#spellbinding studies

she was fated to die from birth. even with that sentence lessened, she has no choice in the matter, no way out—when the princess turns sixteen she will prick her finger on a spindle and fall into a deep sleep, no matter what.

and the thing is they try. her parents try everything they can to keep it from happening—going so far as to destroy all the spinning wheels in the kingdom (which likely created a massive economic crisis in the process but it’s fairytale world so they probs have a few golden geese in the storehouses just for this occasion). but in the end it still happens, because the princess still meets the old woman with the spinning wheel, and she was raised well enough that she isn’t afraid to be curious and ask if she can try it. in the end, she will always prick her finger and die.

others have said it before me, but Briar is the pawn in her story, much like Raven. unlike Raven though, it isn’t society’s expectations that made her one—it’s in her story itself. she essentially inherited a tale about the futility of evading fate. no matter which way they took it, if they only just went a little further—it would have gone so hard.

but the books describe a separate character. she appears in a key scene in The Unfairest of Them All when Apple is visiting home during Yester Day (a day when students have to interview graduated fairytale characters about their stories). right off the bat you can tell their relationship is a lot better than the one displayed in the show; they're a lot more affectionate with each other, and Apple clearly feels at ease around her mother. the main impression i get whenever i reread this scene (and believe me i have read it a lot) is that Snow seems like... a good mom. she doesn't act disappointed or accusatory toward Apple for Raven's refusal to sign. Apple to some extent considers it a personal failure that she didn't persuade Raven to sign; Snow doesn't express any sentiment of the sort. she gets straight to the heart of the matter, which is the problem of division between the Royals and Rebels and the chaos that will undoubtedly ensue (and already has, at this point in the book).

in fact, it's ironic that Snow doesn't address who's in the wrong in this matter, because that's exactly what Apple is focused on. she strongly believes that going off-script is pure evil, and she wants Snow to confirm that for her--which Snow doesn't do. because Snow is a leader, and she knows that pointing fingers is not going to solve a crisis. her advice to Apple is to focus on bringing people back together first, which is ultimately the key to Apple's character arc in this book.

Apple is frustrated by this conversation because Snow's advice seems useless to her: "Just keep smiling." that isn't a very concrete solution to any of the rampant problems she's facing right now; she leaves believing Snow doesn't understand the magnitude of these problems. i don't think that's fully the case, because Snow knew the Evil Queen and had to have witnessed some part of her rampage, which would have been extremely chaotic, but we don't have details on it so that's neither here nor there.

Snow's most important advice to Apple was the line she got cut off, which is "And when you look back, look deeper." based on the context and the conclusion of Apple's arc in this book, i can guess she meant: look at them for who they are, not for who you think they are. in other words, not for who the stories say they are--which is the lens through which Apple is used to judging the rest of the world. that's indeed how she changes and grows by the end of the book, because she learns to stop assigning the roles of "hero/villain/Royal/Rebel" to her peers, and instead think of them for the people they are underneath. Lizzie, a kind-hearted girl who loves to create; Daring, who's eager to help her if she just says the word; Sparrow, who prides himself on his thieving skills; and Kitty, who Apple knows would do anything for Maddie. she even gets Cerise and Duchess to work together.

as a kid i didn't really get the ending of this book; it felt like no one had really solved the destiny conflict. no one had managed to point out how the Royals were in the wrong or fixed everything that was awful about the Rebels' situations. but that would have been too simple, which is crazy for a book written for kids, but that's what makes it so good--instead of trying to eliminate the problem and wrap everything up in a neat little bow, which might have felt really good to read but probably would have fallen very flat, the story acknowledges the problem is bigger than that and people are more complicated than that. Apple is not the villain of the story; she's just a young girl trying to take responsibility (something Raven actually has trouble doing in comparison, which is another reason they balance each other out). Snow gave good advice.

i sort of went off on a tangent there, but to circle back to Snow--in the books her relationship with EQ is very obviously not the same as in the show, as we don't know if they were even in the same class. it's portrayed as something much closer to what the original dynamic of Snow White and her evil stepmother would have been. Snow does not condemn Raven for any of her actions; she even expresses her own doubt about the way Ever After works, about how "if there's no story, it rarely happens." Apple fixates on that statement as explaining why it's bad to go off-script, but what Snow actually seems to be implying is that the lack of freedom in that area is troubling. in a sense she almost seems sympathetic to Raven.

you’d have to largely ignore the show for this, as i only ever got this impression while reading the books. and disclaimer: i don’t think this is actually the case or the intention of the story. just lets take a little mind trip (and don’t consider this an argument i’m just wildly speculating for fun over here).

cuz what if no one ever told her to be the perfect princess? all they ever expect of her is to be beautiful and kind. and that’s enough, apparently—that’s “perfect.” but not to her. that’s why Apple works so hard, so that she can rise above that expectation and prove to be a great leader. it blinds her to a lot of other issues, really, like why other Royals might not be working so hard for the same thing (which we know is often bc they don’t want it).

Apple could theoretically rest easy on reputation alone bc she’s charming and sweet and famous, and she doesn’t really need to be anything else in her story. she expresses disappointment whenever people dismiss her in that manner.

of course, feeling like nobody has expectations for you is really just a guise for a different set of expectations… there’s a reason why people would think this way in the first place. also, this is all from Apple’s perspective, and it’s quite evident that’s skewed in a variety of ways (even if people like the Evil Queen successfully get under her skin via this very topic).

in general i don't much like the idea of overusing labels defined by personal ideals (that makes it easy to dismiss/dehumanize those who disagree with you, which is definitely something that we see happen in EAH, or to apply inaccurate generalizations). but we're humans, and we're kind of addicted to categorizing ourselves, and most of the time it's harmless and even helpful, so i don't think that "choosing a side" in EAH is necessarily a bad thing, either.

so, what people seem to be saying is that "Royals and Rebels" should no longer exist after destiny has been abolished. the main reason they give for this is that Royals were on the side that meant to follow the story at all costs, aka "the wrong side." i agree with that reasoning; the Royals lost the discourse. however. HOWEVER.

not all Royals wanted to perpetuate "destiny" from the start. i do not believe that all Royals supported the idea that everyone should stick to their stories--that's something only a few were shown to explicitly express throughout the series. remember the webisode "Blondie Branches Out"? Cupid says a very important line here that i think summarizes the in-universe definition of "Royal":

"Blondie, Royals make choices too. They choose to follow tradition and honor their stories."

for some reason a lot of people seem to have the impression that Royals are against choice and free will, when i don't think that's what it's meant to imply at all. Cupid said this pretty early on in the story, and Poppy O'Hair and Kitty Cheshire are good examples of other characters that were probably meant to embody this, even before the destiny conflict was "resolved." I put that in quotes because as Dragon Games exists to remind us, it obviously wasn't resolved very well Poppy's case was a lot more unserious tbh, but the point made is that following tradition and progressing forward are actually not in conflict. in other words, the labels "Royal" and "Rebel" do not fundamentally contradict each other, but are meant to be different paths that a person can choose to take. that's like... that's literally what freedom means, actually. the original conflict was never between Royal and Rebel; it was about the freedom to choose how to live your life.

so, in my opinion, Royals shouldn't be considered irrelevant after destiny was abolished. i'd argue they're actually even more relevant now that Rebels exist and the possibility of losing stories becomes realizable. i mean, new stories can only be written with the help of old ones. the existence of tradition is nonnegotiable; it's only when it's indiscriminately enforced upon people that it becomes an issue. the writers of EAH understood this, the actual Royals (not including Apple...) understood this, Rebels like C.A. Cupid understood this! after all, Ever After High is a show about fairytales, all of which are more than a hundred years old!!

now Apple's arc in Dragon Games, which deals with her fear over not being able to realize her destiny with Raven no longer slotting in as the Evil Queen, explores the aftermath to some degree. but that is a personal arc, not something shared across all Royals. Holly O'Hair, for example, is a Royal because she loves stories and is excited to live through her own (honestly, as a writer, i can kinda understand why). Royals like Meeshell Mermaid came later, so while we aren't given much insight as to why they're content with their legacies, it's likely because it's nice for them and they don't care all that much for nowww. which makes sense for royalty, if you think about it. especially as teenagers hello?? have we forgotten Cerise's iconic "we're in high school, for Grandma's sake"??

tldr: the term "Royal" in-universe refers to someone who, as Cupid explained so succinctly, chooses to follow tradition and honor their stories, in their own way.

Here me out: in Shannon Hale's books, Ramona or any possible future big bad wolf is never mentioned. Since her books feature characters who never appear in the series (Coral Witch, Nathan Nutcracker,in theory Darling too), It means that there was a deliberate choice on Shannon Hale's part not to have a bad wolf for Cerise, because Cerise herself is the wolf.; something the SCC doll seemed to allude too. However, another important thing is also stated about Cerise in the books - the world belives that her mother married the Huntsman, so much so that Raven points out "So you are Hunter's sister?!"

Now, in addition to being an interesting glimpse into how the world of EAH works, because it suggests that cross-fairytale relationships are allowed for "commoners", as long as they each have one child to fill their role (and it actually explains better some strange family trees, like the One of the Beautys). It does make you think: why mention the Huntsman if the village HAS other men?

Why hinted that the future Red and Huntsman are siblings? Why emphasize the fact that Hunter's little sister is considerably younger than him? Perhaps because the big bad wolf should be an adult compared to Little Red Riding Hood, who is a child,and indeed, Cerise is the same age as Hunter.

Who knows, I think there was something bigger going on.

eh?? Hunter has a little sister?? i had no idea

but you're definitely on to something...

i don't think it would have been intentional to imply that Cerise would be the Wolf and someone else Red Riding Hood, per se; i feel like the point of her arc in the books is the struggle of having a dual identity, with no clear resolution. in that case, it probably wouldn't have been necessary to consider an actual solution to the dilemma... but i wouldn't put anything past the mind of an author; it's possible she did write in all those references on purpose.

then again, knowing how author vs reader interpretations often work, it's also entirely possible the pieces fit together coincidentally. regardless, i think it's a really interesting idea 👀

previously, i’d always assumed Cerise would be destined to be Red, and some other Wolf would take over her father’s job. that might have been what they were planning, since they chose to present Cerise as Red’s daughter (which is an interesting choice in and of itself—ig bc Cerise doesn’t have a wolf form and, ofc, it’s the hero that gets the happy ending).

there are just so many other iffy variables tho… like how Badwolf was supposed to die (as Red recounts in TUOTA), but well, he didn’t, and as far as the fairytale world seems to know he doesn’t have an heir, so how did that just slide? then Ramona came along and solved that issue, but raised some new ones in the process… yeah idk, i may be going in circles here lol

also yeah, in the original story we have the age gap present between BBW and RRH, but ofc we know that Cerise’s parents were in the same class. not to mention age stuff gets all wonky thanks to the destiny system to begin with—what with Apple and Raven being in the same generation, other characters not being quite the right age for some events in their stories, etc.

so Sleeping Beauty isn’t my #1 favorite (tho it certainly is among the big five); that would be HCA’s “The Wild Swans” which is not as famous due to its lack of representation in popular media :((

but this is an interesting question! rambles under the cut

this girl who tries so hard to fit a label she doesn't think she belongs in... i'm not sure if it was ever confirmed exactly why? i can guess--for sure, she probs wants to be tight with the cool kids and idk she kinda radiates the vibes of being proud that she's "officially" besties with the most popular girls in school--but there could have been more to it that would have been so interesting to explore. she clearly does not want to be a Royal because she's madly in love with her story; it's definitely for status and social reasons. plus my girl is a career woman

it’s true that sleeping beauty is one of the most passive fairytale princesses. in the years when fractured-fairytale type stories were getting popular (same time as EAH), the sleeping aspect was often written off as a silly quirk or general mark of uselessness. and tbh, the original fairytale (either Grimm or Perrault, or if you’re even looking back to Talia Sun & Moon, which is considered its oldest variation) doesn’t do much to help.

but the premise of the story itself sets up so much room for development, which imo is the beauty of fairytales and the retelling thereof. both Briar and Silver are cursed with chronically falling asleep anytime anywhere, and both of them hate it.

there’s something tragic about the heroine who is cursed from birth to lose track of time, and can’t do anything to escape it (no matter how her parents tried, even in the original fairytale). we see this with Briar, who is close friends with people outside her kingdom—people she’s doomed to lose forever at the prick of a finger. Silver, too, is a human raised by a long-life species, forced to spend his days knowing that his time with them is so limited in the full scope of their long lifespans. both of them are constantly running out of time, constantly trying their hardest to grasp what precious little they have and cherish it to the fullest—and yet they keep losing so much of it to sleep.

Imo? sleeping beauty is the best embodiment of the curse of destiny in Ever After. even in the original fairytale the princess cannot escape her fate, no matter how hard she or her parents try. that’s why Briar has such a strong character in EAH. twst explores this in much less depth because it isn’t about fate, but silver’s circumstances set him up for a similar conflict.

and yes. sleeping beauty is one of my favorite fairytales, and aurora is my favorite disney princess 😭 so it’s really no surprise that Briar and Silver are two of my favorite characters.