I’m Evil. Sophie swallowed. Definitely Evil.

So what made her think she could end up with Good’s greatest prince?

She caressed Tedros’ name on her skin beneath the cold, metal ring.

Her heart had promised he was her true love.

And hearts don’t lie.

“I was kidding about you eating the pie,” a boy’s voice said behind her, “but maybe I shouldn’t have been.”

Sophie glanced down and saw she’d drained almost all of it.

“Stress eating,” she mumbled, and looked up to see Tedros looming over her, the sun shadowing his wind-chilled face. He pulled Excalibur from its sheath, the silver blade nearly blinding Sophie with its glare.

“One blow will take care of every last one of our stresses. That’s all we need from you, Sophie. One hard blow.”

Sophie started fussing with the picnic plates, scooping the leftovers into one. “We really should get on. The other two are far enough along by now—”

“I don’t understand girls,” said Tedros, plopping into crinkly tulips. “You leave Rafal, but you won’t destroy his ring. You hire Hort as a bodyguard, but you want to travel with me. You act like you live on air and leaves, but you pillage a whole pie in twenty seconds. Not that I’m complaining. So many Evergirls won’t eat in front of boys because they think it makes them look, I don’t know . . . human? Trust me. Every boy would rather have a girl who eats.”

“So that’s why you and Agatha got along. I’ve seen that girl wolf down garlic-fried sausage,” said Sophie, remembering how she’d abused Agatha for hours afterward over her breath. “Oh, Agatha,” she whispered. “Silly, wonderful Agatha.”

She looked up and saw Tedros flinch, as if the name had stung him.

The prince caught her staring and walked away. “You’re right. Shouldn’t linger until the weasel comes along.”

“He’ll be hungry, won’t he?” said Sophie, bunching dead tulips into a mound and topping it with the leftovers plate, so Hort wouldn’t miss it. “He really is a nice boy. Just wants to protect me from being hurt, even if he doesn’t love me anymore. Poured his heart out in the steam bath at school. Well, after all I’ve done to him, making sure he has his lunch is the least I can do.”

She scraped to her knees to get up and saw Tedros halted on the path, smirking at her. “What?” she asked.

“Who knew you had feelings?” he marveled, and hiked ahead.

Sophie pinked in surprise.

Maybe a wee bit Good after all, she thought.

“And who knew you took steam baths with Hort?” she heard Tedros say.

Thank goodness I have proper shoes for once, Sophie thought, pattering along the trail in snug, pink booties.

They’d been at it for six hours straight, with only a few short breaks to fill water tins and rest weary knees. (Sophie did a few yoga poses to stretch until she saw Tedros gawking and decided yoga was best done in private.) It was dark now and they could only see the trail by magical embers of white light Merlin had left behind like breadcrumbs. Before they departed Headquarters, he’d told them when they reached the last light crumb on the path, it was his signal to camp for the night.