“Help me, you fools!” Agrona said, tearing off her black robe and using the fabric to beat at the flames still devouring Loki’s body.
The Reapers left me to Vivian and headed in Agrona’s direction, but they forgot about one thing—Grandma Frost.
Grandma stuck her foot out, tripping a Reaper as he rushed past her. He tumbled to the ground, and Grandma snatched up his sword from where it had fallen. She twirled the weapon around, then brought the point down into the Reaper’s side, making him scream with pain. Two Reapers whirled around at the sound. They realized that Grandma Frost had a weapon and headed toward her.
I swung my own sword out in a vicious arc, trying to charge past Vivian to help my grandma, but the Reaper girl parried my blow and lashed out with one of her own that had me leaping back to get out of the way of Lucretia’s whistling blade.
Grandma twirled the sword in her hand again and stepped up to meet the Reapers, but the one she’d stabbed reached out and grabbed her ankle, throwing her off balance. Horrified, I watched as she tried to pull herself out of the Reaper’s grasp and straighten up so she could battle the other two who were charging at her. She wasn’t going to get free in time, and both of the Reapers raised their swords, ready to bring the weapons down on top of her head—
A golden arrow zoomed out of the woods and buried itself in the chest of one of the Reapers who’d been targeting Grandma. A second later, another arrow—this one made of regular metal—took out the Reaper on Grandma’s other side. Daphne and Oliver had finally gotten into position in the trees, and they were doing their best to help us escape.
But there were still too many Reapers for that.
Even if I could have gotten past Vivian, there were still more than a dozen Reapers in the clearing, although most of them had gone over to help Agrona with Loki. The Reapers had stripped off their black cloaks and were using the fabric to try to smother the silver flames still crackling over his body.
Finally, Agrona reached down and managed to wrench the candle out of Loki’s hands. It must have burned her too because she hissed and tossed it aside. The candle skittered across the broken black marble, landing a few feet away from me and Vivian.
The silver spark and flames had vanished, as though the laurel leaves and all the magic they had contained had been used up, although a bit of silver smoke continued to puff up from the wick. Other than that, the candle was simply a candle once more, and I didn’t see any trace of the leaves remaining in the wax.
But there was still about a quarter of the candle left. I didn’t know exactly what that meant, but I wasn’t about to let the Reapers get their hands on it.
Vivian saw me looking at the candle, and we both lunged for it at the same time. My hand closed around the wax, and I braced myself, waiting for the awful memories of Loki’s pain to fill my mind. But all I got from the candle was that feeling of intense heat, and I realized there was still some magic left in it after all— more than enough magic to heal Loki, despite what I’d done to him.
Vivian threw herself on top of me, and we rolled over and over across the stone, with her trying to tear the candle out of my grasp, and me tightening my death grip on the smooth piece of wax. I couldn’t let her get her hands on the candle now. Not when I only had one laurel leaf left on my bracelet and no time to press it into the wax.
“Give it up, Gwen!” Vivian hissed. “I’m stronger than you are. Any second, you’re going to let go of that candle, and then you’ll lose—just like you’ve lost to me every single time before now.”
“Dream on,” I hissed back.
Then, I punched her in the face. I was still holding on to Vic’s hilt, and I slammed my fist and the sword into her features as hard as I could. I felt her nose crunch under the metal, and blood sprayed through the air, spattering onto both of us.
Vivian shrieked and rolled away from me. I scrambled to my feet, still holding Vic and the candle, which I stuffed into my jacket pocket and zipped up tight so I wouldn’t lose it. Grandma Frost raced over to my side. We turned to run into the woods but found our path blocked by a group of Reapers. We whirled around the other way, but there were more of them coming up on that side too.
Grandma and I stood back-to-back near the middle of the Garm gate, watching the Reapers slowly approach us. More golden and wooden arrows zipped out of the woods, and a few of the Reapers split off to go after Daphne and Oliver. I hoped my friends could avoid them and that they wouldn’t be foolish enough to try to get close to me and Grandma with so many of our enemies clustered around us. Besides, I still had one trick left, one that I hoped was enough to save us.
“Kill them!” Loki howled, still rocking back and forth on the stone. “Kill them both! Now!”
The Reapers raised their swords and surged toward us, and I snapped up Vic, ready to fight them for as long as I could—
SCREECH!
A wild, fierce cry boomed through the clearing, making me wince at its volume. But a smile tugged up my lips all the same because I knew exactly what had made the noise.
The high-pitched screech came again, even louder than before, and more than a few of the Reapers paused, looking up toward the treetops, no doubt expecting to see their Black rocs roosting on the sturdier branches. But it wasn’t a roc making that noise.
Not even close.
A second later, two male Eir gryphons landed in the middle of the broken stone. One of the gryphons was large, easily as large as the Black rocs the Reapers always used, but the other one was smaller, although he had grown quite a bit since the last time I’d seen him and was now almost as big as his dad. Both gryphons were beautiful, with bronze fur and wings, black beaks and talons, and bright, shimmering eyes that burned like warm, bronze lanterns.
But the gryphons weren’t alone.
A pretty girl with black hair and green eyes was perched on top of the baby gryphon. She wore black jeans, a green sweater, and a green leather jacket that gave her a tough-girl vibe. A woman with similar features and clothes rode the adult gryphon. My cousin, Rory Forseti, and her aunt, Rachel Maddox. The other friends I’d called for help, along with the gryphons.
“Hey, Gwen.” Rory grinned at me, shoving her hair back out of her eyes. “How was our grand entrance?”
“Perfect!” I yelled back at her. “Just perfect!” Grandma Frost ran toward the gryphons, while I cov-
ered her, holding off all the Reapers that tried to get past me to attack her. Rachel jumped off the adult gryphon, and the creature leaped into the middle of the fray, swiping his claws into every Reaper that came near him. In a moment, the gryphon had taken out three of the Reapers, and even Vivian and Agrona were looking at him with surprise—and more than a little fear.