Agatha slowed down. “League business,” she thought, remembering why Merlin said she couldn’t see Reaper. Meanwhile, her bald, mashed-up cat who she thought had no other use than scaring away strangers and decapitating birds had been communicating with her three witch friends all this time. She suddenly missed that vile old coot even more and wondered if Reaper knew her mother was dead. Agatha’s heart sank. She didn’t have the strength to tell him.

Hester was far down the hall now and Agatha could barely see her, with the sky ink-black out the porthole windows and a brisk crosswind blowing through. As her eyes adjusted, she had to put her hands out to find a stuccoed wall and resisted calling out Hester’s name—

Only then did she notice the mural splashed beneath her fingers . . .

Seven brightly dressed dwarves facedown in blood.

Slowly Agatha backed up, taking in more scenes: Tom Thumb devoured by a giant . . . Rapunzel and her prince thrown from a tower by a witch . . .

Good endings she’d seen tacked to a wall in Yuba’s cave. Good endings already rewritten for Evil.

Agatha remembered what Merlin had warned her in the Woods. The School Master was behind all of this. Each fairy tale revised a piece of a bigger plan.

But what plan?

Why was he killing old heroes? Why did he need the old stories at all?

“Unless the Old gives him power over the New,” Merlin’s voice echoed.

Stomach squeezing, Agatha crept further along the muraled walls: Captain Hook plunging his hook into Peter Pan’s heart . . . a wolf biting into Red Riding Hood’s neck . . . a pockmarked old witch jamming Hansel and Gretel into an oven . . .

“Hurry up!” Hester hissed ahead.

Agatha bustled to catch up, terrified for the old League members she’d left behind, safe in a cave for the time being. Whatever the School Master’s plan, they had to destroy his ring before any more of these scenes came true.

As the tower clock tolled ten o’clock, Agatha noticed the dormitories dead quiet now. “Where’d everyone go?”

“Aric declared mandatory study time, since tracking week is next week,” said Hester, tugging her up the rear staircase. “No club meetings, no common rooms, all bodies in assigned rooms. Anyone who saw us thinks we were trying to make curfew. Weird hearing your voice come out of that body, by the way. You look like a creepy page boy.”

“What if teachers see me? Or fairies?” Agatha pushed.

“Doing room checks, starting with first floor. Relax, no one will stop you if you’re with me. Teachers all love me, except—”

Hester froze, staring upwards. Agatha squinted through the dark gap in the staircase to see a tall, spike-haired shadow glaring down from the fifth floor. Glittering purple eyes flashed like warning flares.

“Hester, my sweet. Shouldn’t you be in your room?” said Aric, slinking down the stairs.

“Edgar forgot his book bag in the library,” said Hester, foisting Agatha past Aric. “You know how disorganized boys are—”