Yet, despite their rocky start, the three of them soon found common ground.

“We are not friends, yes?” Hansel said to Hester. “But all of us want same thing: your mother back in grave.”

“For the last time, that thing is not my mother,” Hester retorted.

“Mmmm,” said Gretel thoughtfully. “And yet not-your-mother still sees you as her daughter . . .”

Hester’s eyes widened, catching on.

“What?” said Hansel, glancing between them. “What I’m missing?”

But now Gretel and Hester were grinning at each other. “The plan is clear, young witch?” said Gretel.

“Crystal,” said Hester.

Gretel beamed at Hansel. “Merlin gave us smart one, eh?”

Hansel still looked lost.

“Smarter than your brother at least,” Hester cracked.

Gretel gave her a high five.

Across the oak grove, Anadil was rankling over having to train with both Jack and Briar Rose. (“They’re in love. Can’t blame Merlin for wanting to keep them together,” said Dot. “They can’t even take a poo apart!” Anadil miffed.)

In addition to having to deal with double mentors (as well as their geriatric displays of affection), Anadil also had double the villains to deal with: Jack’s giant and Rose’s Evil fairy. And for Anadil, who’d been trying so valiantly to prove she was more than just Hester’s sidekick, the extra burden was worth it. It didn’t matter if she had to put up with two lovey-dovey mentors. It didn’t matter if she had to work twice as long and twice as hard as everyone else. Kill two villains and no one would call her a henchman ever again.

But it was Hort who had the worst pairing of all. He’d been so focused on wooing Sophie these past few weeks that he’d failed to notice that one of the old men stalking about the farmhouse was his mortal enemy.

Pan.

Pan!

At first he couldn’t believe it, since Peter Pan was the boy who’d vowed never to grow up, let alone grow bald, wrinkled, and frail. But then he saw Tinkerbell perched on the old man’s shoulder and his stomach went cold.

To be matched with the hero who’d slain his father during the Battle of the Jolly Roger, the hero who’d left him an orphan at the age of six, the hero who he’d shadow-dueled in daydreams all his life . . . well, it nearly stopped the poor boy’s heart. And yet, after the shock subsided, he never felt rage, only an empty despair. For in his dreams, Hort had always imagined Peter young and cocksure, a bumptious, trash-talking sprig he could kill in a fair fight. But now, watching Pan so old and ordinary, Hort lost the will to fight him at all.

Right then and there, he understood what made him different from the Evil School Master they were about to face. Because unlike him, Hort could see when a story was over and it was time to move on.

So that first day of training, he and Peter slit their palms and made a blood oath to mutual respect. Hort vowed to slay Captain Hook and put him back in his tomb. And in return, Pan promised to stand beside Hort at his father’s grave when the war was done and won.