My vision swam. As if from deep underwater, I took in what was happening. The flower of metal disks up above us burst into light like an enormous beacon. All around the tower, soldiers staggered to the ground. The undead were the first to fall, sustained as they were by Tilde’s magic. I watched numbly as Shihab’s blue flames flickered and dimmed. Bird women fell from the sky. The earth shook as the giants collapsed under their own weight. For a moment, the confused humans watched the otherworldly creatures crumble around them and allowed themselves to hope that their salvation had come—but then they, too, began to weaken and fall to their knees. The containment reserve above us trembled, lights blinking to life as it filled, gorging itself on the life force of friends and enemies alike.
Jenny hung in the center of the field, helplessly watching as they fell around her. She, too, was fading, thinning.
Charlie was dead. Help was not coming. The veil was falling. The Dire King had won.
I trembled, and the black blade nearly slipped from my grip. I held fast. Why was I holding on?
I lifted my eyes and saw the pain I felt inside my soul playing out on another face. Alina was slumped on the floor of the control stage.
“Alina,” I called out to her. “Please, Alina. We can still fix this if we act quickly. You need to believe me!”
“Kazimir is the only one who ever believed in me,” she said. Her voice sounded as numb as I felt. “All my life, he told me I could become more than what I was. Now? I don’t even know what I’ve become.”
“You’re the choices you make, same as all of us. Good ones, terrible ones. It’s never too late to start making better ones. Please.”
“You don’t know the choices I’ve made!” she snapped. “I believed in Kazimir, too! He always said he wanted more from life than to run away, but then he ran away! That’s what he chose! He was my light, and then one day he wasn’t there, and I was alone in the dark.”
“You’re not alone now, Alina. Please. Help me. If I can get this blade to Jackaby—”
“My kingdom is dead. My father is dead. My brother—I don’t know what to believe anymore.”
“Believe in what your brother believed in,” I said.
Alina wiped the tears from her eyes and glared at me. “In what?” she spat. “In you?”
“No,” I said, tossing the black blade to land at her feet. “In you.”
Alina blinked and wiped her face on her arm.
“I’m believing in you, too. I’m trusting you. For Charlie.” She picked up the sword. “Give that blade to Jackaby. Hurry!”
A dark resolve had come over her face. “A new sun is rising.”
Alina turned. She stepped up the platform—in the wrong direction. Jackaby was still crouched behind the panel. Alina took the blade directly to Arawn.
She held the sword high, offering it to him. I felt a sickening weight in my gut. After everything she had just witnessed, she was still serving the Dire King. Don’t waste it, Charlie had said. His last words to me. I felt dizzy.
Arawn pulled a lever and the light dimmed. The device hummed to a stop. The reserve had filled to capacity. In the field below, soldiers from all sides lay barely moving, barely breathing.
“I gave that blade to my daughter,” Arawn said, eyeing Alina skeptically.
“I know,” Alina breathed. “When you sent me to unlock her from her prison, I used it to cut her bonds.”
Arawn was dispassionate. “I have no need of it, little dog. I have my machine.”
“The Seer has need of it,” Alina said. Her jaw was set, but her eyes were glistening with tears. “At this very moment, he is seeking to usurp the power that is rightfully yours. He’s there.” She pointed to the panel. Jackaby’s eyes went wide.
My blood froze. How could she? I began edging along the metal strut, inch by inch, until the platform was nearly within my reach.
Arawn took the black blade. Tears streamed down Alina’s stony face. She broke. “Please, my lord,” she said, suddenly, clutching pitifully at his robes. “Forgive the disloyalty of my family.”
“You seek a place in the coming kingdom?” the king said.
“I do.” She straightened.
Arawn nodded. “So be it,” he said. He turned. “Our friend the Seer would like to share my power?” My eyes shot to where Jackaby was hidden. The thin snake of blue light was still dancing across his arms. His face twitched involuntarily.
“Let it not be said that I am not a reasonable king,” said Arawn, turning a small dial, “a generous king.” Arawn flipped a switch. “I will let him have his share.”
There was a massive burst behind the control panel. The feeble ribbon of light dancing through Jackaby became a thick bolt of lightning. Jackaby was lifted off his feet, his whole body convulsing. His eyes clenched as the blast crackled violently through his chest. No! Losing Charlie had been too much. Jackaby could not die—not like this.
His spasms calmed for a fleeting moment, and Jackaby’s eyes opened. I held my breath. He locked his gaze on me, desperate and intense. His lips parted and he mouthed two words. I’m sorry. And then his eyes rolled back in his head. Arawn switched off the device. Under the light of the humming machinery, Jackaby’s lifeless body fell from the tower.
Ice rippled across the battlefield. The wave of cold hit my chest. I couldn’t breathe. A shimmer of silver danced around him as he fell, and Jenny Cavanaugh coalesced.
Some part of me saw her catch Jackaby. Some part of me saw her hold him, limp in her arms, saw her lower his body to the frozen earth. Some part of me saw the furious icy gale whipping around her as she lifted his unmoving arms and pressed them against his chest. Compressions. Jenny had always been a quick study. Some part of me saw the mad, manic, furious hope in her eyes as she pressed. Another part of me knew it was too late. Jenny’s efforts were in vain.
Jackaby was dead.
I knew, because the moment his life was snuffed out, a blaze was lit behind my eyes. It was as though I had been stumbling through the darkness my entire life and somebody had just flicked on a light. It was everything Jackaby had ever described. Halos in hues I had no names for bloomed in front of me. They were the colors of pain and courage and distress. There were tastes of the air my tongue could not name. The smell of turmoil. The feel of distress. I looked out over the fields below, and the bodies piled across the frosted earth took new forms in my eyes. They were brighter, more vivid, but also more broken. The visions were beautiful and mad and they were true. I knew that they were true. I knew.
The sight had been Jackaby’s beautiful burden and his terrible gift. And now it was mine.
“It is time,” Arawn said behind me. “Alina, give me their power. Give me the worlds and I will give you your kingdom.”
Alina’s hand trembled as she threw the switch, and the triple bolts shot out once more, hammering into the waiting king. This time, the light was more beautiful than I could describe. It was magic and science and love and hate and the beginning and the end. It was pure and raw. It was life.
Arawn was more brilliant than a hundred suns. I could now see it, roiling beneath his skin, bubbling inside him. The energy of countless lives, their power and potential. He held the black blade as the energy crackled into him. It looked small in his hands as he aimed it toward the sky, and my mind reeled as I looked up. I could just make out the threads of the veil above and all around us. If I concentrated I could see the intricate charms that spun together to hold our two worlds apart. I could also see them rupture under his will. Tears streamed down my face.
And then Arawn stopped. The powers within him were churning, red hot. Something was wrong.
“Rrrrrrraaaaaargh!” Arawn bellowed. “Turn it off!”