The Last Ever After

aybe we have to close our eyes,” said Tedros.

“Or do a rain dance in pajamas while singing ‘Ring Around the Rosie,’” Agatha grumped, Reaper fast asleep in her lap. “It’s past dinnertime and I’m starving. How many times can we try this?”

“Oh I’m sorry. Do you have somewhere better to be at the moment?”

Agatha watched a roach mosey by, cram under the double-locked front door, and disappear. “You have a point,” she said, and shut her eyes.

“All right,” Tedros sucked in, closing his eyes. “One … two … three!”

Agatha scrunched up her face, Tedros did too, and both of them thrust their index fingers at the other. They exhaled at the same time and opened their eyes.

Neither of their fingertips was glowing.

Tedros peered closely at Agatha’s. “You bite your nails too much.”

“Oh for crying out loud. We can’t get into the Woods unless our magic comes back,” she barked, shoving her hand in her pocket. “Magic follows emotion. That’s what we learned at school. You said it yourself! If we both make the wish at the same time, the gates should open—”

“Unless one of us is having doubts,” said Tedros.

“Then I suggest you get over them,” Agatha huffed, standing up. “Let’s try in the morning. Mother’s never this late. She’ll be here any second—”

“Agatha.”

She saw Tedros giving her that lopsided grin … the one that said he knew exactly what she was thinking, even if she was doing everything she could to keep it from him.

“You’re smarter than you look,” she groused, sitting back down.

“And you’re the one famous for not judging books by their covers.” He scooted next to her. “Look, if you want to say goodbye to your mother first—”

“That’ll just make the doubts worse,” mumbled Agatha. “How do you tell your mother you’re leaving her forever?”

“Wouldn’t know. My mother left me without saying goodbye,” Tedros replied.

Agatha looked at him, suddenly feeling very stupid. Tedros slid closer. “What is it, my love?” he asked. “What are you really afraid of?”

Agatha felt panic rising, something coming up she couldn’t keep down—

“What if I’m the problem?” she blurted. “Every time I try to be happy, it goes wrong. First with Sophie, then with you, and all I can think of is that it’s not us who’s broken … it’s me. The girl who ruins everyone’s story. The girl who’s meant to be alone. That’s why I’m afraid to leave my mother. Because what if I’m not supposed to be with you, Tedros? What if I’m supposed to end here, just like her, never finding love at all?”

Tedros froze, taken aback.

Slowly Agatha felt the air return to her lungs, as if a boulder had lifted off her chest.

Her prince traced his finger between bricks in the floor. “We only see the finished storybooks, Agatha. How do we know every Ever After doesn’t take a few tries? Think about it. Each time you left the Woods, you tried to come back to your old life. But this time is different, isn’t it? When we get to our true ending, you’ll have a new life with me. We’ll have my kingdom to protect, until we’re old ourselves and it’s time to pass it on. Just like my father did and his father and all who came before.”

Looking at him, Agatha realized how selfish and small-hearted she’d been by keeping her prince here.

“I promise,” he said, squeezing her hand. “This time, we will be happy.”

“All right, say we do get back to the School for Good and Evil,” Agatha allowed. “What’s our plan?”

“Make things right, of course,” Tedros puffed. “Rescue Sophie, kill the School Master, take back Excalibur, free the other students, and you and I go to Camelot in time for my sixteenth birthday, and coronation as king. The End.” He paused. “The real End.”

Agatha made a sound halfway between a cough and a sneeze.

“All right, Sophie can come too, if you’re going to be difficult about it,” he sighed.

“Tedros, my love,” said Agatha cuttingly. “You think we can just waltz through the school gates and kill the School Master like we’re buying bonbons from the bakery?”

“I think buying anything from the bakery would pose far more obstacles at the moment,” said Tedros, eyeing the triple-locked door.

Agatha let go of him and braced for a fight. “First off, the School Master is an all-powerful sorcerer who last we saw came back from death, turned young again, and stabbed you with your own sword. Second, for all we know, he’s killed the Evers and has everyone on his side. And third, you don’t think he’ll have guards and traps and—”

“Merlin had a saying: ‘Worrying doesn’t solve problems. Just gives you gas,’” Tedros yawned.

“I take back the smarter than you look thing,” Agatha groaned. Her cat stirred and staggered out of her arms, but not before spitting in Tedros’ lap. The prince backhanded it and Reaper fled, throwing Agatha a horrible scowl at her choice of mate.

“He used to love me,” Agatha said, watching her cat gnaw the head off a dead canary.

“Agatha, look at me.”

“Tedros, you don’t even have your sword, let alone a plan. We’re going to die.”

“Agatha, please look at me.”

She did, with folded arms.

“You can’t plan your story any more than you can plan who you’re going to fall in love with. That’s the point of a story,” said Tedros. “And even if you could, what’s the fun of living through it if you know what’s going to happen? All we know is that Good always wins, right? So if Good hasn’t beaten Evil yet, our fairy tale can’t be over. As soon as we make our wish, we’ll be back where we belong, chasing our happy ending. Trust our story, Agatha. We’ll know what to do when the time comes.”

“And what about Sophie?” Agatha asked. “What if she hasn’t forgiven us?”

Tedros thought for a moment. “Everything Sophie did, she did to get closer to you or me. We’ve all made mistakes, that’s for sure. But Good or Evil, Boy or Girl, the three of us are in this tale together.” He leveled eyes with her. “So how can Sophie be happy until we are?”

Agatha fell quiet, aware of the dark room hemming her in with her prince and yet keeping them apart.

Long before she ever met her best friend, she’d secretly read storybooks from Mr. Deauville’s, buying them right after the shop opened, when no one else was inside, and paying for them with the coins her mother had given her for sweets. She drank in the lesson of those fairy-tale books more than any hot cream or fudge, that same lesson told and retold: you didn’t need a hundred true loves to find Ever After … you just needed one. It didn’t matter if an entire town called her a freak or a witch or a vampire. If she could just find that one person who loved her—one measly soul—then she’d have everything a princess did, minus the horrific pink dress, obnoxious blond hair, and moony-eyed face.

From the moment she met Sophie, Sophie was that soul: the friend who made her feel normal, who made her feel needed, who so clearly cared about her, despite all her efforts to disguise it. Back then, Agatha had done everything she could to ensure they’d end up together forever, rather than let her best friend be stolen away by a boy … until Agatha somehow fell in love with that boy herself. And so the story had turned on its head, this time Sophie doing everything she could to keep a boy and her best friend apart. It was a wicked love triangle, with Sophie the point that had to be removed, until finally Agatha and Tedros had rid themselves of her, turning that triangle into a straight line between them—prince and princess united at last, just like in the storybooks buried under her bed. But now, as Agatha sat in darkness, feeling more and more like the graveyard girl of old, she wondered if the reason she missed her best friend was the simplest of all. What if Sophie wasn’t the force that kept her and Tedros apart? What if Sophie was the force that brought them together?

Without Sophie, she never could have opened up her heart.

Without Sophie, she never could have learned to love.

Without Sophie, there never could have been a Tedros and Agatha.

“Princess? What is it?”

Agatha slowly looked up at her prince, new life in her eyes. “Let’s go find our best friend.”

Tedros blinked at her, stunned. His cheeked pinked and his Adam’s apple bobbed, words swallowed by emotion. He placed his hand behind his back. “Wish to reopen our story, then?”

Agatha smiled and hid her hand. “Wish to reopen our story.”

Tedros closed his eyes. “One …”

“Two …,” said Agatha, closing hers.

They took a joint breath and thrust out their fingers. “Three—”

The door slammed open to a sharp heel-crack of boots. Agatha lurched to her feet.

There was an Elderguard in the doorway, the outlines of a black cloak and slatted iron mask blending into the night.

Tedros instantly clasped Agatha and yanked her to the kitchen wall. He grabbed a meat knife from the sink and brandished it at the guard, blocking his princess’s body with his. “Move another inch and I’ll cut your throat!” Tedros spat.

The guard threw the door shut and hissed back at them. “Hide! Both of you!”

Agatha squinted at the big brown eyes glinting through the guard’s mask. “Mother?”

“Hide now!” Callis shrieked, shoring her body against the door.

Agatha couldn’t move, trying to process what was happening, gaping at her mother in the same uniform as the town guards ordered to execute her. “I d-d-don’t under—”

But then Agatha heard them coming … footsteps … voices …

She tackled Tedros to the ground. Stunned, the prince lost his grip on the knife and flailed to reach it as Agatha yanked him by the belt buckle under the bed. Tedros lunged over her and snatched the knife—

The door flung open and Agatha spun to see Callis seized from behind and shoved to the wall by two guards.

“No!” Agatha gasped, leaping out, but Tedros pulled her down under the bed, fumbling his knife at the same time. He stabbed his hand for it, only to see Agatha’s hip knock it away. In horror, they both watched the blade skid across the floor and halt beneath the heel of a muddy leather boot. Slowly their eyes traced up.

A tall guard prowled into the house, teeth bared through his mask. From his pocket, he pulled a fistful of eggs, rolling them around in his big hand like marbles.

“First time I saw her stealing them, I thought maybe she can’t afford to pay. Second time, I thought maybe she’s gone hungry. But the third time …” He let the eggs drop and splatter at Callis’ feet. “I wonder who’s she stealing ’em for.”

He spun and kicked aside the bed, revealing Tedros, unarmed and fists up. The guard’s brutal blue eyes honed in on the prince.

“You and I can duel like men,” Tedros threatened. “But leave my princess alone.”

The guard stared at him strangely … then lifted his gaze. His pupils froze, reflecting Agatha behind Tedros, prostrate on the floor.

In a flash, he threw Tedros aside, knocking the prince to the floorboards. But the guard’s eyes stayed on Agatha.

She trembled as his boots crackled through the bleeding eggs, step by step, until he placed his sharp, filthy shoe tip upon her neck.

He took off his mask.

“So much for promises,” Stefan snarled.

The cage was meant for only one prisoner, not three, so Agatha had to stand with her mother, Reaper curled in Callis’ arms, while Tedros crouched in a daze, clutching his black eye. Back at the house, Agatha told him not to resist, but Tedros assured her Camelot’s future king could flatten six armed guards with his bare hands.

He’d been wrong.

Agatha held on to the rusty bars, tottering for balance, as the horse dragged the cage through the darkened cemetery, Stefan at the reins. She could see a crowd forming in front of the torchlit pyre, watching the guards march down the hill ahead of the prisoners.

“That was your punishment for letting me escape, wasn’t it? The Elders made you a guard,” Agatha said, turning to her mother. “That’s why they never searched the house. Because you were with them, protecting the town from your own daughter.”

Callis paled as she saw the distant pyre, two fiery torches hanging from its scaffolding. “When the people blamed you and Sophie for the attacks, the Elders named me and Stefan leaders of a new patrol, responsible for catching you two if you ever dared return. It was a test of our loyalty, of course. Either we saw our own children as traitors and vowed to make them burn or we’d be burned as traitors ourselves.” She looked at Agatha. “The difference between Stefan and me is that he took the vow seriously.”

“How could Stefan betray his own daughter? It was the Elders who gave Sophie to the attackers. They’re the Evil ones! Why would he obey them—”

But as the cage creaked into the moonlit square, Agatha saw the answer to her question. The widow Honora and her two young boys, Jacob and Adam, huddled near the back of the growing crowd, watching Stefan lead in the prisoners. Agatha knew how much the two boys meant to Sophie’s father, who seemed to love them far more than his own daughter. But it wasn’t the boys that Agatha fixed on. It was the gold band, gleaming on the ring finger of Honora’s left hand.

“He had to obey them,” Callis said quietly. “Because the Elders made Stefan choose between his old and new family.”

Agatha looked at her, stunned.

“Leave it to me,” a voice groused under them.

Tedros careened to his feet between Agatha and her mother, knocking both of them against the bars. “They’ve woken the beast,” he boiled, struggling to blink his swollen eye. “No one’s laying a hand on us.”

The cage door swung open behind him and two guards gagged Tedros with a mucky cloth and hoisted him out by his armpits, before roughly nabbing Callis too. Before Agatha could react, Stefan leapt into the cage and took her for himself.

“Stefan, listen to me—Sophie needs our help—” Agatha appealed as he pulled her through the crowd, who was abusing her with cries of “witch” and “traitor” along with chunks of spoiled food. “I know you have a new family, but you can’t give up on her—”

“Give up? You think I gave up? On my own child?” he seethed, pulling her up the stairs to the pyre behind Tedros, who kicked at his guards with muffled yells. “You promised me, Agatha. You promised you’d save her. And instead you left her there to die. Now you’ll see how it feels.”

“Stefan, we can still save her!” sputtered Agatha. “Tedros and me!”

“I always thought one day my daughter would abandon you for a boy,” said Stefan. “Turns out I had the story all wrong.”

He bound her to the pyre with a long rope around her belly, as two guards shoved Tedros in next to her. Agatha could feel the heat of the flaming torches above her.

“Stefan, you have to believe me! We’re Sophie’s only hope—”

He gagged her with a black cloth, but just as he cinched it, Agatha managed one last breath—

“The School Master has her!”

Stefan’s hands froze and his blue eyes met hers, big and wide. Then a hush swept over the crowd and Agatha knew her time was up.

The Elders had come.

’m afraid we only have room for two on the pyre,” said the gray-cloaked Elder with the longest beard, grinning at Agatha and Tedros as he paced the stage, top hat in hand. He leered down at Callis at the front of the massive crowd, her hands tied, standing between the two younger Elders, both in gray cloaks and tall black hats. “We’ll let mother watch before her turn,” he mused, as the two Elders dragged Callis into the mob.

Agatha spotted Reaper’s shadow sprinting away from her mother and towards Graves Hill, a scrap of what looked like parchment between his teeth. Trapped on the pyre, she wrestled hopelessly against her binds, sweating from the heat of the torches above her. If her mother had entered the house one second later, she and Tedros would have had their magic back—they’d be far into the Woods by now, her mother no longer in danger. Stifling tears, Agatha searched for her again, but darkness rendered the crowd a sea of shadows. They’d called her a witch from the day she was born, destined to burn on a stake, and now they’d made their tales come true. In the front row, a few rosy-faced children gawked at Tedros, clinging storybooks to their chests, like talismans against the boy from inside of them.

“But we are not savages, of course,” said the Elder, turning to the captives. “Justice is only delivered when there is a crime.”

The crowd buzzed impatiently, eager to see the show and get to bed.

“Let us meet our guest from the Woods,” the Elder proclaimed. His shiny eyes flicked to Tedros. “What is your name, boy?”

A guard ripped out Tedros’ gag. “Touch her and I kill you,” the prince lashed.

The Elder raised his brows. “Ah, I see,” he said, peering between Tedros and Agatha. “For two hundred years, those from the Woods have kidnapped our young, ripped apart our families, and attacked our homes. For two hundred years, those from the Woods have brought our children nothing but terror, pain, and suffering. And here you are, the first to ever stand before us, claiming to protect one? An improbable twist …” He studied the way Tedros looked at Agatha, his tone easing. “But if it’s true, perhaps mercy is in the cards after all. Only the hardest of hearts can resist young love.”

The crowd rumbled, as if they’d cast their own hearts in stone to see vengeance for all the curses of the Woods. But as Agatha searched the Elder’s face, the old man’s smile was almost friendly now.

“You’ll let us live?” Tedros insisted.

Agatha’s heart hammered, praying her prince had just saved them.

The Elder touched Tedros’ chest with a shriveled hand. Tedros winced, his wound still tender. “You’re young and handsome, with your whole life ahead of you,” the Elder cooed. “Tell us what you know about those that attacked us and I promise we won’t hurt you.”

Agatha’s stomach sank. That tone. She’d heard it before. It was the same way he’d told Sophie she’d be sheltered from her assassins …

Before he left her to die.

Agatha pressed her fist into Tedros’ ribs. Whatever he did, he couldn’t play this game—

“Tedros,” the prince proclaimed to the Elder. “Tedros is my name.”

Agatha bristled, shoving him harder.

“And how do you know our beloved Agatha, Tedros?” coaxed the Elder, leaning closer.

“She’s my princess,” Tedros declared, gently clasping Agatha’s fist. “Soon to be Queen of Camelot and bloodline to King Arthur, so I suggest you unhand us at once.”

The mob quieted in disbelief, children clutching their storybooks tighter. (Red-haired Radley gaped goonishly at Agatha. “Must be slim pickings in the Woods,” he murmured.)

“A real-life prince!” The Elder stepped back. For the first time, he looked unsettled by Tedros, as if forced to acknowledge the possibility of a world bigger than his own. “And to what do we owe this honor?”

Agatha squirmed against her binds, trying to get Tedros to look at her.

“I’m taking her to my castle in the Woods,” Tedros testified, eyes fixed on the Elder. “We pose absolutely no threat to you.”

“And yet we were attacked only months ago by assassins from the Woods,” the Elder said, masses clamoring behind him. “Attacks from which we are still rebuilding.”

“Well, the attacks are over,” retorted Tedros. “Your town is safe.”

Agatha dug her heel into his foot. Tedros shook her off.

“Oh really? Do your princely powers come with foresight?” the Elder scoffed, the audience echoing his laughter. “How would you know anything about the fate of our town, let alone the attacks?”

Agatha shouted into her gag to stop him—

“Because I ordered them,” Tedros fired.

The crowd went still. Agatha slumped against the rope.

The Elder stared at Tedros … then broke into a slow grin, color growing in his cheeks. “Well. We’ve learned all we need to know about our dear guest, haven’t we?” He smiled wolfishly at the prince and walked off the stage, passing Stefan with a glare. “Do the witch first.”

Roars detonated from the mob, flocking closer to the pyre.

Tedros spun to Agatha and saw her face. “But he promised us!” he cried.

The Elder glanced back as he descended the steps. “Every story has a lesson doesn’t it, young prince? Perhaps yours is that you’re too old to believe in fairy tales.”

Agatha felt Tedros gush into a sweat as the guards regagged him. Frantic, the prince thrashed at the rope, trying to free his princess, but his flailing only made the rope cut tighter. Choking for breath, Agatha hunted wildly for her mother, but still couldn’t find her. She whirled to Stefan, knowing she was about to die—

But Stefan hadn’t moved from the side of the stage, his gaze fixed on her.

“Is there a problem, Stefan?” the Elder said, now at the front of the mass.

Stefan kept staring at Agatha.

“Or should we replace our prisoners with your new family?” the Elder said.

Stefan turned sharply. Guards held Honora, Jacob, and Adam in the crowd.

Stefan’s teeth bit the inside of his cheeks. Then his expression darkened. He moved towards Agatha, no longer able to look at her. Body close to hers, he reached up and took a flaming torch from the scaffolding. Agatha cowered from the wrath of the flame as he drew it down, blinding her with smoke. She could hear Tedros’ muffled yells, the echoes of the shouting hordes, but they were drowned out by the raging torch fire, hissing like a demon snake. Eyes watering, she caught flashes of Stefan’s heaving chest, his quivering grasp on the torch, the red splotches across his cheeks …

“Please—” Agatha gasped into her gag.

Stefan still couldn’t look at her, the torch shaking so much that embers scattered onto Agatha’s dress, burning tiny holes.

“Stefan …,” the Elder warned in a menacing voice.

Stefan nodded, tears and sweat mixing. The crowd went dead quiet, seeing him bend towards the stake. He raised the torch to the sticks over Agatha’s head, the flames about to lick onto the wood—

“Take me!” Callis’ anguished voice pierced the silence. “Please, Stefan! Let me die with her!”

Stefan froze, his flame so close to Agatha it scorched the gag in her mouth. Heart stopped, Agatha watched him deliberate a moment, his face calcifying into a mask …

Then he backed away and turned to the Elder.

“It is a mother’s last request,” said Stefan, adding a snort. “Shove her in with her traitor daughter and watch the flesh melt off ’em. They deserve to writhe together, don’t they?”

Even the most bloodthirsty spectators looked flummoxed, deferring to the Elder.

The Elder’s pupils raked Stefan over, before his lips pursed in a flat line.

“Quickly then.”

“No!” Agatha shrieked, her gag breaking away.

Guards wrenched Callis from the crowd onto the stage and shoved her next to Agatha, binding her waist to the pyre. Helpless, Tedros ripped at the rope, his bicep veins about to burst.

“This is my fault …,” Agatha sobbed. “This is all my fault—”

“Close your eyes, dear,” said Callis, trying not to cry. “It will all go fast from here.”

Agatha looked up and saw Stefan’s hand wasn’t shaking on the torch anymore. With an eerie calm, he advanced towards her and her mother, the dancing flame reaching for the wood sticks between them. He finally met Agatha’s eyes, a strange sadness in his face.

“If you ever see my daughter again, beyond this world … tell her I love her.”

“Now, Stefan,” the Elder commanded.

Petrified, Agatha seized Tedros’ hand as she leaned into her mother’s shoulder. She saw Stefan looking at Callis, his lips trembling.

“I’m s-s-sorry,” he whispered.

“You saved me once upon a time, Stefan.” Callis smiled mournfully at him. “I owe you a debt.”

“I c-c-can’t,” Stefan faltered.

“You must,” said Callis, hard as steel.

“NOW!” the Elder thundered.

With a pained cry, Stefan plunged the torch at Callis. Agatha screamed—

Callis thrust out her finger from beneath the binds and shot a blast of green light at the torch. The fire turned green and ricocheted off the pyre like a comet, blasting Stefan off the platform, before circling the stage in a wall of green flames, sealing the captives in.

Before Agatha could suck in a breath, her mother cut her and Tedros loose from the rope with her glowing fingertip. She grabbed Agatha and spoke over the villagers’ cries beyond the firewall—

“The spell won’t last, so listen carefully. Stefan knew what I was, Agatha. From the night you went after Sophie, we had a plan to save you girls from the Elders if you ever returned. Stefan would do anything to keep his daughter safe. But when you came back without Sophie, Stefan had no reason to keep to the plan and endanger his new family … unless he believes his daughter still needs you. You must repay my old debt to him, Agatha. You must save Sophie as Stefan saved you. You hear me? Do not fail. Now run for Graves Hill as fast as you can—”

“You’re a w-w-witch—” Agatha spluttered, trying to find air. “You were a witch all along—”

“The grave between the two swans. Help will be there, waiting for you,” her mother cut in. “You must find the grave before it’s too late.”

Dazed, Tedros turned to Agatha, expecting her to know what her mother was talking about. But Agatha was paralyzed, staring ahead. Tedros spun back to Callis. “Who? Who will be waiting for u—”

Only now Tedros saw what his princess was looking at … the circle of fire falling around the stage, Callis’ spell about to end. In the green firelight, Agatha glimpsed Stefan, stunned on the ground but unharmed, before a fleet of shadows jumped over him, throttling towards the stage. Tedros and Agatha raised their eyes at the same time to see the guards charging through the crowd with spears, dashing right for them.

Callis took Agatha’s face in her hands. “Don’t look back, Agatha.” She kissed her daughter’s forehead hard. “Whatever you do, promise me you won’t look back.”

With a scared cry, Agatha grabbed her mother’s hand, but her prince was already dragging her towards the edge of the stage away from the sprinting guards. Tedros hooked his arm over Agatha and flung the both of them off the platform in a flying leap. Spinning around, Agatha pulled her mother with them, holding on to her hand with every ounce of strength—

Callis smiled at Agatha in the fading firelight and let her daughter go.

Agatha crashed in dirt, twisting her ankle, before Tedros lifted her up in darkness, towing her towards the town gates. “No—I can’t leave her—” she croaked, resisting him.

“‘Don’t look back.’ That’s what she said,” Tedros fought, goading her ahead. “Trust your mother, Agatha. She’s a witch. A powerful witch. We’re the ones who need saving now.”

Hearing the guards’ shouts, Agatha let Tedros shove her forward. She pinned her eyes on Graves Hill ahead, hobbling beside him. Don’t look back, she begged herself, Tedros clenching her like a vise. Don’t look back …

Agatha looked back to see three guards hurdle the sinking firewall towards Callis, spears about to impale her. Her mother held her ground.

“What is she doing?” Agatha choked, freezing in horror.

“Agatha, don’t!” cried Tedros—

Agatha broke free of him and started running back. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING—”

“Kill her!” the Elder’s voice shouted faraway.

Callis raised her arms, welcoming the guards.

They charged and Agatha’s mother fell.

“NO!” Agatha screamed, voice tearing out of her throat. She sank to her knees at the foot of Graves Hill. Her eyes fogged. Her heart deadened. All she saw was a blur of shadows swarming her mother as the shallow fires extinguished, an army of darkness overwhelming the last ashes of light.

“She let them …,” Agatha whispered. “She let them kill her.”

Little by little, she felt the dirt wet on her knees, the numbness wearing off to an onslaught of pain—the dagger-edged thoughts that she had no family anymore … that her only parent had deserted her … that her mother had given her nothing to come home to ever again. She curled into herself, sobbing with fury. Men were no match for a witch. She could have done another spell! She could have ripped them all to shreds! Agatha cried and cried until she heard a strange echo between shuddering breaths … the whispered sound of her name …

Agatha lifted her eyes to a swollen-eyed boy standing over her, beautiful and scared, and for a moment, she saw nothing but a stranger. It was only when Agatha saw his legs unsteady, that she knew her prince was trying to tell her something. Slowly Tedros pointed a shaky finger over her head. Agatha turned.

Six guards raced towards them from the square, armed with torches and spears.

“We have to run, Agatha,” Tedros rasped. “We have to run right now.”

Agatha didn’t move, still nauseous. “How could she let them …”

“To save you, Agatha,” her prince implored, watching the guards gain ground. “And everything she did, everything your mother and Sophie’s father did to keep us alive will be in vain if we don’t go now.”

Agatha gazed into the wet pools of his eyes and suddenly she understood. Her mother didn’t want her to stay with her. Her mother didn’t want her to come back to Gavaldon. She wanted Agatha to save her best friend … to find happiness with her prince … to abandon this world for a better one, far far away …

Because her happy ending wasn’t here. It was never here.

Her mother had died to set her free.

Do not fail.

She had to find her real ending.

She had to run.

Agatha looked up at the guards bolting towards them, spears gleaming in torchlight. Rage blasted through her blood and scorched through her muscles, nothing holding her back anymore. Lunging to her feet, she hurtled up the slope of Graves Hill.