Stupid Cupid, stop picking on me!

"What do I call this? A romance? A fling? A giant mistake?" Raven asked as she sat in Cupid's dorm room.

The young Queen was sitting on cupcake-themed chair. Prince Daring was sitting two feet away from her in a similar plush chair. They faced the Cupid, sitting on her cake-looking coach. The Rhine-stones looked like sprinkles and she placed blankets on top of valance gave the illusion of layers.

"Same answer, different versions and all are true." The pink-haired girl told her gothic guest.

Daring stared at her wings- he wondered if she could fly. And if she couldn't, what was up with that? Was she trying to look like a monster?

"Okay, I get enough riddles from my Wonderland friends- could you please try to talk straight?" The sorceress didn't enjoy being rude but she was losing patience.

"Ha ha, good one, babe." Daring pointed his fingers like a gun towards Raven.

She rolled her eyes and tapped her spiked nails on her arm. "Don't call me 'babe'."

"It's a term of endearment, Raven. A good start to this relationship would be to accept it." Cupid informed her, reciting lessons her father taught her.

"Yes, thank you Cupid." The prince liked having the weird winged girl on his side.

"And a good start on your part, Daring, would be to listen to her needs. If she doesn't like the term, find a new one."

Raven smiled at the blonde's drooped face. From the corner of his eye, Daring noticed.

"You know you light up when you smile." Glows like the moon against a dark sky.

"Okay what is that about?" Raven held up her hands towards the goofy boy.

"The excess release of Serotonin in his brain happening by physical and emotional aspects he intercepts when he is with you. In simple language, the boy's hot for you, girly." The little goddess told her bashful client.

"You know I tried saying it in a more romantical way but she just resists. I'm just relieved it's not from my lack of effort." Daring told the 'love expert'. He was looking into his big square hand mirror .

"Yeah, you said it loud and proud in total secret from everyone- including me." Raven shot at him. She watched Daring pout in his mirror then turn his annoyed face to her.

"I'm here, in the chicken-winged office of love- no offense," Daring apologized to the funny looking girl on the couch.

"None taken." Seeing passion build in a man gave C.A. Cupid a hype.

"To make this work, the least you could do is try making the same effort. Maybe with a little less snark." Daring suggested.

"Uck! I'm here too, Daring! And if and when we're discovered you won't get half the beef I'm going to get for 'seducing Apple's boyfriend'!" Raven said with a singy-songy voice at the end.

Daring was calmed as he explained. "Apple and I were never dating, Raven, it was all flare for the public. Just like how everyone acts as if they hate you- it's a big production to make the sheepish masses happy."

"Maybe that's the secret- I try to be myself and I'm almost never as happy." Raven admitted it before she thought it through. She kept her head up but she didn't look at Cupid or Daring. The sorceress stared at the painting Cupid hung of her family; apparently she had a lot of siblings still in diapers.

Cupid watched Daring take Raven's hand off her lap. The former ghoul took this as a good sign of care forming.

"Ray-Ray, you're taking High School too seriously. You need some fun, and I need to be with a more serious kind of woman." Daring didn't give her a blinding smile, just a sweet little smile. "I just wanna hang out, and future kings don't listen to no."

Raven listed exactly three hundred and eight reasons to not date Daring. Even if he was a confident, chipper, warm; things she wished she were.

"Your Theater Buddy and my roommate will drown me in a river after half a minute of knowing about this."

With a broad shoulder shrug Daring pushed away the worry. "I'll lead the angry mob in the wrong direction so you can fly away into the stars and onto the moon."

Though she didn't want to, Raven smiled and chuckled. Daring wouldn't take any responsibility- he was light-hearted and stupid; and almost a little sweet. She wondered why she hadn't seen it there before.

"If it eases your troubles you don't have to worry about Apple- she's found a love that she knows is all hers." Cupid said after she soaked in their happy little glow.

Daring's smiled dropped and he looked towards Cupid. "Say what now? With whom?"

"Oh, she having a fling with the most hated person in school too- small world, huh?" Raven snipped at the distracted doofus.

The jock couldn't believe his Apple loved another more than he. He couldn't believe anyone would be more loved than him because he, Daring, was him, Prince Daring!

"Hold the iMirror, babe, I'm getting my fill of gossip here." Daring put an elbow on Cupid's desk. "Is it that flat-nose dork from Crownery class? I never liked the cut of his slacks."

"I cannot reveal his or her name. I just wanted to ease the guilt for you, kids." Part of Cupid wanted to tell the secret she was holding in. She adored secret romances but the process wasn't healthy for real love.

Raven gasped and jumped in her seat. "It's a princess isn't it!?"

Cupid pursed her lips and revealed nothing- it said everything.

"My money's on Briar! Blondie isn't that interesting but Briar is willing to do anything and everything! She once stuck seven gold eggs in her mouth just to prove she could." Daring told the girls in the poofy pink room.

"Good Author this is fabulous!" Raven laughed, she wished she could Maddie. But first she had to decide to tell Maddie why she was in Cupid's office with Daring.

Daring watched her laugh. The sound was like the miserable goose that laid the golden eggs, but the thick-mascara-using girl made the cutest faces when she laughed.

"Okay, back to you two's issue." Cupid fluttered her fingers to make daring sit back in his seat.

The curly-haired love-guru studied at the couple with the grading eyes her father trained her to have. In was in her amateur opinion that they had good potential for a short, happy romance. Cupid wasn't basing this off her secret agenda…not entirely.

"Raven, are you willing to see where this goes despite your well justified fears? For the sake of a little joy and a pinch of bliss?" Cupid asked the witchy girl Dexter had shown feelings for in the past.

"I can stop it at any time, right?" the worried Raven asked Cupid.

"Yes, you have the power to dump him when you feel it necessary." Cupid informed her, ignoring Daring's surprised face.

"Okay. Um. Thanks. Sure, for now." Raven tried to smile but she was too nervous and jittery to make elegant, controlled movements.

Cupid nodded in approval then went to Dexter's big brother. "Prince Daring, stud muffin of Ever After High, do you take the beautiful Raven and all the possible turmoil dating her comes with?"

Because she was beautiful, in her own enchanting, unconventional way, Daring happily said. "I do, until we regain our senses and find our true True Loves."

He's so far from the wonderfulness that shoots out of Dexter. "With the power invested in me from my father, my many admirers and my good, unbiased judgment- I now pronounce you to be in puppy love."

Cupid raised her empty hand. In a small bright pink burst of cloud hearts, a gavel engraved with a heart appeared in her grip. She slammed it down on her glass-heart coffee table. Pink glitter exploded in their faces.

They both coughed and tried swiping the sparkles out of their clouded vision. In all the shaking Daring's hand found Raven's soft one. She felt his heavy, gold family ring- she rubbed the crest with her index finger. Daring felt her bird-skull ring, the beak was sharp as a knife and very cold. He felt giggly and warm as fresh french toast.