The wolf and giant both froze jaws over their prey, eyes flicking to the ninja on the ground. The wolf pulled Agatha out of his mouth and smiled at the masked stranger, prepared to delay a snack if it might result in a larger meal. “And why’s that, oh Faceless One?”

“Because if you release them, I’ll let you go on your way,” said the ninja.

“And if we don’t?” snorted the giant, mouth full of Tedros, shivering between the giant’s teeth.

“Then you’ll be woefully outnumbered,” said the ninja.

“Strange . . . ,” the wolf replied, prowling towards the stranger, Agatha in hand. “Given your prince and princess are a bit held up, I see one of you and two of us.” He loomed over the ninja in the moonlight. “Which means it’s you that’s outnumbered.”

Slowly the ninja looked up. The black mask came off, revealing almond-shaped eyes, olive skin, and black hair flowing in the wind.

Princess Uma smiled. “Then you’re not looking very closely.”

She let out a piercing squeak through her teeth and a roar echoed from every side of the darkness, a thunder beneath their feet. For a moment, the wolf and giant spun dumbly, the roar crashing towards them north and south, east and west . . . until they dropped their two prisoners like hot potatoes. From the ground, Agatha raised her glowing finger just in time to see a stampede of bulls leap over her body and ram into the wolf and giant like balls to bowling pins. Horses and bears sprang over Tedros, tearing into the monsters with their hooves and claws. By the time Agatha and Tedros wobbled to their feet, their gold glows illuminating the scene, the wolf and giant were howling for mercy atop the beastly tide bucking them into the darkness. Princess Uma whistled a cheery thank-you and her animal army echoed with singsong growls. Soon their shadows faded and the wolf and giant were gone.

Agatha whirled to Princess Uma, a teacher at the School for Good who she’d once mocked as helpless and passive and weak, but who had just saved her and Tedros’ lives. “I thought the princes killed you!” Agatha cried. “Hester said Dean Sader left you to die in the Woods. We all thought you were dead—”

“A professor of Animal Communication unable to survive in the Woods?” Princess Uma swished her finger and turned her black robes to pink, a silver swan crest stitched over the heart. “Even your mother had more faith in me and we’ve never met.”

“You . . . you know my mother?” Agatha asked. Knew, a voice corrected. Agatha battled a fresh wave of nausea. She couldn’t bring herself to say it.

“Only through her messages to the League,” Uma replied.

“League? What League?” Tedros broke in.

“The League of Thirteen, of course,” said Uma, unhelpfully. “Her last message to us made three things very clear: That we protect your lives. That we get you to Sophie. And that we’d find you right here.”