They both looked at her like she was crazy, but Marci was already walking over to Myron, pushing right out to the edge of the wind in the trust that Ghost would follow. Which he did, albeit grudgingly.
“This is a mistake.”
“This is atragedy,” Amelia said. “Think about what you’re doing, Marci. Leaving someone to suffer the consequences of their actions isn’t cruel. It’s natural selection at work. You’re only encouraging more bad behavior if you spare him.”
“Probably,” Marci admitted. “But I’d rather deal with that than knowing I walked off and left another mage to die. Besides, it’s not like he can do anything. I mean, look at him.”
The UN mage was little more than a shadow of himself. His body was even more transparent than Marci’s, and he wasn’t moving at all. He was just kneeling there on the ground, waiting for death to come. It was a truly pathetic sight, and angry as she was with Myron, Marci couldn’t stand to see him end like this. If nothing else, she couldn’t let him die before she gloated her victory over him, so she took one more step forward, forcing Ghost’s protective winds to expand until they covered the older mage as well.
The moment the Empty Wind swept away the burning magic, Myron collapsed, clutching what was left of his transparent body with a sob. The heartbreaking sound cemented Marci’s belief that she’d done the right thing, but Amelia rolled her eyes.
“Fantastic,” she said, crossing her forelegs with a huff. “Now we have this to deal with on top of everything else.” She shot Marci a dirty look. “Julius has been a terrible influence on you.”
Marci didn’t agree with the terrible part, but the rest was true. She certainly hadn’t shown Bixby or his men mercy, but a lot had happened in her life since then, and Marci was no longer so quick to kill. Besides, while he definitely didn’t deserve anything after what he’d done, lettingtheSir Myron Rollins die when she could easily save him just felt like a waste. As she’d just seen from the DFZ’s binding spellwork, he was still a brilliant mage. The world needed those, even if they were jerks. Of course, now that she’d saved Sir Myron, Marci had to figure out what to do with him.
She was turning to ask Ghost if there was a way to just kick him back to his body in the physical world when Myron suddenly rolled over, collapsing on his back to stare up at Marci with a look of absolute incomprehension.
“You saved me.”
“I did,” she said, pausing expectantly for the flood of gratitude that usually followed such statements. But not this time.
“Why?” he demanded, sitting up in a rush. “Why would you do that?”
“I’m starting to wonder,” Marci grumbled.
“You know, a little groveling wouldn’t hurt,” Amelia said, hopping off Marci’s shoulder to land on Myron’s head, which she immediately started pushing down toward his lap. “Bow, idiot. You owe her your life.”
Myron waved the little dragon away furiously. An inconsequential gesture, since his transparent hand went right through her. “Why would I be grateful to Novalli? She just freed a Mortal Spirit!”
“That you raised and bound,” Marci said angrily. “Seriously, what were you thinking?”
“What areyouthinking?” he yelled back. “I had to bind her. Do you not have eyes? She’s a monster!”
“My eyes work just fine,” Marci said, rising to her feet. “But the only monster I see is you, Myron.”
“That’s because you don’t understand,” he said, scraping his hands desperately through his graying hair. “You’ve ruined everything. Without the binding, she’ll run rampant!”
“Yeah, well, whose fault is that?” Amelia asked. “You guys were the ones who got her all riled up.”
“I had everything under control.”
“No, you didn’t,” Marci said, exasperated. “You tried to put a leash on something a billion times your size! Ofcourseit went wrong.”
“Only because of you,” he snapped. “The collar was never meant to be permanent. I just needed to keep control long enough to become a Merlin. If you hadn’t meddled, I’d be one right now, and this whole spirit problem would befixed.”
Ghost’s wind grew terrifyingly cold. “You should have let him die,” he growled.
“Not too late,” Amelia said cheerfully.
Marci was secretly starting to agree. But as infuriating as Myron was, her decision was made.
“Done is done,” she said, glaring down at him. “For better or worse, your life is saved. Go home, Myron. We don’t need you here.”
The haughty look fell off the mage’s face, leaving him with an almost sheepish expression. “I don’t know how,” he admitted, looking down at his hands in his lap. “The spirit brought me here by her own path. I don’t…I don’t know how to get back to my body on my own.”
Another time, Marci would have laughed herself sick at the irony of the world’s greatest expert on deep magic getting lost in it. Right now, though, it was just one more annoyance.
“Then you’d better stop complaining,” she snapped. “Because I’m out of time to waste on you.” She turned on her heel, putting her back to him as she walked toward the open door. “Suck it up or get left behind, but I’m going to finish what I started.”
