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It was during the first semester of Raven’s enrollment in Ever After High when the Good King leaned back in a worn rocking chair, hands wrapped around a cup of Earl Grey, enjoying the oddly peaceful environment of the Mad Hatter’s Wonderland Haberdashery & Tea Shoppe. After an initial misunderstanding involving a dormouse, the Mad Hatter had brewed him a personal teapot, and provided him with a sugar bowl and a small jug of cream. The short man, who had excused himself to serve other tables, emerged from the kitchen and jaunted confidently through the room, trays balancing on his arms and one atop his enormous hat. Following the Hatter came two girls, arm in arm, one with a cloud of curls exploding from her head and one with sleek locks framing her face.
“Dad!” the taller of the two said. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to visit my favorite daughter,” the Good King’s chest warmed at the sight of his only child. “It gets a little monotonous in the castle.”
Raven smiled bashfully.
“I’m not going to infringe on your time with your friend,” he continued. “But I’ll be here, enjoying this fine establishment, if you want to come find me later.”
“Okay, Dad,” she gave him a quick hug. “Thanks.”
She ran over to the other girl, who had to be this Maddie he’d heard so much about, and the two exchanged a few words before they exited the Shoppe.
“Here you go!” the Mad Hatter cheerfully slid a three-tiered platter onto the Good King’s table.
“I didn’t order this,” he said, mouth watering at the sight of the sandwiches, scones, and petit fours.
The Mad Hatter nodded gravely, but did not remove the tower of food. Instead he slid into the vacant seat at the opposite side of the table for two.
“It…” he spoke uncertainly. “It isn’t easy, being Wonderful, in Ever After. To need make sure you’re not sliding into Riddlish. To follow the mimsy logic of an otherland.”
The Good King frowned.
“Your fledgling,” the Mad Hatter said. “She is kind to my Madeline.”
“Maddie has been a great friend to Raven,” the Good King said. “Looking beyond Legacy is a rare treat in Ever After High.”
“Still,” the Hatter patted his hand before standing up. “These treats are in your house.”
“You mean on the house?”
“Gracious!” the Mad Hatter said. “What a thought! I never had a meal on a roof before. Unless the house has no roof. But then, is it still a house? When is a house not a house?”
He looked at the Good King expectantly.
“When there is no love,” slipped out of the Good King before he could consider how revealing the words were. “At the core of every real home, there is love.”
“You’ve known fake homes, then?” the Mad Hatter asked. “My condolences. My roof is always sheltering, if you have need of it.”
“Raven turned our house into a home when she came into our lives,” the Good King said unabashedly. “But I thank you for the kind offer.”
“But she is here,” the Mad Hatter pointed out. “And now, so are you.”
The Good King remained quiet, supposing that he had a point.
“Return as you wish,” the Hatter said. “Now, I really must go deal with our bread-and-butterfly infestation. I only have so many sugar cubes.”
- - - - - - -
It was Raven’s semester break, and she had requested he not stay cooped up inside, and so it was not long before the Good King found himself once more in the village of Book End.
Or rather, it was not long before Cook threatened to contact Raven, who was staying at the Hatters’, to tell her that he had not seen sunlight in several days.
As it was a Sunday morning, and his daughter was, probably, sleeping in, he found himself wandering aimlessly, no goal in mind, until he wound up at the front door of the Tea Shoppe.
“What will it be today?” the Mad Hatter called out at his entrance. “Hats or something edible? Though, I must warn you, sometimes they coincide.”
“Hats,” the Good King decided spontaneously. “I’ll be trying on some hats today.”
“Very good,” the Hatter smiled, buckteeth on full display. “If you wouldn’t mind a few recommendations?”
“Please,” the Good King said. “I wouldn’t know where to start.”
“Hm,” the Mad Hatter tipped his head. “How do you feel about yellows? They’d look lovely on you.”
“I’ve always leaned towards the colder end of the color spectrum,” the Good King said. “But I have no objections to trying something new.”
“Hexcellent!” the Mad Hatter clapped his hands together. “Follow me!”
The Wonderlandian skipped into the backroom and began rifling through bolts of fabric, much to the Good King’s bemusement.
“The best hats,” the Mad Hatter said conversationally. “Are the ones made for you. Or by you, but I don’t suppose you have any experience with hatmaking?”
“Er, no,” the King said. “Can’t say I do.”
“Shame,” the Hatter said.
“Um,” the Good King said. “Why are you customizing a hat for me?”
“Because that’s what friends do,” the Hatter didn’t bat an eyelash.
He then held up several tassels and miniature bells to the Good King’s face, proceeding to throw them over his shoulder as he rejected each one.
“Too pale,
“Too green,
“Too metallic,
“Aha!”
He triumphantly lunged to a shelf stacked with rocks, dropping the remaining objects in his hands with a clatter, and extracted a butter yellow sheet from beneath them.
“I knew I left that to be straightened somewhere!” he exclaimed. “My, my, to think I had almost forgotten its existence!”
He expertly folded the large page into a four-cornered hat.
“Best I can do short notice,” the Mad Hatter said, plunking it onto the Good King’s bald head. “I’ll have your forever hat prepared in Time, though he and I are on uneasy terms.”
“Thank you,” the Good King’s lips quirked, as he adjusted the origami adorning his head. “I’ll treasure it.”
Any attention the Good King drew on his walk back to the Travel Mirror station was made up for by the Mad Hatter’s beaming face.
- - - - - - -
The Good King was sitting on a waiting chair outside the door to Grimm’s office during his daughter’s second semester, when the Mad Hatter rolled down the hallway, wheeled shoes slowing to a stop when he was about a foot away.
“Greetings,” the Good King inclined his head.
“Salutational,” the Mad Hatter said.
“What brings you here?”
“These fine contraptions, of course!” the Hatter lifted one leg in proud presentation, somehow balancing perfectly on the remaining wheeled sole.
“Ah,” the Good King said. “Of course.”
“So,” the Hatter said conversationally. “Why are you here?”
“My daughter got into a spot of trouble,” the Good King said. “Grimm is probably blowing things out of proportion.”
“Then I suppose we are here as a result of the same shenaniganry,” the Mad Hatter seemed unbothered. “That’s my girl, alright.”
This last bit was aimed at Maddie, who had just exited the office.
“Dad!” she cheered, rushing to hug him, and stayed with her arms squeezed around his middle. “Destiny’s despot says you two can come in now.”
“Not when he might hear, darling,” the Hatter spoke through a fixed grin.
“Shall we?” the Good King extended an arm.
“We shall,” the Hatter said as he took the Good King’s arm.
The Good King led him -and his daughter, by extension- into the headmaster’s office.
- - - - - - -
It was the summer before Raven’s Legacy Year, and Snow White was throwing a ball to raise funds for Ever After High in honor of her daughter’s “special year”.
Before leaving, the Good King had stared at his reflection, reluctant to head to the carriage that would take him to his step-step-daughter’s place. Whatever she was to him. Either way, she was the most manipulative person he’d met, and he’d been married to the Evil Queen.
So he had focused on his appearance, the irony of his mirror-gazing not lost on him. His Charming blue eyes had shone back at him, his freshly shaved head had gleamed in the torchlight, and his rich purple doublet had emphasized his shoulders, making them seem broad and defined.
He’d reveled in his scraped-together confidence, building himself up for the night ahead.
Now that he was in the ballroom, in the light of the glittering chandeliers, he felt miniscule and insignificant. Next to Snow White in her spotless ivory gown, he felt his colors gauche and over-saturated. Making small talk with her, his tongue was clumsy in his mouth, and his words heavy and stupid.
Thankfully, all parents of second-year students-to-be had been invited. The Good King’s savior cut into their conversation in all his ridiculous bow-tied and striped-pantsed glory.
“May I have this dance?” the Mad Hatter asked.
Snow White inclined her head, stepping back gracefully. Her silence hovered judgmentally, condemning the Mad Hatter in his rudeness. Whispers broke out among the mingling Royals.
Uncaring, the Mad Hatter lightly gripped the Good King’s hand, and, bowing over it, he pressed his lips to its back. The Good King had never been on the receiving end of such a gesture, until now.
“You may,” he murmured his answer, placing his left hand on the Hatter’s shoulder.
The Mad Hatter’s arm circled his waist gently, and he led the Good King in a jerky waltz around the ballroom, slightly out of sync with the music yet no less graceful for it.
“Before I was the Good King,” the Good King found himself saying. “I was a Charming. Prince Just Charming.”
“Well, then,” the Hatter’s eyes twinkled as they spun. “You should call me Hatter. I must say, it’s a pleasure to meet you Just Charming. Though you are no mere Charming.”
“I certainly didn’t get the average destiny of one,” Just said wryly.
“Tell me something,” Hatter, who apparently preferred his last name, said. “Would you say you got a happy End?”
“Mira was… a complicated woman,” Just said. “And I don’t think I know the whole picture when it comes to her. But in a roundabout way, it was through her that I discovered True Love. Only that it was the love of a parent to their child, not of a man to his wife. That stereotypical romance was never in my cards.”
“I hope it finds its way into your deck someday,” Hatter gave his right hand a quick squeeze. “Shuffle things up a bit and you never know what might show up.”
- - - - - - -
Raven’s Legacy Year had barely begun when the Day of Signing snuck up on Just, and before he was ready, it came. Almost without thinking, his hand went to his mirrorphone, and he was dialing a number he knew by heart. It might have been saved in his contacts, but he found memorizing it comforting.
“Hello, Just a King,” a chipper voice answered his call.
“Hi, Hatter,” Just smiled. “How are you?”
“Better now that I’m talking to you,” Hatter said. “Not that I wasn't doing well before, but you can always get happier.”
Just pressed a hand to his smiling mouth, feeling like a young teenager all of a sudden.
“I was wondering,” he hesitated.
“Always a good thing,” Hatter said. “What is it?”
“Would you watch the signing with me?”
“Of course,” Hatter said immediately, and hung up.
Just blinked, letting out a little laugh.
True to his word, Hatter showed up minutes later, tea and scones in tow as a treat, which was a Godmother-send for Just’s dry mouth when half an hour later they watched Raven climbing up to the podium.
“I am Raven Queen,” she said, voice shaking. “And I’m ready to pledge my destiny.”
As she watched a future only she could see take shape, her face on the screen remained frozen in the same expression of barely suppressed terror.
Then her face morphed into determination.
Just steeled himself to watch his child sign her life away.
“I am Raven Queen,” she stated. “And I’m going to write my own destiny! My Happily Ever After starts now!”
She reached for the Storybook, and the live broadcast of Legacy Day cut out with the tearing of Raven’s page.
And everything was absolutely still.
In the ensuing silence, Hatter’s hand found Just’s.
“Why is a Raven like a writing desk?” he asked solemnly.
“Anything seems possible now,” Just whispered, stomach twisting. “But it’s up to us to write it.”
Hatter slowly reached up with his free hand, removed the signature Mad Hatter hat, and placed it on the floor. Head bared, it was easy to see that his lank curls were streaked with white, foam to the sea green of his hair. His laughter-lined eyes popped bright and blue against the faded, yet no less beautiful hues of his face and hair. His unique bucktoothed smile was smaller, more subdued than usual, but it radiated pure joy.
Leaning on his elbow, Just raised their clasped hands and rested his forehead on them.
The air was heavy with unspoken words, but, for a moment, the still silence was perfect.
- - - - - - -
Barely any time had passed since Legacy Day, and Just had yet to receive a reply from Raven to any of his calls and texts.
Then Hatter texted him a two word message -come over- with no exclamation points or emojis in sight.
He booked it to the nearest Travel Mirror.
And now he stood in front of his… friend? not comprehending what had been said, a tale of broken mirror prisons and accidently released Jabberwocks.
“Banishment?” Just echoed. “But-”
“My daughter needs me,” Hatter said. “And so does yours. Do you understand?”
The Mad Hatter’s permanent grin stretched across his face, but tears slid slowly from the corners of his eyes. The Good King wiped them away with his thumb, letting his knuckles linger against the Hatter’s cheek.
“I would have gone with you,” he said. “To the farthest reaches of the most distant lands.”
“I suppose,” the Mad Hatter’s smile was fixed as though etched in stone, “it just wasn’t in our cards.”
- - - - - - -
Maddie’s sentence had been lifted, thanks to Raven’s Irrefutable Evidence spell, a level of magic she shouldn’t have been anywhere close to accomplishing.
Maybe nothing was impossible after all.
The best friends had been inseparable in the twelve hours since, crashing in Queen Castle for an unplanned weekend away from school.
The girls were sleeping in Raven’s room, and Just and Hatter were sipping charmblossom tea in the dim kitchen, talking about everything and nothing. Hatter was extolling the virtues of his guest teacup (large, full of cushions and blankets, in Tea Shoppe’s backroom) when Just realized he hadn’t provided the other man with sleeping accommodations.
“You don’t mind sharing, do you?” he blurted.
“What?” Hatter looked at him, confused. “We have tea together all the time.”
“I meant a bed…” Just bit his lip.
Hatter met his eyes, and the air between them seemed to buzz like robotic bees.
Curse it, Hatter’s way of speaking was encroaching on Just’s mind.
“Hatter?” Just whispered.
“Call me Xy,” he said. “It’s short for Xylophone. I never liked it much, but I think it will sound good coming from you.”
“Xy, then,” Just inhaled shakily. “Do you want to share a bed?”
Xy gripped Just’s shoulder.
“I do,” he said.
- - - - - - -
How had things gone so wrong?
Just flexed his hands, jaw set as he watched the Well of Wonder sparkle in the sunlight, refracting it into rainbows.
“I have to go,” Xy murmured.
Just barely heard him beneath the sounds of the Rebels filing up to the undestroyed Well, pushing each other on occasion, and jumping through the now open pathway to Wonderland.
“It’s your Setting,” Just said. “And the Evil Queen is gathering her armies there. I’m hardly going to stop you.”
Xy opened his mouth, but for once appeared to have nothing to say. He merely swallowed, and turned around, treading softly to the Well of Wonder. Without looking back, the Mad Hatter let himself fall back into the arms of his mad, poisoned homeland.
- - - - - - -
Just tripped, nearly falling, as blood-curdling howls split the night air, the pack of Grimm’s Wolves at the Rebels’ heels persistently tracking their prey. Their encampment in Ever After had been breached, and they were one twisted ankle away from gory death. Just placed his hand on the hilt of the sword at his hip.
He wasn’t a Charming for nothing.
“Go on ahead!” he called out to his comrades. “I’ll hold them off!”
He bit back words about seeing them later, knowing that such a thing was extremely unlikely.
Skidding to a stop, he turned around, drawing his sword.
A prowling wolf emerged from the trees, staring him down with yellow eyes. While focused on the leader, Just was quickly surrounded by the pack, slinking through the shadows to encircle him.
He raised his blade.
Then a goblin came out of the undergrowth. Then another. Then an orc, an ogre, a dragon in its smaller form to navigate through the dense forest, even a few pixies.
Pixies .
His former spouse’s ability to corrupt even the most apathetic was truly impressive.
“He’s ours,” the ogre rumbled.
The lead wolf shifted back into her human form, a chunk of a Rebel’s shoe still stuck in her canines.
“Tell your Queen to go curse herself,” she said.
And all Hex broke loose.
- - - - - - -
The sickly-sweet poisoned air of Wonderland filled Just’s lungs, as his ex-wife’s minions threw him at her spiky-shoed feet.
He set his gaze on her impractical boots, stubbornly refusing to look at her face, and bracing himself for her twisted mind-games.
“Goodie,” the Evil Queen called out. “Oh, second husband, dearest~”
“ What ?” he snapped at that familiar, grating tone, and regret that he’d risen to her bait so quickly filled him instantly when he met her triumphant violet eyes.
“There you are,” she patted his stubbled head, oozing saccharine sincerity. “I’ve missed our little spats.”
Her inch-long nails dug into his scalp, bared of the Rebels’ signature yellow hat, his own lying trampled in the dirt somewhere in the mountains of Ever After.
“What do you want?” the Good King asked, wincing.
“It seems like me and Giles have a common enemy,” the Evil Queen said. “And I thought he could use a little incentive to stop interfering with my plans.”
“They won’t bring Milton down just for you to take over Ever After,” the King defended the Rebels.
“Oh,” Mira smirked, almost childlike in her delight. “I’m not asking.”
- - - - - - -
“What kind of good guy refuses to negotiate over hostages?” the Evil Queen yelled her frustrations at the sky.
“Giles is hardly “good”,” Just said snidely. “He merely had a recent change of heart. But we’re still disposable characters to him at the End of the story.”
“Then why is he fighting so hard to free you all?” Mira countered. “No, no. He’s simply practical enough to know, same as you do, that deals with me always go in my favor.”
“Either way,” the Good King said. “I’m a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”
“Tch,” the Evil Queen’s lips curled. “Useless.”
She kicked him in the gut, driving all the air out of his lungs.
“Throw him in solitary,” she ordered. “He may be of more use in the future.”
As Just was dragged away, he overheard her next words.
“I’ll just have to arrange a face-to-face with that babbling fool myself.”
- - - - - - -
The Evil Queen was on her knees, forced to bow at the feet of her stony-faced opponent, as several Rebels carefully carried a looking glass into the Enchanted Forest clearing.
An off-kilter Just, having recently been extracted from enemy territory and shoved through a portal in Ever After High’s Grimmnasium, gazed morosely at his daughter’s mother, who glared right past him at Giles Grimm.
Mira’s eyes were wild, lips drawn back into a snarl, teeth bloody.
“You’ll never best the headmaster like this!” she spat around her dribbling saliva. “You need me!”
Giles looked down at the kneeling Queen coldly.
“No,” he raised his golden quill. “We don’t.”
“Wait,” Just said. “You’re going to erase her?”
The Evil Queen raised her chin.
“Duh,” Giles said, shattering the ominous atmosphere. “Kind of a no-brainer.”
“Please,” the Good King said to his creator. “Just imprison her again. No one deserves erasure.”
Mira rolled her eyes.
“You brought back the Sisters,” the Good King continued. “Have mercy on someone who was saddled with a villain’s destiny from birth.”
“A single mirror prison is too easily breakable,” Giles said. “I have a better idea this time.”
He turned to the Queen and chanted “I cast this spell out to protect; upon your deeds you shall reflect. You've failed this world to overwhelm; I banish you to the Mirror Realm!”
With an enraged howl, Mira was sucked into the reflective surface of the looking glass.
Giles Grimm slumped in exhaustion.
“I’m afraid Milton has gained control of the portals,” he informed the remaining Rebels. “The majority of our forces are trapped in Wonderland, with the Evil Queen’s headless rabble running around like a dying chicken.”
“But,” Just choked. “Hatter’s still in there…”
“As well as many, many others,” Giles stated sadly. “It appears we will have to change our tactics. I would appreciate it if you aided me in strategizing, even after your ordeal.”
“If getting rid of Grimm-” Just paused. “That is, Milton, will clear the way to Wonderland, there is no force on earth I could forgive for preventing my doing so.”
“It will be a long, arduous journey, my friend,” Giles said heavily. “The obstacles will be many.”
“Well,” the Good King raised his chin. “A Charming never quits.”
- - - - - - -
Chaos. Absolute chaos.
Just didn’t give a damn about Milton Grimm’s erasure.
“Xy!”
After over a year of grueling guerrilla warfare, the Good King and the Mad Hatter rushed towards each other.
“It’s over,” Xy laughed, gripping Just in a bone-crushing hug. “It’s finally over.”
“Not quite,” Just muttered, burying his face in Xy’s tangled, matted hair.
“Yes, well,” Xy shrugged. “I suppose our compatriots are madness-poisoned, but I’m sure without Milton and the queen of reflections butting in, that will be a cinch to fix.”
“How’d you know about Mira’s imprisonment?”
“Oh, our girls had quite the adventure in Wonderland, didn’t you know? That Vice-Principal's a piece of work, let me tell you-”
“Xy,” Just cut him off. “Mira escaped the Mirror Realm. Ever After High, our daughters, are under her thumb as we speak.”
“Well then,” Xy’s eyes widened, then hardened. “We’ll just have to do something about that, won’t we?”
- - - - - - -
Madeline and Raven were breathing softly, curled up together in the Guest Teacup, as Xy and Just drank their third cup of charmblossom tea of the night.
“It’s been quite the two years,” Just reminisced. “I never thought I’d be here. For many, many reasons.”
“It’s certainly been two years,” Xy agreed, reaching over to squeeze Just’s knee. “But we can rest now, if we wish.”
“Maybe for a little,” Just smirked. “Before all the recent excitement, I’d had enough resting for a lifetime. Things don’t need to stagnate again.”
“Yes,” Xy agreed. “I may have returned to my homeland, but I do not wish to return to steeping in sameness, as I sometimes did in Ever After.”
“To new, and better adventures,” Just raised his teacup.
“To better and newer adventures,” Xy echoed, clinking their cups together.
And as the two men slipped into slumber, their damaged, battered souls unfurled hopefully towards each other, as flowers to the rising sun.
A new chapter was beginning.
In the foreground, a humming kettle whistled merrily.