The Lady-in-Waiting

Chapter 16

Lucinda

This is my last official public appearance as Zora. My last chance to give her a good reputation before she chooses to destroy what I've given her. My first and only fairy godmother meeting. Fairy godmother groups have these every two months or so, so I've never gone to one before. But now, I had a chance to do Zora's job right. Colette offered to come with me to the meeting. It's nice to have a friend or a guardian figure, I guess, to go with. Colette got a chauffeur since she's the head of the Norillian fairy godmother group.

I lean my head on her shoulder and she looks at me and whispers, "It'll go fine." Out of my countless mother figures (Mother, Kara, nannies over the years, Brigita), Colette is the closest to me. While the nannies were just there to clean up after me and make sure I didn't get in trouble, Colette was the one who'd hug me and read to me, and put me to bed. When I was a kid, I asked her why she doesn't have her own family. She responded with "Aren't you family?"

"I'm scared," I tell Colette. "What if I portray the good Zora wrong?"

"We're going for another reason," Colette reminds me. "The fairy godmothers can help us know how to defeat the real Zora. By the way, I can't wait the hear the idea you have."

I'm waiting until the meeting to reveal my idea. Then I can impress them with my knowledge of magic.

_______

In the Norillian palace, Colette and I enter a large fancy recently renovated meeting room. There are windows around it and a big table in the middle with twelve seats. I sit in one with Zora's name on it and the other fairies sit in their chairs as well. I recognize most of the fairy godmothers, as I've met them via my sisters, but there are two women I don't recognize. They must be the twins' fairy godmothers. Colette starts the meeting by making her magic wand glow. Everyone looks at her as she starts talking.

"Welcome, ladies, to our January Norillian fairy godmother meeting," Colette starts. "This is a very important meeting and will be a bit different than how we usually meet. I would like to reintroduce Zora, as this is her first fairy godmother meeting in seven years."

I hear the other fairy godmothers clap, but it's forced. They're all barely smiling. They must be skeptical.

"I would also like to introduce our two new members, Christabelle and Carmella," Colette continues. "They will be the fairy godmothers of the next twin princesses."

I hear the fairy godmothers genuinely cheer. I cheer with them. These women will be raising my sisters.

"Role call," says Colette. "Heather? Dorothy? Isla? Xiomara? Natasha? Belinda? Zora? Sadie? Anya? Christabelle? Carmella? Great, everyone's here."

_______

After a lot of event scheduling and checking in on the princesses, Colette finally got to my part of the meeting.

"Now, I need to tell you ladies something about Zora," says Colette. "She's Lucinda. Zora cursed her on the trip to Lopegin and now their bodies are switched."

"I knew she was still a witch!" yells Isla.

"She should be banished again!" yells Carmella.

"It makes sense that she'd curse the heir to the throne!" yells Natasha.

I guess they're easy to convince when it comes to Zora's problems.

"But, I have an idea of how to reverse the spell," I say loudly as the yelling stops. "The other day, I was able to get Zora to lead me to the Lopegin spellbook room. There, I searched through spellbooks and found many possible ideas of how to stop her. But the most realistic idea given my abilities is to blast her using the ultimate form."