“The deal is simple. You either bring us the candle, or your precious grandmother dies,” Vivian hissed. “I’ll call you with the details later, but the choice is yours, Gwen.”
I opened my mouth to say something—I wasn’t quite sure what—but Vivian raised Lucretia high and slammed the hilt of the sword into the side of my head.
The world snapped to black.
Chapter 10
Something warm, wet, and sticky touched my cheek, jerking me out of the darkness that I’d been drowning in for what seemed like forever. A small, hopeful yip sounded, and a solid weight bounded up onto my chest.
I opened my eyes to find Nyx wagging her tail and staring down at me with her bright, twilight-colored eyes. When she realized that I was awake and looking at her, she let out another happy yip and licked me on the cheek again. I wrinkled my nose. Vic was right. Her breath wasn’t the best in the world, but I was so happy to see her that I didn’t care. I rubbed her ears between my fingers, and Nyx’s tail thumped against my ribs in contentment.
I sat up and realized that I was in the academy infirmary, lying on one of the hospital beds. I still had on the same clothes I had been wearing earlier. They were ripped, torn, dirty, and bloody from where I’d scrambled up the hill and down the other side, but the briar scratches on my hands and arms had disappeared. Other than a slight headache, I felt fine, and I knew Professor Metis or maybe Daphne had used her magic to heal me.
Nyx licked my cheek again, then hopped from the bed over onto a chair where Vic was propped up. She licked his cheek as well, and the sword’s eye popped open.
“Ugh, fuzzball!” he groused. “I told you not to wake me up until Gwen was awake too.”
Nyx let out another happy yip and hopped back over onto the bed. Vic realized that I was in fact awake and sitting up, and some of the worry eased out of his metal face.
“How do you feel?” he asked.
“I’m okay. What’s going on?” I asked. “Where’s
Grandma Frost?”
Vic gave me a serious look, his purple eye dark and solemn. “I’ll let the others tell you.”
A hard knot of fear formed in the pit of my stomach. “The Reapers have her, don’t they?”
“I’m afraid they do.”
I pressed my fist to my mouth, fighting back tears, nausea, and the urge to scream all at the same time. Vivian and Agrona had Grandma Frost at their mercy— something I knew they didn’t have a single shred of in their entire bodies.
The door opened, and Metis stuck her head inside. “Oh good,” she said. “You’re awake.”
She stepped into the room, along with Linus and Coach Ajax. Nickamedes shuffled in as well, leaning on his cane. The librarian shut the door behind him, and the adults formed a row in front of the hospital bed.
“What are you doing to find my grandma?” I demanded. “Do you have any idea where the Reapers have taken her?”
Linus shook his head. “Unfortunately not, Miss Frost. Alexei and Aiko told us what they witnessed of the attack, but I’d like to hear your version of events.”
I told them about fighting the Reapers, chasing after Grandma, and my confrontation with Vivian—including what she wanted.
“I told you that putting the candle on display was a bad idea,” I said, staring at Linus with accusing eyes. “Only the Reapers aren’t going to be stupid enough to try to steal it from the library like you wanted them to. Oh no. They’re going to make us hand it over to them instead.”
Linus look at Metis, then Ajax, and finally Nickamedes. Metis and Ajax stared back at him with sad, but resigned faces, but anger burned in the librarian’s eyes, making them glint like chips of hard blue ice.
“I’m afraid that’s not going to happen,” Linus said, squaring his shoulders and facing me again.
That ball of fear in my stomach morphed into a lump of cold, hard lead. “What . . . what are you saying?” I whispered, barely able to force out the words.
“We do not negotiate with Reapers,” Linus said. “We are not giving the Reapers the candle. We can’t afford to. Not after you told us what it does, and how they could use it to return Loki to his full strength.”
For a moment, I cocked my head to the side, wondering if I’d heard him right—and really, really hoping that I hadn’t.
“You’re . . . you’re not going to save her?” I sputtered in disbelief. “You’re not going to give the Reapers the candle?”
Linus straightened up to his full height, his face harsher and sharper than ever before. “No. We are not giving the Reapers the candle. We cannot do anything that will potentially make Loki stronger.”
My gaze snapped over to Metis and Ajax. They both looked back at me with tired, weary faces.
“I’m sorry, Gwen,” Metis said. “We tried to convince him to change his mind.”
“We all did,” Ajax chimed in. “You know how much we all care about Geraldine.”
Nickamedes didn’t say anything, but he looked at the others, his own features pinched tight with disgust.
“But I’m not going to budge,” Linus finished. “I
can’t. Not as the head of the Protectorate.”
“Can’t? Or don’t want to?” I said in a clipped voice. Linus sighed. “Can’t, Miss Frost. Believe me, I take
no pleasure in this. No pleasure at all.”
“But you . . . you can’t just leave her with the Reapers,” I protested, my hands balling into tight fists. “Vivian and Agrona will kill her—they’ll torture her—just out of spite.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Frost,” Linus repeated. “Truly, I am. But there’s nothing I can do in regard to the candle. Rest assured that I have every available member of the Protectorate out looking for your grandmother. We are doing everything in our power to find her.”
I glared at him. “Just not everything in your power to actually save her, right?”
Linus’s lips pressed into a hard, thin line, but he didn’t argue with me. He couldn’t.
I looked at them all in turn. Linus. Metis. Ajax. Nickamedes. They stared back at me, a mixture of pity and resignation on their faces. Well, except for Nickamedes, who looked as angry as I felt. And I realized that they were actually going to do it. They were actually going to stand by and let my grandma die. Anger roared through me at the knowledge, melting that cold ball of lead in the pit of my stomach, and leaving behind a hard, sizzling determination, more intense than any I’d ever felt before.