فصل 17

Chapter 17

AGATHA

Never Trust a Princess

In the storybooks Agatha read back in Gavaldon, the land of Aladdin was a feast of color and fragrance and earthy delights: loafing camels, dusty spice markets, palaces veiled by storms of sand.

But in real life, that’s not what it was like at all.

As the Shazabah Sikander had neared its homeland, Agatha, caged in the bowels of the ship, peered out a porthole at a fertile metropolis lording over the desert. Jewel-green palms bowed to each other over paved streets. Sleek red-and-gold buildings speared through the sky, with a controlled traffic of magic carpets transporting citizens around the kingdom. And everywhere she’d looked: camels, squads of them, military-garbed and precise in their march, patrolled the city while also guarding the imperial palace at its center, a pyramid of red-and-gold glass.

It was deep within this palace that Agatha found herself now, imprisoned with her friends, looking out their cell’s only window at the royal camel pastures, where the camel that had turned them in was now happily grazing, reunited with its family.

“Still trust that thing?” Tedros growled from Agatha’s right, the two crouched in the dark cell.

Agatha couldn’t speak. As soon as they’d reached the palace, the guards had stripped Merlin from her. She had no idea where they’d taken the five-year-old wizard. With each passing second, her skin went clammier, her stomach sicker. “Mama!” Merlin had cried. Again, the wizard was prescient. Because she felt like she’d lost her child.

Despairing, she appealed to the camel through the window, but it offered her only the calmest of nods, as if everything was as it should be. As if it hadn’t betrayed her. As if this was the way to Tedros winning the second test. For a moment, Agatha wondered if she should still have hope . . . if the camel had a larger plan in motion . . .

Then she saw Hort glaring across the cell. “To answer your question, Tedros, yes, she totally still trusts that thing. Same way Sophie trusts guys whose names start with ‘R.’” Sophie let out a long sigh. “You know, Aggie, normally I shield you from boorish boys, but I did warn you about that camel. Animals aren’t our friends. Especially ones with humps.” “Only a Never would say something so foolish,” Princess Uma muttered.

“Oh?” Sophie retorted, nursing her bandaged wrist. “Then why can’t you do one of your bird whistles or wolf calls and summon your friends to help us?” “Not in Shazabah,” Uma said vaguely, looking away.

“Well, someone better help us,” Hort said, standing up. “We’ve been dumped in jail a million miles from home and Rhian and the Sultan were chums, so the Snake’s surely on the way to kill Agatha, win the second test, and then kill the rest of us.” The weasel paused. “It’s that last part I care about.” “Hort’s right,” Agatha confessed, still thinking about Merlin. “Maybe the camel betrayed us. Maybe I was wrong. But we can’t just wait to die.” “What should we do, then? Wish the Snake away? Stick a doll with pins? He’s out there and we’re in here,” Tedros said, clearly frustrated.

“We’ve gotten out of prison before,” said Agatha.

Tedros shook his head. “We shouldn’t have tried to run away. I knew it was cowardice. Dad doesn’t want me to hide from my own test.” He slouched against the wall. “They’ll probably give Merlin to the Snake too.” The thought of Japeth claiming Merlin chilled Agatha’s blood—

“Sounds like Aladdin’s Cave is your only hope now,” a voice chuckled.

Agatha and Tedros flashed their gold fingerglows to the back of the cell.

No one there.

“Up here,” said the voice.

Agatha cast her glow towards a ceiling pipe—

Hanging by his boots was a young man, with smooth brown skin, thick eyebrows, and a strapping physique, doing stomach crunches upside down.

“Too bad only my father knows where to find the Cave of Wishes,” he said.

Princess Uma rose slowly. “Kaveen?”

“Thought you’d promised never to return to Shazabah, Uma,” said Kaveen, hanging like a bat. “Wasn’t that part of our divorce agreement?” “Your father handled that, just like he handled every other piece of our marriage,” said Uma.

“You had a habit of not listening to me,” said Kaveen, “and yet you always listened to the Sultan.” “Because if I didn’t listen to your father, I would have been thrown in here,” Uma fired back, “so clearly it’s you who didn’t listen to him in the end.” “Well, we’re both here now,” said Kaveen, dropping onto the floor. He walked towards Uma. “The cursed Pen pulled us apart. And now it brings us back together.” Agatha watched the distance between them shrink, unsure if they were going to kill or kiss each other— “Hold on.” Tedros stepped in the middle. “You two . . . were married?” Princess Uma, Agatha reminded herself. Because Uma had wed a prince. Prince Kaveen of Shazabah. Aladdin’s great-grandson. That’s what Kaveen’s ancestry scroll had said when she and Tedros had come across it in the Living Library. And yet, Agatha had known of Kaveen before. Years ago, Uma had confided to Agatha about the prince she’d fallen in love with at the School for Good and married soon after. But then the Storian chose Uma for its next fairy tale—the story of a princess whose animal friends rescued her from an Evil warlord when her prince was too late. Uma became famous for her friendship with animals, while Kaveen became a laughingstock for failing to save his true love. Their marriage curdled. But it wasn’t their divorce that surprised Agatha now. It was the part about the Sultan being Kaveen’s father. Because if the Sultan was his dad . . .

“Why would your own father put you in jail?” Agatha asked.

Kaveen’s black eyes set upon her. Agatha’s neck rashed from the heat of his stare. When Tedros looked at her, there was often a note of uncertainty, as if he was never quite sure of himself. But this prince had no questions about himself, nor was he willing to endure any from her.

“Don’t make men like that in Gavaldon, do they?” Sophie whispered in her ear.

Kaveen glowered at Sophie. “Girls like you two are the reason I’m here.” “Excuse me?” Sophie bristled.

“I know your fairy tale. Girls who didn’t need a prince to find a happy ending. Same story as Uma’s. Same rancid ending. The Storian makes fools of the best men. Just look at what it’s done to him.” He pointed his finger at Tedros. “My advice to you, lad: never trust a princess. Not yours, not anyone else’s. Not if you want to become the man you’re meant to be.” Agatha saw Tedros stiffen slightly, as if this resonated somewhere inside him.

She and her prince certainly had their issues with trust, too. Is this how they would end up? Like Uma and Kaveen? Tedros seemed to be wondering it . . . He caught Agatha looking at him. The prince cleared his throat, addressing Kaveen. “Um, you mentioned a cave that could help us. A cave of wishes?” “Aladdin’s Cave,” said Kaveen. He lit a red fingerglow and cast a stream of dust in the dark, which took the shape of vast desert dunes. “The only place where any wish can come true.” The golden sands shifted as if they were alive, opening up the mouth of a cave, the light within a radiant purple.

“The wishes I speak of come from the magic lamp inside the cave. And every soul in the Woods has longed to have this lamp since Aladdin found it. Aladdin, an ordinary slumdog who stumbled upon the cave and the lamp and used his three wishes from the genie within to become the Sultan of Shazabah.” Kaveen’s glow conjured this magic lamp . . . a massive half-man, half-tiger unspooling from its tip . . .

“Some accounts suggest that there is no genie or magic lamp anymore. That Aladdin freed him with his last wish. But the genie knew my great-grandfather’s secret—that he’d become Sultan by magic and deceit—and no one with such a secret would ever set its keeper free. But Aladdin was grateful enough to the genie to give him peace. He returned the lamp to the cave, vanishing it deep into the desert . . .” The genie sucked back into the lamp, extinguishing Kaveen’s glow. But then a new ember of light appeared . . . a vision of a Sultan in red-and-gold robes leading an army across the dunes . . .

“After Aladdin’s death, his son spent his life searching for the cave, to no avail. Then his son took on the quest. My father. Day after day, my dad combed the Shazabah desert . . . until one day he found it.” The cave reappeared out of the dunes, towering high in the sand.

“But it would not let my father in. Instead, it gave him a message.” The cave spoke in a tiger’s growl: “I am the genie of the lamp. Master of this cave. Those who seek admission must bring me something in return. Find my true love and deliver her to me. Only then may you enter my Cave of Wishes.” Agatha looked up as the cave shape-shifted into the genie they had seen before, half-man, half-tiger . . .

“My father wanted that lamp. So he consulted every sorcerer in Shazabah: Who is a genie’s true love?” Kaveen went on. “But none had the answer. After all, a genie is neither human nor animal, mortal nor ghost, free nor unfree. Who could possibly be a genie’s match? Thwarted, my dad enlisted me and my sister in his hunt, banking on the cleverness and ambition of youth. He baited us with the ultimate prize: whoever found the answer and delivered the lamp to him would be named the next Sultan.” Kaveen’s glow mirrored his own self along with a second shadow next to him: a girl with a sleek beehive of hair, her tall, shapely form wrapped in red-and-gold furs, and a hawk on her shoulder.

“Who’s she?” Sophie whispered to Agatha. “She’s fabulous.”

“My sister and I made a pact. We’d find the answer together and share the throne,” said Kaveen. “But we were as stymied by the riddle as our father. Not to mention we were young and soon distracted. I went off to school and then so did she. But after the Storian humiliated me in Uma’s tale, I was determined to prove myself. Not just to my father, but to the whole Woods. So without telling my sister, I hunted relentlessly for the genie’s true love. But not even the wiliest witch could tell me who it was. Until at last, one night I begged my father to show me the cave. To let me speak to the genie myself. He’d kept the location secret for fear that someone else might find the genie’s love and steal the lamp for themselves. But my father honored my plea and took me to the desert in the dead of night, using a map he’d made to mark the cave’s spot . . .” In glowing silhouettes, the Sultan led Kaveen blindfolded across the desert, until the Sultan removed the covering from his eyes. Before Kaveen’s eyes, the sand rose up and whittled into the shape of a magic lamp, the tip of the lamp the opening to the cave.

The prince kneeled before this opening, the Sultan watching from a distance.

“I come to you as a humble man, Genie,” Kaveen appealed. “The Pen has taken everything from me. My name. My wife. My happiness. Look inside my heart and see my intentions are pure. Let me have the hope of a new life. A good life. Like my great-grandfather, who you once opened your cave to. I may have lost my true love. But give me a chance at glory by helping you find yours.” The cave seemed to smile at him, as if he’d said the magic words. Then a golden mist emanated from the cave’s opening, seeping into Kaveen’s ear. Inside his head, the tiger’s growl resounded . . .

“Find the princess who is every animal’s friend,” said the cave. “She is my true love.” Within Kaveen’s mind, the cave’s mist spawned an image of a girl with a tiny nose, long hair, and almond-shaped eyes . . .

Agatha jolted in surprise.

“Me?” Princess Uma gasped.

The visions snuffed out, Kaveen’s dim fingerglow lighting his face. He didn’t look at Uma. “I never told my father what I’d learned. I loved you too much to bind you to a genie and trap you in the lamp. But my dad knew the cave had given me the answer. He’d seen it whisper in my ear. And so he jailed me because I refused to name you to him. All these years, you made your reputation off my humiliation, never looking for me or giving me a thought, while I was in here, protecting you. Saving you. Like the Storian told the Woods I’d failed to do.” Slowly Kaveen looked up at Uma, his face hard.

“But here you are now,” he said, rising to his feet. “As if the Storian didn’t want you protected at all. As if it wants me to name you to my father. As if it wants me to be free instead of you. Finally, the Pen is on my side.” Kaveen raised his fingerglow, casting a phantom crow in red dust, which flew out of the cell, screeching for the guards.

“Kaveen, no!” Uma cried. Agatha and Tedros shielded her. So did Sophie and Hort— A fanfare of trumpets exploded outside.

Then somewhere above, the doors to the prison flew open. Agatha thrust her head through the bars.

Bootsteps rattled the stairs, shadows moving across walls.

Guards came off the steps, flooding in front of the cell, five of them, clad in red and gold, scimitars on their belts.

Kaveen addressed them: “Guards, summon my fath—”

Another trumpet blared above, drowning him out: “Presenting the Royal Princess of Shazabah!” Kaveen drew back in confusion—

A new shadow suddenly appeared over the stairwell. The same silhouette Agatha had glimpsed during Kaveen’s tale: a tall, buxom girl with a sculpted mountain of hair and a hawk on her shoulder.

Then she came to life, gliding down the steps and into the light, the Princess of Shazabah, with cinnamon skin, kohl-dusted eyes, and luscious red lips. Two ladies-in-waiting, wrapped in red-and-gold robes, stood at her sides, their heads bowed. The princess took her place in front of the guards and peered into the cell.

“Looks like my father was right about catching you, Agatha,” she pronounced. “The King of Camelot is already on a ship to Shazabah to kill you.” “Sister?” said Kaveen, grabbing the bars.

“Reena?” said Tedros, grabbing the bars next to him.

“Wait, you know these rebels?” Kaveen asked her.

“Dad hasn’t a clue, of course,” Reena answered. “I told him I was coming down to see you, brother. He said if I could get you to tell me the genie’s true love, then I could have the throne myself . . . Tempting offer, of course, given you’ve been secretly searching for the answer, violating our pact. But in truth it’s not you I’ve come to see.” Her brother shook his head. “I—I—I don’t understand.”

“You see, these aren’t rebels, as you say,” said Reena. “They’re my . . . friends.” The two ladies behind Reena doffed their hoods, revealing Kiko and Beatrix, who sprayed the guards with stun spells, knocking them to the ground.

Agatha was in a daze, watching Beatrix snatch keys off a fallen guard. “How did you—” “Questions later. If we’re going to keep you alive, we don’t have much time,” Reena said, unlocking the cell. “Follow me. All of you. You too, brother, if you’d like to be out of your cage.” Agatha felt Tedros’ arm around her, pushing her out of the cell—

“Stop,” said a voice.

Agatha and her friends turned to see Kaveen holding Uma, his fingerglow at her throat.

Beatrix and Kiko aimed their glows at his head. But the prince’s eyes were on his sister.

“Reena, it’s her. The genie’s true love. It was Uma all along,” said Kaveen breathlessly. “If I give her to Father, I’ll be Sultan. I’ll have the Woods’ respect once more. Take your friends. They’re none of my concern. But this one I keep.” Reena narrowed her eyes. “She was your princess, Kaveen. Give her to a genie? Bind her to the lamp for eternity?” “That would be like me killing Agatha to win my test,” Tedros berated him. “That would be like me handing my princess to a Snake.” Agatha felt a rush of relief. Whatever doubts Kaveen had cast in her prince about her, Tedros had broken the spell.

“But it’s what the Storian wants! The real happy ending to our story!” Kaveen appealed to his sister. “Me, Sultan. My princess punished. You, free with your friends.” Reena hesitated, considering the offer. “Uma is our friend. Hmm, let’s say I do give her to you. There would have to be a steep price. Something me and my friends need . . .” She looked at her brother. “Tell me how Father finds his way to the Cave of Wishes.” Agatha startled. “Reena, we can’t leave Uma—”

Kaveen pressed his glow harder to Uma’s throat, his eyes on his sister. “I keep her. Promise me.” “You’ll have to trust me,” said Reena.

“I never trust a princess,” said Kaveen. “Not even my own blood.”

“Says the one who broke the trust between us,” Reena clipped. Beatrix and Kiko fired whips of glow past Kaveen’s ears. Kaveen turned his glow on his sister, about to attack— “Careful. You’re quite outnumbered, brother,” said Reena.

Kaveen’s nostrils flared. “A magical compass on Dad’s sash. It has the map to the cave,” he snarled. “Now go. Leave Uma with me. Our bargain is complete.” “Thank you,” said Reena, walking out. “You were right, you know. To never trust a princess.” She glanced back at him. “At least one who doesn’t trust you.” Kaveen’s eyes widened—

The hawk launched off her shoulder, stabbing Kaveen in the ribs, severing his grip on Uma and sending him writhing to the ground.

“Come on,” Reena said, ushering Agatha out of the cell.

Uma gave Sophie a look as she followed. “What was that about animals not being our friends?” Sophie pursed her lips.

“Once a teacher, always a teacher,” said Agatha, dragging her best friend along.