The townsfolk stream around us, screaming at the top of their lungs, gushing through the door like water through a burst dam, rushing headlong at the Leatherheads with their shields and weapons raised. The Leatherheads charge to meet them, screeching up a storm, and the two sides clash, filling the pillared hall with the clang of blades and the echo of battle cries.
We’re ushered into the sunlit chamber. The remaining townsfolk gawk at me and gasp at Aki. Someone grabs Yaku’s hand and shakes it, and he snatches it back. Looks like he’s about to pummel them.
“Team A,” Winifred shouts, “storm the fortress. Mind the lava, free the prisoners, and bring them back to Bluehaven. Eric Junior!”
“Yes, ma’am.” A white guy in his twenties steps forward. Takes me a second to realize it’s Mayor Atlas’s son. No snot-nosed little turd, but an actual man with an almost-beard and all. “Hey, Jane.”
“Um . . . hi?”
“You’re in charge, Eric,” Winifred tells him. “You know what to do.”
He clenches his square, stubbled jaw, nods at Winifred, and pats my shoulder as he squeezes by, like we’re old pals. “Good luck, kid. You really haven’t aged a day, huh? Violet, good to see you. Hang in there, John. Hey, wow, Hickory Dawes. Sir!”
Hickory gives him an awkward salute.
Eric Junior’s eyes light up. “I literally have a thousand questions for you.” Is he blushing? “But first, I’ve gotta form the stortress—I mean, storm the . . . yeah, I’ll just . . excuse me.” He hurries from the chamber with the rest of Team A, red as a tomato.
“That was weird,” Hickory says.
Violet hugs Winifred tight. Winifred hugs her back, tears swimming in her eyes. I just stand here like a chump, watching them, slack-jawed and speechless.
“How long has it been?” Violet asks.
“Since you left? Four very long years, my dear girl,” Winifred says. “Alas, the battle has only just begun, and we don’t have much time.” She straightens up and turns to me. “Jane.”
I nod hello. Narrow my eyes. “Hali-gabera.” I leave her hanging for a moment, but I can’t deny I’m relieved. I shake my head and smile. “I can honestly say I’m glad to see you.”
Winifred smiles back. “Then let’s go, shall we? Team B, you’re with us. Move it!”
“So that is Hali-gabera,” I hear Yaku mutter to Violet. “I thought she would be taller.”
Gunshots echo through the pillared hall. Something explodes and the chamber rumbles, raining dust and debris. The townsfolk rally, ushering us toward the golden light of the open Manor gateway, the top of the Sacred Stairs. They hug Violet and welcome her home. They point at Hickory and whisper to each other: the legend of old returned at last. One of them tries to take Dad from Aki and shies away when he snarls.
“Winifred,” I shout over another volley of rifle-fire, “we have to get to—”
“The tunnel beneath the crypt,” she says, “I know. We’ve cleared the path. The second gateway’s ready and waiting.” She nods at a group of men and women standing guard nearby. “Signal the retreat in ten. Roth’s on his way.”
A stiff sea breeze swirls around us as we rush outside. It’s blessedly cool, the midmorning sky clear. I’ve never been up here before—not since I was a baby, anyway, when Dad and I first came to Bluehaven. I take in the sparkling ocean, the steep hillside and the terraced farms. The town lying in ruin around the shore, and the crumbling Sacred Stairs.
The island seems so small.
“There’s a view I never thought I’d see again,” Hickory says, staring at the ocean.
Violet shoves him. “Get a move on or it’ll be the last thing you see.”
We scramble down the steep steps, leaping over missing chunks, keeping as far from the edges as we can. It’s a deadly drop to the fields below. I see what Violet meant when she said Bluehaven was dying. The crops are barren. The coconut palms look like tall, swaying sticks, the fruit trees like skeletons. The Manor’s been sucking the life out of the island.
Winifred runs alongside me. “I’m sorry I kept so many secrets from you, Jane. I don’t expect forgiveness, but I want you to know you’ve done remarkably well.”
Another explosion from inside the Manor rumbles down the Sacred Stairs. A portion of stone breaks away just after we’ve passed it, plummeting to the mango orchard far below.
“How about we save the kudos till we finish this, huh?” I shoot Winifred a sharp glance. “We are gonna finish this, right? We are gonna win? I mean, you saw it, right? Back when you touched the symbol under the catacombs. You know what’s gonna happen.”
“Jane—”
“Before we went to Arakaan, Violet told me you’d only do all this if you saw something good—if you saw a happy ending—so tell me. No more lies. What did you see?”
“Don’t worry,” Winifred says, “everything is proceeding as Nabu-kai planned.”
“That isn’t an answer,” I say. “What happens next?”
“I can’t tell you, Jane.”
“But if you know how this ends—”
“That’s just it, Jane,” Winifred says, “I don’t.”
I nearly stop in my tracks. “What? How can you not know?”
“Because my part in this story is about to come to an end.”
“Meaning what, exactly?”
“You know what it means. I’m an old woman with a score to settle and debts to repay.” She glances back at Violet and Hickory. “You cannot tell the others, but my journey will come to an end where so many have begun. I will face Roth in Outset Square.”
“And what? Let him kill you?”
“I will die, yes,” Winifred says, matter-of-factly, “and take him with me. When we reach the square, you will hand me the arrow and continue to the Cradle with Violet and Hickory. That is the path Nabu-kai laid out for us—laid out for me. We cannot stray from it now.”
“Screw Nabu-kai!” I shout. “Screw the path!”
A volley of gunfire. A chorus of screams. Some of the townsfolk are retreating from the Manor, following us down to Outset Square. A Leatherhead leaps through the gateway and tackles a man over the edge of the landing. A Tin-skin howls at the top of the Stairs.
“It’s okay, Jane,” Winifred says. “It’s my time.”
We reach the bottom of the Stairs. There’s a small crowd gathered in the square. Mayor Atlas, Peg, Old Barnaby Twigg, and some others. Everyone’s older, skinnier, wrinklier. They ogle Aki as he gently lays Dad on the cobblestones, but they also look at me. Stare in a way they never have before. There’s no fear, no loathing. They actually look happy to see me.
Very disturbing.
“Hullo,” I say.
Violet scans the crowd, looking for her parents, but they’re not here. Predictable, really. She holds her head high, like she doesn’t care, but I can tell she does. It’s heartbreaking.
“Welcome back, Doe.” The mayor strides up to me, a shotgun resting on his shoulder. Aki snarls at him. Atlas hesitates but pushes on. “Seems you’ve had quite the adventure.” No insults. No threats. He actually wants to shake my hand. “Truce?”
The nerve of this guy.
“Truce?” I say. “You threw me in a cage and tried to kill me. Right over there on the Stairs.”
Atlas clears his throat. “Yes, well, I apologize. That was . . . a long time ago.”
“Not for me, it wasn’t.” I leave the guy hanging, turn back to Winifred. “There must be another way.”
“Another way to what?” Violet asks.
Winifred ignores her. “Give me the arrow, Jane.”
I take it from my sleeve. The battle’s spilling down the Sacred Stairs now. Townsfolk. Leatherheads. Tin-skins. It’s all-out war, but there’s no way I’m giving Winifred the arrow.
“Jane,” she says, “we don’t have time for this. Roth is going to charge through the gateway any moment now. Give me the arrow and run. The way is clear.”
“Listen to her, Jane,” Hickory says. ‘We have to go.”
“It’s my destiny,” Winifred says fiercely, but with a note of pleading in her voice as she holds out her hand. “Everything has been leading to this. Please, you have to let me do this.”
Life is a series of sacrifices.
But it isn’t Winifred’s sacrifice to make. It isn’t the townsfolk’s. It shouldn’t have been Elsa’s. This is my fight.
“Okay, then.” I hand Winifred the arrow. “Give him hell.”
“Oh, I intend to,” she says, fitting the arrow into her crossbow. “Now go. Run.” As expected, she turns to face the Stairs. Turns her back on me. Big mistake.
I snatch the shotgun from Atlas and whack Winifred in the back of the head. She drops like a sack of clams.
Everyone stares at me, open-mouthed. Not even Violet knows what to say.
“You just knocked out Hali-gabera,” Yaku gasps.
“Yeah, well”—I ditch the shotgun—“now we’re even.” I pick up her crossbow and toss it to Hickory, tuck the hood of Winifred’s cloak under her head. “Sorry, old girl. You said it yourself, way back when: I’m the hero of this story, whether I like it or not.”
“Jane,” Violet says, staring up at the Manor. “He’s here.”
The townsfolk streaming from the gateway are clutching their chests, their faces, their mouths. Roth’s striding among them, a new half-mask fixed to his face, taking his first few steps down the Sacred Stairs into a brand-new world. I can feel him staring at me.
“Good,” I say through gritted teeth. “Let him come.”