The School for Good and Evil #2: A World without Princes (10 page)

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

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“
A
n army dedicated to producing stories just like
yours
,” said Dean Sader, clacking through the sun-washed breezeway from Valor to Honor in her blue-glass heels. “Your tale was just a taste of what princesses and witches can do together. Here you will lead an entire school!”

“A school—” Agatha choked, chasing her down the Honor stairs. “We need to go home!”

“You see, the
former
deans and I have a difference of opinion,” said Dean Sader as butterflies flew in from every direction and vanished into her dress. “They think you must leave our world to find your happy ending together. And I think you must
stay
.”

“But the boys are going to kill me!” Sophie said, bumping Agatha hard as she passed—

“Mmmm, let's say you do break into a castle full of bloodthirsty males,” the Dean said, sweeping her buxom behind through the foyer. “Let's say you free the Storian against all odds.” She stopped outside the frosted doors of the Gallery of Good. “The wish won't work unless you mean it.”

She gazed at Sophie. “How can you wish for Agatha if you know she wants her prince?”

The Dean turned to Agatha. “How can you wish for Sophie if you fear the witch inside?”

She leaned in so close the girls could smell her flawless honeycream skin.

“How can you wish for someone you
do not trust
?”

Sophie and Agatha's eyes met dartingly, hoping the other would argue. Neither did.

“Your friendship must be fixed before you can go home. And here you will fix what is broken,” Dean Sader said, a last butterfly fluttering into her dress. “Fairy tales have trained us to believe a beautiful bond like yours cannot last. Why? Because a man must come between you. A man so threatened by your story that he's willing to
kill
to destroy it. But at my school, we teach you the truth.” She opened the door to pitch darkness.

“That a woman without a man is the
greatest happy ending of all
.”

Her finger magically lit a torch, and the flame roared red to a burst of drums. The two girls leapt back—

Twenty rows of girls stood frozen, heads bowed, each wearing a white veil, royal-blue harem pants, and a light blue bodice stitched with a butterfly crest over the heart. There were more than 100 of them, stretching through the exhibits of the museum, past its open back doors, and into the vast ballroom of Good Hall. Faces obscured, they stood eerily still, arms raised with hands to opposite elbows as if summoning genies. Hovering above them, just beneath the ceiling, two more veiled girls on magic carpets beat snare drums faster and faster.

At the front of this parade was a lone girl without anyone else in her row. Her veil was blue instead of white, her hair ginger red, and the pallid skin on her thin arms dotted with strawberry freckles. Slowly she raised her arms . . .

The drums stopped.

With an untamed screech, the girl blew a blast of fire that singed the magic carpets and sent Agatha and Sophie quailing from flames. As the drums beat once more, the girl whipped into a whirling belly dance, punctuating each move with a wild whistle or trill.

“One look at her, and Tedros will forget all about his wish maker,” said Sophie coldly, watching her.

“Sophie, I'm sorry.” Agatha shifted closer to her friend. “I really am.”

Sophie shifted away.

“I'd never lose you for a boy,” Agatha prodded. But eyeing the dancing girl, she suddenly felt a twinge of jealousy. . . . Had Tedros seen her?

She crushed the thought. Tedros wanted to kill her best friend, and she was still thinking of him?
He's the enemy, you idiot!

Stefan's face haunted her, begging her to return Sophie home safe. Where was the Agatha who'd do anything to protect her best friend? The one who had control over her feelings? The one who was Good?

By now, the rows behind started to echo the leader's dance, flowing with crisp hand movements. Then, with a sudden flourish, the girls all turned to each other and danced in pairs. Hands brushed and clasped as they touched backs before lifting arms and switching places, never losing the touch of their palms. In their glinting blue harem pants and white veils, they looked like swaying sea anemones. Despite the storm in her heart, Sophie managed a smile. She had never seen something so beautiful. Then again, she'd never seen girls dance without boys.

Agatha didn't like Sophie's expression. “Sophie, I need to talk to Tedros.”

“No.”

“I said I'm sorry. You have to let me fix it!”

“No.”

“The fool thinks I want you killed!” Agatha said, smacking away a blue butterfly on her shoulder. “I'm the only one who can make him see reason.”

“A prince who thinks he's School Master, bet half his fortune on my head, and you think he'll see reason,” Sophie said, letting the butterfly perch on her. “I'm surprised Good ever wins if it's this naive.”

Agatha glanced at the Dean's back to them. She couldn't possibly eavesdrop with the drums pounding and the dancing girl hooting like a hyena, but Agatha had the strange feeling she could hear everything.

“Sophie, I lost myself for a moment,” she whispered. “It was a mistake.”

Sophie watched the lead girl spew another jet of fire. “Maybe the Dean is right,” she said, not whispering at all. “Maybe I should stay here.”

“
What?
We don't even know where she
came
from, let alone how she's Dean! You saw the look on Professor Dovey's face. You can't trust her—”

“Right now, I trust her more than you.”

Agatha could have sworn she saw the Dean grin. “You're not safe here, Sophie! Tedros will come for you!”

“Let him. That's what you want, isn't it?”

“I want you home alive!” Agatha begged. “I want us to forget ever coming to the School for Good and Evil! I don't
want
Tedros!”

Sophie whirled, snarling. “Then why did you
wish for him
?”

Agatha froze.

“Let the gifts begin!” the Dean decreed.

“Gifts!” Sophie spun from Agatha, beaming. “At last, some good news.” She sidled up to the Dean as the veiled girls fanned to the walls like a clamshell opening, leaving a wide aisle down the middle.

Agatha followed warily, remembering what this world had once done to her and her best friend. The longer they stayed here, the longer they were in danger. She had to get Sophie home
now
.

Moving into the sunlight of a small window, she noticed the museum exhibits had changed. Evidence of boys' achievements had all been stripped and replaced with relics from her and Sophie's fairy tale: Agatha's Evergirl uniform, Sophie's Lunchtime Lectures sign, Agatha's note to Sophie during the Trial by Tale, the slashed lock of hair from Sophie's Doom Room punishment, and dozens of others, each enshrined in a blue glass case. On the main wall, the Ever After mural, which once celebrated the marriage of prince and princess, was now covered with a navy canvas, embroidered with butterflies. Indeed, the only holdover was Professor Sader's old nook of paintings off the far corner. As a seer who could glimpse the future, the former History teacher had once drawn paintings of every Reader who had come from Gavaldon to the School for Good and Evil. Whenever Agatha needed answers, she always drifted back to these paintings, finding new clues. All she wanted was to study them again now, but there were two veiled girls marching towards her down the aisle, carrying an enormous purple vase.

“From Maidenvale,” said Dean Sader, honeyed voice now deep and commanding. “An urn from Princess Riselda, who like hundreds of others, heard your story and realized she'd be happier without her prince. She had his throne burned and offers the ashes to you.”

The girls held up the urn to Sophie and Agatha, who peered at its carving of a prince magically ejected out a castle window to crocodiles below.

“We don't want it,” Agatha crabbed.

“Shall we put it in my room?” smiled Sophie, turning to the Dean.

“Room?”
Agatha blurted. “Sophie, you're
not
staying—”

But now two girls were marching down the aisle with oriental, bamboo drapes—

“From Pifflepaff Hills,” the Dean boomed. “A hand-painted tree curtain from Princess Sayuri, who read your tale and realized that without princes, princesses and witches are happier.”

Its exquisitely painted bamboo reeds depicted a princess and witch embracing in one panel, while in the other, a prince who looked a lot like Tedros was flogged to a pulp by a beast.

“This is horrible,” Agatha snapped.

“Hang them by my bed,” Sophie chimed to the two veiled girls. “What's next?”

The Dean pointed a gold-lacquered nail down the aisle. “From Netherwood, a tapestry of homeless princes…”

“I wish Professor Dovey and Lady Lesso could appreciate someone as
chic
as you,” Sophie fawned to the Dean, as the procession of prince-abusing gifts continued, including prince voodoo dolls, looted prince swords, and a carpet made out of prince hair. “Do classes start today?”

The Dean grinned as she glided away. “Including
mine
.”

“You're not serious,” Agatha hissed to Sophie. “Now you want to go to
class
?”

“Let's hope they renovated those rooms made of candy.” Sophie hand combed her hair, readying for the day. “I'm allergic to the smell.”

“Sophie, there is a bounty on your head—”

“And lastly, a gift from me,” declared Dean Sader, standing in front of the covered Ever After mural. “Students, your old school taught you balance was about vanquishing Good or Evil. But how can there be balance between Evers and Nevers until there is balance between Boy and Girl? It is no mistake our Readers have returned to join our school, for their fairy tale remains unfinished.”

She looked right at the two girls. “And the battle for its ending just begun.”

She let the canvas fall. Agatha and Sophie drew breaths.

The words EVER AFTER, giant and glimmering, still peeked from painted clouds at the top of the mural in gold block letters. Everything else had been redone.

Now the scene depicted two sprawling blue-glass castles around a lake, as girls in azure uniforms gathered on tower balconies, basked on the lakeshores, and strolled the gated grounds. Some of these girls were beautiful, some were ugly, but they worked, lived, and idled together without division, as if witches and princesses were always meant to be friends.

There were boys in the painting too, if one could call them that. With black peasant rags and ogrishly distorted faces, they scooped manure, raked the a blue forest yard, and built up the towers in miserable chain gangs before retreating to filthy prison slums at the fringes of the gates. Female overseers drove them like chattel and the boys put up no fight, slaves resigned to eternal servitude. Agatha's eyes rose to the top of the painting, where haloed in sun two women in crystal diadems surveyed their kingdom from the highest balcony. . . .

“It's us,” Sophie gasped.

“It's . . . this school,” scowled Agatha.

“Your true Ever After,” the Dean said, stepping between them. “Captains of these hallowed halls, leading girls to a princeless future.”

Agatha grimaced at the vision of Ever and Neverboys hated and enslaved. “This school
isn't
our ending,” she said, turning to Sophie. “Tell her we have to leave!”

But Sophie was gazing at the painting, eyes wide. “How do we make it come true?”

Agatha stiffened.

“How all heroes win their happy ending, dear,” the Dean said, touching both their shoulders. “By facing the enemy.” She grinned out the window at Tedros' tower. “And
slaying
him.”

Agatha and Sophie locked eyes in surprise.

“My cherished students!” The Dean swept her hand over the crowd. “Welcome our Readers back to school!”

With a roar, the mob tore off their veils and rushed the two girls.

“You're home!” gushed Reena, embracing Agatha with freckly Millicent, while green-skinned Mona and one-eyed Arachne smooshed Sophie into a hug—

“Didn't know we were friends—” Sophie croaked, suffocated—

“We're on your side against Tedros,” Arachne cheered, Millicent on her arm as if Evers and Nevers were suddenly bosom buddies. “All of us!”

“You're our heroes,” Reena said to Agatha, who noticed the Arabian princess looked a bit bigger in the bottom. “You and Sophie taught us the truth about boys!”

Agatha fumbled for words before a shrieking blur bear-hugged her and Sophie. “My roommates!” Beatrix yipped. “Aren't you excited? The Dean put you both with
me
!”