A Crystal of Time (The School for Good and Evil The Camelot Years #2) - Soman Chainani Page 0,10

a smile.

The king turned back to the crowd. “The Storian never helps you. The real people. It helps the elite. It helps those who go to that school. How can it be the voice of the Woods, then? When it divides Good from Evil, rich from poor, educated from ordinary? That’s what’s made our Woods vulnerable to attack. That’s what let a Snake slither into your kingdoms. That’s what nearly killed you all. The pen. The rot starts with that pen.”

The people murmured assent.

Rhian’s eyes roamed the crowd. “You there, Ananya of Netherwood, daughter of Sisika of Netherwood.” He pointed down at a thin, unkempt woman, stunned that the king knew her name. “For thirty years, you’ve slaved at your kingdom’s stables, waking before dawn to groom horses for Netherwood’s witch-queen. Horses you’ve loved and raised to ride in battle. Yet no pen tells your story. No one knows about what you’ve sacrificed, who you’ve loved, or what lessons you might offer—lessons more worthy than any puffed-up princess the Storian might choose.”

Ananya blushed red as those around her gave her admiring looks.

“And you there, what about you?” said Rhian, pointing at a muscular man, flanked by three teenage boys with shaved heads. “Dimitrov of Maidenvale, whose three sons applied to the School for Good and were each denied, and yet all now serve as footmen for the young princes of Maidenvale. Day after day, you work to the bone, even though deep in your hearts you know these princes are no better than you. Even though you know that you deserved an equal chance at glory. Must you too die without your stories told? Must all of you die so ignored and forgotten?”

Dimitrov’s eyes welled with tears while his sons put their arms around their father.

Hester could hear the murmurs building in the crowd, awed that someone with such great power was honoring people like them. That he was even seeing them at all.

“But what if there was a pen that told your stories?” Rhian offered. “A pen that wasn’t controlled by mysterious magic, but by a man you trust. A pen that lived in plain sight instead of locked behind school gates. A pen made for a Lion.”

He leaned forward. “The Storian doesn’t care about you. I do. The Storian didn’t save you from the Snake. I did. The Storian won’t answer to the people. I will. Because I want to glorify all of you. And so will my pen.”

“Yes! Yes!” cried the people.

“My pen will give voice to the voiceless. My pen will tell the truth. Your truth,” the king announced.

“Please! Please!”

“The reign of the Storian is over!” Rhian bellowed. “A new pen rises. A new era begins!”

On cue, Hester and the crew watched as a sliver of the Snake’s gold suit peeled off and floated over the balcony wall, out of view of the crowd. The golden strip reverted to a scaly black scim as it drifted higher into the air, still unseen. Then it descended over the mob and into sunlight towards King Rhian, magically morphing into a long, gold pen, knife-sharp at both ends.

The people gazed at it, enthralled.

“At last. A Pen for the People,” Rhian called out, as the pen hovered over his outstretched hand. “Behold . . . Lionsmane!”

The masses exploded in their most passionate cheers yet. “Lionsmane! Lionsmane!”

Rhian pointed his finger and the pen soared into the sky over Camelot’s castle and wrote in gold against the pure blue canvas like it was a blank page—

THE SNAKE IS DEAD.

A LION HAS RISEN.

THE ONE TRUE KING.

Dazzled, all citizens of the Woods, Good and Evil, kneeled before King Rhian. Dissenters from Camelot were forced to a knee by those around them.

The king raised his arms. “No more ‘once upon a time.’ The time is now. I want to hear your stories. And my men and I will seek them out, so that each day, my pen can write the real news of the Woods. Not tales of arrogant princes and witches fighting for power . . . but stories that spotlight you. Follow my pen and the Storian will no longer have a place in our world. Follow my pen and all of you will have a chance at glory!”

The whole of the Woods roared as Lionsmane ascended into the sky over Camelot, sparkling like a beacon.

“But Lionsmane alone is not enough to overcome the Storian and its legacy of lies,” Rhian continued. “The Lion in the tale of The Lion and the Snake