My chin starts to wobble, and I squeeze the hilt of my blade till the wobbling stops. I try to think about making Ebb better—I think I’ve been thinking about it all along—but she still lies there, bleeding.
The Mage steps closer to me, like he’s stepping close to an animal. “You’ve come just in time,” he says softly. He lifts his hand and touches my face. I feel blood trickle down my cheek. “I owe you an apology,” he says. “I got so much wrong.”
I look him in the eye. We’re the same height. “No, sir.”
“Not the power,” he says. “Youarethe most powerful mage who ever lived, Simon. You’re… a miracle.” He cups my face in his wet palm. “But you’re not the Chosen One.”
I’m not the Chosen One.
Of course I’m not.
I’m not the Chosen One.
Thank magic. This is the only thing anyone has said today that makes sense. But it doesn’t make a difference—
I still have to tell him.
I swallow. “Sir, I have something to tell you. Baz and Penelope—”
“They don’t matter now! None of them. The Pitches and their war. As if all ofmagicdoesn’t hang on the precipice! As if the Great Devourer hasn’t marked our door!”
“Sir—”
“I thought I could salvage you,” he whispers. He’s standing so close to me. Holding my face like a baby’s. Or a dog’s. “I thought I could keep my promise to take care of you. That I’d find the right text, the missing rhyme. I thought I couldfixyou… But you weren’t the right vessel.” He nods to himself. It’s like he’s still looking past me. “I got this part wrong,” he says. “I got you wrong.”
I look down at Ebb. Then back at the Mage. “The Humdrum—,” I say.
His face contorts. “You’ll never be strong enough to fight him! You’ll never beenough,Simon—it isn’t your fault.”
“It is!” I shake my head, and he holds my jaw firmly. “Sir, I think my power is tied to the Humdrum. I think I might be causing him!”
“Nonsense!” His spit hits my mouth. “The Humdrum was foretold—‘The greatest threat the World of Mages has ever known.’Just as the Greatest Mage was foretold.”
“But Baz says—”
“You can’t listen to that whelp!” He drops my face and steps back, raising his arms, waving his red sword. “Cut from the same cloth as his mother. Does anyone think that Watford was better under her care? These halls were empty! Only the most prosperous, the most privileged magicians ever learned to speak. Natasha Grimm-Pitch loved her power and wealth—she loved the past—far too much to ever allow Watford to change.”
The Mage is pacing. He’s talking to the floor. I’ve never seen him like this—he’s moving too much, he’s saying too much.
“Should I weep over her death?” he asks, his voice too loud. “When it means a generation of magickal children have learned how to use their power? Am I supposed to besorry? I’m not sorry! What is the greatergood?”
He rounds on me again and clamps his hand where my neck meets my chest, catching my eyes and holding them. “I’m. Not. Sorry.”
Then he leans closer. His hair brushes against mine. “If I could go back, there’s nothing I’d change. Nothing. Except you… I can’t fix you, Simon.” He shakes his head, growling and gritting his teeth. “I can’t fix you—but I canrelieveyou. And I can fulfil the prophecy.”
I don’t know what to say. So I nod.
I’ve known all along that I was a fraud—it’s such a relief to hear the Mage finally saying it. And to hear that he has aplan.I just want him to tell me what to do.
“Give me your magic, Simon.”
I take a step back—in surprise, I think—but the Mage holds me by the neck. He presses his right hand over my heart. “I can take it. I finally found a way, but then I heard that you’d gotten there first. You can give it to me freely now, can’t you? Like you gave it to the Pitch brat?” I feel every one of his fingertips against my skin. “Don’t make me take it, Simon…”
I look down at Ebb. Her blood is pooling around her arm and shoulder. It’s just reached the tips of her blond hair.
“Think of it,” the Mage murmurs. “I have control that you’ll never have. Wisdom… Experience… With your power, I can obliterate the Humdrum. I can settle these quarrels once and for all—I can finally finish what I started.”
“What you started?”
