I’ve been on the Isle for five seconds and I already feel so much better.

Now, time to get back in touch with my villain roots.

What better way than by looking like my bad old self again?

Mal marched through narrow cobblestoned streets and reached Sorcerer’s Square.

Around her, Isle ne’er-do-wells ambled to and fro below clotheslines heavy with damp, soiled garments, and merchants tinkered at their run-down ramshackle shop stalls with outdated objects and slop for sale. Mal made her way down the wet, slick street and approached the double doors of a shabby salon. A weathered sign above showed a giant pair of scissors and a perfume bottle bearing the words Lady Tremaine’s Curl Up and Dye. Mal read a clock sign on one of the doors that said CLOSED UNTIL MIDNIGHT. She looked around, and when the coast was clear, she pushed open a door peeling with crusty paint and stole inside, quickly and quietly.

Mal stepped inside the decrepit building, pushed aside clear plastic panels, and found a girl sweeping a colorful salon. The place had pipes and wires exposed in the ceiling, hair dryers made with botched-together pieces of machinery, and steaming glass vials with colorful dyes percolating and running through a system of pipes over a bathtub. To top it all off, the entire place—from the walls, where cracked mirrors hung, to each janky mismatched salon chair—was splattered with streaks of every shade of bright neon dye.

Dizzy, Lady Tremaine’s granddaughter, wore large gold-painted headphones embellished with tiny flowers and pearly metallic beads. Dizzy hadn’t heard Mal come into the salon as she swept, moving as if she were ballroom dancing with the broom. She had on a multicolored dress and cat-eye glasses, and each of her nails was painted a different color. Her brown hair was back in a bun, and the ends were neon pink. Dizzy turned and saw Mal standing there, and she pulled off her headphones.

“Mal!” Dizzy’s freckled face lit up. “Is Evie back, too?”

Mal let out a little laugh. “Ha. As if.” She put her hand on her hip and looked around the salon. “I, uh, forgot that you guys don’t open till midnight,” she said.

Dizzy nodded.

“The place looks really good,” said Mal.

Dizzy smiled. Even though she was only a few years younger than Mal, she looked up to her and valued her opinon.

Mal looked at Dizzy’s gloves, her apron, and the pile of hair she had been sweeping. “So what is your deal? Has your grandmother given you any customers yet, or…”

Dizzy shrugged. “Just a witch here and there. Mostly it’s a lot of scrubbing and scouring and sweeping.” She looked at the pile of hair. “Lots and lots of sweeping…”

Mal snickered. “The old Cinderella treatment, hey?”

“Yeah. She’s gone from wicked stepmother to wicked grandmother.”

“That’s not much of a leap. Hey, Dizzy, you used to do Evie, am I right?”

Dizzy beamed and nodded. “Yeah! I thought of the little braids!”

“Ya got any ideas for me?” asked Mal.

Dizzy sized Mal up and walked over to her. She picked up a strand of Mal’s blond hair. “The washed-out blond with purple tips? The best of no worlds.” She dropped the hair and examined Mal’s face. “Hmmm, you cannot see where your face ends and your hair begins.” She gestured to a nearby chair, which Mal quickly sat in. Dizzy snatched Mal’s hand and peered at her fingernails. “Ugh! What is this? Bored to Death pink?” She spun Mal. “How far can I go?” she asked with a mischievous tone.

Mal smiled. “Honestly, the works,” she said coolly. “I mean, whatever makes me feel like me but…way worse.” She looked at Dizzy with her green eyes glinting.

“Yay!” Dizzy cheered and rushed to a table, where she lifted a pair of rusty garden shears. She opened and closed the blades twice, then spun back to Mal.

A grin spread across Mal’s face. Let the transformation begin!

Dizzy got to work. First she dyed Mal’s hair purple in the sink, used garden shears to trim Mal’s purple locks, and pinned up soda cans in Mal’s new do. Then Dizzy had Mal sit under a dryer so that her curls could set while Dizzy applied a fresh coat of wickedly black polish to Mal’s nails. At last, Dizzy spun Mal around in her chair for the big reveal. Mal launched out of the chair and peered into the cracked fragments of the shattered mirror on the wall.

Mal’s long lavender hair reached down past her shoulders, and her sparkling green eyes twinkled below new bluntly cut bangs. She beamed. Mal was the child of a villain through and through. Now it was undeniable.

Dizzy looked at her work, sporting the biggest smile imaginable.

“Ah! There I am,” said Mal, delighted.

“Voilà!” squealed Dizzy.

“Voilà,” said Mal, turning to Dizzy and holding out a couple of dollars to her.

Dizzy clutched her chest. “For me?” she asked incredulously.

Mal nodded. “Yeah! You earned it.”

Dizzy took the money out of Mal’s hand and marched across the salon to the cash register.

Harry Hook slipped through the front door and towered over the cash register. “Fork it over!”

Dizzy froze. Mal stood where she was, unnoticed by Harry.

Harry smirked at Dizzy with his hand outstretched.

Dizzy looked crestfallen. She slowly handed the cash to Harry.

“And the rest of it, Four Eyes,” Harry sneered.

Dizzy moved around the cash register, opened it, and handed Harry everything that was inside. She leaned over the cashier desk and rested her chin glumly on her hand.

“Thank you.” Harry turned to leave.

“Still running errands for Uma, or do you actually get to keep what you steal?” Mal piped up.

Harry whirled around and grinned when he saw her. “Well, well, well, isn’t this a nice surprise?”

Mal smiled. “Hi, Harry.”

Harry strolled toward her and waved his hook. “Wait until Uma hears that you’re back. You know, she’s never going to give you back your old territory.”

Mal shook her head. “She won’t have to.” She nodded. “I will be taking it.”

Harry flicked Mal’s new do with his hook. “You know, I could hurt you.”

Mal grabbed his wrist. “Oh, well…” She spit out the gum she had been chewing and stuck it on the tip of Harry’s hook. “Not without her permission, I bet,” she said, looking up at Harry.

Harry grinned, strode to the door, and stormed out, but not before he spun to knock knickknacks off the cash register counter and onto the floor with his hook.

Mal and Dizzy watched him leave.

Dizzy rolled her eyes. “Great,” she said. “More sweeping.”

Jay, Ben, Evie, and Carlos crept down a set of stairs toward the royal limo waiting outside. Thanks to Evie’s sewing skills and talent for fashion design, Ben wore his new Isle-inspired outfit, which consisted of a distressed blue leather jacket with metallic studs, a blue beanie, blue fingerless leather gloves, blue pants, and dark boots. In fact, the whole gang was in their Isle of the Lost attire, with Evie stunning in a blue leather jacket and matching skirt; Jay in red-and-blue velvet pants, a leather jacket, and a beanie; and Carlos in red-and-black pants, a leather jacket, and fingerless gloves. They were ready for the Isle. It was not for the faint of heart. Their feet touched down on the pavement outside the school where the black stretch waited.

“Keys. Remote,” said Ben, tossing them both to Jay. “Let’s go.”

“Wait!” said Evie.

Everyone gathered at the foot of the stairs.

“Something’s wrong,” she said.

Everyone looked at her expectantly.

She stepped in front of Ben, pulled his beanie farther down over his hair, ruffled his jacket, and smiled. “There,” she said, satisfied.

Suddenly, Dude appeared behind them on the stairs. “Road trip!” he said.

“Dude, no!” said Carlos. “Stay! The Isle is way too dangerous.”

Ben, Evie, and Jay gawked at Dude.

“He just…talked?” asked Jay.

“Yeah. I know. I’ll tell ya later,” said Carlos.

Everyone stared at each other for a brief moment and shook their heads.

“Let’s go,” said Ben, determined to push through the shock of the talking dog.

In a haze, everyone climbed into the limo. Filled with buttons, gadgets, refreshments, and vast arrays of colorful sweets, it was the same one that had brought Mal, Evie, Jay, and Carlos to Auradon Prep. Jay and Carlos had tried their first-ever chocolate peanut butter cups in that very limo. But Jay had never driven it before. He smiled devilishly, grabbed the steering wheel, and hit the gas.

The limo rocketed away from the school.