“Go on,” the duke whispered. “Call your lava spirit. It won’t do you any good. Your head will be off your shoulders before the words leave you.”
Eli swallowed, and the duke’s boot pressed harder on his chest, crushing the breath out of him.
“I’ve won, Monpress,” the duke said, raising his ax in a shining arc. “I always win.”
Eli couldn’t even think of an answer for that. He could only watch as the ax whistled through the air, flying straight for the exposed area between his collarbone and his neck.
A moment before it struck, something strange happened. The blow, which had been straight and true, turned sideways, landing not in Eli’s flesh, but deep in the wooden doorstep beside him. For a moment, both Eli and the duke just stared at the blade. Then Edward ripped it free with a roar of rage and raised the ax again, using both hands this time, the fire from his flame-wreathed fingers scorching the ax’s wooden handle. But as he swung again, Eli saw the ax blade flip in the duke’s hands. It flipped on its own, and Eli heard a small, terrified voice cry out in defiance, “Death to tyrants!”
With that cry, the metal head of the ax let go of its shaft. It flew into the house behind Eli, burying itself in the burning door. Edward, robbed of the ax’s weight, stumbled into his swing. He was still staring at the bladeless hilt in disbelief when another extraordinary thing happened. The wooden shop sign, its painted surface blistered and illegible from the fire’s heat, let go of its hinges. Nothing had broken, for the nails were still there, still strong. The wood simply had stopped holding on to them. The sign fell with a fearsome cry of vengeance and struck the duke square in the back.
“Go!” the sign shouted, bearing down on the duke with all its weight.
Eli went. He shot up, kicking the duke out of the way and running past him. But the duke was not done. With tremendous strength, he threw the sign off and made a grab for Eli as he passed, catching the thief’s leg and sending them both sprawling on the wet cobbles. Eli kicked, but Edward was too fast. He surged forward, his hands going for Eli’s neck, but just before he reached the thief, the ground beneath them began to rumble. At the corner of the square, the iron treasury door launched off its supports with a great, ringing cry. It rolled like a wheel, bouncing over the cobblestones that swiveled to guide it.
“For the cause!” it cried, its iron voice filled with decades of bottled anger. “Death to tyrants!”
The duke had just enough time to look up, his face pale and disbelieving, as the door flipped itself around and, with a final wordless cry of vengeance, fell flat-side down on top of him.
With a great, iron crash, the enslavement over Gaol vanished. The duke’s control winked out like a snuffed candle, and all at once spirits were everywhere, piling themselves on top of the door, which was ringing like a gong in triumph. Unfortunately, in their exuberance, they weren’t watching for Eli, who was still lying on his back where the duke had tripped him, staring in amazement. When the second hail of roofing tiles nearly took his leg off, he realized he’d better get out.
He rolled over with a groan, moving stiff and slow where the running and the falls had battered his poor bruises, looking for somewhere safe to lie. But everywhere he looked, spirits were rushing forward, trampling him under a wave of pent-up rage. Eli beat them back as best he could, but it was like fighting the tide, and he realized that he was going to be crushed to death under a riot of celebrating barrels, cobblestones, and roofing tile.
He had just enough time to appreciate the inglorious and ironic nature of such an end when a pair of strong arms burst through the jabbering spirits and grabbed him by the shoulders, hauling him up and out in a single motion.
“You all right?” said a blessedly familiar gruff voice, and Eli nearly burst into tears. He’d never been so happy to hear Josef in his life.
“Better than the other guy,” he said, but the words turned into a choking cough. Even with the rain, the square was still black with smoke.
“He’s fine,” Josef said, slapping him on the back.
Somewhere behind them, Eli heard Giuseppe Monpress’s familiar sigh. “Glad I found you, then. If he’d died here, he’d have been too burned to turn in for the bounty.”
“Thanks for the sympathy,” Eli coughed out, slapping his chest to get his lungs clear. He was just thinking about maybe trying to stand on his own when he felt the courtyard rumble and looked up to see Karon coming.
“I’ve kept the fires confined as best I could,” the lava spirit rumbled. “But I think it’s time for me to go. The river seems to be taking matters into its own hands.”