Vanessa scooted closer to Stefan on the path and smiled up at him . . . He shifted away, ignoring her.

“Only there was one flaw in Vanessa’s plan: Stefan didn’t like her. And there was nothing Vanessa could do to change that,” Professor Sader declared.

The town square melted away and now Vanessa was kneeling in the graveyard at night, near the Forest’s edge, praying into the darkness with clasped hands.

“So young Vanessa did the one thing storybooks taught her to do when you love someone who is out of reach. She wished into the Woods for a magic spell that could help her win her one true love.”

The scene started to evaporate around the two girls.

“Yet Vanessa’s isn’t the only love story that matters in this fairy tale . . . ,” Sader’s voice echoed.

Phantom colors melted in around them and now they were in the School Master’s tower, as the masked sorcerer flew in through his window, carrying a young, attractive woman in his arms, with short brown hair, big, beautiful eyes, and tanned, gangly limbs.

“Because while Vanessa prayed for Stefan’s heart, the School Master was trying to win Callis’.”

Agatha choked on her own tongue. “Callis?” She ogled the woman’s elegant posture, olive-brown locks, and bright, freckly skin. “But that can’t be Callis. It doesn’t look anything like—”

Something hopped out of the woman’s black dress onto the floor.

A tiny, bald, wrinkled kitten.

Reaper.

Agatha blanched.

Merlin had told her part of this story—that the School Master sought her mother’s love—but the woman in his arms didn’t look anything like her mother . . .

Or did she?

For as Agatha looked closer at her wide, lucid eyes and long nose, she started to see bits and pieces of her mother, like a sculpture that had been deliberately altered.

Something floated back to her that Merlin had said her first time in the Celestium with him . . . something about Callis being quite pretty, before Tedros snorted incredulously . . .

Agatha watched the School Master bring the woman deeper into his chamber, Reaper pattering beside her.

It was her mother.

But then why didn’t it look like her?

She broke out of her trance, for Sader had already moved on.

“The School Master was curious about a new teacher, Callis of Netherwood, who the Storian had chosen for its latest tale shortly after she took a position teaching Uglification at school. According to the Storian, Callis had long dreamed of finding her one true love, even though she taught at the School for Evil. In truth, Callis was having doubts as to whether she was Evil at all. So when the School Master took a shine to her—a School Master everyone thought was Good at the time—Callis saw her way out. A chance to switch sides to Good and find her true love at last.”

The masked School Master pulled a golden ring from his pocket and took one knee before her. Slowly she reached for the ring . . . and stopped cold.