Behind Misquamacus, in the center of his medicine circle. the swimming globes of Pa-la-kai, the demon of blood, flared up again. They were brighter than the sun, brighter than anything Harry had ever seen before. In the end, he found it impossible to look. The dazzling globes were slowly floating together to form one shatteringly brilliant sun.

With his eyes screwed up against the light, Harry watched Singing Rock anxiously. He could see that the Indian was already tired, pitting his magic against Misquamacus and twenty other medicine men, any one of whom was more experienced and more powerful than Singing Rock could be in three lifetimes. And as the demon shone and shone, and slowly brought himself together into one supremely evil and unconquerable shape. Singing Rock’s head fell onto his chest, and his arms gradually dropped.

The gale-force winds, which had sprung up so quickly, began to die away.

“Come on, damn you,” whispered Harry. “You can’t let him beat you now. Come on, damn you. Come on!”

But Singing Rock was exhausted. He sank down on one knee, and held his hands to his head to concentrate on the spell he was trying to work. And meanwhile Pa-la-kai, in all his ravenous majesty and brilliance, swelled larger and brighter and ever more devastating. Out of his dazzling maw came a cacophony of gruesome howls and shrieks of bloodlust, and he rose again, high over Singing Rock, to take his sacrificial due.

Singing Rock raised his eyes. Harry could see that he was almost blinded by the light of Pa-la-kai. Neil, standing close by, said, “He’s finished, Harry. He can’t fight that. He must be finished.”

Singing Rock spread his arms. Only a few feet away now, Misquamacus stood over him in his eagle-winged headdress, tall and triumphant and vengefully straight-backed. Behind Misquamacus, in a silent semicircle, stood the greatest of the Indian wonder-workers.

“Pa-la-kai!” howled Misquamacus. “I give you this traitor’s blood! I give you every drop that flows in his veins, every ounce in his heart! This is your sacrifice, Pa-la-kai, master of death! This is your reward, Pa-la-kai, god of blood!”

Singing Rock, instead of collapsing, staggered to his feet and sprayed his medicine powders in a crisscross pattern. His eyes were wild, and his whole face was contorted with the effort of what he was doing. In a stentorian voice, he called: “Ossadagowah! By the commands of the elder gods, by the forbidden words of Sadogowah, by the thousand deaths and the thousand lives, I bid you to appear!”

Misquamacus paused, taken completely by surprise. He stared at Singing Rock in disbelief. Singing Rock had actually dared to summon the demon whom no Indian medicine men ever dared to summon, the beast in no human shape whom Misquamacus had been intending to use himself to call up Ka-tua-la-hu, the one who slept beneath the waters.