Chapter Text
“Welcome to Arboria, Your Majesty,” Veronica said, hands on her hips and a smile across her face, her volume and posture making up for her small size.
Serena nodded along, letting Veronica take the lead as usual, but smiling her own welcome for Queen Frysabel. Then she tilted her head to the side, curious. “Did you come here all alone, Your Majesty?”
“No. Well. Sort of.” Frysabel looked away for a moment. “My, ah, escort was taking his time, and I did not want to tarry.”
“What kind of escort did you bring?” Veronica asked.
“Well, you see,” Frysabel said, then paused with an odd expression crossing her face. “There comes a time in any young ruler’s life when she must consider matters of marriage.”
“Who are you quoting?” Veronica asked wryly.
“Oh, take your pick. My father, Yggdrasil keep him. My maid. Six different well-meaning nobles.” Frysabel’s mouth twitched. “Krystalinda.”
“Is Krystalinda proposing at last?” Serena asked before she could think better of it, a dozen gossip sessions with Veronica having planted the idea of romance between Frysabel and the witch firmly in her mind until she forgot it was only speculation.
Frysabel gave Serena a crooked smile and adjusted her glasses. “I’m afraid the crush was the other way around, and she turned me down. Just laughed, patted me on the head, and told me I could try again in a hundred years, when I’m older.”
“Oh. Oh, I’m so sorry. Oh, there I go, putting my foot in my mouth,” Serena said and pressed a hand over her mouth.
Frysabel shrugged and offered a better smile. “It’s all right. It was hard to work up too heavy of a broken heart over her when she started making a point to treat me like a child for a couple weeks. I’ll always admire her, but I don’t think I’d jump at the chance if she changed her mind right now.”
“Well, who is your suitor now, then?” Veronica asked, never one to dwell too long on uncomfortable feelings.
“Prince Faris.”
“Oh!” Serena exclaimed, tentatively optimistic on behalf of their queenly friend.
“What?!” Veronica squawked at the same time. “That —”
“Veronica!” Serena scolded, alert enough to realize that Veronica’s bluntness was likely to be rude, given the first impression she’d never quite let go of. Veronica had the good grace to look the tiniest bit embarrassed.
“Well, I’ve always known I might marry for political advantage,” Frysabel said with a small smile. “If I can’t find a beautiful, powerful witch to marry, I can’t say that I have any very strong feelings about the matter.”
“Faris, though?” Veronica said.
“Veronica,” Serena said again in a warning tone. She turned to Frysabel and added, “He might not be a powerful witch, and maybe he’s been a bit of a late bloomer in other ways, but he has his good qualities, too. Don’t you think so, Veronica?”
Of course Veronica knew very well that Serena, herself, had very frequently been called a late bloomer. Veronica, in fact, called Serena a late bloomer all the time.
Veronica crossed her arms, looked away, and cleared her throat. She raised her voice again and asked Frysabel, “Well, where did you leave him? Do we need to go rescue him?”
“He was on the road, bundled in the best traveling gear we have to offer, riding a very capable horse that is well suited to the terrain and climate. But he refused to gallop, even though the road is as fine as it ever gets, and I did not wish to keep you waiting all day for me when we have things to be getting on with.”
“You left him alone on the road?” Serena asked, a little worried in spite of her defense of the prince.
Frysabel waved a hand dismissively. “Such a great knight should certainly be able to handle himself. He said so himself. His horse will follow after the one I rode to the waystation at the base of the mountain. The monsters are not even bothering to approach the road these days. And the day is cool enough that the ice ladders I left to scale the cliffs will linger without melting. I made them with plenty of texture for the sake of good traction. He should be fine.”
Serena traded another look with Veronica, who raised an eyebrow. But Frysabel spoke before either of them could weigh in, immediately distracting both of the twins from the subject.
“I’m sure you don’t want to make small talk about the journey when you’ve already been waiting so long for this! I have the counterspell memorized and ready, if you’re prepared to trust me. Or I have some notes about it if you want to review —”
“I trust you!” Veronica interrupted. “Please, I am so ready to be done with this curse. Do you know how exasperating it is to still have to ask for help every single time I want to get something off the top shelf in the kitchen? Anyway, after all of our correspondence, I know perfectly well that this is more your school of magic than either of ours.”
“All right then,” Frysabel said, a genuine smile filling her face. “Then close your eyes and hold still, and I shall begin.”
Serena forgot about Faris and everything else as Frysabel adjusted her glasses, nodded to herself, then raised her hands and began chanting.
She watched as Veronica took a deep breath, held it, and let it out, creating a little cloud of fog in the briskly cool air — no, not fog, smoke. Magical smoke, forming a little cloud in front of her unnaturally small sister, and then spreading, growing, surrounding, hiding Veronica from view.
Serena watched the cloud of smoke grow, holding her own breath and clasping her hand together tightly enough to hurt. She could see Frysabel through the edge of the cloud, but she couldn’t see her sister at all.
Then Frysabel shouted the last few words of her chant and made a sharp upwards motion with her hand. The smoke shot upwards into the sky to disappear, and at last there was Veronica, just as tall as Serena, as tall as she was supposed to be. The original-sized version of her signature red dress looked strangely stretched-out after so much time looking at the child-sized version of it.
“It worked! Serena, it worked!” Veronica crowed triumphantly.
“Oh, Veronica! I’m so, so glad.”
Serena took a step forward, thinking to joyfully embrace her sister, but Veronica was already turning to exuberantly hug the visiting queen. “Frysabel, I could kiss you!”
“I — oh,” Frysabel looked startled, and her cheeks turned pink as she returned the hug. “Oh, you just meant...Well! I am very happy to have helped!”
Veronica pulled away and started to turn towards Serena, but her eyes caught on Frysabel’s expression. Her own eyes and smile widened just a little bit, before she laughed and stepped over to deliver Serena’s expected hug, obviously too happy about being free of the curse to instantly follow up on the probably-accidental flirtation.
Although Serena knew her sister well enough to know that probably wasn’t the end of it. Not after months upon months of Veronica grumbling about her own inability to so much as wink at a cute girl, every time she spotted Serena reading a romance novel.
“Serena, I’m going to go steal some of your clothes,” Veronica declared as she stepped away, visibly brimming over with satisfaction over the statement, because after all, they’d thought nothing of swapping outfits for their whole lives until suddenly, for the past couple of years, they couldn’t swap clothing at all.
“I expect I ought to pay my respects to your elder while I am in town,” Frysabel said, still a little flushed.
“Great. We can walk you over there, and we’ll come meet you in a little bit?”
“Serenica’s dress?” Serena looked Veronica over, faintly startled.
“You don’t mind, do you?”
“No, of course I don’t. You do have as much claim as I do. And it’s not like I’m eager to wear it in this town.”
“Well, I’m not wearing it for anyone from this town, am I?” Veronica said, waving a gloved hand and adjusting her hair. She’d undone her braids but hadn’t brushed it out, so her hair fell in waves down her back.
“Are you sure you should really be flirting with her now, of all times? While someone else is courting her?”
“What, Faris?” Veronica raised her eyebrows.
“Veronica, please. I realize he didn’t make the best first impression on you, but people can change. We can get better.” She hadn’t quite meant to lump herself in with Faris so directly until the words came out of her mouth, but once they had, she decided she didn’t mind at all. After her own magic had taken so long to come in and be useful in her childhood, she never cared to write off anyone as a lost cause. “You haven’t even seen him in over a year.”
“All right, all right, point taken. I’ll give him a fair chance. Long as he doesn’t try to take credit for our hard work again, I’ll play nice. But you heard what Frysabel said. She’s longing for a beautiful witch. I’m sorry to say, I don’t think Faris has much of a chance in that arena, and if Krystalinda’s gone and boxed herself into a mom role, I figure I’ve got better odds than just about anyone. Plus, she clearly doesn’t care about Faris, not like that. I figure, if I can win her over in a night, I’m doing both of them a favor. Better to make my move now rather than after they’ve both resigned themselves to their fate, right?”
“Well. Maybe so.”
“Besides. It would be a shame to waste a minute more of this,” Veronica added, waving a hand at her freshly adult form and grinning.
Serena laughed, suddenly reminded what a self-esteem boost it was to have a self-confident identical twin praising their shared appearance. Of course, she figured Veronica’s open confidence probably gave her an edge between the two of them when it came to attractiveness, but she still always felt a little better about herself after one of Veronica’s bragging sessions.
She took her own turn to rifle through the closet, and she pulled out a heavy cloak from the depths, knowing she’d need it on the Snaerfelt without Veronica’s handy warmth cantrips.
“What’s that for? Were you going somewhere?” Veronica asked.
“Well, I figured you would appreciate some alone time on your date, won’t you? And I thought I ought to just pop down the mountain and look for Faris.”
“By yourself?” Veronica asked, visibly startled.
Serena raised her eyebrows. “Shouldn’t I?”
“Oh, well, it’s just that you don’t usually...I mean, of course, you’ll be fine. It’s not like there’s anything terribly malicious in the wilderness anymore, since we took care of things,” Veronica said, waving a hand vaguely upwards to suggest Cetacea or the Dark Star. “Even your offensive magic isn’t half bad these days. Are you going to take your spear?”
“Yes, I am going to take my spear,” Serena said, long resigned to everyone in her family being a little on the overprotective side.
“All right. See you around sundown, then.” For a moment, that sounded like a goodbye, but then Veronica suddenly turned to look at her. “Hey, listen, let’s go celebrate soon with just the two of us, okay? I mean, I don’t want to abandon Frysabel during her first-ever visit to Arboria, even if she wasn’t brilliant and gorgeous, but you and I should go do something fun together, too. Maybe we can go back to that bar in Hotto and get our revenge by making up really awful haikus.”
Serena laughed, feeling her spirits rise before she’d even realized she was feeling down over the idea that Veronica would rather celebrate the first day of her restoration by focusing on someone else. “Well, it’s a little like a bonus birthday, I suppose, so it’s fair that you pick. If that’s what you want to do with your reclaimed maturity, I’ll be happy to go along.”
“Great. I’ll look forward to it.” Veronica grinned at the teasing, and the sisters traded a wave as Serena settled her spear on her back and turned to leave.