As they forged ahead into the heart of the canyon, Giacomo tripped on a rock. Stumbling, he went to catch himself and his palm scraped against one of the pillars, sending a stinging shock up his arm. He cried out, grasping his injured hand, which felt slick with blood.
“Are you all right?” Aaminah asked.
“No loud noises,” Ozo snapped in an angry whisper.
“Maybe if we could get a little light, that would help,” Giacomo complained.
“Fine. But not too bright. We don’t want to wake our lizard friends.”
Milena whistled to Gaia, who flew to the front of the group. The gem on her crown gave off a dim glow, casting an eerie green light on the path. Giacomo examined his palm, which had been sliced in several places.
“Of course it had to be my drawing hand,” Giacomo said uneasily.
“That looks bad,” Aaminah said. “I can fix it, but you’ll have to wait until we’re out of here.”
“I’ll be fine.” Giacomo clamped his hand into a fist and pinned it against his waist to stop the bleeding. But if he was being honest with himself, he wasn’t fine. The cuts only reminded him of that. It was thanks to him that they were all crossing this life-threatening canyon in the first place. He’d already seen two of Ozo’s men perish on this mission, and he couldn’t shake the thought that he was to blame. If more were killed, or if—and he hated to even consider the idea—Aaminah, Milena, or Savino met some horrible fate, he wouldn’t know how to live with himself. That was assuming he made it out alive. The chances of which, he had to admit, seemed slim. If what Spike had said about the Invisibilia was true, they could all be killed before they even knew what hit them. Is the Compass worth all this risk? Worth all this pain and the constant threat of death? He didn’t know, but it was too late to turn back now. He’d make sure they survived. Somehow.
The possibility of being attacked by the Invisibilia kept everyone vigilant. They crept through the forest of razor-sharp pillars, staying close to one another.
The night passed swiftly, and before Giacomo knew it, the sky began to brighten in the east. But the end of the canyon was still a ways off.
Ozo picked up the pace. It was a race against the sun now. Giacomo’s legs burned. Sweat stung his eyes. The morning light was already hitting the tops of the pillars above them. They reached a full sprint, but the canyon wall remained out of reach.
A warmth spread across his back. Normally, he would have welcomed the sun’s rays after spending the night in a cold canyon. But this morning, all he could think was, We’re all about to die.
Suddenly, he heard a scream. Giacomo spun around to see Spike yanked into the air by an unseen force. The mercenary was whipped back and forth like a helpless, floating rag doll. Spike’s sword flew out of his hand and spun straight at Giacomo. He ducked as the blade whizzed over his head, planting itself into a pillar.
Ozo ran forward and swung his sword, trying to sever the Invisibilia’s hold on Spike, but his blade sliced only air. Savino swiped his brush, and Nero projected a triangle at the unseen creature. The dagger-shaped blast missed and instead took a chunk out of a nearby pillar, scattering shards of sharp stone in all directions.
Mico dodged one of the fragments and lit up his red gem, shining a bright beam at their unseen attacker. By now, Spike’s legs had vanished; he was just a floating torso. As Mico’s light swept the scene, Giacomo caught sight of a giant, rainbow-scaled lizard with a long pink tongue wrapped around its prey.
Ozo and Sveva stood several feet away from the creature, blindly swinging their swords back and forth. The Bull aimed his crossbow and shot, but the arrow flew way off target. Valcaro fired his gun, but the shot missed by several feet, ricocheting off the pillars.
“Can’t you see it?” Giacomo shouted.
“See what?” Confusion was scribbled across Ozo’s face.
“The Invisibilia—it’s right there!” Giacomo pointed to Mico’s red beam. Aaminah, Milena, and Savino aimed their Geniuses to shine their lights in the same direction.
“I don’t see anything,” Milena said frantically.
“Me neither!” Savino yelled. “How about you, Aaminah?”
“No! Nothing!”
Giacomo grasped his sketchbook. In his injured hand, he clutched a pencil. Wincing, he drew a series of circles as fast as he could. Blood smeared across the page as Mico fired off a series of glowing discs that deflected off the lizard’s scales and broke apart.
Spike’s screams fell silent as the lizard’s scaly lips swallowed his head. Then the creature turned and sped away, winding between the columns.
“It’s gone,” Giacomo told everyone.
“And so is Spike!” Ozo snapped angrily.
Sveva held her sword at the ready and scanned their surroundings. She glanced at Giacomo. “How come you could see that thing with your Genius, but they couldn’t?” She nodded toward his friends.
Equally baffled, Giacomo looked to Mico. “I have no idea!”
“Doesn’t matter,” Ozo said gruffly. “You’re leading us out of here.”
Giacomo nodded. He whistled to Mico, then pointed at the path in front of them.
Mico hovered above Giacomo, bathing the area ahead in a red beam of light. To his horror, Giacomo spotted a slumbering Invisibilia less than a foot away. As Mico scanned farther on, Giacomo found another. Then another. Eight in total. They still lay in shadow, but in a minute, the sun would reach their bodies and wake them up. Giacomo and his friends were about to become lizard breakfast.
“How’s it looking?” Savino asked.
“Uh … better if you don’t know. Just follow me.” With Mico illuminating the way, Giacomo led the group past one Invisibilia, then zigged and zagged through the pillars, avoiding the others.
As he passed the last of the creatures, Giacomo was jolted by another scream.
He whirled around. Mico’s red beam revealed an Invisibilia’s tongue wrapped around the Bull’s waist. It was dragging him toward its gaping, fang-filled mouth. The Bull leveled his crossbow and fired, piercing the lizard’s eye. It screeched, but didn’t loosen its grip, pulling the Bull’s legs into its throat. As the Bull struggled to grasp another arrow, Giacomo scanned the area they’d just passed through and saw scaly eyelids opening one by one. Gigantic eyeballs rotated in their sockets, and as the sun cast light on them, their huge black pupils narrowed into ominous slits. The Invisibilia lumbered to their feet.
“They’re all waking up!” Giacomo warned.
Milena tugged on Savino’s sleeve. “We can make a shield.”
Savino nodded. “Everyone huddle in!”
When Giacomo looked back to the Bull, he was gone.
Ozo and his four remaining mercenaries trained their weapons on their unseen attackers and formed a tight clump around Giacomo and Aaminah. Milena and Savino stood opposite each other and directed their brushes toward the ground. As they painted in the air, Gaia and Nero projected green and blue strands of light, creating an elaborate interlocking pattern that built up like a wall around them.
A tongue lashed out, arcing over the top of the rising shield, right at Savino. With a flick of his wrist, he completed a star shape, severing the leathery organ in the process. The Invisibilia shrieked and backed away. The wall tapered above their heads and sealed shut, forming a dome.
The rest of the Invisibilia attacked the shield with a barrage of whapping tongue flicks, cracking its surface in a few places. But thankfully, the dome held.
“Everyone move together and we’ll make it out of here,” Giacomo said, trying to convince himself as much as anyone else. They shuffled slowly as a unit, the dome moving with them.
As more Invisibilia closed in, each tongue lash and claw slash shattered sections of the dome faster than Milena and Savino could replace them. A tongue snaked its way through an opening at knee level and yanked Baby Cannoli out of the shell. Valcaro shoved the barrel of his gun through the gap and fired, blasting the lizard in its side. But the m
etal bullet bounced off its scaly armor and skittered away. The Invisibilia threw its head back and swallowed Baby Cannoli whole. All that remained of him was a bow, which was immediately trampled.
Milena and Savino worked as fast as they could to keep their creation intact, but it seemed like the second they patched one damaged segment, another hole formed. Aaminah bowed short, high notes with her viol, and Luna sent out pulses of light wherever a section opened. But the panic on their faces said it all—they were fighting a losing battle. Giacomo urged the group to pick up the pace, but more and more Invisibilia surrounded them. By now the whole canyon was bathed in the morning sun. There was nowhere to hide.
Sforza jabbed his sword through an opening, stabbing one of the creatures in its mouth. In Mico’s red beam, Giacomo saw the injured Invisibilia wrap its tongue around the sword’s hilt.
“Let go!” Giacomo warned Sforza, but it was too late.
The Invisibilia pulled. Sforza, still gripping his weapon, flew out of the dome and into the lizard’s maw.
Giacomo realized that out of the thirteen mercenaries who had begun the journey with them, only Ozo, Valcaro, and Sveva remained.
Then Giacomo felt a tightening around his right leg and he knew he’d be the next to go.
The tongue twisted several times, wrapping his leg from knee to hip. Giacomo pounded at it repeatedly with his fist. Its pink surface felt like leather covered in grit and mucus. The tongue jerked back and he flew out of the dome. His back slammed into the ground, knocking the wind out of him. Dirt and rocks scraped his body as he was pulled toward a gaping, fang-filled mouth.
Aaminah screamed “Giacomo!” and a burst of yellow light hit the Invisibilia right between the eyes. The creature reeled back, loosening its grip ever so slightly.
Mico swooped in, stabbing the tongue with his tiny beak. To Giacomo’s surprise, the attack worked. The Invisibilia let out a screech and its tongue retracted.
Giacomo scrambled backward on elbows and feet. Mico flew to meet him, and through the red beam, Giacomo saw the Invisibilia’s tongue whip around.
“Mico, look out!” he shouted, but the tongue was too fast. It struck Mico, sending the Genius tumbling through the air. Mico smashed into one of the pillars, and pain ripped through Giacomo, like being slashed with a hundred knives. He lunged for his Genius, but his weakened right leg wouldn’t hold his weight, and he collapsed. Giacomo caught sight of the Invisibilia lurching toward him just as Mico’s red glow faded.
A long wave of bright yellow light streamed past and he heard a screech as the creature was hit.
Aaminah sprinted through what remained of the dome, scooped up Mico in her hands, and dashed to Giacomo’s side. The last three mercenaries took up positions around them while Milena and Savino rapidly rebuilt the shield. But the end of the canyon was still far away. And with Giacomo’s leg unable to carry him, running was out of the question.
“They’ll pick off the rest of us if we stay on the ground,” Savino said. He looked up at the towers of stone, then glanced to the cliff wall. “Aaminah, do you think you can topple that pillar?” He pointed at one to his right.
“Maybe,” she said. “If I can make a low-enough note.”
“I need you to crack it on the side facing the cliff.”
Savino opened a small hole in the top of their shield, just wide enough for Luna to slip through. Aaminah propped the viol in the crook of her neck. Then she clunked the bow onto the bottom strings, pressing down and dragging it with all her might. The instrument let out a deep note, but then the tone dropped, becoming scratchy and grating. It reminded Giacomo of the harsh sound of the bladder pipe. Long, thick yellow waves washed over the base of the pillar, and the stone shards shattered, followed by a deafening crack! Aaminah dragged her bow again, causing the bottom of the pillar to rupture.
It slowly toppled, like a giant tree felled by loggers. It crashed into the one next to it, which slammed into another, causing a chain reaction of falling pillars. Shrieks from the Invisibilia mixed with the rumble of pillars collapsing. By the time the final boom rang out, a long, raised bridge had been created above the canyon floor, clearing a path to the canyon wall.
“Now!” Savino led the group up onto the nearest pillar, letting his part of the dome break apart as he ran. Ozo picked up Giacomo with one arm and continued to wield his sword with the other, cutting swaths around him in case any Invisibilia were near.
Giacomo held Mico close, carefully protecting his Genius’s torn wings and chipped beak. Mico’s eyes stayed shut. “Hold on,” Giacomo said weakly.
With each pounding step, Giacomo found his hatred of Ozo eroding. Despite losing nearly all his companions, Ozo had still risked his own neck to save Giacomo—twice. Maybe he was more honorable than Giacomo had given him credit for. Baldassare should pay Ozo ten times what the mission cost. He had more than earned it.
Then with a startled yell, Ozo fell.
He lost his hold, and Giacomo crashed onto the shards of rock. They sliced his entire body, shredding his tunic. Behind him, Ozo slid down the length of the pillar, dragged by an Invisibilia, leaving behind a trail of blood.
“Ozo!” Sveva screamed. She and Valcaro ran after their leader. Ozo hacked his sword at his unseen enemy as he disappeared off the side of the pillar. Valcaro ran to the edge and fired. Somewhere below, the Invisibilia screeched. Valcaro frantically stuffed more powder into the barrel.
“Go!” Sveva barked at Savino. “Get out of here!” Then she and Valcaro jumped off the pillar, back into the fray.
Giacomo heard the sound of steel clanging against scales, followed by a chorus of screams. A second shot never came.
Savino hooked his hands under Giacomo’s arms and hoisted him onto his feet. “Come on, we’re almost there.”
Giacomo winced, mustering every last ounce of strength. He ignored his crippling aches and, with Savino’s help, limped along the last two pillars and onto the cliff wall. Luna and Gaia launched an onslaught of blazing shapes toward the canyon floor. More shrieks.
As they scrambled up the steep incline, Giacomo looked down at his leg, alarmed by the sight of so much blood. On him, around him. It’s all draining away.
He clutched Mico, whose feathers were matted with blood too. Giacomo lost his balance, but Milena was there to hold him. She and Savino heaved him up and up, toward a cloudless blue sky.
But his head felt like it was being pulled into an abyss, down and down. His skull met the hard ground with a thud, as he was hauled deeper and deeper into unconsciousness.
The last thing he heard was Aaminah shouting, “Giacomo! Giacomo, stay with us!”
15
AWAKENING
Ugalino stayed inside the Cave of Alessio for two days, forbidding Enzio and even Zanobius from entering. He took the added precaution of making Ciro stand guard should either of them become curious.
So Zanobius passed the time at the river, playing a game Enzio showed him. The rules were simple enough: skip smooth, flat rocks over the surface of the water. Whoever bounced his rock the greatest number of times was the winner.
Enzio was a master of the game, and on his first attempt, skipped his rock a dozen times before it sank.
Knowing he’d fail to match Enzio with one rock, Zanobius picked up four, cradling them in his hands. Using all his arms at once, he winged the rocks across the water. The ripples overlapped and expanded like one of Ugalino’s sacred geometry attacks.
“Uh, I’m pretty sure that’s cheating,” Enzio said drily. “But I’ll give you points for creativity.”
Zanobius smiled. “Let’s go again. I think I’m getting the hang of this.”
“You’ll never beat me, even with all those arms of yours.” Enzio scanned the shore for another rock.
Zanobius was fascinated by how humans could be so competitive. Whether it was someone like the Supreme Creator who wanted to hold power over her people, or a simple game of skipping rocks, humans seemed to have an insatiable need to
win, feeding off victories like a glutton devours food at a banquet. Over the years, he’d witnessed firsthand how his master’s search for the Creator’s Compass had grown from curiosity into a relentless quest. And with others now threatening to find it, Ugalino’s drive had only intensified.
But Zanobius was also thankful for his master’s passion and obsessiveness, because without it, Zanobius wouldn’t exist. When others warned Ugalino that bringing a Tulpa into being was impossible, dangerous, and forbidden, he only devoted more energy to his creation. Zanobius wondered if he could ever be as intensely committed to anything.
Ugalino’s voice interrupted. I’m ready. Bring Enzio to me.
Zanobius dropped his stones on the shore. “Next round is going to have to wait.”
“Why?”
“My master told me to bring you to the cave.”
Enzio looked confused. “I didn’t hear anything.”
“He speaks to me without saying a word,” Zanobius admitted. “I hear his voice in my head.”
Enzio’s eyebrows rose in shock. “Doesn’t that make you feel insane? For someone to get inside your mind like that?”
“It’s how he’s always communicated with me.”
“Still, it’s weird.” Enzio looked down at the rock in his palm. “And I’d just found the perfect stone too.” He tossed it into the water with a splash.
As they entered the cave, Zanobius looked around in amazement. Across the walls and ceiling, Ugalino had painted countless overlapping white circles. Within each grouping of circles, blue and green lines crisscrossed, connecting in a complex, interlaced design. The image resembled the pattern on Zanobius’s chest, but on a much larger scale.
On the right side of the cave were two enormous black circles that dwarfed all the other shapes. The circles overlapped, forming an almond shape in between, which was filled in with white. On the rocky floor, Ugalino had painted a map of the Zizzolan Empire, contained within yet another circle.