They were all staring upward, their long, bonelike fingers outstretched, swaying backward. The sounds of their moaning had a droning, almost hypnotic quality to it—like some sort of chant. Takoda couldn’t help but think of the evening songs at his monastery.
A shivering hsssssss echoed through the darkness. Takoda looked up toward the egg, which was shaking and shuddering, trying to work its way free of the Evertree’s roots. He heard a snapping sound as one of the thicker roots broke loose.
Rocks and dirt fell from the cavern ceiling, along with another huge snarl of root. It flopped to the floor, limp and dead—the silver glow already fading from it.
Takoda hadn’t just heard the root breaking—he had felt it. The moment it happened, he gasped, staggering back. It was as though the very breath had been ripped from his chest. Meilin, too, seemed to have been similarly afflicted. She recovered and quickly placed Jhi into passive state—as if to fortify the spirit bond that had suddenly come under assault. Takoda tried to do the same, touching the place on his throat where Kovo dwelled in passive state, but the skin remained clammy and cold.
Kovo felt as distant from him as a stranger.
Another tendril of the Evertree’s roots snapped, and this time the Wyrm’s egg dropped several feet—its weight apparently too much for the young roots to bear. The egg thrashed and swung as whatever lived inside struggled to free itself.
The Many were now howling and shrieking, all reaching toward the Wyrm, all begging for it to free itself. Conor was howling with them, twisting his body and trying to get free of his restraints.
“Stay back!” Meilin cried, pulling Takoda and Xanthe clear of Conor’s gnashing teeth. “Give him some space.”
Kovo lumbered past her, right to Conor, and gave the boy a “tap” on the side of the head with the flat end of his mallet. The boy fell back to the ground—unconscious but otherwise unharmed. The Great Ape then turned toward Meilin and made a smug gesture with his hands: “Problem solved.”
“Takoda!” Meilin snapped. “Get control of your spirit animal. Tell him if he touches my friend again, I’ll make sure he lives to regret it.”
“We’ve got bigger problems,” Takoda said, his eyes fixed on the egg overhead. “The Wyrm is coming.”
Meilin stared at the Wyrm, unable to look away. More roots from the Evertree had snapped loose, and now the egg was hanging by a single thread. The egg itself was swinging and thrashing, as whatever was inside fought to free itself from the roots. Black ooze dripped from the large crack in the shell. Takoda could see dark and slimy tendrils moving between the fissures, writhing and twitching. Then the tendrils slid back, and he saw the red eye of the Wyrm, huge and searching.
Meilin heard a groaning sound as the last strand of the Evertree’s roots snapped and the egg finally broke free. It fell down to the ground, landing with an earthshaking shudder.
Rubble and smoke burst into the air. Meilin fell to one side, trying her best to protect Jhi from falling rubble. In the chaos, all she could hear were the snarls of the Many. And then above that, a new sound. A low, gurgling hiss that seemed to slither right up her spine and land in the back of her teeth.
As the dust cleared, Meilin rose and stared at the place where the egg had fallen. There was a dent in the stone floor from the impact. The shell had cracked open and now lay in several pieces. Black ooze seeped out from the spot, spreading across the ground in greedy little rivulets. And there, in the middle of it all, lay a roiling black knot of slick tendrils.
The arms—there must have been a dozen of them—slithered and flailed, pulling themselves apart like a knot untying itself. At the center of these was the Wyrm. The head—if you could call it a head—was somewhere in the middle of its enormous body. The thing blinked its red eyes—Meilin counted at least four—and then opened what must have been its mouth. It was a hideous, leechlike ring of razor-sharp teeth that seemed to flex and twist as it moved. The Wyrm let out a hoarse screech.
Meilin clutched her staff. “It’s … like something from a nightmare.”
She had been expecting to see a creature that looked like a lizard or salamander, or maybe even a snake, but the Wyrm did not appear so simple. Its movements were so fluid that it was difficult to grasp its full shape. Staring at it, Meilin was reminded of the way oil shifted and slid across the surface of water.
The appearance of the Wyrm seemed to have made an impact on the Many, who rushed closer to the glowstones—now unafraid of the searing light. They were all staring at the bell tower—at Meilin and her friends. The Wyrm was also facing them, its four eyes narrowed into hateful red slits. It screeched again, and the Many all charged through the perimeter—straight for the tower.
“Like I said,” Meilin said, rotating her staff into a fighting position, “we’ve got a long way to go.”
“Incoming!” Xanthe shouted, and then sounded the attack on her horn. “Brace for impact.”
But trying to brace for this attack was like trying to stand up against the crashing tide. The Many hit them like a wave of claws and teeth—sweeping Sadrean fighters right off their feet as they rushed past. The Wyrm’s army moved with a possessed fury—driven on by the shrieks of their master. Screams rang out as the Many grabbed hold of Sadrean soldiers and dragged them to the Wyrm as live offerings.
“Into the tower!” Meilin screamed, falling back with the others. She and Xanthe tried to close the iron doors, but they burst apart from the force of the frenzied mob. Meilin and Xanthe leaped back from the door and raced up the curved staircase, taking the steps two at a time. The Many were right behind them, hissing and clawing and snarling—climbing on top of one another to reach their prey.
Meilin brought Jhi into passive state to keep her safe. Briggan ran in front, attacking the few Many that had climbed in through the windows. Kovo had an unconscious Conor slung over one shoulder. Even with one hand, the Great Beast fought like a titan, grabbing the creatures and flinging them out open windows like rag dolls.
The entire tower shuddered and groaned as the horde began scaling the walls outside, tearing apart anything they could get ahold of. Meilin heard a scream as one of the slingmaidens was wrestled from her turret and thrown to the ground below—another offering for the Wyrm.
“Keep moving!” Meilin shouted. She felt like her heart would burst from running. She closed her eyes, forcing herself to climb even faster. They had to reach that bell before the tower came down on top of them.
At last she staggered onto the platform at the top of the tower. Briggan and Xanthe were close behind her. The huge iron bell hung in the middle of the room. Glowing moss covered the outside. This bell had been silent for thousands of years—waiting for this moment.
“Take care of the bell!” Meilin screamed to Kovo as she assumed a low position with her staff. “We’ll hold the stairs.”
Kovo dropped Conor and leaped clear over her head, landing behind her with a crash. He stomped toward the waiting bell, heaving the iron mallet over his head—
But then, he stopped.
The Great Beast gasped, stumbling backward as if he’d been pierced by some invisible blade. He lurched to one side. The iron mallet slid from his grasp and clunked to the floor.
“This is your chance, Kovo!” Meilin shouted over her shoulder. “What are you waiting for?!”
But the ape did not hear her. He had staggered away from the bell toward the window. Meilin saw that Xanthe had stopped fighting, too. She and Kovo were both staring outside.
Meilin grunted, kicking back a possessed Sadrean girl who was clawing at her boot. She ran to the window. The moment she got there, she knew what had stopped Kovo and Xanthe. She saw the Wyrm writhing and shrieking at the foot of the tower—the ground around it was littered with the corpses of its prey. And clasped in one of its oozing tentacles was a small boy with dark hair, screaming for his very life.
“The Wyrm,” Meilin whispered. “It’s got Takoda.”
IF IT HADN’T BEEN FOR TAKODA,
XANTHE WOULD BE dead.
When Xanthe had first met Takoda in the caverns above Phos Astos, she thought him funny, if a little exotic. He was small, weak, and gentle. It was clear that he had no place among Meilin and the Greencloaks. When Xanthe learned that this quiet young monk was the human partner to the great Kovo she nearly laughed aloud.
But Xanthe soon realized that Takoda was nothing to laugh about. There was a strength to that boy, who could say more with a silent look than most people could with a thousand songs.
When Xanthe had been lost in the burned-out remnants of the Arachane Fields, alone and defenseless, it had been Takoda who kept her alive. She knew that she had to see him again—to make sure he was okay. She was afraid what might happen to him if she couldn’t be there to help protect him from the Wyrm. And that fear had given her the strength to survive.
She had kept the sound of Takoda’s voice in her mind as she wandered through the dark tunnels, without so much as a glowstone to find her way, until she finally stumbled into an intact Sadrean outpost—full of living, breathing, uninfected survivors.
In trying to save Takoda, Takoda had saved her.
Xanthe had continued thinking of him as she rallied those survivors and told them of the return of the Great Ape. Takoda was first in her thoughts as she led their fleet across the Sulfur Sea. And when the ships finally reached the ruined shore, and she saw Takoda’s face amid the flames and rubble—the sight of him somehow opened up a part of her that she didn’t even realize existed. It was as if she could see all of Erdas—the aboveground world she had only dreamed of—shining in his dark eyes.
And now, after all that struggle and pain, Takoda was about to die.
At first, Xanthe hadn’t realized that Takoda had not made it into the tower with Meilin and the others. But when she heard his screams echoing up from the battlefield, she realized her error. She had abandoned him to die among the Many—to die as an offering to that oozing nightmare of tentacles and eyes and teeth that the elders called the Wyrm.
From the high window, she could now see the boy grasped in one of the Wyrm’s arms. It was coiled around his body, crushing the life out of him. The Wyrm raised Takoda over its hideous mouth—its hundreds of drooling teeth twitching in anticipation of its next meal. Takoda dangled upside down, his face pale and bloodless, his gaze wide with terror and shock. His eyes looked upward, straight into hers.
For a moment all the sound seemed to vanish from the world. All Xanthe could hear was the dull throbbing of her own heartbeat.
“Takoda!” she shouted from the balcony. She slung her spear across her back and started to climb over the edge. “I’m coming!”
But before she could even put one leg over the railing, she was knocked to one side by Kovo. The Great Beast let out a terrifying roar and charged for the window. He dropped one knuckle down and leaped clean over the stone banister, sailing through the darkness and landing on the ground far below with a tremendous crash!
Kovo was on his feet again in a heartbeat, swinging his fists wildly as he bounded toward the Wyrm—sending the Many and the Sadreans alike scattering in all directions.
Xanthe had seen Kovo fight once before in Phos Astos, but that was nothing compared to what she witnessed now. The ape roared and lunged for the Wyrm, hurtling toward the creature with both fists drawn over his head.
The Wyrm, sensing the approach, flung Takoda to one side and raised its tentacles. Kovo’s body hit it with the force of a cannonball, and the two of them spiraled backward across the ground, smashing clean through the wall of a building.
Xanthe’s eyes scanned the teeming chaos below, searching for Takoda’s body. But it was impossible to see from up here. She slung her spear over her shoulder. “We have to get Takoda,” she said.
Meilin’s hand grabbed her arm. “Don’t you dare leave me up here!”
Xanthe turned around to see that the entire belfry had been overrun by the Many. Possessed Sadreans were swarming the bell and were trying to rip it free of its yoke. Briggan snarled and snapped, pulling them away with his jaws.
“That bell is the weapon,” Meilin said. She swung her staff, knocking back an attacker who was trying to climb over the edge of the railing. “We have to ring it before the Many tear it to pieces.”
“But Takoda’s down there!” Xanthe yelled.
“Takoda can wait,” Meilin said, kicking a hissing assailant square in the jaw. “This is war.” Her voice was cold and without emotion, and Xanthe wondered just how much war this girl had seen in her lifetime. “Our mission is to stop that Wyrm before it can find a host. This tower won’t stand much longer.” She knelt down and wrapped her hands around the handle of the iron mallet. The thing was enormous—almost as big as she was. “Help me.”
Xanthe tore herself from the window and grabbed the handle. She and Meilin both lifted at the same time, and the mallet’s head rose from the ground. They carried it toward the bell—gaining speed as they moved. Acting as one, she and Meilin swung the mallet over their heads and—
CLANGGGGG!!
The sound was almost deafening in Meilin’s ears. The possessed Sadreans that had been clinging to the bell instantly fell away. The chime echoed and reverberated across the city, growing louder and louder.
Meilin staggered back with Xanthe, letting go of the mallet, which fell to the floor with a heavy thud. They had done it—the trap was sprung.
“What happens now?” Xanthe asked her.
Meilin shook her head. “I have no idea.”
But it was clear that something was happening. The entire tower was trembling. Rubble sprinkled down on her as the platform—no, the entire structure—began to slowly rotate. Screams rang out from the ground below. Meilin ran to the window, Xanthe right behind her.
The ground was changing beneath them. The floor in the center of the city was drawing back like the folds of a paper fan to expose a dark chasm below. The Sadreans and the Many screamed, running to safety around the edges of the town.
“The ground is opening up around us,” Meilin said.
That wasn’t all the bell was doing. Meilin could feel something happening inside her—it felt like her stomach was turning inside out. She staggered to one side, suddenly unable to stand. She touched her tattoo to summon Jhi, but when the panda appeared at her side she, too, was showing the same symptoms. Meilin’s vision blurred—like she was seeing two different things at once. It was almost like she could see herself outside of her own body.
Meilin and Jhi weren’t the only ones. Briggan was whining over Conor’s unconscious body, pawing at the boy.
“What’s happening to you?” she heard Xanthe say.
“The snare,” Meilin said through gritted teeth. “It’s doing something to our spirit bonds.” It felt like her whole body was dissolving with every breath.
She pulled herself to her knees and stared over the window railing. The tower was still turning slowly in the middle of the chasm, and it made her motion sick to stare at the ground below. She glimpsed Kovo staggering through the chaos. Red blood flowed from the Great Beast’s body where the Wyrm’s teeth had cut him. The ape stumbled and swayed, struggling to remain upright.
And then she saw the Wyrm. It was hissing, writhing in pain, its movements jerky and uncontrolled. The infected Sadreans around the Wyrm had stopped moving completely, as if the breath had just gone out of them. Whatever was happening to Meilin and Jhi looked like it was also happening to the Wyrm and its minions—only on a much bigger scale. “It’s working!” Meilin cried, gripping the bannister. “The Wyrm’s guard is down.… This is our chance … to kill it.… ”
But then, with a sharp jolt, the tower stopped moving. Meilin lurched to one side, nearly falling to the floor. She heard a groaning sound as the gears deep within the tower walls strained against something that was blocking their motion. It shuddered and then stopped altogether. “No!” Meilin said, scrambling to her feet. “Keep going!” She kicked the iron bell, trying to start the mechan
ism, but it was useless.
The snare had stopped.
Already Meilin’s head felt clearer—whatever had been happening between her and Jhi had halted along with the tower. She clenched her teeth and struggled to stay upright. She looked to the battlefield and saw that the Wyrm had also recovered. It released a furious shriek, and the Many around it seemed to snap back to attention.
Meilin watched as the creature slithered toward the edges of the hole that had half opened up before it—the doors halted along with the tower. It reached a quivering tentacle out into the void. The tentacle flicked like the tongue of a serpent tasting the air. With a screech that seemed to echo as much in Meilin’s own mind as it did across the crumbling city, the Wyrm slithered forward and melted into the darkness.
A few of the Many leaped into the hole after their master. Their cries echoed for several seconds as their bodies plummeted down. The rest of the Many broke formation and scurried away from the light of the flames and Sadrean blades—disappearing into the darkness of the outlying tunnels.
“Is it over?” Xanthe whispered beside her.
Meilin shook her head, her eyes fixed on the bottomless hole. It seemed to plunge down straight through the heart of Erdas. “I don’t think so.” She ran her hand through Jhi’s fur, taking comfort in the warmth of her spirit animal—in the strength of the bond they shared.
Meilin heard Briggan yip behind her. The wolf was bleeding badly from his side where the Many had attacked him. Conor lay unconscious beside him, bleeding, pale, but still alive. Briggan pointed his muzzle toward the stairs and Meilin and Xanthe followed him out of the tower.
Meilin and the others stepped outside to find Kovo at the far edge of the chasm, clutching Takoda in his enormous arms like one might hold an infant.
Jhi ambled to the boy, tending to an ugly gash in his chest—the place where the Wyrm’s tentacle had pierced through him.
“Takoda!” Xanthe cried, rushing to his side. The girl took Takoda’s hand in her own. The boy’s face was gray. He had clearly lost a lot of blood.