Tedros smiled back at her. “I’m counting on it.”
Agatha had no idea what he meant, but the pureness of his gaze preempted any questions, as if for once, her prince was well ahead of her. The forest opened up into a field of willow trees with silver, shimmering leaves, like Christmas tinsel, the glow of dawn pressing against the dark. Agatha looked back to see the second rat lag out of the Stymph Forest, well behind theirs. Hunger stirred in Agatha’s stomach, with no time to stop and Merlin’s hat out of reach.
“Do you think Chaddick would have made a good king?” Tedros asked.
“No, not really,” said Agatha. “He would always look to you.”
“You’re just being nice.”
“Too hungry for that. Chaddick was a born knight.”
“A loyal knight,” said Tedros.
He paused, thinking about his friend and liege.
“But not meant to lead,” he admitted.
The prince and his princess fell quiet.
Agatha kissed the back of his neck. “Can I eat your apple?”
Tedros sighed. “Think I’m going to hang on to it a little while longer.”
He sounded far away, Agatha’s head suddenly heavy and slow. Sleep assailed her, stronger than before, a strange powerless feeling she knew. She looked up at the willow trees, shedding silvery leaves over her like stars . . . Sleeping Willows . . . She grabbed at Tedros’ chest to warn him, her eyes closing, but he showed no signs of flagging, muscles hard and eyes flared, his will and desire fending off the spell. Agatha strained to stay awake, fists clenched, determined to protect him . . .
The next time she blinked, it was morning, the sun bright over Foxwood.
Her prince was gone.
So was the rat.
AGATHA WAS CURLED up deep under a magnolia bush, a sweet honey smell breaking through her dull senses, along with the buzz of a crowd and the crisp clanging of metal. She pried apart a bough of flowers and spotted the thin towers of Foxwood’s royal castle fanned against the horizon. But in front of that castle was a wall of soldiers, thousands of men deep, dressed in varied armor and shields, gathered under flags of different kingdoms: Kyrgios in pea green, Netherwood in glossy purple, Hamelin in checkered yellow and orange, Akgul in red and black . . . Then, from behind, Agatha heard voices: two Akgul guards in helmets and armor, hacking through bushes with their swords, coming straight towards her.
“Saw him myself. Prince Tedros it was,” grunted one. “Ridin’ somethin’ like a big rat.”
“Must be with his witch friends,” guessed the second guard.
They slashed through more bushes, getting closer and closer to Agatha. She pulled out of the bush to flee—
—only to be yanked back.
She spun to see Hester and Anadil, fingers to lips. Agatha started to ask something, but Anadil’s rats hissed “Shhh!” from her pocket. Hester pointed across, to Tedros and Merlin, camouflaged in a bush. Tedros mouthed to Agatha: “Don’t move.”
The two guards eviscerated the bushes, only a few feet from Agatha’s. With fingers, Tedros counted at Hester: 3 . . . 2 . . . 1 . . .
Merlin and Hester sprung out of the bushes, each shooting a spell at a guard. Hester’s knocked her guard out; Merlin’s didn’t, instead swelling his guard’s helmet ten sizes, so the guard bumbled inside it like a barrel, slashing his sword blindly. The boy wizard shot another spell. This one turned the guard’s sword into a ferret. Merlin tried one more, only to vanish the guard’s pants.
“For God’s sake, Merlin,” Tedros growled.
He punched the guard out.
“It’s that age potion. I’m telling you,” Merlin complained.
“Don’t even start,” said Hester, freeing the ferret into the bushes.
A few minutes later, two soldiers in red-and-black armor crammed into the mob of armies, who were all on the lookout for Tedros of Camelot.
“Snow White’s cottage is to the east,” Tedros whispered through his helmet.
“It’ll be guarded too. The whole kingdom is,” Agatha whispered back. “Let’s go straight to Chaddick’s house—”
“We don’t know where it is! That’s why we need Sophie!” said Tedros.
Through her eyehole, Agatha spotted Merlin, Hester, and Anadil scuttling to the citizens’ checkpoint, where guards hunting for Tedros assessed them with Matchers and allowed them to pass (Merlin’s name popping up made them give the well-suited teenager a second glance, before they shrugged and let him go). Tedros knew that he and Agatha would never survive the Matchers, which is why he’d suggested sneaking through the armies and meeting the witches and Merlin at Snow White’s. But now the plan seemed foolish.
“I can’t move,” Tedros gritted, stuck between trolls.
“Neither can I,” said Agatha, a throng of Rainbow Gale nymphs blocking her.
Drumbeats thundered in the distance.
“Quit your pushin’,” a troll snarled at Tedros. “King Rhian’s comin’. We’ll all get a good look.”
Tedros and Agatha ducked their heads, hoping the troll hadn’t inspected them too closely.
Drums boomed louder, followed by a flourish of horns.
“That must be Japeth!” Agatha whispered to her prince. “We need to hurry—”
Fanfare exploded behind them, the trumpets of a royal procession, as the trees and bushes around Foxwood’s border began to shake. The foliage burst open, a parade of toy horses rolling through, every horse the size of an elephant, each completely covered in mosaics of . . . candy. There was a gumdrop horse, a lollipop horse, a marzipan horse, a caramel brittle horse, a cake truffle horse, a macaron horse, even a horse wrapped in tiny butterscotch balls. But the greatest horse of all, twice as tall as the rest, was latticed in bright red licorice, and atop this horse rose a figure in a red head-to-toe veil, her eyes gleaming through diaphanous silk, an enormous crown of white spun sugar extending off her head like antlers. The fanfare seemed to be coming from inside her horse, the veiled stranger striking poses to each new beat—tree pose, wheel pose, even a headstand in her saddle—like some sort of equestrian yoga, before the toy animals all rolled to a stop and the drums fell to silence. Hands on hips, the red woman stood with a high-heeled boot on her horse’s head and glared down at the hundred armies of the Woods.
“Who claims to have authority here?” she announced in a mystifying accent at once low-class and posh.
A sea of men gaped back at her.
“I said, who claims authority here?” she drawled.
“Me! Me!” yelped a voice far away, before a short, balding man in a lopsided crown popped up amidst the armies, wrestling his way through. He was red-faced and sweaty, with an egg-colored tunic and hideous brown scarf that made him look a bit like Humpty Dumpty. “I’m King Dutra of Foxwood! This is my kingdom!”
“Incorrect, wee little man,” said the red stranger. “This is my kingdom. This entire Woods is my kingdom. I am the Sugar Queen, diva supreme and mistress of realms across the Savage Sea, come to claim the throne of Camelot, as is my right.”
The king looked as gobsmacked as the soldiers around him. “B-b-but this is King Rhian’s land—King Rhian of Camelot—”