Sorcerer's Secret by Scott Mebus

crawl over and cut the last line, freeing the ship from the mast, which had been completely swallowed by the rapids. Rory sighed, but the close calls weren’t over yet.
    As the rapids tossed them around, they slammed into another rock. Water began to leak into the boat as the sides were breached, and Rory couldn’t see how they’d survive. But finally his dad was able to grab hold of the stub of a tiller. He pulled it around with both hands as he tried to guide them past the rest of the rocks and through the rapids. Suddenly they seemed to be hitting fewer rocks. Over and over they seemed to be rushing toward destruction only to have Mr. Hennessy somehow nudge the boat just enough to get them through. For the first time, Rory was actually impressed by his dad. And then, finally, after one last violent dip and spin, they sprang free of the rapids, bursting out the other side of Hell Gate into the calmer waters of the upper reaches of the East River.
    Mr. Hennessy, by now knee-deep in the water that was slowly filling the boat, collapsed back as the boat drifted toward the far shore. Rory was so exhausted he couldn’t even remember what they had been talking about before their brush with death. He just lay against the side of the boat as it floated onward to Queens.

7
    THE ROYAL STEED
    N icholas sat in the back of the council room, trying not to worry. As Alexa finished her report on DeLancey’s Cowboys’ running amok in the Bronx, which duplicated reports from other boroughs, the shell-shocked looks in the faces of the councillors did not inspire confidence. Even his bulldozer of a father seemed uncertain. Nicholas caught Alexa’s eye and she shook her head; she could see it, too.
    â€œThey look like a bunch of kicked dogs,” Lincoln muttered to Nicholas. “They’re gods, for goodness’ sake. You’d think they’d be a little less wussy.”
    â€œThey’re used to petty little struggles among themselves,” Nicholas whispered back. “But half of Mannahatta has followed Kieft to Roosevelt Island. This war will be bigger than even the old battles with the Munsees. So no matter what, they’re looking at the end of something. And no god wants to see anything end.”
    â€œSpirits are rising up on our side as well, don’t forget!” Whitman was saying, his characteristic exclamation points ringing out. “And there are many, the silent majority you could call them, who are simply hiding, hoping everything turns out all right. When the real struggle begins, they will join our side!”
    â€œNot when they see these,” Peter Stuyvesant said, nodding toward the door. One of his farmhands, Diedrich, strode into the room, dropping three knives into the middle of the council table with a clatter. Nicholas’s heart sank as he recognized the evil metal blades—he’d almost been sliced open by one such weapon not long ago. The councillors’ faces turned ashen.
    â€œWhere did he get these?” Hamilton asked, his voice shaking.
    â€œWe pulled them off a group of mobster spirits that were cavorting downtown,” Peter said. “Thankfully, they were too drunk to put up much of a fight.”
    â€œBut I thought there was only one knife and we still have it!” Babe Ruth announced, his round face confused.
    â€œWell, darling, someone has managed to make a couple more,” Mrs. Parker said drily.
    â€œAre we sure these are really god-killing knives?” James Bennett asked.
    â€œMore certain than I would ever want to be,” Peter replied. “The mobsters were boasting about a murder they’d committed earlier that day. I pulled a locket off of them, myself. I destroyed it, of course; we’re lucky no one thinks to put the lockets on. At least not yet. But it’s coming if we don’t do something soon.”
    â€œThree valuable knives given to a couple of small-time crooks?” Mrs. Parker