The Last Ever After (55 page)

“We won't know what it is until you look inside, dear,” Dovey said.

Slowly Sophie tugged at the purple ribbon and watched it slide away. Leaning over the desk, her hand curled around the edge of the white lid and pulled the box open.

Sophie choked.

“No. . . . How—how can—”

She spun to Professor Dovey, but the Good Dean was smiling at the box through tears.

“She told us, didn't she?” Clarissa whispered hopefully. “The ‘Old and the New together . . .'”

She touched Sophie's cheek. “‘Both in good hands.'”

Outside the carriage, Tedros brought his mother and Lancelot cups of tea. Leaning against a wheel, Agatha picked burrs out of Reaper's warty skin while Merlin studied his beardless face in the coach's glass window.

“After every epic journey, something must be lost,” he said, probing his newly visible chin.

“Merlin, I've been thinking,” said Agatha. “Why could I get through the shield between Gavaldon and the Woods when no one else could?”

“The shield was made to keep Evil from breaking into the Reader World, my dear,” said Merlin. “But sometimes to keep Evil from getting in, you have to let Good
out.
”

Agatha watched him, her throat tightening. “Oh Merlin . . . how I'll miss you.”

“Miss me?” said Merlin, swiveling. “You don't think I'll let that boy run a kingdom without my help, do you?”

“And here I thought I was too old for a tutor,” Tedros grinned, sidling next to Agatha.

“Not sixteen until tomorrow, boy,” piped the wizard, sizing up the young couple. “Besides, in time, you'll have a little rug rat who needs a tutor too.”

Agatha and Tedros gaped at him, both hot pink.

Merlin cleared his throat. “Perhaps we should focus on making it through your coronation first.”

“If only there was room in our coach, you could spend the whole ride to Camelot making Agatha and I uncomfortable,” Tedros quipped. “But alas, with Sophie, our carriage is full.”

Merlin looked past them, mouth curling into a smile. “Is it?”

Tedros and Agatha turned.

Sophie swept towards them, wearing Lady Lesso's majestic, sharp-shouldered purple gown.

Agatha dropped her cat.

Sophie had no makeup on, sleepless bags under her eyes, and her hair was a bit of a mess, but even so, as they faced each other in silence, Agatha had never seen her friend look so calm, so assured, so . . . beautiful.

That's when Agatha knew.

“It's what she wanted, Aggie,” Sophie rasped.

Agatha's lip quivered. “You're—you're not coming with us?”

“I'll be Dean of Evil, while Professor Dovey stays on as Dean of Good. The two of us working side by side like Lesso and Dovey once did,” said Sophie. “Together, we'll keep the Storian well guarded until a new School Master is named.”

She could see a crowd of Evers, Nevers, teachers, and heroes, old and young, gawking as word spread. (Professor Manley broke his teacup.)

Agatha couldn't speak. “But . . . but . . .”

“You wanted me to be happy, Agatha,” said Sophie. “This is where I belong. This is what I want. Teaching students like me what Evil really means.”

Agatha shook her head, tears rising. “Oh, Sophie. You'll be a wonderful Dean,” she gasped, throwing arms around her. “I'll . . . I'll just miss you.”

“You'll be an even better queen, Aggie,” Sophie promised. “You'll change their lives. Like you changed mine.”

Even Tedros looked misty-eyed now. “It's only a day's ride to Camelot, Sophie. Surely you'll come visit?”

“As much as you two will have me,” Sophie said.

Agatha hugged her tighter, her tear-stained cheek against her friend's. “I love you, Sophie. I love you more than you can know.”

“I do know, Aggie,” Sophie whispered. “Because I love you just the same.”

There the two girls stayed, holding each other, until Merlin
finally ushered Agatha and her prince inside. As the carriage rode off, Guinevere and Lancelot riding behind, Sophie waved one last goodbye to her friends. The coach trailed into the dappled Woods towards the shadows of spires, faint over the horizon, before the final wheel vanished into the trees.

Agatha and Tedros were gone.

Standing alone at the gates, Sophie let herself cry, shedding warm, cleansing tears.

It wasn't goodbye forever. Only goodbye for now.

And if ever the distance was too much to bear, she would just look inside her heart, for Agatha was already there.

“Hmm . . . Maybe
your
Prince Charming is just around the corner,” said a voice.

Sophie looked up at Hort next to her.

She took in his playful face, well-built body, and adoring grin . . .

“I'm afraid I've already found my Ever After, Hort,” said Sophie.

“What? With
who
?” Hort asked, aghast—

“On my own,” she said, her voice sure and clear. “I'm happy on my own.”

And for the first time, she knew it was true.

As Hort fumbled for words, the bells rang over both schools, summoning the students to their castles. Whispering Nevers gave their new Dean gobsmacked looks as they herded towards the north gates. (“What were you saying about missing her?” Dot ribbed Hester and Anadil, both deathly pale.)

Sophie took a deep breath and hustled after them. “First
things first, Evil needs a new look. Enough with black and doom and gloom, when we should be celebrating our edge, our uniqueness,” she said thoughtfully. “We'll have to weed out underperforming teachers, of course, and encourage Nevers to find their Nemesis within. That's how we'll find the best talents for the Circus . . . and a Ball! Let the winning school in the Trial host the Snow Ball. . . . Oh, that'll cook Good's goose, won't it—”

“Sophie!” Hort said, chasing her.

“Mmmm?”

“You aren't jealous that Agatha gets a boy and a crown and a kingdom and everything else?” Hort pressed in disbelief. “You aren't jealous that Agatha's a
queen
?”

He saw her stop at the gates, faced away as students streamed past.

“A tiny bit, of course,” she said softly. “But then I remember . . .”

Sophie looked back, smiling bright as a diamond.

“I'm
me.
”

Photo by David J. Martin

SOMAN CHAINANI
's first two novels,
The School for Good and Evil
and
The School for Good and Evil: A World Without Princes,
debuted on the
New York Times
bestseller list. The series has been translated into languages across six continents and will soon be a major motion picture from Universal Pictures.

As a graduate of Harvard University and Columbia University's MFA Film Program, Soman has made films that have played at over 150 festivals around the world, and his writing awards include honors from Big Bear Lake, New Draft, the CAPE Foundation, the Shasha Grant, and the Sun Valley Writers' Fellowship.

When he's not telling stories, Soman is a die-hard tennis player who never lost a first-round match for ten years . . . until he started writing
The School for Good and Evil
. Now he loses all the time.

You can visit Soman at
www.somanchainani.net
.

www.schoolforgoodandevil.com

Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
hc.com
.

Cover art © 2015 by Iacopo Bruno

THE SCHOOL FOR GOOD AND EVIL: THE LAST EVER AFTER
. Text copyright © 2015 by Soman Chainani. Illustrations copyright © 2015 by Iacopo Bruno. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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