Agatha spun away, lurching for the curtain, but Sophie held her back. “When our storybook closes, you’ll see this is how it was meant to be from the beginning. Tedros and me, King and Queen of Camelot. You, our faithful friend and savior of Good, happy on your own like you used to be,” she said. “I know what you must be thinking. That I’m still a witch. That I’m still Evil. But how else can three people have a happy ending? You never wanted to be a princess like I did. You never wanted a fairy tale or a boy’s love or anything to do with boys at all. That’s when you were happiest, Aggie. Never caring what people thought of you, never doubting yourself, never answering to anyone but yourself. . . . Don’t you see? This is how each of us gets what matters most to us. This is the ending that feels right. The last Ever After to our fairy tale.” She reached up, fingers shaking, and stroked her friend’s cheek. “Look at me, Agatha . . .”

“Get away from me—” Agatha gasped, strangling for air. She broke free and fumbled at the curtains, grasping at the opening, only to tangle up in the fabric and crash through, face-planting in cave sand.

“Coulda talked louder for us,” Peter Pan’s voice grouched.

Agatha wiped away sand to see the entire League gathered behind Hort’s body barrier, pretending not to eavesdrop.

“Old people don’t have the best of ears, dear,” Riding Hood chided. “Couldn’t hear a word.”

The others murmured agreement.

Then Agatha glimpsed Merlin in the far corner, tight-faced and tugging at his beard. Maybe no one else in the League had gleaned her and Sophie’s conversation. But the wizard heard everything.

“So?” asked a deep voice.

It was Tedros, smiling hopefully next to Princess Uma.

“Is Sophie ready to do it?” he asked. “Is she ready to destroy the ring?”

Agatha saw him smile wider, convinced she’d accomplished what he couldn’t. For all their fights and failings, her prince still trusted her more than he trusted himself. Agatha’s heart melted. In this single, terrible moment, she loved him more than ever before.

Tedros saw the change in her face and his smile wavered. “Or . . . are we moving on to new hideouts?”

Over his shoulder, Agatha could see Yuba the Gnome tacking storybooks to the far wall. More old tales, at least ten of them, open to their last pages, new endings illuminated. Fair princesses slain, valiant princes gutted, clever children eaten . . .

Agatha’s legs jellied.

The School Master was working faster now.

Old villains were on the hunt.

Agatha lowered her eyes to the League of Thirteen, all watching her intently—the greatest heroes of Good, in mortal danger of losing everything they’d worked for to Evil.

Was her Ever After worth all of theirs?

Was her own happiness worth so many lives?

And would she even be happy if she fought Sophie for Tedros?