Warrior Genius

by Michael Dante DiMartino

  “Calm down or we’re both going to fall!” Milena shouted. “We got you!”

  “Th-thanks…” Enzio said, trembling.

  Milena craned her head back and took in his frightened face, which was a mess of bruises and welts. His skin was sweaty and pale. What must he have gone through? She would have to get the story later.

  “Where’s Giacomo?” she said.

  Enzio looked back up at the ship. “She has him in a cabin. She’s trying to take control of him!”

  Lavanthi flicked the reins, and her horse-Genius ascended. When they reached the ship, Govind, Azad, Devika, and Kavita were trading volleys with the Zizzolan soldiers, keeping them away from Savino and Yaday.

  Lavanthi’s horse-Genius landed on the deck, just long enough for Milena and Enzio to dismount. Then Lavanthi returned to the air, joining her warriors in fending off Nerezza’s troops. Milena looked around for her own Genius, and right on cue, Gaia swooped onto Milena’s shoulder. They hurried over to Savino and Yaday.

  “You’re alive!” Savino’s eyes widened at the sight of Enzio. But they didn’t have time to catch up right now.

  “Enzio says Giacomo’s back there!” Milena told them, pointing to a cabin below the quarterdeck. The door had been broken open, and Milena caught a glimpse of Giacomo restrained on a table, Nerezza looming over him. She found it odd that Victoria held her perch on the deck above the cabin, ignoring the threat of the horse-Geniuses.

  Unless Nerezza needs her Genius to take control of Giacomo, Milena realized. “Come on, we have to hurry!”

  As they raced toward the back of the ship, two mountainous men—identical in appearance—came at them with their swords drawn. Milena and Savino fired off strands of green and blue from their Geniuses, blasting the soldiers back and disarming them. As the soldiers climbed to their hands and knees, Enzio ran over and kicked each one in the gut, making them groan.

  “That’s for turning me over to Nerezza!” Enzio shouted, then he grabbed one of their swords and kept running.

  Their path looked clear until Zanobius dropped down from one of the masts, blocking them. His hands were formed into four fists—one for each of us, Milena thought darkly.

  Yaday jumped between Milena and Savino, pointing his bellows at Zanobius. He pumped the handles, expelling a powdery cloud from the nozzle that enveloped his target. The Tulpa coughed, slowing his pace, then staggered. Finally, he dropped to his knees.

  “Nice work, Yaday!” Savino shouted.

  But then Zanobius rose back up, holding his head like he was dizzy. He shook off the effects of Yaday’s sleeping powder and went at him. Yaday frantically pumped the bellows again and to his horror found it empty. Savino fired off a blast from Nero, but Zanobius ducked, and the light sped past him.

  Zanobius grabbed Yaday and threw him overboard. Milena rushed to the edge in time to see Yaday hit the ship’s huge canvas wing and bounce across its surface. He yelped and flailed, yet somehow had the wherewithal to take hold of one of the wing’s wooden struts.

  “Hang on!” Milena shouted.

  Yaday was splayed out on top of the slowly flapping wing. “I’m trying!”

  Milena heard a roar and the hum of energy. She turned from Yaday long enough to glimpse Zanobius tackling Savino to the deck. Trails of blue dissipated into the sky. Savino’s Genius screeched and clawed at Zanobius until the Tulpa reached behind and grabbed Nero by the neck, then flung him into some crates. Savino went limp as well.

  Milena’s legs felt weak, but she pushed away the fear and raised her brush. Above her, Gaia let out a panicked squawk.

  “Go help Giacomo!” Enzio called out. “I’ll deal with Zanobius!” He swiped his sword, but Zanobius grabbed it out of his hand and bent it in half. “Never mind!”

  Milena swiped her brush in long, forceful strokes, and a viridescent wave spread out from Gaia’s crown, smacking into Zanobius and sending him sprawling. Enzio scrambled to Milena’s side.

  “See that guy on the wing?” Milena said. “Yaday’s with us. Pull him in while I cover you.”

  Enzio grabbed a coil of rope and tossed one end over the rail. As soon as Yaday had a grip on the rope, Enzio began to reel him in.

  A growl caught Milena’s attention, and she turned back to Zanobius, who was on his feet again. But as he came toward her, she noticed he was staggering. He blinked repeatedly and held his head, apparently still fighting off the residual effects of the sleeping powder. Milena lifted her brush straight overhead, then arced it down. Gaia projected a glimmering emerald shield in front of her. As Zanobius lunged at Milena, he came up hard against the field of energy and was repelled. On his next advance, he hammered the shield with his fists. The impacts rippled through the light, but the barrier held. For now …

  A flurry of movement caused Milena to glance toward the back of the ship, where Victoria had splayed her wings and was peering down into the cabin through an opening that had appeared in the quarterdeck.

  The giant bird-Genius’s gem glowed brightly, searing a spot in Milena’s vision. Then Victoria directed a beam into the cabin and drowned Giacomo in light.

  37

  UNBOUND

  After the initial shock of the poison in his system, Giacomo had regained his senses. From outside came the muffled sound of gun blasts. The humming of sacred geometry attacks. The whinnies of horses. The screeching of a falcon. The noises mixed and were amplified into a sonic rush, filling Giacomo’s ears with the clamor of battle.

  His friends had come to rescue him.

  Now Giacomo became aware of a cranking, mechanical noise, and the roof parted, sending a howling wind through the cabin. He stared through the opening at the passing clouds and found Victoria’s bulbous yellow eyes gazing back at him. She unfurled her wings, blocking out most of the waning daylight, then bared her fangs and growled.

  Nerezza swiped her brush, and Victoria’s gem lit up, forcing Giacomo to look away. Squinting, he gazed beyond the broken door and found a sight that nearly stopped his heart: Zanobius beating his fists against a green shield that Milena and Gaia struggled to maintain; behind her, Enzio leaning over the rail, pulling hard on a rope; and Savino lying sprawled on the deck, knocked unconscious.

  “Your friends are too late,” Nerezza said. “No one can save you now!” She made a series of sharp strokes with her brush, and the violet light in the cabin intensified. When the glow finally died down, Giacomo saw an octahedron hovering over him.

  “Bound to me through the Creator’s Pattern and the energy of the five Universal Solids…” As Nerezza chanted, she lowered the octahedron’s shimmering point closer to Giacomo’s chest. “You are a Tulpa. My creation. Mine to order. Mine to control!”

  She drove the Solid into Giacomo like a sword. Agony seared through him.

  One after another, Nerezza brought each of the Universal Solids to light and plunged them into Giacomo, their bladed edges carving through every muscle, every bone.

  When the tetrahedron disappeared into Giacomo’s flesh, it was like a thousand of Xiomar’s needles being driven into him at once. The pain eventually became so intense he turned numb to it. And as the final Solid—the cube—shimmered over him, Giacomo’s eyes rolled into the back of his head.

  His mind began to drift far, far away …

  * * *

  When Giacomo came to, the ship, Victoria, and Nerezza had all vanished, replaced by the vast cosmos. He floated in place, stars in every direction. Bands of light formed a barrier around him, and it took him a moment to recognize the shape of his luminous cage—an octahedron.

  Giacomo tried to punch through the Solid, but its shimmering face sent a shock through his fist and up his arm. He kicked at one translucent triangular wall, but the energy shoved back.

  Sensing someone else’s presence, Giacomo turned to find an enormous, glimmering cube suspended across from him. Within it was a tetrahedron, and inside that was a dodecahedron, followed by an icosahedron, the shapes all nested inside one another; at
its center hovered Zanobius, limbs slack, eyes closed, like he was floating unconscious in a tank of water.

  Outside the walls of Giacomo’s octahedron, shimmering triangles appeared, taking the form of the icosahedron. He frantically tried to figure out a way to break free before he was encased in his own sacred geometry fortress, compelled to obey Nerezza’s every command.

  I’m not strong enough to escape on my own, he thought.

  You’re not alone, a woman answered, her voice soft and serene.

  We’re here for you, a man’s deep, calm voice followed.

  He might not have been strong enough to escape Nerezza’s mind-prison by himself, but Giacomo’s parents were with him.

  He closed his eyes, focusing on the sounds of his parents’ voices, and all his training with Yaday came back to him.

  His breathing calmed …

  His heartbeat slowed …

  His muscles relaxed …

  A sense of peace swelled through him …

  And his fear floated away like clouds in a cool autumn wind.

  When Giacomo opened his eyes, the Solid rippled, and an image of his old home gleamed on its surface. His mother sat in a chair, smiling down at a baby she rocked in her arms. His father leaned over her and stroked the baby’s head with his finger.

  You’re not alone, his mother reassured him.

  We’re here for you, his father said.

  And you have all the strength you need inside you, his mother said. We created you in the spirit of love and hope.

  And to withstand any challenge, his father said resolutely. Resistance flows through your blood, my son.

  Giacomo couldn’t believe what he was seeing. He had glimpsed his parents before in dreams, but nothing like this. He seemed to be witnessing a memory, but it couldn’t be his own. He had only been a baby.

  It must be their gems, Giacomo realized.

  The energy from Amera’s and Orsino’s gems was coursing through Giacomo. It had made him vulnerable to Nerezza’s will, but maybe it also was allowing him to reconnect with his parents’ past. He thought of all he could learn about how they had created him, and why. He longed to see more, to know more. But if he didn’t break free now, he wouldn’t get another chance.

  He let the memory go, and the image on the Solid’s surface faded.

  Giacomo thrust his fist forward again, and this time, the octahedron shattered into shards of light. It had worked!

  As the final pieces of the icosahedron locked into place, Giacomo launched himself through the air and smashed those too. Letting his momentum carry him, Giacomo hurtled toward the next Solid that was forming—the dodecahedron. Giacomo drew his knees to his chest and kicked, driving his feet through the barrier in a flash of light. He sailed across space as a large tetrahedron crystallized around him. Giacomo readied his next strike, then glimpsed Zanobius’s prison, its tetrahedron flickering and beginning to vanish.

  Giacomo rammed both fists into the face of his tetrahedron, disintegrating it. He was almost free. Looking back, he noticed that Zanobius’s tetrahedron had glimmered back to life.

  What’s going on? Giacomo thought.

  Enormous squares appeared around him. Giacomo was like a seed encased within a massive, cube-shaped hull.

  At the same time, the cube containing Zanobius faded.

  That was when it hit Giacomo—their prisons were interlinked. What affected one affected the other, which meant …

  Nerezza can’t control both me and Zanobius at the same time.

  * * *

  Zanobius rammed his shoulder into the luminous green barrier Milena had created, and a section gave way. He read the terror on Milena’s face as she swiped her brush again, trying to repair her shield. But before Gaia could cast her light over the area, Zanobius shoved his arm through the opening and wrapped his fist around Milena’s hand, snapping her brush. Gaia squawked frantically as her gem dimmed, and the defense vanished.

  He moved in, shoving Milena against the rail.

  “Zanobius, stop!” she pleaded.

  A loop of rope cinched around Zanobius’s neck. Enzio and Yaday pulled on the other end, yanking him away from Milena. Zanobius grabbed the tether behind him, and all it took was one hard tug to propel the two off their feet. As their faces hit the deck, he placed a foot on each of their backs and pinned them down. He wrapped a hand around Milena’s throat, applying pressure until her eyes bulged and her face began to turn blue.

  On the outside, Zanobius had once again become a monster. But inside, his heart was breaking. He wished he’d never left the Blemmyes and their peaceful forest to seek revenge against Nerezza. What good had it accomplished? His quest for vengeance had only turned him back into a violent slave. If Zanobius could have hurled himself overboard, he would have, but Nerezza’s commands forbade such an act of self-destruction.

  Enzio and Yaday wriggled underfoot like dying fish. Milena grasped his wrist, trying to wrench it free as the life dimmed from her eyes. Gaia dropped onto the deck, her wings flapping desperately.

  Concentrating with all his will, Zanobius made one final attempt to break free from Nerezza.

  * * *

  As the realization swelled within him, Giacomo wavered between relief and dread. He had been so focused on his own escape, he had forgotten about his friends, who were still at Zanobius’s mercy. Even if Giacomo broke free of Nerezza’s mental prison, back in the real world he remained bound to a table. At least here, he had the power to help his friends and save Zanobius. But it meant he couldn’t save himself.

  Giacomo righted himself, slowing his approach toward the final Solid.

  His thoughts turned to those who had sacrificed themselves when he had been in danger: Niccolo, Enzio, Aaminah … He hoped that by offering himself up to Nerezza, it would give others a chance for freedom.

  He spun around and kicked, propelling himself back toward the center of the cube.

  The tetrahedron reappeared, followed by the dodecahedron. As each Universal Solid materialized inside his own prison, the corresponding shapes holding Zanobius vanished.

  By the time Giacomo returned to where he had started, the icosahedron had returned, and finally the octahedron. His prison was complete.

  He looked out at Zanobius, no longer bound by the Universal Solids. The pattern on his fellow Tulpa’s chest flared up, and then his form vanished.

  Giacomo’s senses became dull, his vision hazy. He tried to clear his thoughts, but his mind became engulfed by a thick fog and began slipping away. He felt tired …

  Yet unafraid.

  * * *

  To Zanobius’s surprise, the Creator’s Pattern was illuminated, blazing from his chest.

  His mind was torn in two, like an ax had come down in the center of his head. He’d felt this kind of splitting pain before, when Ugalino had died. Zanobius wasn’t sure what he had done to siphon away Nerezza’s power, but it seemed to have worked.

  Zanobius dropped Milena and stepped off the boys. He staggered away as the bronze melted off his torso. Sensing its bond weakening, Zanobius bashed his metal arm against the mast. Sure enough, the metal tore away and landed on the deck with a thud. Zanobius picked up the severed appendage and hurled it off the ship.

  The throbbing in his head was finally beginning to subside. He turned back to find Milena on her knees, gasping for breath.

  “Zanobius…?” She met him with a worried stare.

  “Nerezza’s out of my head,” Zanobius said, overcome with relief.

  “How did you break free?” she asked.

  “I’m not sure.” But Zanobius began to suspect there had been more at work than mere willpower.

  Enzio and Yaday picked themselves up and helped Milena to her feet. Still wary, they kept their distance.

  “If you’re not being controlled by Nerezza anymore, then help us save Giacomo and get the Sacred Tools back,” Enzio said.

  “Gladly.” Zanobius was eager to put things right.

  Milena wen
t to Savino, who had regained consciousness and was struggling to stand. “So he’s on our side again?” Savino asked skeptically.

  “Looks that way,” Milena said.

  Enzio picked up a bow and arrow that were lying on the deck, and the five of them bolted to the back of the ship, where Victoria was still looming over Giacomo, her gem pulsing dimly. The Genius saw them coming but made no move to stop them from entering.

  They raced into the cabin, and Zanobius absorbed the situation. Nerezza stood against the far wall, the Straightedge in one arm, her brush in the other, the Compass slung across her back. An unconscious Giacomo lay on the table while Xiomar unlocked the restraints.

  Zanobius read the confusion in Nerezza’s face as she took in his bronze-free appearance. “Don’t come any closer!” she shouted.

  Defiant, Zanobius marched toward her.

  “Stop!” Nerezza ordered.

  “Your commands won’t work on me anymore,” Zanobius replied.

  Nerezza glanced angrily at Xiomar. “Why didn’t you warn me I would lose control of Zanobius?”

  “I didn’t know that would happen,” Xiomar said. “I swear!”

  Nerezza scowled at Zanobius. “No matter. You’ve been replaced.” She looked at Giacomo. “Wake up, Giacomo.”

  His eyes opened.

  “Rise.”

  Giacomo sat upright, then swung his legs off the table and got to his feet.

  No, Zanobius thought. It’s not possible …

  Mico darted through the opening in the roof and hovered by Giacomo’s shoulder. Xiomar handed Giacomo a pencil, then backed out of the cabin.

  “Now, help me get rid of these intruders,” Nerezza ordered.

  To Zanobius’s horror, Giacomo pointed his pencil at Milena and the other children.

  “Yes, Your Eminence.”

  38

  ELEGY