How to Stop a Witch (28 page)

Ruuan’s victory cry rang out so long and so loud, Greg could have sworn it was stuck inside his head. Then he realized the dragon’s cry had died away, and what he was hearing was the alarmingly similar sound of an upset shadowcat.

Among all of the fallen soldiers and spireling warriors, Rake had managed to find him and was screaming for reasons only a shadowcat could understand. Rake scampered across the lawn, hopping over fallen spirelings, to where the amulet fell. He rummaged around for a moment. Then his head popped up, the Amulet of Ruuan clenched between his jaws.

“You found it!” said Greg. “Good boy, Rake. Bring it to me.”

Greg took a step toward the shadowcat, but Rake scampered away, dangerously close to the chained wyvern, and stared back at Greg defiantly. The wyvern shot forward, snapped its chains tight, and bounced harmlessly backward.

“Rake, watch out. What are you doing? We need to get that to Nathan. He’s the only one who knows how to use it.”

Rake dropped the amulet and screeched for Greg to come take it, but when Greg tried, he snatched it up again and moved even closer to the wyvern.

“Rake, this is no time for games.”

The wyvern lunged again, its jaws snapping shut just short of Rake’s tail. Greg backed off a step, not trusting the strength of those chains. Maybe it was just a wyvern, but it still looked a lot like a dragon to him.

As if aware of Greg’s thoughts, Rake screeched again, and Greg suddenly understood. If the amulet could be used to control a dragon, maybe it would work on a wyvern, too.

Perhaps it was coincidence, but Rake seemed to calm. He grabbed the amulet in his mouth, ran forward and dropped it at Greg’s feet. The wyvern watched the movement intently and fought against its chains, but Rake kept just out of reach.

Greg debated the possibility that the beast was just toying with him, waiting for him to move closer. He pushed back his fear, swept up the amulet and held it out.

“Stop,” he commanded, and the wyvern instantly froze in place. “Sit.”

The wyvern sat.

From behind, Greg heard panicked shouts. Ruuan swept toward the castle entrance, unleashing a jet of fire that bore a trough in the lawn right up to the gate.

When Tehrer struck the castle earlier, a few stacks of spireling warriors had been toppled by flying debris. Apparently Mordred’s spell only protected them within their living towers. Now men and spirelings alike were running about in chaos, trying to dodge the searing flames.

“Don’t move,” Greg shouted at the wyvern. He rushed to the post where the beast was tethered and unhooked the chains that bound it.

“Bow,” he commanded, and the wyvern lowered its head so Greg could climb aboard.

“Up,” Greg shouted before he really had time to think about what he was saying. The wyvern took to the air. It beat its wings with a flurry and soared easily between the remaining spireling stacks, weaving between them like a child at play.

But the wyvern possessed no magic to hold Greg in place. With the same strength he’d used to grip Tehrer earlier, Greg latched onto the wyvern’s scales to avoid being flung to the ground.

“Go,” he shouted. “To Ruuan.”

Without hesitation, the wyvern turned and sped toward the castle. Distracted by those fleeing below, neither Hazel nor Ruuan saw the tiny threat coming. A glimmer of hope dared to enter Greg’s mind. Then, at the last second, he screamed for the wyvern to change course.

Running just ahead of Ruuan’s flames, barely remaining true to his name, was Lucky. Greg had no choice but to force the wyvern to dart ahead and scoop the boy out of harm’s way.

The element of surprise was gone. Hazel held out her palm and conjured another of her emerald green fireballs.

“Watch out!” Greg screamed.

The wyvern had no desire to disobey. Still clutching Lucky’s robe in its jaws, it dodged nimbly aside.

Compared to a dragon, the wyvern was little more than a gnat, hardly worth concern, but its small size gave it an agility Ruuan could never match. If Greg could just get past Hazel’s defenses, separate her from her amulet as she’d done with Nathan . . .

“Help!” Lucky screamed, still dangling from the wyvern’s jaws, and Greg briefly wondered if his friend was feeling particularly lucky at that moment.

Again Greg ordered the wyvern to attack, and again Hazel ordered Ruuan to protect her.

The dragon had no room to protect itself. Ruuan barely soared between the towers of angry spirelings as the wyvern flew easily behind, able to use its wings far more effectively within the narrow gaps. Hazel had to expend all her magic just to keep the wyvern’s jaws at bay. If Greg only knew a spell he could use against her, he could launch an attack of his own.

Again Ruuan arced toward the castle, dodging blows from spireling axes the entire way. Below, Greg could see Priscilla trying to look up at him, but her mother had clasped a hand over her eyes to protect her from seeing. At her side were Melvin and Marvin Greatheart, cheering Greg on, and next to them Kristin, staring up at him wide-eyed, her mouth dropped open in horror.

At least she’s not staring at Marvin,
Greg thought to himself in one unexplainable moment. Then he realized Kristin’s mouth was open not in horror but because she was calling out to him. For an instant he could swear she said, “Use the force.” Then he realized it was something else entirely. Something about holding his course. She must really believe what everyone had been saying about him being a hero.

If only it were true.

“Down,” Greg screamed, and the wyvern dropped toward the ground. Greg ordered it to fly in low under Ruuan’s belly.

Even if Ruuan had been able to wound Tehrer in these softer tissues, Greg didn’t hold any hopes of the wyvern doing the same to Ruuan. Fate of the kingdom or not, he didn’t know if he’d have felt right about hurting Ruuan even if he could. No, he’d ordered the wyvern there because it was the one spot Hazel couldn’t see.

Now, as Ruuan continued to soar about the yard, antagonized by the constant pounding of spireling axes upon his scales, Greg and the wyvern soared easily along below him, waiting for the witch to make a move.

Greg knew Ruuan’s magic would protect Hazel from falling, as long as she remained between the spikes running along the dragon’s neck and shoulders, but what if she wandered off to either side? If he guessed right, Hazel wouldn’t be able to tolerate not knowing where he was. She’d creep around the dragon’s back for a better look.

Only how would he know when she was away from safety?

Lucky paused in his incoherent screaming long enough to yell something helpful. “Now, Greg, now. To your left.”

But where Greg thought Lucky meant Greg should move to his left, Lucky really meant Hazel had moved to Greg’s left. Greg ordered the wyvern to dart around Ruuan’s rib cage, only to find himself face-to-face with the witch.

He couldn’t say he liked the expression he saw there.

Neither did the wyvern. It spotted Hazel’s amulet and looped around so quickly, Greg could barely hold on.

This is it,
Greg knew. This was the moment he would plummet to his death and fulfill the prophecy.

But fate had something else in mind. The wyvern’s tail lashed through the air as it turned, and—if this wasn’t proof that having Lucky swaying from the wyvern’s jaws was influencing this battle, Greg couldn’t imagine what could be—swatted the amulet from Hazel’s outstretched hand.

The change in Ruuan was instantaneous. The dragon reared and pitched. Any magic he might have been using to hold Hazel in place, he was not wasting now.

Hazel let out a screech. As if in slow motion, she veered away from the dragon’s back, toppled end-over-end toward the ground, screamed words lost beneath the wind.

And then her screams cut off abruptly.

Ruuan didn’t pause to witness the witch’s fate. He took off toward his spire as if just now succumbing to a long elastic band that had been stretched tight between them.

With a roar, the proud wyvern arced around for a victory lap, making a show of rolling over as Ruuan had done. Greg held on for dear life, knowing his ordeal was not over until he touched safely down. The wyvern flew him directly over top of King Peter and Queen Pauline, and there were the two girls cheering and waving up at him.

“You did it!” screamed Priscilla.

“You’re a hero!” added Kristin. And then she said something he never would have expected. “I love you!”

Greg was so dumbfounded, he forgot to tighten his grip during the wyvern’s next roll. Launched off his perch, he barely managed to hang by one hand as the wyvern spun through the air, throwing him first one way, then the other. His fingers strained to their limits. And then, as if in slow motion, he watched them give way.

For a few brief seconds the world spun in front of Greg’s eyes. He witnessed the ground rush up to meet him, soaring faster and faster, and then, suddenly it struck with unbelievable force.

Greg’s vision cut off in an instant, as did the noise of the spirelings cheering, and the pungent smells of billowing smoke and charred grass.

And indeed, the very essence of life itself.

Just as Simon’s prophecy had predicted, the Mighty Greghart was dead.

“No!” screamed
Kristin. She rushed forward to where Greg’s body lay lifeless in the charred grass.

Priscilla pulled free of her mother’s grasp. She ran to Kristin and fell to her knees, and the two girls clutched each other, not daring to believe.

“It’s true,” Melvin cried, running up with his brother Marvin. Tears ran down his face as he announced to the crowd what all others feared. “The prophecy came true. The Mighty Greghart is dead!”

“Let me through, boy,” came a voice from behind. Mordred had broken free of the circle of magicians and had just now reached the spot where Greg lay. He pulled back his hood and stooped to place an ear over Greg’s heart, his greasy black hair hanging heavily across Greg’s chest.

“Well?” sobbed Priscilla.

“It’s true,” he said, and even his voice revealed a hint of remorse. “The boy didn’t make it.”

“No!” Priscilla screamed.

Kristin released an indistinguishable noise and threw her arms around Greg. She begged him to quit playing around, to get up and tell them this was all a joke, but Greg didn’t move. King Peter stepped up behind Kristin. He pulled her away and hugged her to him, and Queen Pauline did the same for their daughter.

As if the sight of Greg lying dead weren’t horrible enough, a sickening thump sounded to their right, and all turned to witness Lucky’s crumpled body bounce off the lawn. Above, the wyvern screeched and tore off toward the Enchanted Forest.

King Peter rushed over, followed closely by Marvin Greatheart, who looked down at the boy and said, “That doesn’t seem lucky at all.”

The king bent and checked on Lucky, and after a moment sat back to regard the others. Tears ran down his face as he shook his head and closed Lucky’s staring eyes.

“No!” screamed Priscilla. She dropped to Lucky’s side, but no matter how much she hugged the boy and told him she loved him, it was not enough to bring him back, and she could do nothing but weep.

The dozens of towers of spirelings melted like ice sculptures on a hot griddle. Within seconds Nathan came running up to join the others, fear in his eyes. “Quickly. We have but a moment. We need the two amulets. They should be in the grass.”

Not one of those who heard him knew what Nathan intended, yet throughout the yard, men and spirelings alike dropped to their knees and began combing the grass. There were enough spirelings present to require each to cover only a few square yards of lawn, but many others lay dead or wounded, hindering the search.

Suddenly a thunderous gasp sounded. Hundreds of thousands of spirelings all turned at once to stare at the very same spot. At the center of the focus, a lone spireling stooped and picked up a small object on a chain.

“Found one,” he said.

With the speed of a spireling, he rushed to Nathan, who was bent over Lucky’s lifeless body. Nathan took the pentagram-shaped amulet that had been forged so many centuries earlier and laid it across Lucky’s chest while the others continued their search.

Even though they sensed how important it was to find the second amulet, Priscilla and Kristin watched to see what Nathan was about to do.

“Hold on,” said Mordred. He stepped over no less than a dozen spirelings as they searched on hands and knees through the grass. “What form of foolishness is this?”

“It is not foolishness,” Nathan said calmly. “It’s a spell I learned in the Void. I think it may save him.”

“The Void?” Mordred gasped. “Why on Myrth would you go there?”

Nathan scowled. “Perhaps to learn the type of spell I’m about to use now.” He brushed back Lucky’s hood, only mildly startled by the sight of Lucky’s bald head. Placing a hand on Lucky’s forehead, he closed his eyes and forced himself to the same state of relaxation he used to help him focus in chikan.

“But the boy is dead,” insisted Mordred. “Only evil magic can return him now.”

“Quiet. Evil is a word used only by those with limited understanding. Now, we’re wasting precious time.”

Mordred was about to object again when King Peter stepped up behind him, his robe wafting out behind, and placed a hand on the magician’s shoulder. “Leave him be, Mordred. He knows what he’s doing.”

Nathan took Lucky’s right hand and placed it over his own heart. “Princess Priscilla,” he called.

Priscilla quickly turned away and pretended to search the grass.

“No, come here, child, quickly.”

Priscilla hopped up and rushed to Nathan’s side. He beckoned her to kneel next to Lucky and instructed her to follow his example and hold Lucky’s left hand over her heart. She grabbed it, tears flowing down her cheeks, and pressed it against herself so fiercely, Nathan worried she might push it right through her own chest. He warned her to be careful and then closed his eyes again and began to chant.

The bright morning sky immediately began to darken. Ominous black clouds rolled in, as if poured from a giant cauldron, and thunder sounded as lightning danced between them, high in the sky.