The Maelstrom

“What are you?” he demanded. “What are you called?”

But Mina did not answer. Spreading her fingers wide, she stretched one little hand toward the demon as though she were grasping at a shiny ornament just out of reach. When she could reach no farther, the girl abruptly closed her fingers and made a fist.

Seven crowns cracked and shattered.

The King of Blys shrieked as they fell from his tangled heads in great shards of hammered gold. Upon each of the demon’s foreheads, the Rowan seal appeared, branded into his flesh as though with a hot iron. With a rending scream, Prusias fell back into the sea and fled over the waves like a vast, repulsive sidewinder.

Mina watched him go, then turned and walked to Max and David. Already, her radiance was dimming and Max realized that the little girl was wearing naught but her nightgown. She padded barefoot through the mud, lifting the gown’s hem so as not to get it dirty. Coming to them, she took each of their hands and gazed up at them, utterly oblivious of the gathering crowds.

“I have cast Prusias down,” she said.

“I should say so,” replied David.

“And I teleported,” she announced, swelling up as though this was far more noteworthy than banishing a seven-headed demon. “You can’t pretend you didn’t see! You know what that means.”

“Another trinket for your magechain,” David sighed. “You shall have it.”

She beamed, clutching their hands as though she never wanted to let go, but at last she turned toward the cliffs and watched the white gulls as they circled and soared against the dark sky.

“I have to go down to the beach,” she remarked. “My charge is waiting for me.”

“How do you know he is there?” asked David.

“Max can say,” she replied, gazing absently at the dark ocean.

“ ‘When the gulls cry out and the waters run red, he’ll rise from the sea to find me,’ ” said Max softly, recalling the girl’s prophecy.

“And he has,” she declared excitedly. “Take me down!”

“I’ll take you,” said David. “I want to see your charge. And there may be something else of interest down there.” He turned to Max. “Can you come?”

“No,” said Max, glancing back at Trench Nineteen. “I have other things to do.”

“But can you even walk?” wondered David, glancing doubtfully at Max’s leg.

“I can ride.”

And indeed he could. As David and Mina departed, Max called out to a nearby knight and asked to borrow his horse. The man helped Max into the saddle. The climb up was agony, but the pain was manageable once he was settled and so long as he kept his mount to a walk.

Max rode to the embankments along Trench Nineteen, to the section where smoke and steam were still rising in little wisps. Peering down into the trench, Max braced himself for the worst.

But YaYa was nowhere to be seen.

Stunned, Max looked up and down the trench. Was he in the right place? Surely he was. There was no mistaking that crater of compacted earth and the smoke still rising from its depths. Prodding with his spear through the wreckage of soil and splintered stakes, Max even saw little pools and droplets of blood. But YaYa herself was missing.

Did ki-rin disappear when they died? Did they simply burn up like rakshasa?

There was no time to solve this mystery. Tugging on the reins, Max rode through the crowds along the ruin of the citadel walls. There was so much commotion, so many cries of jubilation and people streaming past. One group of ecstatic revelers was more than a little stunned when Max snarled at them to move even as they clustered around to thank him.

His eyes were constantly scanning the milling masses for Scathach. He barely noticed Old Tom chiming the Westminster Quarters or the colorful bursts as flares and starbursts exploded overhead. Pushing through, he shouted Scathach’s name and gazed about in search for her. Even in this moment of spectacular triumph, Max’s heart was breaking.

The dread was numbing. Max had not experienced anything like it since he’d found his father bleeding to death in an icy stream. He yelled Scathach’s name again, gazing wildly, frantically about. So many faces surrounded him and yet none was the one he sought.

He was approaching the citadel’s northwest section, riding in the shadow of the ruined walls, when the crowds finally began to thin. There was still an ungodly amount of commotion—ringing chimes and blaring horns and great bursts of fireworks over Old College—but Max could now see each face as people ran past to join the celebration.

As he rounded a tower’s remains to head for Westgate, Max reined the horse to a halt as a family passed by. The father was laughing, holding the hand of one child while his wife tried to corral an escaped toddler who was stumbling after some giggling lutins. Max watched them go and was about to urge the horse onward when a rider caught his eye. Gazing up, Max saw Scathach coming toward him.

She was on a different horse and looked wearier than he’d ever seen her, but when their eyes met, the maiden smiled and stood tall in her stirrups. Max’s sorrow and dread evaporated. He had never felt such a rush of pure, unmitigated joy. All pain was forgotten as he shook the reins and wheeled his horse toward her. He called her name, grinning wildly and urging his horse into a trot.

As they closed, Max heard someone behind cry out his name. He had no intention of stopping, until the person yelled again with such terrible urgency he could not ignore it. Stopping, he turned around to see someone tearing through the crowds after him. As the person raced past the family, Max finally glimpsed her face.

The person was Scathach.

“Morkun i-tolvatha!”

Even as Max heard those terrible words, he realized his folly. Whipping back around, Max merely glimpsed Scathach’s smiling imposter as the mounted assassin swung the blade meant to decapitate him.

With a deafening roar, a huge black blur crashed in from the side.

Max was merely knocked off his startled horse, but the false Scathach was nearly pulverized as YaYa took her to the ground in a furious assault. Arms and legs were pinned instantly. There was a popping of blistering flesh and a piercing, ungodly scream came from the assassin’s throat. Max had never seen YaYa so enraged; the ki-rin was shaking violently, her jaws slavering mere inches from Scathach’s terrified face.

Already that face was changing. William Cooper’s own rough, brutal features were emerging as though YaYa were drawing them forth. The Agent’s eyes were black as pitch, his skin cadaverously pale. There were more popping sounds as smoke billowed off of the man’s body. Cooper screamed again as though he were being burned at the stake. With furious effort, he tried to writhe free, but the ki-rin was much too strong.

The real Scathach’s arms gently closed about Max’s shoulders as she crouched behind him.

“YaYa’s killing him,” Max said, utterly stunned and horrified by the scene.

“No,” Scathach whispered, holding him close. “She’s saving him.”

Max was not so certain. YaYa’s teeth were bared, and she was growling with such ferocity that she looked capable of suddenly tearing out Cooper’s throat. The man had ceased struggling and now merely offered a bloody smile.

“Go ahead!” he goaded. “There’s always another—”

With another roar, YaYa impaled him.

When her horn pierced his shoulder, Cooper’s scream was like nothing Max had ever heard before. Nearby spectators covered their ears and drew away. Fiery symbols erupted on Cooper’s skin, evil runes and symbols Max had glimpsed in David’s grimoires. Cooper was weeping now, pleading with the ki-rin to simply kill him.

But YaYa was unmoved.

At last Cooper’s screams and pleas ceased. He simply lay still on the wet grass and took slow, sputtering breaths while smoke hissed and crackled about the ki-rin’s broken horn. As the fiery symbols faded, Cooper’s eyes returned to their clear, pale blue. His hand twitched, and YaYa raised her bleeding foreleg to release it. Tears ran down the man’s scarred, ruined face as he stroked the ki-rin’s muzzle. His voice was barely audible.

“Tell them I’m sorry.”

When he closed his eyes, YaYa slowly withdrew her horn from his shoulder.