A Crystal of Time (The School for Good and Evil The Camelot Years #2) - Soman Chainani Page 0,76

she dove back under his tongue. With a last surge, Castor threw himself forward, sliding onto the roof, and a moment later, he was on his feet again, weaving through the hedge sculptures of Merlin’s Menagerie, as Priyanka and Bossam yanked the arrow out of his rump.

Agatha could feel Castor’s heartbeat in his throat as she and Dot lit their fingerglows and magically erased the blood he was dripping, so it wouldn’t leave a trail. It would take Kei another minute to make it to the roof, but Castor’s pace was slowing, his leg limping as he hustled past hedge scenes of King Arthur crowned . . . Arthur and Guinevere married . . . their son’s birth . . . until he turned a corner to the final one: the Lady of the Lake rising from a pond to bestow Excalibur on the king. Agatha knew the sculpture well: not just because of her own history with the Lady and the sword, but because the pond was a secret portal to Halfway Bridge. A portal she’d used often in her time at school. Now, as Castor lumbered towards it, Agatha glimpsed Yuba and Beatrix on the shore of the pond, frantically herding a few last first years into the water’s portal. The students vanished beneath the surface in a blast of white light, before the gnome and fourth year jumped in themselves.

Agatha heard the door to the rooftop slam open behind the hedge . . . the rush of Kei’s bootsteps . . .

But Castor was already in midair, flopping towards the water, its portal gleaming with magic—

Rhian’s captain turned the corner a few seconds later.

With his sword, Kei probed at a boy’s blue tie caught on a hedge, a girl’s pink slipper under a bush, a spot of blood on the stone floor. His narrow eyes scanned the horizon . . . the moonlit hedges . . . the rippling pond . . . But there were no signs of life, except the shadow of a cloud moving across Halfway Bridge.

If only he’d looked closer at that shadow, he would have found what he was looking for—

A dog hobbling into the School for Evil, the last of his tail slithering into the castle like a snake.

“YOU CAN PUT us down now,” said Agatha.

“Not until we get there,” Castor garbled, girls in his mouth.

He clamped his teeth harder on her and Dot and clutched the first years tighter as he limped through the School for Evil, still leaking blood.

“You’re as stubborn as your brother,” Agatha sighed.

“My brother is a prat,” said Castor, pulling the girls out and fixing them with a stare. “First Dovey fires him. Then he goes to Camelot and Tedros fires him. I wrote him telling him to come here to Evil. That we could rejoin heads and work together. Never heard from him again. Probably working for Rhian now. Sucks up to whoever will have him, my brother. Doesn’t realize I’m the only one who will always be there.”

There was a sadness in Castor’s voice that surprised Agatha. Castor and Pollux may have tried to kill each other at times, but Castor loved his brother to the end. Who knew that she and a dog could have so much in common, Agatha thought wryly. Her relationship with Sophie wasn’t so different.

“Poor thing,” Dot said, turning a passing roach to chocolate.

For a moment, Agatha thought Dot was talking about Castor . . . then saw her watching Bossam, who had fainted in the dog’s paw, as if the stress of the chase had been too much for him.

Meanwhile, Priyanka was staring wide-eyed at her new surroundings.

“If I’d known Evil would be like this, I wouldn’t have been so Good,” Priyanka marveled.

“You should see my room,” said Bossam, stirring.

“No, thanks,” said Priyanka curtly.

Castor snorted.

Indeed, this was Agatha’s first look inside Dean Sophie’s School for Evil: its black onyx floors, chandeliers with S-shaped crystals, walls of violet vines, bouquets of black roses, and floating lanterns that flooded the foyer with purple light. Black marble columns broadcasted magical replays from Sophie’s fairy tale—Sophie winning the Circus of Talents, Sophie fighting the Trial by Tale as a boy, Sophie destroying the School Master’s ring—while the floor tiles lit up bright purple as Castor stepped on them, with Sophie appearing in each one in different high-fashion ensembles, posing, giggling, blowing bubbles as if the entire castle was an advertisement for herself. The walls of the foyer, meanwhile, had been repainted with