by Amparo Ortiz
The crystal heart flashes its white light twice, then the screen disappears.
The stone descends back into the Sire’s grasp. He hides it in his pocket while Andrew presses his eyes shut. “Rest assured, young man. Your father died before he ever knew you were on the way. I doubt he would’ve been much of a father, had he known. You dodged a bullet, Andrew Galloway. Or I should say, Andrew Barnes.”
The way he says it makes the truth sound colder, crueler. My tears come back, falling faster. A headache drills into my skull. Still, nothing hurts worse than knowing how powerless I am. I’m not a Gold Wand. I can’t get Andrew the hell out of here.
This shouldn’t be how he dies. This can’t be how he dies.
If I stall long enough, my teammates will arrive before the Sire lays a hand on Andrew.
“The man your mother cursed had been in her sights for months,” the Sire continues. “Everything she told you about their relationship was a lie. They were never together.” He nods to me. “And you, Lana Torres, are the one I wish to thank for today’s victory. I could have used Lucy Galloway as my hostage to lure Andrew here, but she’s been in hiding ever since her son’s protest. I suspect she’s in her Other Place. Plan B had been simple enough—tell my Anchor to bring Andrew to me. Then I saw how close you two were getting.” The Sire bends over until our eyes are level with each other’s. “Ask me why it had to happen this way, Lana.”
Stall as long as you can.
I whisper through my tears, “Please don’t kill him. Please. Maybe Randall can make the crystal heart finish the spell for you. It could replace the blood and—”
“Ask me why it had to happen this way.”
Andrew still has his eyes closed. Why isn’t he begging for his life? Maybe the truth has stunned him into silence? I refuse to believe he’s accepted his death so easily.
“He doesn’t have to die. There’s another way you can break the curse,” I say.
“I could help you find an alternative,” Samira offers tearfully. “I’m not as strong as Randall, but I’m smart. I swear I’ll help you. Just don’t hurt Andrew.”
“Yes!” I say. “She’s the smartest person I’ve ever met. Let her—”
“Ask him the bloody question, Lana,” Andrew says. There’s an emptiness in his voice. Like his fighting spirit has been buried miles-deep in snow. He’s convinced I won’t be able to save him—that today is his last day on earth.
“Shut up, okay? Just let me handle this.”
“You’re not handling anything,” the Sire says coolly. If he’s irritated, he’s hiding it behind a smirk. “Now ask me why it had to happen this way.”
Stalling has worked. I should keep baiting him. “Why are you controlling the Cup?”
Samira’s jaw almost hits the floor. Even Andrew is finally looking at me, tears drowning those beautiful hazel-green eyes.
“What?” he asks.
“The Sire has been playing both sides for years,” I say. “He bound President Turner to his every whim when he was still a dragon. He bound us the moment we signed our contracts.”
Andrew blushes furiously, but I suspect it’s more out of rage than shame. He’s sizing up the Sire, as if he’s readying himself to beat his ass. “Prisoners,” he says. “All along.”
With a sigh, the Sire taps me on the forehead twice. “Such an inquisitive mind.”
I’m as unmoving as the marble dragon sculptures on the Blazewrath stadium walls. “Are you trying to break every competing dragon’s Bond?”
The Sire’s hand freezes in midair. He laughs humorlessly. “You clever girl.” He drops his hand with a flourish. “Every dragon deserves to be free. Even if they can’t see a better life without their humans, I will make them accept it. They’ll join my army once they see the light.”
So my theory’s right. “You only want soldiers? Or will you use them in other ways?”
“Ask Master the right question!” Randall watches me like he’s desperate to dip me into a vat of frying oil.
“Now, now, Randall. Let the clever girl speak.” The Sire steps back without looking away from me. “I don’t fully understand your team’s dragons yet, but I know they’re not Transporting. If my Anchor were in a normal Other Place, I could still feel him in our world. But it’s as if he no longer exists. No Other Place can remove magic. If that is indeed what the Sol de Noches are doing, then their abilities could play a critical role in destroying others’ Bonds.”
No. My teammates are going to roast him and Randall any second. He won’t win.
“I answered your questions,” the Sire says. “Now ask mine.”
Fine. “Why did it have to happen this way?”
The Sire spreads his arms wide. He exhales like he’s been offered a lifetime of free vacations. “You had to be involved in Andrew’s death. This is your punishment, Lana—living with this memory.”
This sick bastard’s right. If Andrew dies here—which he won’t—his blood will be on my hands. I’m the one who asked him to come.
“Takeshi … he agreed to this …” Andrew’s voice quivers. He’s staring at the floor with those drowning eyes. Every ragged breath seems like a challenge for him.
The Sire pauses to drink in Andrew’s quiet despair. Then he waves Randall forward. “Our time with our guest of honor has ended. Kill him.”
“No!” Samira and I are one voice, but it doesn’t matter.
Randall whips out his wand. He conjures a metal cauldron as dark as his cloak. The cauldron lands inches away from Andrew. Randall then conjures the dragon hearts. Both are faded crimson, as if their vibrancy lessened after removal from their hosts’ bodies. Randall moves his wand in a complicated pattern, aiming it at the cauldron. A cloud of red smoke billows out of its edges. He tosses the hearts into the cauldron, which makes the smoke grow thicker.
The air reeks of fresh blood.
“Don’t hurt him!” I try to launch myself at Randall. The Paralysis Charm’s grip is relentless, even though he’s distracted. Each attempted thrash sends a sharp pain into my ribs, my shoulder blades. I’m screaming and crying and hoping my teammates can hear me.
But they don’t come.
Randall holds out his wand to Andrew.
“Do everything you can to get yourselves out of here,” Andrew says, his tearful gaze fixed on Randall’s wand. He might speak firmly, but his expression is as heavy as a soldier who’s lost the battle for his whole regiment. His hopelessness is tenfold now. “This isn’t on you, Lana. Forget what he said. This will never be on you. Just tell my mum that I—”
A golden lightning rod hits Andrew in the chest.
“ANDREW!” I roar till all I know is the incessant stabbing at my sides from trying to reach for him, the weight of his blood on my hands, the ashes of memories we’ll never make.
He’s doubled over, screaming as more lightning pours out of the wand’s tip. Andrew’s whole body shakes. His suit’s magic is no match for Randall’s powers. The golden lightning shifts to red, seeping out of Andrew as if he’s being drained of blood. Randall shapes the lightning into a steady stream of crimson tendrils. He spills them into the smoking cauldron, which hisses upon contact. The bigger the red cloud grows, the fainter Andrew’s screams get. I pray for him to fight this, to keep living, but he’s shrinking into a ghostly pale shell of himself.
The crimson tendrils stop coming.
Randall dumps what’s left into the cauldron. It bubbles and hisses as the cloud thickens.
Andrew lands with a thud on the floor. He’s facing me. Both eyes are pressed shut, with tears running down his sallow cheeks. No matter how hard I beg him to move, he doesn’t.
The heir of Edward Barnes is dead.
I’m a thunderstorm of cracked wails. Andrew should be meeting with reporters right now, talking about my team’s disappearance. He should be boasting about us being too afraid to play his team. He should be nagging the IBF to cancel the Cup. He should still be alive.
A dozen little e
xplosions spark. The red smoke flies out of the cauldron, swirling up to where the Sire floats in midair. Limbs sprout from the back of his coat. His silver scales elongate on either side of him, a much frailer netting piecing them together. He has his wings back. He unfurls them as his face morphs. He keeps getting bigger and bigger until he’s the largest dragon I’ve ever seen. His hands are claws, and a tail grows out from behind him, whipping side to side. He aims his fire propeller at the ceiling.
There’s a diamond-covered dragon where the Sire once was.
He’s burning a crater into the ceiling. As soon as the hole’s big enough for him to fit through, the flames disappear. The Sire flies away, announcing his return as a dragon with a mighty roar.
Your glass coffin awaits,
It’s calling out your name,
So say goodbye,
To everything you love,
Now it will all be mine.
—Poem written by Randall Wiggins, age thirteen
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
“I DID IT!” RANDALL SPINS IN PLACE. THEN HE JUMPS WITH A FIST in the air. He sprints and jumps once, twice. He’s getting farther and farther away from us, too excited to glance in our direction.
Samira grunts. She’s squirming hard again, sweating up a storm.
“What are you doing?” I whisper-yell. “You’re hurting yourself!”
“Be quiet!”
“He’s going to see—”
“Be quiet, Lana. I need to concentrate.”
Randall’s laugh stabs through whatever’s left of my heart. He clicks his heels together in a ridiculous display of euphoria. His back is turned to us as he faces the lake. “I did it!”
Samira’s shaking so much, I think she’s about to pass out. “Just … a little … more …”
“You have to stop. Whatever you’re doing, it’s hurting you.”
She keeps pushing herself to the brink, doubling over with her eyes pressed shut.
Then she stops. She’s huffing out in exhaustion as she straightens back up. Randall’s magic is still gripping her as hard as it’s gripping me.
“My master rules the skies again.” Randall walks back over to us. When he’s close enough for me to touch, he points to the hole in the roof with his wand. “Your worthless friends are about to regret their defiance. And they will—”
Samira bulldozes into Randall.
She pins him to the ground with a battle cry. Randall loses his grip on his wand.
The stabbing pressure on my body washes away in a steady stream. I lean to the left. No pain. The Paralysis Charm is no longer trapping me!
I jump to my feet. “What … how did you—”
“I don’t know! I just felt the need to charge him, and I could!” Samira kicks Randall’s wand away. It lands about four feet from where he lies. “Let me fetch my wand real quick!” She rushes off to fetch her wand, while I launch myself at Randall. Then I beat him over and over.
He slams his head against mine.
I’m knocked off of him. Even without his wand, this jerk’s strong enough to paralyze me yet again. At least he’s not gouging my eyes out like he did to that bureau-agent lady when he was a kid. “Ugh!” I’m lying on my back. The pain in my ribs and my shoulder blades smashes into each bone like a wrecking ball. Randall’s magic returns even worse than before.
He towers over me. “It feels good, doesn’t it? Your rage? It makes you think you can do anything.” Randall wags his finger. “Rage is a liar, Lana. So is hope. Your friends at the bureau taught me that. The first thing I did when I freed myself was act on rage. It didn’t make me happy. It just fanned the flames, but Master showed me true power. Revenge hurts more when it’s calculated.” He shrugs. “Too bad you’ll never avenge stupid little Andrew.”
I try to lunge at him, forgetting about the Paralysis Charm. Invisible knives slice into me. My scream could shatter an entire building made of glass. “Don’t you dare say his name again!”
Randall smiles. “Andrew. Andrew. Andrew.”
“SHUT UP!”
“What a great name, isn’t it? Andrew.”
A boulder rushes toward Randall from behind.
Randall raises his clenched fist. The boulder disintegrates. He magically yanks Samira across the habitat, and drops her directly between me and him. Samira tries to summon a fallen tree, but Randall cracks it into splinters. He laughs as he lowers her wand. Then he marches to the spot where the Sire flew outside of the habitat, twirls his wand, and aims it at us.
“I don’t know how you got free, but it doesn’t matter,” he says. “Lights out, little girls.”
A golden lightning bolt shoots out of Randall’s wand.
I thrash to no avail. “Samira, get out of the way!”
She summons a lightning bolt, too. It’s as copper as the humble weapon she wields.
BOOM!
The two lightning bolts clash, spreading outward and engulfing the two wizards in a giant ball made of magic. Part of the ball is made of copper lightning; the other half is gold. While the copper lightning flickers, the gold lightning is steady, and devours its rival inch by inch. Punishing heat swarms the habitat. Samira’s barely able to keep her wand from breaking. She shakes and sweats and doesn’t let go of the metal rod. It’s seconds away from bursting.
Randall’s the picture of poise. He’s still smiling.
“Samira, just run!” I yell. “You’re not going to die for me, too!”
“I’m not going to die, and nobody’s killing my best friend!”
She lets out an earth-rattling scream. Her wand quakes harder. The coppery color fades, as if the wand’s turning itself off. The magic ball keeps getting dimmer and dimmer. It grows smaller, too, leaving Randall out of its lightning walls. Only Samira is stuck inside.
Even if I could move, chances are I’ll get fried if I touch that ball. But I can’t have Samira’s blood on my hands, too. One loss has already ruptured my soul. I need her out of that magical prison ASAP. “Samira, get out of there right now! He’s going to kill you!”
She doesn’t listen. Her copper lightning is three inches away from her skin.
Randall blows her a kiss, leaning forward as if he’s about to jab his wand in her direction.
The lightning stops.
It’s frozen about a breath away from Samira, shaped in an electric outline of her body.
Randall jabs his wand. His lightning doesn’t move.
“What the hell?!” he spits out.
Samira’s wand doesn’t have any color left. The metal rod is translucent, worn-looking, and dead. None of us make a sound. It’s like the whole habitat has been stripped of life, along with the wand’s magic. Then the whole thing bursts into light, but it’s not copper anymore.
Samira’s wand shimmers bright gold.
“Oh my God … Samira, you …” I can’t even finish my sentence.
Samira throws all of herself into the counter spell, her screams rising as the copper lightning bolt shifts to the same gold that’s filled up her wand. It’s gold against gold now.
The ball leaves Samira behind. Now it’s traveling back to Randall at an even quicker pace. No matter how hard he tries to shove it toward Samira, the ball keeps barreling toward him. His eyes are bulging out. He’s heaving frantically, shaking his head like he’s in disbelief. “How are you doing this?! Stop!” Randall wails.
With a jab of her wand, Samira rips the ball apart in a flurry of crackling sparks.
BOOM!
Randall’s wand explodes into dust particles.
He’s in the middle of a scream when Samira strikes him in the chest with a lightning bolt. He’s launched ten feet deeper into the habitat, landing spread-eagle on the other side of the lake.
“Yes!” I haven’t laughed this hard since God knows when. Who cares if my sides are exploding with each prick of those invisible knives? Samira has to be the first witch in history to evolve from Copper to Gold. To change her wand from one level to another. Magic u
sers can’t change their wands even when their wand level evolves. Their wands just stop working. Instead, they have to buy a brand-new wand for their brand-new status.
Samira pants like she’s been running a marathon nonstop for a week. She waves her Gold wand at me. I can move again. My ribs and my shoulder blades aren’t begging for mercy.
“Are you okay?” Samira asks, watching Randall intently. He moans, so I know he’s still alive. Though it’s taking him forever to get up.
“Forget about me.” I let her help me stand. “Are you okay? That looked like it hurt a lot.”
“Not as much as he’s hurting right now. I mean, it was just a Shield Charm. I didn’t mean to do any damage.” Samira risks a smile. She lets out a soft giggle, as if she’s excited yet a little guilty about what she did to Randall. “But I guess some jerks get what’s coming to them.”
Randall is back on his wobbly feet, bleeding from his nostrils. “You … stupid … Regular-loving … Gold wannabe!” He’s closing his fist, as if he’s about to conjure a spell.
Samira yanks me behind her and raises her wand.
WHOOSH!
A white object flies past me. I don’t recognize it until it finds Randall’s stomach, stabbing him in a clean, swift blow.
Takeshi’s claw dagger.
Randall doubles over with a grunt. He unclenches his fist and pulls the dagger out. It falls to the floor with a clang. The dagger’s tip isn’t smeared in blood, though. It’s coated in a viscous liquid the color of tar—the same color Randall’s veins are turning. He stops bleeding. Randall grunts then drops on his side, hugging himself.
“Dragonshade,” Samira murmurs. “He’s been poisoned. His magic is gone.”
“He’ll be dead in three days,” someone behind us says.
I wheel around.
Takeshi exits the elevator alone. His eyes are glued to Andrew’s body.
And. He’s. Crying.
His is a silent, lonely kind of devastation. He makes it to Andrew without sparing us a glance, even though Samira’s pointing her wand at him. Even though I’m ready to knock his teeth out and demand to know what he’s done to Papi. He kneels on the floor and puts a tender hand on Andrew’s shoulder, as if he’s made of glass.