Algonquin looked down at her. “Do you always ask this many questions?”
“I’ve found it’s the best way to get information,” Marci said. “And since you’re not a dragon, I don’t think you’d show me all of this just to brag.”
That joke at the Heartstrikers’ expense went over much better than Marci had anticipated. Algonquin looked absolutely delighted, throwing her head back with a bright, musical laugh. “You certainly do know how to play to power,” she said, wiping her eyes. “A very useful survival mechanism for one as lowly as yourself. But seeing how I brought you up here precisely to answer the question you just asked, I’ll oblige you. Look again at the dragons, and tell me what you see at their base.”
The last thing Marci wanted to do was look at that grisly pile of corpses ever again. But curiosity eventually overpowered her disgust, and she looked, peering down through the now-bright moonlight at the pile of dead dragons. She was morbidly searching for a telltale Heartstriker feather when she saw it. At the base of the pile, in the spot where the draining dragon blood formed a large, circular pool on the sodden ground, something wasmoving.
Her first thought was that it must be a trick of the wind and moonlight. It was just a puddle of blood on the ground. Even from this distance, she knew it had to be far too shallow for anything to swim in. And yet, the longer she stared at it, the more convinced Marci became that that was exactly what was happening. There was something living in that pool of dragon’s blood and mud. Somethingbig.
“What is it?” she whispered, squinting in the dark.
“What I told you at the beginning of this,” Algonquin said, her watery voice trembling with excitement. “That is a Mortal Spirit.MyMortal Spirit.”
Impossible.
Marci jumped. She’d been so distracted by the craziness going on in front of her, she’d completely forgotten that Ghost was still in her arms until he wiggled free.
You can’t own a Mortal Spirit,he said, his voice wavering between a cat’s angry yowl and the Empty Wind’s deep, unearthly rumble.We are the products of mortality. Just as the glaciers carved out your bed, lake spirit, we are what remains when human fears and hopes dig gouges into the magical landscape of this world. You can’t own or control us any more than you can create us.
By the time he finished, Marci was staring in shock. Her spirit must be feeling better if he was making speeches, but how did he know all of that? When she’d asked him about Mortal Spirits before, he’d claimed to be as ignorant as she was.
I was,Ghost purred in her head.Amelia told us, remember?
She choked a little.And you just took her word for it? About your own nature?
A nudge rolled through her head, almost like a shrug.It felt right.
Marci didn’t know what to say after that. Algonquin, however, was full of ideas.
“Well, well,” she said, crouching down to look at the glowing cat eye to eye. “The walking deathcanspeak. And here I thought you were just playing kitten to string the mortal along.”
Ghost hissed at her, raising the fur on his back, and Algonquin stood up again with a smile. “Neither of you is as special as you think,” she said, turning back to Marci. “Mortal Spirits might be shaped by humans, but they’re born the same way the rest of us are. All you need is a well and enough power to fill it, and pop, you get a spirit.”
“That’s what you’re doing here, isn’t it?” Marci said, the words bursting out of her as everything came together. “All this magic isn’t for a weapon or even your own power. You’re using it to fill a Mortal Spirit so that it’ll be born ahead of all the others!”
“Don’t forget dependent on me,” Algonquin added with a cruel smile. “That’s the most important part.” She looked out toward the horizon where the glimmering lights of the DFZ sparkled in the distance. “The magic is rising, but it’s not there yet. Without me to feed it, my new Mortal Spirit will be no stronger than your sad little cat was outside the city, if it managed to be born at all. But with all ofthisto back it”—she swept her hand over the interlocking circles of spirits—“it will soon be at full capacity, and wholly dependent upon me to stay that way.” She looked back down at Ghost. “So you see, kitten, you can be both createdandcontrolled. Sorry to ruin your expectations.”
Ghost growled low in his throat, but Marci still wasn’t convinced. “If that’s true, how do you explain my spirit? He didn’t need you.”
“True,” Algonquin admitted. “But I’m afraid your precious spirit was little more than an unintended consequence. A freak mistake born far too soon due to the elevated ambient magic caused by my real work here.”
I am no mistake!Ghost roared, blue eyes flashing as his body began to shift.I was born because you left the ground littered with corpses! This city was built on the deadyoucreated, Algonquin. Hundreds of thousands in a single night, abandoned and forgotten, and all because you were angry about some dirt in your water.
The glowing cat’s shape fell away as he spoke, and in his place was the faceless soldier, his transparent body taut with rage and growing more solid by the word. “Did you think they would not cry out for justice? That their pleas would not be heard? There is far more magic in this world than what you can touch, water sprite. More power than your shores could ever know. Our time is coming, Algonquin, and when it dawns, the dead will have their satisfaction, and you will pay for what you have done.”
By the time he finished, a gale was howling over the mountain strong enough to blow the chairs over. Even Marci was having trouble staying standing, and Algonquin’s body was rippling like water in a storm. But though she seemed to be having trouble maintaining her reflection, her voice remained as calm and cold as the deep lake bottom.
“I know what is coming better than any,” she said, glaring the Empty Wind down. “Ignorant fool. I am the land itself. My anger is older and greater than any pain your precious forgotten dead will ever know. Why do you think I’m doing this?”
The Empty Wind clenched his fists, but Marci got there first, putting a warning hand on the spirit’s ice-cold, ghostly arm. “Actually,” she said. “Whyareyou doing this? If you’re so certain of your ability to breed a new Mortal Spirit, why bother grabbing us? For that matter, why bother with any of this? You clearly don’t have a high opinion of mortals or our spirits, so why put all this effort into creating a Mortal Spirit of your own?”
“Because a Mortal Spirit alone is not enough,” Algonquin said bitterly. “To actually get what I want, I need the human that controls it.”
She’d thought as much. “You need a Merlin,” Marci finished confidently.
“Not just any Merlin,” the lake said. “ThefirstMerlin.”
That made less sense. “Why does the order matter?” Marci asked, looking at the Empty Wind, who shrugged. “I thought a Merlin was just a souped-up mage with a Mortal Spirit for backup.”
