She was cut off as she had to move again.
More blades appeared. They were indiscriminate. The Dragon was speared four times, lifted clear off the ground, but not divided.
He wasn’t going that far, at least.
The others were left to scramble, running.
Faysal was contained within a cluster of blades, shielded from our interference.
“This is not your ideology, this is not how you fight!” Rose screamed the words.
Another blade, one Rose wasn’t prepared to avoid.
Even if she’d taken my humanity to patch up her human shape here and there, she was still hurt, still slower.
I extended more of myself, one wing’s worth of material to block the blade. It was dashed to pieces. The Hyena was part of it, and clattered to the ground.
Rose pushed herself forward, staggering at first, then running. For the throne.
We had his weak points. Rose was calling him on them. Driving them home.
We just needed a final blow.
“You don’t have his face, you don’t have his voice!” She repeated herself. “You are not Johannes! Johannes would not bind his familiar like this! He would not corrupt his demesne! Johannes would use the flute, not the shears! On all three counts-”
Another near miss. I moved to shield Rose, but she avoided it herself.
“You are not Johannes!”
Abruptly, I was caught. Rose jerked in place, arm trapped.
We were bound.
Rose turned.
At three points around the rooftop were lawyers. Ms. Lewis stood on top of the impaled dragon.
“And you are not going to save the world,” Ms. Lewis said. She held a loop of platinum.
“This is a farce,” Rose called out. Continuing to challenge all of this. “You’ve lost.”
“Maybe the Barber won’t get his claim,” Ms. Lewis said. “But we haven’t lost. We have the Thorburn diabolist, and we can subject her to a fitting punishment for breaking the compact.”
Rose bowed her head.
I felt her clench her hand.
Not a fist. A pulse. A heartbeat.
A warning, much as I’d asked her to give Green Eyes.
Ah. The loop of platinum.
Not to bind her, but to bind me.
I let her go.
Rose stumbled forward the last ten feet.
A blade erupted between her and the throne.
She twisted, kicking the flat of it.
Discredited. Even the demesne doesn’t believe in Johannes anymore.
The blade broke as if it were made of glass. Rose stumbled, staggered, and half-spun in the air as she practically fell in the seat.
The impact seemed to reverberate. Her intact left hand, partially that of Conquest, two fingers a near ivory white, gripped the armrest.
There was a heartbeat’s pause.
Not a victory unto itself.
One step.
Her eyes turned to the remaining others. “Help!”
She’d taken the hill, in a manner of speaking. But taking the hill didn’t mean anything if we couldn’t keep it long enough to matter.
16.12
“Buy me time!” Rose called out.
Easier said than done.
The others were okay, though battered, bruised, and at least one bad injury. They were standing closer to where the dragon had been impaled, and many of the blades were in their way, forcing them to very slowly extricate themselves, out of fear of dying to a simple slip or fall.
In short, it was Mags, Paige, and Peter on one side. Buttsack, the Welder and the Nurse were there as well, though the goblin had been gouged by the blade, the Nurse injured in the prior encounter with the dragon.
Ms. Lewis, the possessed lawyer with two deep wounds in his chest, and the chauffeur that had taken us to Toronto, and the Barber, on the other side. The Barber was only a short distance from the throne. Closer than anyone else.
The Barber surveyed the situation, taking it all in, while the others fought to get closer to Rose, one eye on Ms. Lewis, who loomed above them, perched on the fallen Dragon.
He started toward Rose.
Rose brought a hand to her mouth, and whistled.
“Sic ’em!” she hollered.
Bristles leaped from the wall above, a solid twenty-foot drop, slamming into the demon. The Barber stepped back for balance, it was able to stay standing by leg strength alone. The hound’s exterior was heavy with the arrows, makeshift spears, knife handles, darts, a spade, and any number of other tools, making it something of a mess, and each of these weapons proved an obstacle or additional hazard as it clawed at the Barber’s chest and arm, fighting for leverage.
The Barber struck it, only to cut his arm on a knife that stuck from the bogeyman’s shoulder. He pulled back, grabbing Bristles with an apparent intent to fling the beast off the side of the building, only for Bristles to twist around, mouth opening. In the doing, it revealed that two of the weapons had once pierced its skull, replacing teeth with a blade and what might have been a screwdriver. It seized the Barber’s wrist in its jaws, teeth and tools cutting deep. The attempt to fling it away failed.
The other practitioners were acting. The chauffeur was speaking, his low tones carrying. The possessed practitioner was approaching, one hand to his chest.