“I killed her, Hansel and I am not killing smelly witch again,” said a wild-haired woman in a wheelchair next to him with the same accent, her big gray eyes flaying Agatha and Tedros. “Your story bringing villains out of graves, your responsibility put them back.” She smiled phonily. “And I’m Gretel, since the bossy little gnome said we must introduce ourselves.”

“Which leaves me and Briar Rose (or Sleeping Beauty for the uneducated Reader), who were planning our fairy-tale wedding until you came along,” said a freckle-faced man with salt-and-pepper hair, wearing a brown tunic and white lederhosen. He was holding hands with an elegant, white-haired woman in a revealing puce gown. “Now we’re hiding from my man-eating giant and Rose’s curse-obsessed fairy—”

“When Jack and I should be picking out a cake,” Briar Rose glared.

“That makes seven of us who think these young twerps should sleep in the Woods,” trumped Cinderella.

Tink squeaked.

“Eight,” said Cinderella.

Tedros and Agatha gawked at the gang of famous old fairy-tale heroes who just voted them out of their cave.

“It’s why I tried to avoid you meeting Evers on the trails . . .” Uma yawned in the corner. “Everyone blames you for messing up the Woods.” She fell back asleep.

“Well, I don’t know about the rest of you, but I think they’re adorable,” chirped a short, big-bottomed old woman with a dyed brown bob and a red-hooded cape. “Isn’t that what being old is for? Mentoring younger folk to get through their stories?”

“Oh go back to granny’s, you blithering ass,” growled Cinderella.

Red Riding Hood shut up.

“You all act as if we don’t need our young guests,” Yuba’s voice slashed through the cave.

Everyone twirled to see the old gnome standing in front of the moth-holed curtain hanging across the cave wall, the White Rabbit standing at his side like a magician’s assistant. “Let me remind you that one week ago, the School Master placed his ring on his queen’s finger, earning her vow of true love. That same night, the villains rose from their graves on Necro Ridge and the Crypt Keeper was killed.”

On Yuba’s cue, the rabbit drew the curtain back, revealing dozens of storybooks spread open to their last pages, tacked to the wall with sharpened sticks.

“Two days later, Rapunzel and her prince were kidnapped by Mother Gothel and hurled from her tower to their deaths,” the gnome declared, illuminating one of the storybooks with his staff and its gruesome new ending to Rapunzel’s story. “Then yesterday Tom Thumb was eaten alive by a giant, while Rumpelstiltskin killed the miller’s daughter who’d once guessed his name,” Yuba went on, lighting up two more storybooks with revised endings. “And today, Snow White and her seven dwarves have been murdered at Cottage White, where they once lived happily.” He snapped his staff like a whip, lighting up a last storybook with a loud crack. “All of these victims refused to leave their homes and join our League in hiding, as did many others who may soon suffer the same fate.”