Zach Brenner's Arc

Chapter 40 of 86

Lyra's finger trembled on the tracking map. "The second seal," she said. "He's there now. When it breaks, Darkthorne wakes." Zach felt his stomach drop. His training was done. He could fight now. But the seal lay far to the north, and Malachar stood on top of it. There was no road left that reached him in time. Zach turned to Geneva in the doorway. "Tell me it isn't over. Tell me there's still a way to stop him." Geneva leaned on the frame. The old man's cat ears twitched. For once he did not scold. "Listen close, chosen one, because everyone hears this wrong." He limped to the fire and sat. "Even when Malachar breaks the last seal, Darkthorne does not simply rise. The waking is not finished at the stones." The group went still. Raven crouched by the hearth. Talon lowered his katana. Ayla gripped her crystal staff. "Breaking the seals only frees the sorcerer's chains," Geneva said. "After that, Malachar must find the tower. It moves each day, hidden from every map. Inside its heart sits a dark crystal. He has to carry it down, into the center of the world, to a fire that never dies. That fire holds the soul of Maximus." He looked at Zach. "He drops the crystal into that fire. Only then does the soul of Maximus take his body and rise whole." Zach breathed out slow. "So the seal isn't the finish line." "No," Geneva said. "It is the start of his longest road. You cannot beat him to the stones. You do not need to. You need to beat him to the fire." Raven's ears pricked forward. "Then we stop chasing the seal." She stood. "We go for the tower. For the crystal." "The tower moves," Talon said. "No man tracks it." Lyra pressed her palm flat to the map. Her purple eyes narrowed. "I track heartbeats through stone," she said. "Malachar carries the crystal himself. Once he leaves the stones, he becomes the beacon. I follow him, not the tower." She traced a line north. "He'll head for the tower next. We fly ahead. We take the fire before he reaches it." Zach looked at his sword resting against the wall. White light slept in the steel. He had spent weeks learning to hold that light steady. Now he knew where to aim it. "Then it isn't lost," he said. "We were racing the wrong finish line. The real one is deeper. And we can still get there first." Geneva rose. "Go, then. Reach the fire before the crystal falls into it. If Maximus takes flesh, no blade closes that door again." Zach lifted the sword and slid it home on his back. Outside, the swamp mist thinned toward the marsh where the airship waited. The chase was not over. It had only changed direction.