“THE BALL!” Hester screeched. “HOW DO YOU EVEN KNOW ABOUT THE BALL?”
“A villain at a Ball?” said Dot.
“A villain waltzing!” said Anadil.
“A villain curtsying!” said Hester, and all three collapsed into howls.
“I’m going to that Ball,” Sophie fumed.
“Presenting the Witch of Woods Beyond!” Hester cackled through tears.
By lunch, she wasn’t laughing.
First, Sophie was twenty minutes late to class after trying to find a solution to her jagged hair. She disguised it with berets, bows, combs before settling on a daisy wreath.
“Not hideous,” she sighed before she walked into Uglification and saw students’ hair turned gray from bat wing potions. A “1” suddenly exploded over her head.
“Hideous!” Professor Manley beamed, ogling her hair. “Your greatest beauty. Gone.”
Sophie sobbed as she left class, but then heard Hester scream. In the hall, Albemarle, a studious, spectacled woodpecker, was chipping Sophie’s name just below hers on the Evil rankings board.
“One little love spell, Hester,” Sophie reminded sweetly. “And then I’m gone forever.”
Hester stomped away, reminding herself that Nevers kissing Evers couldn’t be encouraged no matter how extreme the circumstances.
At the start of Curses, Lady Lesso swept into the ice chamber, jaw tighter than usual.
“Impossible to find good torturers these days,” she muttered.
“What is she talking about?” Sophie whispered to Dot.
“Beast went missing!” Dot whispered back.
Behind her, Sophie looked nauseous.
Testing the class on Nemesis Dreams, Lady Lesso seethed and sniped at every wrong answer.
“But I thought a Nemesis Dream meant you’ll be a Lead Villain,” Hester said—
“No, you imbecile! Only if you have symptoms! A Nemesis Dream is nothing without symptoms!” Lady Lesso retorted. “Dot, what do you taste in your mouth during your first Nemesis Dream?”
“What you ate before bed?”
“Blood, you idiot!” Lady Lesso dragged nails across the ice wall. “Oh, what I’d give to see a real villain in this school. A real villain who could make Good weep instead of these dung fleas.”
When it came to her turn, Sophie expected the worst abuse, only to have Lady Lesso give her a wart for a surely incorrect answer and caress her shorn hair as she passed.
“Why is she being nice to you?” Hester hissed behind her.
Sophie had the same question, but turned around with a smile. “Because I’m future Class Captain. As long as I stay here, that is.”
Hester looked like she might break Sophie’s neck. “Love spells are junk villainy. They don’t work.”
“I’m sure you’ll find one that does,” Sophie said.
“I’m warning you, Sophie. This will end badly.”
“Hmm … What about petunias in every room?” Sophie mused. “I think it’ll be my first proposal as Class Captain.”
That night Hester wrote to her relatives for love spells.
“It’s contagious,” Agatha moaned as Evergirls bounded around the Clearing showing each other their invitations, each snowflake a different shape. Nearby Tedros shot marbles and ignored them entirely. “Every challenge had to do with Ball beauty, Ball etiquette, Ball entrances, Ball history—”
Sophie wasn’t listening. Pail of pig’s feet in hand, she gazed longingly at the Evergirls.
“No,” Agatha said.
“But what if he asks me?”
“Sophie, he needs to kiss you now! Not take you to some stupid Ball!”
“Oh, Agatha, don’t you know your fairy tales? If he takes me to the Ball, then he’ll kiss me! Like Cinderella at midnight! Kisses always happen at the Ball! And by then my hair will have grown and I’ll have fixed my shoes and—oh no, the gown! Can you steal some charmeuse from one of the girls? Some crepe de chine too. And tulle! Mountains of tulle! Preferably in pink, but I can always dye it, though tulle never looks quite right dyed. Perhaps we should go with chiffon, then. Much more manageable.”
Agatha blinked, speechless.
“You’re right, I should ask him first,” Sophie said, leaping up. “No frowns, darling. It’ll be easy as pie. You’ll see! Princess Sophie at a Ball!”
“What are you—YOU’LL RUIN EVERYTHI—”
But Sophie had already flounced to the Evers’ side, plopped next to Tedros, and held out her pail.
“Hello, handsome. Want some of my … feet?”
Tedros misfired his marble into Chaddick’s eye. The entire Clearing went silent.
He turned to her. “Your girlfriend’s calling.”
Sophie followed his eyes to Agatha, waving her off.
“She’s just upset,” Sophie sighed. “You were right, Tedros. She and I are too close. That’s why I left in the middle of class yesterday. To tell her it’s time I make Good friends now.”
“Dot said you left because you were sick.”
Sophie coughed. “Oh, well, I had a bit of a cold—”
“She said it was diarrhea.”
“Diarr—” Sophie swallowed. “You know Dot. Always making things up.”
“She doesn’t seem like a liar to me.”
“Oh, she’s always lying. Just to get attention. Since she’s, you know …”
Tedros raised his eyebrows. “Since she’s …”
“Fat.”
“I see.” Tedros lined up his marble. “Funny, isn’t it? She crawled into empty graves to eat enough worms for the two of you, just so you wouldn’t fail. Said you’re her best friend.”
“Did she?” Sophie saw Dot waving at her. “How depressing.” She turned to Tedros, who was preparing to shoot. “Do you remember when we first met, Tedros? It was in the Blue Forest. Nothing that happened after matters, not you punching me or calling me a Never or you landing in poo. What matters is what you felt at first sight. You wanted to rescue
