Aru Shah and the City of Gold - Roshani Chokshi Page 0,44

Aru as she looked around.

Ravana and his ten heads—well, eight now—were the only thing keeping them out of Kubera’s palace.

“What do we do now?” asked Kara.

Ravana looked up from the ground and started crawling toward Aiden, which gave Mini just enough time to cast an invisibility charm on herself and run back to Kara, Brynne, and Aru.

“We’ve got to draw him away from the palace,” said Aru. She snapped her fingers and Vajra transformed into a sparkling rope.

“Agreed,” said Brynne.

“I can distract him with something shiny?” said Kara, holding up her trident.

Brynne smiled at the other girl approvingly. Aiden nodded at Aru, who gave him one end of her lightning rope. At once, they ran to the opposite sides of the courtyard as Mini’s invisibility shield fell over them, concealing the lightning rope from view. It stretched taut in front of the demon king.

“HEY, YOU!” yelled Brynne at Ravana. “What’s got eight heads and is still a loser?”

Ravana growled.

“If you look up the etymological history of coward in the Oxford English Dictionary, you’d find a mirror!” added Kara.

Aru winced. They were going to have to work on Kara’s trash talk….

Ravana lumbered forward, and Aru crouched, her grip on Vajra tightening. The shadow of the demon king fell over them, and the ground trembled. Aru squeezed her eyes shut, all her strength focused on keeping the rope tense. Suddenly, Aru was nearly dragged forward. She signaled to Aiden to let go just as electricity zipped down the rope, delivering a paralyzing shock to Ravana.

“Now, Shah!” yelled Brynne, as Mini threw off the invisibility shield.

Aru gave Vajra a tug, and the rope coiled up like a rearing snake. By the time it was all back in her hand, the lightning had turned into a sharp, glinting javelin. Ravana fell over like a statue, the eyes in his eight heads rolling back as he thudded to the ground so loudly that the nearby trees trembled and roots jutted out of the dirt. Ravana started to move again, clawing the ground as he tried to push himself up to standing. At that exact moment Aru let loose her javelin….

SWISH!

The weapon instantly skewered three heads, and they turned to gold as they rolled across the ground. Vajra returned to Aru as Ravana stumbled to his feet. His movements were shaky, his steps off-balance.

“Five to go!” yelled Aiden.

Brynne let out a savage whoop, and Kara tossed her trident into the air. It caught the light in such a way that it left Ravana momentarily blinded. He threw up his hands to protect his eyes, and…

TWANG! TWANG!

Two more golden heads fell to the ground around his feet as Aiden leaped back to the ground, breathing hard from his slashing maneuver. His scimitars dripped gold blood.

“Three left!” said Aiden.

“Two!” yelled Mini, as she flung out her Death Danda. Dee Dee whacked Ravana’s remaining right skull just below the ear, and the head shimmered to gold and rolled off his shoulder.

“All you, Kara!” said Brynne.

Kara caught her trident one-handed, pulled her shoulder back, and let the weapon rip through the air….

“ONE!” yelled Kara.

Ravana swayed on his feet. Fury twisted his face, but when he tried to step forward, he tripped on his own heads, crashing to the ground once more.

His body disappeared in a cloud of golden smoke, leaving them standing in the now-silent courtyard. Kara’s hair had gotten mussed in the fight, and her face was smudged with dirt. She leaned on Sunny and grinned at them.

“Victory!” shouted Brynne, swinging her wind mace.

Aru cheered. Aiden clapped. Mini lifted her Death Danda and shouted, “And with no risk of tetanus, because none of us got impaled!”

That was a somewhat strange way to say We did it! but then again, it was Mini. She looked around at their confused faces and sighed. “Tetanus is an infection caused by Clostridium tetani, which can be found on pieces of metal and transmitted into the bloodstream through breaks in the skin, and if that happens you could—”

“Die?” said Brynne and Aru.

Both of them fought back a laugh.

“Neuromuscular paralysis and possible mortality is not funny!” huffed Mini. “I’m just saying we should be happy it didn’t happen!”

“I’m happy,” said Kara, lifting her trident. “Hooray for a non-Pyrrhic victory!”

Now the confused faces turned to Kara. She blushed, lowering Sunny.

“Is Pyrrhic a disease?” asked Mini excitedly.

“It means ‘a victory gained at too great a cost,’” Kara said enthusiastically. “The origin is from this battle in 279 BCE where Pyrrhus of Epirus won against the Romans but