“Give it up,” he says, and there’s a slight chuckle in his voice, as if he’s enjoying himself. As if we were just playing a game. “Fighting is pointless.”
He’s right. I can’t win—not like this. He’s too strong, too fast. He’s everywhere. I wonder if he toyed with Dad like this, too. If I’m just repeating the same pattern. If Joe will go to my mom tonight and tell her he did everything he could to save me.
I’m sorry, Mom.
I slow down. Glance at the shadows behind me. A speck of an idea plants itself in my brain, grows into a sapling, and then taller, wider, branching off into a scurry of thoughts. It’s insane, and most likely impossible. But I have nothing to lose.
I stop, my coin trapped in my palm. I keep my flashlight pointed up at me, but my legs are in the dark, and the shadows begin attacking my boots and jeans like starving piranhas. Their coldness seeps into my bones so I can hardly feel them, and it allows me to clear my mind completely, just like Dad taught me. I focus on the only thing that matters:
Controlling the Sentinels.
I don’t know if it can be done, but there can be no doubt in my intention, or it won’t work. Instead, I think about the fireflies, about the day I first called them to me. The day they fluttered against my cheeks and Dad told me it looked like they had taken a shine to me. I had been wanting to see them the moment I stepped in the wood. I focused on it so hard that a word popped into my mind, as if it had always been there even though it was a word I’d never heard before.
Sahabri’el.
I’d whispered it under my breath, trying it out on my tongue, and then the fireflies appeared. They were the only creature I’d ever tried it on, mostly because they were the only creature in the wood, aside from travelers, I’d ever seen. But if I could control them, why couldn’t I control other creatures in the wood? Of course, I’ve never read anything like it in the journals, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be done. Maybe no other Parish guardian has tried.
And this time, I’m not waiting for a word to come to me. I remember the word Varo—Uncle Joe—used to call the Sentinels to him that first day I saw him in the wood.
I focus on the shadows, on their long, amorphous bodies and the way they suck every last drop of warmth from the air, until the very ground beneath my feet is a sheet of ice. I focus on everything I know about them: from the way they smell, a sharp and piercing absence of life, like the wind on the coldest day of winter, to the way their laughter tinkles through the air. And then, I speak the language of the Old Ones:
“Tierl’asi.”
The shadows stop. Uncle Joe’s lips part in surprise.
I meet his eyes, and then I issue one command. “Attack him.”
The shadows do not hesitate.
Joe tries to call them off, but they are single-minded. Still, I’m certain it won’t be long before he regains control, so I turn and run as soon as he’s swarmed. Joe’s screams echo off the trees, but I am not lucky enough for them to be screams of pain. Only screams of frustration.
Just a little farther, I tell myself. Almost there.
He’s still screaming when I barrel through a threshold and come out the other side, my boots slapping the damp stone floor of council headquarters.
XL
Headquarters is complete pandemonium. Joe’s supporters (wearing their black cloaks, their hoods thrown back this time to reveal their faces) brandish a mixture of daggers, sabers, and short swords; the Old Ones and guardians fight back with the heavy broadswords that have always lined the walls.
I don’t see Henry anywhere.
I grip my knife in my palm and enter the fray, my eyes scanning every face, searching for him. Several bodies lie unmoving on the floor. One bears the long, white hair of a council member. Another wears modern clothes. Either a guardian or an intermediary, but there’s no time to look. All I know is it isn’t Henry, so I keep moving.
Blades clash in front of me. Guardian Ballinger grimaces as he presses all his weight into his sword, refusing to let the cloaked figure in front of him gain the upper hand.
“Need some help?” I ask.
“If—you—don’t—mind,” Ballinger grinds out between his teeth.
I slice my knife forward, toward cloak guy’s face, forcing him to break contact. Our eyes meet.
Septimus.
He knocks my knife away easily, raising his sword—
Ballinger carves his blade through Septimus’s midsection. Just like what happened with Uncle Joe, the wound heals itself as quickly as it appears, but it shocks Septimus enough for Ballinger and me to get away unharmed.
“I don’t know how much longer we can keep this up,” Ballinger shouts over the clang of metal and the percussion of magic exploding all around us.
“The Old Ones can go on forever,” I reply. “It’s just us mortals who are in danger.”
Ballinger shakes his head grimly. “Did you not see Tiberius on the floor? Their blades are tipped with dragon’s bane.”
Oh, God. It’s going to be a massacre.
Everything slows. The guardians swirling their weapons through the air, fury and pride and fatigue all battling for precedence on their faces. The Old Ones staggering under the assault of their brothers-turned-enemies. The walls and ceiling crumbling all around us, leaching streams of lake water onto the floor. And then I see him.
Henry, wielding one of the broadswords like a vengeful angel, pushing Joe’s supporters away from guardians and Old Ones alike before their poison-tipped blades can find their marks. Sweat dots his brow, but the strength with which he wields his weapon and the determination in his gaze make me think he could do this for another hour, at least.
I run to him, dodging blades and fists. Henry parries a thrust from a black cloak and kicks him square in the stomach, sending him flying into the wall.
“Henry,” I say, laying my hand on his shoulder.
He turns his wild eyes on me, momentarily uncertain if I’m friend or foe. Then he exhales a huge gasp of air, as if he hasn’t breathed since I left him in the wood. He wraps his free hand around my skull and pulls me to him, pressing his lips against my forehead.
“Thank God you’re all right,” he says.
“We need to get out of here. There’s no winning this fight.”
“Not until we’ve gotten everyone else out, too.”
I glance around. Count our numbers against theirs. Nine guardians, three intermediaries, and six Old Ones versus four black cloaks. We have the numbers on our side, but if our Old Ones go down from the dragon’s bane, the rest of us won’t have a chance.
“Okay,” I say, thinking. “Okay. We’ll have to try to round everyone up into a circle and make our way toward the threshold. Then maybe we can—”
My coin blazes white-hot against my skin. I suck in a breath.
“Winter, what is it?” Henry asks.
Everyone stops at the sudden, burning sensation of their coins. Even the black cloaks. Joe’s voice echoes through the room.