The Enchantress (The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel #6) (39 page)

“Maybe we can hold the windows and doors,” Mars said doubtfully. The ruined building was little more than a shell, with no roof and gaping empty rectangles for windows. “But if they charge us …”

“They’re charging!” Hel shouted.

S
ophie and Josh followed Tsagaglalal down a corridor.

They were still shaken by what had happened in the long room. One moment, the young-looking woman in the white armor had been standing in front of the three monstrous berserkers, and the next she was standing behind them, her curved swords dripping black blood. The three bear men had folded to their knees with looks of absolute surprise on their faces.

“Questions later,” Tsagaglalal said as they raced outside, “but let me give you some answers first.”

An unlucky anpu guard spotted them and made the mistake of reaching for Sophie. Josh hit him hard enough to send him cracking back into the wall.

“We need to get out of this building so you can use your powers,” Tsagaglalal said.

Suddenly the entire building shook, a deep shuddering vibration running up through the floor.

“Earthquake,” Sophie breathed.

“My husband created it,” Tsagaglalal told them. “Even now the shock wave is racing here. He made it for one of you to use. But you need to be in a place where you can use it.”

Josh stopped so suddenly that Sophie ran into him. Their armor clanged together. “I’m starting to get sick and tired of people telling us what to do and expecting us just to do it. If it’s not you, it’s Isis and Osiris.”

Tsagaglalal’s gray eyes were huge in her head. “Oh, believe me, Josh, I am not telling you what to do. You will make—you
must
make that decision yourself.” She pointed down a corridor and the twins saw Isis and Osiris emerge around a corner.

The couple spotted the children at the same time, raised their hands and started to run toward them.

“You may believe that they trained you for one thing,” Tsagaglalal said, “so that they could rule this land through you. But my husband has always believed that there was more behind it. They are powerful enough to put anyone on the throne—so why spend millennia plotting and planning to make sure it was a Gold and a Silver? They want to use you for something more than just ruling the island empire. You two are powerful—incredibly powerful. Abraham believed it was your power they were trying to access. But that very training they gave you will allow you to take control and make your own decisions.” She spread her arms. “It’s your choice.”

Sophie put her hand in her brother’s. “Let’s get out of here—we’ve already chosen.”

“I know,” Tsagaglalal said.

“How do you know?” Sophie asked.

“Because I trusted you to make the right decision.”

The twins turned their backs on Isis and Osiris and raced down the long hallway, toward the opening and the light.

Behind them, the two Elders screamed their names. It was not a pleasant sound.

“Kill them. Kill them all!” Bastet screamed. “No survivors.”

She stood in front of the pyramid and watched the vimana circling and the gliders dropping out of the sky.

The air was starting to buzz with arrows, and a few of the anpu had tonbogiri rifles and were firing at the attackers.

The ground continued to tremble with minor earthquakes, and cracks were starting to appear in the stones.

The Elders began to stream out of the pyramid. They looked around in shock, stunned at the sight of the vimana and gliders in the air. Arrows and spears began to rain down. An Elder, his face caught somewhere between man and monkey, staggered and fell, and that was all it took to galvanize the Elders. One creature, a figure wrapped in stinking wet cloths, raised his arm to expose a three-fingered hand, and immediately a vimana overhead burst into flames and spiraled down to explode across the square.

The Elders howled, screamed, squawked and cackled in delight.

“Kill them all!” Bastet shouted again. “Death to all the humani!”

The cry was taken up by the majority of the Elders. “Death to the humani!”

“No survivors!” Bastet howled.

“No survivors!” the Elders chanted. Their mixed auras flared into a rainbow of colors as they began to pull down the vimanas with their powers. A handful of the bigger craft burst into flames and streaked across the city like burning comets.

“No!” Inanna the Elder strode out of the pyramid, claws scratching on the ground. “No!”

“Yes!” a rat-faced Elder shouted. “After this night, the humani will be no more. It is time to end this mistake.”

Inanna leapt, her claws and wings carrying her twenty feet into the air. When she landed on the rat-faced Elder, his brittle bones snapped and he was dead before he hit the ground.

“I said no,” Inanna repeated. “We cannot exterminate an entire race.”

“Oh yes we can,” Bastet screamed. “We should have done it a long time ago.”

Hands and talons dragged Inanna to her feet, but she turned on them, scratching and clawing, and suddenly one of the Elders to her right erupted into a ball of fire, and one on the left crumbled into a pillar of salt.

The courtyard in front of the pyramid dissolved into chaos as Elder fought Elder and the hybrid guards fought the humans. But those Elders who supported the human cause were vastly outnumbered by those who called for their annihilation. And thousands more of the hybrids were streaming from the pyramid.

And in the midst of all the confusion, Tsagaglalal led
Sophie and Josh out the entrance and started the long climb up the steps of the pyramid. Their gold and silver armor took the evening sunlight and they blazed brightly, reflecting streaks of light across the golden stones.

Bastet grabbed Anubis’s arm, squeezing hard enough to leave a bruise. “Kill them!” she screamed. With surprising strength, she spun her son around her. “Kill them, and Danu Talis is ours. Yours.” She lowered her voice and put her head close to his. “Let the humani kill as many Elders as possible and you will be able to rule as an absolute emperor, with no one to oppose you. Think of that a moment.”

Anubis shook off his mother’s arm and fought and kicked his way through the milling humani to grab the nearest anpu commander. He pointed to the three armored shapes—white, gold and silver—scrambling up the side of the pyramid. “Leave the humani to the Elders. Take everyone, take every single beast, monster and hybrid under your command, and chase down those three. Kill them and bring me their heads and their armor as proof.”

The anpu looked around and pointed left and right, a question clear on his jackal face. A small group of humani archers were picking off the anpu guarding one of the bridges over a canal. Another group had crashed a vimana into a troop of Asterion, decimating them. With the bridge breached, humani were starting to pour into the square.

Anubis shook his head. “Those are all minor irritations. Kill the children.”

The anpu grunted, raised a hunting horn to his lips and blew hard, three short blasts. Suddenly all the anpu, followed
by the rest of the hybrids, retreated toward the pyramid, leaving the cheering humani to have the bridges and the square.

Another short blast sent every creature racing up the pyramid after Tsagaglalal, Sophie and Josh.

And on the opposite side of the square, moving low and fast, avoiding the conflict, Isis and Osiris ran toward their vimana.

“P
eople of Danu Talis,” Aten called.

Everyone screamed aloud his name, but he held up his manacled hands for silence and a hush fell over the crowd.

“Humans of Danu Talis. Ard-Greimne wants me to tell you what to do.”

The crowd moaned.

“He wants me to tell you to go home …”

The crowd groaned even louder.

“… and leave this place.”

“No!” someone shouted.

“But I am not going to tell you to do that,” Aten said loudly. The flickering torchlight painted his features in flame and shadow, making him seem even taller than he was. “If I had remained in power, you would have become the equals of the Elders. But now the Elders are determined that you will
never be more than you are. And if some have their way, you will cease to exist altogether.”

“Get ready,” Scathach said suddenly. She’d been watching Ard-Greimne, noting the way his muscles were bunching, seeing the line twitching in his jaw.

She’d never known the person her father had been before the Fall. The family never spoke about it. He’d always had a temper, and there were hints here and there that he had been a monster—worse, that he had killed hundreds, maybe even thousands of humans—but she’d never believed it.

And yet, here he was, prepared to order archers to fire into an unarmed crowd before loosing troops on them.

“Ard-Greimne wants me to tell you what to do,” Aten continued. “I want you to look toward the Pyramid of the Sun and tell me what you see.”

As one, the crowd turned. Outlined in the setting sun against the clear evening sky, they could see streaks of light as vimanas fell to the earth. The sky was filled with fliers.

The shiver of excitement that ran through the crowd was a physical thing. They started to shout and scream.

“The People of the Tree have risen up,” Aten said. “Human people. They are led by Hekate and commanded by Huitzilopochtli. Prometheus protects and guides them. Abraham the Mage watches over them. Elder and human together. Equal, as one.”

The crowd roared.

Scathach watched Ard-Greimne step up to Aten. Immediately she started to run, flying across the ground directly toward the massed anpu ranks.

Dee shot out his hand and gripped Virginia’s arm. He too had seen Ard-Greimne move and knew what he was going to do. “Take my aura, Virginia, and do what you have to do.”

Virginia Dare carefully lifted his hand off her arm and then wrapped her fingers around his. “Thank you, John.”

“John,” he breathed.

She looked at him quizzically.

“In all the years we have known one another, you have never called me by my name,” he said.

“Of course I have. Many times.”

“But never with affection …”

“That’s because for all the years I’ve known you, you have been an arrogant immortal called Dee.”

Ard-Greimne stepped up to Aten and sighed loudly. The two Elders looked down over the cheering, screaming crowd. And then Ard-Greimne looked to the Pyramid of the Sun. “I am guessing they will not be needing you tonight?”

“I guess not,” Aten answered.

Ard-Greimne put his hand on Aten’s shoulder. “But you should see this first,” he said, then shouted, “Fire at will!” to the line of archers.

Two hundred bowstrings sang and the arrows loosed, again and again and again. The arrows each had a tiny hole cut into the head so that they screamed as they flew through
the air. They arched high into the night and fell in a shrieking, deadly rain into the crowd.

And then the salty evening air of Danu Talis suddenly smelled of sage and sulfur.

A pale green fire outlined Virginia Dare, while the faintest nimbus of yellow steamed off the English Magician.

“Give it everything you have,” Dee had advised her when he’d outlined the plan earlier. “You will only get this one chance.”

“I’ve never done anything like this before,” she had answered.

“This is as good a time as any to start.”

Virginia Dare was a mistress of Air magic. She had learned her skills in the woods on the East Coast of North America and perfected them in the wild forests of the Pacific Northwest. She knew how to make and shape clouds, how to use air as a tool … and a weapon.

The immortal called upon every iota of her aura and gathered it for one massive outpouring. She could feel the Magician’s heat flooding into her hand, seeping through her flesh, strengthening her. His was a dark, bitter power, but it complemented hers.

The arrows rose.

Virginia Dare closed her eyes

The arrows screamed down.

The American immortal’s aura burned brighter and brighter, until she was a blazing green beacon. Dee’s aura burned a bright sickly yellow, sending grotesque shadows
dancing across the ground. Virginia’s eyes snapped open and she felt John squeeze her hand.

“Now,” he whispered.

Virginia exhaled in a great bellowing breath.

And the arrows stopped, hanging suspended over the stricken crowd, caught by an invisible wall of air.

Everyone in the crowd and along the walls fell utterly silent.

Then the wind shifted, and the hundreds of arrows turned in the air to face the opposite direction. With another burst of wind, they screamed into the massed ranks of armored warriors standing before the prison walls, mowing them down in a clatter of metal and armor.

On top of the walls, watching the guards fall beneath him, Aten nodded. “I am glad you made me wait to see that. What will you do now, Ard-Greimne?” he asked. “It looks like about three-quarters of your troops are dead, and I’m not sure how keen the rest will be to fight. And do you know, I believe it was a human who did that to you.” He nodded toward the Pyramid of the Sun, which was now speckled with fires. “Where will you go?”