“What doyouknow?” the rat cried. “You’re a dragon. You can fly away any time you want! But I’m chained to Algonquin forever, and she willneverlet me be.” The spirit bared her yellow teeth. “You have no right to tell me what to do!”
“I’m not trying to tell you what to do,” Julius said calmly. “But the DFZ was my home. What Algonquin does hurts all of us, but so does what you do to yourself.”
The rat glowered. “What do you care?”
“I care because I know what it’s like to be under someone’s boot,” he replied. “I know how it feels to be at your enemy’s mercy, how it feels being helpless. All this anger and rage isn’t hurting Algonquin, but it’s ripping you to bits. You’re just doing her job for her, but it doesn’t have to be like that.”
He looked over at Marci, who was hovering beside him. “Marci’s the best mage I’ve ever met. She and Ghost have stood against Algonquin before. They’ll help you do it now. So will I, because Algonquin’s my enemy, too. There are dragons out thereright nowrisking their lives against Algonquin and her Leviathan to buy us time to help you.” He smiled at her. “You don’t have to fight alone.”
His plea was a long shot. He still didn’t fully understand the situation or Marci’s plan for fixing it, but while Julius wasn’t a mage or a spirit, he understood despair very well. He knew what it felt like to be trapped and stomped on, but where he’d had Marci and Justin and Chelsie and even Bob, the DFZ had no one. She was a city of millions, but she thought she was fighting alone, and as one of those millions, Julius couldn’t let that be.
“We’re your allies,” he said firmly. “You can’t stand against Algonquin, but Algonquin can’t stand against the world. She’s the one who’s alone, not you. Wewantto help you. You’re our city, our home, and we’ll fight to defend you if you’ll just let us.”
The rat stared at him for a long time after that. “I remember you,” she whispered at last. “You lived in the house under the underpasses, and you cleared rats from the sewers. You had a business here. A life, even though you’re just a little dragon.”
Her round eyes dropped. “I’m touched you want to fight for me, but you’re wrong. Even with your help, we’re no match for Algonquin. All the magic I gathered is gone. Without it, I’m no longer bigger than she is.” She looked up at the flooded Pit with a shudder. “When the next wave comes, she’ll drown us all.”
“Then we’ll just have to make sure it doesn’t come,” Marci said, marching up the pile of trash. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. Raven has a plan.”
“Raven?” The rat cringed. “Raven hates me.”
“Raven doesn’t hate anyone,” Marci said. “I don’t even think he hates Algonquin. He’s just mad because you took his construct and ran amok. But he was the one who came to the Heart of the World to help me, and who brought me back to this world so I could helpyou. It’s all part of his plan to stop Algonquin’s threat for good, and that starts with you letting Myron back into his body.”
“What?” The DFZ cried, skittering backward. “NO! He’s the one who chained me!”
“He did,” Marci said. “And he was an idiot. Just like you, though, he only did those stupid, self-destructive things because he was afraid. He thought the rising spirits were going to destroy humanity, and he made some very bad choices because of that. If you give him another shot, though, I think you’ll find he’s had a change of heart. At the very least, you need to release your hold on his body so he can come back from the Heart of the World.”
The rat looked surprised. “He got in?”
“I let him in,” Marci said. “So he wouldn’t die. Now he’s trapped there until you let him out.”
“I don’t want anything to do with him,” the spirit grumbled. “Why can’t Raven do it? He brought you back.”
“Because I wasdead,” Marci reminded her. “Myron’s not. At least not yet.”
She glanced back at Julius, who was still carrying Myron’s unconscious body on his back. “However it came to be, you’re his Mortal Spirit. The two of you are intrinsically linked, connected across the two halves of this world. Just as you were the only one who could get him into the Sea of Magic, only you can get him out.” She smiled. “If nothing else, it’ll give you a chance to yell at him.”
That argument seemed to appeal to the DFZ more than any other, but when Julius walked up the pile of trash to carefully lay the unconscious mage in front of her, the spirit looked nervous. “I’m not sure how to—”
“Just reach out to him,” Ghost said. He was still a cat in Marci’s arms, but his eyes were open and bright again, looking at the DFZ with the exasperated patience of an old hand talking down an excitable, foolish novice.
“Reach out, and he’ll grab back,” he said. “Humans are quick learners, and Myron’s probably ready to come home.”
The DFZ didn’t look convinced, but she leaned down, nudging Myron’s body with her pointy nose. For several seconds, nothing happened, and then Myron’s body convulsed, his eyes shooting open as he gasped for breath.
“Myron?” Marci said, waving her hand in front of his wide eyes as he lay panting on the trash. “You back?”
Myron’s answer was to scramble to his feet, waving his arms frantically as if he were under attack. “We have to stop!”
Marci jerked back. “Stop what?”
“Everything,” he said, his eyes haunted as he scrubbed his shaking hands through his graying hair. “The seal, Novalli. I tried to hold it, but Algonquin’s attacks, whatever the DFZ did to blend her domains,you!” He stabbed his finger at Amelia. “You plunged all the dragon fire in the world into the Sea of Magic at one time! What were youthinking?!”
“Easy,” Amelia said, putting up her hands. “What’s wrong?”
“Everything!” he cried, whirling back to Marci. “The seal is breaking. I kept it together as best I could, but with all of you down here swinging magic around like bats, there was nothing I could do. If we don’t calm everything down right now, the seal’s going to break wide open.”
“It’s okay,” Marci said. “We’ll just—”
