A serene warmth basks his body and what was a hard seat is now cushioned. Light permeates his eyelids and Mal knows he’s in a dream. His soul aches for the faces alive only in dreams but when he opens his eyes he is met with a scrutinizing gaze inches from his. Mal yelps in surprise and tumbles backward in his seat. Grand auroras dance in the morning skies and Mal stares, dumbfounded, at the fishes swimming in the colored streams. Twittering birds sing around him, melodies accompanied by great roars of dragons somewhere in the distance.

Mal rolls off the chair and stands up to see the vast meadow where trees are thicker than carriages and twist upwards with windows and doors and stone roads connecting them. And amongst these strange homes are remnants of human structures, stone rooms, and hallways as if someone took apart a castle and spread out the pieces. And in the center of this world is a tiny round tea table from which Mal had appeared seated in front.

The girl makes her way to her seat opposite Mal and sits, her honey eyes never leaving Mal. She rests her chin on her interlocked fingers, not moving in the slightest even when her raven swoops from nowhere to land on her shoulder.

They are silent for a long while until Vespera says quite simply, “I didn’t conjure you here.”

Of all the things she could’ve said, Mal did not expect that. He did not expect to talk to her at all, just take a peep at what she is up to and leave. Now that he is confronted by the very person he cursed all he manages to say is, “I’m, uh…passing through.”

Vespera tilts her head. “So you aren’t here to wake me up?”

“Huh?”

“Well, I am dreaming, am I not?” When Mal doesn’t respond she leans back and waves her hand in the air as she talks. “I overheard my nanny talking with a servant once. They were arguing if, when my curse put me to sleep for a hundred years, I’d age or not. Father told me it was all nonsense but I never saw them again after that.” She shrugs and leans back in her chair, her legs stretched and splayed out unladylike. “I’ve forgotten about that until recently.”

Mal picks up the chair and takes a seat and though he remains straight and proper, he can’t help but fiddle with his thumbs clasped on the tabletop. “And what makes you think this is a dream?”

To prove her point Vespera snaps her fingers and a ten-layered cake explodes into existence on the table. Then it leans to the side until it topples off, each layer splitting and rolling away like wheels. “Because everything I want to happen, happens.” She slams her palms on the table in exasperation. “But it’s so boring now! I’ve done everything already. Mister, how long has it been?”

“…Seventeen years.”

“Seventeen! That means I still have…” She counts on her fingers. “Eighty-three! I’ll die of boredom first!”

Daisy hops onto the table and slumps just like her companion.

Mal looks between the two of them and can’t help but ask, “You’re not scared?”

Vespera sits back up and snaps, making a clear, diamond coin appear which she rolls back and forth along her knuckles. “I was at first. But Daisy’s here with me so I assume my family is sleeping somewhere too. If they’re with me when I wake up, even after a hundred years, I’ll be fine.”

Mal huffs. “Of course you will be.”

“So, who are you, Mister?”

How unfair it all is. Mal woke up all alone but the princess gets to have her parents. He crosses his arms and answers, “The one who cursed you.”

The coin stops and Vespera settles her gaze at him. There’s no anger, no anguish, but her gaze is piercing all the same. “Are you?” She says and sets the coin down, sliding it around with her finger. “How did I ever offend you so?”

Mal puffs up his chest. “It is Phellious’ offense. As are your parents’.”

A fragile tension festers between them. Although Mal hangs on to his feigned calm demeanor, in actuality he is tense, body wound up as he prepares for her outburst. But the princess retains her cool attitude.

She leans forward. “My great-great-grandfather and my parents offend you, yet you curse me?”

Mal leans back. “W-well…”

“I, a sweet young lady, who has done nothing to you other than be birthed by my mother who, along with my father, have offended you, is cursed? I, an innocent little flower?”

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“But they—”

Vespera stands with enough force to knock over her seat. Daisy flaps her wings and caws, prepared to fight. “The cowardice! The audacity! To strike a helpless, beautiful babe such as I for the offense of her forefathers! You, Mister, offend me!”

She stalks around the table, stomping her way to Mal as she talks until she has him cornered in his seat. Her words strike him, the truth in her reasoning like a weight that keeps Mal immobile and mute. “And for offending me,” she continues, “now I shall curse you.”

“What?!”

Mal’s eyes focus on her raised hand fully expecting a violent retribution. But when her hand comes down it is not in a slap nor a snap of her fingers. She points at him instead. “Teach me.”

Her command hangs in the air as Mal tries to wrap his head around such an absurd thing. “Teach you? Teach you what?”

Vespera throws her hands in the air. “Anything. Everything! The curse can’t be broken; I will be stuck here for a hundred years.”

“But you can create whatever you want.”

“No, it’s not the same…” She taps her finger against her lip in deep thought before she turns to her Dreamland with open arms. “I’m imprisoned in this paradise where all my wishes come alive. And yet I’m reminiscing, all this power but there’s something missing.”

Behind her, Mal quietly gets up and tiptoes backwards to make his escape. But the princess turns back to him and locks her arm in his to lead him along as she snaps more things into existence. “Snap a cake, snap a dress. Consume it all without a thought. Then I think of the cook, watching me eat with her gratified look!”

The massive treehouses part and the two plus the raven enter a massive room without a roof full of half-dreamt dreams. Mal picks out pieces of a kitchen, a cold oven, and tools splayed out. But there are also malformed swords and armor, and unfinished paintings. Mal finds her frustration in each abandoned project and her lack of knowledge in each mistake. Vespera releases him to pick up a hammer. “How do I use my hands?” she pleads. “How do I build, create, construct? All I’ve owned made by hands like mine, but my mind has nothing to instruct!”

To further explain her dilemma she tugs at dress. “My dresses don’t come from nothing. Not the shape, the color, the thread.” Then she muses at her room of endless puzzles. “How does a painter paint a picture? How does a baker bake the break.”

All interesting questions but not meant for Mal. He frowns. “I’m the Spinning Fairy. How am I supposed to—”

Vespera gasps and stares at him, her eyes shinning. “The spinning wheel! Why yes, of course. You’re going on ahead. Biggest question of them all: how does the spinster spin the thread?”

With a snap, a spinning wheel appears before them. It is an exact replica of the one in the tower, still broken where Vespera had pricked her finger. But that memory doesn’t register in her eyes as she circles it with curiosity instead. “It looks just right, spins just right, but,” she pushes the wheel into a spin, “I don't know how thread comes out of it.”

She continues to play with it, pulling at it and putting more force behind her push. Unable to bare much more of her blasphemous treatment he jumps forward to stop the wheel. “Thread doesn’t ‘come out of it’.”

“Uh-huh,” Vespera says, hanging onto his every word.

“You feed it wool or cotton and spin the wheel round.”

“Uh-huh, uh-huh.”

Taking command of the dream, Mal waves his hand over the missing part and the wheel becomes complete. Then he brings forth a mound of cotton and begins his work. “You twist it to form thread and fill the spool like so.”

“And then from there?”

With a defeated sigh Mal spins. “How does a spinster spin the thread, as if I were a any mere spinster. Princess, you forget I’m more. Watch my magic pour.” Vespera leans close to look at his fingers move. “The thread should be even. No bumps, and twisted so. As it passes your fingers, here’s the key: all your intentions you must set free.”

Vespera lifts her head. “Intentions?”

“Good intentions, bad intentions. In creating you lay your heart out bare. In every thread, I spin my will for another to don on and wear.” He spins faster. “How does a baker bake the bread? With a need to make hunger despair. How does a painter paint a picture? With a vision their souls plead to share.

Mal stands and motions for Vespera to take his place. She does so and mimics Mal’s movements and starts feeding the spinning wheel. She starts off slowly, struggling to get into the motion but as she starts to get the hang of it a bright smile spreads on her face. “With my own two hands, magicless, I still create. With this their love I will repay. To my people, my heart I’ll display.”

Mal looks down at Vespera a little taken aback by her admission. He hears a whisper of Phellious woven into her words and can’t help but to gently smile at her. He thinks that maybe it won’t be so bad to visit her again. Who was he to deny her learning a craft as important as spinning thread?

But the moment is broken when the string in Vespera’s hand snaps. She stops the wheel and looks up at Mal with a fierce determination ablaze in her eyes. “Now show me again until I get it.”

Mal’s face scrunches up in horror as he realizes that to be a teacher he will, in fact, have to sit there and teach her. And because one cannot teach an entire craft in a day, he’ll have to come again tomorrow, and the day after. The only thought in his mind is thus: What did I get myself into?

Back in Mal’s room in the waken world, Third and Seventh finish the last of the cleaning. All the shades are newly bathed and dressed and trading shiny rocks with one another. When the two fairies hear the connecting doorway open they drop their rags and broom and dart over to meet Mal.

The person before them is not the same lethargic, depressed Mal, but a more irritated yet contemplative Mal and they know that he has found an issue to focus on. He’s found a new goal, one that will not prove simple to achieve. Carefully, Third asks, “How did it go, Sweetie?”

Mal meets her eyes and answers with persistent disbelief at this new turn of events. “I’ve been cursed.”

END SCENE