from the example of Princess Muguruza, who married a commoner, nearly prompting a revolt, until she revealed her bridal gown, made entirely out of pink pearls she’d dredged from the Savage Sea. No one dared attack a girl who’d braved such treacherous waters and in time, every last dissenter forgave her. …”
Agatha glazed over, her head drooping into the purple sheet. She tried to force herself awake, prying her eyes open—
That’s when she saw the pattern stitched on the fabric.
Tiny, silver five-pointed stars in a purple night sky, like they’d been drawn by a child.
It wasn’t a sheet at all.
It was a cape.
Agatha held in a smile, her eyes on Pollux’s back. She put her nose to the purple velvet and inhaled the scent of fresh cocoa, as if someone was brewing it right now. …
“Then there was Princess Mahalaxmi, whose father kidnapped her during the ceremony and sold her to a Never warlord in Ravenbow,” Pollux rattled. “Which goes to show all family entanglements should be sorted before the wedding. …”
Agatha rose from her chair, careful not to make a sound, and slipped her palms into the cape, vanishing her hands like a magic trick … then her arms … then her shoulders. …
“I don’t hear your pen, Agatha. This is for your own good,” Pollux tutted—
But by the time he turned, all that remained of his student was a single clump, somehow left behind.
The moment Agatha put her face through the cape, she felt herself swaddled in velvet, then plummeting through darkness, pulses of blinding white light streaking by. She closed her eyes and let herself free-fall, her arms raised, her one-shoed feet splayed, her mind untethering from her thoughts, her fears … until at last she crashed face-first into something fluffy and soft and tasted sweet cloud in her mouth.
Agatha opened her eyes and craned up to a purple night sky lit by thousands of silvery five-pointed stars, as if the childish pattern on the cape in the Library had come to life in heavenly dimension.
“The Celestium,” Tedros once called it. The place where wizards go to think.
Agatha rose to her knees and saw there was indeed a wizard peering thinkingly at her, sitting cross-legged on the cloud with purple silk robes, a droopy cone hat, horn-rimmed spectacles, and soft-furred violet slippers.
“Merlin,” she smiled.
“Sorry to interrupt your lessons, dear girl, but I’m afraid we have more important ones at the moment,” the old wizard said, sipping at a mug of cream-topped cocoa. “First, tell me: Do you want whipped cream in your chocolate? Provided my hat complies. A third mug of cocoa might be too much to ask. He’s been rather insubordinate of late, insisting on a minimum wage and a month of paid vacation—”
“A ‘third’?” asked Agatha, confused. “But there’s only you and me here.”
“Goodness, you two really do have a hard time seeing eye to eye, don’t you?” Merlin murmured.
He leaned back, revealing a boy sitting next to him, who’d been obscured by the wizard’s profile.
Tedros didn’t look at Agatha. He held his own undrunk mug of chocolate, heaped with cream and rainbow sprinkles, his bare legs dangling off the cloud. He wore a sleeveless white undershirt and pajama shorts, his gold king’s crown sunken into his wet hair.
“Agatha and I have work to do, Merlin. Not that you would know since you’ve been gone for half a year, but we’re in charge of a kingdom now,” Tedros said, dumping his steaming mug over the cloud. “Our coffers are empty. We have no knights. Mother and Lance are missing. There’s unrest all over the Woods. We don’t have time for a wizard’s games.”
“You used to share your chocolate with Agatha. Now you’re wasting it,” Merlin upbraided him.
“I didn’t ask for chocolate,” said Tedros, yanking his crown tighter. “I’m too old to be bribed with sweets.”
“But not too old to let your dear princess go hungry?” Merlin asked.
“I’m stuffed from dinner,” said Agatha, trying to play both sides.
“Where’s the girl’s cocoa!” the wizard bellowed into his hat.
“You can’t keep me here all night,” Tedros scorned. “Air’s too thin in the Celestium.”
“I can keep you here until you’re as white-haired as me. I’ll just turn you into a goldfish and put you in a bowl. Agatha can feed you,” said Merlin, giving his hat a good shake. “That is if she doesn’t dump your food off a cloud.”
The hat spat chocolate at Merlin, who promptly sat on the hat in return. “Now let’s begin,” the wizard harrumphed.
“Begin what?” asked Agatha.
“We don’t need this, Merlin,” Tedros hounded.
“Need what?” asked Agatha.
“You need this more than your obsessive workouts and overdeveloped stomach muscles,” said Merlin, sitting harder on his squirming hat.
“You don’t know anything about me anymore,” Tedros snapped. “You disappeared when I needed you like you always do, haven’t sent so much as a postcard in six months, and then drop in acting like you can help me when you don’t have the faintest clue. Just go back to whatever hole you were hiding in.”
“Because you were doing such a fine job as king without me,” said the wizard.
Tedros snarled. “My father was right to banish you from the castle.”
“Well, you’re certainly seeming more and more like him each day,” said Merlin.
“Stop it! You’re like squabbling hens, the both of you!” Agatha yelled, echoing into the night. “What is this? What are we doing? Why are we here!”
The two men gaped at her sheepishly.
But it was the hat that spoke from beneath Merlin’s rump, scowling at them all—
“Couples therapy!”
Somewhere inside, Tedros knew this would happen. He couldn’t continue the way he’d been going, treating Agatha like a distant cousin while wrestling his own demons down down down into
