It was Ozuma. He was brandishing his longsword, cutting down people in his way, charging toward Yorda.
“Ozuma!”
Ozuma swung his sword in all directions, driving back the possessed throng around him, shouting out to Yorda. “The book, Princess! The book!”
Buoyed by his voice, Yorda once again lifted the book in her hands. When she raised it over her head, the crowd on the bridge shrank back, some fleeing altogether. Ozuma pushed them aside, making a path to the front. When he was finally free of them, he ran up and took Yorda’s arm. “Now!”
Grabbing Yorda, he pushed her toward the edge of the bridge.
“What are you doing?”
“We have to run!”
Run? Run where? The Tower of Winds was a dead end. If they ran inside the tower, they would only be trapped.
She hesitated and the crowd regained their fury, advancing, a dark light in their eyes.
“Come with me!” Ozuma shouted. Not waiting for an answer, he picked Yorda up lightly in one arm. He returned his sword to its scabbard, tossed his helmet aside, and ripped off his chain-mail vest to lighten his load. Holding Yorda in both arms now, he leapt from the top of the bridge. Yorda pressed her eyes shut a moment before they touched the foaming waves. Icy water wrapped around her, but her heart was filled with a song both triumphant and sorrowful. The book is safe.
With the Book of Light still clutched in her hands, she slipped into unconsciousness.
How much time had passed since then?
Yorda looked up at the boy staring into her eyes, clasping her hands tightly. I know you, she thought.
And he knew her as well. The memories of the castle-how it had become enveloped in mist until the mist became its name, and fear and awe its reputation-she had shared these with him, through his hand in her own.
That was why doubt now clouded the boy’s eyes. That was how he knew she was the queen’s daughter, the only one who could hope to defeat her.
He knew she had left the castle, bearing the Book of Light, and so escaped the queen’s dark grasp. He knew that when she and Ozuma had plunged into the sea, the waves acted as a veil, blinding the queen to their whereabouts until the currents carried them safely ashore.
But why did you come back? the boy wondered. Why were you imprisoned here? The steel cage that held you in the top of the tower was the cage that once held your father. The cage you fought so hard to free him from. Yet it was you I found lying in that cage. Without hope, sadness your only companion.
And the gallant knight Ozuma was turned to stone by the edge of the old bridge, as lonely as you. Why does he stand there, the knight from a foreign land come to save you, now stripped of his life and the sword he wielded for you? With the passing months the weather wears away at him. He is mindless and cold.
So too do the shadows-that-walk-alone fill the castle once more. The pools from which they spawn form freely on the stones, trying to take you back into their embrace.
What happened after you escaped the castle? the boy wondered. Why, though you held the book, could you not defeat the queen? What terrible misstep did you make that sealed your fate?
Though Yorda could now understand the boy’s tongue, he could not understand her. Still she whispered in her heart:
In the end, I could not defeat my mother.
It had all been in vain. In the end, the child of the Dark God was still master of the Castle in the Mist, and the Dark God still awaited the day of his revival. The threat to their world had not been defeated, merely delayed.
And it is all my fault. I could have defeated her, yet in the end I betrayed myself.
Yorda knew that, though the boy’s language would not rise to her lips, her memories would tell the tale of the great battle that ensued after her escape from the castle, of the tragedy and deceit that followed. If she just held on to his hand, he would learn it all.
But what good would that knowledge bring him? What meaning was there in showing him the defeat her own hands had wrought? The deceit that dragged Ozuma down, cursing his blood, the curse that spanned generations, down to the boy himself.
No, even if there was meaning in showing him, Yorda did not want the boy to know. Not now, when she was powerless, able only to offer apology after apology.
I should release his hand. I will return to the tower, and he may leave here on his own.
But the boy only gripped Yorda’s fingers tighter. His eyes flashed. “The knight Ozuma was my ancestor. The blood of the knight who defended you runs in my veins.” He stood. “This time the blood will not fail.”
CHAPTER 4. THE FINAL BATTLE
1
THE GIANT FRONT gates of the Castle in the Mist were closed once more. Ico and Yorda stood together in the sunlit courtyard. The memories of the castle and its history now returned to Yorda formed a link between her and the boy, a link firmer than his grip upon her hand.
Ico squinted in the breeze, looking up at the gates that blocked their escape.
“We’ll get out, I promise,” he said. On her knees, Yorda whispered something weakly. Ico looked down at her, still not understanding her words. “It’ll be okay this time,” he said.
How can you say that? she thought, her eyes widening. How can you know?
Ico smiled. “I just know. I can see it now.”
He understands my thoughts, even though he cannot understand my words, Yorda realized.
“There was a battle, wasn’t there?” Ico whispered. Yorda trembled, recoiling from her own memories.
“You broke the queen’s enchantment. Then you and Ozuma escaped and took the Book of Light to the outside world. That’s why the armies of Zagrenda-Sol finally launched their attack.”
Yes, Yorda thought, they came-
At once, a new vision spread before Yorda’s eyes. She saw a massive host of armed men, battle-worn and brave. An armada of warships covered the sea. Atop the deck of the lead galleon flew the flag of the Holy Zagrenda-Sol Empire, and on its bow stood the priest-king himself. She saw him closely now, in profile, his face filled with determination and battle lust. The sun lit his face and made the imperial emblem on his shoulder glitter like gold. Ozuma stood at his side, the longsword at his waist imbued with the power of the Book of Light.
Yes, they came to destroy the queen. With her enchantment gone, the seas around the castle were as easy for ships to enter as a grassy field is to a brigade of footmen. There was nothing to stop them. They crossed the narrow sea, made landing by the castle, and the sound of their boots upon the stones drowned out even the howling of the sea wind.
They arrived to find nothing waiting for them-not a single soldier stood in their way.
Yorda jerked her hand from Ico, wrenching him from the vision of the past. The phantasmal armada upon the waters vanished into the sunlight.
A seabird passed overhead, its cry plaintive. For a while the boy stood there, looking down at Yorda, whose hands covered her face. Then he knelt close beside her and rested a hand on her shoulder. “You don’t want to remember, do you?”
Yorda’s head drooped lower.
“There was a battle, but the castle still stands,” the boy said, thinking aloud. “In the end, Zagrenda-Sol and Ozuma couldn’t defeat the queen.”
Yorda was silent. Again, the seabird cried out, high above them in the clear sky.