Eona: The Last Dragoneye

CHAPTER EIGHT

RYKO’S FIST PUNCHED three fast signals: twenty-four, on foot, northbound.

Crouching, I pulled Dela down into the grass and scanned the woodland behind the islander, every part of me focused on finding movement. My eyes caught on the quick flip of a pheasant tail, a branch bobbing in the hot wind, the shift of light between leaves.

“I can’t see any soldiers,” I whispered.

“What’s Ryko carrying?” Lady Dela said. “Is that a child?”

“Lady Eona!” We both spun around at Yuso’s low call. Beyond him, Vida and Solly were struggling to turn the horses.

“Make for those trees,” the captain said, pointing to a thick copse at the steeper edge of the slope.

I knew I should move, but something about Ryko’s small passenger held me still. His presence was almost like a taste in my mouth. Ryko had reached the emperor, and the two men were running side by side through the grass. The islander was losing momentum, his big chest heaving under the strain of his squirming burden. Whoever was slung over his shoulder did not come willingly. Behind them, Tiron had finally faced Ju-Long in the right direction. He dragged the horse into a reluctant trot.

“Lady Eona, you must go now!” Yuso ordered.

Ryko’s head jerked to one side — a nasty punch in the face from his passenger. He stumbled and lost his grip on the child. They both hit the ground and rolled in the long grass, legs and arms flailing. Kygo slowed and turned back. With easy strength, he pulled the child upright, but jumped back from the frenzied kicks and punches. Free of the emperor’s hold, the boy whipped around to face us, his hair half unraveled from a high-bound queue.

My heart tightened with sudden foreboding. I knew that tender curve of cheek and frail shoulder.

“That’s Dillon.” I stood up for a better view.

“Lord Ido’s apprentice?” Dela said, rising to peer at the boy, too. “What is he doing here?”

But I had a more pressing question on my mind.

“Can you see the black folio? Does he still have it?”

The last time I had seen Dillon, he had attacked Ryko and me and wrenched the black folio from my keeping. He had thought he could trade the book to Ido in return for his life. The poor fool did not realize it held more than the secret of the String of Pearls — it held the way for royal blood to enslave us and our dragon power.

No one but Ido and I knew it, and I could still hear the Dragoneye’s last, urgent words to me at the conquered palace. Anyone with the blood can bind us. Find the black folio, before Sethon does.

Merciful gods of heaven, I prayed, let Dillon still have the folio.

“I don’t see it,” Dela said, quick to understand. “It’s not there!”

A glimpse of dark leather sent dizzy relief through me. “No, he’s got it. Under his sleeve. See!”

My shrill triumph carried across to Dillon. His eyes fixed on me, his face widening into a scream. “Eona!” He ran a few steps, his hands beating the air. “See, see, I found her.” He struck himself in the head. “See!” His fist slammed into his skull again. “It’s Eona. See! It’s Eona!” Both fists pounded into his forehead, over and over. Although we stood at least fifty lengths from him, we could hear the dull thud of each blow.

Beside me, Yuso curled three fingers into a ward-evil. “Is he possessed?”

“No, Sun Drug,” I said, remembering the rage that had overtaken me with just a few doses. “Ido tried to kill him with it.”

Dela’s hand covered her mouth. “Poor child.”

“If he doesn’t shut up, he’ll bring the whole army down on us,” Yuso said, even as Kygo caught Dillon by the shoulder and clapped his hand over the boy’s mouth, muffling his screams to muted shrieks. Yuso pushed me back a step. “Get to cover,” he ordered, then ran to help his emperor.

Ryko had already crawled over to the struggle and was dodging Dillon’s vicious kicks as he grabbed for the boy’s legs. Tiron looped Ju-Long’s reins over a nearby tree, obviously intending to join the fray.

“They’re going to hurt him,” I said.

Dela tugged my sleeve. “Come, we must get to safety.”

“No.” I broke free and ran toward the three men struggling to contain Dillon. My breath came in hard gasps, more from fear than from the desperate sprint. Dillon’s ruined mind would push him past surrender; he would force them to hurt him.

I ducked around the knot of men, trying to find a way to Dillon. Across his writhing body, Ryko’s eyes met mine in clear communication. Still insane. The moment of understanding was as brief as a heartbeat, but my spirit lifted. Perhaps all was not lost between us. And perhaps all was not lost for Dillon. I launched myself into a gap between Yuso and the emperor.

“Dillon, it’s me,” I yelled. My hand grazed the boy’s shoulder. “It’s Eona. Stop fighting.”

“I told you to get back,” Yuso snarled. “Tiron, get her to safety.”

The guard ran up behind me. I dodged and searched for another opening in the shift of straining, sweaty bodies.

Yuso had one of Dillon’s shins clasped to his chest, his other hand trying to catch the boy’s wild punches. A pale flash flicked up from the boy’s forearm — the rope of guardian pearls, its end curled back like a whip above the black folio. It lashed out at Kygo, but Yuso deflected it with his fist. With breathtaking speed, it flailed Yuso’s hand, lifting skin and blood. The guard recoiled, cursing. Ryko clamped down Dillon’s other leg and arm, and Kygo locked his arms around the boy’s chest, his own head craned back to avoid the pearls and the boy’s frenzied head-butts. With savage intensity, Dillon bucked against the brutal hold on his body.

I saw a chance and lunged across the tangle of arms and legs, grabbing the boy’s ragged queue. “Dillon! Stop!” I roared against his ear.

Abruptly, he stilled. With a last click, the rope of pearls collapsed onto the black folio, then slithered around it, binding it back to his left forearm. Dillon’s jaundiced eyes fixed on mine. “Eona, Eona, Eona,” he chanted. “What happened to Eon?” He gave a shrill giggle.

“For Shola’s sake, keep him quiet,” Yuso snapped at me. “Ryko, what’s coming?”

I stroked Dillon’s clammy cheek, hoping to calm him as Ryko gave his report.

“Twenty-four men, fan formation, with a local upfront. They’re tracking the boy. They were two arenas away at least when I picked him up, but they’re moving fast.”

Yuso stared down at Dillon. “Why are they after you, boy?”

Dillon giggled. “Why are they after you, boy?”

Yuso’s lean face darkened.

“They want the black folio,” I said quickly. “Sethon thinks it holds the key to a weapon made of all the dragon power.” Between the tightly coiled pearls, I could make out the twelve interconnected circles embossed on the leather cover: the symbol of the String of Pearls. “Lord Ido thinks so, too.”

“Black words,” Dillon muttered. “Black words. Inside me.”

“I remember this boy now,” Kygo said. “Lord Ido’s apprentice.” His eyes found mine, but I could not read his expression. “Another Dragoneye. How does he come to be here?”

Dillon’s eyes darted from me to the emperor. “My lord sent me,” he said. “He’s in my head. ‘Find Eona, find Eona, find Eona.’ Always in my head.”

“What does he mean?” Kygo asked me.

But I could not speak, silenced by an obvious truth. If Ido died, the only thing that stood between the bereft dragons and me was Dillon — a mind-sick apprentice as untrained as myself. There was no chance he could hold back the beasts. We would both die, torn apart by their grief. I fought for air as if I was surfacing through oil.

We had to get Ido out of the palace, alive.

Yuso suddenly straightened, his dark eyes scanning the eerily quiet woodlands around us. “Your Majesty,” he said quietly. “We don’t have time to question this boy. We must move, now!”

“Not until we get the black book off him.” Kygo’s face held a new intensity. I had seen its like before, on Ido and my master: the burn of ambition.

Yuso’s jaw clenched, but he gave a curt nod and reached for the folio. The last two pearls lifted, like a snake’s head. He yanked back his hand. “Are they alive?”

“They have Gan Hua worked into them,” I said. “They’ll strike at anything that tries to move the folio.”

Even now, the negative energy woven into the pearls was nauseating me. No wonder Dillon was still so sick in mind and body; he did not have a chance between the book and the damage from the overdose of Sun Drug. Both Tiron and Ryko leaned away from Dillon’s arm.

“Your Majesty, we must move,” Yuso said.

Kygo’s jaw tightened. “All right. Leave the book where it is. The boy comes with us. Just keep him and the book safe.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Yuso fixed me with a hard stare. “You seem to be able to control him, Lady Dragoneye. Keep him quiet.”

At his nod, all the men loosened their grip on Dillon, allowing him on to his feet. He staggered, striking out weakly at their steadying hands until I hooked him into the circle of my arms. His thin body stank of fevered nights and driven days.

“You’ve got to stay with me and be quiet,” I said, holding him upright. “Do you understand?”

“He’s still in my mind,” Dillon whispered. I grabbed his fist as it arced toward his forehead. It was not going to be easy to keep him quiet — or alive.

With one last look at the tree line, Yuso herded us forward. “Go!”

I pulled Dillon into a stumbling run. A downrush of cold air from the heavens cut through the heat, chilling the sour sweat on my face and neck. The monsoon was coming. Yuso overtook us, joining Kygo a length or so ahead.

“Your Majesty, take Ryko and the others southeast,” the captain said, keeping pace beside the emperor. He looked up at the heavy mass of roiling clouds.

“Ride as long as you can, but don’t take any risks in the mud. I’ll lead the soldiers north, with Solly and Tiron.”

“Understood,” Kygo said.

He and Yuso drew away from us, intent on mobilizing the others. I squeezed Dillon’s bony hand, urging more speed. Dela was only thirty or so lengths away, frantically waving us in. Further back, Solly and Vida waited with the horses.

“Is that Lady Dela?” Dillon asked in such a normal voice that I slowed to stare at him. “Why is she dressed as a man?” For a moment, I saw the gentle Dillon I had once known— bewildered and lost — then he was gone again, bright madness back in his eyes. “My lord said he’d get out of my head. Why isn’t he out of my head?” His voice rose piteously. “Find Eona. Find Eona. Find Eona.”

I had heard Dillon call my name like that before. But when? The elusive memory hardened into an image: the dragon battle at the fisher village. Dillon screaming for me through the power of the Rat Dragon. Through Ido.

“Did Lord Ido send you to find me?”

“He’s in my head.”

Yuso and Kygo reached the thicket. I tugged Dillon into a sprint. A second gust of wind brought light pulsing across the dark clouds. For one heavy moment, time hung between hot earth and cold heaven, then the land shuddered under the sky’s roar. Dillon screamed, dragging at my hand. I looked over my shoulder. He was bent, as if the gods pressed him to the ground. Close behind us, Ryko and Tiron led Ju-Long in a tight hold between them, the horse blowing hard with fear.

With grim effort, I pulled Dillon into a run beside me. “Does Lord Ido want you to give me the black book?” I eyed the folio bound to his arm.

Dillon’s features sharpened. “It’s my book,” he panted. “It’s mine. Lord Ido can’t hold onto the dragon. They make him drink the black beast. All his power is draining away.” He giggled in tight, painful gasps. “It will be mine soon, then I can make him hurt. Just like he makes me hurt.”

Part of me hoped I was listening to the ravings of a ruined mind — yet I had seen my old friend in that moment of sanity. Although his words were feverish, they still rang with truth. Dillon knew that Lord Ido was losing hold of the Rat Dragon. And he knew he would soon have Ido’s power. I shuddered, pushing my coursing fear into a final burst of speed. We were almost there.

“Dillon, how sick is Lord Ido?” I tightened my grip on his damp hand. “We can’t let him die. Do you understand? We have to save him.”

“Save him?” Dillon’s glassy eyes narrowed. “No!” This time his fist was too quick. The crack of knuckles against his skull made me wince. “He hurts me.”

“I know, I know,” I soothed. “But we’re going to save him, so he can train us.”

“No!” Dillon shrieked. “I want him to die.”

He twisted in my grip like a wild dog fighting a noose. I stumbled after him, towed by his savage fury. Another blast of cold wind slammed into us, bringing the smell of sweet, wet grass. The piercing cricket song stopped, the sudden silence pounding in my ears. I looked up in time to see a claw of light rake the sky, then a booming shock surged over us.

“Eona, behind you!”

Kygo’s frantic voice swung me around to face the dense tree line at the far end of the slope.

A wide semicircle of soldiers had broken out of the woods, all carrying Ji, the hook-bladed pikes braced for attack. They were no more than one hundred lengths away and moving with wary speed. I heaved on Dillon’s hand, but he had dropped to his knees, a shrieking anchor. I felt the gusty wind flex into the heavier muscle of the monsoon, its brutal strength knocking me back a step and stealing my breath. Before me, the grass flattened and the trees bowed in obeisance as the gale brought the first drumming drops of rain. A panic of starlings burst out of the trees and spiraled upward, turning in a sharp arrow ahead of the wind. I gasped as the sudden rush of cool water streamed against my hair and face, its weight stinging my skin and scalp.

A few lengths away, Ryko pushed Ju-Long and Tiron onward, then turned and drew his swords. The islander’s lone figure blurred in the thick veil of pounding rain as the shapes of Tiron and the gray horse forged past us. I thought I heard the young guard call me though the teeming water, but Dillon pulled my hand again. He was back on his feet. My relief froze into realization; I was no longer holding Dillon. He was holding me.

Even as I tried to wrench free, he caught my other hand and with brutal strength swung me around in a splashing circle, as though we were children again, playing Dragon Spin.

“What are you doing?” I yelled. “Stop it!”

“Dragon day, dragon night, dragon spirit with the right,” he sang. “Call your name, bring your light — show us who will have the sight!”

The wet hem of my gown wrapped around my legs. I tripped, collapsing onto one knee in the pooling water. The wind was gone, the rain now falling in a seamless gray curtain as if the gods were emptying a pitcher over our heads.

“Dillon, the soldiers are coming!” I blinked, trying to clear my stinging eyes of water. It ran in rivulets down my face and the front of my gown, soaking the rough cloth into a dead weight. “We have to run.”

“Which dragon? Which dragon? Choose!” he singsonged. “Choose!”

He yanked at my hands, grinding the thin bones together as he hauled me upright. Such strength was not natural. I threw my weight backward in a bid to jerk free, but he held me locked in his game.

Just above our wrists, the rope of white pearls loosened its stranglehold. The last two perfect gems lifted again, this time like a snake tasting the sodden air. With clattering purpose they uncoiled, leaving only one loop binding the folio to Dillon’s arm. The rest of the rope slithered around the edges of the book and settled a protective rank of pearls along each groove of exposed paper. Then, with a snap and lunge, the lead length wrapped around my right wrist, strapping my hand to Dillon’s as if it was a wedding bind.

I strained against the shackle. Heat engulfed my arm and rolled through my body on a wave of thick nausea. Bitter power rose behind my eyes, whispering words that struck at my mind with acid. Ancient words. The book was calling me, folding me into its secrets. It was a book of blood, of death, of chaos. It was the book of Gan Hua.

If this was what burned in Dillon’s mind, no wonder he screamed and pounded at his head.

Desperately, I pulled against the pearls; I did not want to follow Dillon into madness. Already, the words were searing their mark into me. Although I had beaten back the Gan Hua in Kinra’s swords, that had been a mere flicker compared to this blazing bitterness. If I did not stop it now, it would consume me.

I pushed back against the scorching power as I had pushed back against Kinra’s swords. It made no difference to the book’s relentless, blistering force.

Perhaps Kinra could hold back this ancient power. I did not trust her influence, nor did I want to touch her treachery. Yet she’d had the strength and skill to shape Hua into a dark force and send it across five centuries — the swords were proof.

I still had her death plaque in my pocket, although I could not reach for it. Would its presence be enough? I sent out my plea: Kinra, please stop the folio from burning its madness into me. Then I sent another prayer to my ancestors who had brought her Dragoneye power to me: Stop Kinra’s own madness from burning me, too.

As if in answer, a force rose through my blood. An aching cold flowed across the acid words like frost, extinguishing the burn of the book. Then the words and the chill were suddenly gone. But neither the pearls nor Dillon eased their brutal grip.

“Choose,” Dillon cried again.

I shook my head, trying to clear away the aftershock of the searing words.

“Choose.” His fingers tightened into a bone-crunching demand. “Choose!”

“I choose the Ox,” I gasped. The second dragon; two spins in the game. If I could find Kygo, maybe I could drag us in his direction.

“I choose the Rooster,” Dillon called. Ten spins.

I clenched my teeth and swung with him into the twirling count of twelve.

“One,” he yelled. The landscape was a blur of gray and green, Dillon’s pale, grinning face the only fixed point.

“Two.” His weight pulled at the end of my hands, wrenching me into a splashing stagger.

“Three.” His voice changed. No more playful singsong— just flat command. I closed my eyes against the relentless water and the whirling sickness in my head.

“Four.”

Every spin dug us deeper into the mud, closer to the raw force of the earth. At the edge of my reeling senses, I heard him murmuring more words. Although their form and meaning were lost in the deafening tattoo of water, the Dragoneye in me knew they were the same ancient words that had attacked my mind.

Dillon was calling dark energy. It was embedded in the deep resonance of the numbers and in his fevered chant. Four was the number of death, and I could feel it coming with the pounding certainty of my own heartbeat.

“Eona!” Kygo’s voice. I opened my eyes. His tall figure flashed past.

I dropped onto my knees in the watery mud, dragging all of my weight against Dillon’s hold, but his savage strength jerked me back up into stumbling submission. Power prickled along our bound hands.

“Five,” he yelled.

“Dillon, what are you doing?” I yelled.

“With you, I’m strong enough,” he screamed.

Strong enough for what?

Around us the rain slanted, caught in the roaring gusts of a sudden wind from the northwest. Kygo flashed past again, bent into the brutal slam of air, his swords drawn. I tried to call his name, but water filled my eyes and mouth.

“Six.”

I shook my head, fighting for sight and breath. A smear of dark figures coalesced into running soldiers, their battle cries broken into a staccato wail by the buffeting wind and the spine-snapping momentum of our spins.

“Dillon, the soldiers!” I screamed.

“Seven!”

His eyes were closed, head craned back. The drone of his chant rose into a shrill keen that matched the shriek of the wind. I tasted the ancient power within it. It dried my mouth like a sour plum, but something else lay within the bitterness. A familiar, sweet tang of cinnamon — the taste of the red dragon’s power. Was he calling my dragon? Impossible, yet there were also the faint notes of vanilla and orange. Lord Ido’s beast. Dillon’s ravings sharpened into one clear moment of fury: I want him to die.

Merciful gods, he was using me to kill Ido.

“Dillon, no!” I slammed my body back, yanking at his hands, but I was still held fast.

“Eight.”

From nearby came the clash of steel meeting steel. Swords! My heart contracted into a hard ball, then burst back into drumming fear. Had the soldiers attacked Kygo? A dark knot of struggling men flickered past. Ryko, beating back three soldiers.

“Nine.”

There was nothing I could do to stop Dillon in the earthly plane; he was too strong. Focusing on his ecstatic face, I tried to shift into mind-sight. It was like forcing my way through a briar made of pelting water and panting terror. As he spun me around, I managed three deep breaths. On the fourth, the gray-green earthly plane yielded to the iridescence of the energy world.

“Ten.”

I staggered into the next spin, disoriented by the sudden assault of bright color. Before me, Dillon’s flesh and blood shifted into the streaming pathways of his energy body. I gasped, repulsed by the swollen network of dark power that flowed through him in a thick, oily slip. What had happened to his Hua? Even the seven points of power along his spine — usually pumping with the silvery life force — were black and bloated. And something else was wrong with them. I stared at the heart- point in his chest, only a faint tinge of its green vigor left in the murky depths. It was spinning in the wrong direction.

He raised his head, the dark energy swarming through his eye sockets.

“Eleven,” he said and smiled. “He’s dying.”

My head snapped back as he pulled me into the second- to-last pivot. I locked my eyes on the crimson dragon above, desperate for a fixed point of sanity. Her huge, sinuous body thrashed against an invisible enemy. Ruby claws raked the air in futile slashes. A channel of bright gold Hua stretched between her and Dillon — he was siphoning her power, with no return of vital energy. With no defense against the ten bereft dragons.

“Dillon, let her go. Before the others come. You can’t control this!”

“I can do anything,” he yelled.

Fury roared through me, bringing a new surge of strength. He was hurting my dragon. Using my power.

“Eona!” I screamed, calling our shared name, but there was no answering cascade of golden energy through me. It was all streaming into Dillon. Somehow, he was blocking us from union. Another channel, thin and stuttering, leached from the blue dragon. The beast was barely an outline, its small, pale body rolling in agony.

“Dillon, stop it! You’re hurting them.” A terrible thought seized me — could he kill the dragons?

He cannot. Ido’s voice. It was barely a whisper in my mind, ragged with pain and effort.

Are the others coming, Ido? Can you hold them back?

They will not come near the Black Folio, he rasped. Stop the boy from draining my dragon. Please, before— His voice broke into a scream that ripped through me.

“How?” I yelled. “How do I stop him?”

Get the book, Ido panted. Cut him from its power.

I did not want to touch the book.

“Twelve!” Dillon shouted, triumphant.

He wrenched me into the final spin, breaking my hold on the energy world. Its jewel colors slid back into the dull, wet landscape of the mountainside. With a shrieking rush, the rain and wind disappeared, the flooded ground suddenly dry and hard under my stumbling feet. No more driving rain. My face, gown, hair: all dry. Ryko and the three soldiers flashed past again, but they were no longer fighting. All four men were staring up at the sky.

“Look at that!” Dillon shouted through a new roar of gushing water. He stopped spinning, the sudden halt jerking me into a gasping standstill. “Look at what I can do.” He threw his head back, laughing.

Above, the rain was still streaming from the heavy clouds, but not downward. It was horizontal, sucked into a ring that circled the entire slope like an immense whirlpool suspended in the air. It spun around us, a thundering torrent four houses high that ripped up trees and bushes into its swirling sluice. All of us, friend and foe, were corralled in its center, our sanctuary already shrinking as the vortex churned across the pine trees, yanking them into its swelling depths.

“Dillon, push it back,” I roared. “Push it back!”

A shrill animal scream cut through the booming rush. A horse broke out of a thicket near the churning wall, dragging Solly behind it by its reins.

“Solly, let go,” Vida yelled. She and Dela pulled the other two horses clear. “Let go!”

The stocky man released his hold and tucked into a ball, barely escaping the slicing hooves. The horse galloped past us — eyes rolling white — toward Ryko and the soldiers. All four men still stood gaping at the expanding water and debris, the horse’s pounding progress lost in the deafening rumble.

“Ryko, move!” Kygo yelled. But he was too far away.

The horse plowed into the middle of the group, stamping over Ryko and a screaming soldier. For a moment horror stole my breath; then the islander moved, rolling away from the frenzied beast. A few lengths away, the water swept up a chunk of mountainside in an explosion of cracking wood and earth.

Dillon looked up at his handiwork, his delight draining into sudden pallor. “It’s too big.” A fine spray of cool water wet my face and Dillon’s hair. He dropped my unbound hand, digging his freed fingers into his forehead. “It hurts,” he gasped. “Is it supposed to hurt?”

“Give me the book.” I dug at our pearl shackle. “Let me help you.”

“No!” He shoved me in the chest, pushing me back a step. “You want my power. Just like my lord.” He bared his teeth in a vicious smile. “Can you hear him? He’s screaming.”

I grabbed him by the front of his tunic. “Dillon, you can’t kill Ido. If he dies, we die.” I shook him. “Do you understand? We have to save him!”

“Save him?” Dillon spat the words. “I’m going to kill him. Before he kills me.”

His yellowed eyes bulged with hate. He would never save Ido. Never help me. I felt the roaring water around us falter, the fine mist gathering into drops that hit my face with ominous weight. Dillon was losing control.

I had one chance to get the book before he killed us all. But he was stronger than me in every way. What did I have left?

Sucking in a desperate breath, I slammed my forehead into his face. The impact jarred my head back in an explosion of bruising pain and streaming light. I heard Dillon howl as he recoiled, pulling me with him. Through a blur of tears, I lunged at the pale rope binding the folio to his forearm. My fingernails scraped the embossed cover and connected with the row of pearls. I rammed my fingers between gems and leather and pried open a gap, enough space to hook the rigid rope. My first yank loosened its straining resistance. On the second, half of the pearls lifted. Once more and I would have it.

I hauled, but instead of releasing, the pearls snapped back, clamping my hand against the leather binding. Dillon straightened, blood welling from a gash above his eye. Frantically, I tried to pull my fingers free, but there was no slack. Both my hands were bound to the folio, and the folio was bound to Dillon. His fist swung back, but I had nowhere to move. The savage undercut caught me in the delta of my ribs and slammed out my air. I doubled over, my breath locked in my chest.

I had lost my chance to get the book.

The pearls closed even more tightly around my fingers, sending burning pressure up my arm. Heat rose through me, unclenching my chest into gasping relief. Sour acid flooded my mouth as soft words seared my mind. The black book was calling me again, whispering ancient promises of perfect power— whispering a way to stop Dillon.

For a moment, the book’s treachery held us still, each caught in our own desperation.

“No!” Dillon screamed. “It’s mine!” His wild punches hammered my arms and chest.

All I could see in front of me was Dillon’s flailing madness and the sickening memory of his black, bloated Hua. Was this the book’s promise to me, too — the dark grip of Gan Hua and burning madness? There was no choice. I had to let the acid words score their power into my mind. I had to risk its madness. Everything else had failed.

Around us, the circling wall was shedding waves of rain laden with stinging stones and mud. The air rippled and streamed with collisions of water, as if huge bucketfuls were being thrown from all directions. An uprooted tree spun out of the torrent and crashed into the ground near Solly, reaming a hole in the mud. Only a few lengths away, Kygo ducked as a bush flew past his head and bounced across the flooding slope. It was all coming down.

I closed my hand around the pearls and prayed to Kinra again. But this time I asked her to call the black book and let it carve its dark Hua into my mind.

The heat slammed through me like a physical blow. I staggered and pulled Dillon off balance. The pearls coiled and squeezed our connected hands like a rattling constrictor, pulling the book across the bridge of our wrists. Bitter gall parched my mouth and throat, shriveling my howling pain into a whimper.

The book was coming to me, bringing its scorching power.

“No!” Dillon swung his body into mine. “No!”

His weight knocked me to my knees in the muddy water, the momentum bringing him splashing down beside me. Bracing his shoulder against mine, he tore at the shifting, contorting pearls. His nails gouged my flesh, his fingers sliding under the gems in the slip of my blood. I rammed my body against his, but it only added more leverage to his heave on the pearl rope. The book lifted. Dillon hauled on them again, murmuring words that sang their power through my head. In an explosion of unraveling pearls and shrieking Hua, he wrenched the book free.

I screamed as the ancient energy ripped out of me.

For a moment, I saw the stark triumph on his face. Then the swirling wall of water dropped with a roaring crash that sent up plumes of mud like a ring of explosions. Huge peaks of water collided around us in all directions, breaking into rolling, swelling waves black with dirt and debris. I saw Solly and Dela disappear under the roiling torrent that swept toward us. Near the tree line, a backrush caught a group of running soldiers, their leather armor dragging them under. A horse squealed, the sound suddenly cut off as the poor beast was swamped. I lunged for Dillon, hoping to grab him before the full force hit us, but my fingers only grazed his shirt. I heard Kygo scream my name. He was only an arm’s length away from me. But so was Dillon. As I lunged for the boy again, the pearls coiled around his forearm, wrapping themselves around the exposed edges of the book. It knew the water was coming.

The wave hit me like a cold sledgehammer. It slammed me backward, then pulled me under its dark surface, flipping me into a straining tumble. I heard only the rush of water and my heartbeat pounding the sudden lack of air. Legs caught in heavy folds of cloth. Swirling stones and twigs pelting me. No air. No air. Was I up or down? Something hit my shoulder. I grabbed it — the buoyant length of a branch. Up, please let it be up. I kicked frantically, my feet tangled in the twists of my gown.

Chest searing with the end of my last breath. Up, up. Clinging to the wood, I broke the surface, gasping, my ears ringing with the relief of air, and the deafening crash of water.

Something snagged my sleeve.

“Grab the tree.”

Yuso’s blurred face. I reached for him. His cold hand locked into mine and pulled me over the solid round of a tree trunk.

“Hold on,” he yelled and hooked his arm over my body.

We spun, caught in a violent eddy, then lurched back into the wild current rushing down the slope. Pale shapes under the roiling water bumped and tumbled past. Bodies, their flailing limbs brushing against me. For a few lengths a sobbing horse swam beside us, struggling to keep its head above the murky rapids. Then our tree trunk snagged on another and swung around. For a breathless moment, I saw Dillon clinging to a tree, the black folio swarming up his body like a rat finding higher ground. The pearls wrapped around a branch and pulled him to safety.

Then our makeshift raft broke loose and Yuso and I spun back into the deadly plummet downhill.