I gritted my teeth, pushed the pain of my many injuries away, and kept fighting, just like any Spartan would, just like any true warrior would.
Even if I hadn’t been injured, the chimeras were far bigger and stronger than I was. One of them lashed out with its long tail and knocked my legs out from under me. I hit the floor hard and slid back ten feet, slamming into another display case and losing my grip on Babs.
The sword landed a few feet away, and I slowly crawled across the floor and grabbed her blade with my bloody fingers. But my entire body felt cold, heavy, and numb from where the chimeras had clawed me, and I simply didn’t have the strength to pick up the weapon, much less wield her.
“Looks like you were right about that curse after all,” I mumbled.
“I’m sorry, Rory,” Babs whispered, staring up at me, tears streaming out of her green eye. “So sorry.”
I tried to smile, but I didn’t have the strength for that either. “It’s not your fault,” I mumbled again. “This was my decision, my choice.”
Babs kept staring at me, more and more tears streaming down her half of a face. The drops were as cold as snowflakes stinging my skin.
I looked over at the archway, but I was in the front corner of the room, and I couldn’t see anyone from this angle, although I could hear my friends shouting, along with Aunt Rachel and Takeda. They were still trying to save me, even though it was already too late.
A series of low, pleased growls sounded. The three remaining chimeras all grinned, showing me their teeth, and started advancing on me for the final time. In seconds, they would leap on me and rip me to pieces. I just hoped it wouldn’t hurt too much—before the end.
I stared at the chimeras, too injured and exhausted to do anything but watch them come for me. At least I’d saved Ian, Zoe, and Mateo. I took comfort in that.
The chimeras got down on their haunches and crept forward, one foot at a time, their paws scorching the floor. They rocked back, all readying themselves to leap at me…
And then they stopped.
They just stopped.
The chimeras’ heads snapped up, and they all stared at the glass ceiling. I craned my neck up too, wondering what they were looking at, since all I saw were the moon and stars twinkling in the night sky far, far above…
I frowned. Wait a second. Maybe it was my imagination or the blood loss, but it seemed there were several patches of sky that were darker than the rest and rapidly dropping down toward the museum…
The ceiling exploded with a roar.
*
Glass fell down all over me, tink-tink-tinking against the floor like drops of crystal rain. I put my arms up over my head, protecting my face as best I could, but the sharp shards still sliced into my skin, making me hiss with even more pain.
The roaring shower of glass stopped, but a series of loud screech-screech-screeches rose up to take its place. My heart lifted with hope. I knew those screeches.
I dropped my arms, raised my head again, and blinked, trying to focus on the scene in front of me. Sure enough, one after another, Eir gryphons dropped down through the shattered ceiling and landed right in front of me. Balder, the leader, along with Brono, his son, and a third adult gryphon. But what were they doing here? How had they found me?
For a moment, I wondered if I was imagining things. If maybe I was already dead and just dreaming that this was all happening.
But I wasn’t.
The gryphons were here, and they launched themselves at the chimeras. The two sets of creatures went around and around the rotunda, scratching, biting, and attacking each other with their claws, teeth, and beaks. They whirled around in a tangled mass of bronze wings and black fur, so fast and vicious that I couldn’t tell where the gryphons began and the chimeras ended.
But slowly, the gryphons began to get the best of the chimeras. One of the chimeras exploded in a puff of smoke, then the second one. The three gryphons cornered the last chimera, then pounced on the creature all at the same time. A second later, the final chimera also disintegrated into a cloud of smoke…
After that, I must have passed out for a minute, because the gryphons were suddenly standing next to me, with Brono, the baby, hunkered down on the floor right beside me. I smiled and tried to lift my hand to pet him, but I was too weak, and I couldn’t even move my fingers right now…
I must have drifted off again, because the next thing I knew, someone was shouting my name.
“Rory!” Ian’s face appeared above mine. “Rory!”
He fell to his knees, picked me up, and cradled me against his chest. My head dropped down. Maybe it was the pain of all my injuries, but I could have sworn that Ian was holding a tiny whistle in his hand. I frowned. What was he doing with a whistle?
“Rory! Rory! Stay with me!” Ian kept shouting at me, but his voice got fainter and farther away with every passing second.
Then his voice cut off altogether, and the world faded to black.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
I woke up in the Eir Ruins.
I must have fallen asleep, since I was sitting on the ground, slumped against the stone fountain in the center of the main courtyard. The sun was setting behind the mountain, and a lovely purple twilight was creeping over the landscape. I rubbed the grit out of my eyes and got to my feet. Something brushed against my bare legs, and I realized it was the skirt from the Spartan princess outfit Zoe had made me for the costume ball.
I frowned. Weird. Why was I wearing this?
A gleam of silver caught my eye. I looked down to find Babs lying on the wide rim that circled the fountain, her green eye closed as though she was sleeping. How had she gotten here? How had I gotten here? The last thing I remembered was battling the chimeras at the museum. My stomach dropped. The only way Babs and I could have gotten from the museum all the way up here was…if I…
If I were dead.
I’d thought the chimeras would kill me, but to realize that it had actually happened…
My heart squeezed tight. Tears pricked my eyes, but I ruthlessly blinked them away. I wasn’t going to break down just because Babs had been right about her curse. Wielding her in battle had been my decision, and now I was facing the consequences. I was a Spartan. Tough, strong, fierce. I wasn’t going to cry just because I was dead—
“Hello, Rory,” a voice called out.
I whirled around, not sure who or what I would find, but I wasn’t too surprised at the familiar figure standing in front of me.
Sigyn.
Black hair and eyes. A long white gown. Old, faded scars crisscrossing her hands and arms. A beautiful face tinged with perpetual sadness. The Norse goddess of devotion looked the same as I remembered from our previous talk here.
The goddess stepped forward, a smile spreading across her face. “Hello, Rory,” she repeated.
“Um, hi.” I glanced around, but we were all alone in the ruins, except for Babs lying on the stone rim of the fountain and the colorful carpet of wildflowers at our feet. “So… I guess the chimeras killed me after all.”