The Zeitgeist, meanwhile, seemed to have tired of this barrage of nonsense. It knocked aside a flock of Tar Geese and turned toward Sophie, its eyes narrow. With a great roar, it charged straight for her—claws over its head, its mouth wide and crackling. Sophie fell backward, staring up into the gaping maw—a swirling vortex of molten books.
Sophie felt herself pulled backward as Akrasia dragged her to safety. “We must get you out of here, my cub.”
Sophie looked through the smoke ahead to the towers of old Bustleburgh. There was a chance they could escape in the crypts beneath the streets, but first they had to get there. “To the alley!” she said, pointing toward an ancient stone archway. Beyond that point lay the twisting passages of Olde Town. Sophie knew those streets better than any person in Bustleburgh. Surely she could lose the beast there.
Akrasia lowered her head and raced beneath the archway. The air whipped Sophie’s face as they descended a curving stairway, and she had to close her eyes to stop from getting dizzy. “To your left!” Sophie cried, looking up just in time. Akrasia sprang off a barrel and turned a sharp left down a covered footbridge.
The Zeitgeist was still following them, but it was having trouble navigating the narrow alleys. Sophie could hear thousand-year-old stones crumbling as the beast tore at the walls of Olde Town.
They reached the entrance of the crypts to find that it had already collapsed—blocking their path. Akrasia slowed, panting. Her body was shaking, and it was clear that she had sustained injuries from their flight. Sophie let go of the tigress’s collar and spilled onto the cold cobblestone. The Four Questions were still floating around her, though they, too, looked tired.
A distant roar rang out and the ground beneath Sophie shook as the Zeitgeist toppled another ancient building—the academy, perhaps? “It’s impossible,” she said, trying to claw through the rubble. “I’ve tried everything I could think of to stop it, and nothing works.”
“Perhaps you are asking the wrong question,” Akrasia said through labored breaths. She was limping, and Sophie could see a deep gash along her side where she had been cut by falling rock. “Perhaps it is not a matter of what but who?”
The tigress seemed to be saying more than Sophie could understand. “If you know something, just spit it out,” she said.
Akrasia’s striped tail wove back and forth above her. “It is the question I asked the first moment I met you. The question we all must answer.” She stared hard at Sophie, her yellow eyes flashing. “Who are you?”
This was hardly the time for riddles, but Sophie had no better options. “Who am I?” she said. At once, The Book of Who moved in front of her and opened its cover. It flipped to an entry in the very middle—
SOPHIE QUIRE: Daughter of Coriander Quire. The Bookmender of Bustleburgh. The Last Storyguard.
For a brief moment Sophie had thought Akrasia’s question might actually lead to a solution. But that hope was dashed as soon as she read the entry—the very same entry she had seen when she first discovered the book. “Nothing!” she said, showing Akrasia the page. “It says I’m a Storyguard. But what good is a Storyguard against that thing?”
Akrasia, however, did not look discouraged. She stared at Sophie, her cat eyes growing brighter. “Look closer, my cub.” She placed a silver paw on the page. “You are not merely a Storyguard. You are the Storyguard—the last of your kind.”
Sophie stared again at the words. “But what does that mean?”
“Even when the beast killed Prigg, it did not harm the books.” Akrasia’s voice sounded more urgent—the excitement of someone discovering a new thought as they spoke. “Perhaps that was not an error?”
Sophie stared at the four books moving slowly around her. “The Four Questions,” she said. “The Zeitgeist doesn’t want to eat them.”
Akrasia crouched beside her. “Perhaps the beast understands what we do not—that these books are the source of its power. And if it was the magic within these books that created the beast, perhaps that same magic can destroy it.” She tilted her head to meet Sophie’s eyes. “Do you understand what I am saying, my cub?”
Sophie remembered what the books had told her when she asked what could destroy the Pyre.
“The Four Questions,” she whispered. “They can stop the Pyre.” It felt as if her heart had ceased beating. And her mouth felt very dry. She swallowed. “If I want to destroy the monster . . . I have to destroy the books.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
THE LAST STORYGUARD
Sophie stared at the four books circling around her—Who, What, Where, and When. The books she had struggled so hard to find. The books her mother had died protecting. The thought of throwing them into the Pyre, of just letting them burn, made her sick. “I can’t destroy them,” she said, backing away from Akrasia. “I’m the Storyguard—”
“The last Storyguard,” Akrasia said. “And this is your final task. The furnace is waiting. You need only to cast them into the flame.”
“The books won’t burn,” Sophie said. “Papa tried it in the shop.”
“Perhaps they will not burn in an ordinary fire. But that monster is far from ordinary. Its flames are themselves magical—their only purpose is to consume other magic. If anything can destroy the Four Questions, it is that beast.” Akrasia took a step forward. “You must try, my cub.”
Sophie knew in her deepest of hearts that Akrasia was right. She knew that if she were reading her own story, she would see the truth of what must happen. She reached out and drew the Four Questions into her arms, holding them tightly to her chest. The screams, the destruction, the raging Pyre all melted away. All she could think of were the countless pages that she would never read, countless wonders that she would never summon. In a single moment, all those stories would be lost forever. Along with her own hope of summoning—or trying to summon—her mother. Of seeing her one last time. “But a world without these books . . .” she said. “It will be the very thing Prigg wanted all along.”
“Prigg was correct on one count,” Akrasia said. “The books are too dangerous for this world. Where Prigg has fallen, countless more like him will rise up. You have seen what the hearts of common men can yield for the world of magic.” She met Sophie’s eye. “The books must be destroyed, my cub.”
“My mother died to protect these books,” Sophie said. “I can’t just destroy them.” Flecks of burning embers rained down around her. She stared up at the city—a once-shining beacon reduced to ruin. All because of these books. She closed her eyes. “I’m sorry, Mama . . .”
The ground rumbled beneath her as the Zeitgeist’s roar echoed close by. “We have to get to its mouth,” she said. “That’s the only way to reach the heart of the Pyre.”
There was a deafening crash as the wall directly behind them burst into rubble. Flames spilled out, surrounding Sophie as the Zeitgeist towered over them—so tall that it blocked out the sky. Crackling books spilled from the beast’s open mouth like flaming drool.
Akrasia lowered her back for Sophie to mount. “Let’s draw it out into the open,” she growled. “Before there’s no city left to save!”
Sophie grabbed hold of Akrasia’s collar. The tigress leapt between mounds of flaming rubble. But before they could slip through the passageway—crash!—a fresh pile of rubble blocked their path. “We’re trapped,” Akrasia said, snarling.
“Not for long,” Sophie said, looking at The Book of What. As if reading her very thoughts, the book opened wide to an entry—the very entry she had wanted. “What are wings?” she cried.
Sophie had not been sure how the wings might appear, but when she spoke the word, she heard Akrasia snarl and falter in her steps. There was a ripping sound as golden feathers sprouted from the tigress’s mighty shoulders, gleaming in the light of the Pyre.
“Akrasia,” Sophie said, awestruck. “You look magnificent.”
“I look ridiculous,” she growled, racing forward. “But let us fly.”
Sophie held on to A
krasia’s collar with both hands. The tigress raced the length of the alley straight toward the wall of flaming rock, her wings flapping with broad strokes. The first moments were tense, and it looked as if they might not take to the air, but then a gentle breeze came beneath them, and Sophie felt both the tigress and herself lift off the ground and over the rubble.
The Zeitgeist thundered after them, swinging its long arms, trying to knock Akrasia from the air. The winged tigress swooped and ducked between the flames, climbing higher and higher into the broiling sun.
“We’re flying!” Sophie cried, clinging to Akrasia for all her worth. The books were still moving with her, spinning faster now—so fast they were a blur. Wind whipped her face, whether from the Pyre or their speed, she could not tell. She clenched her eyes shut, afraid to see the ground so far below. Then she forced herself to open her eyes, seeing the burning rooftops all across the city. Bustleburgh looked like a battlefield, littered with rubble and ash. Crowds of tiny, screaming people were staring up—all of them pointing at her. And there, looking up from the front of the crowd, was one pair of emerald-green eyes.
Akrasia beat her golden wings, climbing even higher until the air became thin around them. Sophie peered at the mouth of the beast, now directly below them—a swirling cauldron of crackling storybooks. The heat was so great that she could feel the ends of her hair singeing. She couldn’t help but think that this was the very same thing that Prigg had seen right before being eaten alive. She let go of Akrasia’s collar with one hand and drew the Four Questions into her arm, holding them to her chest. “I’m ready,” she said.
“Hold tight, my cub!” Akrasia shouted, and swooped toward the chasm.
Sophie forced herself to keep her eyes open as they hurtled into the Zeitgeist’s open mouth. The heat was like nothing Sophie had ever imagined. It felt as if her insides were boiling. She screamed as Akrasia’s collar seared her hand, the golden chain bursting into flame. Sophie felt a jolt as Akrasia’s body keeled to one side—her golden wings burning into nothing. The books, still in Sophie’s arms, were now glowing red, searing her hands, her chest, but Sophie refused to let go—not until they reached the heart of the Pyre.
She screamed as her body slipped away from Akrasia and fell deeper into the crackling depths, the Four Questions still clasped in her arms . . .
When Peter Nimble saw Sophie and Akrasia fly into the air, it was unlike anything he had ever experienced. He had encountered many wonders in his life but seen very few. And the image of this girl riding on the back of a winged tigress, soaring up over a flaming Zeitgeist, was more majestic than anything he could have imagined. His heart was racing so fast it was as though he were up in the air with Sophie.
But the wonder of this sight quickly gave way to terror when that same girl and tigress plunged headlong into the open mouth of the beast, disappearing into the flames. “Sophie!” Peter cried.
The Zeitgeist released a terrific howl, spinning its body around. The ground beneath Peter shook as the beast stumbled forward, lurching to one side. It roared, twisting its body as if in terrible agony, books spilling from its maw. “We have to save her before she’s burned alive!” Peter shouted, fighting his way past the gawking crowd.
“Wait,” Sir Tode called from inside Peter’s burgle-sack. “I think it’s weakening.” Slowly, astonishingly, the Zeitgeist began to crumple in on itself, growing smaller.
Peter stopped, his mouth open. The mighty beast howled and thrashed, and with each turn its body continued to shrink. “She’s killing it,” he said. The Zeitgeist kept compressing itself, and then, with a final roar, it burst like a firecracker. Peter was knocked onto his back as tens of thousands of charred books shot high into the air in a slow arc and then rained down on the streets below like so much flaming confetti. People ducked for cover, hiding beneath bridges and awnings to stay clear of the falling nonsense.
Peter scrambled to his feet and ran with Sir Tode to the place where the Zeitgeist had been. They found a huge, charred mountain of books—many of them miraculously intact, pages flickering like dying embers. “By Jove, she did it,” Sir Tode said. “She really did it.”
“Sophie!” Peter cried, racing toward the smoldering wreckage. “SOPHIE?” There was a brief, agonizing stillness as he searched for any sign of life. He tore through piles of burning books—not caring about the burns on his hand and legs, only caring about her. “She’s not here,” he said, falling to his knees. But then he turned and saw that Sir Tode was staring out at the river, waving a hoof over his head.
“Storyguard, ho!” he cried.
Peter turned around to see Sophie and Akrasia climbing onto the deck of the lighthouse, soaking wet but very much alive.
You have doubtless read many scenes in which two young heroes race toward each other and indulge in some sort of amorous embrace. This did not happen to Peter and Sophie. In fact, by the time the two children were standing face-to-face, they had each become rather shy and somewhat tongue-tied.
Sir Tode, however, had words enough for everyone. “Huzzah! Huzzah!” the knight exclaimed, clopping between them as they met on the smoldering pier. “A death-defying plunge into the belly of the beast. I can’t wait to write this one down! You simply must tell me what it was like inside that crackling inferno—ooh! That’s a good title for a chapter, don’t you think?”
Sophie and Peter did not answer. They walked together through the demolished streets, their hands not quite touching, while Sir Tode trailed behind them, already composing the first lines of what would come to be known as his greatest chapter.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
ALL CHARMS GUARANTEED
The end of the Pyre brought a calm over Bustleburgh that the city had not seen for many years. A gentle breeze came off the mountains and blew the soot from people’s eyes. Overhead, the dark clouds broke, and a soft, cool rain sprinkled down on the city, washing away the ashes, quenching the last of the fires.
Sophie was proud, but not too proud to accept Peter’s help as she limped through the streets. The Four Questions—which had ignited within the Zeitgeist—had left painful burns along her chest and arms, burns that would need medicine and time to heal. Akrasia, too, had been badly injured. Her silver coat was now charred and black, and there were two ugly scars where her golden wings had been burned away from her body. But for the first time in twelve years, she was free of the widow’s might and her step was lighter than Sophie had ever seen.
Virtually every person in the city had seen Sophie and Akrasia’s flight into the mouth of the beast. And they now crowded around her, many reaching out their hands to touch the robe of the girl who had rescued them. Even those who distrusted nonsense had to grudgingly accept that they were grateful for her sacrifice. It was from the heart of this crowd that Sophie heard a familiar voice call her name. “S-S-Sophie?”
It was her father. His clothes were tattered and charred, his face drawn. He looked like a man who had just seen his only child burned alive (which, to be fair, he was), and to behold her now left him trembling. “Is it really you?”
“Papa!” Sophie let go of Peter’s arm and rushed to meet him. “Papa! I did it.” She wrapped her arms around him. “The books are gone.”
“My child, my sweet, stubborn child.” He kissed her on the head over and over again, and Sophie could feel his warm tears on her skin.
“It’s over,” she said, burying her face in his frail chest. “It’s all over.”
“It is not quite over, little bookmender.”
Sophie looked up to see Madame Eldritch standing apart from the crowd. The woman’s face bore a familiar expression—the expression of someone who wields a secret that she knows you would like to hear. “What is it?” Sophie asked her, letting go of her father. Whatever dreadful thing the woman was preparing to reveal, it could not be worse than what Sophie had already endured.
Madame Eldritch ran one finger along Taro’s hand. “As you know, I happened to be in the Professor’s l
ibrary when you were captured by the Inquisitor. Which means I heard what Prigg said about how he stabbed your mother.”
Sophie thought of Prigg’s face as he described plunging his blade into Coriander’s heart. Even now that he was dead, even after hearing his final screams in the mouth of the Zeitgeist, she knew he had not suffered enough. “And?”
Madame Eldritch raised one eyebrow into a perfect arch. “And it is just as I told you that night so long ago in my carriage: If your mother used the charms she purchased from me, then she was not so easily slain.”
Sophie’s father placed a protective arm around his daughter. “Why would you say this to us? I found her cold body—I held it in my arms.” His voice was hoarse and shaking. “Doctors examined her!”
Madame Eldritch flicked a hand. “Do not speak to me of doctors. Did doctors rescue you from the quickbramble? Did doctors save this city from ruin?” She stepped closer to him. “Where is she now?”
Sophie’s father shook his head. “I laid her in the Quire crypt.”
“And in all this time, did you ever visit her?”
He inched back, running a hand through his thin hair. “It’s troublesome luck to trouble the dead,” he said. “Besides, I had the shop and Sophie and . . .” He lowered his head. “And I was afraid of what seeing her like that would do to me.”
“After what has transpired this day, I should think we are all beyond fear.” Madame Eldritch turned and walked into the hazy light. “Let us visit her now.”
Sophie and her father followed the woman to a canal at the far end of Olde Town. The main entrance had been destroyed, but Madame Eldritch showed them a different, older path hidden in the canal wall. They wandered together through the dark catacombs. Bodies were laid in stone tombs, which were sealed with binding cloth. Thanks to the rampaging Zeitgeist, many of the city’s streets had collapsed in on themselves. For the first time in centuries, daylight shone into the tombs, which were thick with cobwebs and dust.
Sophie Quire and the Last Storyguard Page 29