Sherlock barked madly, but he stayed back, out of harm’s way, injecting his comments heedlessly. Kick his spider ass, Maria. That’s it! You almost got him! Come on! He was Maria’s own telepathic cheering squad.
Gramps shouted his spells. Lightning rose up and struck Malakai, driving him farther back. That was all they did. Maria had the idea that these types of spells and incantations would be enough to topple over buildings, yet they seemed to bounce off of Malakai’s chitinous armor.
Maria swung down again, this time going for the chink of flesh missing and leaking his black blood. She gritted her teeth and shouted with all her might. The magic buzzed inside of her head, but she could not control it, not yet. The only thing she could control was her blade. And as it whistled through the air, she tasted the victory on the tip of her tongue—the victory and the blood.
Thunk.
The Arachnid’s two bottom arms caught the sword. Malakai’s hands looked like he was ready to pray to some dark god. His top right arm came up and out in a gesture that seemed to say ‘Stop,’ and a burst of light deflected from his palm, setting his claws ablaze.
Maria’s eyes got bigger as Malakai’s glowed darker red.
Now he not only deflected her blows and her grandfather’s spells, but he absorbed them, it seemed. To Maria, he appeared taller, larger, stronger.
He opened his mouth and cackled. All the damned voices of hell escaped his throat with that laugh. Maria’s hands went weak. She felt the sword slip from her grasp.
“No!” she shouted, but it was too late. The blade was free. No longer was it her blade. Now it belonged to Malakai.
“Maria!” Gramps shouted.
With one of his other hands, Malakai pushed Maria to the street. Her head clonked off of the pavement and her vision fuzzed out. She yelped in pain—should’ve rolled over and taken the loss, lest she lose her life, but already she was trying to scramble back up. ‘You get knocked down, you don’t stay down. You keep fighting.’ It was what her grandfather had once told her after a particularly nasty bout with the third grade playground bully Velma Sheers.
That’s all Malakai is, isn’t he? A bully. She was taught to stand up to bullies.
So Maria tried to stand up. She didn’t need a blade.
Malakai laughed again. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw her grandfather. He no longer slung spells in the Arachnid’s direction. He was too busy watching Maria, who was hunched over on the ground, trying to get up like a drunken woman who’d taken a particularly nasty spill.
Maria turned her focus back to Malakai. He cocked the sword behind his bulbous head, his eyes glowing so fiercely they were almost impossible to look at, like looking directly into the sun. He threw the blade.
But not at her.
It sliced through the air like a bullet. The spinning, glinting metal was all but a blur as it plunged toward her grandfather.
“Gramps, no!” she screamed.
But it was too late.
The sword struck him so hard, he didn’t even have a chance to cry out.
“NO!”
He fell over, his body crumpling into a frail mess of bones and skin. Maria couldn’t even see the sword any longer. She couldn’t see anything at all.
The fury and rage blinded her, and the magic took over.
She yelled words she didn’t understand, incantations and spells she’d picked up from her grandfather, either subconsciously or telepathically. It didn’t matter. What did matter was that the joy on Malakai’s face changed into pain and anguish, and he was driven back farther.
“This. Is. Our. World!” Maria shouted. A great burst of energy plunged into Malakai’s chest, hitting him where he was already wounded, where the dead heart no longer beat inside of his chest. The hole grew larger. The brightness and malice blazing in his eyes dimmed.
Yes, the real end was near, but victory was closer.
Then, as fast as it had come, the magic left Maria. She fell to her knees drained. Malakai also collapsed, this battle of good versus evil momentarily on pause.
You got him, Maria! Sherlock said. You kicked his ass. He’s as dead as that squashed squirrel! You—
But he stopped.
Maria—her vision almost gone, her body exhausted, her muscles and tendons like jelly, floating around, detached from the spots where they should’ve been—saw that Malakai was slowly standing up. He hadn’t been beaten. Not yet.
No. Impossible, Maria whimpered. How do you kill something that’s already dead?
Tires screeched. Headlights bathed the giant spider. A revving engine screamed. Maria, dimly aware of her own demise if she didn’t haul ass, looked in the direction of the car.
It was a Kia.
A horn honked.
The cabin light flipped on. Claire sat behind the wheel, her hands gripped on the wheel, teeth bared. Next to her was Tabby, and she held her arms out in front of her as if she were on a train that had jumped the rails.
Maria, move! Sherlock barked.
And she did.
Just in time. The wind the Kia made as it flew by blew her hair out in every direction. Exhaust and tire smoke filled her nostrils. She hit the ground again, her eyes closing, but not before she saw the Kia plow into Malakai at upwards of fifty miles per hour.
The Arachnid was launched into the air; a black creature in the blacker night sky. He seemed to fly, to float.
Until he didn’t.
Until he fell down, his body clattering and shattering on the road.
Maria
Mariaaaa
“Maria!”
It was Gramps’s voice. But that was impossible. He’d been speared by her very own sword.
Her eyes flicked open. She saw faces hovering above her. It was Tabby, Claire, and Sherlock.
“Maria, finish him,” Ignatius said.
Her friends helped her up. Her legs were wobbly
