Chapter 26: It's All Been In Vain

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"What was that noise I just heard from the palace?" Audrey demanded, her voice cutting through the stillness like a knife

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"What was that noise I just heard from the palace?" Audrey demanded, her voice cutting through the stillness like a knife. She glared at Chad, her deep brown eyes glowing a fierce red, igniting with frustration. A heated flush spread across her cheeks as anger bubbled just below the surface.

"Keep it together, Audrey!" She murmured under her breath, her fists clenching at her sides, nails biting into her palms—a physical outlet for the chaos swirling inside her. "Shove off the anger! Play it like you don't care what anybody does around you!" She fought the urge to scream as the lessons she had been forced to learn in the past came crumbling to pieces. "All her mastery of them now felt vain because of Mal and Ben becoming a couple. The sound of her suppressed rage echoed like a caged animal desperate to be free.

"Who was that? Who did Mal let under the palace roof beside her precious VKs and Jane?" Her voice dripped with incredulity.

"We have a new fairy student from another world at the school!" Chad mumbled, barely meeting her gaze.

"Without Fairy Godmother's authorization?" Audrey shot back her tone sharp slicing through the air like glass.

Chad nodded, swallowing hard knowing he was treading on thin ice. Sometimes silence was the only way to survive her storm.

"Of course, Princess Mal is quite the rule breaker! And that will never change!" Audrey growled, her voice low and menacing. Each word dripped with venom revealing her disdain. She could already see it unfolding in her mind: Mal's reckless choices would come back to haunt her, pushing her trio of friends away one bad decision at a time.

"Being the princess-to-be, she doesn't need authorization, not anymore, Audrey," Chad offered gently, hoping to soothe the tension, but knowing it probably wouldn't work.

"Get out, Chad!" she hollered, her voice echoing off the walls like thunder. "I need some privacy in my own dorm. See you in class!" She thrust him out the door; the slam of it reverberating behind him as she turned back to the mirror.

Staring at her reflection a scowl etched deep on her face; she recalled the countless hours spent trying to mirror her mother's beauty. The once-brown strands of her hair were bleached blonde now interwoven with pale aqua hues, transforming her into someone she barely recognized. All of it for what? A grand entrance, a warm welcome that never came.

The ugly thoughts tangled in her mind, and with each heartbeat, the weight pressed heavily on her. "All that work, all that money—gone down the drain!"

"Mal is going to pay for sending my life spiraling into chaos!" she hissed; her voice low and dangerous. A surge of fury coursed through her as she snatched a picture frame from her vanity. It was a snapshot of her and Ben, smiling in a moment that now felt foreign and far away.

With a swift motion, she hurled it against the mirror. The glass shattered in a dazzling display of shards, reflecting fragments of her fury and despair. The golden frame splintered, sending fine pieces flying across the floor like a storm unleashed. A satisfied smirk curled on her lips, the chaos echoing her inner turmoil as the shards caught the light, momentarily glinting like a thousand fiery stars—beautiful, yet sharp and dangerous.

"I want to meet this newcomer from another world," Audrey declared, a fierce determination lighting her eyes. "Soon, I'm sure we will meet in the next few days."

She reached under her pillow and pulled out her diary, the leather cover worn from countless moments of emotional release. Flipping it open, she was instantly taken back to the hurt she had poured onto its pages—a raw testament to a year riddled with pain. Each entry screamed the injustice of it all, recounting how Mal had not only stolen Ben from her but had ripped him away with a magical love spell. A spell that had been forbidden for years in their land.

Audrey's hands trembled slightly as she traced the inked words. "Mal never faced any repercussions for this sickly hurtful deed." The unfairness raged inside her; it felt like a fire that refused to be extinguished.

"Comeuppance must be reckoned. If she was to be the one to deliver that reckoning, so be it." Mal's days of carefree manipulation were numbered.

With a steely resolve, she closed the diary, her mind racing with plans. She would do whatever it took to win back the respect and love of the people of Auradon.

Even if it meant hardening her heart to the point where it became as frosty as winter ice.

Author's Note: I feel like they didn't really display Audrey's anger and rage soon enough in Descendants 3. We could have had a snippet into a scene sometime before Ben proposes to Mal where we see all the malice Audrey's been trying sugar coat her stirring rage in public get fully seen like a private scene in her dorm like the one up above thus forming the predicament that she was going to turn into an actual figure who gets a villain arc.

Shifting_Tide Normaniforever4

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