“That’s none of your concern,” the king said, smiling slightly. “Though it’s good to know that even you are vulnerable to them. Even if you fail me in other ways, we’ll still have that to fall back on.”

  Jin blinked, his emotions swirling around in his head, making it hard to concentrate on anything. If he failed, they’d have what to fall back on? The Faceless’s swords? What did that mean?

  “Still, that doesn’t answer my question. She has some kind of abnormal strength, and that cat has obviously been magically modified. So again, I order you to tell me who this girl is, this enchanted creature who you brought into my dining room without warning and who could have killed me… or your punishment for failure will be doubled.”

  Ah, so that was what the king was so angry about. Jin swallowed hard. “I… honestly don’t know. All I got was her name. I don’t even know where she took me to heal me.” That was mostly the truth, with just a few facts left out here and there. Still, he figured the Golden King would buy it.

  The king narrowed his eyes, then held up the Spark. “And this?”

  Uh-oh. The king having the Spark was definitely not good. But if Jin explained what it was—or at least the little he knew about it, since he still wasn’t sure he really understood what it was—there was no way the king would ever part with it.

  “I know as much as you do,” Jin lied, shrugging. “It’s called the Spark, and it was able to heal me, but beyond that, I have no idea. Probably just an old enchanted item, not worth anything.”

  “Oh, it’s much more than that,” the king said quietly, making Jin inwardly wince. “It’s confounding my advisors, but from what they can tell me, this fire is pure magic. Its possibilities are endless, if one knows how to access its power.” The Spark reflected in his eyes, making them burn. “Just think, genie. I could do anything I wanted. Snap my fingers and bring the Last Knight to me here, instantly, without relying on your pathetic help. Or burn all the remaining rebels where they stand. No one could stand against me, not even one of your power!”

  Jin took a step back anxiously and put his hands up to slow things down. “I don’t know if it could do all that.…”

  The king grinned in a way that made Jin extremely uncomfortable. “Oh, it can. And now we’ll see together.” He held the Spark out toward Jin, and he felt a strange buzz pass through him at the memory of its power. “I gave the girl a chance to save her pet. All she had to do was show me how to use it, but she refused. I’ll make you the same deal. Show me what this is, and how to use it… and I’ll let the girl go. Otherwise, I have a couple of new statues for my throne room. What do you say, genie?”

  CHAPTER 23

  The Golden King had only touched Lena with his glove, but whatever he’d done had sent her somewhere… else. She could still think, sort of, but couldn’t move an inch. And thinking was getting harder with every moment that passed, like she was struggling to stay awake. It didn’t help that everything around her was silent and dark in whatever prison he’d stuck her in.

  Part of her wondered if he’d also turned her to gold, like he’d done to Rufus, but remembering her poor cat’s fate just enraged her, making her feel even more powerless that she couldn’t help him.

  She should have run the moment she saw the king, back in his dining room. Just grabbed the Spark and had it take her and Rufus somewhere, anywhere else. The boy, too…

  Except no, the boy worked for the king. And that meant that whoever he was, he was probably some kind of spy, maybe even looking for the Last Knight. That’d explain what he was doing in the forest outside the Cursed City… but not why the Faceless attacked him.

  None of it made any sense, and that just added to her frustration. She tried to scream, release some of her pent-up rage, but found that impossible too, which made her feel even angrier.

  None of this would have happened if she hadn’t insisted on going to the ritual with her parents. Couldn’t she have just kept hiding out in her cottage, avoiding the other villagers? Then Rufus would be okay, and she wouldn’t have maybe led a spy toward the Last Knight. If she could have just put up with wearing the Growth Ring when needed, pretending to be someone she wasn’t… never being acknowledged as a giant with the rest of the kids…

  No. As much as it might have fixed things, she just couldn’t take that life for much longer. She just couldn’t, not after spending so many years of her life hiding, waiting to turn twelve and to start to become a true giant in the eyes of the village, and get her real name.

  Yes, everything had gone horribly, and she desperately missed her parents, the giant village, even some of the giants themselves. But if she could figure some way out of her current imprisonment and rescue Rufus, she might still be able to find the Last Knight, use the cauldron, and…

  And what? Go back to her village? King Denir would never allow it, not even if she returned the Spark. If he didn’t stab her with his spear the moment she returned, she could at best hope for exile, and to live out the rest of her life in the Cursed City. And that wasn’t even the most likely possibility.

  No, at this point she might as well resign herself to living with the humans and hope to return the Spark some way without the giant king catching her. Which meant she’d have to keep hiding her true self from the Cursed City residents, so that they wouldn’t start fearing her too.

  And if that was her life, was it any better than hiding her true self back in the giant village?

  Enough, she told herself. All of this wasn’t helping her get free. She had to concentrate on escape, at least for the moment, and figure a way out of this.

  But as she began to pick through plans, a voice spoke up from what felt like a great distance, a voice she recognized: the boy who’d fought the Faceless with her.

  “Lena, I’m so sorry this happened to you,” he said, almost too quietly to hear. Either he was whispering, or whatever she was trapped in was muting sounds somehow. “But right now, I really need to know how to use the Spark. The king won’t let you go unless I tell him how to use it.”

  The Spark? That was what he wanted to know? There was no way she’d ever tell him that, even if she could talk! Clearly the Spark could do more than heal, since it’d teleported her and Rufus. Who knew what else it could do? The last thing in the world she’d consider was handing its power over to the Golden King and letting him use it against the Last Knight and the rest of the Cursed City.

  “Leave me alone!” she tried to yell, but no sound came out, and she inwardly growled.

  “You know, this would be a lot easier if you turned her back,” she heard the boy say, though this time it didn’t seem like he was talking to her.

  “Turn her back?” said a second voice, one that Lena recognized as the Golden King’s, and instantly her anger doubled. “And why would you think I could do that?”

  “What?” the boy shouted. “You turned all these people to gold, and have no way to bring them back?”

  “Of course I don’t. The glove only works one way, genie. Now, if you want this girl’s freedom, tell me how to use the Spark.”

  Lena couldn’t believe what she was hearing. She had been turned to gold, just like Rufus! So was she just a statue now? And the Golden King couldn’t turn them back, at least not without using the Spark?

  And what was this about a genie?

  It was a term Lena had only heard once, while chatting with the Last Knight about the cauldron. He’d been telling her all about magic, including stories about a Wicked Queen and her spies, which she called the I’s for some reason, apparently like the letter, which Lena had never understood. Maybe they didn’t like working as a team? Anyway, one of them had almost started a war between a fairy queen and a genie that could have destroyed the entire world.

  And that was what the boy was, a creature that could devastate everything? He looked human, but that didn’t mean much; she of all people knew that. But if he was so powerful, why did he need the Spark to heal her? None of it made sense.

  “Listen, Lena,” she heard him whisper again, too softly for the king to hear from how far away the man’s voice sounded, it seemed. “This Spark thing… it talked to me. There’s something inside of it that wants out. If I touch it, it might get free, and then I have no idea what will happen. I’m not sure I’d be able to hold it back, or even if I’d want to, honestly.” He sighed. “Maybe that’d be for the best? I could make this all go away, if I had the power.…”

  Um, that didn’t sound good, whatever he was talking about. But there wasn’t much Lena could do about it either way.

  “Yeah, I get that,” he said, his voice still just a whisper, though now sounding more annoyed, and not really speaking to her anymore. “No, I know, I should just try to heal her with it, and see what happens. Yes, I know I could unleash something that might be dangerous, but… You don’t have to tell me again.… Okay, you’re still telling me. Could you stop for a second?”

  There was no way he could talk to the Golden King that way. So either there was a third person in the room, or the genie boy was talking to himself. Neither possibility made Lena feel particularly good.

  “Okay, Lena,” he whispered, back to talking to her, apparently. “I think I figured a way out of this without making things a whole lot worse. I’m going to hold the Spark’s bowl, then touch the flame to your statue hand. If you can hear me, maybe you can do whatever it takes to make it work. If that happens, heal yourself, and we’ll all be better off. Then I can figure out later if I should set this magic free or not. So can you trust me, and just… make the Spark work? Turn yourself back human?”

  Trust him? That was the last thing she’d do, considering who the boy worked for. Not to mention that if he was a genie, he’d been disguising himself as a human to hide his true self, and…

  Well, okay, that she couldn’t really hold against him. But still.

  “Here we go,” he said. “It’s touching your fingers now. I hope you’re in there somewhere and can hear me.”

  If the Spark was touching her, she couldn’t feel it. But this might be her only chance to free herself, so whatever the boy’s reasons, she didn’t have much choice but to go along with him. She concentrated as hard as she could and turned her thoughts toward the Spark.

  Please, turn me back to normal. And if you can, do the same for Rufus?

  For a moment, nothing happened, and she began to worry that she’d done something wrong, or maybe the Spark couldn’t hear her through the gold. But then light blinded her eyes, and she squeezed them shut quickly, wincing in pain. She tried to cover them with her hands but found she couldn’t yet move them.

  Opening her eyes, she saw the gold covering her body slowly disappearing, releasing first her arms, then her legs, freeing her far too slowly for her liking.

  As the gold passed from her legs, she felt a wave of exhaustion hit her, and she collapsed, just as her feet returned to their regular, non-golden color. Taking a deep breath, she tilted her head and looked up at the boy who’d just saved her.

  He stood over her holding the Spark, with the Golden King a few feet away, watching carefully.

  “Uh, hello,” the boy said. “We haven’t really been introduced. I’m Jin.”

  “Hello, I’m Lena,” she said.

  Then she punched the boy as hard as she could.

  The Spark went flying into the air as the boy crashed backward into the Golden King, knocking them both to the floor. She threw herself forward, in spite of her exhaustion, and caught the Spark before its bowl could hit the floor, then looked down at the boy angrily. “And it’s not nice to meet you!”

  CHAPTER 24

  The pain from the Faceless’s sword had been the worst Jin had ever felt. But getting punched across the room definitely came in second.

  He slammed into the Golden King, knocking them both back against the wall with a huge crash. As they fell, Jin saw his hand almost touch the king’s glove and instantly turned himself insubstantial the moment before he touched it. As the glove passed through him, he felt an odd sort of tingling from the magic and hoped he hadn’t just turned himself into a statue.

  “Rufus!” Lena shouted across the room as the gold covering the cat began to fade, just as it’d done for her. But it wasn’t happening quickly, so they weren’t going anywhere for the moment.

  “Take the Spark from her, genie!” the king roared, pushing right through Jin to get back to his feet. “Don’t let her—”

  A large chair slammed into him, and Jin looked up in surprise to find Lena searching for a second one to throw. “You should just learn to leave people alone!” she shouted, glaring at both Jin and the king, which seemed a bit unfair, since Jin hadn’t done anything to her. Well, other than follow her around and try to find the Last Knight, but she probably didn’t even know that. “No wonder everyone hates you!”

  The Golden King’s face contorted in shock and rage. “No one hates me!” he shouted, trying to push the chair off himself but only succeeding in turning it to gold, and therefore too heavy to lift. “I’m the most beloved chancellor to rule these kingdoms!”

  Jin snorted, earning him a dark look from the king. “Oh, uh, sorry,” he said, and quickly solidified, floating over to where Lena waited with her cat, who had just about finished de-golding. She aimed a small couch at him, but he put up his hands in surrender. “Wait, Lena! There are hundreds of Faceless just outside the door, so you can’t escape!” At least not that way, he left unsaid, hoping she got the point. “If you hand over the Spark, I’m sure we can work something out where you and your evil cat go free.”

  Her eyes widened. “What did you say about Rufus?”

  Jin winced. “I said the, um, weevil cat! Because he’s cute as a bug, obviously.”

  “You’re lying now, and you were lying before,” she said, glaring at him. “You’re a genie, and you work for the king!”

  Okay, whoops, maybe she did know about the whole following-her-to-the-Last-Knight thing. “I wouldn’t call it ‘working’ for him,” Jin said, shrugging apologetically. “It’s a whole servitude thing, but believe me, if I could get out of it, I would. I hate him too—urk!”

  Jin’s throat began to close, and he turned to find the king squeezing two fingers together. “Get to the point,” the king growled.

  “Right, the point,” Jin croaked, and the king thankfully released him. Jin put up a hand for everyone to just pause for a moment as he took in a deep breath, though in truth, he had no idea what to say or do next. If Lena was going to get out of this unharmed, he was going to have to figure out a way to help her without the king realizing it. And that was going to take some finesse.

  Sounds like you’re in trouble, then.

  Not helping! Jin yelled at the cosmic knowledge, then turned back to the girl, who’d now grabbed a six-foot-tall candelabra and was aiming it at Jin like a spear. “Lena, I could take the Spark from you if I wanted,” he said, hoping she believed it. “Like you mentioned, I’m a genie. There’s nothing I can’t do. But I don’t want to. I want you and your cat to leave here in peace. And that can happen, as long as you hand the Spark over, and tell us how to use it.”

  There. That should convince the king he was following orders.

  Lena didn’t respond at first, and while she considered things, Jin looked beyond her surface again, to see if he could get a sense of what she was thinking through her inner magic. The blinding blue that was her inner self still shone too brightly to look at directly, and he had to shield his eyes a bit, but there was more of the painful red color now too, running through the blue like cracks in a vase.

  “I can’t let you have it,” she said finally. “The giants will come looking for it, and they’d destroy every human they came across until they found it.”

  “Show me how to use the Spark, and the giants will never threaten anyone again,” the king said, now out from under the golden chair. “I’ll destroy them all with its magic!”

  Jin winced. Even though that sounded reasonable to him, he didn’t see Lena going for it. In spite of her incredible strength, the blue inside her wasn’t the color of someone who wanted to see others destroyed. It was far too peaceful.

  As he’d feared, Lena looked both shocked and terribly offended. “You won’t touch them! They’ve done nothing to you. They just want their treasure back!”

  “He didn’t mean destroy,” Jin said quickly. “He meant exile!” Another large red crack appeared in her blue light as he said it, and he flinched, hating that he was making things worse, though he wasn’t sure what had set it off. The word “exile”? “I mean, he’ll send them somewhere where they can be happy and free! I’m sure there are plenty of unoccupied clouds in distant lands or something.”

  “Enough of this!” the king roared. He stepped closer to Lena with his golden glove outstretched. “Give me the Spark, girl. I tire of these games.”

  “Stay back!” Lena shouted, and swung the candelabra, only for the king to catch it in his golden glove. The force of the blow made the king yell out in pain, but it didn’t stop the glove’s magic from working, as gold flowed up the candelabra almost too fast to see. Lena dropped it just before it could reach her hand, at least.

  Jin let out a huge breath with relief. He’d freed her from being a statue once, but he doubted the king would allow them to use the Spark a second time. The Golden King liked his trophies too much for that, especially those of some particularly annoying heroes he’d turned to gold years before—

  “Guards!” the king shouted out, as Lena was now defenseless. The doors opened, and a squad of Faceless entered the room, each holding one of the shadow-magic swords that had caused Jin so much pain. He instinctively floated out of their way, but Lena didn’t look the slightest bit intimidated.

 

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