The Snake was bringing them all there for a reason.
Even so, the Four Point was still a hundred yards off with at least a thousand bodies in the way— The scims paid no mind, barreling straight for the jagged-ice walls and thrusting the two girls into the crowd with reckless force. Sophie ducked her head, jammed between men and trolls, children and centaurs, scims gripping her tighter and tighter. She could hear the crowd as she squeezed through— “King Tedros is on his way with his knights,” a horned ogre said to his family.
“But I thought Camelot had no knights anymore,” said his lumpy ogre daughter.
“Then he’ll fight single-handedly,” his humpbacked mother assured. “He’s King Arthur’s son.”
“A useless king, that’s what he is,” groused her surly son. “Don’t even have Excalibur.”
“Watch your mouth, boy. Heard folk say they saw him riding down Glass Mountain,” a pastel-dressed man cut in. “He’ll be here soon—”
“And he’ll make whoever’s responsible for this pay,” growled a troll.
Sophie’s head jerked up. If they were all waiting for Tedros to save them . . .
That means they’re on our side!
This whole crowd was on their side, Good and Evil! Everyone knew Agatha was Tedros’ princess and Sophie his friend. Everyone knew their fairy tale— She swiveled her head left and right, frantically making eye contact with the ogres and everyone else near her. But as the scims rammed her and Agatha through the crowd, no one seemed to notice. Confused, Sophie started bucking against her binds, knocking hard into people and creatures, who whirled around, peering angrily, but then went back to surging towards the walls.
Undaunted, Sophie cried out: “Help! Someone help us!”
A few people glanced in her direction, perplexed.
Sophie tried harder. “We need help! It’s us, Sophie and Aga—”
A scim gagged her.
Can’t anyone see us? Sophie thought, flailing wildly. They’re acting like we’re— She stiffened.
The scims on her and Agatha’s backs.
They were made of snake scales.
Which meant . . .
We’re invisible.
Snakeskin was the one fabric that could hide its wearers, given the right hex. Sophie had used it for her own devilish designs at school; indeed, her famous snakeskin cape now hung inside the Exhibition of Evil, cased in a special gallery dedicated to her and Agatha’s fairy tale. But now the Snake was cheekily ambushing her with snakeskin as if to turn her own fairy tale on its head. . . .
They were almost at the frozen walls. Just as Sophie could glimpse through them as to what lay inside, the scims yanked her and Agatha into the air, flying them up and over the walls, their backs caressing the Camelot flag flying over the Four Point. Embers of sun blinded her before they extinguished in the horizon, and it was only as she descended that Sophie could see what lay beneath her, illuminated by the crowd’s torch flames. . . .
Gallows.
Sophie lost her breath, scanning three rows of prisoners to be hanged, their nooses made of oily black scims. The first row had Hester, Anadil, Dot, Hort, and the rest of her crew mates, still chained together, hands cuffed behind their backs. . . . In the second row, leaders of Ever and Never kingdoms were strung up by the neck, which had drawn the raging crowd, desperate to save them. . . . But it was the third row that startled Sophie the most, loaded with fourth years from the School for Good and Evil, kidnapped from their quests. These captives gazed fearfully into the crowd, unable to see Sophie or Agatha descending to the stage in front of them. Ravan looked gaunt, his once-flowing black hair crudely shaved; Mona’s green skin was littered with bruises; Vex was missing a chunk of his pointy right ear; Kiko cried to herself, burn marks on her arms. More classmates teetered on trapdoors near them, all injured in one way or another: Brone . . . Giselle . . . Drax. . . .
The last light in the sky went dark as the scims parachuted Sophie towards the wooden platform, Agatha floating down next to her. Their feet touched the stage— Instantly the scims scattered off them, stripping them of their invisibility and revealing them to the mob.
The crowd froze in shock.
Agatha spun around, finally able to see. She took in the stunned prisoners, her eyes assessing the scene like a panther’s, her fingertip glowing gold. “The Snake . . . Where is he?”
Sophie scanned the stage, her fingertip glowing pink. “I don’t see him!”
A buzz swept through the crowd, hopeful and intense— “IT’S TEDROS’ FRIENDS!” someone cried.
“THAT MEANS HE’S HERE!” shouted another.
“WE’RE SAVED!”
“Hurry up, you nitwits!” Hester barked at Sophie from the front row, demon strung up next to her. “Cut us loose!”
“No, the children first!” the King of Jaunt Jolie said—
Sophie was about to sprint for his young princes, but then she saw Agatha hadn’t moved, her friend’s eyes wide and pinned ahead.
Slowly Sophie turned to see the scims reassembling at the front of the stage, globbing and sticking to each other at lightning speed, until they’d reformed the Snake, his mask glimmering green in the mob’s torchlight.
It’s why Agatha had silenced her in the garden.
The Snake had been with them all along. Split up into scims on their backs, waiting for the moment to reunite.
Now the Snake’s cold blue gaze crept across the crowd, which was silent as a tomb. “For thousands of years, you thought your pen told you the Truth,” he said, voice resounding. “The pen of Good and Evil. The pen whose stories you have believed without the slightest doubt. And what does that pen tell you now? It tells you I am the one who attacks your kingdoms. It tells you I am Evil. That I am the enemy.” The Snake paused. “But what if I tell you everything you think is Truth is Lies?”
His eyes moved to the flag flying over them. “You won’t believe me, of course. No one will. Not even your greatest heroes,” he said, glancing at Sophie and Agatha.
“You think a Lion is your only hope. You think only a Lion can save you. All of you. That’s what Camelot promised. A Lion who can destroy Evil like me. A Lion with King Arthur’s blood.”
He looked back down at the people. “You wait for this Lion named Tedros. You wait for him to answer your prayers. Yet here we are on the Lion’s land . . . with the Lion’s princess . . . with the Lion’s friends . . . with the rulers who call on the Lion to lead. . . . Everyone but the Lion himself,” he mocked. “He stays in his castle while your kingdoms burn. He stays in his castle while his friends die. He stays in his castle like a coward.”
He turned to the crowd. “Say it with me. ‘Cowardly. Little. Lion.’”
Nobody made a sound.
The Snake stabbed out his finger and the noose around the youngest prince of Jaunt Jolie strangled him. The prince choked, legs twitching.
The crowd screamed in horror—
“Say it with me,” the Snake hissed. “Cowardly. Little. Lion.”
“Cowardly Little Lion!” the crowd shouted.