The Gingerbread Town Square was now total bedlam. Candy and toys attacked mice, kicking them, stepping on their tails, and tossing them into carts to be hauled back to the Land of the First Order. Rey saw Captain Phasma sulking as the tall female soldier skulked over to King Snoke. She was hard to miss. The fragrance that drifted behind her was somewhere between rotted, centuries-old cheese and ripened sticky-sweet taffy that had been left out in the sun too long. Anyone who took one whiff of her instantly got out of her way.
Poe blocked Hux from leaving. “Going so soon, General? You are too afraid to fight without your friend Ren around?”
Hux put up his ginger-colored paws. “I can fight you with my tail tied behind my back, you chocolate cream puff!”
The smaller soldier smirked. “Oh, that hurt, Hux. Just for that, I will not go so easy on you.”
“We'll see about that.” Hux may have had the advantage of height and a mouse's fast reflexes, but Poe was smaller and stronger. He ducked under the red mouse's skinny legs and around his back. “I am over here!”
Hux's face was getting as red as his fur. “Stay still so I can hit you!”
“Not a chance!” Poe finally delivered a solid right to Hux's nose. The mouse hit the platform with a soft whump!
“Owww!” Hux let out a wail. “I think you broke my beautiful nose!” He threw his paw over the bleeding nostrils.
Poe handed him a handkerchief...even as he started to tie him up with ropes of taffy. “Your nose, she is not so pretty as you think. It might look even better this way.”
Chewbacca and Rey had pulled Han from the front of the platform. She tugged at his chains. “I can't get these off! They're too tight!”
The elder fairy just turned to the bear warrior with a feeble grin. “Hey Chewie, how about a paw here?” Rey could barely see those paws under all Chewie's fur, but somehow, they broke the iron bands on his wrists and wings like they were peanut brittle. Han quickly brushed them off. “Thanks, pal. I owe you one.” The bear gave his friend the biggest hug he possibly could! Han gasped. “I'm glad to see you too, but right now, we need to go get Leia and make sure the Nutcracker kid's ok.”
“The Nutcracker!” Rey's voice was close to a screech. “Fat...Han, I forgot him! I have to go help him!”
Han nodded as he tested his wings. “You go get him, kid. Chewie n' I will go after Leia.” He frowned. “And by the way, have you seen Luke? He's the only one missing.”
Rey shook her head. “No, I haven't. I'm surprised. Maybe he went to get more help.”
That was when Rey heard the clatter and a sickening crunch. Han almost literally pushed her towards the combatants. “Go, kid. He needs you!”
Rey turned around just in time to see Ren slice into the Nutcracker's back and arm. He nearly cut his arm right in two. The blue candy sword skittered at Ren's feet. “I knew you were no match for me, you warped piece of trash! I should have taken you out years ago. You're nothing like the great King Vader.”
“No...I had to...to save my friends.” The Nutcracker gasped and Rey screamed as Ren gave him one last slash that left his back in splinters. “I...Rey...”
“She's mine, now.” Ren reached for the crystal sword. “As is this. It rightfully belongs to my family. I'm the heir to Anakin of the Skywalker Fairies, not you!”
“NOOO!” Rey raised her hand. “You...you bully!” Gold light flitted around her as the sun came up...and the blue candy sword flew across the platform and into her hand. into her hand. The moment the sword reached her, she felt the light penetrate her. Something inside her changed. Long golden wings burst from her back. Her white and gold gown, with it's short, stiff lace petticoats and gold beaded bodice, looked almost exactly like her fairy ballerina doll. A white crystal tiara sparkled from her brown waves.
King Snoke squeaked angrily as people in the crowd gasped. “The Dewdrop Fairy! I thought she was a myth!”
Ben held out his hand. “Give me that sword, girl. You don't know how to handle it.”
Even her voice had a different timbre to it, one that was far more confidant than normal. “You'd be surprised, Fairy Prince. I'm not going to let you hurt this poor Nutcracker or the Sugar Plum Fairies anymore. They're my friends...my family. I love them. That's what's important.”
“No!” Ben hissed. “They hate me! Father doesn't understand me. Mother cares more about work than she does about her own child. They raised that...that piece of wood and ignored me! They couldn't even be there for me for Christmas! They were too busy fussing over the heir apparent! They're nothing like King Vader, the strongest mouse who ever lived!”
“Ben, you're selfish and bratty,” she insisted, “but you're also my bro...someone's son. You're in there somewhere.”
“I...I'm not! I'm not weak! I'm more than them! Snoke says so!” He let out a growl, a pair of purple and blue wings appearing behind them. “I'm not like them!”
“We're both like them.” She raised her sword. “And that's not a bad thing. Snoke's wrong, Benjamin. They love you.”
“No!” Ben lunged for her. “Snoke wouldn't lie!”
She parried. She had no idea what she was doing. She'd only watched Ben's fencing classes. Girls weren't allowed to take part. She must have absorbed more of those classes than she thought. Not only did she hold her own, she actually drove her brother back to the edge of the platform. Of course, it helped that she was in decent shape, and he had a bleeding shoulder.
“How could you believe him?” Rey snarled, smashing at him. “He's just some MOUSE! That's all! An old man...rodent! This is your FAMILY! That Nutcracker never hurt you! Your parents care about you!”
Ben fell backwards against the platform, Rey hovering above him. “Kill me, Dewdrop Fairy. You know you want to.”
Rey's rage was blinding. On one hand, she did want to. He'd killed others, tried to kill his father, may have killed the Nutcracker, and enslaved half the Candy Army. On the other...he was a person, or at least a fairy. And he looked and acted a lot like her brother. Her brother may have been a spoiled brat who drove her crazy, but he was her brother, and she loved him.
She raised the sword. Instead of hitting him with the blades, a beam of blue-gold light writhed around him. When it subsided, he now wore a black vest over a pale purple shirt and, quite frankly, looked a lot like a younger version of the Cavalier. His purple wings unfurled behind him, darker and sharper than his mother's.
“Principe Ben!” Poe's eyes narrowed. “It is you! Only someone who knows our land and customs would be able to attack as surely or swiftly. You are traitor, not Nutcracker!”
“You're a fairy now, Prince.” Rey ignored his glares. “Your wings will be out for good. You can no longer make them disappear or hide them. You can't hide who you are.”
“NO!” He shrieked as his wings lifted him into the air. “I'M NOT A FAIRY!”
Rey rushed over to the Nutcracker. Poe had already pushed his hat under his head for a pillow. Chewbacca held him, looking concerned. “Isn't there anything we can do?”
Poe shook his head. “Not unless you know a very good toy maker or wood carver. His wood, it is all broken.”
“You...how could you love him! He's nothing! He's just a Nutcracker!” Ben hovered over them, looking confused. People in the crowd were calling out the names of wood workers or doctors that they knew.
“No, Ben!” Rey took him in her arms. “He's not nothing! He's special. He's tried to save Han and me twice. He's good and funny and brave. I don't care what he looks like. He's my friend!”
“How very touching.” Rey barely heard the crowd murmur, or saw Snoke wander over, his guards holding a struggling Han and Leia. Both had cloaks thrown over their wings and mouse paws over their mouths. “Now, boy, it's time the so-called Dewdrop Fairy and the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier joined their broken toy. Turn them all into statues. The bear and the Spanish soldier, too.”
“Do it!” Hux made his way over to Snoke, Phasma stumbling behind. She was eating the last of the taffy he'd been tied with. “Don't be a fool!”
“Ben,” Rey whispered, her eyes begging him to disregard Snoke's orders. “Please.”
Ben had just closed his eyes and raised his red candy wand when the sound of jingle bells broke through the murmurs of the early morning crowds. She heard the snorting of reindeer and a very distinct “ho-ho-ho” as people began to flee the platform.
Ok, now this was just getting weird. There was only one person anywhere who “ho-ho-hoed” like that. She immediately searched the sky, looking for a familiar white beard and bowl full of jelly. “Father Christmas?”
It could be no one but him. He was accompanied by Lady Kaydel and her entire snowflake troop. They danced around him as he landed. He had a red sugar molded sleigh with magnificent gold-foil runners and gold-leaf trim. A velvet sack the size of her room at home stuffed full of toys sat in the back.
Father Christmas was surprisingly familiar, too. He had twinkling blue eyes and a gentle, kind smile. His beard and hair were greyish yellow rather than white, and his stomach wasn't quite as round as the drawings and newspaper photos usually made him appear, but it was still him.
She almost dropped the Nutcracker. “Uncle Luke? You're Santa? Father Christmas?”
“Why yes, Rey. Have been for quite some time.” He put out his green staff, blocking Snoke's twisted metal one. “You're through, Snoke. Father Christmas won't sanction any action that could threaten this world and the people in it. The world needs Christmas magic.”
“Christmas!” Snoke glared at him. “What on Earth does the world need Christmas for?”
Uncle Luke gave him a sunny grin that Rey knew well. “It needs faith, King Snoke. Faith and hope. And above all things, it needs love.”
“Love,” the old mouse snarled, “is for fools.”
The older man in the red suit pushed him back towards his throne. “You'd be surprised.”
Rey wasn't listening to any of this. She was too busy cradling her Nutcracker. “I'm sorry,” she whispered to the wooden toy. “I couldn't save you. I wanted to.”
“It'll be all right.” He took her hand. “I love you, Rey.”
Rey looked at Han, then smiled at the wooden remains in her arms. “I know.” The male fairy smirked, nudging his wife playfully.
The moment her lips touched his cracked jaw, a brilliant gold light surrounded him. It became so intense, she and every creature and toy in the square had to jump back. It gave Han and Leia a chance to swipe their wands from their captors and turn them into ordinary, tiny-sized mice, then turn Jessika, Snape, and the Candy Army back into human creatures. They joined Poe and Chewbacca surrounding the lovers.
When the light subsided, a handsome young man in a red and white soldier's uniform lay in her arms. He had beautiful cocoa-colored skin and short, dark curls. As his eyes fluttered open, he reached up and touched her cheek. “Rey?” he whispered, his jaw working just fine now. “Rey? Did you...did I..”
Chewbacca was the first to see the change besides Rey. He almost literally tackled the youth, knocking him and Rey to the ground. “Whoa, Chewie!” The boy laughed. “I'm glad to see you, too.”
Poe helped both of them to their feet. “It is Prince Finnegan!” He got on his knees before him. “Our prince, who we thought was killed by Snoke.”
“No, I wasn't.” Finnegan...the Nutcracker...turned to Snoke, glaring at him. “I remember everything now, thanks to the Dewdrop Fairy. I fought Kylo Ren at the Siege of Gingerbread Castle. He turned me into a Nutcracker, then told me I was a member of the Mouse Army.”
Ren sneered at him. “I thought we could finally get some use out of you. My parents cared more about you than they ever did about me.”
“That's not true!” Leia pushed her way through the crowd, Han following behind. “Ben, we love you. We always have. It's just that we were Queen Viola and King Morgan's head advisers. They left their son in our care after he died.”
Father Christmas pointed his staff at Ren. “You destroyed the Gingerbread Academy in the Land of Fairies. I would have trained you to become good magicians and Father Christmas helpers. The Mouse Army didn't give me a chance. You chose to destroy everything we did, instead of listening and learning.”
“Learn what?” Snoke snorted. “That you hate our kind? That you wouldn't even give us a tiny bit of cheese? Your queen and king trapped my kind, instead of allowing us to learn magic, like those blasted fairies. All we wanted was a cheesecake, and the queen got angry when we ate hers.” Snoke shoved the wand into Father Christmas' big belly. “Magic belongs to those who know how to use it. It should go to those in power, not to weaklings like you and the Sugar Plum Cavalier.”
“Watch it, pal.” Han lunged for him. “I ain't the one who's surrounded by half the fairies in the Snowflake Meadows, about to be tossed in the frozen hoosegow.” Chewbacca had to grab his arm to keep him from grabbing Snoke and pummeling the whiskers off him.
Rey hadn't even noticed the snowflakes. They'd spread out, trapping mice in huge cages made of icicles. Kaydel made the ground under Hux and Phasma so slippery, they slid right into the largest cage.
The kindly old toy maker directed his staff to a statue in the square that depicted a mouse in a menacing black outfit. “My father found out how important love was, too. King Vader was the mouse name for Anakin of the Skywalking Fairies. Palpatine, the previous Mouse King, turned him into a half-mouse, half-machine when he fought with the previous Head Magician, Obi-Wan, and landed in a vat of hot taffy. He was a terrible king who killed and melted anyone who got in his way. He even cut off my hand when I tried to defy him, and turned Han into an ice sculpture. He repented in the end when Palpatine tried to use his dark magic to kill me, but if he hadn't died as well, he would have gone on trial for what he did.”
Rey gasped. “That's what I saw in my vision back at Maz's cottage. I saw you two dueling and you losing your hand!”
Leia removed the tiara from her head and waved her wand over it. A purple light spread around her hand, until she held a larger, more elaborate silver and crystal crown. “This is yours, King Finnegan. You're the true ruler of the Land of Sweets.”
Finnegan knelt to the ground as Leia placed the crown over his dark brow. The remaining crowd cheered with a force that could be heard well into the Dark Chocolate Mountains. Leia nodded and continued soberly “With this crown, I now declare you King of the Land of Sweets and ruler of all the candy and toy domains. May you rule wisely and well.”
“Thank you, Mistress Leia.” The Nutcracker...no, King Finnegan...stood before the crowd. “Citizens of the Land of Sweets,” he gave them a very familiar, wide grin, “I promise to do the best I can to govern as my parents did, with justice and kindness towards all.” He turned to Han and Leia, who were wrapped in each other's arms. “My first order is to appoint the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier as my top advisers. I could do no less for their dedication in raising me all those years.”
Leia curtsied and Han bowed before him. “We would be honored,” Leia said, “to serve you, just as we did your parents.”
“They were good folks, kid.” Han gave him that lopsided grin. “You turned out pretty well yourself.”
He then turned to Poe. “Commendante Poe, you are now the head of the Candy Army. Officers Jessika and Snap, you've been promoted to the top generals and heads of Poe's staff.” They all grinned and hugged one another. The young man gave Chewbacca a big hug. “And Chewbacca and the stuffed bears will be the bodyguards to the royal court.”
He turned to Mother Maz, looking up...and up...at the diminutive woman perched on the cake dress. “Mrs. Maz, we're in your debt. If there's anything you want from the royal court, name it.”
Maz put up a tiny hand. “Just seeing all of you where you belong is enough for me. I've got my kids and my cottage. Woman doesn't need much else in this world.”
Kaydel and her girls bowed before him next. “We're ready to return the mice to the Land of the First Order. We have to make it snow on the tops of the Dark Chocolate Mountains anyway.”
Finnegan shook Kaydel's hand. “Good work, Lady Kaydel. You and your Snowflake Fairies are always welcome here.” Kaydel gave him a quick curtsy before returning to her girls. They were loading the cages into the same white sugar sleigh that brought Rey and the Nutcracker to Ribbon Candy Village.
The King's eyes rested on Ben. “Master Benjamin, I'm afraid if you remain here, you're going to have to stand trial. You tried to kill me, did kill others, and kidnapped Cavalier Han and the Dewdrop Fairy. By Land of Sweets law, you'll be lucky if you're not sentenced to life work at the salt and pepper mines.”
“Then I won't stay here.” Rey couldn't help the tears that pricked her eyes when Ben's purple wings fluttered and raised him into the air. “I don't belong here. I don't know what I am, really, but do know I feel more comfortable in the Land of the First Order.”
“Benjamin!” Rey tried to fly to him, but it was too late. He'd waved his red wand around him, making himself disappear in a deep purple light. The Snowflakes followed soon after. Hux and Phasma could be heard arguing with each other all the way across Gingerbread Town.
“Darn kid.” Han raised his wand. “Come back here, boy, and stand trial like you're supposed to!”
Uncle Luke took Han's arm gently. “Let him go, Han. He has to figure out his own way.”
Finnegan nodded. “We know who he is and what he is now. We'll be able to more easily recognize his trickery and make him stand trial the next time he comes to this land.” He took Rey's hand. “Thanks to the Dewdrop Fairy, our own Rey.” He took her hand. His hands were warm now, warm and strong and surprisingly rough for royalty. She could feel callouses on his palms.
“Do you...” she smiled “do you work with machines? My hands have callouses in the same places.”
“I used to.” He gave her that sweet, huge grin again, the one that made her turn mushy inside. “I want to work on machines with you forever. Please stay with us. Marry me. Become the Queen of the Land of Sweets.”
“We'd love it if you would stay,” Leia added. “There's something so...familiar about you.”
“I do love you, Finnegan.” Rey gave him a smaller kiss on the lips. “I love you more than anything.” She sighed and raised her wand. When the gold light subsided, she was just herself again, wearing her white lace nightgown. “But I also love my family and friends. I miss them. What would they do if I stayed here? Who would take care of Bee Bee? Besides,” she shrugged, “I'm not really a Dewdrop Fairy. I don't know where that came from. I'm just plain, ordinary Rey.”
“You'll never be that.” Finnegan gave her a hug. “You're a lot of things, Rey Stahlbaum, but one of them isn't ordinary!”
Uncle Luke tapped her shoulder. “I have to get going and deliver the rest of these gifts. I could give you a ride home.”
“Really?” Rey grinned. “I'll get to ride in Father Christmas' sleigh? Oh wow, all of my friends will be so jealous!”
Now that she was really leaving, Rey wasn't so sure she wanted to. Everyone wanted a hug. Chewbacca nearly lifted her right off her feet! “You be good now,” she said into the soft fur. “Keep an eye on Han and Leia for me.”
“We will miss you, Senorita.” Poe grinned. “Don't forget us!” Jessika handed a handkerchief to Snap, who sounded like a trumpet when he blew his nose.
Han squeezed her shoulder. “Thanks for coming after me, kid. I owe you one.”
“We're in your debt, dear.” Leia smiled at her. “You've done more for us than you could ever know.”
King Finnegan gave her another kiss. “Rey...”
She threw herself into his arms, crying openly now. “I'm going to miss you most of all.”
“I will, too.” He handed her a wooden nutcracker that looked a lot like her original one. “Here. A Christmas gift, from me to you.”
“Thank you.” She wrapped her arms tightly around her new gift before finally turning to Luke. “I'm ready to go now, Uncle.”
Finnegan helped her into the sleigh next to her uncle. Jessika tucked soft fur blankets around her legs. Uncle Luke grinned down at his teary-eyed niece. “Maybe it'll cheer you up to call the names of the reindeer and start them flying.”
She wiped her eyes. “May I, Uncle Luke? Just like in the poem?”
He put an arm around her. “Of course.”
“I never thought I'd get to do this!” She sat up straighter and called the names she'd heard every year when Father read the famous poem to them. “Now Dasher, now Dancer, now Prancer and Vixen! On Comet, on Cupid, on Donner and Blitzen!”
The moment she finished, the reindeer took off like a shot! She barely had the chance to wave good-bye to the people below her. Even as she turned around, they were barely become pinpricks on the increasingly snow-covered ground below her.
She leaned into her uncle. “You know,” she said with a yawn, “there was something...strange...about the Land of Sweets. It was like I knew everyone there. Finnegan, Han, the Sugar Plum Fairy...I've seen them before. But I couldn't have, could I?”
“You never know, my little ray of sunshine.” His voice was the last thing she heard before she fell asleep in his warm embrace, still clutching her beloved Nutcracker. “You never know.”
No comments:
Post a Comment