“Uncool!” I yelled out. “You shouldn’t use magic against people who don’t have it.” A little more grappling, and I managed to get my pinkie in a loop of ribbon. I pulled up the key and slipped it around my neck again
I glanced back. Two of Fayden’s minions—already on the ground floor—were heading toward me.
The pipe was just wide enough to run along, so I hauled butt across it—a pretty impressive feat in heels. As I ran, I began the chant. “It’s a circle of fear, a circle of control.”
I stopped right in the middle of the pipes, equal distance between the balcony walls and right in the middle of the circle. It was louder down here, the circle whooshing as it spun nearly drowning out Fayden’s yelling.
But not quite.
“She’s chanting a spell!” Fayden yelled out. “Stop her!”
I jumped from one pipe to another, barely avoiding the hands of a minion who reached for me. “You wanna wreak havoc? Then you have to pay the toll.”
“You little brat,” she said. “You have no idea how hard I’ve worked for this.”
And I don’t really care, I silently thought.
Aloud, I kept repeating the incantation. “You take our power. You try to take our souls. But in this case, honey, it’s you who’s gotta go.”
Someone grabbed my ankle, but I kicked myself free. I pulled the key from around my neck and chanted the last bit of the spell.
“We’re breaking your circle, we’re tearing up your goal, and most of all we’re taking back the magic that you stole!”
I lobbed the key—and it landed right in the middle of the spinning wheel. Sparks suddenly flew across the room. I ducked and put my hands over my head as the wheel expanded into a spinning sphere, then exploded in a burst of light and sound and energy that made my hair stand on end. The windows exploded outward, and the pipes creaked and groaned around us as energy shot the length of the pumping station.
After a moment, the room went silent.
I looked up. The wheel of light was gone, leaving a dull blue haze in the room. Neither Fayden nor her minions were anywhere in sight.
Time to make a run for it.
I left the key behind, hopped over the pipe, and hit the ground. I pulled off my shoes and ran toward the stairs, my party heels dangling from my fingers. I took the stairs two at a time, the metal treads biting into my bare feet as I ran. But I didn’t care. I just wanted to get out of the building and away from Fayden. I made it to the balcony, ten feet from the door, when she stood up in front of me.
There was a cut on her cheek from where she’d fallen to the floor. She looked mad, and I could feel her energy swell as she gathered it up for a strike.
It took me a minute to remember that I had magic of my own—or I was supposed to, anyway.
I opened myself up to the power in the room, and there was plenty of it. And for a glorious second, I could feel the firespell gathering in my bones.
But only for a second. The more firespell Fayden tried to make, the less I could gather up. It was like there was only a certain amount of power in the room, and she was pulling it all toward her.
“Oh, this is going to be bad,” I muttered.
“Yes,” she said, an evil grin on her face. “It is. And you deserve it. You ruined what I made. You did this—destroyed something I built. And for what? Because you didn’t believe in me? Because you didn’t agree with me?”
I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me, or just thinking about the things she really wanted to say to Jeremiah.
Either way, this was going to be bad. I tried to pull in a little more firespell of my own, just to reduce the amount she had to work with. It wasn’t going to do much good, I knew, but what else could I do?
“When all this falls apart,” she said, “it will be your fault.”
She wound up her arm to throw the firespell at me, and I closed my eyes, bracing for impact . . . when I heard the roar of a wolf.
My eyes shot open. Fayden was on the ground, a giant silver wolf atop her, little bits of glass in his fur.
It was Jason. He’d come through the window . . . to save me.
He fought with Fayden, but she couldn’t get enough traction to throw the firespell. They rolled around and tumbled a bit, and as they did, the power in the room filled up again.
I closed my eyes for a second, blocking out the burst of joy from seeing Jason again, and concentrated on gathering up power.
She slapped at his hide, and he whined a little.
“Jason,” I yelled out, when I was as primed as I was going to be. “On three. One, two, three!”
Jason leapt away, and Fayden sat halfway up to stare at me.
“Your turn,” I said, and I let the firespell go, sending the entire burst of it directly toward her. Her image wavered as the air warped, and then she fell back and hit the ground with a thud.
Just in time, the other Adepts rushed in through the door, but I had eyes only for the wolf at the other end of the balcony, chartreuse eyes shining. He looked at me, but he didn’t come any closer.
“Thank you,” I said, but he disappeared out the door.
My heart broke again. Did he hate me so much that he couldn’t even stand to be in the same room with me, even after saving me from Fayden?
It was heartbreaking that he’d left, but I tried not to think about it. I did not want to cry in front of a room of Adepts and minions.
Scout jogged over to check me out. “You’re okay?”
“I’m fine. The spell worked. The spool exploded. There are still minions down there, I think.” To confirm, I looked over the rail. They were definitely still down there, waking up groggily after being hit full-on with the impact of the exploding magic.
“Is she wearing spandex?” Paul asked, tilting his head as he stared down at Fayden.
“Yep. She most definitely is.” I looked at Daniel. “She wanted to start some kind of magical socialism, where the amount of everyone’s magic was controlled. But mostly I think she was just angry at Jeremiah.”
“What a weirdo,” Paul said.
“And an unconscious weirdo,” Scout said, putting an arm around my shoulders. “And that’s what really counts.”
One victory at a time, I thought.
* * *
We had our magic back. Of course, so did all the Reapers in the city. But it was hardly worth the trouble of going back to fight if we didn’t at least stop to celebrate. Scout helped me clean up, and she, Michael, and I headed back to the Field Museum. Daniel promised to get the pumping station cleaned up—and to explain to the cops exactly how Fayden had managed to blow the windows out.