Page 82 of Knight's End
That was what made me paralyzed with fear. He didn’t care how many men he lost. He didn’t care how much this battle cost him.
He only cared that he got to punish Blue and end me.
I realized Blue had accidentally projected the sultan’s thoughts again and I swallowed hard. As I stared up, I could see the hunger, the cruelty in Raj’s gaze. How could I fight someone so obsessed with power and punishment? How could I win when I had two wishes left, and he had a million at his disposal?
“Never give up, the heart is greater than the mind, the more you love, the more you’ll find—the truth!” Donaloo’s voice streamed past me as he flew into the air, spinning and causing his own whirlwind. “Round and round we spin, what a way to go, to fight and win with a dizzy grin!” His tornado zoomed upward. The rainbow-colored twists of smoke started to scream and materialize as women. The same women that had surrounded Raj when he’d tried to destroy Marscha. His harem.
Donaloo brought them up, up, up, farther into the sky, past the orange rays and into the blue of the encroaching night. He and the harem women went so far up that they became mere pinpricks. And then I saw all of them fall. Each pinprick fell down to earth like a meteor made of shadows instead of light. I searched for Donaloo, floating up there in the sky, cackling about whatever he’d done, but I didn’t hear him. I didn’t see him. Until his body landed in the courtyard and splattered across the stones.
I might not have known it was him but for the jester-styled shoe that remained on one of his feet.
The sight made me dizzy. And ill. Then I thought that Raj was putting a hallucination spell on me. But he floated above us and his expression was also shocked. Everything had happened so quickly. His harem was there and then they weren’t. And then they were so high in the sky—
He flew to where the air was too thin,Quinn told us all.That’s what Declan says.
My shock slowly faded to a dull pain that glowed like an ember. It was hot and hurt, but it didn’t consume me. Not yet.
Because as I stared up at Raj, I realized that Donaloo had given me a shot. Donaloo had done something selfless—surprising the sultan, who had built a life based on greed and fear. And that had given me an opening.
What had Donaloo said? The heart is greater than the mind … My memories clicked through my other conversations with him. “A buzzing mind is but dung and flies, the heart is where humanity lies.” He said a simple wish would work. Blue’s song started to play for some reason. The Maid’s Foolish Wish. “I had a ring for her finger, a flower for her hair, but simple happiness hadn’t a prayer.” And it clicked.
Raj turned his face back down to us, a sneer forming on his lips.
Quinn! I need that wish!I mentally screamed.
Yes, Dove. Do it!
I started to shove a mental apology Quinn’s way for what I was about to do, but Raj opened his mouth—no doubt, to make a wish that would get granted by one of his own cohorts. Panic took over. Adrenaline. I had to finish this wish before he finished his. My fingers trembled as I held Blue’s hand. I whispered, “I wish Raj was happy. Truly, blissfully happy every day for the rest of his existence—” Inspiration struck, and I tacked on, “As blissful as if he were having an orgasm.”
Raj’s jaw dropped. His eyes rolled back in his head and a strange, nearly pained expression came over him. He moaned.
Everyone in the courtyard froze and looked up at the sultan.
The moan dragged on and his hand reached down into the blue smoke so he could touch himself.
“Uh. I don’t know if I’m relieved or traumatized,” Declan muttered. “I’m pretty sure that’s Raj’s ‘O’ face.”
The sultan’s eyes snapped open and he stared down at us for a second. Then he muttered something as his hips swiveled in the air. From the ground, I heard a djinn soldier yell, “Granted.” Then Raj disappeared in a navy puff of smoke.
Around us, soldiers climbed to their feet, the whirlwind gone, the sultan gone.
To my surprise, Cheryn’s soldiers tossed down their swords. All but the two or three who were next to alligators.
“I surrender,” one said. “Any queen who can defeat a man with orgasms is worth dying for.”
A chuckle went through the courtyard. And the chuckle grew to full on tears-streaming-down-their faces laughter as Cheryn’s men all put their arms in the air and my soldiers took them into custody.
I was familiar with the giddy after-effects of surviving against the odds. But this time, the silliness didn’t overtake me. Because my eyes drifted back to Donaloo. Regret filled me instead of silliness. I wished I’d been nicer to the old coot. He deserved better. He deserved to know how much I admired his magic. And his principles. Even if I couldn’t stand his rhymes. But why did he go and do such a foolish thing? He was so powerful! He could have taken on that harem. Maybe even Raj. I stared at his crumpled form, full of wistful regret.
“He didn’t have to die himself,” I shook my head.
Behind me, a squeaky little voice said, “If he hadn’t, the sultan would have only seen another soldier killing people. He wouldn’t have seen a sacrifice made from love.” The giant vine snaked through the courtyard. Her petals gazed down on Donaloo for a moment, before she lowered her lips and swallowed him up.
I gave a shriek. “What are you doing?”
Dini turned her petals toward me. “I’m a flower sprite. Plants eat dead things all the time. How do you think I survived down in that hole? People are just fertilizer.”
A hand on my arm kept me from arguing against the undignified ending she just gave one of the most powerful and amazing men to ever live.
