Jack Staples and the City of Shadows (21 page)

Alexia drew her short sword and stepped toward him. Fierce battle raged all around, but man and girl ignored it as they faced each other. Korah grimaced as he raised his blade. “I don't know what I hated more, pretending to be my weakling of a brother or pretending to be your father.”

“If it makes you feel better, you weren't good at either,” Alexia said. For just a moment, she glanced at something over Korah's shoulder and smiled. Korah shifted his stance so he could look back—

It was all the time Alexia needed. In Korah's moment of distraction, she slung a stone into his hand. Korah screamed as he dropped the blade. Before he could pick up his sword, Alexia had the sling spinning again.

“This is the sling my father gave me.” She spoke in a cold voice. “What did you call it? A child's weapon? Since I am the Child of Prophecy, it's fitting that I use a child's weapon to defeat you.”

Korah snarled as he shot a wall of black flames toward her. Yet Alexia had already flung her stone, and as she leaped away from the flames, it struck Korah in the forehead, knocking him flat on his back.

Alexia stared down at her uncle. She realized she didn't hate him, but pitied him. Just before she'd released the stone, she'd slowed the spinning of the sling. She didn't want to kill her uncle. Korah was a murderer, and Alexia didn't want to be anything like him.

As she turned to look for the Assassin, her heart sank. The battle was over. The few remaining Awakened were being overwhelmed even as she watched. From every side, man, woman, and animal went down to the dark army. The battle was nearing an end, and the final few hundred Awakened would not last another minute.

We did our best
, she thought sadly as she watched a building collapse around Ollie. Yet Alexia could no longer think about the others. Fifty dark servants were rushing toward her. She gritted her teeth and turned to run. If she had any chance of living even a minute longer, it would be because she fought from the rooftops.

She darted toward the nearest building as colored mist rose from the paving stones. A creature with three heads leaped at Alexia, but she dropped at the last moment and rolled beneath it, then leaped to a windowsill. She pulled herself up and kicked at a creature that was nothing but eyeballs, teeth, and matted fur.

Alexia shimmied to the rooftop and turned to send a stone into a lizard-like beast with one head and two bodies. Colored mist now covered the entire street. It surrounded the remnants of the Awakened like a rainbow fog. Alexia stabbed her sword at a monster that had no head, then turned to send a stone into a beast that was a ball of nothing but clawed feet.

She reached inside her cloak for another stone and found the pocket empty.
No!
Five monsters were crawling up the wall as more rocketed down from above. There was nowhere left to go.

Alexia closed her eyes and stepped back. It would be far better to die from a fall than be torn to pieces by the Shadow Souled.
This is the end
, she thought as she fell backward through the air. A strange peace rose inside her as memories flooded her mind. She was three years old and climbing a large boulder outside her house. Her father ran over and hugged her fiercely. “You climb better than a mountain goat!” he said with a grin. She was four, and her mother taught her how to tie a sailor's knot. “You are very good at that, my girl,” she said as she wrapped Alexia in a hug.

There were tears of joy in Alexia's eyes. These memories were what life was about—family and love and joy and laughter. These moments were what gave meaning to her life. She was five and sitting on her parents' bed, opening her presents. Her parents laughed so hard that they began to cry. She was seven and jumping about with her friends in the Gang of Rogues, whooping and hollering. Alexia was thirteen and sitting with Megan Staples, drinking tea and eating strawberry pie. All of the painful and heartbreaking moments of her life faded as she remembered the people she loved and who loved her back.

All these memories and more flooded through her in the blink of an eye. And as she fell, she braced herself. Yet she didn't hit the ground. Alexia thought she might be hallucinating when she saw she had landed on top of a large red fox with wide wings. That's when she saw the Sephari. There were at least fifty of them, hovering above the street. Spinning wildly above them was an unearthly tornado.

Paving stones, gargoyles, roofs of buildings, and even dark servants rose from the ground to spin in the ever-growing cyclone. Many of the winged Shadow Souled had also been drawn into it.

“Elion!” Alexia breathed. Elion's eyes blazed like the sun, and as she began to sing, all of the Sephari joined in. It was the most terrifying and awesome thing Alexia had ever heard, as if fifty different songs had somehow joined together to form a masterpiece. It was a cadence, a war cry, and a mournful dirge—and it was absolutely breathtaking.

Alexia remembered Elion's song from the battle in the square of Buckingham Palace. She remembered thinking it had been the most beautiful thing in the world. Yet it was nothing compared to this. This song had power, as if the song itself were alive and taking part in the battle.

Besides the fifty Sephari and their fearsome song, Alexia saw at least six more winged animals. In the air nearby was a lion, a meerkat, a rather large rabbit, and a panther. More beasts circled farther off, though she could barely see them through the thickening hurricane spinning above the Sephari.

What are they waiting for?
Alexia wondered. The Awakened were growing fewer by the second. Even with the arrival of the Sephari, the dark servants had barely slowed their attack. Alexia saw Josiah and Juno standing back-to-back and striking out with sword and spear at Petrus, the Gang of Terror, and row upon row of dark servants that surrounded them; Adeline was lying unconscious on the ground between them.

A mountain of bodies ringed Mrs. Dumphry, but thousands more were scrambling to get to her. Aias lay unmoving at her feet with a spear protruding from his chest. Jack had found his black sword and was wielding it with a master's hand. He danced among thirty of the Shadow Souled, spinning and twisting the blade with a deadly fury, yet she had no doubt he would be overwhelmed in a few more seconds. The Assassin was there, though at the moment his attention was on the Sephari above. Liquid evil shot upward to explode against shields of light.

Abruptly, the Sephari's song ended as Elion threw down her arms. A hail of marble, diamonds, gemstone, gold, paving stones, barrels, dark servants, and rooftops rocketed toward the ground.

The army of Shadow Souled shrieked in fear as death rained down to smash them away from the few Awakened still standing. Much of the debris crashed into the Assassin, quickly burying him beneath a mountain of rubble. For a moment the street was still. The few Awakened still standing looked toward the heavens in exhaustion.

The attack from the Sephari had been deadly, though it had bought the Awakened only a few seconds at most. The rubble covering the Assassin was already shifting and falling away, and the Shadow Souled from the surrounding streets were spilling in.

As the flying animals swooped down and gathered the remnants, Alexia wept. Barely a handful was still standing and not one member of her Gang of Rogues was among them.

 

Jack looked numbly down upon the City of Shadows. Thousands of humans and animals had been left behind.
No!
His eyes found Aias. The last he'd seen, the one-armed man had been fighting fifty Shadow Souled at once. Now he lay among the rubble with a spear in his chest, his eyes staring blankly at the heavens. Aias had been one of the first humans to Awaken. And now he was gone.

When he had first seen the Sephari and the flying animals, he'd hoped more were coming. He hoped they could take everyone, but he had been wrong. From what Jack could see, only Alexia, Mrs. Dumphry, Wild, Andreal, and Arthur had been saved, though Arthur was unconscious atop the winged meerkat.

Jack turned to look at Alexia.
At least she is safe.
It was a numb thought. As their eyes met, they nodded.
She's my sister!
Jack still could barely believe it. He clung to the back of the panther as a chill passed through him.

“I am sorry, Jack. We arrived as quickly as we could, but even if we had come sooner, we wouldn't have been able to save them all.” Elion was flying beside Jack and looked as forlorn and exhausted as he felt.

“I know,” he said tiredly. “Thank you for saving us. Are the rest of them …” Jack hesitated, not sure he wanted to hear the answer. “Are they all dead?”

“I don't know,” Elion said. “But there is nothing we can do for them now.”

Jack wiped fresh tears from his eyes.

“The Assassin thought he would win the war today. Yet in a single battle he lost both of the Children of Prophecy. He will be angry.” Elion shivered. “And that will make him even more dangerous. But you did well. You wounded him for the second time, and that is no small thing.”

“Will we win?” Jack asked. “In the end, will we be able to stand against him?”

“I do not know,” Elion said. “I don't think he could ever kill the Author as he plans, but he may be powerful enough to destroy the world. Yet we must stand and fight no matter the outcome.”

Jack stared at the darkening sky. “What happens now?” He suddenly felt cold.

“The Last Battle has begun, and nothing in all of creation will be able to stand aside. The choice will be made—the Author or the Assassin.” Elion's eyes turned as black as pitch. “The world has become a far more dangerous place. Every blade of grass, every insect and mountain, even the air itself will become enemy or ally. We must gather every last Awakened into an army like this world has never known. And we must find the Poet's Coffer. Without it, we have no chance of standing against the coming darkness.”

Jack clung to the panther as they flew over rivers and valleys. He had no idea what the Poet's Coffer was, and at the moment he didn't care. So many of the Awakened had been lost in a single battle! Right now all he wanted was to sleep.

As Jack Staples closed his eyes and fell into a fitful sleep, his sister, Alexia Dreager, also slept atop her stallion. And as the Children of Prophecy flew toward the horizon, neither saw the mountains tremble or the valleys quake. Neither Jack nor Alexia witnessed the sinkholes forming below, swallowing entire forests in a matter of seconds. Neither child noticed the grass of the fields withering as large swathes of earth chose to follow the Assassin.

The Last Battle had begun, and the choice was being made. And the world itself began to tremble.

Chapter 26

AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR

Three hours later

 

Alexia didn't make a sound as the Shadule threw the five members of her Gang of Rogues into the prison cell. All looked weary beyond words and carried multiple wounds. She stayed safely hidden in the darkened corner of the cell, barely able to contain her excitement.

“The master will come for you soon,” the Shadule rasped. “You will beg for death by the time he is done.”

None of Alexia's friends protested as the Shadule closed the prison door. Juno dropped to the cold, wet floor and cradled Adeline's head in her lap. Adeline was bleeding from a wound in her shoulder. Josiah stared blankly at the closed door as Summer and Benaiah sat beside him. All five were filthy and streaked in blood; some of the blood was theirs, much of it was not.

Alexia waited until she was sure the Shadule was gone, then stepped out from the darkness. “I know you are weary,” she said boldly, “but if you are willing to come with me, I can get you out of here. And with your help, we can free every last prisoner and animal.”

None of the children so much as moved.

“I don't …” Josiah stopped. “We saw you fly away …”

“I did,” Alexia agreed, “but that was three weeks ago. I've come from the past to rescue you.” A boy stepped out from the shadows behind her. “This is Parker Staples. He'll help us. But before we free the prisoners, I'm going to need your help with something else.” Alexia was giddy with excitement. “We're going to free my mother.”

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—Mark Batterson and Joel N. Clark