The School for Good and Evil (37 page)

“Please.”

From the sky, the Good brother dove and smashed into Sader’s willing body.

Sader shivered, hazel eyes wide, then slumped to his knees, eyes closed.

Slowly his eyes opened, sparkling blue.

The School Master backed up in surprise. The skin of Sader’s arms softened to white feathers, shredding his green suit away. Terrified, the School Master turned into a shadow, fled across dead grass towards the lake, but Sader flew into the air after him, human arms now giant white swan wings, and swerved down and snatched the shadow in his beak. With a searing bird’s screech, he tore it apart, raining black feathers over the battleground below.

From the sky, Sader looked down at Sophie in Agatha’s arms, tears welling in big hazel eyes at the first and last thing he would ever see. Then, his sacrifice done, he dissipated to gold dust and was gone.

Faculty stormed from the castles, freed from the School Master’s curse. Professor Dovey stopped short first, then the others behind her. Lady Lesso’s jaw quivered as Clarissa gripped her hand. Professor Anemone, Professor Sheeks, Professor Manley, Princess Uma all had the same scared, powerless faces. Even Castor and Pollux couldn’t be told apart. All bowed their heads in mourning, knowing that they were too late for even the mercy of magic.

In front of them, the children gathered around Sophie, dying in Agatha’s arms. Agatha tried in vain to staunch the wound, a mess of tears.

Tedros dove beside them. “Let me help,” he said, taking Sophie in his arms.

“No—” Sophie wheezed—“Agatha.”

Speechless, Tedros left her to his princess’s arms.

Agatha pressed Sophie to her chest, hands soaked with her blood.

“You’re safe now,” Agatha said softly.

“I don’t—want to—be Evil,” Sophie panted through sobs.

“You’re not Evil, Sophie,” Agatha whispered, touching her decayed cheek. “You’re human.”

Sophie smiled weakly. “Only if I have you.”

Her eyes flickered with life.

“No—not yet—” Sophie struggled—

“Sophie! Sophie, please!” Agatha choked.

“Agatha—” Sophie exhaled her last breath. “I love you.”

“
Wait!
” Agatha screamed.

Icy wind snuffed the last of the torches and the blackened Good castle vanished behind dark fog.

Sobbing, shaking, Agatha kissed Sophie’s cold lips.

Black feathers shivered on the dead ground between the children’s feet. As they stared in horror, Agatha lay her head on Sophie’s silent heart and wept into terrible silence. Beside their two bodies the cold, bloody Storian dulled to gray, its work finally done.

As the teachers took children into their arms, Agatha stayed holding the body, knowing she had to let go. But she couldn’t. Cheek wet with Sophie’s blood, she listened to the sobs rise around her, the wind rake through wartorn sludge, her shallow breaths wither against a corpse.

And the beat of a heart.

Color returned to Sophie’s lips.

Glow warmed her skin.

Blood faded from her chest.

Her skin restored to its beautiful whole and with a shocked breath, her eyes opened, emerald clear.

“Sophie?” Agatha whispered.

Sophie touched her face and smiled.

“Who needs princes in our fairy tale?”

Sun exploded through fog, coating the two castles in gold. As the grass around it greened, the Storian blazed with new life and soared back to its tower in the sky. Across the shores, children’s robes, black, pink, blue, melted to the same silver, dissolving their division once and for all.

But as jubilant students and teachers descended on the girls, they suddenly retreated. Sophie and Agatha had started to shimmer, and within seconds, their bodies turned translucent. They spun to each other, for in the wind, the two heard what the others couldn’t, tenor tolls of a town clock, closer, closer . . .

Sophie’s eyes twinkled. “A princess and witch . . .”

“
Friends
,” Agatha gasped.

She whirled to Tedros. With a cry, her prince seized for her—“
Wait!
”

Light slipped through his fingers.

They were gone.

About the Author

S
OMAN
C
HAINANI
believes in fairy tales even more than the children of Gavaldon do. While studying at Harvard, he practically created his own “fairy-tale” major and wrote his thesis on why evil women make such irresistible fairy-tale villains.

Soman is also an acclaimed screenwriter, a graduate of the MFA Film Program at Columbia University, and the recipient of the school’s top prize, the FMI Fellowship. His films have played at more than 150 film festivals around the world, winning more than 30 jury and audience prizes, and his writing awards include honors from Big Bear Lake, New Draft, the CAPE Foundation, the Sun Valley Writers’ Conference, and the coveted Shasha Grant, awarded by a jury of international film executives.

When he’s not telling stories or teaching in New York City, Soman is a die-hard tennis player who never lost a first-round match for ten years. Then he started writing
The School for Good and Evil
. Now he loses all the time.

You can visit Soman online at
www.somanchainani.net.

www.schoolforgoodandevil.com

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Credits

Cover art © 2013 by Iacopo Bruno

Copyright

The School for Good and Evil

Text copyright © 2013 by Soman Chainani

Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Iacopo Bruno

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

www.harpercollinschildrens.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

ISBN 978-0-06-210489-2 (trade bdg.)

EPUB Edition APRIL 2013 ISBN 9780062104915

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FIRST EDITION