“Well, why would I want to grow up?” he shouted. “I’m perfectly happy to stay this age forever but you come along and now all of a sudden I’m getting taller and my voice is changing.”
“Don’t look at me. I didn’t ask you to grow up,” Sabrina said, scanning the sky for more dragons. She could see three high in the sky, circling the fort. “You started this war against me, but aging is your own fault. You wouldn’t grow a day older if you didn’t want to.”
Just then, three arrows thudded into the side of the platform. Sabrina studied the forest to find their source and nearly fell over in shock when she spotted the massive army approaching the fort. There must have been two thousand Everafters charging in their direction. Sheriff Nottingham and the Queen of Hearts were leading the throng. Even from her great height Sabrina could see the bright-red handprints on their chests.
“The Scarlet Hand is here!” Sabrina shouted down to the soldiers inside the fort. The news caused even more panic than before and many in Charming’s army fled into cabins and tents, presumably to hide. She snatched the cannon back from Puck and turned it on the approaching army. She pushed the Fire button hard and unleashed an avalanche of water on them. The liquid crashed into the center of their ranks and knocked nearly a hundred goblin soldiers flat. She continued her assault, hosing down as many of the thugs as she could. She couldn’t be sure but she thought she might have waterlogged nearly five hundred soldiers until something terrible and unexpected happened. The stream of water turned into a trickle.
She turned to the water tower and saw her mother peering into a glass window on its side.
“It’s run dry!” she shouted.
Without the water cannon there was little they could do against the overwhelming Hand army or the five remaining dragons hovering overhead.
“Why aren’t you firing?” Puck cried.
“We’re out of water!” Sabrina explained.
“That can’t be right. You must be doing it wrong,” he said, pulling the cannon out of her hands once more. He pushed the Fire button over and over with no results. “You broke it!”
Puck swung the cannon around in anger. The nozzle spun and hit Sabrina in the chest. The force was so powerful she was knocked right off the platform and fell backward off the tower. She saw sky above her and felt the wind in her hair. How ironic, she thought, as she fell to her certain death, that at that moment she would have given anything to be a giant goose again.
ir rushed past Sabrina’s ears and suddenly she felt her back tingling again. A moment later she was hanging upside down, inches from the ground. She looked up to find her savior, only to find that her hero wasn’t a person but a long, furry tail sticking out of the back of her pants. It was wrapped around a beam in the tower and kept her swinging there like a monkey.
Puck floated down to her, his wings flapping softly enough to allow him to hover.
“I bet you think this is hilarious. Look what you did to me with your stupid pranks. I have a tail!” she raged.
Puck’s face was trembling. “I’m sorry.”
“What?” Sabrina said blankly.
“I almost killed you. I’m sorry, Sabrina,” he said, rubbing his eyes on his filthy hoodie. He lifted her off the tower and set her on the ground.
“Since when do you care?” Sabrina said, still stunned by the boy’s apology.
Prince Charming and Snow White rushed to join them while doing their best to direct the troops. Charming looked around his fort bitterly. “We … we have to retreat.”
“Retreat? To where, Billy?” Snow asked. “We’re on the very edge of the town. We can’t retreat any farther than we already have.”
“Through the mirror,” Charming shouted. “Get everyone through my magic mirror.”
Snow White shouted to her troops to retreat. Her words brought Mr. Canis, Red Riding Hood, and Daphne to the growing group that soon included Elvis, Granny Relda, Henry, and Veronica.
“You heard the prince. Everyone into the mirror,” Henry said.
“But what about big and ugly?” Daphne said, pointing to the dragon that still blocked their path into the cabin. The crowd of knights still surrounded it, but their assault seemed more of an annoyance to the beast than an attack. It hissed at them and swatted back with its long spiky tail.
“There’s no way we’re getting past that,” Granny Relda said.
Puck’s wings appeared and soon he was hovering a few feet off the ground. “Does saving the day always have to fall on me?”
“I thought you weren’t the hero type,” Sabrina said.
“I’m not,” Puck groaned. “But the whole lot of you are constantly in jeopardy.”
“Which you tend to be the cause of,” Sabrina said.
“Beside the point!” Puck said.