So I'm just putting the whole thing here.
The atmosphere in the headmistress's office was tense, which made sense, what with the second in line to the throne of Auroria having recently snapped and placed much of the population of the school-not to mention the entire kingdom-under a sleeping spell, and turned the rest, including the headmistress, into stone statues.
On one side of the desk sat Audrey; on either side of Audrey sat her parents, Prince Phillip and Princess Aurora -not king and queen yet, as their respective parents, while elderly, were still very much alive.
On the other side of the desk sat Cinderella's Fairy Godmother, the headmistress of Auradon Preparatory Academy.
On the side of the desk sat Ben, having pulled up a chair for himself and cleared away some space, since he felt that neither side of the desk was appropriate for him right now, as a student of the school but also as a king.
They were here to decide on a suitable punishment for Audrey.
Not the Isle, of course. They had seen how that had worked out. But there were a lot more possible consequences for a crime than simply "lock her up and throw away the key." It seemed that the Beast, however, hadn't known this, or had chosen to ignore it.
"Community service," the Fairy Godmother was suggesting. "Especially to those areas badly affected by-"
Someone pounded hard on the door, making them all jump.
"I explicitly said no interruptions," the Fairy Godmother said, frowning.
There were a few more bangs on the door. The knocks sounded angry, if emotion could be determined by knocks on a door, which it sometimes could, depending. Whoever was at the door clearly didn't care about whatever the headmistress had said.
"I suppose I'd better answer it," the Fairy Godmother said, beginning to rise, but Phillip, ever the gentleman and also sitting closer to the door, answered the door before she could.
"If it's a student-" the headmistress started, but she didn't get to finish her sentence.
The moment Phillip opened the door someone shoved it, hard, making him stumble back.
A girl who looked like an older version of Celia Facilier except with darker, straighter hair and lighter eyes stormed in, zeroing in on Audrey. "You!" she shouted.
Several things happened at once.
Audrey stumbled back a few steps.
The secretary rushed in, saying, "I'm sorry, I couldn't stop her."
Phillip stepped in between the intruder and his daughter. "Who are you?" he demanded.
The girl turned to him and Aurora. She gave a perfectly formed curtsy. "I," she said, in a tone that somehow managed to be both respectful and mocking at once, "am Frederique Odette Facilier. My friends call me Freddie, but you're not my friends, so don't call me that."
"Miss Facilier," the Fairy Godmother started. "This is a private meeting."
"One minute," Freddie said. She glared at Audrey, her eyes flashing. Actually flashing. "Eighteen months," she said. "Eighteen months I've been waiting for my sister to be able to get off the Isle."
Audrey opened her mouth, to say she knew not what.
"I was patient!" Freddie said. She was shouting now, and her words seemed to be directed at Ben now as much as Audrey. The room seemed to chill. "I waited! I didn't try to sneak her off! Do you know how many times I was tempted to? I could have gone home for the summer and snuck her out in a suitcase or something! But I listened to the rules, I listened to all your speeches about political whatever and getting people used to us gradually and making a good impression, and I didn't complain! Not even when I didn't know until the last minute if Celia was one of the kids who was going to be chosen to get off the Isle, even though I'd been begging you and Evie for the past month! Not even when I wasn't allowed to meet my sister right away when she came over! I listened to the rules! And then!"
She glared at Audrey even harder. The lights flickered.
"You think you can just attack my sister and get away with it?" Freddie demanded.
"Freddie," Ben started placatingly, "we were actually-"
"Let me finish," Freddie said, and suddenly Ben couldn't speak. He felt cold from the inside, like he had the flu.
Freddie's shadow moved, growing larger and larger, with giant teeth set in a rictus grin and clawed fingers, pinning everyone's shadows down, making them immobile. Ben couldn't move. Neither could anyone else, except Freddie and Audrey.
"Listen to me, Audrey Rose," Freddie said, her voice quiet now, and somehow that sounded even more dangerous than when she'd been shouting.
Audrey took a step back, but Freddie stepped forward, her shadow looming large over them all. The room darkened from the corners outward. "If you ever come near my sister again," Freddie hissed, her eyes glowing yellow in the twilight gloom, "I will personally bind your soul so deep on the Other Side that nothing can bring you back. Believe me, there are ways." She laughed unpleasantly. "I don't care if I get sent back to the Isle for it."
"Stay away from my family," Freddie ordered. "Or else."
She glared at Audrey, and Audrey felt her own shadow rising up against her as strange, eerie noises echoed from the room's shadowed corners.
"Understand?" Freddie demanded.
Audrey's shadow stood, glaring at her just like Freddie was, ready to fight her, to bring her to the Other Side; it was so dark, Audrey couldn't see, she couldn't breathe-
"Understand?" Freddie repeated.
"Y-yes!" Audrey managed.
"Good."
Suddenly sunlight filled the room again; Freddie's menacing shadow shrank into its ordinary shape on the floor, laying there innocuously. They could all move again, but no one did.
"And don't you forget it," Freddie told Audrey savagely. She gave Aurora, Phillip, and Ben another mocking curtsy, then turned and stalked out of the office, slamming the door, which echoed in the silence she left behind her.
