Story's End (26 page)

The characters were fighting valiantly. Across the way, Snow could see fairies flitting above their foes, aiming fiery arrows at their heads. Dazzling volleys of spells halted many of the half-dead before they even reached the lines of battle. But Snow’s side was outnumbered. The sheer volume of the Enemy’s forces gave him the advantage. And his minions were determined. Like the Taleless at the Ranch, their current flesh was rotting away, and Snow had no doubt that they had been promised the bodies of those they killed.

“I think it was a stupid idea to stay,” Horace grumbled, and Snow could hear the soggy sound of his fist striking Taleless flesh. “We could’ve been halfway home by now.”

“Just shut up and be a Hero, Horace,” Snow said as she heaved her branding iron at a snarling beast.

She couldn’t see the fairies anymore. She and Horace were an island in the midst of walking horrors. The wave of foes kept coming. Many fell, but more slipped out of the ever-present cracks in the castle walls. Snow swung hard at a grasping mummy, and it evaporated into a cloud of dust. It was the same as it had been at the Ranch. Once their temporary bodies were destroyed, the Taleless disintegrated, gone forever. But no matter how many Snow defeated, more came at her.

“I think I’d rather be a live Villain than a dead Hero,” Horace muttered from behind her.

Snow’s heart sank. Horace was right. They were outnumbered. There was no way they could survive this. A crumbling Taleless had got past the deadly range of her weapon. She punched it hard in the jaw, and it crumbled back, but five more rushed in to fill its place. She swung her iron, and two were gone. They were surrounded. Snow felt Horace’s free hand fumbling backward for hers.

“Do you see my mother?” Snow gasped, squeezing Horace’s hand hard. The Witch nearest her was reaching out toward Snow with decaying fingers, her eyes crazed with hunger. Then Horace was at her side, backhanding the Witch. Snow scanned the shifting mob for her mother. The End was coming. And Snow wanted to see her one last time.

“There,” Horace said. “By the drawbridge.”

A flash of yellow light, and Snow spotted her.

Her mother stood looking down over the battlefield like some savage leader. She didn’t see the Red Enchantress coming out of the gatehouse doorway behind her. She couldn’t have known that Duessa aimed a bolt of red fire straight toward her back.

“Mother!” Snow screamed.

Her mother looked up, her gaze meeting Snow’s, and then the blow struck her. The force blew her mother forward, and it seemed to Snow that time stopped as her mother hovered in the air and then crumpled to the ground in a heap.

“No!” Snow ripped the word from her throat. Her iron swung wildly, whipping paths through the remaining half-dead. Horace was at her side, cutting and scything a wide road forward, and the next moment, she was there. Her mother’s eyes were closed, and she lay peacefully on her back. She might have been sleeping.

“Mother?” Snow whispered, leaning low over her body. Snow felt wetness on her cheeks and knew she was crying.

“What a pity. I forgot it had a daughter.” Duessa’s low laugh was full of mockery.

Snow froze. The Enchantress was right behind her.

Snow inched one hand down, so that her fingers closed around the iron rod. And then, she flung her body around, ripping the weapon through the air. It caught Duessa hard across her arm with a satisfying crunch. Snow stumbled, the momentum of the blow throwing her off-balance.

The Enchantress did not cry out. She let her wounded arm dangle and advanced toward Snow. “The little snake has some venom,” she said with a cruel smile. “Let’s see if we can knock it out of you.” Snow flipped over onto her back just in time to see Duessa aim one arm at her face. As the blast of red light shot straight at her, Snow rolled to one side, and the spell hit her shoulder. Liquid fire seared through her, and Snow screamed in pain.

“You will regret that.” Snow’s mother was there, standing between her and the Red Enchantress, sword out and aflame with silver fire.

“You were the Warlock’s Apprentice all along,” Duessa hissed. “I should have killed you when I had the chance.” Duessa was fast. A flaming streak crossed the air, but Snow’s mother blocked it smoothly. Red light flashed with white, and the two enchantresses teetered on the edge of the drawbridge. Snow’s shoulder was on fire, the heat of Duessa’s spell ripping through the muscle and down to the bone.

Snow managed to get up on all fours. She heard her mother cry out. She was losing ground, the red flames overtaking the silver. Her face looked hollow with the strain of it. Snow saw her iron weapon lying where she had dropped it. If she could just get a bit closer. She crawled forward, the pain exploding with each movement. And then her fingers were on it. Duessa’s back was to Snow. The red cloak swished nearer, as its owner was consumed with the duel. Snow pulled herself within reach. She gripped the handle of the rod, biting down hard through the pain, and swiped the air with all her remaining strength.

Duessa screamed in agony, and Snow saw a flash of red fabric as she hovered on the edge of the moat, and then fell out of sight. The world was swimming before Snow’s eyes. A man’s voice was ringing from somewhere behind her, but it didn’t make sense. “My name is Story,” he cried. “And I cannot be unwritten.” Snow wondered if she was dying. She was witnessing things that couldn’t really be happening. She saw her mother aim a stream of silver fire down after Duessa. And then there was a flood of children, cheering and waving wooden swords as they scrambled over the drawbridge and up toward the castle. And Indy, supporting the old man they had first released from prison. And then there were beautiful warriors, appearing out of nowhere and moving to and fro among the wounded. A tall black woman, with the most beautiful golden eyes Snow had ever seen, leaned toward her. She laid a cool hand on Snow’s shoulder and drew out the poison of the Red Enchantress’s spell.

“You’re going to be all right, child,” the goddess said. “What is your name?”

“I’m Snow,” she managed through dry lips. “Snow Thornhill.”

Chapter 35

W
hen Una opened her eyes, a hazy gray smoke hid the night sky. Broken stone lay all around her, and her ears pounded with the echo of the explosion. She remembered seeing Kai’s silhouette framed by the fiery black inferno and then all the quicksilver racing into him.

Una sat up and cried out from the pain. Her ankle was twisted under her at an odd angle. A figure appeared out of the fog, coming toward her. “Kai?” she called out.

But it was a gravelly voice that answered. “Who’s there?”

The Enemy.
How had he survived the blast? Una scooted backward. The smoke would soon be gone. He would find her.

Huge pieces of the destroyed tower lay everywhere, silent witnesses of the great battle. Una pushed herself up, limping forward on her one good foot. She had to put more distance between herself and her father. Had to see if Kai had survived. Una stumbled over something, landed on her bad ankle, and toppled to the floor with a moan. Her hand struck something wet and sticky.

Please don’t let it be blood
, she thought as she peered at the thick liquid. It wasn’t blood. Her hand was covered in Ink.

“Duessa? Is that you?” Her father was coming closer.

Someone across the way moaned. Elton maybe. Una inched forward on her belly. Kai’s words came crashing back into Una’s mind.
You write the Tale
, he had said. And with a flash of clarity, she knew what she needed to do.

Una fumbled around on the stone floor. The puddle of Ink was there, lying next to the goblet. But what about the Quill? It was hard to see anything. Even the ground was covered with a fine layer of soot. She felt around in the debris. Her hands struck something sharp. The silver color of the Quill glistened under the ashes.

Una could see her father clearly now, his face covered with the grisly remains of his dark magic, the whites of his eyes peering out into the dust.

The Scroll. Where is the Scroll?
Her hands pawed fruitlessly through the rubble. She stopped trying to be quiet, pushing aside broken china and the remains of a table. And then she saw it. The faintest glow of fire, a smoldering roll of embers nearly hidden under the throne.

Una snatched up the fiery Scroll. It was cool to her touch, and she spread it out on the floor next to the pooled Ink. And then Una realized that she had no idea what to write. Not the Story the Enemy wanted, of course. It would have to be a Tale that would bind him up and keep him away from Story forever.
You write the Tale.
Una dipped the Quill in the Ink.

The Enemy was kicking aside broken stone. The crunch of his steps was coming closer.

Una twisted the Quill in her fingers. Perhaps it was her Muse blood, or maybe it was because she had read so many books in her old world, but Una knew in that moment how it would be. This would be the Tale of Fidelus, not the Tale of the Enemy. He would not be a Villain. He would not have power to hurt anyone. His would be a very ordinary Tale.

She spread the paper out flat with one hand and began to write:
Fidelus—

“Elton!” Fidelus shouted. “Elton, is that you?”

The Tale Master moaned, and Fidelus darted toward him. “Who is writing my Tale?” Una heard the sound of her father slapping Elton hard across the face, and then, “Una!”

Una gripped the Quill tighter. It was hard to write quickly. She had to dip the point every few letters. When the Ink spilled, it had sunk into the stone, and she had to scratch at the surface to get enough to form the letters:
often told himse—

“Una!” The Enemy hissed her name like it was a dirty word. “Stop.”

Una didn’t look up. He had seen her now. It was only a matter of time. “I’m writing your Tale,” she said. “Isn’t that what you had planned? A great Tale that would change all of Story?” She could feel something happening. She wasn’t just writing the words. She was giving them life. The paper felt hot beneath her fingers, as though it were alive. Tiny particles of light drifted up from the words, spreading from the page toward her father. “Though I prefer something different. How about: The Tale of Fidelus Fairchild?”

“Don’t do this.” His face twisted into anger . . . and was that fear? Una could see the gash along his arm, where the Ink-blood had spilled out. She scratched at the stone with the Quill, but the Ink was gone.

“It won’t work, anyway.” Her father was very close now. “There is no Muse to bind the Tale.”

And then Una saw it: the empty shell of the goblet upturned on the paving stones, a spot of Ink puddled in the center. She sank the Quill into it and kept writing:
—lf that he was invisible.
The first sentence was complete. The shaft of blue light had grown, arching across the air to her father. It hovered for a moment, as though it were unwilling to touch him, before it sank into his chest. She knew the moment he felt it. A bittersweet victory. He had forgotten that his Muse blood also ran through her veins.

“Oh, but, Father,” Una said, “
I
will bind it for you.”

His face twisted into fury then, as he realized the meaning of her words. But it was too late. The binding was already upon him. The Tale had begun.

“No one will write my Tale,” he said, frozen where he stood with a crazed look on his face, “but me.”

Una didn’t respond, but she kept writing, the words flowing quickly out of the silver Quill, nearly as fast as she could write. She stripped him of his magic powers. With a stroke of her Quill, his immortality was gone. Next came the setting of an ordinary house in an ordinary town. An ordinary job. With each word, her father’s strength waned, until he was left in a crumpled heap on the floor.

“A quiet Tale,” a voice said from behind Una. “Very good choice, Una.”

“Kai!” Una exclaimed, and jumped to her feet. She wouldn’t have known him but for his voice. The King of Story was walking through the remains of the ballroom, coming toward her in his royal clothes. Kai moved past her and bent low toward the broken figure on the floor. Fidelus didn’t even lift his head.

“The Tale of Fidelus Fairchild,” Kai said, “will be sealed by the King. And there will be no escape this time.”

Kai came over to Una and took the Scroll in both hands. There was no flash of light. No extraordinary spell. Just a gentle breeze, followed by the quiet rustle of paper. And then Fidelus was gone.

“What happened?” Una asked.

“You wrote the Tale, Una,” he said, and he sounded like the Kai she knew.

“Yeah, but what did you just do? It’s like he disappeared or something.”

“His Tale cannot be undone now. He is in it forever, to make the best he can of his ordinary life.” Kai smiled at her. “Well done.”

“Well done!” Una stared at him. “Look at this place.” Below them, the desolate landscape smoldered with the remains of the battle. “Everything is ruined. Why didn’t you come back sooner?”

“Una,” Kai said, looking at her very fondly. “I never left.”

She shook her head. “But you let Fidelus . . . you just let him . . . be . . . this whole time. Duessa, too. Couldn’t you have bound him up in a Tale right from the beginning? Or used the Elements to unwrite him so that he never would have done all this?”

“Unwrite evil, and you’ll unwrite goodness right along with it. The best Tales have to have both.” Kai picked up the Silver Quill and ran the feather along his finger. “Better to strengthen the good than to rid the world of evil. Which is why I Wrote you In to Story.”

“
You
Wrote me In!” Una knew it was true as soon as she said it. “But how could you have known—?”

“That you were the Enemy’s daughter?” Kai smiled at her. “I know all my characters, Una. You all belong to me. I am Story.”

“That’s what you said to Fidelus, too. When he tried to kill you.” She looked up at Kai. “But the quicksilver didn’t even harm you, did it?”

“I have no End, Una, no matter how much Fidelus might have wished it.”

Elton moaned and rolled over onto his back. Kai frowned at him. “Mortimer Elton. The boy who was Written In. A tragic Tale.”