“Don’t!” a voice yelled.
Beneath her, Bettina appeared, a shadow in Sophie’s pink glow, curled around the side of the ridge, glaring blackly at her.
“Coming!” Sophie croaked, leaving the flower behind.
Just a trick, she reminded herself.
What could a tree know about her future?
And yet, the tree had given them a way out of the bank. It had answered the question she’d asked. So why wouldn’t this answer be real, too? Plus, the way the bloom spoke . . . that boy’s voice . . . so confident and clear . . . as if he was her true love . . .
Who was it?
What was his name?
The flower would have told her. After all she’d been through, she’d finally know who he was. Her one true prince. Her Ever After. And with it, the power to shortcut to The End instead of wishing and hoping for the Storian to write it. She would have control back. Man at the helm, instead of a Pen.
Which is how we ended up in this mess to begin with, Sophie thought.
Open that flower and she would be no better than two monstrous twins who thought they should be the Pen . . . that they had the right to bend fate to their will . . . Meanwhile, she and Agatha were fighting to protect the Storian and the stories that set the example for their world. To allow these tales to unfold the way a real flower would, in its own time, instead of plundering them for selfish need. Even if it meant enduring pain and suffering. Even if it led her to a thousand false endings. Nature had a way. The Storian had a plan. One that had brought her to a best friend and a world beyond her own where she’d found purpose and meaning and strength. Only in the realm of the Storian could everyone find their place. Their true place. This was the future she was fighting for. And that was worth more than the pleasures of a boy or a kiss.
Except now a new flower was talking to her.
“I know a way out of the Evil in your heart . . .”
The green glow within the petals throbbed, like a magical seed.
“A way you can be as Good as Agatha . . . Just open me . . . I’ll show you the way . . .”
Sophie hustled past it, wishing she could plug her ears. She let her feet skid down the rope as she rebounded around the side of the ridge, spotting her teammates once more. But now there were new flowers, bending towards her.
“I know a way out of your dress . . . Evelyn Sader’s dress . . . I know how to escape its magic . . .”
Sophie clenched her teeth and rushed past.
“I know a way out of the mystery . . . I can tell you who the Snake’s parents really are . . .”
“I know a way out of your question . . . why Rhian had a fingerglow and the Snake doesn’t . . .”
“I know a way out of Lady Lesso’s secrets . . . I know who fathered her child . . . who Aric’s real dad is . . . just open me up . . .”
Sophie resisted these new whispers, each pulling on the strings of her heart, promising to unravel a knot. Nearby, Robin seemed to be battling too, his jaw flexed, his muscles tense. For a moment, Sophie could hear his vine’s taunts—
“I know a way out of your resentment towards Marian . . . a way to forgive her for what she did . . . Open me, Robin . . .”
Robin paused, teeth gnashed, before he shook his head and kept going, faster than before. He and Bettina were racing towards the bottom from opposite sides, the Courier scribe unfazed by her flowers, as if she’d already investigated every last question of her heart. Willam and Bogden, too, were close to the exit, until Willam hesitated in front of a sealed bloom—
“I know a way out of your brother’s grave . . . a way to bring Tristan back to life . . .”
Bogden tugged Willam by the leg, forcing him down.
Tristan, Sophie thought. The name kept coming up when Willam was around. And yet the only Tristan she’d known was a boy who’d gone to the School for Good: a redheaded, freckled waif who’d been brutally killed in a tree by Aric—
Sophie swiveled, looking back at the redheaded, freckled waif with Bogden.
Of course!
Willam was Tristan’s brother.
It explained everything: Willam’s resentment towards Tedros . . . his insistence that the prince bullied his brother . . .
Does he know how Tristan died?
Does he know the Snake was friends with Tristan’s killer?
That he’s trying to bring that killer back to life?
It’s why Japeth wanted the Pen’s power, Sophie remembered. It’s why he’d killed his own twin.
For Aric.
This was about more than being king to Japeth, more than killing Tedros or erasing his opponents.
This was about Japeth getting his best friend back.
This was about love.
Sophie knew that story well. She’d climbed out of hell to find her Ever After with her best friend, again and again, and yet there was always something in the way.
“Sophie! Hurry!”
She looked down at Robin, Bogden, Willam, and Bettina, converged on the pool of light, poised to jump through and escape back into the Woods. They’d survived the flower traps. Only she was left to finish. Sophie smiled with relief, hurrying down her vine. More blooms ambushed her, their voices louder, more insistent, but she was untouchable now, like a last wolf charging for her pack.
“I know the way out of being a Dean . . . a way to feel more fulfilled . . .”
(Sophie thought: I’ll feel fulfilled when the Snake is dead.)
“I know a way to check on your father in Gavaldon . . . to see if he’s alive or dead . . .”
(Stefan has a new family now, Sophie dismissed.)
“I know a way for you to look even more beautiful . . .”
(“Impossible,” Sophie wisped.)
“I know a way out of your secret cravings for cheese . . .”
(“Now you’re just being daft.”)
“I know a way out of your fairy tale . . . so that you and Agatha can be how you once were . . .”
Sophie hesitated. The very last flower on her vine loomed over her, white petals cupped by thorns, the trapped glow flashing hot pink.
“Two best friends . . . before Tedros . . . before princes . . . when you only lived for each other . . .”
Sophie told herself to keep moving, to shut out the voice. Her body didn’t listen.
“I can restore you like you used to be . . . Agatha and Sophie . . . Sophie and Agatha . . .”
Her heart was outracing her breaths now, something inside her taking over.
“Back to two girls . . . Back to the beginning . . .”
“Sophie!” a boy’s voice called below.
“The true way out . . . Open me, Sophie . . .”
Sophie dripped with sweat, her fingers curling into a fist.
“Open me for Agatha . . .”
“Sophie, no!” another voice cried.
She ripped open the petals, pricking her finger on a thorn like the tip of a spindle.
Blood dripped onto her white dress.
Inside the bloom, the pink glow withered, white petals desiccating to dust. Only the thorns remained, thickening, growing longer and longer.
Sophie snapped out of her trance.
Oh no.
She glimpsed movement below and spotted Robin and Bettina rushing up their vines towards her, as if something was about to happen, something terrible she couldn’t understand. She spun back to the flower—
The thorns snatched her like fingers, before green moss lassoed on top of her, binding her in. Harder and thicker these binds grew, morphing into wood—into bark—from which a new tree began to grow. Sophie couldn’t breathe; a few more seconds, and she’d be fossilized into this new tree. Tearing her hand free, she seared through wood with her glow, freeing herself, and instantly plummeted backwards, ricocheting off a branch, then another, then another. Around the pit, new trees erupted from white flowers, an explosion of branches and leaves, ping-ponging Sophie up into darkness. She could hear the shrieks of her friends, careening off new-growing trees, their bodies tiny shadows in the cast of her glow. More trees detonated to life, volleying Sophie up in an endless white canopy, higher, higher, until she saw a ceiling of earth above. Branches suddenly cradled her like a throne and crashed her through dirt, then through stone—