Chapter 8. The Man of the Marsh

"Jango murdered Mikhail," Manie said, her tone drifting between anger and accusation. "That's why the Protectors executed him almost a thousand years ago. You can't be Jango, and even if you are, you definitely aren't Mikhail's friend!"

Jango leaned away. "I was Mikhail's friend until he betrayed me, and the code of the Protectors."

He can’t be, Shawn thought. How can that be true?

"That's why you killed him?" Manie asked, "because he broke some code?"

"I didn't kill anyone," Jango said, "that's what fools believe. Mikhail's followers couldn't tell the difference between a Crystal keeper and someone who could perform a tavern trick, let alone find the murderer of their king before the night was through. They couldn't have come close to finding me unless I let them."

"So why did you let the Protectors find you, then?" Shawn asked.

"Protectors," Jango growled, "Sometimes I laugh when I remember that's what we used to call ourselves. The Protectors became tainted by greed and the lust for control, one and all, directly because Mikhail refused to share what talents he learned from that Blue Crystal. Merely mentioning the idea of a future where Crystal wielders could exist among us would drive Mikhail into a rage. He hoarded his knowledge and kept it secret from everyone: a force that could have raised our civilization from the dirt and painted us into history as living gods."

The old man sounded like he was trapped in some faraway dream–of a world that no longer existed.

Jango went to the back corner of the room where a spiral staircase twisted up into the ceiling. "There are more important things we must discuss," he said. "If you would please follow me. Both of you."

Shawn turned to Manie and she looked back.

"You tried to drown us," Manie yelled, "and now you expect us to trust you?"

"I did not try to drown you," Jango said. "I was going to drown you. You could have been assassins sent here to kill me. I was protecting the future of Talmoria."

"By drowning two teenagers?" Manie asked.

"Assassins," Jango corrected. "I was going to drown two assassins. Your age wasn't a factor. I've seen a thousand year old woman turn up looking as young as a girl who'd barely crossed her eighteenth summer. But I saw all I needed when those golden flames ignited in Shawn's hands. I know what happened at the Battle for the Beacons. Now come along." He climbed the staircase and disappeared into the stony darkness above.

A rumbling breath roared around the room as if Shawn and Manie had been tossed inside a Renjin's mouth. The basement was just like the cage Duncan had locked Shawn inside to await execution. He was at the mercy of this stranger in the same way he'd been to that creature. "Do we follow him?"

"It doesn't seem like we have much of a choice," Manie said. "Unless you want to try swimming back up the drain pipe."

Obviously that wasn’t possible, but it seemed preferable to going up those stairs. What was waiting at the top? Another noose? "I don't think we can escape. It almost feels like we were meant to come here."

"Meant to come here?" Manie asked. “You mean like fate?”

"I guess. Doesn't it feel like we're being forced to do this somehow?" Shawn asked. "Like someone is guiding us down a path?"

“That’s how I’ve felt ever since I left my tower, but I’m not so sure this time.”

“Duncan believed in fate. After it captured me, it told me it had no idea we’d arrived in Ferengul that day. Duncan thought we were meant to meet, just like how we met Milly." Shawn stood and took Manie's hand, helping her back to her feet.

"I wonder if Duncan still believed in fate after I turned its face into a lightning rod," she said.

"Our conversation was after that, so I guess he did," Shawn said.

"You really think Milly would have sent us here?" Manie asked. "Like with the Skyward Stairway?"

"It's not like we're in more danger here than we were there."

"We almost got drowned by a madman who's accused of kidnapping people and experimenting on them. This seems less dangerous to you?"

"But what if this really is Jango?" Shawn asked. "Don't you remember the story your mother told us in her cabin?"

"Of course I remember the story, I've been hearing it all my life."

"If he's telling the truth, Jango could be a powerful friend. He might know how to make a cure for the Gray Death." Then another thought crossed Shawn's mind. "He might even know how to open the doorway back to my world."

Manie's eyes became as distant as the dimmest stars in the sky, like gems sparkling from a billion miles away. "A cure to the Gray Death is possible...but I wouldn't get my hopes up about opening the secret doors. Mikhail's Crystal has always been the only Crystal that could open them. Mikhail wrote in his journal that the Blue Crystal was like a key, and he never found another."

"I hope you're wrong," Shawn said, as a cold shadow fell on his heart.

"I thought you wanted to stay in Talmoria?" Manie asked.

“I do,” Shawn replied. “But if there's a way for me to see my home again... I have to find out if it's possible. I need to tell my mother that I'm alright. I promised her I'd come back when the battle for the North was over. She probably thinks I’m dead."

Manie looked as if she wanted that to come true less than anything. "You're right. I’m sorry.”

Shawn could see the heartbreak in her eyes. “I won’t leave you. I promise. You're the reason I stayed."

Manie warmed to his words. "I know. I'll never forget that night in Sarratania, Shawn. No one's ever done anything like that for me before. I’d be dead if not for you. I probably deserved it after everything I’ve done, but instead, you saved me."

"And I'd do it again," Shawn said as he grabbed her hands, her fingers tingling in his. Manie smiled, but her eyes said she didn't believe him.

Shawn loved Manie, but there was no denying his longing for home, for the safety of a warm bed and a quiet movie about adventures in far away lands. But instead he was trapped here on the wrong side of a door that led to a separate universe, stuck chin-deep in his own adventure. It wasn't just a movie playing on a screen or a scheme cooked up by his friend Spencer. This was real.

Manie squeezed Shawn's hands. "All I ever wanted was to have my family back, the way it was before these Crystals destroyed everything. Now I’ve put that same fate onto you.”

Shawn shook his head. “It’s not your fault. I chose to stay.”

“But I’m the one who brought you here. I made you come.”

“And I chose to stay,” Shawn said again, reaffirming his commitment.

Manie smiled and let it down. “One day we'll find a way to make things go back to the way they were. You'll see your family again, Shawn. I promise. I won't give up until you do."

Shawn had never met someone so devoted to him as Manie was. It was humbling to know that she cared about him as much as he cared about her. Maybe he was the one who didn’t deserve it. “I don't know where I'd be without you."

"Probably having a peaceful life where dangerous creatures aren't trying to kill you every five minutes," she said.

Shawn smiled. "Probably. But I bet my friend Spencer would have eventually found a way to get me killed if I hadn’t come here with you."

"Maybe," Manie said. "You’ll have to introduce us one day. Maybe we can all be friends and go to school together, like you used to. Sounds a lot safer than what we’ve been doing.”

“It’s safer, but boring,” Shawn said. “I’d much rather be here with you.”

A smile grew on Manie’s face that never completely faded. “Well, let's go hear what this old man wants to say before he tries to drown us again."

Manie moved towards the stairs. Shawn squeezed steamy water out of his shirt as he followed. He would have been sweating if he hadn't already been soaked. The air was uncomfortably hot, and the steam made his skin feel sticky.

The room beyond where the glass had been was occupied by a leather operating table. Beside it was a rack filled with knives, sutures, bonesaws, cloth gloves, many different surgical tools and wheels of gauze. On the wall was a diagram of a person with their skin removed to show the location of different organs. The parchment was stained in dry blood.

"Holy crap... I wonder if Jango really ran experiments on people down here."

"Still think we were destined to come here by fate?"

Filets of skin were stretched out to dry like pelts in the corner. Just beside them were buckets of coagulating blood, surfaces a gummy sheet of red gore floating over pools of crimson rot. “Maybe not.”

There was a window above the buckets, looking through rock walls and into another chamber. As Shawn went closer, a slithering river of magma appeared, warping and pouring by in a tunnel of gold and silver rock. "Where are we? Did that river take us into a volcano?"

The walls of Jango's torture chamber were shimmering with gold and yellow waves in a circus of hot light, illuminating drops of steamy perspiration hanging off the cieling. The sight wasn't dissimilar to the mouth of a Renjin before it puked a breath of flame.

"Mt. Ven isn't far from the Sour Marshes," Manie said. "Maybe this is the heart of the island."

"How did Jango build this place so deep underground?" Shawn asked.

"Maybe he really is who he says he is. Jango was one of the most powerful Crystal Keepers to have ever lived."

Shawn and Manie moved onto the circular iron staircase and climbed its metal steps. Shawn went first, rising until the basement disappeared beneath the ceiling, turning into light at the bottom of a tunnel below his feet. The staircase went up a narrow tube, completely dark except for him and Manie's red and blue eyes projecting light across the rocks. The walls were wet and glassy, made of black rock like oil turned to stone. Shawn dragged his palms as he climbed to feel the smooth, glossy walls, noticing the rocks were warm to the touch.

As they came to the top of the stairs, the room connected to a doorway that opened into a wide hallway with a dozen doors on either side. A black carpet stitched with embroidery of planets, stars and galaxies lined the way, twirling with surreal color, and on the walls hung paintings, framed documents, and tapestries depicting historical battles fought on Talmorian soil. Jango waited ahead, his body draped in a flowing black robe.

"Welcome to my home. It's been many years since true Protectors graced these halls. The last time your like was seen in this place was almost a thousand years ago. This structure was just a three story mansion, then, standing alone in an abandoned swamp. Now it's a multi-story palace reaching deep underground."

"Very impressive. And you somehow stayed alive all this time?" Manie asked skeptically.

Jango looked down at his hands and feet to confirm it. "I have."

"How?" Shawn asked.

"Hold that question," Jango said. "I mean to explain in greater detail once we arrive at my study."

Manie crossed her arms. "How did you build this without anyone finding out you weren't dead?" she asked.

Jango smiled. "With magic. Through the power of these Crystals humanity could accomplish anything. We could tunnel to the center of the Earth, change the direction of a river, even sail across the stars if given enough time. That's what our king took away, all those years ago, when he tried to stamp that power out."

Manie looked like she'd swallowed a moth. Jango turned and moved down the hall. Shawn gave Manie a glance before they followed.

"For thousands of years humanity scratched away at this rock, hoping to carve out a life free from the wars beyond the sea. It wasn't until the Rain of Crystals brought untold power to this island that Talmoria found its true place in history. Before that event we were little more than peasants with a pretty dream. But after, we were transformed into gods."

As they went down the hall, frames and tapestries drifted by. Some were paintings of landscapes, others creatures. In an especially intricate black frame was a painting of Mikhail knighting a man in a wide cavern lit by torches of blue flame. Mikhail was surrounded by Protectors, each of their eyes burning blue. The King's longsword was set valiantly against the kneeling man's shoulder.

"Our first King, at a time when he still believed in the values our order was founded upon."

"Is he performing some kind of ritual?" Shawn asked.

"It was an initiation. Those trusted to uphold the code of our order were given their blessing by the King and the rest of his most trusted companions. I was among them. The first step to join the Protectors was to awaken the blue fire in your eyes. After that, one of us would seek you out, and offer up the choice to hand over your life to a greater cause."

"How does a Protector get the blue fire in their eyes? Is it some kind of a test?" Shawn had wanted a better answer to that question ever since the day at the Skyward Stairway. Agatha's explanation had been less than satisfying.

"There have been countless books written about the subject, attempting to find the answer to that question. No one knows with certainty how the blue flame chooses who it does. It's never been the same for any two people. I believe it is a sort of test. It's a choice we are forced to make, one tailored specifically to who we've let ourselves become, and whatever reason we use to make that choice decides whether we are worthy to carry the flame."

"And what about when you lose it?" Manie asked, her eyes robbed of blue flame by the red.

Jango no longer had his blue flame either. His eyes reflected a world of anguish and ghosts and misery, as if he'd asked himself that question many times before. "Perhaps it means we made the wrong decision when presented with our test."

Manie stared at the floor, squeezing her upper arm. "Will it ever let us choose again?"

"I've never heard of it happening. But I'd rather die trying to prove whatever took my flame wrong than give up hope. The blue flame is in our heart, not our eyes."

Manie nodded in understanding.

"If we're trying to do the right thing, I don't see why it should matter what color our eyes are," Shawn said.

"I’m of the same mind," Jango replied. “That’s why we can’t give up.”

A frame on the wall opposite the painting of Mikhail held a flat piece of gold, perfectly shaped and thin, like a shiny sheet of paper. It was three times as long as Shawn was tall. The bottom was marked with a date and inscription, First wood to gold alchemical transformation.

"You turned wood into gold?" Shawn asked. He could barely imagine Spencer's overreaction if he saw something like this.

Jango raised his eyes, as if he'd forgotten. "Ah, yes. Seems it's much easier to get help and silence when your gold grows on trees."

"The Torch Wings did the same with glass," Manie said. "Maybe they learned it from you."

Jango grinned. "I doubt that. Those creatures were here long before I was."

Manie took Shawn's hand, making his veins tingle. Jango resumed his stride and went on.

At the end of the hall the brick walls disappeared where they'd been shattered by a mess of moss and ivy squirming between the cracks, webbing all across the corners of the hall. Shawn and Manie followed Jango through the jungle of green veins and into a giant room that extended out on both sides, with most of the added width going out to the left. The walls were smooth stones with intricate designs of soldiers, mages and creatures carved into them, painted by smoky colors. The frozen battles they fought seemed alive.

The chamber had reflective floors made of brown and white marble submerged beneath a coat of glaze like deep ice. Black lines embedded into the marble came together in the center of the room from ten different angles to make a perfect circle. There were lines and dots to mark stars and constellations, each with letters and numbers to name them. The ceiling above extended high into the darkness like the roof of an ancient cavern.

"What is this place?" Manie asked, like they’d discovered some lost temple.

"This is my Seeing Room. It's a place where I come to learn about things most in Talmoria could never comprehend. One of the topics I study here are the stars and the secrets they keep."

A gathering of gold-rimmed tables and wooden desks stood where the lines in the floor converged. Beyond was a massive bookcase reaching around three walls between blinking torches and dark lanterns. Rows upon rows of books, hundreds high and thousands across, filled shelves where ladders on wheels clung to gold rails like the legs of a metallic spider.

"Have you read all these," Manie asked, eyes lost among the thousands of covers.

Jango peered back over his shoulder. "Not all. I've read bits and pieces of relevant information from some. I've certainly read about half cover to cover."

Books were never high on Shawn’s list of interests back when he’d been in school. Being forced to read all these for entertainment would have seemed like torture. "You must be pretty smart."

"I like to think I am," Jango said.

Jango went to the four tables situated in the center of the room. Shawn and Manie stopped near a table that was covered in strange metallic devices shaped like engraved apples. There were roots in bowls of dirt; shattered Green and Orange Crystal's glowing like hot ember dust; a bronze crossbow and some silver swords laid out beside it, metal glowing with unnatural light. The table nearest to Jango was covered in loose papers, likely written using one of the quills and ink pots.

Manie picked one of the metallic apples off the table. She was studying the coarse engravings when a rough ring twisted open and sprang out ten curved blades that froze in place. The Blades exploded and shot across the room, pelting the walls and floor with tiny daggers.

Shawn jumped away as one of the blades stuck into the floor beside his foot. "What is that thing? Some kind of a bomb?"

Jango snatched the apple from Manie's hand. "Good for clearing a room full of enemies. Not so good in a room full of friends."

Manie shrugged. "So we're friends, now?"

Jango glared at Manie as he shoved the device into a drawer. He wrenched one of the tiny daggers free from the wood of his desk, tossing it aside like a metallic tooth. "I have information to share with you," Jango said.

"What kind of information?" Shawn asked.

"The kind that might save everyone in Talmoria from a pointless and early death."

"Right," Manie said, like she believed him about as much as she believed in flying snakes. "I want to know what happened to our friend Silvan. We lost track of him after that thing threw us down the hole in the swamp."

"Silvan," Jango asked. "I've yet to meet the man. I assume that thing you met in the swamps was my bodyguard Ivor? He can be overprotective at times, to say the least. Bearing that, I'm sure your friend is fine. I've told Ivor not to harm anyone."

"He punched Silvan so hard he fell unconscious," Manie said, as if she'd been the one to get hit.

"Well, fatally anyway," Jango said.

"What is Ivor, another unfortunate victim of your experiments gone wrong?" Manie asked. "It looked like a living corpse."

"No," Jango said. "Ivor came to me. He was dying of a flesh devouring virus. I created an ointment that stopped the progression of his decay. He's been helping me ever since."

"I want to see Silvan." Manie said. "I want to know he's not dead."

"He's fine, quit your winging."

"I want to know he's okay!" Manie shouted back. "Or I'm not listening to a word you have to tell us."

"I'll take you to him once we're done speaking. This information is best kept between us."

Manie crossed her arms. "I've already told you what's going to happen."

"I'll take you to Silvan once we're done," Jango repeated, his tone a threat on its own. "You're lucky you aren't dead, and so is he." Jango pointed at Manie, then Shawn. "Now open your ears and close your mouth."

Manie tightened her stare. "We're waiting."

"What I tell you now will be hard to accept, but I want you both to know what's going to happen." Jango grabbed a stack of papers off his desk that were bound by wax and string. He stared at the first page for a long time, as if the words might cut out his tongue if he dared to speak them. "Would you like to know who your mother really was?" he asked, staring at Manie.

Manie's eyes were smothered by exhausted fury. "I'm not sure I do."

"You don't. The truth is rarely pleasant, but there are times when we each must face it. Doesn't mean we have to turn and run once we find out who we are. Sometimes that hard truth can make us stronger."

Manie let out a breath, then took another in. "Okay. Just say what you have to say."

"Your mother is not of this world. She came to me a long time ago from out of the swamps. But now I'm convinced that she was sent to Talmoria on purpose. Perhaps to hide. Or perhaps to begin a war."

Something dark rose up inside Shawn. He didn't know whether it was fear, or hate.

Manie seemed lost in the explanation. "What do you mean, ‘not of this world?’"

"From another universe," Jango said. "The stars could be full of creatures we've never seen, civilizations raised and fallen, people born under different skies. Some believe a comet shed the Crystals from its tail as it passed our atmosphere, but I'm not so sure. Your mother could have been born in the same place where the Crystals first came from."

"So you think she traveled through the secret doors to get here? Like Shawn did?"

Jango looked as if he'd seen a thousand stars explode on Manie's lips. "Shawn came from behind the doors?"

"I did. That's how I came to Talmoria," Shawn said. "I found Manie's Crystal and we came back together."

"So life does exist beyond the darkness. Mikhail was telling the truth..."

"Yes, but now that the Blue Crystal has been destroyed," Shawn said, "it can't open the doors anymore. I'm stuck here."

"Don’t lose hope. There may yet be a way. Nothing is impossible."

"You know how?" Shawn asked.

"I don't," Jango said. "Mikhail's Crystal was known to be the only one that could. But if my theories about Agatha are correct, the Red Crystal might very well carry that same ability."

A sort of hope and fear rose up inside Shawn. But would he ever see the Red Crystal again? That he didn't know.

"What is it like where you come from?" Jango asked. "Are your people better? Are there less wars?"

Shawn shook his head. "We're not that different from you. We still have wars. It isn't all bad, just like in Talmoria–our technology is just better. Our magic comes from science instead of Crystals."

"But something is out there? Mikhail wasn't hallucinating when he said he saw hundreds of other worlds, all with histories of their own."

"I guess he wasn't," Shawn said.

The stars in Jango's eyes never faded, but his look soured as he remembered the point he was trying to make. "We can speak more on that another time. To answer your question Manie: yes, I believe it is possible that your mother came from behind the doors. Even more so, now. Why or how she came to be here is what I still don't understand.

"August 7, 1434," Jango read as he opened the journal pages bound by string. "By gale and black water she came–hair raven, eyes a green glaze, crying, stumbling, unable or unwilling to speak. She seems no older than eight winters, but never for a moment could I be sure of that fact. Her eyes hold such malice and memory that no veteran of wars could possibly contend. In her right hand she carries a trinket, one she would not allow me to inspect. I know not from where she comes, but I know for certain where she'll go. My home in the Sour Marshes seems as fitting a sanctuary as any. Upon learning of her previous whereabouts I shall set off at once to find the Royal Army. There they can return her to her parents, or find those who are able to fill for such a role."

Jango shook his head. "What a fool I was. I can hardly read my own words without feeling disgusted.

"October 13, 1434. The girl has finally spoken. Not with childish fears, or wants for the safety of home, but with questions. Strange questions. What planet are we on? What year is it here? She asked me my name, to which I told the truth, but she would not tell me her's. She claims to remember nothing of what she calls The Time Before, which I've concluded must refer to whatever event led the girl to become lost in these marshes in the first place. I see cunning in her eyes: ruthless intelligence. She does not belong here, on our island, but I must admit my intrigue. I need to learn how she came here, where she's from, and most importantly, why she's here. I must know at least one of these things..."

Jango turned the page. "October 20, 1434. The trinket she carries is a Crystal, one unlike any I've ever laid eyes upon. I coaxed her into letting me look at the stone earlier this day. The glass of it was red, and locked inside its center was the ominous but distinct shape of a man."

The hair on Shawn's neck became stiff and cold as steel. He remembered the sight like it had only been minutes ago: the terrible clawing figure inside the Red Crystal, fighting to escape the darkness, body a writhing mass of smoke and flame.

"The material that made this man seemed to be of sparks and smoke and flame," Jango continued, making Shawn’s stomach turn. "The mere sight of its desperate clawing to escape the inner confines unnerved me to my core. I felt a presence in my mind: a whisper, just behind the ear. I know not what power hides inside this Crystal but it must be that of evil, of that my mind is certain. Whatever force gathered this device into existence means to cause us harm, but why? This Crystal draws nothing but questions to my mind. Who made this thing? Who is the man of fire inside the stone? And why is this young girl carrying it? If this object fell into the wrong hands, it could be disastrous. I'm even forced to wonder if those hands could be my own. I must never use it. And neither can she..."

"The Red Crystal..." Manie said, as if she'd come to some unwanted conclusion.

Jango looked like he’d gotten what he wanted. "October 27, 1434. Shaleah. That is the girl's name. She remembered it today."

"Shaleah?" Manie asked, her voice as high and shrill as wind in the arctic.

With every word Jango spoke, Manie seemed to become more and more unnerved. Even Shawn was growing uncomfortable. The connection between Agatha and the Red Crystal was stronger than he’d ever known.

Jango cleared his throat before he continued. "...I cannot fathom where a name like that could come from. Not even in the mainlands have I heard such a name be uttered. Like the Crystals that uniquely fall on our island, Shaleah seems unique to us as well. Never once has she asked to leave, or return home, or even to find her parents. She refuses to allow me to bring her to the Royal Army. I haven't a clue what to do with her, other than to keep her safe. Yet still, I see untapped potential in this girl. To carry such a unique item must mean she is important. Tomorrow I'm going to give her one of the safer stones I've gathered as a replacement for her Red Crystal, which I've taken for now. I want to see how she'll respond to a power that we understand, something we can control. I think I'll start small... Maybe frost to begin with..."

Jango lowered the papers and stared at Manie.

"I saw the man of smoke and flame," Shawn said. "I saw it that night we took the Red Crystal out of Sarratania."

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"Then you understand my fears. That device was evil to its core. I'm not even sure Shaleah fully understands what she's dealing with."

"Who is this girl Shaleah?" Manie asked.

"I know I don't need to give you that answer, unless you'd rather deny reality."

The breath in Manie’s lungs seemed to escape her.

"After I took the Red Crystal, I gave it to Mikhail, who was still leading the Protectors at the time," Jango said. "Mikhail promised to hide it away, to keep the artifact safe, never to be used by anyone, never to be seen again. He locked the Crystal in a place that only he was able to access. I suppose he was right, after a fashion."

"You trusted him to do the right thing?" Manie asked.

"If there was one thing I could depend on Mikhail for, it was to keep power away from anyone who wanted to use it. Over time he learned to fear the Crystals because of what they showed him. A fear founded in foolishness. But he was not an evil man."

Manie grabbed her wrist and wilted into herself.

"I'm going to grant you and Shawn the mercy of having to hear any more of my journal entries. The day after I learned Shaleah's name, I gave her a Crystal of frost and enrolled her in a class with children her own age. In the beginning she couldn't make a flake of ice appear between her fingers. She almost gave up many times. My students would tease Shaleah, mock her, bully her. They fought Shaleah every step of the way as she tried to learn her power. But like the fool I was, I urged her on.

"One day rage consumed Shaleah, and she released the hidden power she possessed inside. An ice storm appeared above the Sour Marshes the likes of which Talmoria has never seen again, freezing and shattering trees and rocks as if they'd been born from glass. The cold was so deep and hard that you could feel it stabbing into your flesh like the point of a thousand blades. The other students couldn't protect themselves. None survived...except Shaleah..."

There was a growing terror in Manie's eyes as much as in Shawn’s. How could anyone have guessed that such a frail old woman like Agatha could have once possessed so much power?

"What happened that day should have been enough for me to send Shaleah back into those Marshes and be done with her. But she was young, and I convinced myself I had to help her, like I had some sort of damn responsibility to history to make her power grow. I thought that, in time, she could learn to control her power and become my greatest apprentice; that one day she'd try to do good for the land, like I had. I was correct about one of those things..."

Shawn heard Agatha's last words hiss inside his mind. Come with me. We'll have the power to shape worlds. Maybe she'd been trying to do the same with him.

"After the ice storm subsided, I found Shaleah unconscious in the snow, surrounded by crystalline sculptures of my own students. It was quiet. The only sound I could hear was my own breath echoing out among frozen trees. When I reached Shaleah, I had to chip away the ice just to raise her off the ground. ‘Maybe I’ve let it go too far,’ I said to myself. I thought about killing her there and then. Instead I took her into my home and kept her alive."

It frightened Shawn to hear him speak so casually about ending a child’s life.

"For months her flesh burned. I sustained her using icy water and potions, but it never seemed enough. Once she cooled, she starved. Her body devoured itself down to nothing until she was just a shell of the girl I met in the Marshes. I never thought she'd survive. But one night, nearly four months later, she woke. Shaleah opened her eyes, looked into mine, and said, You must teach me to control the Crystals." Jango sounded as if a demon had whispered the words into his ear as he spoke them.

"I was hesitant," he said. "I urged Shaleah to wait until her health could improve. Instead, she crawled out of that bed and took my hand in hers. She asked if I believed in fate. I told her I did. She told me that learning to use the Crystals was her destiny, and that it was my destiny to teach her." There was a graveyard staring back at Jango through the reflections in his eyes. "She told me we would grow more powerful than the gods had ever been, and that the world would kneel before us if we could succeed. The next morning, I began her training."

"You helped her?" Manie asked. "After she murdered your students?"

"Your mother was all I had left. Mikhail rejected his power. Even then I was an outcast in the eyes of the Protectors. If Mikhail had known then that the storm which destroyed my school was born of my own students, he likely would have executed Shaleah and I the same day. I chose to understand the Crystals instead of fear them."

Jango slapped the booklet of journal entries against his desk. "I know I was a fool for letting her live. I carry that knowledge with me every hour of every day. But I wouldn't have needed to put all my hopes for Talmoria's future in that girl if Mikhail hadn't been so ready to cast my world aside. We could have studied Shaleah together, learned from her, guided her, shared that power," Jango slapped the journal pages against his desk each time he spoke to emphasize his words, "instead I had to hide her away like she was some kind of damn fugitive."

Manie's skin grew visibly paler whenever Jango slapped his desk with the booklet. She flinched as the snaps landed. She seemed shackled to who she was, like a ghost of her mother's worst actions.

"I began with the base Crystals, the most simplistic I could find. Shaleah mastered the power of fire, frost, lightning, gravity and sound in what seemed like the blink of an eye. I'd never witnessed such quick mastery of the stones. She wanted the power more than anything she’d ever known. She was guided by a force I still don't understand. What I did understand was that I was forging a god, and she knew it, too.

"One day I gave Shaleah a Crystal of wind and her power grew again. She raised her arms over her head and brewed a storm above my mansion with little more than a whisper upon her lips."

Jango paused. The awe and fear in his eyes melted away like moisture in a desert. "Shaleah had only seen fifteen summers when she summoned that tornado. She stood beneath its eye, smiling and laughing, while it tore my manor to pieces. It was only through luck that I made it to the center before she and the rest of the Sour Marshes were entirely consumed. ‘Shaleah, stop,’ I shouted, ‘I've got you!’

“‘Help me make it grow,’ she said back. ‘I have to know how far I can reach.’”

Manie shivered as Jango recounted the events.

"After that night, I allowed Shaleah to build a secret class of Crystal users. Most were no older than she was. Shaleah led them, raised them, taught them to control the wind. She loved them as if they were her own children. They named themselves The Stormstriders, and they became my greatest students."

There was a pride in Jango's voice, as if his school had been the last true happiness he'd ever felt. Then the memory faded from his eyes, turning as dark and sour as a sea of boiling poison.

"As Shaleah grew, tales of her power spread across the island. She became an infamous and mysterious figure in the minds of those who knew of her. She was more powerful, more beautiful, more terrifying than the most devastating typhoon to ever drift upon our shores. She was awe inspiring: even to me. She was a daughter as much as a student. And my student had grown more powerful than I could ever hope to be..." Jango's eyes were stuck to the darkness at the corners of the room. He turned and broke free from the net of his memories. "Based on what you've accused me of, I assume you know the tale of Mikhail's Crystal and the founding of the first Protectors?"

"Yes," Manie said. "We know the story."

"Well, let me tell you what really happened. You know of our kings mysterious assassination and my execution. I know who really killed Mikhail, and who was really executed. It wasn't some dark assassin sent from lands unknown to stir up strife on our island, as many history books claim–it was Shaleah: my own student, my daughter. She used a power that even I dared not learn to control. Something fitting of the label Dark Magic. She entered Mikhail's mind and forced his consciousness to destroy itself from within. He was dead before he even felt the ground."

Manie followed Jango’s words as if he was telling her about the world’s ending. "I've read about Mikhail's death a thousand times, in dozens of different books, and no one has ever dared to question who killed the king," she argued.

"I'm about to do exactly that," Jango said.

"Are you trying to say that my mother killed Mikhail? Not you?"

Eyes like carved granite stared back at her. "Come, follow me," Jango said as he went to the back wall of the room. A large red drape was hung across the length of the study. Jango tore away the cloth, tugging and dragging to reveal a dark tapestry stretched across the hall.

"I can show you what happened." Jango said. He pressed a hand against the fabric and closed his eyes. As Shawn and Manie went to him, the darkness in the cloth turned to color. The tapestry exploded into light and shapes as a great field of rock and mud became revealed. Two armies swarmed and crashed together like an exploding ocean of waves bursting against themselves. The picture was as alive as liquid. "It's moving," Shawn said, almost unable to believe it.

The tapestry changed as the battle raged on, colors swelling and shifting like a living world had been painted onto its cloth. A sea of sparks, flame and lightning danced across the fabric, ripping apart terrain and turning fighters to corpses. Over their heads was a different kind of sea, one of planets, stars and clouds of sapphire gas, and a rain of Crystals descending in flame like meteors from out of the black, exploding as they hit the ground. Beneath this mysterious world two peoples were going to war, using powers they'd gained from the Crystals to change the tide.

A great breath of flame burst down among the Protectors, so bright it made Shawn raise a hand to shield his face. He could feel a real fire inside the cloth. The fighters writhed in the inferno, death-screams echoing across Jango's study like a canyon of melting dead. Sweat bled from Shawn's hands. The sight of Duncan's army disappearing beneath Goroth's flame flashed in his mind like a red-hot razor slashing through his thoughts.

A return strike came from the Protectors in the form of a blinding blue light that turned the battlefield into a sapphire sea. All those caught in the beam were turned to black stone. Then, out of the stone graveyard came a charge of survivors in silver armor, rushing through the remains of their brothers and sisters and into the field of waiting mages, hacking away at Crystal Keepers with swords and spears and axes. A storm of blood raised around them while a kingdom of thundering clouds coiled above.

A woman descended from lightning and black mist like a shadow of death. Cloudy breath shot across the fighters like a poisonous cloud. It was Agatha. It was the same woman Shawn saw in the tornado that night in Milly’s forest, after her age melted away like dust being blown from glass. It was the woman who killed his father, his grandfather. The one who tried to kill him.

Agatha screamed a breath of ice down across the fighters, mud exploding with snow and frost. As the cold swept through them, every piece of flesh it touched became hard as rock, changing hundreds of men and women to icy sculptures in an instant. When the breath of cold subsided, a rain of lightning came down in the blizzard's wake, pounding the landscape into a sea of sparks and flame, shattering the frozen army into thousands of thousands of pieces. Tornados followed, ripping apart the terrain, throwing soldiers and Crystal Keepers like shards of glass across the battlefield, crushing them together and impaling them on torn wood and loose steel.

Fire and lightning exploded across Talmoria. Meteors roared down from the sky, landing like missiles among fighters, erupting into mushrooms of burning death, turning the battle into ripples on a lake of flame. Another inferno came down from red clouds and charged across the plains. The heat was so intense that a crowd of spearmen turned to ash the instant it met them. Thousands were dying, and hundreds-of-thousands more were waiting at the battle’s edge for their chance to rush in.

"The War of Light and Dark Magic," Jango said, his voice roughened by the death and destruction he saw. "A war that was fought for the Crystals. Thousands died for nothing; for one man's decision, for one girl's mistake."

Jango moved to the other side of the room, sliding his hand along the tapestry as he went. Every step he took sent the image farther back in time. The armies receded beyond the flames; the first fiery meteor went from explosion to rock, then soared back into the stars; the tides of battle formed and washed away.

Shawn and Manie followed Jango. The colors transformed into a crowd of ten-thousand watchers gathered in a concert before their king. Mikhail stood on the stage above, silver armor gleaming, as he looked out across a mountainous bowl filled with tall buildings and stone streets, the city dressed in gold and crystal metals. The world in the tapestry grew as the viewpoint swept down amongst the crowd, looking up at Mikhail beside a figure cloaked in black.

"We must stop this plague before it grows strong enough to consume us," Mikhail declared. "The use of Crystals and the magics they bring are hereby outlawed by Talmorian law, from this moment onwards until our island sinks into the sea."

A gasp shuttered over the audience. It seemed a dark line had been crossed. Whispers spread across hundreds of lips.

Mikhail’s eyes grew wide with worry. "I've made this decision to protect Talmoria. To protect our future. There is too much about the Crystals we do not yet understand. We can't take the risk of what might happen if that power weaves itself through our society. You must trust me when I say this power is too dangerous for any of us to control."

"You'll never stop me from finding the truth," a woman screamed from inside the black cloak. A hand shot towards Mikhail and immediately the king recoiled, bending over himself like a broken branch. There was a struggle amongst the Protectors as they huddled to Mikhail's side. The king was fighting a fierce battle behind his eyes. Someone was attacking his mind. He let out a cry of anguish, then sprang up and shouted, "You're a fool if you think you can prevent what's coming!"

Mikhail's eyes turned dark and hollow. He fell, but the Protectors caught him before he hit the floor, laying their king down upon the stage. The crowd stirred before the stage. Confusion turned to madness as it became clear that the king was dead. The figure in the black cloak fled. Something among the spectators changed, and soon a voice gave rise to a name, "Jango," and it wasn't long before the fury took hold. "The mage betrayed the King at Sarratania! Jango must have killed him! Jango killed the king!"

It was almost too wild to believe. The name crossed lips like flame spreading on parched wheat. Not much time passed before the crowd was roaring the name Jango, roaring for vengeance as the Protectors hauled Mikhail's corpse away.

"Shaleah killed the king because he wanted to stop people from using the Crystals?" Shawn asked.

"Yes," Jango said. "Little proof exists, but Shaleah came to me after. She wanted to tell me before anyone, as if it was a victory we could both share in. But Mikhail had been my friend. It was hard for me to find any joy in what she'd done..."

"How did you survive?" Shawn asked.

"I hid," Jango admitted, the pride drained from his eyes. "When Shaleah told me how the crowd was chanting my name in the streets, I knew the Protectors would come for me. I was the most famous of all the Crystal wielders on the island, the one who defied the king at the battle for Sarratania, who defeated Goroth by a rain of molten sunlight; the teacher who lead a school of tortured children, bleeding and whipping terrible power into their bodies like a demon of sorcery."

The tapestry changed again, the cloth shifting into an angry mob of spectators soaking in sheets of rain, torches and spears stabbing the night. A man was brought onto the stage, his clothes bloody, his face hooded. A Protector ripped the hood away and revealed a face, a face that looked exactly like Jango's.

"How do you plead?" a Protector asked.

"I'm not Jango," the man cried, as rain and blood dripped from the edges of his face. "They tricked me! They've tricked us all! Jango and that demon girl he keeps at his side want to take over the world!"

A fist slammed into the man's gut, turning his speech to retching coughs. The Protectors dragged him towards the gallows and a rope was wound around his neck. Before he could draw a final breath the lever was yanked and the floor dropped out to a horrifying crunch. Only a moment passed before the crowd erupted into a maelstrom of beastly cheers and furious cries. It was a mass of madness. Shawn's body tingled with chills. He'd come close to finding the same end that night with Duncan.

"The only solution Shaleah and I could imagine was to send an imposter to stand in my place,” Jango said. “We were in Denengear when it happened. Shaleah found an orphan on the streets who looked enough like me to pass off. Even still we made him drink an elixir that changed his face. His cheekbones became higher and more pronounced, his lips sunk in, his face became more bold, he looked older.

"Shaleah delivered the boy to the Protectors that night using a magic disguise of her own. We told the boy that no matter what happened, Shaleah and I would protect him. But it didn't turn out that way. He was hung before a crowd of thousands, his identity mistaken for mine."

Jango pulled his arm and the tapestry faded, darkness washing down the cloth to the end of the hall, erasing Talmoria's history as it went.

"You sacrificed an innocent to save yourself?" Manie asked.

"I did. Allowing the Protectors to kill me for a crime I did not commit would have changed nothing. There was no investigation, no trial, just an angry mob and a noose. I gave them what they wanted."

"That doesn't make it right," Manie said.

"Very few things in this terrible existence are right," Jango replied. "You simply do what you must to see the sun rise."

"It doesn't have to be that way," Shawn said. "We can be better than people like them. We don't have to let evil define what the world is." Manie squeezed Shawn's hand.

"Better? They had the numbers, can you not see? Right and wrong mean nothing when ten-thousand people are furiously shouting your name."

Maybe he’s right, Shawn wondered. Things are rarely that simple.

"How could that have gone unnoticed for so long? Didn’t anyone ever look at the corpse?" Manie asked.

"They were preoccupied," Jango replied.

"With what?"

"Within a few months of that night, half of Talmoria had been washed away in a tide of war. By the time the books were written, most who were there that day were dead, insane, or disappeared into time. An entire generation lost."

"What happened after the Protectors executed your double?" Manie asked.

"Your mother began her next plan. She gathered The Storm Striders and the rest of my students and rallied them together under a cry of vengeance in my name. She knew what would happen if they thought the Protectors killed me. I often wonder if she'd been planning it all along. I was forced to hide underground while my school was transformed into a training ground, with Shaleah as their leader. But the war truly began when she led an assault against a town called Rotherton. She believed the Protectors there were planning to attack my school, so Shaleah struck first."

Jango pressed his hand against the tapestry. The darkness changed to red fire, swarming together to form the shape of a city on a wide coast, high buildings lit from below by a rising tide of flame, and from above, by a pale blue moon rising over the sea. The sounds of explosions and shattering brick rocked the night as a crowd fleed the front gates. Tall buildings crumbled, falling to rubble and rising flame as they collapsed, sparks dancing to the tune of death and shouts of rage.

"Her assault claimed the lives of a thousand innocent people, as well as hundreds of Protectors. After that night, the Protectors across Talmoria found no difficulty in uniting to stop Shaleah. The Royal Army acted as their backbone."

Manie’s eyes became a flame in frozen wind, like she was staring across a sea of icy corpses.

"They fought this battle for years. Shaleah's war turned Talmoria into a sea of elemental destruction that made the Gray Death look like a mild fever in comparison. Hundreds of thousands died, and never once did Shaleah think of ending the bloodshed. Especially not once her side began to win." Jango removed his hand from the tapestry. The image went dark.

The frost in Manie's eyes changed to uncertainty, like she was looking at herself from a place far beyond her eyes.

"As the War of Light and Dark Magic grinded to its end, Shaleah fought on," Jango continued. "The leaders of the Protectors arranged peace talks with the Storm

Striders when it became clear that Shaleah's army would soon wipe them out. The leaders agreed to a permanent and unending truce, one that brought an end to the fighting. They agreed to divide off a sliver of land in the North for the Protectors and mages to have as their own. They erected statues along this new border: the Beacon's of Black Fire. Cloaked old men stood as a magic wall to prevent our power from spreading north, to the Protectors' eden born of Mikhail's decree."

"The Beacons never worked. We found ways underneath them," Manie said.

"It was never a perfect solution," Jango said. "There never is in war. I remember a time when those who could control the Crystal's passed freely to all edges of the island. That was the sacrifice Shaleah's army agreed upon that day. But Shaleah didn’t want peace. She had no intention to forgive the people who tried to steal her power. She wanted to wipe them all out.

"Following the decision to erect the Beacons, Shaleah hunted down the leaders of her own army–the Storm Striders–wherever they were across Talmoria, and slaughtered them one by one until none were left alive. The Protectors united with mages once again, but this time it was Shaleah's own army who they drew their swords beside, and together they launched a search that spread to all borders of the island.

"Everyone knew her face. There was nowhere Shaleah could hide, nowhere she could run. No place except for one. In the midst of this search, Shaleah came to me, except this time she needed my help. She said she needed to disappear into time."

"Into time?" Shawn asked. "What is that supposed to mean?"

"Hiding wouldn't be enough. Shaleah needed to fade into history like a myth, a legend, a nightmare–like someone who never existed at all. So that's what we did. I concocted a formula that would cause her body to fall into a thoughtless and dreamless sleep, one she would never wake from, if she chose. She planned to seal herself away and use the energy from the Crystals to sustain her life. However, she needed someone to wake her. That was when the full depth of Shaleah's plans became unveiled. The night we sent the orphan boy to hang in my place, we created an elixir to change his face. In order to create that elixer we needed blood–my blood."

"Why is that important?" Manie asked.

"Shaleah must have kept some of that blood. She used it to tie my life to a particular Crystal. A Crystal that created a cage around the Sour Marshes. A cage I've still not found a way to escape."

"How did she tie your life to a Crystal?" Shawn asked. "I thought the Crystals are just things we can use–like a sword, or a bow."

"No, the Crystals are more than mere weapons. When our bodies become linked to a stone for the first time, they change something inside us. The Crystals create a bond with our life force that can never be broken. In the deepest layers of our biology we each contain a microscopic structure that carries all the information needed to make us what we are. The Crystals alter that structure. They change us into something more."

"That sounds like you're talking about DNA," Shawn said.

"Is that what your people beyond the doors named the information structure?"

"Yes," Shawn said. "In my world, rich people alter their children's DNA to make them smarter."

Jango’s eyebrows came together. "Well, the Crystals alter our DNA to make us more receptive to their power. And once that link begins your body will require that power for as long as you want to live. What was done to me is worse. Shaleah activated a Crystal using my blood. When that happens, the Crystal intertwines itself into our DNA and makes a link that can never be reversed. The method makes you more capable with magic, your senses become sharpened, you never age–but it all comes at a cost. If a Crystal like that is destroyed, it doesn't matter how many others your body is feeding from, nothing can prevent the death that follows. The removal of such potent abilities is too great a shock on our bodies.”

Shawn looked at his hands, studying the scar in the center of his palm.

“To conclude, Shaleah carries my life in that stone,” Jango said. “I will never escape that truth. There is no way to reverse a bond of blood."

"You've been trapped in the Sour Marshes ever since my mother killed Mikhail?" Manie asked. "Why would she do that?"

"She wanted to keep me hidden so her army would believe I'd been killed by the Protectors, otherwise they'd have never followed her off to war."

"So she locked you in a prison?" Manie asked, her voice dimming like a low candle. "How can she be so cruel?"

"Shaleah has always been cruel. She’s never cared about anything except power. She didn't regret killing those children from my school, nor the tens of thousands that perished on the battlefield because of her mistake. Nor what she did to me, the closest thing she ever had to a father. Shaleah cares about one thing, and one thing alone: finding who she is. Nothing and no one can stand in the way of that."

"Maybe if she'd open her eyes she'd find the answer," Manie said. "She tried to kill me twice, and I'm her own daughter."

"Shaleah can only see tomorrow. The present doesn't exist for her anymore, if it ever did," Jango said.

“So did she succeed? Did the ban on Crystals get lifted?”

“No. The opposite came true: she imprinted the danger the Crystals posed into people’s minds like a searing brand. Her war proved that Mikhail was right. The Crystals were too dangerous for people to use.”

“Is he right, though?” Manie asked. “Are the Crystals really too dangerous?”

Jango froze on the question, letting his eyes sweep across the stones lying across his desk. “They are… But we’ve come to a point where it may be more dangerous not to use them.”

"Why didn't I die when Mikhail's Crystal was destroyed?" Shawn asked. "It was the only Crystal I've ever used."

Jango turned to Shawn. "You've never bonded with another Crystal?"

"No, Mikhail's Crystal is the only one," Shawn said. "Manie took the Red Crystal out of Sarratania, so it never linked with me."

Jango searched Manie's eyes. He reached out, grabbing a lock of her red hair, rubbing it between his fingers. "What of your hair? And your eyes? Why do they share the Red Crystal's color?"

"It happened when I found it," Manie said.

"It changed your hair and eye color?" Jango asked.

"Yes, it was painful. Not like other Crystals," Manie replied. "I thought it was going to kill me."

"It isn't entirely surprising, you being Shaleah's daughter. But I wonder why it never did the same to her? What type of power did this Crystal grant you?"

"I can draw fire. I could never do that."

"Nothing else?" Jango asked.

"No, those are the only things I've noticed."

"That's strange... Fire Crystal's aren't rare." Jango cradled his chin against his fist. "Perhaps there is more than we can yet understand." He put his attention back on Shawn. "How did you destroy Mikhail's Crystal?"

"I channeled my power through the Crystal and it erupted into a blue beam. It burned the stone down to nothing, like it was being used as fuel. Before she died, Milly kept telling me that if I focused my power I could use the Blue Crystal like a weapon. She said Mikhail could have done the same to save those people at Sarratania, but he didn't because he was afraid to lose his power. But I couldn't watch Manie die." Shawn looked at Manie, a flame rising in his heart.

"Who were you saving Manie from?" Jango asked.

"Duncan and Goroth. They were going to burn down the last forest."

"Goroth, no," Jango said. "That can't be so. I destroyed that creature myself."

"Milly recognized him," Manie said. "She was there when Mikhail refused to go inside the city."

"Are you suggesting Goroth was resurrected?" Jango asked.

Shawn turned to Manie, afraid of the answer.

"I guess we are," Manie said.

"If King Dukemot has the means to resurrect a creature as impressive as Goroth, then why hasn't he used the same ability to reverse the effects of the Gray Death?" Jango asked.

Manie’s eyes became dark. "It doesn't mean my father has the ability to raise the dead. It could have been Duncan who brought Goroth back to life… Or maybe Milly was wrong, maybe it wasn't Goroth."

"I wonder," Jango said. "Shawn, when you used Mikhail's Crystal to destroy that Renjin, it should have killed you. Each and every Crystal on this island can be used as a weapon. The problem is that doing so consumes your Crystal down to nothing, and if it’s the only Crystal your body has ever bonded with, it means death."

"Maybe no one really knows how the Crystals work," Shawn said. "Mikhail's Crystal brought Manie back to life when I fell from the cliff where she died.”

"It's possible... I have no idea why the Crystal was able to bring her back from death, or why it didn't kill you when it was destroyed. To my mind that means there's something special about both you and the Crystals."

Shawn showed Jango the scar on his palm. "Could it have something to do with this? This is how I activated my link with the Crystal."

Jango squinted. "That's a sight I haven't seen in many years. Who did this to you?"

"I did," Manie said. "My mother was trying to activate Shawn’s powers. I was afraid she was trying to trick him into becoming her slave, so I used the method you wrote about in your books. I knew it would limit his powers. My plan worked."

"That was clever of you," Jango said. "Had you not done that, Shawn likely would be with Shaleah now, wherever she is, drunk on power and wanting more."

Shawn agreed, but he’d never liked the fact that he'd escaped being twisted by one person only to be lied to by another, even if it had been done to protect him.

"Your mother carries the Red Crystal," Jango said to Manie. "And you've bonded with that Crystal."

"Yes," Manie said, a disaster to admit.

"Then my life is not the only one she carries in her stones. She has that same power over you."

"No, she doesn't," Manie said. "I have another. A Purple Crystal of lightning. I lost it when I was still locked in my tower. It's somewhere back in Denengear."

"That is certainly good news. But I'd advise you to do whatever you can to find that stone before someone finds it for you."

"I don't know if that's possible," Manie said. “I’d have to go home. But I’ll try.”

“Good.” Jango let his eyes dip to the floor. "Now I'd like to ask you both a question: what do we do?" Jango's voice carried the doom of uncertainty.

"What are you talking about," Manie asked, confused.

"The most evil object in existence is back in the hands of your mother. So I ask again: what do we do?"

"What are you trying to say? That she's going to come back?"

"That's exactly what I'm trying to say. Shaleah manipulated you and Shawn in order to reclaim her precious weapon. Now she has it. What is she going to use it for?"

"To get more power," Shawn decided. "That's all she's ever wanted."

"Exactly right," Jango agreed, sounding justified. "And who has more power than an island full of Crystals and the people chosen by blood to wield them? I need your help. It's not hard to imagine what Shaleah’s planning. We must rekindle the era of Crystal Keepers. Put a Crystal in the hand of every able-bodied man, woman, and child in Talmoria and teach them how to fight. It's the only chance we have."

Manie was looking at Shawn, but he couldn't take his eyes away from Jango's. Something was coming. He didn't know what, but it was the same feeling he'd gotten that day he found the Blue Crystal at the mineshaft in Wisconsin, like he was about to be swept away into something he couldn't possibly be prepared for.

"That won't work," Manie said, shaking her head. "Our island has been torn apart by war and disease. If we try that now we'll likely turn people against each other as much as my mother."

Jango took a breath. His stare hardened like he was about to give a speech to ten-thousand battle-ready men. "Talmoria must prepare. We can't wait until fire starts raining from the clouds to decide what to do. The destruction of everything we've ever known–all our history, our homes, our land, gone–that is what we risk if Shaleah comes back wielding the power inside that Red Crystal. There will be nothing and no one that can stop her."

"With the Gray Death running loose how can we arm anyone? The disease kills thousands everyday," Manie said. "Shawn and I have been to Market-Town. We’ve seen bodies piled high enough to fill a town square: all burning. No one can decide if my father is the one who released the Gray Death or if he’s the one who wants to save them. None of them even know my mother's name. And the people who are sick are roaming the countryside freely, spreading disease and madness to other Talmorians. How are we supposed to overcome that?"

Jango turned his eyes. He looked as if she'd asked him a question he didn't have an answer for. "You're with the Protectors?" he asked.

"Yes," Manie replied.

"Good. Then the first step belongs to you. You must convince your leader to seek out new members and begin to grow your army.”

"Jarod's already doing that. More people show up at the Valley of Caves every day."

Jango nodded. "Good. The more we gather on our side the stronger we become. We must build the most powerful army Talmoria has ever seen if we are to stand a chance in the wars ahead. We need a banner to unite people under. Why not the Protectors? False as they may have once been, the code they lived by was good."

"Building an army isn't going to unite the island," Manie said.

"Not on its own, but we can train them with Crystals. Swords and spears will be no use against a storm of flames and lightning."

"Who will be in charge of this army?" Shawn asked.

Jango raised his brow. "Well it certainly won't be me. I suppose for now you'll be in charge of yourselves, until a king can rise that the people want to stand behind."

"Crystals have been outlawed for a thousand years," Manie said. "How are we going to convince people to use them?"

Jango grinned as if he'd found a way to reverse the planet's rotation in his mind. "Your mother said it best herself: tell them they'll be immune."

"Immune?" Shawn asked. "Like to the Gray Death?"

"Yes, it was Shaleah's own plan–release a simple disease and offer a cure in the form of magic Crystals. No one who can control a Crystal will ever get sick. She thought it would be a way to reverse the ban Mikhail enacted nearly a thousand years ago."

“When did that become her plan?” Manie asked. “I thought the last time you spoke to her was when she trapped you in the Sour Marshes?"

Jango let out an agonizing breath, as if he'd rather that remain forgotten. "No, that wasn’t the last time I spoke to her. I sent your mother away the night she told me what she’d done. I couldn't help her wake from her long sleep, so she didn't need anything more than the sleep potion. Shaleah sealed herself in a cave and cast herself adrift in time. She left clues in journals hoping that someday someone might discover who she was. And someone did find her. Nearly a thousand years later, your father unsealed that cave and brought Shaleah back to life, and just as I became your mother's weapon, she became his: a forgotten enemy strong enough to bring Talmoria to its knees. That's how Dukemot became king, through your mother's power."

"My father never loved her?" Manie asked, sounding like she was about to faint. "It was only about the crown? He told me he rescued my mother from a ship that ran aground off Talmoria's coast?"

"A sinking ship? No... I'm afraid that isn't true. I can't say for certain whether your father loved Shaleah. I never knew Dukemot. It's possible that he fell in love. But it didn't begin that way. He'd have never known Shaleah existed at all if he hadn't learned the secret of who she was and what she'd done."

Manie looked as if all the air had been sucked out of her body. Her existence was merely a thing of vanity, created to appease a kingdom built on blood–not a child born of love.

"When your mother returned to me as queen, nearly one thousand years later, I almost didn't recognize her," Jango said. "She looked as young as you do. That's when she told me about our future of Crystals, reborn. Mikhail never was able to smother that hope from her heart like he'd been able to do in mine. She said she needed a disease, one that would make the whole island fall ill."

Manie looked as if she'd been slapped. Her cheeks grew red and her demeanor changed, becoming more threatening. "Don’t say it."

"I have to," Jango admitted, strangled by the words. "I helped your mother create the Gray Death."

Manie looked like she was about to spring on Jango and murder him. "You did this? You’re the one who created this disaster?"

Jango's expression twisted into misery. "I find myself unable to deny it, though the accusation isn't wholly true. What I made for Shaleah was as harmless as the common fever. She took it back to Denengear and tweaked it, to make my disease more deadly. What I created had the ability to spread to anyone it came near. What she created had the ability to kill anyone it came near."

“How could you do that?” Manie demanded, the words crashing out of her lips like a tsunami. “Do you know how many people I love and care about have died because of you? How can I ever trust you? You’re as bad as my mother.”

"She lied to me," Jango said, looking stabbed. "You don’t have to trust me, you just have to believe me when I say that when your mother returns, it's not going to be in the interests of anyone living on Talmoria. We must put our pasts aside and work together to find a future. That’s the only choice we have left."

A tingle climbed Shawn’s arms. It would be sweet revenge to outsmart Shaleah, after what she’d done to his father and grandfather. But the path to that victory would be padded with corpses.

"I guess we know where to start, then," Manie said. "We have to cure the Gray Death."

"Cure it?" Jango asked, as if she'd spat on his hand.

Shawn was almost as stunned as Jango. Not even Milly had known the cure. But she was right. After seeing Market-Town up close, he knew they had to do something. "Building an army of Crystal users isn't a solution to all of our problems,” Shawn said. “What about children? And old people? And people who are sick or disabled? They can’t fight, and we can't just let them die of Gray Death."

"I suppose that’s true," Jango said. “But if we do that, we'll have no way to convince people to adopt the Crystals. And then we’ll be left defenseless if Shaleah returns.”

“There’s no reason we can’t do both,” Shawn said. “Me and Manie can focus on a cure while you and the Protectors build up our army.”

“But where are we going to find that many Crystals? I've only ever seen a handful in my entire life," Manie said.

"I have many here, but an even larger store lies hidden beneath Denengear, locked away by Mikhail himself. Shawn should be able to unlock the seal like he did at Sarratania if we need to use them. But going down that path would require convincing your father to help us, which I doubt very much he'll agree to do, especially when an army of Protectors begin pounding on his gates."

"We don't have time to focus on my father," Manie said, her eyes wide with panic. "Don't you understand? Every hour that passes, people are dying! The Gray Death can't be reasoned with, can't be prepared for, we can't stab it with a sword or burn it with magic. It's a breath that's going to sweep across all Talmoria if we can't find a way to stop it. There won't be anyone left to build an army with."

Now Jango was the one who looked like he'd been slapped.

"We don't have time for theories or guesses," Manie continued. "My mother is a monster. She possesses great power because I gave her the Red Crystal. She's someone we should fear. But we have no idea what she's doing out there. She left Shawn and I at the Battle for the Beacons to fend for ourselves. She may never come back. But right now we do have a clear danger to face, one we do understand: the Gray Death. And it isn't going to wait for my mother's return to continue exterminating the entire island."

Jango bent his face from cheek to cheek. "You might be right."

“I know I am,” Manie said. “Now focus, Jango! How do we find a cure?”

Jango let a deep breath escape through his nose. “Come. I’ll show you what I know.”