Everything hurts and life is misery.

Such was the first thought that pounded through her skull as Ramona forced herself up on an excessively soft couch, squashed against Minerva to her right. Instantly she tensed into defense mode. Everything was unfamiliar. Her mind cranked out possibilities by the second: kidnapping, arrest, about to be eaten alive by a vaguely humanoid spider cult. Perhaps she shouldn't let her personal foul experiences influence her judgment. There were no spider-people in sight, and besides, this didn't look like any jail cell she'd spent the night in. She elbowed Minerva's head out of her lap, groaning as the soreness in her muscles doubled in intensity. Minerva blinked awake, and within moments, she wasn't the only one.

Penny's voice split the silence, her glare sweeping apprehensively across the room. "Where in Rose's good name are we?"

Minerva clutched her head, long locks of blond falling neatly over her shoulders as if she'd never gone to sleep at all. She'd never had a bad hair day, or even really a bad hair minute, and Ramona was more than a little bitter about it. Come on—she hardly even sweated!

"The butterflies," she mumbled, her voice lined with painful acceptance. The trap had been devastatingly effective, leaving all of them to mourn their falling for it upon realization afterward.

"You know what they say," Ramona sighed back, rubbing a hand over her face as if she would blink and the scene around them (which undeniably came with the next phase of their unwanted adventure) would miraculously disappear, "everything that glitters costs you gold."

Minerva rolled her eyes at the dumb Villagetown expression, but mouthed it to herself anyway. A reminder. It was almost unnerving how fascinated she had been with the winged creatures the night before, like she'd never seen anything so fantastical and never would again. There was just something about things that flew that had always piqued her interest, but looking back on it...

Ramona shook her head wearily, knocking it back against the cushion behind her. They were just butterflies. They were just butterflies.

Penny brandished the short knife in her sleeve and turned it over, scanning their surroundings for threats on instinct. Her eyes were still half-lidded, barely awake. "In Rose people say 'florists always sell you thorns'," she said, quiet and with that Villagetowner accent she'd never quite dropped that came through thicker when she was sleepy. It was funny, Ramona thought, that the three of them could have all come from the same place and lead completely different lives, only to find each other anyway. One could never escape Villagetown, not really. Growing up there, everyone said that you'd never leave if you hadn't before you were twenty, settling for an easy, boring lifestyle because it was safe. If you did get out it followed you forever regardless. People recognized the not-so-attractive looks or sometimes the accent or the occasional odd slang phrase or the drab sense of style. It was only when Ramona had learned to embrace her Villagetownness—her averageness—that she'd gained the ability to blend in with a crowd. No one spotted her at first glance anymore.

When she first met Claude he'd been surprised that she didn't live up to her reputation. There was only ever one rumor that was true. And it was a secret she'd only told once. "I'll entertain that one. The Ugly Duckling's a ghost."

"And how does one go about becoming a ghost?" Claude had asked lazily, leaning back with a fresh bottle of brandy even though there was already alcohol on his breath. He was a considerably worse drinker three years ago than he was now, mostly because everyone always pretended not to notice when Penny threw his stuff out.

Ramona had smirked and told him, "Be ugly."

Claude today was grudgingly sitting up, not far from Bear splayed across the floor. He looked about as energized and ready for whatever was ahead as she felt; that is to say, not particularly. Bear had transformed back into himself still dressed as Walter Wagner, which took Ramona a moment to register as the previous day and its costumes somehow felt like a distant, hazy memory already. His head thunked against a standing lamp as he disorientedly tried to get up after the stint he'd done in his animagus form. Something was off about him. Usually he seemed refreshed and revitalized after a transformation, albeit a little dizzy maybe, but he looked grayish and terribly drained. Claude shot him a wary glance.

"You alright over there, big guy?"

He rubbed his head and blew air out of his cheeks. The absence of the bottom half of his beard made him look all the worse—all of it accumulating in the observation that he wasn't quite himself. "Definitely been better."

"Not sure how we ended up in the Writer's tower," Claude muttered, and Ramona's eyes widened, taking in her surroundings with a renewed sense of understanding. For a tower in the middle of Nowhere, it was a pretty nice place.

The first floor resembled something of a foyer, paintings on the walls of various landscapes that might have been some of the views outside. Some of them depicted replicas of scenes from famous fairytales—dancing princesses in a meadow, a middle-aged man plucking a rose from a garden, a small girl approaching a castle encased in ice. In contrast to the lifeless murals of FastTrav, there was a special care and passion visible through the paint, each scene quaint and peaceful in its own way. One could tell just by looking at them that the artist respected the stories and truly sought to capture their quietest, most meaningful moments.

Along with the artwork, a large piano sat in one corner, a plush velvet settee beside it. The thieves were all scattered across the various other pieces of furniture, and there was a great deal of unoccupied walking space. A sitting room was a strange thing to have for a place that presumably entertained no guests.

"We couldn't in good conscience leave you out there unguarded," came a shy voice. Claude jolted, his back suddenly ramrod straight, and everyone turned.

Ramona didn't need the confirmation from Claude in the form of an incredibly nervous smile; she knew immediately that this was his sister. Sicilienne Verelia stepped into the room on the first floor of the tower with the same easy grace that he had always carried himself with, even if he sometimes fumbled his way out of palace vents. She had those same lavender doe eyes, the same pearly skin—although hers was dotted with curious white flecks, everywhere except for her face. Instead of blond curls her caramel-brown hair fell in soft waves, her just-too-long bangs pinned back neatly with a barrette that matched her cloudy ballet-pink dress perfectly. The patch over her right eye was a striking difference as well. Oh, but the gloves—she wore white silk gloves just like Claude did, hers detailed with lace.

"Claude," she said in greeting, with a little curtsy.

Never had Ramona seen Claude quite so... afraid. He had to have worshiped the very ground the young girl walked on to look so guilty in her presence. He swallowed. "Sicilee—"

"You, brother, are a lying wretch."

He heaved a sigh, rubbing away an oncoming headache blooming at the bridge of his nose. "There's a lot you're never gonna understand."

"I don't need to. Tragic circumstances aside, nothing warrants plunging a little girl into an ocean of illusion and insincerity."

Who gave this girl such a massive thesaurus?

"This whole world is insincere!" Claude snapped, already wide awake whereas Ramona was barely mustering the energy to follow their conversation. He was what one might call a bittersweet morning person. "Nothing comes for free, least of all a happy childhood. Were you happy, Sicilienne?"

Her posture changed, and though she was an ethereal beauty and an angel of destiny, for a moment she was simply Claude's lost little sister. She lowered her lashes. "I was. Still I am."

Claude exhaled deeply. "Then you'll have a better life than I ever have, and that's all I need. I don't need you to approve of me." But watching him say it, it clearly wasn't true. His obvious desire for her approval was etched in every inch of his face. He longed for it like the lungs longed for air. Ramona had never seen him look at anyone or anything like that. Maybe that was what it looked like to love someone. She wouldn't know.

Sicilienne cleared her throat after an uncomfortable pause, glances darting between the others in the room as if she'd only just remembered that they weren't alone. "Well. Um. I suppose if nothing else it is a delight to finally meet your friends. I have heard a great deal about each one of you."

"Aw, Claude writes about us?" Bear said with a mockingly sweet tone, batting his lashes at Claude, who shot him a flat look.

"Good things, I hope," Lindsay added, batting her lashes as well.

Sicilienne clearly couldn't help her small smile. Ramona figured that from an outside perspective their somewhat chaotic dynamic might have been at least a little funny. Friends wasn't even really the right word to describe them. Immature mutual nuisances who all tolerate each other for monetary purposes seemed more fitting. "He writes... things about you, certainly," she said with amusement dancing in her eye. She turned to the closest person to her and held out her hand to shake. "I take it you are Ramona," she said politely, her voice still quiet. Ramona didn't miss the brief glance at her hair, but Sicilienne quickly looked away, shuffling awkwardly on her toes.

"Lovely to finally meet you," Ramona said with a wink. "Likewise, Claude never stops going on about you."

"I can't believe she's real," Penny muttered, narrowing her eyes at Sicilienne. "Like, I'm still not sure."

Sicilienne smiled shyly—the innocent, genuine sort of smile that belonged to the heart of a child—revealing pretty dimples. Ramona hadn't seen a smile like that up close in a long time. There was no room for children in her line of work, or at least not real ones. Any children who led lives like hers became adults very quickly. She tilted her head.

"How old are you?"

The girl twirled her fingers through her hair, avoiding eye contact as she answered, "Just seventeen."

This surprised her. She didn't look anywhere near Minerva's age, and it felt near impossible to believe they could only be a single year apart. Sicilienne exuded youthful innocence, approaching things little clumsily and a little cluelessly. It was clear that, while based on the way she spoke she could likely recite several pages out of a book, she hadn't yet grasped the way the world worked. She seemed to be taking great offense to Claude's shortcomings—which were mere inconveniences at this point to Ramona if not in fact useful. Frankly, Ramona found herself wondering when Sicilienne had last interacted with an actual human being.

Minerva, on the other hand, was shadowed by some kind of faraway grief, her childhood ripped from her with only hardship to replace it. And she expected from people exactly what she got: greediness, selfishness, everyone ready to exploit whatever they could get their hands on. Thus, she treated them as such. It was really no wonder she showed such little fondness for anyone around her.

No, no—the two of them may have only been a year apart, but Minerva was considerably older. Older in that she'd seen and experienced what Sicilienne had apparently been sheltered from. Older in that her faith was lost and her trust shattered. Older in that she understood what no one should have to understand, but everyone needed to.

Funny how that was.

"And these paintings are yours?" asked Bear, admiring the canvases covering the walls.

"Oh," she mumbled, reddening, "yes."

"They're lovely, wow."

She looked a little unsure how to respond, and tugged at the lace on her gloves before squeaking out a "Thank you."

Everyone looked at each other half-expectant and half-wary. Now that they were here, it wasn't exactly clear what should happen next.

"Um," Sicilienne said again. What a silly thing to say for such an obviously educated girl. Um. What useless waste of breath. "You all... you all must be hungry, I think. And I should inform the Writer that you're awake. If you'll follow me this way—" she gestured for everyone to follow her, confidence slipping into her voice with the decision— "we can head upstairs."

She ducked her head and started back towards the small pocket in the corner where the doorway was hidden, beginning up the stairs. Ramona caught her trip momentarily over her own feet and smirked slightly despite herself, retracting her previous assumption. Claude had to be the graceful one.

Claude was there in an instant, trailing after her with a slightly dazed expression on his face. He was apparently more unsettled than anyone about the whole thing. Minerva poked at Ramona's wings.

"Ow!"

"I'm just making sure your sling is on properly," she muttered, and Ramona flexed her scapula, feeling an adjustment at her back. She held out her arm.

"Would you mind—?"

Minerva didn't bother to respond, just linking her arm with Ramona's as they trudged up the staircase that wound its way up the tower. She glanced through a passing window and was relieved to see Gray parked outside. The higher floors were each completely unique, some of them visible from behind the staircase railing as their doors had been left open. She paused to peek inside a bedroom that must have been Sicilienne's judging by the decor. She wondered where the Writer slept, if he slept at all.

Claude's sister led them to a sprawling, magnificent library that somehow felt like an entire field compared to all the other rooms in the tower. Some kind of enchantment, Ramona figured as she looked up at the ceiling in awe. Rows and rows of more books than she would ever even think to read were all around her. All colors, shapes, and sizes. More significantly, this was the most magic she'd felt anywhere, ever, in her life. She turned over her hands, eyes widening as her veins pulsated gold through her skin. She looked to Minerva for confirmation she wasn't alone.

Minerva looked just as amazed as she was, and held up her hands as well. Her fingers were stained in a sort of purplish-reddish-black, and her eyes flashed red briefly before fading to their usual sharp jade green. Penny didn't seem to be showing any changes, but the hair on Bear's hands stood up and lengthened into fur, his nails sharpening into claws. He gaped at them for a few moments before they returned to normal.

Wow.

Sicilienne fiddled with a thin gold band that sat around her neck, taking a deep breath as if to mentally prepare herself for speaking with them, and Ramona made an observation that explained her educated style of speech. Voice corrector. Although, with all these books, she didn't really see the use for one. She realized then that Claude tended to pocket things he claimed his "sister" would like, which had always been scoffable for the others, but now made a whole lot of sense. Given that she did exist, he must have been sending her various collectibles by post.

Sicilienne picked up a book and set it down on a large desk, smoothing a hand over the cover, and the thieves stepped closer to examine it. Lindsay breathed in sharply, recoiling. A shimmery slipper was printed on it—the ballroom dancing kind, not the sleepwear kind—and in gold letters it read Cinderella. Below it, a subtitle: Ella Desdemona Hartley. Sicilienne glanced at Lindsay then back to the book, and as she flipped it open her hands trembled slightly.

"When I saw you in the palace," she began, "I could have sworn that I'd seen you before."

Claude's brow furrowed. "What do you mean, 'in the palace'?"

"Well, I wasn't there," she amended quickly. "But I did watch a memory of the queen's death. It's a, um, Writer thing. And you—Lindsay, correct? Lindsay seemed familiar." She flicked through the pages until she landed on one that displayed a snapshot of two brunette girls shouting at a slightly shorter blond girl, hassled with laundry and dishes and dressed in servant's rags. Any old idiot could recognize that picture. They'd seen something similar on the walls of FastTrav. It was Cinderella and her stepsisters. Sicilienne tapped a finger to the stepsister on the left. "Took a bit of thinking, but I was skimming through the Famous Six after everything that had happened, and realized where I had seen her before. Cinderella."

She slid the book aside and set another one on the desk. The Wicked Stepsister: Lindsay Elizabeth Amata. And a third. The Cruel Stepsister: Alexis Anastasia Amata. The latter was somewhat thinner a volume.

"Wicked?" Lindsay said huffily, turning up her nose. "Bah. Where's 'The Misunderstood Stepsister'?" She pointedly refused to look at her sister's story. All of them were well aware that Alexis had long been dead.

Sicilienne cleared her throat, hesitating, but opened Lindsay's book and skipped to a page with an image of all six thieves on it. "Um. So. That's how I found the rest of you. I have some of the books right here—" she pulled them out of a drawer in the desk— "but I haven't found Claude's or Penelope's. I would have asked the Writer for help, since he probably knows where to look, but he's busy just about every second of every day and I feared bothering him. It isn't easy keeping track of... you know. Everyone in existence."

Minerva looked mildly intrigued, which probably meant she cared more than she was letting on. "So we're really entertaining this Writer theory now, aren't we?" It was finally clicking for Ramona, too. Minerva had always believed somewhere deep down that the Writer was real and Claude did know something about all of it. But Ramona? She'd just been humoring Claude for a while—trusting him blindly, maybe, whether that was in good judgment or not—but they were here. They were all in. It was real now, and in a way, it changed everything.

The Writer was real. That meant that destiny had to be real. Slowly she realized that this meant the lens through which she saw the world was being completely flipped inside out.

Sicilienne blinked but smiled brightly. "The Writer always says that theories are just truths that aren't quite ready to be proved yet."

"I'm sure the Writer says lots of things," said Penny, crossing her arms, "but I'd like to meet this scoundrel before believing a word he says."

"Why, of course. It's difficult to believe that which cannot be proven."

Everyone's heads turned in the direction of the newest arrival, like moths to a flame.

The Writer was tall and thin, wearing a long coat and carrying a walking stick. His hair was carefully combed back but still curled over his ears beneath his fedora, and he exuded an aura of something Ramona couldn't quite identify. He sported closely shaved salt-and-pepper stubble and looked like he had to be in his late forties, but his eyes were ancient and all-knowing, like he saw everything in the world occurring at once. Looking at him, he just seemed... she really didn't know. There was something both ambiguous and secure about him, like he could be anything and everything at once but what he was would never change. "Not everything you see is the truth, Miss Windsor," he said as he approached them, his relaxed smile and posture making Ramona cautiously drop her guard, "and not everything that's true you can see."

Sicilienne was visibly relieved that he'd come, and seemed to be more comfortable now that they were in his presence. Either she deeply trusted him or he just had that effect on people in general. Ramona wasn't entirely sure, because she was feeling pretty comfortable too. Yes, trusting strange omniscient beings wasn't ideal, but where she should've felt hesitant, the Writer seemed like someone she'd known all her life.

The Writer shook everyone's hands in turn. "Penny Windsor." Penny eyed him warily.

"Bernard Bear—or, no, they still call you Baby, don't they?" he said with a twinkle in his eye as Bear shook his hand, seemingly a little confused but smiling back all the while. The Writer turned to Lindsay. "Lindsay Amata. You look quite the same, you know."

Minerva shook his hand slowly, her eyes fixated on him intently like she could fish out all his secrets if she just stared long enough. "Laurette Lynon. Minerva now, correct?"

"Right." The ribbon tied across her hand and up her arm got caught on one of the multiple rings he wore, and he had to shake it loose. "You a married man or a collector?" It was mostly a question to prod at him; there was very obviously no wife in sight.

"A long time ago," he responded with a sigh, "I collected souvenirs along my youthful ventures. Perhaps I would have gotten my ears or my nose pierced instead, but I think I'm glad that I didn't—aren't you?"

Even Minerva smirked a little from the sheer stupidity of the half-joke. For such a mysterious, magical figure, he sure did seem down-to-earth. The Writer turned to Ramona next. "The Ugly Duckling. You've grown into yourself."

She didn't feel like it. Least of all now. She'd never been more overwhelmed and confused with both herself and the state of the world around her.

He frowned. "S'pose that's valid, isn't it?"

Ramona blanched.

No.

"Sorry," he added sympathetically. "I know you aren't fond of telepaths."

You have got to be kidding me.

So he wasn't trustworthy after all. Ramona reminded herself of the insight Claude had given her—We're dealing with a man. Not a god. Men could lie and cheat. And boy, did they.

The Writer politely ignored her thoughts if he could hear them. Lastly, he shook Claude's hand. "The last time we met you came for your sister. And here we are again."

"Yeah," Claude said with an edge to his tone. "Kinda how my life works. Anything's goin' on with Sicilienne, and I'm here. So why don't you cut to the chase and tell us what this is all about?"

He tapped his cane. "Fair enough." He looked at them each carefully. "Do you all know the significance of a fairytale? And I mean really understand it."

"We call them life-books," Sicilienne said softly, fingers brushing over the cover of The Cruel Stepsister. "Live records of the human experience. Not just humans, in fact—everyone, from the little cricket to the fearsome ogre. Some become more significant to culture and history than others. Some are merely devices to move along the story of someone larger."

"My job is not to dictate the trajectory of these stories but to manage them," the Writer went on. "To ensure that the world doesn't spin itself into a frenzy. It is not my job to interfere."

Ramona folded her arms. "Until now."

"You'd be correct, Ramona. See, the world is on track to erupt into complete and total anarchy, and I won't stand by and let it happen. Mark my words, each royal will drop one after another until everything has descended into disarray, nothing left to anchor society anymore. This is the goal of the enemy."

She was still unclear on who exactly this supposed enemy was—

Lindsay snatched up her life-book (or whatever) from the desk and skimmed it. "So these are all active records of our lives? As in, everything?"

"Of course," answered the Writer, and Lindsay mumbled something about a severe invasion of privacy. Sicilienne turned to him.

"Oh, if you'll—"

"Give me a moment." He wandered over to the bookshelves, set down his cane, and swung onto the rolling ladder with notably little caution. He seemed to think himself a little too youthful for a middle-aged (or, likely, much older and simply with the appearance of one middle-aged) man who sat around writing all day. Sicilienne fiddled with her gloves, watching him uneasily.

"Do be careful, sir."

"I'm fine, Siciliee—I'm not an invalid."

Moments later he returned with two new stories, handing them to Claude and Penny respectively. Penny made a face at hers, which read The Frog Princess.

Sicilienne gave Ramona hers, and her breath hitched slightly at the awkward little duck printed on the front cover. The Ugly Duckling. And below it, Ramona Suna Ambers. There was no 'Ramona Swan' to be seen here, and she tilted the cover away from the others slightly, hoping no one would notice. It didn't matter in the long run, but a small part of her still didn't want to have to face that particular facet of her mask, especially not to Claude. Luckily, he had busied himself with skipping furiously through his own book.

A wave of nostalgia washed through her as her eyes roved over the first few pages, skipping to the ones with pictures. Her hometown, her adopted mother and all her siblings... her being pushed around and taunted in primary school... the day she was shoved off a roof because you've got wings, can't you fly? It wasn't happy nostalgia, really, but somehow it was still there, digging into her skin and cutting through to her soul. She found herself flipping further—the day she ran away. Her first night in a local jail. All the petty crimes of her early teenage years and her gang affiliation in the later ones. A gun to her head. A wordsmithing blond pickpocket. A string of robberies, a small gang of her own. All the people she'd met, all the stories she might've touched along the way.

But eventually it ended, all the rest of the pages blank. Like there was still so much left to be written and read...

Claude held up his book, his mouth agape. "Are you kidding me? This is the title I get to cover my whole life?" He read off the cover. "'The Servant Who Retrieved Rumpelstiltskin's Name'. That's it? That's the only thing significant I'll ever do? I wasn't even a real servant in the palace! We were there to rob the place." He made eye contact with Sicilienne and winced upon realizing what he'd said. But it was too late anyway. All his cards were on the table with his sister.

"And that's what you get for ruining a perfectly well-set-up heist," Linsday told him, turning up her nose. Minerva's brows stitched together, and she held up her own book.

"You think that's bad. Look what I got. 'Beauty's Third Jealous Sister'. I'm not even the jealous sister, just sister number three. I'm actually kinda offended now. How come Duckie got a better title?"

Ramona laughed incredulously. "Ugly isn't really that much better than jealous, to be honest."

"Bear's got the best one," Penny pointed out. His was called simply Baby Bear, subtitled Bernard Bertrand Bear. That was a lot of Bs. "We all call him that anyway."

"I dunno, Pen, I think 'Frog Princess' is kinda catchy," he replied with a cheeky grin.

"I think we deserve better than these dumb titles, Mr. Writer, sir," Claude huffed, dropping the Servant book on the desk. "Can't our destinies ever be more than this?"

The Writer considered him thoughtfully. "If you'd like my honest opinion?"

"Have at it."

"Before this incident, no. You're an extra. Your job is to serve a purpose in the background that propels the plot of someone else's story forward. After that, you might have been living in a Wolfswagen content with achieving precisely nothing for the rest of your life. It didn't matter what happened once you'd fulfilled that purpose. But now..." He trailed off hesitantly, like he wasn't so sure anymore. "Now everything has changed. Your destinies all churned up and spat back out, lost in the woods, mixed together and then divided again in not quite the right way. The tables have turned. Who knows what could happen now."

Ramona held onto The Ugly Duckling tightly. What had she done to deserve her own nickname for a title? Could she really be the protagonist of her story? Bear was an integral part of the relatively widespread tale Goldilocks, but she couldn't name anything of importance that she'd ever done. She'd never achieved anything that little Ramona at the beginning of the story wanted. She'd never found her real family or discovered true meaning.

But maybe that meant her story wasn't over.

-ˋˏ✄┈┈┈┈

Another awkward cut because it was really difficult to find a good place to do it. Oh well. Also, spellcheck tells me scoffable isn't a word, but the council has made a stupid decision and I'm electing to ignore it. I use made-up words every once in a while anyway, like boulderous. Only the grammar Nazis will notice, which is why I'm quite aware of the issue myself, but it's a little fun ignoring spellcheck and being ever-so-slightly rebellious in that way. Oh no. I'm getting formal-worded. I must have been spending too much time writing reviews.

I have been looking to submit some of my stories; specifically, this one and TQH; to a review shop myself, but why does everyone demand such a hefty payment ("follow me permanently and read x chapters of my book and comment genuinely x amount of times and give me a shoutout on your message board") for reviewing, like... 3-5 chapters, usually? A lot of reviewers limit themselves to that few. Even considering submitting a form seems daunting and exhausting because of this, and the concern that you won't really get that much out of it. Just seems weird to me since I don't personally do payment, although I guess it makes sense given that they're spending their time on you. I still wouldn't want through-the-teeth complimenting comments from people who are paying me for a review and don't actually care about my story.

In all fairness, the people who read 3-5 chapters almost certainly don't take months to write reviews like I do. The search for the right reviewer continues. Wish me luck.