STEFAN LOOKED TERRIBLE. He’d been up all night, pacing in the room he rarely left anymore. The sun peeked out, marking the dawn of another day. If he hadn’t been so distracted, perhaps this time of day would have reminded him of the daughter who had been named after it.

“You mock me,” he murmured just as a servant entered the room behind him.

“Sire?” the servant questioned.

But Stefan did not turn, did not answer. He simply gazed ahead, not blinking.

The servant decided to go on with the news he’d been trusted with. “Majesty, your presence is requested by the queen.”

“Leave me,” Stefan said simply, acknowledging the servant’s presence at last.

“Sire,” the servant pleaded. “She is not well. The nurses are fearful that —”

“Leave me!” Stefan shouted. “Can you not see that I’m having a conversation?”

The servant stared at him, mystified. There was nobody else in the room. Clearly the king had come unhinged. The servant left, closing the door behind him, deciding to come back when the king was better rested. He only hoped it would not be too late. The queen had hours left at best. No one knew what disease plagued her, but most suspected she was dying of a broken heart.

Stefan had not even noticed that his wife was dying, just as he didn’t notice that the servant had taken leave of him now. He started to walk straight ahead, still not blinking. “Intended to represent my triumph, my strength. And yet, day after day, year after year, you exist only to mock me. To remind me… It is not without purpose. Is it?”

He stared at the objects tormenting him: gigantic raven-black wings hanging in a glass case. Maleficent’s wings. Shafts of morning light shone around them eerily.

Stefan moved up to the case, peering in. Then, resting his head on the glass, he whispered, “Is it?”

Suddenly, the wings flapped. Stefan jumped back, startled and alarmed. The wings were motionless once more. He took in a deep breath, unsuccessfully trying to calm his nerves.

“I spare her life and this is my reward? A curse upon my child? Upon my kingdom? Upon me?”

The wings flapped again, more powerfully this time.

Stefan continued his monologue. “When the curse fails, Maleficent will come for me. This I feel. This I know. As sure as the sun rises.” He pointed an angry finger at the wings. “And on that day, I shall not be as benevolent. I will slay her as I should have done then. And I shall burn her carcass to ash!”

He paused, trying to catch his breath. He thought of the victory, of sweet vengeance. “And then… you will be once again a trophy. Nothing more.”

The wings flapped angrily now, but Stefan just stared at them. Then, slowly, his face broke into a wide smile.

Maleficent’s well-intended plans to keep Aurora away from the Moors quickly went awry. No sooner had she concluded that Aurora would never visit the Moors again than the beautiful princess found her way back to the Wall. And before Maleficent knew what she was doing, every night she was putting Aurora to sleep and bringing her into the faerie world.

In no time, Aurora had made herself at home amid the woods. And still worse, before Maleficent knew it, she was actually enjoying having the princess around.

There was something invigorating in the way the princess moved about the Moors in the star-filled nights. Whether she was hopping over a stream or wading through tall cattails, she was always reaching out, connecting herself to the world around her. And it wasn’t just the flora she loved. She loved all the woodland creatures, too, from the beautiful dew faeries to the silly-looking hedgehog faeries, with their oversized ears and spiky backs.

And they all loved her. Even the jealous water faeries, who were known to pull anyone they thought prettier into the water, admired Aurora’s beauty. They would let her play along the water’s edge, eager to show the princess the treasures of the streams. When they pulled out a shiny rock, Aurora would laugh in delight and praise them, causing the water faeries to blush with pride.

When they had no more stones to show Aurora, the water faeries would take to the top of the water, skating over its surface, leaving barely a ripple. Aurora would sit, entranced, as they put on a show for her, their long wings flowing out behind them. And when the show was over, they would dive under the water, leaving Aurora clapping on the shore.

The water faeries were not the only ones to vie for Aurora’s attention. The grouchy wallerbogs loved to engage her in mud fights, which she inevitably lost. And even covered in mud, she kept smiling, thrilled to be part of this magical world. When she stumbled upon the more fearsome faeries, like the ram trolls, with their hunched shoulders, dark bark-like skin, and sharp branches that grew out of their arms and back, she didn’t run but simply let them pass, aware that they too had a part in the way the Moors worked.

As the nights passed and Maleficent watched the princess, it became harder and harder to think of her as Stefan’s daughter. She was nothing like him. While he had never respected nature, only ever seeing what the Moors could give to him, Aurora loved everything about the faerie world. She seemed instinctively to know how to be a part of it, and Maleficent found herself growing fond of the girl. Together they would wander, Aurora eagerly listening as Maleficent pointed out various plants and trees. And Maleficent found herself happy to listen as Aurora babbled on about whatever silly antics her aunts had been up to on that particular day. With each night, the pair grew more and more comfortable with each other. And while Maleficent had a hard time admitting it to herself, when she put a sleeping Aurora to bed as dawn broke, she was sad to leave her.

In Aurora, Maleficent had found a kindred spirit. Someone whom she could teach and someone from whom she could learn. Aurora’s heart was wide open, eager to love, while Maleficent’s was still closed up tight. Yet seeing how free and happy Aurora was, Maleficent couldn’t help wondering if perhaps she had been doing herself a disservice all that time by being so cold. Even in the short time that Aurora had been a part of the Moors, Maleficent had felt a thawing toward her from the creatures who had ignored her before the girl’s arrival. Through Aurora, they began to see a softer side of Maleficent. And Maleficent couldn’t help enjoying being part of the bigger community once again.

But despite how much Maleficent liked having Aurora around, there was a heavy weight on her shoulders. She knew the visits would have to end. They have to end, she reminded herself on many occasions, because of my curse.

“Why can’t I ever come here during the day?” Aurora asked Maleficent one night as the pair wandered through Snow Faeries Meadow. All around them, the iridescent faeries, their wings imprinted with unique snowflake shapes, flitted over the pond in the center of the meadow or played around a big old tree that dominated the shore. From where Aurora and Maleficent stood, the snow faeries looked like hundreds of bright lights that illuminated the tree and made it glow.

Maleficent looked down at the girl, unsure of what to say. She couldn’t tell her the truth: that if her “aunts” discovered where she was and with whom she was spending her time, they would be very, very upset. Nor could she tell her the reason they would be so upset: that Maleficent was not what she seemed. So instead, she simply said, “It is the only time the Wall is open to you.”

Before the girl could ask any more questions, Maleficent strode on, forcing Aurora to run to keep up. But through the rest of that night and into the next few days, Aurora’s question tugged at Maleficent. She wanted to see Aurora playing in the Moors during the day. If she was being honest, she wanted to see Aurora all the time and, preferably, for many years. But for that to happen, she would have to do something about the curse…

One night, weeks after Aurora’s first trip to the Moors and only a few weeks before her sixteenth birthday, Maleficent lay Aurora down in her bed. And as she had done every night for many nights, she pulled the covers up gently and whispered, “Good night, beastie.” But on this particular evening, as the moon began to sink into the horizon and the sun began to rise, she softly added, “I retract my curse. Let it be no more.”

As the words left her mouth, the room filled with magic. The air crackled and shimmered and a gentle wind rustled. But the magic didn’t touch Aurora. Narrowing her eyes, Maleficent stepped closer and repeated the words, this time more forcefully. “I retract my curse. Let it be no more.”

Once again, magic filled the air and the room shimmered. But once again, the magic flowed around Aurora, leaving her untouched.

Feeling dread begin to build in the pit of her stomach, Maleficent spoke the words again, with still more passion. And then she repeated them. Again, and again, and again she spoke, mustering all her strength and willing all her magic to break the curse. The room began to shake as the massive amount of magic collected in the small space, but Maleficent went on, oblivious. All she could see was Aurora, sleeping the way she would forever if the curse could not be broken. Letting out one last cry, she threw her staff in the air and sent a huge burst of magic raining down over the room.

But it still didn’t touch Aurora.

Lowering her staff, Maleficent slowly left the room, her heart aching. She had done everything she could. Yet the curse, the one she had so foolishly called a gift, could not be undone. Which meant, one way or another, in a few short weeks, Aurora would prick her finger on a spinning wheel and never wake up.