Читать книгу The Last Ever After - Soman Chainani, Soman Chainani - Страница 14

he Tunnel of Trees led straight to the Good castle doors, lit by candles usually visible by now through the branches. But the deeper Sophie went, the darker the tunnel became, a sharp clacking sound amplifying ahead, like an aggressive clock. Uneasy, she took Rafal’s hand.

“I didn’t expect Dean Sader to make a holy mess of things,” he sighed. “I thought that by putting a piece of my soul into Evelyn, I’d have some control over her in the event of my death—”

Sophie could hear the sounds growing louder. Click clack. Click clack. Click clack.

“From within Evelyn’s body, I had enough control to ensure she brought you back to school … and, one day, to me,” he continued. “And yet, I couldn’t control all of her. That crude business of slaveboys and worlds without princes, and girls good, boys bad … She was always resentful of her brother’s gifts and I’m afraid my students had to suffer for it.”

Sophie could hardly hear him over the clacking, as she glimpsed frosted doors ahead, black instead of the old white, the once blue torch flames above it now green.

“She left behind an ugly war, with Boys and Girls hell-bent on destroying each other,” he was saying, “but in the end, it wasn’t hard to make them lay down their arms. After all, no matter how divided they’d become, now they have something even stronger uniting them …”

He stopped at the doors with a dashing grin. “Me.”

Sophie stared at him. Confused, she flung open the doors—

A crush of bodies nearly flattened her and she hugged a wall for dear life.

“Welcome to the School for New Evil,” said Rafal.

In a black-marble foyer, boys and girls in crisp black uniforms and black berets marched by in perfect lines. Chins up, chests out, they stomped with steely stares, right-left, right-left, past the four glass staircases, now hued green. The boys were in belted leather breeches, half-sleeved black shirts with starched collars, narrow green ties, and thick-heeled boots, while the girls wore skin-hugging black pinafores over plunging green blouses, knee-high socks, and flat black slippers. Two of the girls marched in front of Sophie: green-skinned Mona and one-eyed, bald Arachne, tight lipped and eyes fixed ahead. Ravan was right behind them, his oily face scrubbed clean, his once long, matted hair clipped short and neat. Impish Vex tramped next to him, head shaved, spine straight, subtly picking at breeches wedged up his bottom.

Sophie stiffened in shock. Nevers chic … clean … in straight lines? She’d once despised the villains for their poor appearance, but now it was Sophie who felt embarrassed by her own unwashed cheeks and dumpy black nightgown. She tried to catch more Nevers’ faces beneath their berets, but the foyer was dark, holding them in shadow. The only lights seemed to come from fleeting flashes of green glow, dispersed over the army in sync with the march, as if there was an invisible swarm of fireflies keeping time.

Then Sophie noticed another haze of green light over the Legends Obelisk, centered between the four staircases, crammed with student portraits. Looking for the source, she scanned up the high stained glass windows (once haloed visions of a white swan, now replaced with a glaring black swan) to the domed sunroof, sealed over with deadly stalactites, glowing snake-green like a malevolent chandelier. As Sophie’s gaze roamed to the buffed staircases, shiny onyx arches, and ruthless marchers, she saw that Good’s home and all that came with it—elegance, discipline, style—had been usurped entirely by Evil.

And yet, watching this parade, Sophie felt her stomach relax, for there wasn’t anything the least bit sinister about Evil wanting to be “New” or adding a dash of color or showing off a bit of thigh. Indeed, she’d held lunchtime rallies her first year, pleading for all three—

Suddenly, beneath the stalactites, she caught sight of another face in the Never army: a scared-looking boy with a big chest and hairy arms. Chaddick’s gray eyes met Sophie’s, just as shocked to see her as she was to see him. Out of the corner of his lips he mouthed the word “Help”—before a burst of green firefly lights detonated near him, and he whipped his gaze forward, wincing with pain.

Flummoxed, Sophie slid along the wall, trying to catch a last look as he vanished into the wings. Chaddick? Good’s most loyal sidekick? Why was he with Nevers?

But from her new vantage point, Sophie saw more Evers in black uniforms spliced into the march: luscious, caramel-skinned Reena … tall, willowy Giselle … sleek dark-skinned Nicholas … redheaded, freckled Millicent … baby-faced Hiro … all trembly and tense as fireflies popped off around them like warning shots.

Dread rising, Sophie turned back to the Legends Obelisk. The Evers’ portraits, once smiling and kind, were painted with baleful scowls and sneers, matching the Nevers’ frames, now jammed onto the same column.

“Evers learning … Evil?” Sophie breathed, looking up at Rafal.

“Evers and Nevers both,” the young School Master corrected. “After two years of war, a unified school, protecting the future of Evil.” He surveyed his troops. “The students had to adjust to all being in the same castle, of course. More of them per room, more competition in classes … but if anyone has any complaints, I haven’t heard them.”

Sophie squinted out the window, remembering the other tree tunnel. “But what’s in the ‘Old’ school?”

Rafal eyed the rotted towers across Halfway Bridge. “If the School for New will write Evil’s future, then the School for Old rewrites its past …” His pupils shot to Sophie lizard quick. “But you are not to step foot in the School for Old. It is forbidden to all students and to you. Understand?” He stared her down, looking like a headmaster despite his youth.

Sophie nodded, startled.

“Your responsibilities are here and only here,” he commanded, “ensuring your young colleagues adjust to their new school. With the volatility of the past two years, all students will be held to—how should I put it—a higher standard than before.”

“But you told us all souls are born Good or Evil,” Sophie prodded, “that they can’t be changed—”

“And yet, a wise girl taught me it isn’t who you are that matters, it’s what you do. And now all of them will do Evil.” His gaze slid past her. “Just like their new queen.”

Sophie followed his sightline to the foyer’s wall murals, all featuring her and the young School Master kissing against celestial night skies. They were both in black leather, wearing jagged metal crowns, as fiery stars cast halos over their heads. In each mural, a single green letter was superimposed on their embracing bodies. Once spelling out G-O-O-D, the wall paintings now spelled … E-V-I-L.

As students kept filing past, Sophie turned full circle, soaking in her painted image on every wall: her golden hair fanned beneath a spiked queen’s crown; her lips pressed against her true love’s, a boy so smoldering, so intense, so unnerving that he’d have made Snow White, Cinderella, and Sleeping Beauty dump their princes at first sight. All her life, she’d devoured storybooks, desperate to have her own face big enough someday for the world to worship … to have an Ever After that would make girls writhe with jealousy … And now Sophie realized she’d won. She was the face of a school. The face of a generation. The face of the future. Sophie couldn’t stop an imperious grin, feeling more and more like her old self.

“For hundreds of years, Readers like you wanted to be Good because Good always wins. But our story will change all that,” said Rafal, pulling her into him. “Evil is the new Good.”

Sophie felt so safe in his arms that his words washed over her. “Evil is the new Good,” she burbled, cuddling into him … until she saw sweet, cherubic Kiko in line, sniffling back tears, an elaborate black veil over her face, as if on her way to a funeral. “But suppose they can’t be Evil?” Sophie said guiltily, pulling away.

“Every student has a choice: join Evil or die,” he snarled, simmering with hot-blooded youth. “And it is not enough to join Evil. They must excel at it.”

He was looking at the green glass staircases at the corners of the room, the banisters no longer carved with the four values of Good. Instead each staircase had a new inscription:

LEADERS

HENCHMEN

ANIMALS

PLANTS

“Third year is tracking year,” Rafal said. “We’ll house students by rankings, as they prepare to enter their new lives beyond graduation. And if that isn’t enough incentive to perform … let’s just say I do better than butterflies.”

With a swish of his finger, he brightened the glow of the chandelier and now Sophie saw the fireflies weren’t fireflies at all. Floating over the students was a cloud of black-winged fairies, armed with whippy green stingers and jaws of black shark teeth. If any Ever or Never lagged in line or glanced in Sophie’s direction, the fairies stung them with a blast of angry light, jabbing and biting them on until the last of the terrified students disappeared into the wings. As the fairies whizzed after them, Sophie caught a glimpse of their faces—hideously peeling skin, serrated stitches, and eyes cloud-white like zombies. Sophie recoiled in surprise, only to see one fairy in the group stop and peer straight at her: a boy fairy she knew with sunken cheeks and short, wispy wings.

Bane. The Good fairy she’d killed first year.

Except now Bane was right here in front of her, zombified and Evil, glowering back at his killer.

Sophie plastered against the wall, looking for somewhere to hide, but it was too late. Bane ripped towards her with a violent hiss, his knife-edged teeth gleaming—

The School Master shot him with white sparks, sending Bane sputtering out of the foyer like a popped balloon.

Cowering with relief, Sophie looked up at Rafal. “Dead f-f-fairies … undead?”

“Once upon a time, Nevers who failed at being Evil were turned into slaves for Good. Now they have a second chance to prove their love of Evil and their loyalty to me.” His eyes seared into hers. “Just like you.” He walked away, humming a soft tune. “Come, my love. There’s more to see.”

Sophie didn’t follow, her breath stoppered.

Don’t go, whispered a soft voice inside her.

Agatha’s voice.

This isn’t you, Sophie.

This isn’t real love.

Sophie felt her back sweating, the gold ring on her finger suddenly scalding hot.

He’s using you.

Light flooded through her and Sophie couldn’t breathe. She closed her eyes, the ring boiling on her skin as if about to eat through her—as if she had to destroy it right now—

“Sophie.”

Her lids opened.

“No one loves you but me,” said Rafal, his voice like a dagger. “No one will ever love you but me.”

Sophie stared into his pupils and saw her own reflection. The ring went cold on her finger. Agatha’s voice quieted inside of her.

Rafal took her by the waist and this time, Sophie didn’t resist. As he guided her ahead towards the Leaders staircase, she heard his voice echoing inside her … No one but me … echoing deeper, echoing deeper, like a pebble down a well until it settled at the bottom, an undeniable truth. Looking up at Rafal, she nestled tighter into his side, afraid to let him go—

She stopped cold.

A raven-haired boy was standing ahead, at the edge of the foyer. Tight chest and stomach muscles pressed against his black uniform shirt, and his breeches revealed smooth, chiseled calves. His dark bangs draped over his forehead and his long nose was the only feature out of proportion on his small, heart-shaped face. Sophie drew a breath, taken by his cool, erect stance, and for a moment she thought him the strange man from her dream. But he was too young, clearly a student. Only she didn’t recognize him from either school—

But then Sophie saw his eyes.

Scorching her with hate.

His beady, weaselly eyes.

“Shouldn’t you be somewhere, Hort?” the School Master said, glowering at him.

Hort’s glare slashed deeper into Sophie, honing in on her hand in Rafal’s, before he finally glanced up. “I was throwing hammers in the gym, Master,” he said, flat and hard. “Earned extra time.”

“Right. You’ve been racking up the first ranks, I hear,” said the School Master, pulling Sophie tighter and making sure Hort saw it. “Keep up the good work, Captain.”

Hort gave Sophie a last deadly look before he walked into the wings.

Sophie didn’t move, her heart thundering. First ranks? … gym? … Captain? Hort?

“Shall we?”

She looked up at Rafal, who was staring blackly at where Hort had just been.

“I don’t want you to miss your first class,” he said, slipping a small scroll of paper into her hand, before he glided up the stairs in front of her.

Sophie lagged behind, still dazed by Hort’s reappearance and the weird looks between him and Rafal—

Then her eyes bulged wide.

“My first what?”

“Class?” Sophie fluttered after the School Master, frantically scanning the parchment. “Advanced Uglification … Advanced Henchmen Training—this is a schedule! You said I was a queen! A queen doesn’t go to class—”

“A queen has responsibilities,” said Rafal, calmly stepping off the first-floor landing.

“Oh I’m sorry, did Cinderella go to class for her happy ending? Did Snow White find true love and then go do homework?” Sophie squawked. “A queen’s life should be a cornucopia of servant briefings, bodice fittings, court meetings, caviar tastings, attaché dinners, ball planning, and sea-salt massages by scantily clad boys. Not a return to plebeian students and insipid class—”

Sophie stopped short, noticing her surroundings. The entrance hallway to sea-themed Honor Tower, whose walls and ceiling once mimicked a princely blue tidal wave, now had its surging waters painted the same slime green as the fog tipping the two castles. For a moment, she was confused by the change, until she looked out a porthole window and saw Halfway Bay in the melted sunlight. For the first time in two years, there was no dividing line between the waters, no halves to the bay at all. Its entire body was the same slime green as the painted tides on the walls around her.

“One dip and it’ll rip the flesh right off your bones,” said Rafal, posed against a column. “Good deterrent against anyone who might try to swim into the school or swim … out.”

Sophie heard the warning in his voice, for she’d tried to escape through the bay each of the past two years. Clearly Rafal was still testing her new allegiance to him. Where had the crogs gone? she distracted herself, searching for the stymph-eating white crocodiles that once protected the moat. Then she glimpsed a flesh-eaten, disembodied snout floating along the bright green surface. The crogs had lasted about as long as the stymphs.

Sophie followed Rafal across the seashell floor, now artistically smattered with bloody splashes, while an old statue of a smiling, barechested merman, trident on his lap, had been rechiseled with a gnashed scowl, curled fists, and a trident poised to kill. Turning the corner, Sophie took in epic murals along the walls, once visions of Good’s most honorable victories, now flaunting different endings: a wolf biting into Red Riding Hood’s neck … a giant atop a beanstalk snapping Jack like a twig … Snow White and her dwarves facedown in blood … Captain Hook plunging his hook into Peter Pan’s heart …

Sophie knew she should be sickened by what she was seeing, but instead felt a mutinous thrill at the sight of Evil winning so defiantly, so matter-of-factly, as if Good was never supposed to win at all. How could she not take secret pleasure in the thought? Her whole life she’d tried to be Good. She’d tried to join their school where she thought she belonged. Only Good had rejected her, again and again until here she was, Queen of Evil … queen of the same school she once thought a mistake. Soaking in the last mural—Sleeping Beauty and her prince, lashed to a spinning wheel, set aflame by a black-caped witch—Sophie started to feel disoriented, as if she couldn’t remember the real endings anymore.

What if I’d learned these stories as a child? Would I have ever wanted to be Good?

Doesn’t matter, Sophie thought, breaking from her trance. “An inspired bit of redecorating, Rafal. But it still doesn’t make any of it true.”

“Says who?” he called back.

Sophie frowned at the murals. “Says the storybooks, obviously. I can paint an ending where I bask on a tropical island, serviced by well-muscled slaves. But it’s just a fantasy. All of these are fantasies. They don’t mean anything. The real endings already happened.”

Rafal turned. “And what about your kiss with Agatha? Or Agatha’s kiss with Tedros? Weren’t those real endings too? And yet here we are, back in your story, as if those endings never happened. Endings can change, my queen.”

He gazed out a window at the School for Old. “And change they must.”

Sophie could have sworn she heard a roar from deep within the Old castle, like a monster breaking out of its cage.

“The Deans are eager to meet you,” he said, heading towards the rear staircase. “They’ll take you to your class.”

Sophie didn’t move, hands on hips. “You said it yourself. Agatha and Tedros are on their way to kill you. I can’t be in class! I have to protect you … I’ll fight with you—”

“And who do you think will be your army against Agatha and Tedros, if not your class?” he said, not looking back.

“What? No one at this school even likes me—they’ll never listen to me—”

“On the contrary, they have to listen to you,” Rafal said, fading up the stairs.

Standing alone in the hallway, Sophie watched his shadow spiral up the banister. She groaned, glancing quickly at her schedule.

Sophie snorted, confused. “There’s a mistake on here—has my name for—”

“Your class.”

Your class.

No.

Not possible.

Sophie dropped the schedule like a stone.

“I’m a teacher?”