فصل 22

Chapter 22

TEDROS

Snake Eyes

“Where are we?” Agatha asked.

Tedros couldn’t see anything, his arms still around his princess. There was no sun-gold light this time. They’d fallen straight into darkness before sliding into dry, scratchy earth. It smelled oily and rank, like fish gone bad.

“We’re inside his secrets,” said Tedros.

Agatha pulled away. “What?”

She sparked her glow, casting it around—

They were in a tunnel.

Made of scims.

The ceiling, the floor, the walls . . . all of it was a mass of dead, desiccated eels, black and briny, packed like mulch.

Tedros rose, shining his own glow behind them. No visions or clues. No window into the Snake’s heart. Just more endless tunnels. More darkness and scims.

Is something wrong with the mirror? Tedros worried. Did it not work outside the cave? Was that the genie’s revenge? Trapping them inside someone else, with no way out? A someone else that just happened to be their nemesis?

“How are we inside his secrets?” said Agatha, still in a fog.

“A magic mirror I picked up from the genie’s cave,” Tedros said quickly, masking his panic, trying not to tell his princess that he just locked them inside the Snake’s soul. “Supposed to show you a person’s greatest secrets. Things they want to hide.” “Supposed to?” Agatha said, eyes narrowing.

“Like it showed me the genie’s secret word to escape his cave, and it showed me my mother so happy with Lancelot that she never really wanted me back in her life,” Tedros rambled. “Explains a lot, actually—” “But where are his secrets, then?” Agatha pressed. “According to you, we’re supposed to be seeing the Snake’s, but there’s nothing here.” Tedros swallowed. “Right.”

“So how do we get out?”

“Uh . . . not sure.”

Agatha waited for him to say something else.

He didn’t.

Her cheeks flushed, as if about to unleash on him, for his foolishness, for his failure to think through things, a big, fat I-told-you-so speech that she surely was holding in about his impetuousness and poor instincts and all his other shortcomings as a man, the same speech Tedros had waited so tensely for his dad to give him before he died, the speech that never came, but instead lived in the prince’s own head day after day, now at last to be spoken out loud by his princess . . .

Instead, Agatha smiled at him. “Still alive, aren’t we?”

Tedros watched her sleuth around the cave. “How did you see your mother’s secrets?” she asked.

“They were just there, clear as day—”

Her gaze fixed past him. “What’s that?”

Somewhere, at the end of the darkness, a tiny green light beamed.

Agatha moved towards it, but Tedros cut her off. “Stay behind me.” His princess hesitated, then followed. Tedros could hear her holding her breath. If there was one thing about Agatha, she really didn’t like being led.

“The others,” she panicked. “They’re still up there—”

“When I went in the mirror before, I returned without losing time. The same way time stops in the Celestium. Which means our friends are safe as long as we’re here. Speaking of which, Japeth looked like he’d been boiled to a pulp. Your doing?” “Sophie’s. He tried to kill me . . . and she screamed.”

Tedros simmered. That Japeth tried to kill Agatha and he wasn’t there to save her, leaving Sophie to do the job . . . He forced a light tone. “Vintage move! Not surprised she still had it in her. Once a witch, always a witch. Wonder what would happen if we went inside Sophie’s secrets. Better not. Might find out she’s still in love with me.” “She’d rather marry Japeth.” There was no levity in Agatha’s voice. Instead, she looked crestfallen. “We were so close to killing him, Tedros. To all of this being over.” “It wouldn’t be The End, even if you did,” said the prince. “Killing Japeth might have made you the hero, Agatha. You and Sophie. But it wouldn’t have made me king. You said it yourself at the palace. I need people to believe I’m the Lion. There’s only two ways to do that: win the tournament or expose Japeth as a fake. Thought I could win the tournament, but I’m trapped at the second test. So we need to expose Japeth. To make him give up the throne. That’s the plan the knights and I came up with. But maybe there’s an easier way . . . Which is why I brought us here, inside his secrets. Hoping to find the secret that can show the Woods who he really is.” “Makes sense,” said Agatha flatly.

“What are you really thinking?” Tedros asked.

“Both of us are being fools, thinking there’s an easy way out. Your father made the tournament for a reason. He wants you to finish the tests, not find some way around them.” “But I can’t get past the second test—”

“Why would your father make a test you can’t pass?” Agatha pushed. “You who he gave his ring to? You, his true heir?” Tedros thought about this. “What if these tests aren’t just meant to prove I’m king? What if they’re meant to make me a better king than my dad? The first test was about the Green Knight. Why? To learn there were two Japeths and a connection between them, yes. That strange vision of Evelyn you saw in the pearl. But the test was more than that: to see that the Green Knight was one of my dad’s mistakes. He lost his brother to anger and pride. He lost Merlin too. He knew I could be just as angry and prideful, like when I refused to hear the story of the Green Knight. He feared my emotions would get the best of me. So the test was a lesson. Swallowing Merlin’s beard meant swallowing my pride and letting the grudges against my father go. It meant accepting him as fallible and forgiving him for it. The first test of being a good king.” “Only I messed it all up,” said Agatha.

“Did you?” said Tedros. “Or did Dad want the second test to be about you? Maybe Dad had a glimpse of the future, like you and Sophie guessed. The more I think about it, the more I think he wanted to put you to the test. The next Queen of Camelot. Because Dad chose the wrong one. My mother ruined him and nearly brought down the kingdom. Everything that’s gone wrong in Dad’s story can be traced to the Guinevere Mistake. Dad wanted her to die for the pain she caused him. He even put a death warrant on her head. Not because he truly wanted her to die. Because he wanted her to come back to him. That death warrant was his last cry of love. So now he’s putting the same warrant on your head. Daring us to find a way out. Maybe this is his way of forgiving my mother—if I can learn from her sins. If I choose the right queen because of her. That’s why I think Dad moved the bounty to you. To test our love. To redeem Guinevere. To finish his and my mother’s story.” Tedros exhaled. “Only I have no idea how. Which is why we’re inside a Snake, looking for something to help us.” He walked taller, his voice steeling. “But we will win somehow. I promised you that from the beginning. You are the queen, Agatha. My queen. We’re unbreakable in a way Arthur and Guinevere never were. Which means we’re not going to die from this. We’re going to come out stronger.” He waited for her to say something. When she didn’t, he looked back at her, silhouetted in their twin gold glows, his princess quiet and thoughtful, her head bowed. She clasped his hand, letting him lead her. Soon, their glows faded, neither able to sustain them. But the green light paved the way, throbbing bigger, brighter ahead, like an emerald in a mine.

“Your wishes,” Agatha remembered. “What did you ask the genie for?” “Powers,” said Tedros vaguely, still feeling the genie’s magic pulsing in his blood.

“Powers that can help us?” Agatha probed.

Tedros didn’t answer. Because he didn’t know the answer. The genie’s powers wouldn’t last much longer. Would they work against the Snake when the time came? Tedros still had doubts about the Knights’ plan. Which is why he needed to find something here fast . . . something else to use against Japeth . . .

“Suppose he can see us?” said Agatha, eyeing the glow ahead. “Suppose he knows we’re in his secrets?” “We’re safe here,” Tedros reminded. “It isn’t real.”

“I thought the same thing when I went into Rhian’s blood,” she pointed out. “Japeth saw us, remember? Almost killed me and Sophie.” The blood crystal, Tedros thought. It was inside Rhian’s blood that Agatha had learned that Rhian and Japeth were Arthur’s sons with Evelyn Sader.

And yet . . .

“What about Japeth’s blood?” Tedros mulled. “To get into the Celestium, he had to have wizard’s blood. There’s no other way in.” “But how could Japeth have wizard’s blood?” Agatha asked. “Rhian’s blood said he and Japeth are Arthur and Evelyn’s sons. Neither parent is a wizard or sorcerer. There must be another explanation.” “Like what?”

“How could Rhian pull Excalibur the first time? Why did the Lady of the Lake kiss Japeth, thinking he was the king? Why did Rhian have a fingerglow and not his brother? Why did I see Evelyn Sader in the pearl? There’s so many questions without explanations, Tedros. As if we not only have the story wrong, but don’t even know the story at all—” Tedros stalled, Agatha bumping into him.

“What is it?” his princess said. Then she stiffened. “There’s . . . two?” Two green balls of light, as big as globes, each a distance from the other.

Which meant the tunnel had to have gotten wider while they were walking.

A lot wider.

Slowly, the prince and princess shined their glows.

Tedros’ blood ran cold.

They weren’t lights.

They were eyes.

A colossal black snake glared right at them, as big as a whale, floating over a pit of dead scims that extended infinitely in every direction, like the darkest of nights.

Agatha recoiled, expecting it to attack—

But the snake didn’t move.

It was at once alive and dead, green eyes glowing, its mouth wide open around knife-sharp teeth, but otherwise lifeless in midair, as if frozen in time.

There was nothing else in sight.

Nowhere else to go.

This was where the mirror had led them.

Which meant they had only one choice.

Tedros took a deep breath.

“No, don’t!” Agatha choked.

But her prince was already climbing into its mouth.

IT WAS SURPRISINGLY cool inside, the air crisp and dry, the passage ink-black. Tedros tried to light his fingerglow, but it didn’t work this time. Neither did Agatha’s apparently; he heard her dress rip as she stumbled over the snake’s bottom teeth, his princess mumbling un-princess-like words, before she found Tedros in the dark.

“Magic must not work in here,” he said.

“Maybe because we are inside a snake’s mouth. Why are we inside a snake’s mouth!” Tedros squinted ahead. “To find that.”

Deep inside the snake, the prince spotted something blocking their path.

A door.

He led her closer, the door growing sharper in its details, smooth and luminescent, as if under a spotlight. But it was only when they came within a few feet of it and spotted the lion pattern on the moldings, the distinctive orange-gold of the knob, that Tedros and his princess both realized something.

“White Tower,” said Agatha, glancing at her prince. “Isn’t this what the doors look like?” Exactly like this, Tedros thought. The White Tower, where Tedros rarely ventured in his time at Camelot’s castle, whether during his father’s reign or his own. There was no reason to: it was mainly staff quarters and storage. But there was one room in the White Tower that Tedros knew well. A room that kept pulling him back, like a ghost out of a grave. A room where all the darkness in this story had been born. And as Tedros turned the knob, moving deeper into the Snake’s secrets, he was quite sure this was the room he was about to enter . . .

He opened the door.

Immediately he smelled the familiar thick, unwashed scent.

The Guest Room.

That strange suite his father had built soon after he became king. It was a room for visiting friends, his father would tell him as a child, but Arthur never used it for guests as far as Tedros knew. Arthur hadn’t even let maids in this room (hence the smell), nor his wife or son. Indeed, only Arthur had the key to it. And Lady Gremlaine, Tedros remembered. She’d had a key too, since her private quarters adjoined this one. In later years, Tedros’ father would lock himself in here during his drunken hazes, but it never explained why he’d built the room in the first place. Tedros himself had only been inside a few times since his father died, and each time, it gave him a dark, seedy feeling.

Except the room was different now, Tedros realized.

The brown-and-orange rug was bright and fairly new, the leather sofa fresh and unstained, the beige walls unblemished. There was even a brass flowerpot in the corner, with blooming seedlings— “Tedros?” Agatha rasped.

He followed her eyes to the bed in the corner.

Someone was sleeping on it.

A young man with gold curls, rosy cheeks, and a coat of light, patchy stubble. For a moment, Tedros thought he was looking at himself . . . then saw the man was taller, ganglier, and at least a few years older . . .

The prince’s eyes flared. “Dad?”

He moved past Agatha, thrusting a hand out for the young Arthur, but it went straight through, as if Tedros was a phantom. King Arthur remained asleep.

Tedros could see Agatha’s fists tighten, her throat bobbing, and only then did he understand.

“This is it, isn’t it?” Tedros said, tensing. “The scene you saw in Rhian’s blood.” Voices rose from next door.

Lady Gremlaine’s room.

“That’s them,” said Agatha. “Lady Gremlaine and Evelyn Sader. They’re about to come in.” And indeed, now Tedros could hear Gremlaine’s voice on the other side of the wall— “Only Arthur and I have the keys,” she was saying. “When he came from school with that tramp, acting like she was already queen, I tried to leave. He begged me to stay. Built this room as a place for us to meet without Guinevere knowing.” A secret door in the wall pushed open, two figures entering from Lady Gremlaine’s room. Tedros broke into a cold sweat. Agatha had already described this scene to him, but now it was real, the prince witnessing the younger Grisella Gremlaine in lavender robes, her tan face unlined, brown hair loose to her shoulders. At her side was a hooded figure in a black cloak, gripping a knotted piece of rope in her hand. A rope that looked like it was made out of human flesh.

The spansel, Tedros thought.

Beneath the hood, he could make out Evelyn Sader’s forest-green eyes, glinting like a snake’s.

Nausea coated the prince’s throat.

“I put hemp oil in his drink like you told me to,” Lady Gremlaine said to Evelyn. “Fell straight to sleep.” “We must move quickly, then,” said Evelyn, holding out the rope. “Place this spansel around his neck.” Lady Gremlaine swallowed. “And then I’ll have his child?”

“That is the power of the spansel,” Evelyn replied. “Use it and you will be pregnant with King Arthur’s heir long before Guinevere marries him.” Tedros felt light-headed, hardly able to listen.

The Evils of the present were seeded in the past. This past. Right here, in this room.

He looked up to see Lady Gremlaine standing over his father as he slept, her shoulders stiff, her lips quivering.

With a choked gasp, she spun to Evelyn and grabbed the rope into her hands. Her shadow stretched over the sleeping king, her fingers firm on the spansel. She stared down at Arthur, cheeks pink, breaths rushed, her thirst for him fighting the sin of what she was about to do. Fingers shaking, she reached the spansel for his neck.

Tedros averted his eyes, even if he knew how this played out. The idea that this was happening at all . . . that Lady Gremlaine and Evelyn Sader were in cahoots . . . that Grisella Gremlaine, his father’s once-steward and lifelong friend, had drugged him asleep and wanted to have his child— “I can’t,” she whispered.

Tedros looked back at her.

“I can’t do it,” Lady Gremlaine sobbed. “I can’t betray him like this. I love him too much.” She dropped the spansel and fled the room.

Tedros exhaled . . . until Evelyn Sader picked the spansel up.

His blood rushed so hard he could feel it in his teeth.

“I won’t watch this,” he said to Agatha, spinning for the door from which they came. “We have to leave—” “This is where the Snake’s secrets led us, Tedros,” said his princess, not moving. She held him in place the way he’d held her when the Snake charged them across the desert. Each one strong for the other when they needed it.

Tedros let her hold him, his legs steadying. Slowly, he lifted his eyes to Evelyn, pulling back her hood, the spansel pinched between red-painted nails, as she skulked towards Tedros’ father. She had Rhian’s tan and Japeth’s cold leer, so clearly their mother, Tedros could see now. She smiled down at the sleeping king. Then Evelyn hooked the spansel around Arthur’s neck . . .

“This is where the scene ends,” Agatha told Tedros. “It disconnects here—” Only it didn’t this time.

The scene continued, Evelyn releasing her hands from the spansel, leaving it noosed on the sleeping king’s throat.

Arthur’s eyes opened.

They fixed upon Evelyn Sader, his big blue pools brimming with lust.

Agatha pulled away from Tedros, her face pale.

“What’s happening?” said the prince, watching his father and Evelyn draw close.

“I—I—I don’t know,” Agatha sputtered. “I didn’t see this!”

Tedros wanted to rip the spansel off his father’s neck, to fight the horrors of the enchanted rope, but he was as powerless to stop its magic as his father had been— From behind Tedros came a whirl of motion, flying past the prince, swinging something down— Straight into Evelyn’s head.

She fell without a sound, onto the startled king, before she slumped to the floor, unconscious.

Arthur looked up at Lady Gremlaine, hunched over Evelyn’s crumpled body, a brass flowerpot in her hands.

Her eyes spilled tears, her face ghost-white. “I didn’t know . . . I didn’t know what she was doing . . . I had to stop her . . .” Arthur looked startled for a moment, like a child shaken from sleep. Then his gaze set upon Lady Gremlaine, kindling with the same lust he’d just had for Evelyn— Lady Gremlaine yanked the spansel off his neck.

Instantly, Arthur snapped out of his trance.

The young king gaped at his weeping steward . . . then at Evelyn on the floor.

Arthur lurched off the bed, backing towards the door. “What’s happening!” he panted. “Guards! Guards!” “Arthur, I—I—I can explain,” Lady Gremlaine stammered. “It was m-m-me . . . I asked her for the spell . . . I—I—I’ll explain everything . . .” The color went out of Arthur’s cheeks, his eyes darting between his steward and the flesh rope and the stirring body on the carpet. “Grisella . . . ,” he breathed. “What have you done?” The room vanished, returning Tedros to the coolness of a dark passage, inside the body of a snake. His heart was leaping out of his ribs, his body vibrating with fear . . . horror . . . relief.

He glimpsed his princess’s eyes shining through the dark with the same emotions.

“Agatha . . . Arthur’s not his father.”

“Or Evelyn his mother,” she said.

Neither prince nor princess finished the thought they were both sharing, but it hung over them like a dagger.

So who are his parents?

“Tedros, look!” said Agatha.

Ahead, an emerald flare of light blinded them. Then two. A new pair of eyes. Only these were moving, racing towards them like green fireballs, a black body attached. A snake within a snake, hissing and flashing massive fangs. Tedros grabbed Agatha to run, but it was coming too fast and too big to dodge. Tedros dove, sheltering his princess with his body. The snake swallowed them whole— Then it was muggy and hot, like a jungle in summer.

They were in Sherwood Forest.

Marian’s Arrow lay ahead, couched against lush, dewy trees, growing so wild that all the branches had wrangled around each other, giving only peeks of a red sunset.

“Another secret,” said Agatha. “Something the Snake doesn’t want us to see.” “In Sherwood Forest?” said Tedros, dusting himself off. “What does Sherwood Forest have to do with the Snake?” Whistles and hoots echoed behind them, along with men’s chants— “To the three rings of marriage!

The Engagement Ring,

The Wedding Ring,

and the Suffering!”

Tedros and Agatha turned to see a parade of Merry Men, carrying a fresh-faced Arthur on their shoulders towards the Arrow, the young king wearing a donkey-skin cape and a paper crown with the word “BACHELOR” scrawled in red, while he gnawed on a charred turkey leg and responded with a chant of his own.

“Guinevere, Guinevere,

My heart, my love, my dear,

These men are just jealous

For life without you is hellish!”

The men booed.

“Can’t boo a king!” Arthur scoffed.

“In Sherwood Forest, we boo any prat who deserves it, especially kings,” said the leader of the pack, boyish and muscular, with strawberry-blond hair and a dashing smile. Robin Hood, Tedros realized, handsome as ever, carrying young Arthur towards the Arrow.

“It’s your last night as a single man, Arthur!” Robin crowed. “Better make good use of it!” Tedros smiled, seeing his dad and Robin alive and together, a lump rising in the prince’s throat . . . Agatha pulled him towards the pub. “Come on. Must be a reason we’re here.” Together, they piled into the Arrow. A boisterous party was at its peak, a dozen women to every sweaty, red-faced man, servers splashing beer and tipping plates of chicken wings, all those present chanting “LION! LION!” as soon as they spotted the king. A band of Sherwood fairies streamed through the window playing a jaunty tune on willow violins, whereby three Merry Men took to tabletops, danced a jig, and promptly fell off, before two more swung from the cheap chandelier with the same result. A gaggle of women crowded around a young Maid Marian in the corner, who gave Robin a cheeky grin, as if at once happy to see him and warning him away from other girls. He saluted Marian across the bar, like an obedient soldier.

“Sheriff was in here earlier,” one of the servers whispered to Robin. “Thought he was here to make trouble, but he wanted to talk to Marian.” “About what?”

“Tried to listen in. Something about Marian going to visit her folks for a few months in Ginnymill?” “Maidenvale. And yeah, I know. Leaving next week. Wait. Few months? Didn’t tell me that. What else?” “Sheriff said he wanted to visit her there.”

Robin laughed. “Get your hearing checked, mate.”

He strutted into the mob and swung an arm around Arthur, who was dancing poorly, a chicken wing in his mouth. Robin nodded towards Marian’ friends. “Fine flock of women, Your Highness.” But Arthur wasn’t looking at them. He was eyeing a woman at the bar, sitting alone, near a couple of brown-hooded Merry Men. A woman with long hair, tan skin, and a lavender dress. Arthur’s face tightened. “Excuse me,” he said, heading over to her.

Robin shrugged. “Bring him a pub full of women and what do you know, goes for the one he already knows.” Tedros and Agatha were already huddling behind Arthur as he sat beside Lady Gremlaine, the prince and his princess listening close in the raucous pub.

“What are you doing here, Grisella?” Arthur asked.

His steward couldn’t look at him, her hand gripping a full glass of cider.

Arthur exhaled. “I’m assuming you followed me—”

She spun to face him, splashing her glass. “It’s been three months, Arthur. Three months you haven’t said a word to me. Every night I listen for the knock from the guest room and it never comes. And you won’t talk to me when you see me in the castle. What was I supposed to do?” Arthur drank from her cider. “Forgive me if I haven’t come knocking, Grisella. I don’t especially feel like going into that room.” “I know you hate me,” said Lady Gremlaine, reddening. “I know you’d have me jailed or punished or killed if you could without Guinevere finding out what I’ve done. That’s why you’re avoiding me. You’re trying to shame me out of the castle. To force me to run away. But I won’t. Not without trying to repair things between us.” “I don’t hate you, Grisella. I just don’t know what to say to you,” said Arthur. He paused, looking at his hands. “There’s no ill will. I’m nothing but grateful. You’ve been my friend since I was six years old. When I was Wart and you were my Grizzle-Grazzle. You know me as I really am: flawed, restless, impetuous . . . and yet you never make me feel unworthy of my new place. If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t feel at home in that castle. I wouldn’t feel like myself, let alone a king. And if it wasn’t for you, that Sader witch would be pregnant with my heir, instead of deep in the Woods, wherever my guards dumped her. Told her if she came within a hundred miles of Camelot, she’d be shot full of arrows at first sight. Put out word to the Kingdom Council that she wasn’t to be allowed in their lands either. Quite quickly Evelyn Sader discovered she’s no longer welcome in these Woods. Hasn’t been seen since.” “But I was the one who brought Evelyn in! It was me who wanted to use that spell!” said Lady Gremlaine. “I wanted your child, Arthur. I was in love with you.” “And it’s my fault that you were,” Arthur sighed. “Because I loved you too.” Grisella stared at him. “What?”

“Boys are just better at hiding it,” Arthur said wryly. “I loved you before I even knew what love was. Maybe because deep down, you and I are the same: perfectly happy with a small, ordinary life, and yet fated for a life that’s neither of those things. Why do you think I wrote you every week during my years at school? Because you remind me of who I used to be and who I can’t be anymore. The real Arthur. You don’t know how much I missed you while I was gone, Grisella. How much I missed our old days, before I ever pulled that sword from the stone. Perhaps you sensed my love in those letters, because I sensed yours, growing stronger and stronger, and yet I kept writing you back—” A beer mug shattered somewhere, followed by a chorus of boos. Arthur took a deep breath. “But then I returned with Guinevere as my wife-to-be. How confused you must have been. Nearly four years of letters. Nearly four years of waiting for me. And then I arrive at the castle with a pretty, strong-willed Evergirl, who insults you in front of your staff at your very first meeting. No wonder you hated her. No wonder you hated each other. She must have known there were feelings between us. But it’s neither her fault, nor yours. It’s my fault for not telling you the truth.” “That you love her more,” Grisella said starkly. “That you don’t love me as you thought you did.” “That I can’t love you,” the young king contended. “Now I’m the King of Camelot. The leader of our world. Whoever I marry doesn’t belong to me. She belongs to all the Woods. A queen who must play the part. A queen for the people.” “Which isn’t me,” Grisella admitted.

“Which isn’t you,” Arthur agreed. “Guinevere is from the right family, the right upbringing. She was top of our class at the School for Good. You should have seen the way Everboys looked at her, Lancelot included. Everyone knew Gwen was meant to be a queen. I had to make her mine. Especially since there’s a good many people who aren’t sure of me as king. But with Guinevere, I look the part . . . like I deserved to pull Excalibur from the stone. Marrying her means I can start my reign the right way. She’s who my kingdom needs. She’s who I need.” “And do you love her?” Lady Gremlaine asked.

“With her, I believe I’m a king,” Arthur answered.

Grisella teared up.

“Please don’t cry,” said Arthur.

“You might be king, but I only see the boy I knew. You’re as pure a soul now as you were before,” Lady Gremlaine said softly. “Thank you, Arthur. For telling me the truth. For being so decent when I’ve been nothing but lying and deceitful.” “You’re guilty only of being human, Grisella. Something neither a king nor a queen is allowed to be,” said Arthur, touching her. “Your story isn’t over. You’ll find love one day.” Grisella shook her head. “Your story is mine, Arthur. You were my one love. Maybe I wasn’t worthy of you. But loving you was enough. The real you.” Arthur’s eyes misted. “It is I who am not worthy of you,” he spoke. “I chose Guinevere so that I can erase who I used to be. The Wart who was nothing, a nobody, completely insignificant. But you loved that Wart with your whole heart. The way I loved you. And tomorrow that boy will be gone for good. I only wish our story had a different ending. One that let us forever remember what we were to each other.” Arthur gazed deeply at her, lost in his thoughts. Grisella noticed his hand on hers, warm and soft.

She sighed, pulling her palm away. “One last night as Wart and Grizzle-Grazzle. Better enjoy our time together.” Through the empty glass, she saw Arthur still watching her.

“What?” she asked.

“Is there somewhere we could go to talk?” he said.

“We are talking.”

Then she saw the look in his eyes.

“Course there is, laddie!” Robin chimed, swooping in, shunting Arthur and Grisella out the front door. “Use my treehouse. Perfectly empty!” “Follow them! Hurry!” Agatha hastened Tedros, guiding him to the door, but the prince didn’t move. “Tedros, what are you wait—” But now Agatha saw what he did.

A blue butterfly tailing behind Arthur and Gremlaine as they went into the forest.

Slowly Tedros and Agatha turned, looking back in the direction from which the butterfly came.

Those two strangers in the corner. The brown-hooded ones near where Grisella had been sitting. Tedros had thought them Merry Men. But now they slipped off their hoods, watching Arthur and Lady Gremlaine leave together.

They weren’t Merry Men at all.

“Funny what you see in Sherwood Forest,” drawled Evelyn Sader, eyes on the door.

“Everyone here has their secrets,” her male companion replied. “It’s why both of us found our way here too. In Sherwood Forest, we’re all sinners.” He was thick and muscular, a few years older than the young Arthur. But that’s not what made Tedros recognize him.

It was the green tint to his skin.

As if Sir Japeth Kay had only begun his transformation into the Green Knight.

“The spansel was her idea, of course. And now he acts like I’m the villain, while those two serpents cozy up,” Evelyn groused to Sir Japeth. “And to think they call him the Lion! I see a Snake, through and through. Had me banished from every kingdom, that coward. I managed to find a home at the School for Good and Evil—School Master doesn’t answer to Camelot—but ended up expelled from there too, thanks to my traitorous brother. For months, I skulked around in pits and caves, a homeless hag. And then to fall ill . . . terribly ill . . . and to be in my condition, while winter raged . . .” She shifted in her chair, looking uncomfortable. “If it wasn’t for you, coming upon me and shepherding me here, I’d have been food for rats.” “Was on my way here anyway after leaving Camelot myself,” Sir Japeth admitted. “And truth be told, you offered me friendship at a time when I had none.” “Two fair souls, equally cursed,” Evelyn cracked.

“We do share a bit in common,” Sir Japeth remarked. “Betrayed by our families. Forced to watch our brothers steal our fate. Our glory. And they say the Storian is balanced! Bah. The Pen favors them with impunity and leaves us to rot. No wonder our brothers fight to protect it. When there is no other pen to fight for the likes of us.” “August and Arthur. Even their names sound alike, dripping with self-importance,” Evelyn mocked. “No doubt they’ll be bosom buddies soon enough. August finds every way to suck up to power.” “And to think, all that power blessed on a wart,” Sir Japeth said grimly, as Evelyn’s butterfly spy returned from the forest, whispering to the Dean. “If only there was a way to humble them both . . .” He sighed ruefully. “Sherwood Forest, home of outcasts and dreamers.” But now Evelyn’s face was changing, the butterfly at her ear . . .

“My dear Sir Japeth . . . ,” she said, peering up at him. “Perhaps there is a way.” She slipped open her hood, letting her tiny spy flit back into her dress of blue butterflies, nestling amongst the ones near her stomach— Tedros’ eyes bulged.

Agatha choked.

She was pregnant.

Evelyn Sader was pregnant.

“Yes . . . there might be a way after all . . . ,” she mused, thinking it over.

She whispered to Sir Japeth, who cocked a brow, listening.

“Oh, how I love your wicked little mind,” he said, when she finished. “And the surest sign yet that you’ve returned to full health.” “I have only you to thank, Sir Japeth,” Evelyn pointed out. “You could have left me to die. Instead, you’ve given my child a path to a throne. The throne of a king who hurt us both.” “And you’ve given me a chink in my brother’s armor,” said Sir Japeth.

“Sounds like we both have work to do, then,” said Evelyn. “Our time together may soon be at an end.” “Wherever our travels take us, know that you’ll always have a knight at your service,” said Sir Japeth.

“My Green Knight,” Evelyn anointed him. “My child will know your story.” “Then let me bless it with all the love I have left.” Sir Japeth put his hand on her pregnant belly. Evelyn closed her eyes. For the briefest of moments, her skin tinged green, before it restored milky smooth. Her eyes fluttered open.

“The Green Knight . . . I quite like that . . . ,” Sir Japeth said. “You’ve given me a name, my lady. Perhaps I can give your child mine?” Evelyn smiled back at him. “Perhaps.”

The lights in the bar went out, plunging Tedros and Agatha into darkness.

Crisp air chilled Tedros’ skin. He could smell the oily hollow of the serpent, he and his princess returned inside its body. Agatha’s eyes pierced through the dark.

“So the Snake is Evelyn Sader’s child,” she said, with certainty. “Only not her child with Arthur.” “He’s the son of Sir Kay and Evelyn,” Tedros agreed. “Explains the connection between the Green Knight and the Snake. And the vision you saw in the pearl. Plus, Sir Kay and Arthur were brothers. If Sir Kay was their father, Rhian and Japeth would have had Arthur’s blood. It explains everything—” “No it doesn’t. Kay and Arthur were foster brothers, remember? They weren’t related by blood,” said Agatha, the confidence in her voice fading. “Lady of the Lake wouldn’t have mistaken Kay’s blood for Arthur’s. And it doesn’t explain how Japeth would have wizard’s blood to get into the Celestium. And Evelyn’s tone with him . . . she called it ‘my’ child, not ‘our’ child—” “We have our proof Japeth isn’t my father’s son, Agatha. We have the Snake’s secrets. All of them,” Tedros disputed. “We can use them against him. We just need a way out of here—” “Tedros?” Agatha said.

“What?”

Then he caught the green glow reflecting in her pupils.

Slowly, Tedros turned.

Just in time to see a new snake about to swallow them.

CRIES OF A baby.

Two babies.

That’s what they heard first, suspended in a wash of white, before the scene filled in, like the Storian inking a page.

On a rumpled bed, stuffed in the corner of a cluttered one-room house, Evelyn Sader swaddled her twin boys in her arms, the Dean’s face ashen and sweat-soaked, the sheets around her stained with blood. The babies were almost identical; one had a rosier complexion, with sea-green eyes, the other milky pale, his eyes ice-blue. A woman with long gray hair bent over her—the midwife, Tedros assumed—patting her forehead dry and wrapping the boys in fresh blankets.

“Is he coming?” Evelyn said weakly.

“Soon,” said one of two more midwives in the corner, rinsing bloody towels and boiling tea, both of whom had the same stringy gray hair, high foreheads, and— Tedros balked.

“Mistral Sisters,” Agatha said, her eyes shifting between the three women, who looked just as old nearly two decades into the past as they did in the present.

What were they doing here? Tedros wondered. As far as he knew, Evelyn Sader and the Mistral Sisters had never crossed paths . . .

“I need to see him,” Evelyn insisted, trying to soothe the paler boy, who was wailing, while the ruddier boy smiled and cooed on her arm. “You promised he’d come.” “Patience,” said the Mistral named Alpa.

“You did a wise thing writing us,” said Bethna. “Your brother, August, has spent years maligning our efforts to find the One True King, who can bring the Storian’s reign to an end. We’ve had few allies in our search. Even our own brother doesn’t believe the One True King exists, despite his continued efforts to control the Storian.” “But now we can all work together for the same goal,” hissed Omeida next to her, pouring a cup of smoky tea. She brought it to Evelyn. “Drink this, dear. It will give you strength to nurse them.” She held it to Evelyn’s lips and the Dean took a sip, still trying to calm the pallid, unruly child.

“They’ll be safe here in Foxwood, won’t they?” Evelyn asked, anxiously cuddling the newborns. “Couldn’t stay in Sherwood anymore. Too many high-ranking leaders coming in and out. Needed a place where we could blend in. Especially with two.” “No surprise that you’d have twins,” Omeida chuckled. “They run in the family, after all.” “Have you given any thought to their names?” said Alpa.

“I have,” a voice said.

A man’s voice.

Tedros’ heart stopped.

A voice he knew.

Slowly the prince and Agatha turned to a shadow in the doorway. Behind him, an empty street of cottages swirled with autumn leaves, as if he’d arrived by wind. He glided inside the house, hooded silver robes billowing over his slender frame. A silver mask covered his face except for puckish blue eyes and full lips, pulled into an impish smile.

“No . . . way . . . ,” Agatha gasped.

His eyes flicked to the prince and princess, as if even from the past, he seemed to know that they were standing there.

“Hello, Evelyn,” he said, his focus turning to her twins, his lithe fingers touching the head of the pale, crying child. Instantly its wails ceased. “Two boys. Imagine that.” “Past is Present and Present is Past,” said Evelyn, peering up at him.

“Indeed.” The man’s eyes moved to the rosy, genial child. “But you only need one to complete your plan. Let me take this one to school. Spare him the indignity of growing up in Foxwood. Hello, little cub. Should we make you an official student?” He put his finger to the boy’s, as if to unlock a spell, and the child’s fingertip suddenly glowed gold, alive with magic. “Sweet nature . . . dashing smile . . . and now he has a fingerglow too . . . My precocious Everboy, soon to walk the halls of Honor Tower. Proof I’m as Good as people think.” He winked at the child.

“I know you well enough to know you’re joking,” said Evelyn, though she pulled the boy closer to her, out of his grasp. “If I was still a teacher at your school, you would have the right to see them whenever you wish. Your school that took me in when Arthur banished me from the Woods. You saved me in a time of need. You, my true love. But then my brother convinced you I wasn’t your true love. And you listened to that lying fool, expelling me like I was nothing, despite my loyalty to you . . . Well, disown me and you disown my children too. After today, you will never see them again. Nor me.” The man’s eyes twinkled through his mask. “And yet, a part of me lives inside you forever . . .” He pulled aside the bedsheets and put a hand to her chest, a subtle blue glow lighting up at the heart of her butterfly dress. “I never questioned your sincerity, Evelyn. I believe you loved me. Yet I also believe your brother: that I will love someone more in years to come. Even so, I can’t discount the possibility that you are right. It’s why I imparted a piece of my soul into you before I expelled you from school. And if you are correct that you are my true love and that August Sader will destroy me . . . then one day you will use that piece of my soul to bring me back to life. Wouldn’t that be something? You and me together again.” He looked down at the boys. “This time, a family.” Evelyn stared at the masked man, their eyes meeting, and for a brief moment, her face blushed with hope. Then she hardened, drawing away. “Go and make your own family. I almost died in the Woods because you betrayed me. Because you threw me out like Arthur did. If it wasn’t for a kind knight named Japeth, these boys never would have been born. A man like that should be my true love.” “Except he isn’t. Otherwise he would be standing here instead of me,” replied the visitor. “Your heart only loves me, Evelyn. We both know that.” Evelyn glowered. “I don’t need you. Nor will my children. They’re mine now.” “You summoned me here, Evelyn. And not just to insult me, I presume,” said the man coolly. “Your letter proposed a plan that I found compelling. A plan to rule Camelot. A plan for which you need my help.” “To be fair, brother, you will benefit as much as she will,” Alpa chirped, alongside Bethna and Omeida in the corner.

“As will you, Sisters. All of us will benefit,” said the masked man, without a glance. “And you’re sure of what you saw, Evelyn? Arthur and a woman not his wife . . .” A butterfly fluttered off Evelyn’s dress into the visitor’s hands. A scene magically replayed across its wings for him. His eyes grew bigger as he watched.

“Quite sure,” said Evelyn.

The man let the butterfly return to her.

His gaze moved back to the paler child, silently studying the visitor. Next to him, his sunnier brother fixated on his new fingerglow, making it beam on and off.

“Very well, then. The boys can stay with Evelyn,” spoke the man, as if the matter was still in question. “Let them grow up together, the way my brother Rhian and I once did. Only one can be the King of Camelot, of course. But they can fight it out for themselves, Good versus Evil, brother against brother. Like two School Masters did, before one rose to power . . . But this time, it is a King who will rise. A King who can ensure that Camelot is in the hands of our bloodline, as much as the school is. The two great forces of the Woods fully under our control.” “Provided you stay alive,” Evelyn observed. “Your alliance with my brother certainly limits those odds.” “Then you would bring me back to life, wouldn’t you?” the masked man needled. “My brother was a far more deadly opponent and I put Rhian in his grave. Wizard blood runs through my veins. A blind seer hasn’t a chance against me. Besides, from what I can tell, your brother has done nothing other than tell you the truth: that he does not see you as my true love.” “Whoever he does see as your true love will kill you,” Evelyn scorned. “And knowing my brother, she’ll kill me too. And who will bring you back to life then? My brother is a greater threat than you realize. He may play the friend to both Good and Evil, but he is as surely on the side of Good as your brother Rhian once was. August won’t rest until you and I suffer the same fate as Rhian. Why do you think August came to teach at your school in the first place?” The man could see Evelyn’s conviction. Doubt flickered in his pupils . . .

He turned to the Mistrals. “In the unlikely case that Evelyn and I both perish, then it will be up to you, Sisters, to guide the boys to Arthur’s throne. To make them believe they are King Arthur’s sons, so that they may seize control of the Woods. With a little help from me, of course . . .” He reached down and lifted a single butterfly from Evelyn’s dress. On his finger, it morphed into a small, scaly, black eel, which he raised to his ear, before the tiny eel slithered inside. The masked man closed his eyes, as if imparting his thoughts to the creature, before he gently drew it out the other ear.

“Everything they need to know is here for them to find.”

He held the eel up on his finger, twisting and gleaming in the house’s dull light.

“Including how to bring me back if I die?” asked Evelyn. “Including how to take the Storian’s power?” The masked man hesitated.

In the corner, the Mistral Sisters smirked. “She believes in the One True King, brother,” spoke Alpa. “It’s why she’s brought us here, too.” “I’ll leave specious theories to my sisters,” the man said sourly. “But even if the myth of the One True King is true, it would not be enough to claim the powers of the Storian. These boys have my blood. And the Pen rejects my blood, ever since I killed my brother. Even if my sons make all the kingdoms burn their rings, even if they sever the bonds between Man and Pen . . . the Storian’s powers will not be theirs. For the same reason I’m unable to control the Pen. Good is too strong. The balance still intact. But there is a cure, says August Sader. Marrying a queen whose blood is as Evil as mine. A queen whose blood bonds with ours to tip the balance. A queen your brother promises me I’ll find.” “And if my brother betrays you? If this queen kills you instead?” Evelyn pressed. “Then what?” The masked man considered this. He whispered to the eel, a wizard making a prophecy: “Then my son will have my revenge . . . by making that queen his own.” He let the eel morph back into a butterfly before returning it to the rest of the butterflies on Evelyn’s dress. “In the event of our deaths, give them this dress, Sisters. It will lead them to a pen that shows them their future. A new pen. A pen that ensures that even death cannot stop our blood from ruling the Woods.” “Which pen?” Evelyn asked, unsure.

“The better question is: Which son?” the man spoke, watching the boys. “Which will succeed if we fail?” He honed in on the ruddier, cheerier boy, still playing with his new fingerglow, Evelyn trying to keep him from squirming off her arm. But then the man noticed the other boy grinning at him. In a flash, the skin on the boy’s face coated with scales, like a snake’s, before it reverted milky and smooth. He saw the man’s eyes widen and the boy giggled, his mother none the wiser.

“But I have my suspicions . . . ,” said the man.

The rosier boy began to whimper, showing distress for the first time. “Shhh . . . my good boy,” Evelyn whispered. “My sweet Rhian.” She didn’t look at the masked man, her lips curled with triumph, as if she knew the name had made an impact. As if she knew that he was glaring right through her.

“And his name?” the man said, pointing at the paler child.

Evelyn held the second boy close, kissing his face that had just been a snake’s only a moment before. “For a middle name, Japeth, after the knight who saved him. That’s what I’ll call him.” “And his birth name?” the man asked, stone-cold.

Evelyn finally looked up at him. “Rafal,” she breathed. “For his father.” The man pulled off his mask and hood, revealing young, frost-white skin, a shock of silver hair, and a smile as wide as the devil’s.

Tedros heard himself scream, Agatha’s own scream slashing into his— But they were already falling into darkness, the cool insides of a snake opening up into a vast, strange sky.