The Last Ever After (14 page)

Sophie looked away, an old darkness rearing into her heart. “Just like my mother.”

Lady Lesso arched her brows, intrigued.

“My mother was the third wheel, watching my father and her best friend fall in love,” Sophie said, eyes pinned to the
floor. “And my father and Honora didn't care.”

“Because they knew your mother didn't have the courage to fight them.”

Sophie nodded. “It's why she died so young. She couldn't face the rest of her life alone. She just . . . gave up.”

“Then it looks like your best friends are betting an old story can be made
new
,” said the Dean.

Sophie slowly lifted red eyes.

“Like mother, like daughter,” said Lady Lesso. “Is that what you want?”

Sophie's body hardened to steel.

“My job as Dean is to ensure
you
do not end up alone, Sophie,” Lady Lesso soothed. “My job is to ensure you and Rafal win your Happy Never After. But I made you a teacher because I need you to find out how Agatha and Tedros plan to break in.”

Sophie frowned. “How would I know how they plan to—”

“Because there is a spy working for your friends
inside
this school,” said Lady Lesso harshly. She shoved forward the crumpled scrap she'd been studying. “The fairies snatched this from a white mouse near the school gates, before it escaped.”

“It's a map of your movements,” said the Dean. “Why the notes about the fog, I haven't the faintest clue. But someone in this school is telling Good how to find you.”

Sophie looked up, the last of her fear draining away. Good was
spying
on her? That's how desperate they were to destroy her happy ending? Suddenly, any remaining desire to see her best friends scorched to wrath.

“I haven't told Rafal, of course. He's so drugged up on teenage testosterone that he'd exterminate every last student in this school,” griped Lady Lesso. “I need
you
to find out who the spy is, Sophie. A white mouse messenger suggests it's an Ever, but you know Agatha and Tedros' friends better than I. As a teacher, you can keep your eye on any suspects and help us uncover how exactly your friends plan to invade our castle.”

Sophie bridled. “But I don't have the foggiest idea how to teach a class!”

“Pollux has been teaching your class the past few weeks and will stay on to help you settle in, especially with double the number of students to manage. That said, I'm quite sure they'll prefer you to that twit even if you pick your nose the whole time. Focus on finding the spy, Sophie. We don't have much time. Agatha and her prince will be here in days. And if you don't end your fairy tale now, the sun will soon end it for
all
of us.”

Sophie nodded, adrenaline coursing through her . . .

Then she saw the empty Dean's desk in the corner. Guilt dampened the storm inside of her. “But surely Professor Dovey knows a way to close our storybook without me hurting anyone—”

“Professor Dovey is no longer a Dean,” Lady Lesso said stiffly.

“Where is she?” Sophie asked, startled.

“She and the other Good teachers have been imprisoned in a secure location, where they will remain until the School Master deems otherwise.”

Sophie gawked at her. “But she was your friend! You two always helped each other!”

“Like you once helped Agatha.” Lady Lesso's purple eyes cast down as she caressed the basket of plums. “But a witch can't be friends with a princess no matter how hard she tries, Sophie. Haven't we learned that lesson well enough?”

Sophie's mouth dried out, her voice trapped in her throat. “But then . . . then who is the other Dean?”

The door flung opened behind her and a tall, menacingly handsome boy in a sleeveless black leather shirt swaggered through with spiked black hair, deathly pale cheeks, and lethal, violet eyes.

“Morning, Mother. Brought you fresh coffee,” he said in a deep, strapping voice.

He put a mug of blackish liquid on Lady Lesso's desk, then leered at Sophie. “Well, well, I see you're getting our new teacher settled in.” He leaned against the sunlit window, a coiled black whip gleaming on his belt. “Funny, we've never quite met have we, Sophie of Woods Beyond? You've seen me, of course, in your invisible cape and in your elfish boy's body, sneaking through the School for Boys . . . Filip of Mount Honora, was it? Threw me against a wall one night to stop me
from torturing your precious Tedros. Oh yes, now I see Filip in there . . . those same pretty eyes and succulent lips. But of course you aren't Filip anymore, are you? So perhaps I should forgive your impertinence . . .” His purple eyes slashed into her. “I wouldn't want to hurt that delicious little face.” The boy licked his lips and slid his hands into tight pockets, blue veins flexing through his biceps. “Wish I could stay, ladies, but I have to administer punishment to a few Everboys in the Doom Room. Caught them writing letters to their parents, asking to be rescued. As if anyone could get in or out now that the School Master's returned.” He headed for the doors, then looked at Sophie. “You do remember my name, I hope?”

Sophie cowered into her nightgown, unable to speak.

“Aric. Best remember it this time, since I
am
your Dean,” he purred, backing through the door. “See you at lunch, impertinent little Sophie. Faculty gets its own private spot on the balcony. Now that we're friends, I look forward to getting to know you more . . .
intimately.
”

He winked at her like a devil and then he was gone.

Sophie slowly turned to Lady Lesso, eyes big as marbles.

Lady Lesso sniffed the coffee and poured it into the plum basket. The plums liquefied with a smoking, poisonous reek.

“School Master forbade him to kill me but he still tries,” she said grimly, pitching the mug out the window. “Yesterday, he put an asp in my toilet.”

“Aric is your . . . your son?” Sophie gasped. “He's a monster—a murderer—he killed Tristan!”

“Nearly managed to kill me too in the brief chaos after the
Trial, before the School Master took control,” the Dean said much softer now. “I don't blame him, of course. When I accepted the position of Dean of Evil fifteen years ago, it was my duty to sever all attachments—children included. But instead, I hid Aric in a cave near school, stealing in to see him at night, year after year, pretending like he had a mother who would always love and protect him.” Her voice quavered and she fiddled with the plum basket. “The School Master found out and sealed me inside the gates. Never even had the chance to say goodbye to my son. Aric will never forgive me for it . . . leaving him there, six years old in the Woods, all alone. And he shouldn't.” She looked at Sophie. “Like I said, you and I must both pay the price of our mistakes—and mine is having my own son vengefully plot my death, while he shares my power as Dean.”

She glanced out the window with a wistful grin. “Suppose it's just like the School Master wants. Mother and son as Deans . . . a former student teaching my class . . . a timeless Master and his young queen . . . Old and New working together for Evil.”

Sophie followed her eyes to what used to be the School for Evil across the bay, now the crumbling, pockmarked School for Old. There were shadowy figures on the roofs now: hulking, misshapen, and clearly not human, with bows and arrows slung on their backs, like a monstrous castle guard. Then beneath them, through a tower window, Sophie noticed another shadow—this one human. Stepping closer, she glimpsed a man's silhouette with a boat-shaped hat, like a pirate's . . . and where his hand should be, a sharp flash of metal instead . . .

A tuft of fog floated in front of him and when it cleared, the man was no longer there.

Sophie bit her lip. Rafal had refused to tell her anything about the Old castle. But she
was
queen, wasn't she? She had a right to know what he was hiding in the other school.

“Lady Lesso, please tell me what's in the School for Old,” she said firmly.

“Students of the old fairy tales, of course, just like we teach a new fairy tale here. But the School for Old is the School Master's domain—not yours,” the Dean snipped, before a cacophonous crackle broke through the castle, like an army of demented crickets. “That's the fairies signaling end of session.” She stood up and clacked towards the door in her steel stilettos. “Shall we? Students won't respect a Curses teacher who's late. Especially a teacher who's supposed to be the new
me
.”

Sophie rooted deeper in her chair, arms crossed over her nightgown. “First of all, if I'm going to stand in front of a class full of teenage boys, I at least need something to wear. Besides, even if you do get me into that classroom, I don't know any of the new fairy tales!”

“I said a new tale. Not tales.”

“Well, whatever fairy tale this is, I can't possibly teach it—”

“Of course you can, since it's the only fairy tale we teach at the School for New.” Lady Lesso glowered at her, holding open the door.

“Yours.”

12
Find the Spy

T
he old lollipop room in Hansel's Haven was still made of lollipops, but they'd been blown up into thousands of rainbow-colored shards and pieced into new murals across the walls.

As students flurried in from the crowded hall, Sophie sat on Professor Sheeks' old lollipop desk that had been slashed, scarred, beaten into lumps, and riddled with holes. Wearing black-suede stiletto boots and a formfitting, lacy black dress, she studied the murals of herself at her most Evil in
The Tale of Sophie and Agatha
—riding a rat to slay Agatha during the Good-Evil War . . . invisibly attacking Tedros during the Boy-Girl War . . . throwing
Agatha into a sewer . . . pushing Tedros off a cliff . . .

You fought them before
, the voice inside her said.
You can do it again.

Her hands started to shake.

I can't
, Sophie panicked, looking away.
I'm different now.

She waited for the voice inside her to agree, to speak reason and protect her friends . . .

Instead a different voice came this time. Darker. Angrier. Spewing bile.

Like mother, like daughter.

Like mother, like daughter.

Like mother, like daughter.

Like mother, like daughter.

Slowly Sophie lifted her eyes back to Agatha and Tedros, painted on the walls . . . and for a moment she saw Honora and Stefan instead.

Sophie's hands stopped shaking.

Find the spy
, the witch inside whispered.

Find the spy,
she obeyed, locking to the task.

A throat cleared loudly.

Sophie looked down at a class of almost forty Evers and Nevers in black-and-green uniforms crammed into seats—Beatrix, Reena, Chaddick, Nicholas, Mona, Arachne, Ravan, Vex, Millicent, Brone among them—all wearing the same putrid scowls.

“Oh hello there, um . . . c-c-class,” Sophie sputtered, startled by both their expressions and the sheer number of students. “It's been a w-w-while, hasn't it?”

The student's scowls intensified.

“But we're a family now, aren't we?” Sophie fawned, trying a new tactic. “And look at you, so smart in black! Never used to like black (such a nihilistic color), but Lady Lesso said this dress belonged to Rumpelstiltskin's niece, who used to teach this very same class. Small-boned woman—not surprising since her uncle was a dwarf—so no one's been able to fit into it until me.”

The students looked positively hateful now.

“Um, Lady Lesso said Pollux has been teaching in my absence,” she puttered, “so perhaps we should wait for him to—”

Vex let out an angry fart.

Sophie held her breath, appalled.

Find the spy
, she refocused. Someone in this room was on Good's side, trying to help kill the boy she loved . . .

And yet, with their matching scowls, all the students in the room looked equally capable of betraying Evil, Evers and Nevers alike. That is, except for Kiko in a black babushka and veil, sniffling at the back of the room. Sophie glimpsed the small pink ribbon pinned to her uniform:

Kiko saw Sophie looking at her and gave her the same horrible glare as everyone else.

“Did someone put frownies in the school gruel this morning?” Sophie simpered, trying to keep her cool.

A spitball hit her in the eye.

Sophie exploded red, not even bothering to look for who shot it. “Look, it's obvious why you're all upset, okay? When I first came to this place, you were vile to me, even though I was nothing but nice to each of you, whether greeting you in hallways, enduring your odious hygiene, or educating you about the evils of white flour. And now you're mad because the most handsome boy in the world gave me his ring, which makes me queen of the school, sitting up here with all the power, while you're down there, with no power at all. But you know what? Tough
tooties
. I've been alone my whole life, trying to find someone who loves me who won't leave me, someone who actually likes me for who I am, warts and all. And now I found him! I don't care if he's a sorcerer. I don't care if he's the most Evil boy in the world! He's
mine
and he loves me, even if I'm emotional and complicated and brutally misunderstood. So pout and be mad all you like, but after all I've endured in my life, I deserve to have true love, whether you like it or not, and the least you could do is be happy for me!”

Silence.

“That's not why we're mad,” snapped Beatrix.

“No one gives a hog's behind if you have a boyfriend,” Mona stabbed.

Sophie pursed her lips. “Oh. Then what's the problem?”

All the kids turned towards the window. Sophie followed their eyes to the colossal scoreboard over the Blue Forest, listing the students in order of their scores. Glowing red lines divided the board into three sections: a top group, a middle group, and a bottom group. She couldn't read any of the names through the hazy green air, except for Hort's, firmly atop the rankings.

“Third year is tracking year,” growled Ravan, picking miserably at his shorn black hair. “Starting next week, we're split into dorms as Leaders, Henchmen, or Mogrifs, based on our rankings.”

“Which means Evers like me have to excel at Evil or we'll end up poisonous toads!” Millicent carped to Sophie. “This is entirely your fault!”

“And it's no better for Nevers either,” Mona added. “We have twice as many people to compete against now that the whole school is Evil!”

“And even if you do end up a Leader, they get double the homework as everyone else,” said Vex.

“And Henchmen have to follow their Leaders and do everything they say,” fretted Reena.

“And Mogrifs have to go to class as animals!” said Beatrix. “And god forbid you fail three challenges in a row. Then you end up a plant!”

“What are you upset about? You're on track to be a Leader!” Kiko said, whirling to her. “I'm third to last in the whole school! Suppose I get turned into a tulip? I can't even concentrate ever since . . . ever since . . .” She burst into tears. “Tristan
adored
tulips! Used to put them in his hair.” Kiko
blew her nose into her veil. “That boy loved me so much.”

“Oh for Pete's sake, that boy wouldn't have loved you if you were the last girl on earth,” Beatrix hissed. “Besides, I don't want to be a leader of Evil, you dimwit! Once upon a time, I was almost Class Captain in the School for Good. And now I have to uglify and curse people and have
henchmen
?”

“Sounds like a typical day for you, actually,” Sophie murmured.

Beatrix gasped.

“Even the School for Boys was better than this,” Chaddick contended. “Sure our castle was a little rank but at least we didn't have fairies stinging us like bees if we're a second late and Aric sending us to the Doom Room to be tortured for rules he's completely made up. He's punished every boy in school like ten times already.”

“He got me for an untucked shirt yesterday,” Nicholas said. “That kid is Evil.”

“And not in a Good way,” muttered Vex quietly.

Sophie waited for them to elaborate, but all the boys glanced at each other in tortured brotherhood, before swiveling back to her.

“Everything was fine for the last two hundred years, until you came along and messed up Good and Evil,” barked Ravan.

“Boys and Girls too!” Brone boomed.

“I hope Agatha and Tedros break in and kill the School Master!” seethed Arachne. “I hope they bring Good back!”

“Bring Good Back!”
Beatrix shouted, and all the students stomped their feet in solidarity, cheering along:
“Bring Good
Back! Bring Good Back!”

Sophie gaped, speechless. How could she find the spy for Good if all of them were on Good's side?

“That's your job, you ninny—” a sharp nasty voice echoed outside.

The door flew open and three students pattered in, tittering loudly.

“—to follow me around and do whatever I say,” grouched a pasty girl with dirty hair streaked black and red and a fearsome buck-horned demon tattooed around her neck.

“Hope I get tracked as a Leader and you as my Henchman,” retorted an albino girl with a throaty rasp and three black rats sticking out of her pockets. “I'll make sure you spend the rest of your life kissing my—”

“Daddy said he'd buy me a new horse if
I
made Leader,” chirped a girl behind them, round as a balloon, snacking on a bundle of chocolate daisies. “Killed my last one by accident.”

“Sat on it?” scoffed the albino.

“Fed it too much fudge,” said the round girl.

Suddenly all three girls stopped in their tracks and craned their heads to Sophie. They broke into toothy smiles and dropped into their seats in unison, hands folded over their bags.

“Sorry we're late,” said tattooed Hester.

“Castor made us clean up after a dragon in Henchmen,” said albino Anadil.

“Dragons poo a lot,” said paunchy Dot, mouth full.

Sophie nearly leapt off the desk to hug her old roommates. “Oh praise heavens! My
real
friends,” she beamed, so relieved
to see the three smiley witches against the sea of snarls. “At least someone's happy to see me!”

“I wouldn't go that far,” Hester mumbled. She started opening her book bag—then noticed the furious faces around her.

“Oh here we go,” she moaned. “For the last time, you're all in the School for Evil now and that means you're fighting
for
Evil. Look at me: Aric stabbed a blade in my stomach during the Trial and now I obey his every word. You want to stay alive? You want the sun to stop melting? Then do what the teachers say and help Sophie kill Agatha and Tedros.”

“I thought Agatha was your friend,” Ravan sniped.

“Excuse me?
These
are my friends,” Hester said, pointing to Anadil and Dot with a glowing red fingertip. “The coven everyone fears and yet wants to be in. The clique that doesn't give a damn what you think. The sinful, sinistral, all-around-original Three Witches of Room 66.”