A Ball.
And the Queen wasn’t invited.
The first snow littered the Clearing in lumpy brittles of ice, pelting Nevers’ pails with loud pings. As they tried to grasp moldy cheese with frozen fingers, they looked daggers at Evergirls scrabbling about, too busy to worry about weather. With the Ball two weeks away, the girls needed to make every possible arrangement, since boys still refused to propose before the Circus. Reena, for instance, expected Chaddick to ask her, so she had dyed her mother’s old school gown to match his gray eyes. But if Chaddick asked Ava instead (she had caught him ogling Snow White’s portrait, so he might like paler girls), then Nicholas might ask her, in which case she’d trade for Giselle’s white gown to balance his tanned skin. And if Nicholas didn’t ask her …
“Mother says Goodness is making people feel wanted even when you don’t want them at all,” she sighed to Beatrix, who looked bored. With Sophie out of the picture, Beatrix knew Tedros was her date. Not that he had confirmed this. The prince had been ignoring everyone since the Trial, sullen as a Never. Now Beatrix felt his mood infect her as she watched him shoot arrows into the tree he and Sophie used to sit beneath.
Tedros ripped more holes in its heart, but there was no satisfaction. After a few days of teasing, his mates had tried to cheer him up. Who cared if he shared his spoils with a Nevergirl! Who cared if she puttered with him along the way! He’d still won a brutal Trial and outlasted them all. But Tedros saw only shame in it, for he was no better than his father now. A slave to his heart’s mistakes.
Still, he hadn’t told anyone about Agatha. He knew she was surprised by this because she winced every time he spoke in class, as if expecting him to expose her any moment. But where a week ago, he would have loved to see her punished, now he felt confused. Why had she risked her life to save him? Had she been telling the truth about that gargoyle? Could that witch actually be … Good?
He thought of her tramping through halls with leery bug eyes—
A cockroach. That’s what Beatrix said.
So Agatha was there all along, helping Sophie to the top of the ranks? She must have been hidden in Sophie’s dress or in her hair, whispering answers and casting spells. … But how had she made him pick Sophie in the pumpkin challenge?
Tedros felt sick.
A goblin picked from two … A princess whose coffin knocked him out … A roach hidden on a pumpkin …
He had never picked Sophie.
He picked Agatha every time.
Tedros whipped around in horror, looking for her, but he didn’t see Agatha anywhere in the Clearing. He had to stay away from that girl. He had to tell her to stay away from him. He had to stop all of this—
A hunk of sleet smacked his cheek. Blinded by water, Tedros saw shadows gliding towards him, wiped his eyes—and dropped his bow.
Sophie, Anadil, and Hester slunk in step with matching black hair, black makeup, and black-hearted scowls. With a shared hiss, they sent Evergirls bolting, leaving only Tedros and spooked Everboys fanned out behind him. Anadil and Hester dropped behind Sophie, who stepped up to face her prince.
From the sky, ice fell between them in jagged slivers.
“You think I faked it,” Sophie said, flaying him with her green eyes. “You think I never loved you.”
Tedros tried to quell his thumping heart. Somehow she was more beautiful than ever.
“You can’t cheat your way to love, Sophie,” he said. “My heart never wanted you.”
“Oh, I’ve seen who your heart picks,” Sophie smirked, mimicking Agatha’s buggy gape and trademark scowl.
Tedros reddened. “I can explain that—”
“Let me guess. Your heart is blind.”
“No, it just says anyone but you.”
Sophie chuckled. In a flash, she lunged and Tedros drew his sword, as did all his mates behind him.
Sophie smiled weakly. “Look what’s happened, Tedros. You’re scared of your true love.”
“Go back to your side!” the prince yelled.
“I waited for you,” Sophie said, voice breaking. “I thought you’d come for me.”
“What? Why would I come for you?”
Sophie gazed at him. “Because you made me a promise,” she breathed.
Baring teeth, Tedros glared back. “I made you no promises.”
Sophie stared at him, stunned. Her eyes cast down. “I see.”
Slowly she looked back up.
“Then I’ll be whatever you want me to be.”
She thrust out her glowing finger and the boys’ swords turned to snakes. As Everboys fled, Tedros kicked dust at the hissing coils. He spun to see Sophie wipe tears, then pull her cape around her and hurry away.
Hester ran to catch up—“Feel better?”
“I gave him a chance,” Sophie said, walking faster.
“You’re even now. It’s over,” Hester soothed.
“No. Not until he keeps his promise.”
“Promise? What promise—”
But Sophie had already raced ahead into the tunnel. As she fled through twisted branches, she sensed someone watching. Through tears and trees, she couldn’t see the face on the balcony, just a milky white blur. Her stomach sank—she found a break in the leaves—
But the face was gone, as if it was just a dream.
The next morning, Good woke to slippery lard all over the floors. The morning after, Everboys screamed after putting on coats laced with rash powder. On the third morning, the teachers found framed underpants replacing Beauty’s portrait on the Legends Obelisk, the sides switched in the Theater of Tales, and candied classrooms flooded with stinky green goo.
With the fairies unable to catch the vandals in the act, Tedros and his Everboy mates formed a nighttime guard, patrolling the halls from dusk until dawn. Still, the culprits eluded capture and by the end of the week, the bandits had filled the Groom Room pools with stingrays, warped the hall mirrors to taunt passersby, released overfed pigeons in the Supper Hall, and enchanted Good toilets to explode when students sat on them.
Enraged, Professor Dovey insisted Sophie be brought to justice, but Lady Lesso said it was highly doubtful one student could manage to cripple an entire school without help.
She was right.
“It doesn’t feel good anymore,” Anadil grouched after supper in Room 66. “Hester and I want to stop.”
“You got your revenge,” said Hester. “Let him go.”
“I thought you two were villains,” Sophie said from her bed, eyes glued to Nightmares Be Gone.
“Villains have purpose,” Hester snapped. “What we’re doing is just thuggery.”
“Tonight we’re putting pox in the boys’ breeches,” said Sophie, flipping the page. “Find a spell for it.”
“What do you want, Sophie?” Hester pleaded. “What are we fighting for?”
Sophie looked up. “Are you going to help or should I turn us all in?”
Tedros soon had all 60 boys on his nighttime guard, but Sophie escalated the attacks. The first night, she made Hester and Anadil brew a potion to turn the Good lake to Evil sludge, forcing the magical wave to migrate to the sewers. The brew left their hands red with burns, but Sophie made them return at dawn to lace Ever linens with lice. Soon,