting enthusiastically with the social worker for a few minutes.  And then she heard another voice.  A male voice that sounded like honey tastes.

He said only a brief hello and introduced himself as Nicholas Monarch.  But just a few words from that voice were enough to completely mesmerize her.  The stack of Lexi's laundry she carried slipped from her hands and scattered on the floor.  She drifted into the hallway and then crept quietly down half of the staircase.  She crouched down to remain hidden by a wall and peeked just barely through the bars of the banister.  She had a limited view into the parlor.

Nicholas Monarch towered over Thelma and the social worker.  He stood straight, somehow managing to look both regal and at ease.  He had a flawless face with twinkling blue eyes.  And when he smiled, a dimple appeared, and pearly white teeth were revealed.  His thick brown hair was neatly trimmed and his clothing too, appeared tidily tailored.  He looked like any number or all American boys, yet something about him and his way set him far above the rest.

Brittany and Lexi buzzed around him while Thelma and the social worker chatted.  They fawned and mooned obviously over him.  He couldn't get a word in edgewise for all their chatter.  He smiled awkwardly, obviously flustered by the Dark twins' intense level of attention.

She hated to pull her eyes off the handsome boy.  But she didn't wish to be caught eavesdropping.  So she slipped back upstairs.

Consumed with thoughts of Nicholas Monarch, she didn't even notice what a poor job she did on her chores.  Nor did she care just then, what the consequences might be.