The Power (The Magnificent 12 4)

The spear trailed a wire that snapped tight, stopping the weapon’s flight. Prongs snapped out of the side of the spearpoint, and the whole thing went flying back, reeled in faster than a yo-yo.

A Skirrit, three Tong Elves, and a Gudridan were impaled like some hideous shish kebab, yanked wildly back toward Charlie’s machine.

Mack had foreseen a problem with this: Charlie’s speargun would soon be buried in dead monsters. But the instant the monsters cleared the protection of the invisible barrier, they exploded into vapor.

The spear was sucked back into its barrel bearing no traces of the monsters that had just been killed.

“Nice touch!” Mack yelled to Charlie.

“That wasn’t me,” Charlie yelled back, but there was no more time to discuss the matter because if you thought the Pale Queen’s army would just turn and run away in terror, you’d be sadly mistaken. They had something much scarier behind them—the Pale Queen—than they had in front of them.

So after a stunned pause, the creatures charged again, loud as ever.

Mack yelled, “Back! Back behind the speargun!”

They fell back, and Rodrigo, who was operating the speargun now, cranked it up to maximum effect.

The result was slaughter.

The spears shot out one at a time, speared Bowands and bugs and giants, yanked them back, and reduced them to air pollution. The ten barrels turned in the drum, bringing a new spear into firing position every second.

In the first minute the spears flew and withdrew sixty times. The slaughter was appalling and the air was clouded with the stinking vapor left behind by the creatures’ dissolution.

And yet, despite this fearsome destruction, the Pale Queen’s army kept pushing forward, and soon Mack and Stefan and Dietmar were hauling the machine back, foot by foot, even as it fired frantically.

There have been many epic battles in history that involved a tiny, outnumbered band of heroes borne down upon by irresistible forces. The Spartans at Thermopylae. The English navy and the Spanish Armada. The 101st Airborne at the Battle of the Bulge. The Ewoks of Endor against the Imperial Stormtroopers.

But never in history had so few stood against so many. Eight twelve-year-olds and one fifteen-year-old ex-bully against tens of thousands.

And they were not going to win.

Not as the Magnificent Eight at least.

Twenty

MEANWHILE, BACK IN SEDONA

The Destroyer picked up an SUV—it happened to be a Toyota RAV4, not that it matters—and he threw that SUV—it happened to be blue—again, not that it matters—into the front wall of a house.

The SUV crushed the front door, collapsed the porch, shattered the window, and scared the residents pretty well.

It was a miracle no one was hurt.

The Destroyer then kicked a fire hydrant, which snapped off clean and sent a giant plume of water spraying up into the air.

He didn’t exactly know what the limits were to his power. Risky had tried to explain, but whenever he tried to pay attention, his thoughts would drift away to . . . well, he could no longer remember what to call the creature in his memory. But she was a girl, he was pretty sure of that. And she was cute edging toward pretty.

But he had no time for that now. He was the Destroyer.

The Destroyer formerly known as Mack’s golem grabbed an elm tree by the trunk and heaved up on it. Sure enough it

came free after some resistance, ripping out topsoil, grass, and bits of sidewalk. He opened his baleful mouth and breathed out. Flames!

But the tree didn’t burn, really, not the way he’d hoped. The wood was still green and fresh so it mostly just kind of steamed and twisted. He threw the whole thing onto the roof of a pleasant stucco bungalow.

People heard loud crashes and car alarms and began to poke their heads out of their homes to see what was going on. But it wasn’t nearly enough. He’d been tasked with the job of scaring everyone all the way out of town. And so far he was getting more puzzled looks than terrified ones.

So he tilted back his head and let go of a howl that sounded like, “Braaaaarrrrrgggg!” But really loud. Jet-engine loud. Rock-concert loud.