Chapter 1
Julius woke to the alien feeling of absolute contentment.
He was still in his old room in the DFZ, squeezed into his narrow twin bed with Marci cuddled up against his side. He had no idea what time it was, and he didn’t care. If his arm hadn’t been falling asleep, he would never have moved again. He was trying to ease the offending limb into a different position when Marci’s brown eyes fluttered open.
“Sorry,” he whispered.
Marci just smiled and rolled over, flattening herself against his chest with a contented sigh. Julius sighed too, running his now freed hand up her naked back with a shiver of wonder. He’d been here for all of it, but it still didn’t seem real that Marci was here with him, whole and alive again. She didn’t even have a scar, a fact that he knew firsthand after the rampant nakedness of the previous hours.
That thought made him blush beet red. But while he’d been able to ignore the obvious questions during the rush of getting the person he loved most back from the dead, this wasn’t something he could put off much longer. Now that the initial out-of-his-mind joy at getting Marci back had faded to a more manageable level of extreme happiness, Julius’s number-one concern was keeping her. It felt like bad form to question a miracle, but he’d sworn he was never letting her go again, and if he was going to make good on that, then he needed to know exactly how this miracle had occurred.
“Marci?”
“Hmm?”
Julius tightened his arms around her. “How did this happen?”
Her lips curved in a mischievous smile. “I’m pretty sure you started it.”
“Not that,” he said, turning even redder. “I meant this.”
He brushed his fingers over the place on her unmarked back where General Jackson’s shot had passed through. He could still see the horrible wound in his mind: the smoking edges, the way scarlet blood had spread like spilled ink across her shirt. The memory of her death was one he’d never shake no matter how long he lived, so now that it was suddenly undone, he couldn’t relax until he knew.
“Is this real?” he whispered, clutching her. “Are you really back?”
She laughed. “Do I need to prove it to you again?”
“I’m serious.”
He must have sounded it, because Marci stopped laughing. “That’s a complicated question,” she said, pushing up on her elbow so she could look him in the face. “The short answer is yes, I’m back, and I’m human. A mortal, just like I was before, only minus the holes.”
She smiled down at her healed chest like that was a joke, but Julius was shaking. “How?” he asked again. “Last I checked, humans didn’t come back from the dead.”
“Not normally,” Marci agreed. “But it’s amazing how flexible the rules get when multiple immortals need your help. Amelia always intended to bring me back with her, but Raven was the one who did the actual hauling. He flew me back from the other side so I could reclaim my body and do my job as Merlin.”
Then Julius owed Raven a debt he could never repay. “Could he do it again?” Because if people could be brought back from the dead, then the greatest problem of falling head over heels in love with a human had just been solved.
“If you mean ‘Are you immortal now?’ I’m afraid the answer is no,” Marci said, shaking her head. “Happy as I am that it worked this time, the whole ‘rise from your grave’ thing was the product of highly unique circumstances that probably shouldn’t be repeated. But don’t worry. I’m not planning on dying again any time soon.”
He kissed her in thanks for that. Then he kissed her again, just because he could. He was about to kiss her a third time when Marci started in with questions of her own. “What about you? How did you end up in the DFZ with the Dragon Emperor of China? And why does Chelsie have a baby now? I wasn’t gone that long.”
“The baby’s not actually new,” Julius said, racking his brain to think of a shorthand way to explain what had happened with Chelsie and the Qilin, or Chelsie and Bob. He couldn’t come up with one that made any kind of sense, though, so he wound up telling her the whole story of Chelsie’s ill-fated journey to China and the fallout that had haunted his clan for the last six centuries. Marci listened raptly all the way through, though her eyes got really wide at the end.
“So the Qilin thanking you was what caused that golden hammer thing at the end?”
“I don’t know about a hammer,” Julius said, confused. “But it was definitely a luck bomb.”
Marci shook her head rapidly, making her short hair fly. “No way. Bombs are bad things. This was an enormously good thing. When we were in the Heart of the World, Amelia kept saying that Bob had warned her not to let any of us charge into the fight until we got his signal. Trouble was, she had no idea what that signal would be. We were about to go anyway—because things were getting really bad—when we felt this huge surge of amazing dragon magic, and suddenly everything went right.” She grinned. “That must have been you! Bob clearly knew it was coming too, which was why he told Amelia to wait. He knew we’d need imperial levels of magical good fortune on our side to make everything work.”
The mention of his brother’s name made Julius flinch. “I’m not so sure Bob is on our side anymore.”
“What are you talking about?” Marci said, incredulous. “He and Amelia planned this whole thing. The fact that I’m alive and with you right now is mostly due to him.”
“He’s also why you died in the first place,” Julius said angrily. “I’m not arguing with the results, but his methods are not good, Marci. Bob used us all. He let Chelsie and her children suffer for six centuries. He could have ended it all at any time just by telling Bethesda to stop. Mother always listened to him.”
“Would Chelsie, though?” Marci asked. “You just told me it was her idea to keep her children locked in the mountain so they’d be safe from the Qilin. Even if Bob had freed them all early, she still wouldn’t have let the Fs go for fear of her ex. Don’t get me wrong. I agree it was all terrible, but I don’t think anyone was trying to be cruel. It just sounds like a lot of desperate dragons trying to do the best thing in bad circumstances. But while he’s definitely pulled some sketchy stunts, I know Bob is on our side. Amelia trusted him with her life and death, and she doesn’t trust lightly.” She shrugged. “We just have to have faith that Bob knows what he’s doing. He can see the future, after all.”
“I’ve never questioned that,” Julius said. “I’m just worried about what he’s willing to do to the present to get there.”
“Well,” Marci said, snuggling closer. “If this is Bob’s chosen timeline, I’ve got no complaints. It sucked for a while there, but now I’m back, Amelia’s back, and Chelsie’s free and reunited with her boyfriend, which will hopefully make her less snappy. We’ve even got a bona fide lucky dragon on our team! That’s a huge deal, because the way things are looking, we’re going to need all the luck we can get.”
She glanced over her shoulder at the window, where the rainbow glow of the rising magic was still shining like the Northern Lights through the lowered blinds.
“What are we going to do?” Julius whispered, pulling her closer. “I couldn’t follow all your theory talk last night, but I know visible magic rising from the ground like backward snow is not good.”
“Actually, the magic itself is fine,” Marci said. “It’s not like we pumped the system full of new power. This is just the magic the ancient Merlins stole from the rest of the world finally flowing back to where it belongs. I always meant to return it. Not in one big blast, of course, but while this situation sucks in the short term, over the long haul, I think this will actually turn out to be a very good thing.”
“Is there going to be a long term?” Julius asked quietly. “Not to be a pessimist, but everything Amelia and Raven said about the Nameless Ends made it sound like our only hope was to stop Algonquin from falling into despair, and we didn’t. We failed. There’s no way to know how much since we’re trapped in the house until the magic clears up, but I can’t imagine Algonquin’s been idle. She’s probably bringing that thing into our world right now. How do we face that?”
“The same way we face everything else,” Marci said, smiling down at him. “How many times have we done the impossible, Julius? We are always punching above our weight class, and yet we always pull it out in the end. This time will be no different. Our enemy might be a giant creature that eats worlds, but the only thing he’s eaten so far is Algonquin, and she’s small potatoes these days.” She pointed at the glowing window. “The magic is back! We’ve got two Merlins with fully amped Mortal Spirits. We’ve got Raven and Amelia and a bunch of really scary dragons, not to mention a legit luck god.” Marci flashed him a grin. “I bet we kick that Nameless End’s butt.”
That statement was so ludicrously overconfident it bordered on delusional, but the optimism was just so her, Julius couldn’t help but grin back. He’d missed her so much. Just like always, Marci was ready to go. Ready to fight beside him against anything, and he loved her for it.
He kissed her then, pulling her down to him with the desperation that still hadn’t gone away. She kissed him back just as fiercely, wrapping her arms around his neck. He was losing himself in the wonder of having Marci all over him again when someone knocked.
They both froze, turning in unison to look at the door, which was still locked. That wouldn’t mean much to a dragon, but dragons didn’t usually bother with knocking. Julius was working up the will to ask who it was when Emily Jackson’s voice filtered through the wood.
“Sorry to interrupt,” she said, not sounding sorry at all. “Raven and I are calling an ops meeting. Be downstairs in five minutes.”
Julius bristled. It was a perfectly reasonable request, but her tone still irked him. He might be a Nice Dragon, but that didn’t mean he took orders from humans. Especially not the one who’d shot Marci in the back.
“Who put her in charge?” he muttered as Emily’s footsteps vanished down the stairs.
“She is a general,” Marci reminded him, climbing out of bed, much to his dismay. “Being in charge is her default. General Jackson’s no fool, though. No one interrupts a happy dragon unless they have to. If she’s pushing, there’s a reason, which means we need to get moving.” She tapped her bare foot on the moving rainbows the magic from outside was casting across his scuffed wooden floor. “Can’t hide in here forever.”
Julius would have been happy to stay in this sheltered room with Marci until he died, but she was right. They’d had a reprieve, but now it was time to go back to the real world, so Julius hauled himself reluctantly out of bed and began climbing into his clothes as slowly as he could. Marci was done way before he was, dressed in one of his sweatshirts and what had been her favorite pair of jeans. She’d also dug up a spare plastic bracelet to replace the ones she’d melted, and while Julius didn’t see any spellwork written on the inside yet, the chunky pink band made her look like herself again.
When he was finally decent in jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt, he kissed her one last time, wrapping his hand around hers as they unlocked the door and headed downstairs to jump back into the fight.
***
Marci clutched Julius’s hand the whole way down, clenching her jaw to keep from grinning. It was hard, but they were in the middle of what could be a world-ending event, and she was the Merlin. Grinning like a lovestruck idiot was not allowed, so she forced herself to keep her eyes off of Julius—whom she could touch now, anytime she wanted—and on the stairs ahead of them, where Fredrick was waiting at the bottom.
Now there was a dragon she did not understand. From Julius’s story, Marci was pretty sure Fredrick was the dragon equivalent of the crown prince of China. Someone needed to tell him that, though, because he was still acting like Julius’s butler. He even had the younger dragon’s jacket in his hands, which he held out for Julius to put on as soon as they reached the bottom of the stairs.
Julius looked as awkward as Marci felt, but he let Fredrick put the jacket on him anyway, probably because the house was freezing. It was November in Detroit, and they hadn’t run the heat in days. Even global warming couldn’t take the edge off that chill. They were lucky it wasn’t snowing actual frozen water instead of just magic.
When Julius was properly attired, Fredrick handed him a sword that looked like a tooth. It was the same kind of blade Fredrick wore at his own side, a Fang of the Heartstriker.
Julius took the blade with a shocked look. “How did you get this?”
“The Diplomat’s Blade is far more forgiving than the Defender’s,” Fredrick said with a smile. “You dropped it when you went after your mortal. I thought you would need it, so I picked it up. It didn’t transform for me, of course, but it was courteous enough to allow me to carry it in its sleeping form. I would have given it back to you earlier, but I didn’t wish to interrupt.”
From the smirk on his face, Fredrick knew exactly what he would have been interrupting. Marci smirked back, but Julius just turned red again, though that didn’t stop him from reclaiming Marci’s hand the moment the sword was belted around his waist. “Where’s everyone else?”
“Waiting for you in the kitchen,” Fredrick replied. “They wanted to start earlier, but I refused to let them begin until you arrived, sir.”
He hid it well, but Marci swore Julius winced at the “sir.” “Thanks, Fredrick.”
The F beamed. “You’re welcome, sir,” he said proudly. “And happy birthday.”
Marci whirled toward Julius with a gasp. “You didn’t tell me it was your birthday!”
“I completely forgot,” Julius said, looking bewildered.
A lot had been going on, but… “How do you forget your birthday?!” Marci cried, gaping at him. “So you’re twenty-five now, right?”
He nodded, a smile spreading over his face. “Same age as you.”
Two months ago, Marci would have considered having a dragon boyfriend who was the same age as herself slightly disappointing. Now, though, she was too happy just having him to care. “Happy birthday,” she said, rising up on her toes to kiss his cheek.
He blushed again, lifting their tangled hands to his lips to kiss the back of her fingers before turning them down the hall that led to the kitchen. “Shall we go hear the bad news?”
She motioned for him to lead the way, clamping down on the grin that was threatening harder than ever to take over. It was serious game face time now, but when they walked into the kitchen, the sight waiting for them was comically surreal.
There were three dragons and two spirits sitting at their kitchen table. Chelsie had her human-shaped daughter in her lap, brushing the girl’s fine black hair with her fingers while the toddler struggled to fit an entire personal pizza into her mouth. The Qilin was right beside them, looking as perfect as ever, his golden eyes full of happy wonder as he watched his child eat. On the other side of the table, Amelia was tipped back in her chair, deep in conversation with Raven, who was perched on her shoulder. The only ones who weren’t sitting down were General Jackson, who was pulling another round of frozen pizzas out of Marci and Julius’s tiny electric oven, and Myron, who was standing in front of the back door, staring through the window at something behind the house. The disconnect between the powers in front of her, any one of which could be considered a national threat, and the cozy domesticity of the scene was so bizarre, Marci didn’t even realize they were two short until she noticed that Myron was standing alone.
“Where’s the DFZ?” she asked, alarmed. And for that matter. “Where’s Ghost?”
Just the fact that she had to ask made Marci feel like a failure. She’d been so busy with Julius, she’d completely forgotten about her own spirit, which she was pretty sure made her the worst Merlin ever. She fully expected Myron to call her on it too, but the older mage beckoned her over instead, pressing a finger to his lips with one hand while he tapped against the glass of the back door’s window.
When Marci looked out, she saw why. The stretch of dirt behind the house was filled with the same haze of multicolored magic as everywhere else, and bounding through the glowing drifts like kids in the snow were the Mortal Spirits. They were both in what Marci had come to think of as their “casual” forms—Ghost as a cat, and the DFZ as a large rat—and they were clearly having the time of their lives. Ghost actually flipped over as she watched, rolling on his back through the magic like a normal cat would in a field of catnip. The DFZ was just as bad. She hopped through the magic with happy squeaks, her beady orange eyes gleaming with sheer delight every time she landed in the soft, glowing piles.
“Well,” Marci said, grinning despite herself. “At least someone’s having a good time.”
“More than a good time,” Myron replied, his chest expanding as he took a deep breath. “Can’t you feel it? It’s like they’re reborn.”
She could feel it. She’d been so happy herself these last few hours, she hadn’t noticed, but now that she was looking at him, Marci realized she could feel the Empty Wind’s joy like a wave in her mind. Power was pouring into him, filling the emptiness at last. For the first time since she’d found him latched to that poor old cat lady’s chest, the god of the Forgotten Dead felt alive, and it was beautiful. So, so beautiful.
“I can feel her delight,” Myron whispered, reaching up to wipe the suspicious wetness from his eyes. “It’s… I don’t have words, honestly. I’ve never been this happy, and I’m only experiencing a reflection.”
“Of course they’re happy,” Marci said. “This is how they were always meant to be. Ghost was around before the drought, but the DFZ is new. She’s never had proper levels of magic before. No wonder she’s celebrating.”
The rat changed shape as she said this, shifting back into the androgynous-looking human girl Marci had seen before. But though the spirit still looked like anyone you might see on the city streets, she was no longer dressed in black. The clothing she manifested this time was a riot of color as bright as the neon in the DFZ Underground’s most garish party districts. Even through the glow of the magic, she was shining, and the longer Marci looked at her, the more certain she became that—even if it had happened by accident—this was the right thing.
“If we’re all here.”
The stern voice spoke right in her ear, and Marci turned to see General Jackson standing behind them, tapping her makeshift body’s scrap-metal fingers impatiently. “Myron?”
“Right,” the mage said, clearing his throat as he pulled a piece of paper out of the pocket of his rumpled jacket. “Since we’re all in this together, General Jackson and I have decided to share information to increase our odds of survival. Over the last eight hours, we’ve been on the phone with UN Central Command, my lab back in New York, and various other magical institutions all over the world.”
“I’m just shocked the phones are working,” Amelia said, winking at the Qilin. “Lucky break.”
“Very lucky,” Myron agreed. “There is absolutely no reason we should have internet access here in the DFZ, but we do. That’s hardly the strangest thing that’s happened in the last twenty-four hours, though, so I’m not even going to question it.”
“Enough about how you got the information,” Chelsie growled. “What’s going on out there?”
“Everything and nothing,” General Jackson said, walking over to pick up the two personal pizzas that were cooling on the stove top. She placed one down in front of Julius and one down in front of the seat he’d squeezed in next to his, which was apparently for Marci. “Eat,” she ordered. “This will take a few minutes, and there’s no reason you have to be hungry during them.”
The general didn’t have to tell Marci twice. Now that pizza was on the table, her body was reminding her loudly that it hadn’t eaten since before she’d died. She practically dove into her chair, trying not to burn her tongue as she stuffed a slice of cheap, and surprisingly delicious, pepperoni pizza into her mouth.
“Good, isn’t it?” Amelia said. “I didn’t think there was any food left, but then I found a pile of those in the back of the freezer.” She wiggled her eyebrows at the Qilin, who was starting to look uncomfortable. “That’s lucky break number two. Now we just need to stumble onto your forgotten tequila stash and we’ll have a grand slam!” She turned her grin on Chelsie. “Can you kiss him or something? We need another luck blast so I can get a drink.”
“Amelia,” Chelsie said in a low, deadly voice, “shut up.”
The Spirit of Dragons lifted her hands helplessly and motioned for General Jackson to continue.
“Moving on,” Emily said irritably. “As Sir Myron predicted, the breaking of the Merlins’ seal has created a global crisis. As the epicenter of the breach, the DFZ was hit the hardest, but we have reports of dangerously elevated magic levels all over the globe.”
“Dangerously?” Julius said. “How dangerously?”
“That depends on where you were when it happened,” Myron said. “Not everyone was lucky enough to have a warded bunker nearby. But high as they are, the elevated magic levels probably won’t be fatal to healthy individuals. Highly unpleasant, certainly, but not deadly. The danger General Jackson refers to is more of a long-term problem.” He glanced at the glowing particles drifting up from the ground outside. “This is actually quite similar to the night magic first returned, only stronger. How much stronger varies depending on the local ambient magic, but the numbers I’ve seen generally seem to be clocking in at two to three hundred percent higher than normal.”
“But that still shouldn’t be more than humans can handle,” Marci said with her mouth full. “We didn’t make new magic. Everything that’s here now was here before the drought, and humanity handled it fine back then.”
“We did,” Myron admitted. “But while the raw amount is the same, the majority of the magic back then would have been tied up in natural systems, not dropped on people’s heads all at once. We don’t know if the world has ever experienced a flood of this magnitude before, but we can say for certain that no living human has ever been doused with this much free-floating magic. Unless they were able to flee to a warded location, as we were, new manifestations are inevitable.”
Julius went pale. “Manifestations?”
“He means new mages,” Marci explained. “The night the magic came back, a whole bunch of people with the right combination of genes were suddenly able to use magic. Most of those burned themselves out in the first hour. Another good chunk went crazy. Only a few could actually handle the change. It was only later, when mages started being born naturally and growing into their powers slowly, that magic stopped being a death sentence.”
“And you’re saying we’re going to see that again,” Julius finished with a frown. “But isn’t everyone who could be a mage one already?”
“Everyone that we’re aware of,” Myron said authoritatively. “But we’ve never been able to pin down the exact genetic combination that gives people the ability to consciously control magic because the range is too enormous. Half the human population has at least one of the markers for magical potential. It’s been theorized that those people failed to become mages not because they lacked the fundamental ability, but because magical levels were simply too low for them to access. Now that magic is shoving its way down their throats, however, that could change.”
“We might see a whole new wave of mages!” Marci said. “Assuming they don’t all go nuts first, of course. But everyone knows magic is real now, so the transition should be much smoother this time around.”
“That’s good for them,” Emily said. “But the situation right here and now is anything but. We have no official measurement devices left in the DFZ, but from the visual clues, Myron’s estimated that the magical levels here are much higher than the rest of the world’s.”
“At least a thousand percent higher than normal,” Myron agreed. “Maybe more.”
“And that’s why we can’t go outside,” Raven finished, turning on Amelia’s shoulder to give the frolicking forms of Ghost and the DFZ outside the evil eye. “True mortal spirits might be big enough to roll such power off their backs, but the rest of us are grounded. Even I can’t fly in a storm like this.”
“Nothing can fly,” the general said angrily. “I’ve been on the horn with our air base in Canada since six this morning. They can’t get anything within fifty miles of the DFZ due to the magical interference. Planes, jets, helicopters—they’re all useless. Even the satellites can’t see through the glare of magic rising off this place, and that’s a problem, because without eyes, we can’t see what Algonquin’s doing.”
“So send one of the Mortal Spirits,” Chelsie suggested. “They’re clearly not having a problem, and we need information.”
“I’ve tried,” Myron said. “But I’m afraid my spirit is not in the correct mindset to… that is, with the current environment…”
“He can’t ask them because they’re high out of their minds,” Amelia finished. “They’re so drunk on magic right now, they don’t know which way is up, the lucky bastards.”
Chelsie gave her sister a flat look. “I’m surprised you’re not out there with them.”
“I would be if I could,” Amelia said, her voice pained. “Alas, like Raven, I’m too much of a hybrid to actually enjoy the current situation. If I went out there, I’d be squished as flat as the rest of you. Not exactly a useful scout.”
Myron turned to Marci. “I was hoping you’d have more luck with Ghost. He’s been in magic like this before, and he seems more disciplined. Whenever I ask her to help, the DFZ just laughs and tells me to come out and play.”
Marci understood the importance of what he was asking, but interrupting Ghost’s pure joy felt wrong to her. This was an emergency, though, so she reached out reluctantly with a mental hand to tug on her connection to the Empty Wind. The moment she touched it, a flood of happiness washed her under. Ghost’s hands followed, clutching her mind and tugging on her to come out and bathe in the glorious magic with him. It was so intoxicating, she actually stood up before she realized what she was doing.
“I don’t think he’s doing any better than the DFZ,” she said, gently prying herself out of her spirit’s delirious grip as she sat back down. “But the fallout has to be almost over. What time is it?”
“Noon,” General Jackson replied.
Marci blinked. She’d known she’d lost track of time in Julius’s room, but she didn’t think they’d been in there that long. They hadn’t even gotten to the house until eight last night, which meant… “We’ve been experiencing magical fallout at the visible level for sixteen hours?”
“I told you it was severe,” the general said. “But all these worries are secondary to the threat of the Nameless End.”
“You refer to the thing from beyond the planes,” the Qilin said, his perfect face worried. “The devourer of worlds Amelia was telling us about earlier.”
“One of the devourers,” Amelia corrected. “There are as many Nameless Ends as there are endings. I’m not sure which specific flavor of destruction Algonquin’s hooked up with, but if he was crafty and patient enough to get this much of himself into a healthy plane, he’s not going to stop until he gets the rest. According to Raven, Algonquin was the only one holding him back. Now that she’s freaked out, I have a feeling we’re going to discover exactly what sort of end we’re up against.”
“I fear the worst,” Raven said sadly. “Algonquin would never barter with something that couldn’t get her the total new beginning she needs to return this world to the spirits. If the Nameless End plays her fair, he’ll scrub every living creature off the face of our plane. If he’s playing her for a fool, which is what I suspect, he’ll eat her and use her vessel as a platform to eat everything else, leaving our reality an empty husk.”
“Then we have to stop him,” Marci said. “I know Nameless Ends are serious business, but the fact that we’re here having this conversation proves that he hasn’t gotten enough of himself inside our plane to start the carnage yet. If the only thing he’s eaten so far is Algonquin, then we’re still sitting pretty. She might have been the biggest spirit around sixty years ago, but she’s nothing these days. I mean, look at us.” She waved her hand across all the fantastic, beautiful, stupidly magical creatures sitting at the table. “We’re packing a lot of firepower, some of us literally. If it’s all of us versus Algonquin-plus-one, that’s not even a contest.”
“Assuming we can fight it,” Emily said. “We’re still talking about a being who lives in the void between worlds. We don’t know what it’s made of or how it works. We don’t even know if we can hurt it.”
“Actually, I think Marci’s onto something,” Amelia said, tapping her sharp nails on the table. “As strong as Nameless Ends can be, this one’s still an interloper. The Nameless Ends are scavengers. They prey on the weaknesses of dying planes, not healthy ones. The only reason this one was able to get inside at all is because he tricked Algonquin into letting him use her as a foothold. You can’t kill a Nameless End because they’re forces of the universe, but if we can find a way to dislodge him from Algonquin, we’ll destroy his anchor to this world. Once that’s gone, the natural defenses of our otherwise healthy plane should be able to force him back out with no further help from us.”
“Like a body defeating an infection,” Marci said, nodding. “That’s fantastic. All we have to do is defeat Algonquin, and our problem’s solved.”
“But Algonquin’s already defeated,” Raven said sadly. “That’s how this started. She’s already given up and turned her water over to that thing because she’d rather die than lose. We can’t beat her any lower than she’s already gone. I don’t even know if she’s alive anymore, and I didn’t think spirits could die.”
The table fell silent as he finished. Marci poked her empty plate, trying to think of something that might turn this around. Then, out of nowhere, Amelia said, “We could wait for Bob.”
Chelsie snorted. “That’s your plan?”
“It’s been my plan my entire life,” Amelia said stubbornly, lifting her chin. “You think he didn’t know this was coming? He’s a seer. He’s been working on this for centuries.”
“Okay,” Chelsie said, crossing her arms in front of her daughter, who’d fallen asleep in her lap after she’d finished her second pizza. “What’s his plan, then?”
Amelia bit her lip. “I… don’t know,” she said after a long pause. “Knowing your future changes it, so he couldn’t tell me anything past my death, but I know he’ll come through. He’s never let us down before.”
Chelsie looked away. “Speak for yourself.”
“Would you knock it off?” Amelia growled. “Your secret’s out, Chelsie. We all know that mess in China was entirely your own making. You’ve been blaming everything on Bob for centuries, but he wasn’t the one who panicked and bolted. Bob could have just let the Empress Mother kill you, but no. He pulled a miracle out of his ear and got Bethesda to China to beg for your life. It’s thanks to him that you’re still alive to hold your grudge. How can you be so ungrateful?”
Chelsie opened her mouth to retort, but Fredrick beat her to it. “Ungrateful?” he snarled, moving away from Julius to stand behind his mother. “Brohomir left us to be Bethesda’s slaves for six hundred years! He only cares about his future, not about those who suffer to create it!”
Marci leaned back in her chair. She’d never seen the normally quiet F this angry. Amelia was looking uncharacteristically pissed off as well, with dangerous curls of smoke leaking out from between her lips. The atmosphere in the kitchen was getting so tense, Marci was considering preemptively ducking under the table when Julius suddenly stood up.
“You’re both wrong.”
The whole kitchen turned to look at him. His time as clan head must have done something, though, because Julius didn’t even flinch at all when all those predatory eyes landed on him. He just stared back, and when he spoke, his voice was steady and sure.
“Bob’s not nice,” he said. “But he’s not evil, either. He’s not like Bethesda, who steps on dragons for the joy of feeling taller, but he’s also not afraid to crush us under his heel if that’s what he feels he needs to do to guarantee the future he wants. Like Fredrick, I don’t think that’s right, but it also doesn’t mean that Amelia is wrong.” His green eyes flicked to Marci. “As someone very smart told me earlier today, Bob’s the reason we’re in a lot of these messes, but he’s also the one who made sure we got out, and he’s the one who brought us all together here.”
“How can you be sure of that?” Fredrick asked angrily. “No offense, Great Julius, but we’re cowering in a hovel while an enemy we may not even be able to fight is coming to power above our heads. If this was truly the work of a seer and not mere chance, where is our advantage? Where are our weapons and our armies? Why would Brohomir put us through all of this just to leave us stranded and desperate now?”
“I don’t know,” Julius said. “But I’m certain this is Bob’s work, because she”—he pointed across the table at General Jackson—“is the Phoenix, and Bob told me ages ago that I would have lunch with the Phoenix on my birthday.” His face split into a smile as he turned back to Fredrick. “Don’t you see? This is all Bob’s plan. Yes, we’re trapped, but we’re trapped together. All of us are here in this house because of Bob’s meddling. He’s the one who arranged to bring Marci back from the dead, and he’s the one who finally fixed our troubles with the Qilin.”
“Both of which were problems he caused,” Chelsie growled. “I’m not going to praise him for wagging the dog.”
“Did he?” Julius asked, turning to face her. “Did Bob tell you to run from the Qilin? Did he tell you to lie when Xian asked you why?”
Chelsie’s answer to that was a deadly glare, and Julius sighed. “I’m not trying to poke at old wounds. I’m just saying that Bob isn’t always the total villain you make him out to be. There’s no question he’s run roughshod over all of us, but you know as well as I do that he’s been building toward something huge for a long time now, and I can’t think of anything bigger than the end of the world.”
He smiled then. A big, warm, dazzling grin that made Marci’s breath catch in her throat. “I have faith in my brother. I don’t always understand what he’s doing or approve of how he does it, but I don’t believe for a second that Bob moved heaven and earth to bring us together—from China, from eggs that were never supposed to hatch, from death itself—only to drop the ball at the end. Whatever’s coming, Bob has a plan, and we’re part of it. There’s just no other explanation for how we all ended up here. That’s why I think, if we want to survive what’s coming, we need to put aside our anger and help him make it work.”
Fredrick opened his mouth to argue, but Chelsie raised her hand. “I believe you, Julius,” she said quietly. “I can’t forgive him for all the years he left us to rot, but I believe you when you say that this is Bob’s doing. Even accounting for the Qilin’s fortune, this whole situation is simply too improbable not to have a seer’s fingerprints all over it. Also, if the Nameless End eats everything, Bob will die too, and he’s much too selfish for that. But if this is all part of Bob’s grand plan, what does that mean? What did he bring us here to do?”
“Work together,” Julius said, looking pointedly at General Jackson. “All of us. The dragon clans, the UN, spirits, Merlins—we’ve all got our backs against the same wall. If we’re going to survive, we have to join forces.”
“And do what?” Myron asked. “The magic outside might not be deadly, but it’ll still knock any of us out cold before we make it three feet. Maybe dragons would fare better, but I don’t see how we’re supposed to work together when half of us can’t leave the house.”
“We’d make it more like ten feet, but the general idea still holds,” Amelia agreed. “Magical fallout is no joke. It’ll take you down in a heartbeat, and it’ll burn the entire time. But the good news is I think the magical crash is affecting the Nameless End as well.”
“How do you know that?” General Jackson demanded.
“Because, as Marci already pointed out, we’re not dead yet,” Amelia said. “It’s been sixteen hours since Algonquin kamikazed herself into the Leviathan. It takes time to eat your way through five Great Lakes, but not that much time. I bet the Leviathan is just as stuck as we are. That buys us some wiggle room.”
“How much?” Julius asked.
“Not enough,” Raven said, hopping off Amelia’s shoulder to perch on the windowsill. “Heavy as it looks, the fallout’s actually been getting lighter for a while now. In my unprofessional and unresearched opinion, I’d say we have an hour, maybe two, before we can safely go outside.”
“Then we need to get to work,” Marci said, standing up.
“I thought we just agreed to wait for Bob,” Amelia said.
Marci rolled her eyes. “We can’t just sit here doing nothing until a dragon seer shows up and tells us what to do.”
“It worked last time,” Amelia said with a shrug.
“Only because he told you it would,” Marci pointed out. “Do you have any instructions for this crisis?”
The dragon spirit shook her head, and Marci spread her hands. “There you go. Maybe Bob will show up with a plan of action to save us all, but until then, I say we listen to Julius and pool our resources to come up with a plan of our own, because we don’t have time to mess around.”
“I agree,” the Qilin said, rising to his feet and turning to Julius. “You have the full support of the Golden Empire. My dragons are already on their way here. We will help you fight the Nameless End in whatever way we can.”
Julius blinked. “Um, that’s fantastic, but how do you know they’re coming? I only said we should work together a minute ago.”
The Qilin shrugged. “Because I want them here, and when I want something, my luck generally makes sure I get it.”
“Really?” Marci whistled. “Dude, that is a crazy power.”
The Golden Emperor shrugged again, but Julius was grinning from ear to ear. “I think I see how this is supposed to work,” he said excitedly, turning to Fredrick. “You’ve got Chelsie’s old Fang. That means you can cut to any Heartstriker, which gives our clan a way into the city as well. Between the Heartstrikers and the Golden Empire, we’ll have half the dragons in the world fighting together against a common enemy. That has never happened before!” He smiled even wider. “Don’t you see? This has to be Bob’s plan! This is why he had us jump through all those flaming hoops! It was so we’d all be here at the right place and the right time with the trust and the tools necessary to fight together against the Leviathan!”
“It does make sense,” Marci admitted. “But weren’t you the one who always said it was foolish to try to guess a seer’s intentions?”
“What else could it be?” Julius asked. “He got you here too, along with General Jackson, Raven, and Amelia, plus the Mortal Spirits. That gives us the Merlins, the human UN, and both types of spirits. Between all of us, every sentient magical force in the world is represented. We’re even stuck in the same house. If that’s not a seer’s doing, I don’t know what is.”
“You make a good point,” Fredrick said, frowning down at his Fang. “I suppose I should start bringing in the rest of the clan, then?”
“Not yet,” Amelia said quickly. “The magic’s better than it was last night, but it’s still waaaaaaay too unstable for teleportation. If you try to cut anywhere, you might end up slicing off your own head.”
“And we need a better idea of what we’re up against,” Julius added. “The Golden Emperor can command his dragons however he likes, but I’m only one vote on the Heartstriker Council. If I bring Bethesda and Ian into this, and they see the Leviathan as an unwinnable fight, they might decide to take their chances underground instead. We may only get one shot at this, which means we can’t bring anyone else into this fight until we have some kind of idea of how we’re actually going to win.”
“Assuming we can win,” Myron said glumly.
“We have to assume that,” Marci said. “Otherwise, what’s the point of fighting?”
“Thank you, Marci,” Julius said, flashing her a smile. “Our first hurdle is to figure out how to get out there and take a look at the problem. Once we know what we’re actually up against, we can put our heads together and figure out how to beat it, because there has to be a way. Bob wouldn’t have gone through all the trouble of bringing us together if we didn’t have a chance.”
“Then why doesn’t he just tell us?” Emily said, glaring at him. “Everyone goes on and on about how powerful dragon seers are, but what’s the use of all that power if they never tell you anything?”
“Because knowing the future changes it,” Amelia snapped. “Seriously, Phoenix, pay attention.”
“Bob won’t tell us his move until he’s played it,” Julius agreed. “But the fact that we’re on the board he’s set up means that move is already in play, and we’re part of it. The only thing he’s ever told me since the beginning is to be myself, and this is what I think we should do. If I really am the seer lynchpin everyone keeps telling me I am, that should be a pretty good indicator of which way we need to push for success. And even if I am wrong about all of this, how can us working together be a bad idea? The forces sitting around this table represent the combined strength of our plane. If anything we have is capable of beating the Leviathan, it’s this.”
He placed his hand down on the center of the table with a thunk, and Marci held her breath. She’d seen Julius do his thing enough now to know this was his big push to get everyone on the same side, and it seemed to be working. All around the kitchen, heads were nodding. Even Chelsie looked convinced, and Amelia had been on board from the beginning. The only holdout was General Jackson, who was looking at Julius as though she wasn’t sure what to make of him.
“You truly are a very strange dragon,” she said at last. “I have no interest in trusting humanity’s survival to one of the enemy’s seers, but I’m in no position to turn down allies. If you can get me the world’s two largest dragon clans and a promise they won’t eat my soldiers, we’ll work with you. I’ve already put in a call for backup from the UN’s headquarters in New York, as well as our field offices in Chicago and Toronto. The moment the magic clears enough for aircraft, we’ll have helicopters, gunships, battle mages, everything but tanks. I’ll have to warn my people not to shoot at the dragons this time around, but if this is going to be as bad as I fear, I don’t think target confusion will be a problem.”
“We’ll help too,” Marci said. “I mean, obviously I was going to help, but I’m formally offering my assistance as the First Merlin, which I’m pretty sure means I speak for Myron as well.”
“I was already in through the UN,” the older mage said stuffily. “But if it makes you feel important, feel free to claim me.”
This time yesterday, Marci wouldn’t have claimed Sir Myron Rollins if he’d been the last mage on earth. But his words to the DFZ last night and his steadfast efforts to protect the world from magical disaster had raised him a great deal in her opinion, enough that she met his grumbling with a smile. Julius was smiling too, beaming at her with a happiness that lit him up from the inside out, and no wonder. He’d brought everyone together, which was all Julius ever wanted to do. To pull it off so quickly now, when so much was at stake, he had to be feeling on top of the world. Maybe it had only worked because they were stuck on the rails of Bob’s plan, but Marci was proud of him anyway. She was proud of all of them, because they were finally going to fight back.
After so long spent scrabbling in the dirt, so many defeats, they were finally going to end this. She still owed Algonquin for what had happened in Reclamation Land, and for Vann Jeger. Now, though, everything was coming up aces. They were going to finish Algonquin and end her stupid, reckless idea of a super-weapon Leviathan once and for all. Marci was already imagining armies of dragons backed up by fighter jets soaring through the sky when something hit her ward so hard it nearly knocked her over.
She grabbed the table, fighting to stay upright as the wrongness rolled through her. It was gone a second later, leaving her blinking in pain and surprise. Amelia looked equally shocked, her amber eyes wide as she jumped to her feet.
“Anyone else feel that?”
“Feel what?” Julius asked, looking at Chelsie, who shook her head.
“I felt it,” Myron said, putting a shaking hand to his forehead. “Someone just did something awful to the magic we wrapped around the house.”
“They tied it in a knot,” Amelia snarled, stomping out of the kitchen. “A very good knot at the end of a very good spell.”
“But that’s insane,” Marci said, scrambling after her. “Good or not, casting a spell in magic this thick is like throwing a lit match into a sea of gasoline. Who in the world would be stupid enough to risk—”
She didn’t get to finish, because at that moment, a giant sphere of ice materialized in their living room, landing with a thud on the hardwood floor. Cold rolled off it in waves, dropping the temperature of the house ten degrees in an instant. Marci was still gaping in surprise when the outside of the sphere exploded into ice dust, releasing the winter cyclone of fury that was Svena the White Witch.