No. I refused to think about that.
I hobbled toward the back of the truck using the sharpened rod as support, almost catching my foot in the tarp, then staggered outside. I swerved to take in the world around me. The same scene played out all over. Trolls fighting, trolls confused, trolls collapsing. Neven was across the field, flying toward me with her tail wrapped around a flailing truck driver.
A troll rammed into my thigh and pinned its claws into my jeans. I yelped. The troll hissed, low and hard.
I jabbed the blunt end of the rod into its torso. The troll dropped like a bag of sand. It sputtered out dirt, already scrambling to attack a second time. Before it could, I flipped the rod and pushed it into the troll’s chest. It went through as easily as my hunting knife would’ve. The troll jerked and collapsed into dirt.
“That,” Neven said, flying in a low circle around the truck, “didn’t go entirely as planned.”
“Let go! Put me down! Girl, run—!” The driver beat his fists futilely against Neven’s tail.
“You realize she saved your life?” I said. “She’s on our side. Promise.”
“Dragon good,” Neven informed him. “Trolls bad.” She landed by my side and gently put down the driver. Two approaching trolls had gotten knocked over from the gusts produced by her wings.
“You’re hurt,” I said softly. That gash on her hind leg looked even worse up close.
“So are you. Let’s not dwell on blaming ourselves or one another. You have business to attend to.” Her tail casually whacked aside a troll rushing her. About a dozen others approached. In the background, even more were stirring, as though realizing I was still here.
“Yeah. Yeah. Um.” I glanced at the remains of the troll I’d taken down a minute ago. It hadn’t moved yet. It was too early to tell whether the plan worked—the goal had been to weaken the trolls enough that steel could kill instead of just incapacitate them—but it looked like a good sign.
Taking out one troll was an awful lot easier than taking down dozens, though, no matter how weak they were. More and more were coming at us, but several were breaking away, slithering off toward the trees. I needed to take them out before the group fragmented further, and before I got trapped in a fight I couldn’t win.
I looked at the steel around us, gleaming dark in the evening light. The blue tarp was all bunched up in the nearest pile of junk.
“I have an idea. Can you two hold them off?” I turned to Neven and the driver and offered the latter the spike. “I’m sorry, I hate to ask—it’s only for a minute, and the trolls are weaker now, and . . . if things go wrong I can still jump in. I’ll be fast. Don’t stab the dragon.”
“It’s rude,” Neven added.
“What are you—?” the driver started, deathly pale.
“Troll!” I pointed behind him, then crouched. Pain jolted through my leg. With the truck behind me, steel in front of me, Neven on one side, and the driver on the other, I had some time to work. I tugged at the tarp. The steel clattered every which way. Once I had the tarp free, I hoisted a bundle of rods into its center. These were thinner ones, like rebar, which would serve my purpose fine.
I dragged my hunting knife along one edge of the bundle, turning the blunt ends sharp.
I dragged the knife along the bundle again, cutting half an inch off the sharpened ends. Chips of steel tinkled onto the tarp. With every cut, more slices dropped down. I worked fast, like helping Mom prep beans in the kitchen.
“Got it,” I said before the last pieces even hit the ground. “Neven?”
She took one look at the tarp and the heap of sharpened steel chunks and nodded. Satisfaction glinted in her eyes. “Let’s go.”
CHAPTER FORTY
That night, steel rained from the Damford skies.
The slices flickered and gleamed as they fell. Most embedded in the ground or bounced off the asphalt. The rest hit unsuspecting trolls with enough force to bury deep into their bodies.
Most dropped within seconds.
None got back up.
The largest merged troll tried to stand as we flew overhead, its face twisted in rage. The moment the steel hit its body, it started crumbling. Parts collapsed into dirt, while other parts shifted into smaller trolls that instantly scattered across the grass.
We took them out, too.
We cleared the fields, the roads. In town, we dropped the driver at the library and confirmed with Four that Alpha was comatose and safe inside a local clinic, being looked after by the resident nurse—Mr. Ávila, Tara’s dad. (I then had to escape Red, who wanted me to join Alpha at that clinic—my bloody jeans had caught her eye.)
I left the library with a high-powered flashlight in hand and took a couple of minutes to replenish our supply of steel shavings. Then Neven and I went back into the sky. We searched the Damford streets for any stray trolls. Most were already being taken down by local fighters, laughing and jeering, their every movement sheer elation. I’d heard the nearby towns were the same. The second the trolls showed weakness, survivors had gone after them with a fury.
I hoped the Powers That Be were watching.
We’d only arrived in Damford that afternoon, and already we’d wiped the vast majority of trolls from existence. The few trolls left would be too weak to multiply, and would be hunted down soon enough. The thought filled me with a grim sense of satisfaction, atop pain and exhaustion and nervousness and hope. But mostly—
Mostly, I felt relief. This was it.
This had to have been it.
Well past midnight, Neven and I landed outside the clinic. The other Hazels had gathered to keep an eye on Alpha and wait for me to join them, allowing Mr. Ávila to finally look after my leg. A cut several inches long ran across my calf, ragged but shallow. Mr. Ávila administered stitches, painkillers, and a stern warning to take it easy.
I promised him that I would—now that the trolls were gone, I could—and asked to see Alpha.
“She’s so still,” I said. The two of us stood in the doorway of the treatment room. It looked almost cozy. Plastic plants in flowerpots. A poster with exercise tips on the inside of the door. The wallpaper was a warm yellow, the floor a geometric pattern that matched the blanket covering Alpha.
Alpha herself lay pale and unmoving in the center of the room. Her face was blank. Not twisted from wariness or rage or panic—the only way I’d seen her so far. Just blank. The IV hooked up to her hand kept her that way.
“Weird to see her like that, isn’t it?” Four quietly came up by my side. “Or see us like that, I guess.”
“But she’s OK?” I asked.
“She’s fine,” Mr. Ávila assured me. “The tranquilizer Dr. Torrance supplied is low impact. The moment it’s safe to wake her up, it’s just a matter of removing the IV. It’ll only take minutes for her eyes to open, and she’ll be back to normal within the hour. I’m keeping a close watch on her in the meantime. Now, if you’ll excuse me—I need to get a hold of Dr. Torrance.”
As far as I knew, Torrance was outside Damford by the upturned truck, helping the sheriff coordinate safe cleanup of the troll remains.
“Your sisters are in the waiting room, I believe,” Mr. Ávila said.
The two of us reluctantly stepped back into the hall. Mr. Ávila drew the door shut.
I tore my eyes away, turning toward the waiting room at the entrance of the clinic. “About Dr. Torrance . . .,” I started.
“She seemed fine to me,” Four said. “Not, um, murderous or anything. We didn’t leave her alone with Alpha until we confirmed the coma was affecting the trolls like we hoped. Dr. Torrance didn’t seem to mind.” She hesitated. “She was even cool about hiding Tara’s involvement from her dad.”
We crossed the linoleum hallway. Health posters and abstract paintings decorated the walls. The clinic seemed empty aside from the other Hazels and Mr. Ávila; it hadn’t been safe to enter before. Its backyard stretched into the woods, making it vulnerable to trolls. Most people injured over the past fe
w days had either been treated in the library or gotten rushed to a proper hospital.
“. . . near the airport a minute ago. Damn it.” Red looked up from her phone as Four and I entered the waiting room. Rainbow sat beside her, both on plush blue chairs. The lighting in this place was so bright it felt like the middle of the day, which was all the more unsettling with the midnight sky visible through the window.
“How’s your leg?” Red said.
“All stitched up. What’s with the airport?” I dreaded the answer.
“The rift just reopened at an elementary school a couple miles from there.” Red held up the phone, revealing a photo of a playground. Twenty feet over the rubber tiles, the rift distorted the air. The front end of a hyperrealistic cow sculpture stuck out from its center, lit only by the surrounding streetlights. “The rift had bounced around in New Jersey for a bit. It’s back over the Delaware River now.”
“I don’t understand why it hasn’t closed.” Rainbow shook her head. “Most of the trolls are dead, and the few left aren’t any threat. We completed our mission. Destiny. Whatever. Right? Or are we supposed to tromp through every inch of the Pennsylvania Wilds to weed them out?”
“Maybe you were supposed to cut up more helicopters,” Four said.
I tried to smile. “I asked Neven earlier about how long it might take. She said rifts aren’t programmed to close straightaway. There’s a delay.” After all, the Power might need time to wrap up loose threads or prepare a proper happy ending. It could take one minute, or it could take ten. For complicated missions, it could even take an hour.
It had now been several.
I’d wanted to be mature and patient. As little as I knew about saving the world, it probably didn’t involve raising your hand to ask, “Did I do it yet? How about now? How about now? Is it saved yet?”
If we were missing something, though, we had to know.
The other Hazels—Rainbow and Red seated, Four lingering nearby—were all looking at me, as though expecting a decision. They still thought I was in charge. I wanted to argue, but how did you argue with something no one had actually said aloud? It’d sound so arrogant.
I sighed in defeat. “Let’s talk to Neven.”
We grabbed our coats and headed out the door, shoulders hunched against the cold, and almost bumped into Tara. A pickup truck was just driving off; someone must’ve given her a lift.
“I was wondering about you guys.” She was so short she had to crane her neck to look at us properly. It was kind of cute, especially with her puffy green winter coat. “Where are you headed?”
“To talk to Neven,” Red said. “We have . . . questions.”
Rainbow chimed in. “Neven’s the dragon. You saw her earlier, right? Grouchy, size of an SUV. Can’t miss her.”
“Only from a distance. She talks?”
“Yup. Usually to tell us how much we’re screwing up.” Rainbow grinned, but her mirth seemed to fade when Tara didn’t respond. “Um. Hey, want to come meet her?”
“Really?” Tara blinked owlishly.
So did I. We were treating conversations with Neven as show-and-tell sessions now? I couldn’t exactly tell Rainbow to withdraw the invite, though. While the others might think I was in charge, I wasn’t going to act like it. Besides, Tara already knew the situation, more or less, and she had risked her life. We owed her.
“That’d be great!” Tara glanced at Rainbow, then quickly averted her eyes, as though regretting the eye contact. “I’d never turn down an opportunity this cool. Well, maybe some alternate-universe version of myself would. Can I joke about that?”
The five of us went around the clinic building, weaving through tall grass. Blades crunched under my shoes. The night was dipping into freezing temperatures. I kept one hand in my pocket, resting on my knife. Just in case. I opened my mouth to call Neven—
Actually, no.
Neven wasn’t responsible for this. I needed to talk those who were.
“Power!” I hollered at the forest. “Um, Powers That Be! You know who you are.”
The others looked surprised. Carefully, Red said, “I don’t know if they’re the kind of entities we can actually . . . talk to? Maybe Neven could convey a message.”
“Trust me. We can talk to them.” I had my fists clenched, my arms tight by my sides. The tension hurt. I’d gotten more banged up in that truck than I’d thought. I’d even found blood caked in my hair and zigzagging across cracked knuckles. I tossed my head back and raised my voice. “Hey! Glowy Hazel! We need to talk!”
The fluttering of wings announced Neven’s arrival. She’d probably kept an eye on the clinic from afar. “Ah,” she said, landing in the grass. “I see we’re doing this.”
“Well, we’re trying.” Rainbow blew out a breath. “Neven, do you know whether the rift will close? What if—?”
“How about you stop the what-ifs,” Four said to my right. My head snapped toward her.
Except it wasn’t Four who’d spoken. The voice was identical—all our voices were—but there had been an echo to it.
And the sound had come from a few feet past Four.
Tara inhaled sharply.
A light shape stepped across a fallen branch. It looked like me, down to the concerned expression I’d come to recognize on the others’ faces.
“Is that . . .?” Red asked.
“One of them,” I whispered.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
“Yes?” the Power said.
“The rift didn’t close,” I said. “Even though we defeated the trolls. Didn’t we win? Did we do something wrong?”
The Power raised an eyebrow. “You’re not serious. Are you?”
I opened my mouth to answer, then closed it again, unsure what the Power was getting at. I heard indistinct whispers behind me, while beside me, Neven gave the glowy Hazel a flat look. “Explain,” she growled.
“Yeah, explain,” Rainbow said. “We helped take down, like, a hundred trolls—”
“Exactly. Helped.” The Power fixed its eyes on me. “I’m not surprised the rift didn’t respond to your actions. This was far too much of a team effort. You’re supposed to be the hero.”
“I got killed trying to be a hero.” My voice trembled. I ignored the confused whispers of the others.
All this couldn’t have been for nothing.
“These trolls tried to shake me out of a truck like an insect stuck at the bottom of a mug. I hurt my leg, I . . .”
The Power started ticking down on its fingers. “You spent the evening eating tomato soup—”
“I was trying to gain Alpha’s trust. Help her control the trolls.”
“—you took forever discovering your mission—”
“To kill an innocent girl,” I said. “It wasn’t the first solution to come to mind, no.”
Its eyebrows rose. “Even after hearing ‘having no alpha makes trolls vulnerable’ and ‘vulnerable trolls can be killed’ within minutes of each other? Truly?”
“Maybe she’s a nice person,” Neven suggested.
The Power ignored her. “Then, when you learned what you needed to do, your first response was to run away. You even let strangers take care of the trolls so you could flee.”
“But they—”
“Just like you shoved a weapon in the hands of an injured, scared bystander while you played arts and crafts—”
“You mean the truck driver out on the fields? That’s how we ended up taking out the trolls!”
“And I’ve lost count of the number of times Neven fought on your behalf.”
“I don’t even know how to throw a punch and she’s a goddamn dragon!” My voice skipped. “Wasn’t she supposed to help?”
“The operative word is help. See, if you’d sat on her back during that last fight . . .”
“I was busy almost dying inside a box truck!” I crushed icy grass as I stepped forward. My fists clenched enough to hurt. I couldn’t tell whether I was screaming or pleading or apologizing or all of
those at once. “What are you saying? It doesn’t count?” My eyes stung. I couldn’t hold back the tears for long. “The trolls are dead, they’re defeated, they . . .”
“Do you know what I believe was the coup de grâce?”
I stared, uncomprehending.
“You took the easy way out.”
“You’re kidding,” Rainbow said. “How was any of this easy?”
“You couldn’t even kill a girl who was prepared to die. You went for a coma. That’s so—” The Power gestured wildly. The glow left an echo where its hands had been. “It’s so . . . practical. On top of that, you neither came up with nor executed the final plan yourself. You let some bystander risk her life”—it eyed Tara—“while you and Neven were out flying in circles. I hardly expected a dramatic self-sacrifice, but you could’ve followed basic standards. It’s out of my hands, regardless. The rift’s programming is fixed, and apparently you weren’t heroic enough to trigger it. We’re done.”
“But . . .” I deflated. This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening. Those three words kept running through my mind, making it hard to come up with others. “I thought that our plan made more sense.”
“We asked you to be a hero. We did not ask you to be sensible about it.”
My mouth twisted into something ugly—a smile or a grimace, I didn’t know. Nor did I know what to say. It wasn’t enough.
It was never enough.
None of the others spoke. Their eyes were wide, their faces unsure. They expected me to keep arguing. They still—even now, with the evidence of my failure right in front of them—thought I was in charge.
Neven cleared her throat. “I would—”
“No, wait.” I scraped together my courage. “I have more to say. What do you want from me?”
“Are you unfamiliar with the concept of the Chosen One, or . . .?”
“First I’m not proactive enough, then I’m overeager. First I fail and get myself killed, then I’m too sensible by not risking getting killed. First you send support from other dimensions, then I’m cowardly for accepting help. First you freaking turn back time so I have a chance to save the world, then you scoff at me when I succeed . . . What do you want?”
The Art of Saving the World Page 21
