The thicket went dark.
Shrieks of confusion—claws released her and Sophie plunged into dirt. In blackness, she scrambled through gouging twigs until her hands found a log and she hid behind it. She could hear talons scraping blindly through dirt, furious grunts growing closer. Sophie sprang back and slammed into a rock with a cry. The monsters heard her and lunged for her head—
The thicket lit back up.
The Harpies craned their beaks to see Agatha the Dove hovering high, wingtip glowing orange. Agatha waved her wing and the thicket went dark. Agatha waved it again and the thicket went light. Dark then light, dark then light, until the Harpies got the point and two flew for Agatha, who squawked fearfully in place—
“Fly!” Sophie screamed, but Agatha flailed and thrashed as if she’d forgotten how. Twin monsters gnashed for the helpless dove, tearing higher, faster, until they had her in claws’ reach—
Flames exploded across the barrier with a cruel crack and they fell, charred feathers and flesh.
The last Harpy gawked at their smoking bodies. Slowly it looked up. Agatha smiled and waved her glowing wing. The thicket lit up. The monster swiveled—
Sophie smashed its head with a rock.
In the Forest’s silence, she panted and bled, alone on the ground, legs shaking under her cloak.
Sophie glared into the sky.
“I want to switch places!”
But the dove was already halfway to the Pumpkin Patch. Sophie could do nothing but follow miserably, hand gripping her kerchief inside her pocket.
Across the silent patch, pumpkins fluoresced a thousand shades of blue. Sophie stepped onto the dirt trail that snaked through the lit orbs, mumbling to herself that these were pumpkins, only pumpkins, and even a School Master couldn’t make one scary. She rushed ahead to keep up with Agatha—
Dark silhouettes on the trail. Two people in front of her.
“Hello?” Sophie called.
They didn’t move.
Heart thundering, Sophie stepped closer. There were more than two. Ten at least.
“What do you want!” she screamed.
No answer.
She inched closer. They were seven feet tall, with spindly bodies, faces like skulls, and crooked hands made of . . .
Straw.
Scarecrows.
Sophie exhaled.
The scarecrows lined both sides of the trail, dozens of them on wooden crosses, guarding the pumpkins with outstretched arms. From behind, glowing pumpkins lit their profiles, revealing shredded brown shirts, bald burlap heads, and black witch hats. As she walked slowly between them, Sophie saw their terrible faces—eyeholes ripped out of burlap, jagged pig noses, and sewn, lecherous grins. Spooked, she hurried forward, eyes on the path.
“Help me . . .”
She froze. The voice came from the scarecrow next to her. A voice she knew.
It can’t be, Sophie thought. She pushed on.
“Help me, Sophie . . .”
Now there was no mistaking it.
Sophie willed herself forward. My mother’s dead.
“I’m inside . . .” the voice rasped behind her, weak with agony.
Sophie’s eyes filled with tears. She’s dead.
“I’m trapped . . .”
Sophie turned.
The scarecrow wasn’t a scarecrow anymore.
A man she knew gazed back at her from the wooden cross. Under the black hat, his eyes were gray and pupil-less. Instead of hands, he had two meat hooks.
Sophie paled. “Father . . . ?”
He cracked his neck and carefully pried himself from his cross.
Sophie backed up, right into another scarecrow. It was her father too, wresting off his cross. Sophie whirled and all the scarecrows were her father, climbing off their stakes and walking towards her, meat hooks gleaming in chilly blue light.
“Father—it’s me—”
They kept coming. Sophie backed against a cross—“It’s me—Sophie—”
Far ahead, the dove looked back and saw Sophie cowering, screaming, as scarecrows stood peacefully still on the sides of the trail. Agatha yelped—
Sophie tripped on a pumpkin and fell. She spun to see her father’s face again and again, devoid of mercy.
“Father, please!”
The scarecrows raised their hooks. Sophie’s heart stopped—she choked a last breath and closed her eyes to slashing steel—
Water.
Cool, pristine water.
Her eyes fluttered open to a storm.
The patch was deserted. Just scarecrows on crosses, falling to pieces in rain.
Hovering high in the storm, Agatha waved her glowing wing and the rain stopped.
Sophie crumpled to the flooded path. “I can’t . . . I can’t survive this . . .”
Howls in the distance. Her eyes widened.
The next pair had entered the Forest.
Alarmed, the dove shrieked back at her and flew towards the Willow Bosk.
Shivering, Sophie staggered up and followed, shaken that a heart so haunted could still keep beating.
The long, thin trail through the Sleeping Willows sloped downhill, so Sophie could see the ghostly blue glow of the Tulip Garden at the bottom. One last push and she’d be safe among its flowers. For a moment, she questioned why Agatha hadn’t made her turn into a tree or blade of grass near the gates—then remembered that Yuba had taught them to spot enchanted trees and that grass would be trampled by night’s end. No, Agatha had chosen well. One tulip in thousands. She’d be safe till dawn.
As Sophie crept through the willows, her eyes darted around for the next threat. But the sapphire trees stood sentinel along the trail, long dangling branches glittering like chandeliers. As she drifted through, leaves shed over her in slow, beautiful rhythm, beads slipping off bracelets.
Something is here. Don’t be fooled.
Wolves howled again at the gates and her stomach seized.
At least four others in the Forest now: Brone, Tristan . . . then who? Why hadn’t she learned the order! She had to get to the tulips before they found her! Sophie broke into a breathless sprint, chasing the dove ahead. She didn’t notice that the faster she ran, the faster the starry willow leaves shed, showering her in suspicious comets of light.
Then her head went heavy, her legs weak . . .
No . . .
Assaulted by leaves, she slowed to a stumbling limp.
Sleeping Willows . . .
Flying overhead, Agatha looked down and screeched.
Sophie lumbered forward, smelling the tulips . . . Few more steps . . .
She collapsed, the flowers ten feet away.
Agatha waved her glowing wing, sparking an explosion of thunder. Sophie didn’t move. Agatha tried spells for rain, sleet, snow, but no response. Frantic, she squawked Sophie’s favorite song, a wretched ode to princes and weddings—
Sophie’s eyes peeked open.
Ecstatic, the dove kept warbling, more off-key with every note—
Agatha choked.
Blue hoods.
Two in the Thicket, two in the Pumpkin Patch, two more near the gates. She couldn’t tell who they were, but they were all frozen, carefully discerning the precise source of the song they’d just heard.
Then they started running towards the tulips.
Agatha glanced at Sophie, splayed in dirt—then at blue hoods coming to kill her—
On the ground, Sophie dug her nails into earth and nosed forward a few inches.
Sensing her escape, the willows shed faster, paralyzing her muscles. Agatha flailed helplessly, dove beak whipping between Sophie and her hunters.
Panting, grunting, Sophie clawed herself through the last patch of willows, dirt turning to loamy petals beneath her. Exultant, she collapsed into big, blue flowers and inhaled their scent, reviving instantly. She shoved a tulip bud in her mouth, grabbed Agatha’s note from her pocket, finger glowing pink—
“FLORADORA FLEUR—”
She
froze.
Across the Tulip Garden, Brone and Vex smiled back at her, two tiny white fish thrashing in their hands.
“That’s how you’re going to kill me?” Sophie snorted. “Fish?”
“Wish Fish,” Brone corrected, fish turning black in their hands.
“And we wish to be Hench Captains,” Vex smirked.
The boys hurled the fish into the air—instantly they ballooned big as Sophie’s body and dove for her, snapping piranha teeth—
Petrified, Sophie closed her eyes, felt her finger burn—
Poof! Her pink fox dodged the swollen fish, which careened off the ground like bouncing balls. Sophie sprinted for her life between them, paws slipping on tulips—
Faster! Need something faster! Her finger glowed, ready to help. Cheetah! Lion! Tiger!
Poof! She was a slow pink warthog, waddling and farting. Sophie grunted in horror. The bouncy fish careened off a tree and lunged for her hide. She thrust out her glowing hoof, focused harder—
Poof! She hurtled between them, a pink gazelle, and heard the fish crash into each other.
Sophie limped into a clearing, heaving for air. Faint wolf howls at the gates sent shudders through her fur. More enemies on the way.
Her big green eyes searched the dark sky for Agatha. Nothing but stars winking back at her.
She looked back down and jumped. Across the clearing, Tristan and Chaddick stood in the moonlight. Face ice cold, Tristan drew an arrow into his bow. Chaddick pulled his sword.
Sophie turned to run—
Reena blocked her escape. The Arabian princess whistled and two golden wolf dogs slunk into the clearing behind her, baring knife-sharp teeth.
Sophie spun to see Arachne skulk out of the trees, finger glowing. Two more Everboys drew arrows into their bows.
Legs quivering, Sophie’s pink gazelle stood surrounded, waiting for her white dove to rescue her.
“Now!” Chaddick screamed—
Boys unleashed arrows, Arachne stabbed her finger, two dogs lunged as Sophie thrust out her shaking pink paw, closed her eyes—
Arrows and curses sailed over her scaly rattlesnake head. Sophie hissed in relief, slithering towards the safety of trees . . . until a shadow cast over her.
Reena’s wolf dog pounced and grabbed her in its mouth.
Furious, Sophie felt her snake rattle burn pink—
Elephant buttocks crushed the dog’s head as Sophie stampeded out of the clearing, trunk trumpeting in terror. Everboy arrows slammed into her massive pink rump and she crumpled to the grass in pain. Sophie glanced back at ten hooded assassins and two chomping fish, bouncing right for her. Helplessly cornered, she raised her glowing elephant trunk—
Curses, arrows, swords, fish grazed her feathers as Sophie’s pink lovebird flapped into the air—
Screeching with triumph, she flew higher, higher, out of arrow reach, then saw the glint of flames at the barrier. Sophie recoiled in shock, only to feel something snare her wing. Slowly, a whip of water drew her towards a hooded figure in the Blue Brook.
Sophie shrieked for help, but then more whips ensnared her, pulling her through branches to her captor in the stream, who lashed the water with a glowing green finger. Slowly the waters delivered Sophie’s lovebird into ashen hands as the shadow pulled back its hood.
“You would have made a great witch, Sophie,” Anadil said, stroking her beak. “Even better than me.”
The lovebird gazed up at her with pleading eyes.
Anadil’s fingers crushed its tiny throat. The bird thrashed for breath, but Anadil pressed harder, and as Sophie’s eyes went dark, she knew the last thing she’d ever see was a flaming star fall majestically through sky, falling straight for the witch about to snap her neck—
In a flash, a burning dove thieved Sophie out of Anadil’s hands, into wings afire, and up through frigid sky.
As arrows tore through treetops, Agatha thrust out her glowing wingtip and arrows turned to daisies in the wind. She flew as long as she could on fire, Sophie clasped in her feet, then plunged into a dark pine glen and the birds smashed to the ground, tumbling over each other, snuffing out the flames.
Whimpering, Agatha struggled to make her charred wing glow. It flickered—she and Sophie instantly turned human, both paralyzed with pain. Sophie glimpsed Agatha’s bare arms, blistered with burns. Before Sophie could cry out, Agatha’s eyes widened and she circled her glowing orange fingertip around them—“Floradora pinscoria!”
They both turned to scrawny blue pine shrubs.
Anadil stormed into the glen with Arachne. They peered into the deserted patch.
“I told you they landed in the pumpkins,” Arachne said.
“Then lead the way,” said Anadil.
“Which of us gets to kill her?” Arachne said, turning—
Anadil stunned her with a lightning bolt. She stripped the red kerchief from Arachne’s pocket and threw it to the ground. Red sparks shot into the air and Arachne vanished into thin air.
“Me,” Anadil said.
Red eyes narrowed, she took one last long look around.
“Nick, I saw her over here!” called Chaddick, nearby.
Anadil smiled wickedly and headed in his direction.
In the dark, silent glen, two shrubs shivered side by side.
The night had just begun.
Outside the golden gates, the unchosen Evers and Nevers waited for Sophie’s name to vanish off the scoreboard like Kiko’s and Arachne’s. But as the hours passed and more names vanished—Nicholas, Mona, Tristan, Vex, Tarquin, Reena, Giselle, Brone, Chaddick, Anadil—Sophie’s stubbornly remained.
Had Sophie and Tedros united? What would their victory mean? A prince and witch . . . together?
As the hours passed, Good and Evil shared looks across the Clearing—first threatened . . . then curious . . . then hopeful . . . and before they knew it, they were drifting into each other’s sides, sharing blankets, crepes, and cherry grenadine. Evil thought it had corrupted Good and Good thought it had enlightened Evil, but it didn’t matter.
For two sides soon turned into one, cheering on the Prince-Witch revolution.
Inside the cold pine glen, two shrubs waited.
They waited through silence, split open by screams. They waited through sounds of classmates fighting enemies and betraying friends. They waited as something snared child after child with angry splashes in the Brook. They waited as drooling trolls stomped past them, brandishing bloodstained hammers. They waited as red and white sparks painted the sky, until only four competitors remained.
Then the Blue Forest went quiet for a very long time.
Hunger tore at their stomachs. Cold glazed their leaves with frost. Sleep attacked their senses. But the two plants stayed rooted still until the sky bruised blue. Sophie held her breath, willing the sun to break through . . .
Tedros limped into the glen.
He had no cloak, no sword, only a brutally dented shield. His tunic was torn to shreds, the silver swan on his bare chest gleaming against welts and blood. The prince gazed into the lightening sky. Then he crumpled against a skeletal pine, sniffling softly.
“Corpadora volvera,” Agatha whispered. “That’s the counterspell. Go to him!”
“When the sun comes up,” Sophie whispered back.
“He needs to know you’re okay!”
“He’ll know in a few more minutes.”
Tedros bolted straight. “Who’s there?”
His eyes moved to Agatha’s and Sophie’s shrubs. Someone stepped from their shadows.
Tedros backed against the tree.
“Where’s your witch?” Hester hissed, unscathed in a clean cloak.
“Safe,” Tedros said hoarsely.
“Ah, I see,” Hester smirked. “So much for your team.”
The prince tensed. “She knows I’m safe too. Otherwise she’d be here to fight with me.”
“Are you sure about that?” Hester said, black eyes flashing.
“That’s
what makes us Good, Hester. We trust. We protect. We love. What do you have?”
Hester smiled. “Bait.”
She thrust out her glowing and red fingertip and the tattoo peeled off her neck, swelling with blood. Tedros backed up in shock as her demon engorged with blood, tighter, tighter, about to burst. Hissing an incantation, Hester’s eyes grayed and her skin lost all color. She sank to the ground in agony and howled in fury as if tearing her own soul apart. Then the demon’s body parts detached from each other . . . head, two arms, two legs.
Five fractured pieces, each one alive.
Tedros turned snow white.
The five demon pieces blasted towards him, conjuring daggers instead of fire bolts. He bludgeoned the stabbing head and leg with his shield, but an arm sank a dagger into his thigh. With a cry, he batted the arm away, pulled the knife out of his leg, and clawed up the only tree in the glen—
Agatha’s shrub whipped to Sophie—“Help him!”
“And end in five pieces?” Sophie shot back.
“He needs you!”
“He needs me to be safe!”
A demon leg hurled a knife at the prince’s head and he jumped just in time to a higher branch. The other four limbs ripped toward him, daggers raised—
Trapped, he glanced down at Hester, weak on her knees, directing the demon fragments with a glowing finger. Tedros’ eyes widened, spotting something through the leaves.
Red silk. In her boot.
The fragments unleashed five knives point-blank, all aimed for his organs. Just as they pierced his shirt, he jumped out of the tree and landed on his wrist with a sickening crack.
Hester saw him scraping towards her. She circled her finger savagely, bringing the demon parts back around with new knives. Tedros held her glare as he crawled towards her. Sneering, Hester raised her finger high and the demon limbs coiled back to kill him. This time there would be no mistake. She roared and the knives stabbed down—the prince lunged for her boot—