#the chainlink necklace never leaves me neck | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

crackheadh0urr · 4 years

Text

North of Inferno (Audrey Rose x OC!Fem/Daughter of Queen of Hearts)

(I got the entire first part from Archive of Our Own. This part was written by liability(overstatements)so I want to complete it and share with other and if the author is reading this right now, I love it and can you PLEASE finish it?)

I was used to the stares by now. Anyone who’s the child of exiled royalty is. The great ruler of a land reduced to nothing but insanity is something everyone talks about, forgetting the fact that they are nothing, too.

My mother isn’t my defining characteristic; she never will be. She lost the throne, her title, her castle, her riches. I’ve lost nothing, only the chance to ever live the life of luxury due to my mother’s mistakes. My mother is nothing more than a fool, the deck of cards flipping until the queen takes the place of the joker.

Now we live on the Isle. I never got to remember the castle. By the time I was old enough to walk or remember anything, I was pickpocketing on the streets of the Isle.

It’s not as if anything’s changed. Stealing is the only way to survive. No one makes an honest living on the Isle. It’s impossible. No one has friends, only bonds that are strong enough to not let the chance of food or money ruin it. Nothing matters except for survival.

Which is exactly what got me into this mess.

My hands are never empty. There’s always something in them. It’s known to never leave pockets unchecked. If someone were to keep their guard down, then there’d be nothing to protect anymore.

But that’s how I survive. The innocent who don’t know better are the ones that unknowingly help me.

I don’t have to think before I have the few cents someone has in my hand. It’s clockwork.

Taking the wrong person’s things ends badly. The sons of Gaston are rough if they find that someone’s stolen from them. I have the black eye to prove it.

Then there are other people that nobody steals from. At least, I know not to.

Dr. Facilier’s children are off limits. Since the doctor supplies all the drugs the Isle needs, nobody wants to risk being cut off.

I don’t steal from those that would be considered close to me. As long as they don’t backstab me, I keep my hands away.

And then there’s the Four. Mal Drakon, Jay Nazari, Carlos de Vil, Evie Queen. All of them have one thing in common: a connection to Maleficent, self-proclaimed Queen of the Isle.

Nobody doubts the power that Maleficent used to hold. Here on the Isle she’s nothing. She has no power, she has no staff, and her minions are petty-workers. Yet she steal strikes fear into everyone’s heart because one day maybe, maybe, she’ll get her powers back. Nobody wants to be on the wrong side of that.

It was bad luck that I seemingly forgot about my simple list of people not to steal from. Perhaps it was because I didn’t recognize her from behind, or maybe it was because of the emptiness of my stomach. None of that matters. I still stole from Evie Queen, and now I would pay for it.

Blood was bitter to taste, and it filled my nose with the scent of iron. My back dug against the chainlink fence, but I didn’t care.

A grin stretched my lips as I looked at the boy in front of me. Evie Queen stood back a little, a small frown playing on her lips as she watched everything unfold in front of her.

“Is this really necessary, Jay? All this grandeur was never really you,” I teased, tasting the blood drip from my busted lip.

“Give it back,” Evie said. She tried to sound demanding, but she only sounded weak in my opinion. She should’ve been the one holding me to the fence, not Jay. That was a coward’s move.

I laughed, “It’s all yours, Queenie, but I’m in a little situation right now. It’s not exactly like I can get it right now.”

My eyes slid to the entrance of the alleyway they pulled me in. I was on my way home when they ambushed me, and I was helpless except to provoke them into letting me go.

Jay patted me down, feeling the pocket with the item in question was: a necklace, gold with a little rust blemishing it. Evie gasped as she tore the necklace from Jay’s grasp and fastened it around her neck.

I waited a few moments for Jay to let me go, but nothing happened. “You got what you wanted, Nazari. Now let me go.”

“Don’t forget what happened to the last person who fucked with us,” Jay sneered as he released my jacket and backed up next to Evie.

Laughter escaped me as I straightened out my jacket. There was a small stream of blood dropping down onto my chin from my lip. I wiped my hand across it.

“No need to be so vague. I know what happened to them. You weren’t exactly subtle. But I think you should remember that last time that happened, it wasn’t just you there. It was all four of you, together, inseparable.” I laughed to myself. “Like a little best friends group.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, Hearts? Are you calling me a coward? You know for a fact that I could take you. I’ve done it before, and I’ll do it again,” Jay threatened, taking a small step forward.

I was playing with fire at this point. Jay Nazari wasn’t someone to mess with, but here I was. I didn’t care for my life, and I could lose it at any point. Survival would only last for so long before it got boring. Playing with the reaper was the only thing that got me through. Besides, my mother’s a bitch. She’s not worth surviving for. No one is.

“Calm down, Jay,” Evie said quietly to him. She laid a hand on his shoulder, but it didn’t seem to do any good. Jay Nazari was a prideful son of a bitch, and I was practically spitting on him.

“Picking fights in alleyways? How juvenile,” Mal Drakon drawled sarcastically from the mouth of the alleyway.

Right now, Mal was the last person I wanted to see. Her mother was Queen of the Isle, and Mal wasn’t afraid of it. If there was the chance that Mal could be humiliated, her mother was pulled out as the playing card. Mal was never threatened because a threat to her was a threat to the Queen.

Maleficent didn’t care about her daughter; nobody cared about their kids. But Maleficent’s reputation was tied to Mal’s and vice versa.

“Mal,” I spoke curtly. “Fancy seeing you here.”

“Shut the fuck up, Hearts.” Mal made her way towards Jay and Evie, standing in between them. “It is actually really fantastic that you’re here right now because my mother and I are going to be paying you and your mother a visit. Along with Jay, Evie, and Carlos and their parents.”

I tried to hide the frown on my face, but I know that they could see it. “What in the hell do you want with me and my mother?”

Fake glee spread on Mal’s face as she made her way closer to me. I was leaning against the fence as casually as I could, but the broken metal was beginning to make its presence known. I wouldn’t let them see my discomfort; I wouldn’t be seen as weak.

“We just have wonderful news, my mother and I. See, it’s this big secret not even Jay and Evie know about,” Mal fake whispered, leaning in close to my ear.

A quick glance behind her told me she was telling me the truth. Both of them were sharing a look of confusion. They had as much idea of what Mal was talking about as I did.

Mal backed up quickly and began to walk towards the exit. “You might want to hurry. My mother planned to be at yours soon. Wouldn’t want your house to look like garbage for guests, would you?”

Jay and Evie followed after Mal like obedient pets. I watched them go with a small frown on my lips. There was nothing that could be hidden on the Isle. If one person learns something they shouldn’t, everyone knows. When Maleficent got pregnant with Mal, it was big news everywhere. I was still too young to remember it, but my mother still talks to herself about it.

The humiliation the queen must’ve faced was enough to fuel my mother’s fantasies of being the Queen of the Isle for weeks. For some reason, my mother believed that Maleficent being pregnant was enough to dethrone her.

It wasn’t, of course. My mother is insane to think that it would. How she ruled over a kingdom for as long as she did is still a mystery to me. Alice dethroning her shouldn’t have been a surprise to anyone.

My mother relied on her guards to do everything for her. I don’t have that luxury.

_____

“Corin!” my mother screamed from the armchair.

I looked to her from the small kitchen that was practically part of the living room. “Yes, Mother?”

“Don’t you dare speak in front of Maleficent when she arrives. Understood? I don’t want you to make a fool of me. I know firsthand how unbelievably stupid you are,” my mother bit out.

“Yes, mother.”

I looked back down to the sink I was cleaning. There were bits of mold that had begun to grow in there due to my mother putting rotten food in there insisting that it was fine.

Her words meant nothing to me at this point. Of course, they hurt. It was my mother. But I’d forget about them by tonight. There was always something else that she’d say to replace her words before that and before that and before that.

My hands felt as if they were bleeding by the time I heard a knock on the door. They practically could’ve pushed it down from that simple force. The door was barely hanging on by a few screws.

“The door, you stupid girl! Get the door,” Mother ordered, throwing her shoe at me.

I dodged the broken heel quickly, trying to get to the door before Mother had time to get her other heel off.

In front of me was Maleficent with the coy smile she always wore on her face. I could see the rest of them cramped into the small hallway that led up to my home.

“Corin, darling,” Maleficent said as she moved into the apartment. I moved aside quickly as the rest of them filled the apartment.

Mal sent me a smirk as she passed, but the rest of the Four looked as uncertain as I felt.

Maleficent sat herself in the armchair across from my mother, leaving the rest to scatter around the small living space.

“Margaret, how do you live like this? It’s simple horrid in here,” Maleficent insulted, waving her hand around flamboyantly. “It’s a good thing I don’t live in a dump like this or none of you would ever hear the end of it.”

Everyone laughed obediently, including my mother. I could tell that she didn’t like the fact that Maleficent was insulting her home, her new castle, but I didn’t care. There was nothing false about what Maleficent was saying. The apartment was garbage, and my mother should know that it is.

“Why are we here? Evie needs her beauty sleep, I can’t have her ruining her face with bags. Look at the wrinkle on her forehead! She’s already ruining her face, and I can’t let it continue,” the Evil Queen lamented.

Maleficent sighed dramatically. “You can’t have conversations with anyone anymore, it seems. Oh, well. I suppose it is important to tell you all.

Our children have been chosen to go to Auradon Prep. They’ll be spending a year there in order to see if they can be good.”

“Carlos isn’t going. He can’t. I’d miss him too much,” Cruella said immediately, a hand on Carlos’s shoulder. I could see him tensing visibly.

“Nonsense, Cruella. Our children will be performing a very important task for us. Won’t you, Mal?”

Mal visibly straightened at the attention of her mother. Everyone knew that she wanted to be “Mommy’s Little Protege”. It would never happen, though. The title of “Mommy’s Little Protege” belonged to Maleficent’s son, Malachi.

Malachi didn’t need his mother’s title in order to become infamous. He had his own methods, some that had the rest of the villains on the Isle afraid of him. I heard rumors that they even frightened Maleficent in the sense of losing her title as Queen of the Isle, but whoever started them was quickly dealt with by the queen herself. Nobody ever heard of anything like it again, but we all know that there’s a chance that it could be true.

The fact that Mal was chosen to attend Auradon Prep probably infuriated Malachi. Mal was his little sister, and everyone knew it. Mal stood in the shadow of her mother and brother, and both of them she would never be able to escape. I knew that she wanted this to be the one thing she could do, not her brother. She’d finally be able to prove something to her mother.

I gave up on the crusade of trying to please my mother a long time ago. That bitch owed me everything now.

“We’re going to steal Fairy Godmother’s wand, and we’re going to destroy the barrier around the Isle,” Mal said. She said it with such confidence that I almost believed that it was true.

One closer look, and I knew that Mal doubted it. Nobody was foolish enough to leave shit like that just out in the open. It was probably under lock and key, away from the hands of anyone who wants it for less than kind reasons. Reasons that we needed it for.

Now Maleficent had the twisted idea that we could get it for her. She had to be high. We were kids. Yes, we were raised in a hellish environment with no hope of ever escaping, but we were still kids. No kid knew how to break in high-security places and not get caught. I didn’t. I only knew how to work the streets.

“And you’re going to do it as quickly as possible,” Jafar added. “I have some unfinished business.”

“Don’t we all,” the Evil Queen laughed. She held Evie’s chin in her hand, scanning her face for any imperfections. When she saw an eyebrow hair out of place, it was promptly plucked. She ignored the winces on her daughter’s face, only chiding “wrinkles” every once in a while.

My mother grabbed my hair, pulling me down to her level. I knew everyone saw it, but they didn’t do anything. What would they do, the parents especially? Act like they had never done it to their own kid?

“You will cut this disgusting blonde out of your hair,” Mother hissed to me, gripping my hair even tighter. I resisted wincing in order to not show weakness in front of the others.

“Yes, Mother. I’ll do it immediately after this meeting is over,” I told her, trying to convince my mother to spare me from this humiliation.

Maleficent smirked, “Lucky for you, it’s over. Hope your scissors aren’t too rusty, wouldn’t want for your hair to be damaged. But your mother is right. Blonde just isn’t your color.”

Mal obediently laughed along with her mother, following her out the door. The rest of them shuffled out, and soon it was me left with my mother. As much as I hated my mother, I think I hated all of them combined even more. They were all simply unbearable, not being able to think for themselves. Maleficent had them crawling on their knees, forgetting the fact that Maleficent was essentially powerless here.

“Why are you still sitting here?” my mother spoke, staring at the pixelated TV screen. I knew instantly what she was referring to.

I didn’t want cut my hair. The ends of my hair had been bleached dyed to a bright blonde. I’d done it weeks ago on a dare with Peia, a daughter of Anastasia Tremaine. My mother knew what she was doing. I was attached to my hair now, and now she was forcing me to cut it off.

Obediently, I did it. I watched the blonde hair fall to the floor. All that was left now was my black hair, curling just above the bottom of my ribs. I hated how much I looked like my mother.

“Corin.”

My mother was impatient when she called me, even if she called me just once. Sometimes, she believes she’s called me, but she hasn’t. She’s going insane, and it’s becoming more and more apparent.

As soon as I got close enough, Mother yanked on my hair once again. She inspected the hair, looking for any hints of the blonde.

She grunted when she saw a small bit of blonde. Mother pulled on my hair, producing a blinding white pain in my scalp as she pulled the hair from my head. I cried out, falling to the floor with my hair still in my mother’s grasp. Tears stung my eyes; I tried my best just to not let them drop to the ground in shame.

“You missed a spot,” she snarled, finally releasing my hair. I almost fell to the bare wooden flooring when she let me go.

Mother still assessed me from her place on the couch. “You will enter Auradon as Princess of Wonderland, not some slut with blonde hair. You were given black hair, and you will keep black hair.”

My scalp still burned with the force used on it. “I understand, Mother. I’m sorry that I disrespected you.”

“Disrespect me? You did more than just disrespect me. What you did was disrespect your ancestors who gifted you with your bloodline. You exist because of me, and you will free me of this hellish place. I will regain my throne, my crown, and my kingdom.”

I knew then what was happening as she continued on. She was falling into another one of her fantasies that focused completely on what she used to have. Mother was falling down an unclimbable hole of insanity. She dreamt of the things she would never have again. Even if we were to free the villains of the Isle, my mother would be dead by the time it happened. I had no doubt about it.

Her eyes were becoming glossy as she kept talking out loud to herself. Leaving her alone was usually best in these situations as I learned the hard way. It was easier for her to lash out in these circumstances.

Without another minute spent in that place with my mother, I left.

5 notes · View notes