“We have our proof Japeth isn’t my father’s son, Agatha. We have the Snake’s secrets. All of them,” Tedros disputed. “We can use them against him. We just need a way out of here—”
“Tedros?” Agatha said.
“What?”
Then he caught the green glow reflecting in her pupils.
Slowly, Tedros turned.
Just in time to see a new snake about to swallow them.
CRIES OF A baby.
Two babies.
That’s what they heard first, suspended in a wash of white, before the scene filled in, like the Storian inking a page.
On a rumpled bed, stuffed in the corner of a cluttered one-room house, Evelyn Sader swaddled her twin boys in her arms, the Dean’s face ashen and sweat-soaked, the sheets around her stained with blood. The babies were almost identical; one had a rosier complexion, with sea-green eyes, the other milky pale, his eyes ice-blue. A woman with long gray hair bent over her—the midwife, Tedros assumed—patting her forehead dry and wrapping the boys in fresh blankets.
“Is he coming?” Evelyn said weakly.
“Soon,” said one of two more midwives in the corner, rinsing bloody towels and boiling tea, both of whom had the same stringy gray hair, high foreheads, and—
Tedros balked.
“Mistral Sisters,” Agatha said, her eyes shifting between the three women, who looked just as old nearly two decades into the past as they did in the present.
What were they doing here? Tedros wondered. As far as he knew, Evelyn Sader and the Mistral Sisters had never crossed paths . . .
“I need to see him,” Evelyn insisted, trying to soothe the paler boy, who was wailing, while the ruddier boy smiled and cooed on her arm. “You promised he’d come.”
“Patience,” said the Mistral named Alpa.
“You did a wise thing writing us,” said Bethna. “Your brother, August, has spent years maligning our efforts to find the One True King, who can bring the Storian’s reign to an end. We’ve had few allies in our search. Even our own brother doesn’t believe the One True King exists, despite his continued efforts to control the Storian.”
“But now we can all work together for the same goal,” hissed Omeida next to her, pouring a cup of smoky tea. She brought it to Evelyn. “Drink this, dear. It will give you strength to nurse them.” She held it to Evelyn’s lips and the Dean took a sip, still trying to calm the pallid, unruly child.
“They’ll be safe here in Foxwood, won’t they?” Evelyn asked, anxiously cuddling the newborns. “Couldn’t stay in Sherwood anymore. Too many high-ranking leaders coming in and out. Needed a place where we could blend in. Especially with two.”
“No surprise that you’d have twins,” Omeida chuckled. “They run in the family, after all.”
“Have you given any thought to their names?” said Alpa.
“I have,” a voice said.
A man’s voice.
Tedros’ heart stopped.
A voice he knew.
Slowly the prince and Agatha turned to a shadow in the doorway. Behind him, an empty street of cottages swirled with autumn leaves, as if he’d arrived by wind. He glided inside the house, hooded silver robes billowing over his slender frame. A silver mask covered his face except for puckish blue eyes and full lips, pulled into an impish smile.
“No . . . way . . . ,” Agatha gasped.
His eyes flicked to the prince and princess, as if even from the past, he seemed to know that they were standing there.
“Hello, Evelyn,” he said, his focus turning to her twins, his lithe fingers touching the head of the pale, crying child. Instantly its wails ceased. “Two boys. Imagine that.”
“Past is Present and Present is Past,” said Evelyn, peering up at him.
“Indeed.” The man’s eyes moved to the rosy, genial child. “But you only need one to complete your plan. Let me take this one to school. Spare him the indignity of growing up in Foxwood. Hello, little cub. Should we make you an official student?” He put his finger to the boy’s, as if to unlock a spell, and the child’s fingertip suddenly glowed gold, alive with magic. “Sweet nature . . . dashing smile . . . and now he has a fingerglow too . . . My precocious Everboy, soon to walk the halls of Honor Tower. Proof I’m as Good as people think.” He winked at the child.
“I know you well enough to know you’re joking,” said Evelyn, though she pulled the boy closer to her, out of his grasp. “If I was still a teacher at your school, you would have the right to see them whenever you wish. Your school that took me in when Arthur banished me from the Woods. You saved me in a time of need. You, my true love. But then my brother convinced you I wasn’t your true love. And you listened to that lying fool, expelling me like I was nothing, despite my loyalty to you . . . Well, disown me and you disown my children too. After today, you will never see them again. Nor me.”
The man’s eyes twinkled through his mask. “And yet, a part of me lives inside you forever . . .” He pulled aside the bedsheets and put a hand to her chest, a subtle blue glow lighting up at the heart of her butterfly dress. “I never questioned your sincerity, Evelyn. I believe you loved me. Yet I also believe your brother: that I will love someone more in years to come. Even so, I can’t discount the possibility that you are right. It’s why I imparted a piece of my soul into you before I expelled you from school. And if you are correct that you are my true love and that August Sader will destroy me . . . then one day you will use that piece of my soul to bring me back to life. Wouldn’t that be something? You and me together again.” He looked down at the boys. “This time, a family.”
Evelyn stared at the masked man, their eyes meeting, and for a brief moment, her face blushed with hope. Then she hardened, drawing away. “Go and make your own family. I almost died in the Woods because you betrayed me. Because you threw me out like Arthur did. If it wasn’t for a kind knight named Japeth, these boys never would have been born. A man like that should be my true love.”
“Except he isn’t. Otherwise he would be standing here instead of me,” replied the visitor. “Your heart only loves me, Evelyn. We both know that.”
Evelyn glowered. “I don’t need you. Nor will my children. They’re mine now.”
“You summoned me here, Evelyn. And not just to insult me, I presume,” said the man coolly. “Your letter proposed a plan that I found compelling. A plan to rule Camelot. A plan for which you need my help.”
“To be fair, brother, you will benefit as much as she will,” Alpa chirped, alongside Bethna and Omeida in the corner.
“As will you, Sisters. All of us will benefit,” said the masked man, without a glance. “And you’re sure of what you saw, Evelyn? Arthur and a woman not his wife . . .”
A butterfly fluttered off Evelyn’s dress into the visitor’s hands. A scene magically replayed across its wings for him. His eyes grew bigger as he watched.
“Quite sure,” said Evelyn.
The man let the butterfly return to her.
His gaze moved back to the paler child, silently studying the visitor. Next to him, his sunnier brother fixated on his new fingerglow, making it beam on and off.
“Very well, then. The boys can stay with Evelyn,” spoke the man, as if the matter was still in question. “Let them grow up together, the way my brother Rhian and I once did. Only one can be the King of Camelot, of course. But they can fight it out for themselves, Good versus Evil, brother against brother. Like two School Masters did, before one rose to power . . . But this time, it is a King who will rise. A King who can ensure that Camelot is in the hands of our bloodline, as much as the school is. The two great forces of the Woods fully under our control.”