One True King

by Soman Chainani

  Bethna stood up. “When King Rhian gets here, he will correct your error.”

  “My spy tells me Rhian seeks access to Vault 41,” said the woodpecker, feathers puffing. “A vault that belongs to the Four Point kingdoms. Rhian may be planning to enter Vault 41, but I have plans to stop him. It doesn’t matter if those in Putsi and elsewhere slave to Rhian’s word. I am master of these safes. I decide who enters.” Albemarle stood tall against the steel vault. “Because only my touch can unlock them.”

  The door to the office flew open.

  “Good to know,” said a voice.

  Gilded scims ripped across the desk, impaling Albemarle’s body.

  Sophie’s butterfly lunged into the corner, barely eluding Japeth’s boot as the Snake swept into the bank manager’s office, followed by Kei.

  The scims returned to Japeth’s blue-and-gold suit as he kneeled down and plucked a feather from the woodpecker’s corpse. Sickened, Sophie turned away, before she peeked back to see the Snake approach the steel door behind the desk and slide the feather into the lock.

  The door creaked open.

  “I hear Sophie’s been in this bank,” said Japeth.

  He glanced at Kei and Bethna, then at Albemarle’s dead body.

  “Make it look like she did this,” the Snake ordered.

  He entered the vaults, the door closing behind him. Snapping to her wits, Sophie followed, whizzing through the shrinking gap in the steel, her wings shivering at the sudden draft. She glanced back at Kei overturning furniture, Bethna scrawling messages on the walls—“LONG LIVE TEDROS!” “THE WITCH IS BACK”—as Albemarle’s blood stained the floor . . .

  That’s when Sophie caught Kei watching her through the last sliver of closing door, the captain tracking her butterfly with wide eyes, before the darkness sealed him off and locked her inside with the enemy.

  AMBUSH IN THE dark.

  That’s how she would do it, Sophie thought, shadowing the Snake.

  She had the beast cornered.

  It would be easy.

  And yet, her wings were shaking.

  She couldn’t remember ever being alone with the Snake. Someone had always been there between them: Agatha, Tedros, Hort . . . Rhian. But now, in the dark, she listened to his boots against stone, harsh and clipped, clack, clack, clack, the same rhythm he disposed of his enemies. Without pause. Without compunction.

  Sophie had to punish him the same way. No hesitation. No mercy. The faster she did it, the sooner it would be over. The Woods spared. The story fixed.

  Evil attacks. Good defends.

  The first rule of fairy tales.

  Not this time.

  No one would see this attack as Evil.

  It would be an act of Good.

  A death well-earned.

  But there were obstacles.

  She was an insect, first off. A butterfly in a snake pit wouldn’t last long. Try reverting to human and he’d hear her instantly, his scims shredding through her the way they had the woodpecker. Plus, it was dark, pitch-dark, to the point Sophie couldn’t even see the walls or the floor or ceiling, as if she and her nemesis were floating in a starless sky. Add in the Snake’s scims and magical talents and the fact he’d murdered men bigger than her—Chaddick, Lancelot, the Sheriff, his own brother—and Sophie’s chances didn’t look good, no matter how skillfully she ambushed him. Even if she did manage to defeat him, she’d be trapped in this vault with no one to let her out but a bank full of enemies who’d been duped into thinking she just killed their manager.

  So for now, Sophie trailed behind Japeth, keeping her distance in the seemingly endless chamber, tracing his frosty scent and the contours of his body.

  Then he stopped cold.

  Scims curled their heads off his suit like cobras.

  “The Witch of Woods Beyond,” he cooed. “The Empress claimed she’d had you killed, but I sensed her hesitation. Knew full well that you wouldn’t die so easily. Not the Sophie I know. Not my queen. In fact, I debated going back to Camelot once you’d escaped. To find you. To punish you. But, in the end, I knew you’d come to me.”

  His eyes scanned the darkness, like gems in a cave. Sophie’s butterfly drifted away from his gaze.

  So much for an ambush, Sophie thought.

  “Your school magic won’t protect you for long, you know.” His suit of scims turned black, vanishing him into the dark. “Girls have a stink that can’t scrub off. Aric had a good way of describing it. Like a rose gone to rot. I can smell it anywhere. But you . . . I’m afraid you reek of it worst of all.”

  Sophie’s wings grazed a wall: the slightest brush against stone—

  Eels shot off Japeth’s suit, spearing in her direction. Sophie plunged to the ground, barely dodging them. The scims probed the bricks around her, slimy heads inches above her wings. The Snake’s glowing eyes roved down, about to find her . . .

  Sophie skidded forward on her tiny thorax. More eels shot off Japeth, following her sound. Sophie dove between scims, the rush of their flight blowing her into a soot-filled corner. She raised her antennae: everywhere she looked, scims hung in the air, inky black ribbons, hunting the darkness for her. Silently, she submerged in soot, blackening her wings, soaking in stale, thick-smelling dust.

  Japeth didn’t move.

  She could hear him sniffing the air.

  He waited a moment longer, as if doubting himself.

  Why doesn’t he light his glow? He’d see me in a second, Sophie thought. Rhian had a fingerglow . . . which means Japeth should have one too . . .

  Unless Japeth doesn’t have one, she realized.

  But why would his brother have a student’s glow and not him?

  Japeth cursed under his breath. “Clever girl. Must have gone before we came and left her stink behind,” he snarled, his scims melding back into him. Then he tensed visibly. “The vault . . . if she got there first . . .” He was already pacing ahead. Sophie could see his hand rustling against his suit, pulling something from inside . . . a furry lump . . . moving in the dark . . .

  Whatever it was, it was alive.

  Sophie floated closer to get a better look. Japeth’s scim-gloved hands glinted in shadow, caressing the furry form, before he released it into midair.

  The creature lit up, electric blue, phosphorescing in the dark, like the Blue Forest at midnight.

  Neon glow flooded the chamber, the creature brighter than a torch in a mine, revealing rows of vault doors ahead. Sophie camouflaged herself against the wall, studying the flying rodent made of spotted fur, its body shaped like a . . . key.

  The same key the Queen of Jaunt Jolie had slipped Japeth before he’d left for Putsi. The key he said he needed to win Arthur’s first test.

  Vault 41. It belongs to the Four Point kingdoms, Sophie remembered. And Jaunt Jolie is one of them. So the queen’s key will open it . . . The answer to the test must be inside.

  Pieces of memory returned: a scroll fallen from the sky . . . a Green Knight come to Camelot . . . something he wanted from Arthur . . . hidden where “wizard trees grow . . .”

  The key peered down the corridor, assessing its surroundings. The top of the key was the creature’s head, with a big fish eye on each side instead of a hole. The shaft was its snout, ridged with teeth, and the tip the opening to its mouth.

  It turned back to the Snake, blinking at its new master.

  “Bhanu Bhanu,” it gibbered.

  Then it flew down the hall, spotlighting gilded numbers on black doors, left and right, the numbers completely out of order . . . 28 . . . 162 . . . 43 . . . 9 . . . 210 . . . before it turned a corner and vanished.

  “Bhanu Bhanu,” the key echoed, like a homing signal to track it.

  Japeth followed the key’s calls, with Sophie flitting behind at a safe distance, dripping soot and trying not to cough.

  She wanted to kill him.

  She wanted to turn human and rip every scim off his body.

  And yet . . .

  What would
Aggie do? Sophie mulled, thinking of her best friend, somewhere in the Woods. A best friend she’d just tried to kill at the wedding to Japeth. Sophie remembered the horror in Agatha’s eyes, seeing Sophie under the Snake’s control, manipulated into hurting those she loved. But now Sophie was free. She’d come this far. Agatha would be proud. What would she tell me to do?

  Follow him, she’d say.

  Follow the bastard to Vault 41.

  Let him find the answer to the first test.

  Then steal it from him.

  Whatever was in that vault, Sophie had to get it first.

  “Bhanu Bhanu,” the key blipped.

  Butterfly hunted Snake now, her tiny chest beating with the power of two hearts. Right and left she flew, around bends, whisking between vaults—“Bhanu Bhanu,” “Bhanu Bhanu”—deep into the bowels of the bank, before finally catching up with the key, stopped in front of a door, a vault number gleaming in blue glow.

  41

  The key stabbed into the lock and yanked the door open, before zipping upwards, gluing to the ceiling, and illuminating the inside of the vault like a skylight.

  Japeth swung into the chamber, Sophie’s butterfly hot on his heels. Hiding behind the open door, she poked her head over hinges.

  Her bug eyes bulged.

  Inside the modest room, four copper walls reflected the contents of Vault 41.

  There was no gold, no jewels, no treasures.

  Instead, there was a tree.

  It was a white birch, rooted in the stone floor, with four spindly branches and a broad trunk, slashed with black patches. From each branch hung a small white box, like a Christmas ornament, carved with Camelot’s seal.

  Japeth grazed his fingers across one of these boxes, looking for an opening . . .

  A powdery substance chafed off it, as if the box was made of dust.

  “I’d be careful if I was you,” said a low, smooth voice. “Human ashes are more delicate than you think.”

  Japeth pulled his hand away. Sophie gawked at the four boxes, dangling from the tree.

  Human ashes?

  “And one more thing,” said the voice.

  Suddenly, Japeth’s magical suit curdled, his army of scims crumbling to the floor, like a gameboard upended. The Snake was laid bare, save a strip around his waist.

  “No magic in the vaults,” the voice finished.

  It was the tree speaking, Sophie realized, its eyes and mouth formed out of the dark slashes in its bark.

  “Beyond the door, you may recover your powers, whatever they may be,” said the tree to the Snake.

  Quickly Sophie drew back, her wings dangerously close to crossing the plane of the door. One more inch and she would have reverted to human, with nowhere to hide.

  The tree continued addressing the Snake. “If you’ve come this far, you must know this vault safeguards the ashes of Sir Kay. Or more officially, Sir Japeth Kay of Camelot, son of Sir Ector of Camelot and foster brother to King Arthur. It was Kay’s will to be cremated and Arthur’s will to protect his once-brother’s ashes, entrusting them to the Four Point leaders, who maintain this vault. None of them know that Sir Kay was the Green Knight. No one knows the truth of what happened between Arthur and his brother. But you do. You have learned what the Green Knight came to Camelot to obtain. This is what Arthur wanted his heir to know. The story behind Sir Kay’s death. The wish that led to it. Because knowledge is the first step to true power. Except the test is not yet passed. Not until you find the answer you’ve come here for.”

  The tree bent its trunk towards the Snake. “Yet which bough holds this answer? Four safeboxes . . . but you only get one choice. The true heir of Arthur will feel in his blood where the answer lies. Choose the right box and its contents are yours. Choose the wrong one and . . .”

  From the walls, a hundred steel spikes crashed in, slicing towards the Snake’s pale body from every direction, stopping only a hair’s width short.

  The tree stared hard at Japeth. “Choose wisely.”

  Without a sound, the spikes retracted into the walls.

  Sophie watched as Japeth moved across the four boxes, his cold blue eyes inspecting each one. That they were made of human ashes didn’t faze him in the slightest, nor did the chill in the vault, his lean torso hunched forward as he moved between boughs.

  What is he looking for? Sophie thought. What did the Green Knight want?

  It didn’t matter.

  Whatever it was, she couldn’t let Japeth have it.

  Assuming he chose the right box, that is.

  If he didn’t, well . . . problem solved.

  At the moment, the latter seemed more likely. The Snake seemed no closer to choosing a box, the four casings of ash identical in every way—

  Except then he paused.

  The second box.

  Something about it stopped him.

  The Snake drew closer, his nose to the ashes.

  Now Sophie spotted it: the subtle green glow pulsing at its center each time Japeth drew close.

  “Oh, that is unexpected,” said the tree smoothly. “It’s not Arthur’s soul you’re kin to . . . it’s the Green Knight’s . . .”

  Japeth’s long fingers curled around the box, ashes crumbling off it, the green glow throbbing harder, brighter . . .

  The tree searched the Snake’s eyes. “Most unexpected. So who are you?”

  Japeth crushed the box, ashes spewing into the air.

  The other three boxes magically combusted too, clouding the vault with dust.

  Left hanging on the Snake’s branch was a lock of white hair, curled inside a glowing, clear-coated pearl the size of a coin.

  The tree seemed to frown. “You’ve chosen correctly. Merlin’s beard is yours,” it spoke. “Swallow the pearl to finish the first test. Only then can you learn the second.”

  Japeth grinned, the hard steel of his gaze returned, any doubts about the outcome of the tournament quelled. He reached up to claim the pearl—

  CRACK!

  The Snake whirled to see the vault door rip off its hinges and crash into the room. He leapt out of its way, almost crushed by the heavy slab. Startled, he lunged towards the hall—

  No one there.

  The Snake went back to the tree—

  Merlin’s beard was gone.

  The pearl missing.

  The tree wearing a vague smile.

  Japeth gaped for a moment, as if he must be seeing wrong.

  That’s when he caught it.

  In the vault’s copper walls.

  The distorted reflection of a girl’s bare skin.

  He whirled around.

  Sophie was backing out of the vault, Evelyn Sader’s white dress magically re-forming on her body.

  Merlin’s pearl was in her hand.

  Witch and Snake watched each other across the threshold.

  Sophie eyed his undressed body.

  “The emperor really has no clothes,” she said.

  Scims flew onto the Snake the moment he crossed the door, eels rocketing off his suit for her—

  But Sophie was already ahead, running deeper into the vaults, taking any turn she could, hearing the eels whizzing behind her. She knew there had to be an end to this maze as she swerved around corners, losing more and more scims, until the thrum of the pack became a softer buzz, then a lonely squeal, a single eel left, until she was chased only by silence and the choked sounds of her breath. She clutched the pearl with the beard tighter, slippery in her palm. She’d hide here until she could escape and find Agatha. She’d bunker for days, weeks, whatever it took. She had Tedros’ salvation in her hand. She’d won the opening test for him. She’d outwitted the enemy. As long as she was the one with Merlin’s beard, the prince was ahead in the race. All she had to do was wait. Relief hit her hard—

  So hard she didn’t see it coming.

  The single, sharp blow to the back of her head.

  She gasped, more at the irony than the pain.

  Ambushed in the
dark.

  A witch dead instead of a Snake, falling, falling, gone before she ever hit the ground.

  12

  SOPHIE

  Back to the Beginning

  When you’re sure you’ve died, it’s strange to wake up.

  Especially to the sound of two boys who are very clearly in love.

  “Look, Willam, she’s got it. She’s got Merlin’s beard!”

  “Shouldn’t have hit her that hard, Bogden. She’s a girl!”

  “My sisters beat me up all the time. You’re the one who told me to stop her—”

  “I meant call her name, like a civilized person.”

  “Snake would have heard us!”

  “Do you clods ever shut up?” growled a third voice, deep and gravelly, as Sophie felt rough fingers pry apart her eyelids. “Pupils dilated . . . nostrils flared . . . Just a bit of shock. It’s how I wake up after a good night at the Arrow. Or used to, at least.”

  Sophie’s eyes flickered open to a ruddy, handsome face, floppy red-brown curls dangling over his brow.

  “R-R-Robin?” she sputtered.

  “Nice hair,” Robin Hood cracked, glancing at her bright red bob. “So inconspicuous. A wonder no one noticed you.”

  Sophie sat up to a dark vault, the faces of Willam, Bogden, and Robin lit by the weak glow of Merlin’s pearl. She could feel a lump rising off her skull, pain pulsing behind her eyes. More disconcerting, the floor was moving. Sophie looked down at a mass of gold coins shifting beneath them like cold, hard sand.

  “Where are we?” Sophie breathed. “H-h-how are you here?”

  “Remember when Reaper gave us our missions in Gnomeland?” Willam started. “Bogden and I were supposed to keep our eye on Camelot—”

  “Then that shady Mistral Sister leaves the castle, so we tailed her to Putsi,” Bogden finished. “Plus, Willam is obsessed with geese.”

  “I fed a duck at Camelot once and now I’m obsessed with geese—”

  “You should be happy I care enough to pay attention, Willam. Can’t say you do the same for me.”