Beyond the darkness, Lizzie’s voice was saying, “She doesn’t need a kiss to wake her up. Get out of the way!” Then she said, “Duchess? Can you hear me?”
Someone was gently shaking her.
When Duchess opened her eyes, the first thing she realized was that she was human again. Then she realized that Lizzie was okay, because Lizzie’s smiling face was looking down at her.
Duchess turned her head to the right, then the left. She was lying on the ground near the troll bridge. Mrs. Her Majesty the White Queen, Daring Charming, Raven, and the rest of the princesses had all gathered around. No one was glaring or booing.
“You saved me,” Lizzie said. She started to kneel next to Duchess. Daring whipped off his letterman’s jacket and placed it beneath Lizzie’s knees.
“And I saved you from the mud,” he announced with a flourish of his hand. “No need to thank me. Just doing my duty.”
The mud was cold beneath Duchess’s head, but Daring didn’t bother offering her a jacket. Not even a sock. Even though she now realized that he wasn’t one hundred percent perfect—because no one was, and that included herself—she still thought he was drop-dead gorgeous.
“I’d be as flat as a card if you hadn’t swooped in and grabbed me,” Lizzie said. “Thank you.” She gave Duchess a hug.
Lizzie hugged her! Did this mean they were friends again?
Then Raven knelt beside her. “That was amazing. But I don’t think the princes are very happy that you out-rescued them.” Indeed, Daring and the members of the Emergency Prince Patrol were looking a bit red-faced. None of them made eye contact with Duchess.
A bell sounded in the distance, marking the end of the school day. Everyone turned to face the grandstand, where Mr. Badwolf stood, holding a megaphone. “It is time to announce the official grades for the General Villainy thronework,” his voice boomed.
“And the winner of the Next Top Villain,” Blondie hollered.
Lizzie and Raven helped Duchess to her feet. Her backside was coated in mud, but she didn’t care. This was it. The moment she’d waited for.
Mr. Badwolf wiped spit from the corners of his mouth. “After reviewing the disappointing thronework from each of my students, I had decided that Ms. Swan’s acts of sabotage and double-crossing were worthy of an A grade.”
Duchess smiled.
“But that has all changed.” He snarled, revealing his canines. “Any villainy she practiced was erased by the fact that she rescued a princess. A villain never rescues a princess. That is unheard of. By being a do-gooder, Ms. Swan sabotaged her own grade. She receives a DG. So that means the A will be awarded to someone else.”
Duchess’s mouth fell open. The person walking across the grandstand, toward Mr. Badwolf, was Sparrow Hood.
“For disrupting the Princessology equestrian examination, and for forming an alliance with Ms. Swan and then double-crossing her, I hereby award Mr. Hood an A in General Villainy.”
There were a few random claps, but no wild applause.
Duchess stared in shock as the grandstand’s mega-mirror lit up, and Sparrow’s face filled the screen. A streaming headline read:
THIS JUST IN:
SPARROW HOOD WINS NEXT TOP VILLAIN
Blondie almost tripped on her own feet as she scrambled over the benches to get an interview. The obstacle course began to clear of people. The adoring and the angry villagers left, along with the troll. Students started heading back into the school, or down the lane toward Book End. Life returned to its normal fairytale pace.
Using Daring’s jacket, Lizzie wiped mud from Duchess’s face. “I don’t care that I fairy-failed. I’m just glad that stupid Villainy thronework is over.”
“It’s only over until Badwolf gives us next week’s Villainy thronework,” Raven said.
Lizzie groaned.
Duchess felt light-headed, and her heart was beating quickly, like a bird’s. It wasn’t surprising that Sparrow had double-crossed her. She’d known he couldn’t be trusted. But she’d surprised herself by failing. “I got a DG,” she said quietly. “Do-gooder.”
“Yep.” Raven nodded. “And we got FF’s. But at least Sparrow seems happy.” They looked over at the grandstand. Sparrow beamed as he gave his interview, his proud smile almost as blinding as Daring’s.
“He’s happy because he’ll get a prize from Badwolf’s treasure vault,” Duchess said. “At least he got what he wanted.”
“But you didn’t get what you wanted,” Raven said.
No, she hadn’t. She’d wanted to succeed so she could eventually change her destiny. But she hadn’t changed anything…
… or had she?
Then Duchess realized something: Whether she called herself a Royal like Lizzie or a Rebel like Raven, one thing was perfectly clear. Standing on either side of her were two girls, each holding on to her arm, helping her across the field. She wasn’t alone. Birds of a feather did flock together after all.
As they walked, a single feather drifted from Duchess’s hair. It was the same size and shape as the other swan feathers that she found after transforming. Except for one thing.
It was black.
“That’s random,” Raven said as Duchess held the feather in her fingers.
“Not really,” Lizzie pointed out. She pulled a card out of her deck and read the message her mother had written there. “Without the black side of the chessboard, the white side would be fast asleep. See?”
Duchess grinned. For the first time in her life, Riddlish made perfect sense. She was wide awake now, and she knew that whether she summoned her white swan side or her black swan side, her story, the one that belonged to her and to no one else, had yet to be written.
Instead of trying to hide the black feather by tucking it into her pocket or by tossing it aside, she stuck it back into her hair.
This was just the beginning.
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