Crisanta Knight: The Lost King

by Culbertson, Geanna;

  “Crisa!” Jason shouted as the Jolly Roger rocked from side to side, and up and down. “Maybe you shouldn’t have said bronco!”

  The six of us were thrown across the cell again and again. Daniel and I managed to grab hold of some of the nearest bars, but SJ was thrust straight into another cell across the corridor.

  “SJ!” I called. I clung on to the bars and glanced over my shoulder toward the porthole. I could see straight outside. We were about to reach the wormhole. Daniel noticed the same thing.

  “Knight, make it level off!”

  Once again I poured magic into the boat. I closed my eyes and said my commands in my head this time. I ordered the Jolly Roger to keep flying, but to stop going crazy and halt beside the portal. Fresh golden energy flooded into the boat, and the rocking ceased.

  I cracked a kink in my neck and rolled my shoulders back.

  Hm. This is awesome.

  I still felt the strain of my magic every time I used it, especially with the more difficult tasks. But the repercussion was different. Every time I’d used my magic in the last hour, afterward I felt stronger instead of weaker. The sensation was invigorating and made me second-guess Merlin’s advice about reining it in. As is, it felt like I had nowhere to go but up.

  SJ wobbled out of the cell she’d been flung into.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  “No, Crisa,” she said sternly. “Next time, please try to think through your magical commands. I almost lost my head.”

  “If you didn’t lose your head in Wonderland, I doubt you’d lose it here,” Blue commented.

  We both stared at her, and she frowned. “Alice in Wonderland? Queen of Hearts reference? Anybody?”

  “Hilarious,” SJ huffed. “But now is not the time.”

  “Let’s go,” Kai called to us. She and Jason were already at the hatch that led out of the brig.

  “Looks like a good number of pirates got chucked overboard,” Jason declared. “The ones left are disoriented and trying to figure out what’s happening, but they’ll definitely still try and kill us if they spot us. So instead of running, let’s cut across the boat as inconspicuously as we can and delay drawing their attention.”

  We agreed and climbed up the staircase. The top deck was in disarray. Pirates were leaning over the sides of the ship, looking for their fallen comrades. Others were messing with rigging and sails to try and gain control of the ship. They were all freaking out that it was flying.

  The area where we arose was clear, and we ducked behind barrels as we edged closer to the bow. The ship was less than fifty feet from the wormhole. We had just reached the foremast when someone cried out.

  “Hey, you’re that girl!”

  Here we go.

  I rolled my eyes and pivoted with one hand on my hip to meet the gaze of the pirate who’d spotted us. It was Captain Hook’s first mate. He’d shaven since we’d last met, and he no longer had a parrot on his shoulder. Maybe it’d gotten roasted in the fire.

  “You’re the protagonist that set the boat ablaze!” exclaimed a balding, chubby-faced pirate, pointing in my direction.

  The other pirates stopped what they were doing. They no longer seemed to care about the flying ship, their lost pirate friends, or even the spectacular Aurora. We had their full attention, and they began to encroach on our group with bloodlust in their eyes.

  “Flattering,” I said in response. “But I can’t take credit for that one. The hero in that scenario is right here.” I gestured to SJ.

  “Present and accounted for.” She stepped in front of me as the nearest pirates began to draw their weapons. SJ had her slingshot in hand and an almost mischievous smile on her face. “Remember me, boys?”

  Before they had the chance to respond, SJ launched a purple potion at the main mast behind us. Lightning exploded from the beam and it snapped in half, falling toward the ship in flames. Many men leapt out of the way; others in the clear charged us. The whole scene became a blur of swords and men who smelled like scurvy.

  I ducked as a knife came swinging at my throat and thrust-kicked a pirate to my left. Kai abruptly appeared beside me. Her eyes widened.

  “Crisa, down!”

  I obeyed as Kai fired an arrow at a pirate in the crow’s nest. I yanked out my wand and transformed it into a spear.

  “I guess you can deduct one point from that life-saving count we’ve got going,” I kidded as Kai and I fought back-to-back.

  “Just fight, Crisa. I’m not in the mood to joke,” Kai said bitterly.

  Her tone cut me deep. She was still mad.

  I would deal with that later.

  Fresh out of arrows, Kai used her bow to smack a pirate in the jaw before dropping the weapon, pulling her sword from its sheath, and grabbing a nearby barrel lid to use as a shield.

  SJ, meanwhile, fired potions all over the deck. Daniel, Blue, and Jason formed a defensive circle around her as she encased pirates in slime and ice, and added flame to the scene with her explosion and lightning potions.

  The boat arrived next to the wormhole—massive and glowing. Our magical exit was directly past the bowsprit; we only needed to scale it and jump.

  “Crisanta Knight!”

  Why is it the only time I ever hear my full name these days is when I’m in trouble?

  I turned to see several pirates assisting Captain Hook over the railing of the vessel. He must’ve been tossed off during the ship’s bronco phase. Despite the crackling flames, the other pirates suddenly turned passive and parted as the captain approached. Hook drew a sword from his belt with his good hand and maintained a homicidal look in his eyes, both aimed at me.

  That was a bit perturbing. I tended to be our group’s leader, yes, but all of my friends had wreaked as much havoc. For Book’s sake, SJ just set his newly reconstructed boat on fire. Why were villains always out to get me personally?

  I blame the boots.

  Kai leaned in close. “A lot of people hate you, don’t they?” she whispered.

  “It’s a fairly full list, I’m not gonna lie,” I whispered back.

  “Well, isn’t this convenient?” Hook announced. “Since you and your friends nearly sank my ship, slicing your throats has become my life’s ambition. Oh, how I’ve dreamed of this moment!” His wickedness was almost gleeful.

  I rolled my eyes. “Take it down a notch, will ya? That barely happened four days ago.” In my periphery, I saw the portal starting to close.

  “Tell you what, Hook,” I said. “We’ll pass on the throat slicing for today. But since we’re in a hurry, if your men apologize for trying to kill us, maybe my friend here won’t finish blowing up your ship.”

  The captain guffawed and the group of pirates behind him boisterously echoed the cocky sound.

  “This guy’s such a jackwagon,” Blue huffed under her breath. “Now you get why punching him was on my bucket list.”

  “Quite the offer,” Hook bellowed. “But I think I’ll simply have you walk the plank instead.”

  “Suit yourself,” I said.

  I pivoted to SJ, who’d been a few feet behind me. However, when I turned, my face sank and I knew why Captain Hook hadn’t looked afraid. Two pirates who I guess had been hurled off the boat earlier had climbed up again and were holding onto the edges of the ship directly behind SJ. They reached out for her as she aimed her slingshot.

  “SJ!” My warning came too late. The pirates grabbed her arms and yanked her backward, throwing her over the side of the Jolly Roger.

  My golden glow ignited and a fresh coating of the aura consumed the boat in a second. Without me commanding it to, the vessel filled with life—angrily tilting on its side and violently cracking in half. Most of the pirates went rolling forward while my friends and I were thrust against the side of the ship. In the middle of the vessel, the floorboards had splintered to form a jagged, gaping mouth. And that mouth was now opening and closing, swallowing the pirates that fell inside its depths.

  I felt panic. Magic Instinct h
ad stepped in. I wasn’t even in immediate mortal danger and it had acted before I did. That wasn’t good. That was really not good.

  There was no time to dissect the situation. I whirled around and looked over the ship’s railing, searching for SJ.

  Thank Book!

  She had caught onto one of the ropes dangling from the side of the Jolly Roger. Jason and Daniel immediately started reeling her in. Once we’d hauled her back on deck, we took off for the bowsprit. Before I started running, I projected my will over the power tearing up the ship. I reined in the action of my Magic Instinct and commanded the boat to stop its out-of-control chomping.

  You listen to me, I ordered my magic as if it were a disobedient child.

  It took a moment, but my will was strong and I was able to focus and adjust the power. The boat calmed down and floated steadily once more.

  With my wandpin converted and clipped in place, my friends and I sprinted up the angled wooden beam at the head of the ship and went bounding through the wormhole—Kai, Daniel, and SJ disappearing first. Blue was about to dive through next, but she pumped the breaks when she saw her partner in action was not behind her. Jason ducked beneath a swinging jib and leapt back on deck. He turned and ran straight toward Captain Hook and the couple of men who were running after him.

  “Jason!” Blue called.

  He didn’t halt. Jason smacked one pirate clean off the bow with the force of his axe. He dropped low and spun to whack the legs out from under the second. Then he popped up and snatched Hook by the hook before punching the captain directly in the face. It was a beautiful shot—one for the memory books.

  “Good luck with the reconstruction, man,” Jason said—the pirate sprawled out on the deck. Blue gave Jason an incredulous look as he bounded back onto the bowsprit.

  “It was on my bucket list too,” he replied with a shrug.

  At that, the three of us jumped through the shrinking wormhole just before it was too tiny to fit through. Our next landing was not the smoothest. We found ourselves thrust onto a small sloped hill that we half-stumbled down due to the angle and abruptness. I accidentally rammed into SJ at the bottom and knocked her off her feet.

  As I helped her up, I surveyed the forest surroundings. Goodness only knew where we were in Camelot. But frankly, I didn’t care. My Hole Tracker was heating up from the sheer number of portals it projected when I called up the display. There were so many wormholes being torn open in the realm, we had our pick. The nearest one was less than a couple hundred feet away, so we bolted for it. Our feet trampled over broken branches and brambles with a satisfying crunch.

  It may have been night, but the luminescence of the Aurora created an entrancing glow nearly as strong as daylight itself that purged through the treetops. I tried my best not to look at it. The more I was aware of the Aurora, the more difficult it became to keep my magic in check. I was slipping more than I wanted to admit.

  What happened to me on the boat was unsettling. Magic Instinct had taken over so easily and powerfully. I smacked myself mentally for not seeing the truth sooner. I wasn’t feeling stronger; my magic was. In an interlude of cockiness, I’d let myself confuse the two. Now I couldn’t. The Aurora was acting like super-intense lighter fluid to my magic’s fire—increasing my range of ability but not necessarily my control. At the start of this hour, what felt like a tingle needing to be scratched had grown. With every step I took, the magic pulsed faster and harder, drawing me toward it.

  I didn’t want these thoughts to distract me now that we were so close to the climax of the evening, but I couldn’t help it. I worried that if the right trigger came along, I might lose control again and the consequences would be way worse than a pirate ship splitting in half.

  Don’t think like that. Breathe, Crisa. Just breathe, I reminded myself as I hopped into the next realm behind Jason.

  Holy bananas!

  Cloud Nine could not have been any more breathtaking. We were smack dab in the middle of the Aurora. The shifting sky was almost too brilliant to handle. Strong colors fluctuated in streaks like rivers. Stars glistened like jewels and seemed close enough to be plucked from the sky like fruit. The pink, gold, and white clouds of this realm looked like enchanted, fluffy lanterns.

  “The clouds work like trampolines,” Jason told the others. Only he and I had been to this realm before. “But only touch the pink ones!”

  Following my lead and Jason’s, the others pursued us across Cloud Nine. We did not need the Hole Tracker to guide our way. We could easily spot at least five portals opening within a five-hundred-foot radius. Hopping from cloud to cloud, we bridged the gap to the nearest one. At last, we plunged through our final portal—that which would take us to Oz.

  For once, our point of entry was convenient. Like super convenient. The wormhole ejected us a couple miles from the foot of the North Mountains. My friends and I stood at the threshold of the Plain of the Forgotten—a grand sea of yellowed grass swaying in the breeze through a forest of thin, black trees.

  On the other side of the plain was the dreaded cornfield known as the Maze of the Mindless. That was where were Glinda kept the people she’d transformed into brainless scarecrows. They were trapped there, bound to electrical stakes in the ground that would set them on fire if they were cut free. Paige Tomkins was amongst them, and I had not forgotten my promise to save her.

  While much had happened since our encounter, every detail of the woman/scarecrow was etched into my memory. Her navy irises that matched the glittery navy scarf she wore. Her heart-shaped face and short black straw hair. The way her limbs were an amalgamation of hay, straw, and mossy green human tissue. And most of all, the look of sadness and disbelief in her eyes when I’d promised that we’d come back to rescue her. I may not have known how we were going to do that—I would cross that bridge once we defeated Glinda—but I was adamant about it. We would find a way.

  The six of us raced toward the mountains, darting through the creepy-looking trees that sprouted from the grasses. Their leafless, crooked branches resembled broken limbs on contorted bodies. The vines that draped from those branches could have easily been mistaken for snakes. The trees’ voluptuous, bulbous roots gripped the earth like swollen feet.

  We veered to the right of the valley. The Maze of the Mindless was off to the left and we needed a straight shot to the mountains beyond.

  The hypnotic magic lights swirled above us ominously. I checked the time. We had forty-five minutes left in the Aurora. Forty-five minutes left to influence this story’s outcome. Nothing could stop us now.

  Or so I thought.

  There was a lantern hanging from one of the trees in the distance. I didn’t think much of it until we neared it and my friends stopped suddenly. I had been bringing up the rear of the group at the time and didn’t see the reason for their pause right away.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked as I came to a halt.

  When Daniel and Jason parted, I got a full view. The lantern hung from an oddly bent branch that cast strange shadows across the lumpy silhouette of a woman. She was leaning against the tree trunk, and her limbs were the same blackened color as the bark.

  That’s when I realized it wasn’t a woman. It was a scarecrow. All the blood drained from my face.

  “Paige!” I rushed forward and fell to my knees.

  The former Fairy Godmother had been cut down from her stake in the Maze of the Mindless and as a result, true to her warning, she’d caught fire and burned. Her silver dress was a tatter of scorched pieces; her scarf was nowhere to be seen. Her thin, charred limbs smelled like smoke and her eyes were closed completely.

  I cupped her burlap sack face in my hands and lifted it. It felt damp. In fact, her entire body was wet—like after she’d burned for a bit, someone had doused her to put out the fire then dragged her here. But why?

  “Paige,” I repeated, still holding her face.

  She didn’t answer or move. I channeled my powers and my hands lit up in fiery gold.

/>   Come back to life, Paige. Come on.

  My magic flowed through my fingers as I channeled the extra force the Aurora was filling me with. I could feel the power pouring into Paige’s body, and yet, she remained unmoved.

  “Why isn’t it working?” I shouted.

  My friends stood around me silently. They knew and so did I.

  I tried one more time—my magic glowed and consumed Paige’s body—but nothing changed. I dropped my hands. My glow went out and I just stared at her, my heart pounding. Jason knelt beside me and gently put his hand on my shoulder.

  “She’s been dead too long, Crisa,” he said. “Your window to save her . . . it must have closed.”

  “No.” I shook my head adamantly and tried again, forcing my magic to flood from me to her once more. “Come on, Paige. Please. Wake up. WAKE UP!”

  She did not stir. I extinguished my glow as the truth set in. “I told her we’d save her,” I whispered under my breath. “I promised we’d save her.”

  “Crisa,” Jason said slowly. “You can’t—”

  I put my hand up, signaling him to stop.

  The adamant, unwavering, and unfair truth about life finally set in. I’d tried to run from it so many times, including in Century City. I’d tried to outsmart, out care, and out fight it. But no amount of cleverness, kindness, or fierce-heartedness could change what so many people had tried to get me to accept along this journey. The fact lay in front of me in the form of a dead Fairy Godmother.

  “I can’t save everyone,” I said sadly.

  “Truer words have never been spoken,” said a male voice.

  I looked up but it was too late. A large net shot out of the trees and ensnared Jason and me. Another bundled up Daniel, Kai, SJ, and Blue. We were tossed to the ground in two tight heaps. A moment later, a magic hunter appeared in front of us.

  I immediately recognized him. It was one of the three hunters who’d taken Merlin’s invisibility powers—the man with the gray mustache and salt-and-pepper hair. He stretched out his hand. Silver energy consumed it and two more magic hunters became visible. They were both carrying net guns.