The Lady's Secret (School for Good and Evil)

A Royal Wedding

The two eyes blinked at her. Sophie slowly looked back to Agatha, but she didn't seem to hear, as Pospisil the priest had started talking already.

"Welcome to all of you, who have come to share in this important moment in the lives of the bride and groom. I ask you to join together in celebrating, acknowledging, and honoring this day and the vows that they will be making." Pospisil went on, but Sophie had already tuned him out. Her heart had stopped, but also seemed to be racing at the same time. She felt her hands go clammy around her bouquet of flowers.

She looked to the witches, who were staring right at her, Anadil's red eyes seemed to pierce through her soul. Sophie stood up straighter and gave her a look.

Anadil glanced at her with confusion, until Sophie mouthed the one word nobody wanted to hear.

Snake.

Though it was impossible, Anadil went a shade paler. She leaned over to Hester and whispered something. The tattooed witch went stiff and gave Sophie a look of pure hatred. She had figured out that Sophie brought him back.

Pospisil kept talking. "Love is something that helps you truly respect and appreciate one another. You stand together, your hearts as one."

Hort looked at her from behind Tedros. He gazed lovingly, taking in these words with his entire soul, before he frowned slightly and saw that Sophie had gone pale. He read her expression with horror, and he too faded, colorless.

Pospisil started again, "Does anybody reject this proposal between these two people-"

"I object," A slithery, ice cold voice sneered up at the priest.

Japeth walked down the aisle towards Agatha and Tedros, fists curled, he looked different though. He still had cropped hair, but he looked almost... tan. At that moment, Sophie understood what he was doing. He had pretended to be his brother before. And he was doing it again.

"I, Rhian of Foxwood, object," he said again, looking right at Tedros. "That's right, my brother Japeth may have been evil and killed me, but the best kings always find their way back to their thrones," he repeated, sounding chivalrous like a king.

Sophie knew it was a ploy, Japeth couldn't sound chivalrous, he could only sound like a dirty, scheming snake. But this didn't stop the crowd, for they thought it was really Rhian, back from the dead.

The garden erupted into chaos, with writers and journalists yelling questions. The aisle was flooding with people out of their seats holding notepads and books, trying to interview Rhian.

Sophie, Hester, Anadil, and Hort knew the truth and gaped at each other.

The tattooed witch got up out of her seat and rushed to Sophie, grabbing her wrist and pulling her behind the stage that the new King and Queen were standing on.

"What did you do?" she hissed.

"Well, um, I-I kind of brought back the snake," she whispered so that Hester could barely hear her. "But I didn't mean to-" she was cut off by the furious witches.

"Why would you do that?" Anadil seethed.

"I thought I was bringing back Tristan, but it was Japeth pretending to be him! He split his soul in two and put part of it inside Lionsmane, and when William and Kiko put their blood on it, it transformed into Tristan, but it wasn't really him, it was Japeth!" Sophie stopped to take a breath.

Hester stared at her, thinking, then confusion spread across her face.

"What?" Anadil asked, her red eyes glinting with bewilderment.

"I don't know how I got it, but after Japeth failed the tournament of kings, I just had it."

"Had what?" the two witches asked in unison, frustration portrayed in both of their voices.

"Lionsmane, but anyway darlings-" Sophie continued.

"First of all, don't call us darlings-" Hester started.

"And second, why do you have the snake's pen?" Anadil seethed.

"I told you I don't know how I got it," Sophie defended.

"How do you not know how you got something?" Hester hounded, eyes narrowing suspiciously as Sophie.

"Stop it!" Sophie shrilled. Her face softened as she said her next words. "Please don't tell anyone. I'm going to fix it before anyone finds out. You can't say anything about this to anyone." She stared the two witches in the eyes. "Especially Agatha."

When she didn't elaborate, Hester and Anadil exchanged glances before looking back at Sophie.

Finally, the pale witch spoke up, "What were you going to do with it?"

"Destroy it of course. Why?" she asked, almost too quickly, as if she already knew what the witches were thinking.

"No reason," Ani replied back.

Sophie gasped. "You thought I was trying to bring him back on purpose!"

Anadil blinked. "Yeah, and that's the conclusion everyone is going to draw when you tell them."

"I'm not going to tell anyone," Sophie seethed. "And neither are you guys."

"Shut up," Hester hissed, pointing towards Japeth. "Look."

The three of them slowly peeked around the corner past the bride and groom, both wearing terribly frightful expressions, turning their gaze towards the Snake.

Japeth was still standing in the middle of the aisle, surrounded on all sides by reporters and starting to push through them. He shoved the last one out of the way and stormed up to Tedros.

Sophie whipped back around and jumped out of her skin when she saw Aric; he had Hester and Anadil by their throats, finger glows to each of their necks, and his hand wrapped around Hester's demon, keeping it sealed to it's master's throat. Sophie stood there with a horrified expression on her face before Aric broke the silence.

"Move even an inch, and I kill them both," he said, a sly grin growing on his face.

Hester and Anadil, though usually emotionless, were both were paralized with fear.

Sophie didn't know what to do. If she moved, the witches would die, but if she didn't Tedros and Agatha might. She decided to stay where she was, until she heard Agatha scream, and bolted for it. The last thing she saw was a glow of purple before she turned the corner.

They were going to be ok. Right? Sophie thought to herself.

They were Hester and Anadil, they would be fine, she repeated in her head. But the hollow sick feeling in her stomach told her she was wrong.