Diana’s mouth fell open. Cyrus was trying to fly away. In this storm. Pulling her gun, she began to run back down the jetty. She paused. She had her own job to do. She’d have to do it quick.
She turned back to the plane. The water was rough, too rough for any sane pilot to attempt a takeoff. But it had been too rough for any sane pilot to attempt a landing. And the wind would give the plane extra lift.
She had no time. None. And no plan. Bright, erupting fireworks continued up by the main building. She couldn’t let herself watch.
Diana looked at the gun in her hand. She had five rounds. She looked at the plane’s grinding pontoon. Three steel braces attached it to the main fuselage. They were pipes, and they weren’t very thick.
Scrambling down the rocks and through the spray, Diana hopped onto the pontoon. Pulling the hammer back on her revolver, she aimed down at where the forward brace attached to the pontoon. She fired.
A hole appeared in the metal.
Up the hill, lightning forked to the ground. The thunder washed around her, fading quickly in the wind.
Diana fired into the brace two more times, and then twice up into the plane’s engine for good luck.
She heard guns. Two tall shapes were coming down the hill. Phoenix was retreating, but where was Cyrus? Shapes were rushing out the kitchen door, and she saw muzzle flashes. A fireball swirled back up the hill but fell short, erupting into a hurricane of sparks in the wet grass. Another painted white flame across the face of Ashtown.
Diana moved down the jetty. Her gun was empty. The shapes at the top of the hill were huddling over something.
Two shapes were retreating across the airstrip. They’d be at the jetty soon. Pursuit had begun. Gunfire. White flame swirled back up the hill in reply.
Lightning struck again, but behind her, over the water. Diana covered her ears against the thunder and backed toward the plane. She didn’t want to be in the water with lightning falling, but she didn’t have much choice.
The two tall men reached the jetty — Phoenix with one green man.
Diana hopped onto the pontoon and slipped off quietly, treading water beneath the plane. She could hear yelling, but her ears were ringing from thunder and her own gunshots. The wind and waves swallowed the rest.
Fuel dripped into the water around her.
The twin dropped to his knees on the jetty, and white fire swirled back at invisible enemies. Phoenix jumped into the plane.
Spitting water, Diana wished she hadn’t emptied her gun.
A moment later, the engine sputtered to life. Diana closed her eyes against the propeller’s battering breath and wished she could cover her ears.
Cyrus stood panting in the rain beside his sister. His face was singed and blistered. Rupert Greeves and Nolan stood beside them, their clothes smoking. The guns were all empty, and every time they took a step forward, another fireball bowled up the hill, exploding in the grass while the wind whipped the flames around them.
“Cyrus,” Antigone said. “We have to get them. We can’t let him do this.”
Cyrus said nothing. Blinking away the rain, his eyes bounced between the plane and the man guarding the jetty.
The plane’s engine started. The propeller was growling, ready to pull, ready to climb. Lights were on in the cockpit. It hadn’t blown up. Where was Diana?
Tensing, he inched forward. Greeves dropped a heavy hand onto his shoulder, holding him back.
Cyrus bit his lip, tasting blood. If his brother and mother were really on that plane, he couldn’t watch them leave, not with that man, not into a storm. He didn’t have a choice. Dying would be better than watching.
A dragonfly whipped by overhead.
Rupert watched it go, then he raised two fingers to his mouth and whistled long and sharp.
Cyrus dashed down the hill.
The first fireball seemed to come in slow motion. He dropped onto the wet grass and slid through its sparks. Hopping up, he had three strides before the next one exploded at his feet.
He jumped as high as he could, flailing his arms, kicking through the heat, overbalancing as he came down. The crash became a roll, and he was up again and running.
A wave of dragonflies streaked above him. Nolan came up beside him.
The screaming pitch of the seaplane’s engine climbed, and it rocked away from the jetty, beginning to turn around in the harbor, preparing to fight the wind. The man on the jetty was finally retreating to the plane, running fluidly, spraying fire over his shoulder. A fireball exploded around a ship’s mast. Three others drifted away into the trees. The dragonflies were on him now, and he swung at them as he ran. At the end of the jetty, he launched himself easily through the air, landed on the plane’s moving pontoon, grabbed the wing, and swung himself up through the open door.
The dragonflies veered away.
Cyrus reached the wet stone. His mouth opened and his tongue crawled out as he pumped forward, every tired muscle firing, his limbs screaming as he sprinted the long stone curve. Nolan was falling behind. Rain stung. Legs burned. None of it mattered.
The plane had completely turned. It was just off the end of the jetty. The engine shrieked at the wind, and it began to pull away.
One second. Two seconds. Three.
Cyrus planted his left foot on the end of the jetty and threw himself out into the air.
He smacked into the tail and tried to hang on, his hands slipping down the wet metal, peeling open his lightning-blistered palms. And then the plane hit its first wave and shook Cyrus off. Dropping to the water, he grabbed for the pontoon, just managing to hook his left arm around the rear brace.
The plane was picking up speed, bouncing, slamming into each wave, dragging him on his back, nosing him under into the force of a waterfall, skipping him across the top like a stone.
The pontoon smashed into a wave and rose above the water.
Cyrus’s torso rose with it. His waist was free. His legs slapped into the next wave. The force jerked him loose and sent him rolling across the rough surface. Above him, free of the water and accelerating into a climb, the plane burst into flames.
Sputtering but still conscious, Cyrus watched the plane as it dropped, trying to touch back down against the windblown waves.
With a snap, the first whitecap ripped off a pontoon and sent it cartwheeling across the surface. The plane’s nose smashed into the water. Its tail rose and fell forward in a somersault.
Metal creaked and sighed. Flames trickled out onto the water.
Cyrus tried to swim toward the wreckage, but the wind was too strong for his weakened arms, and the chop of the water was too big, driving him back toward the distant shore.
Filling his tired lungs to bursting, he dove, pulling himself below the moving surface.
Ten feet down, he started kicking forward. He could hear the groaning metal of the plane all around him. He had no sense of direction, no energy in his limbs, and no possible chance of reaching the wreckage.
But he couldn’t stop. Not now.
A large shape rose up beneath him. Sandpaper skin against his hands. A vertical fin. He grabbed on, and Lilly the bull — he hoped — surged forward through the darkness.
The popping and creaking grew louder. Before long, the orange dance of fire lit the surface above him.
He patted the shark and let go, kicking up toward the inverted cockpit.
Both doors were open.
The submerged cockpit was empty.
Cyrus slid through a door and pulled himself back toward the rear of the plane and up into an air pocket.
Dan was sitting on the plane’s ceiling, bleeding from his forehead, cradling his mother in his lap. His blond hair had been cropped close to his scalp. His eyes were frantic and confused. He was much bigger.
“Cy!” he yelled. “What are you doing here? What’s going on?”
