As a whole, though, the tale collapses under its own weight as the San Francisco subplots turn out to be no more than an irrelevant sideshow, and climactic conflicts take place on an island that is somehow both a historical, physical place and a higher reality from which Earth and other “shadowrealms” are spun off. The cast never seems unwieldy despite its size, the pacing never lets up, and the individual set pieces are fine mixtures of sudden action, heroic badinage and cliffhanger cutoffs. Meanwhile, in ancient Danu Talis (aka Atlantis), Josh and Sophie are being swept into a play to bring certain Elders to power as the city’s downtrodden “humani” population rises up behind Virginia Dare, the repentant John Dee and other Immortals and Elders.

Flamel and allies (including Prometheus and Billy the Kid) defend modern San Francisco from a motley host of mythological baddies. Multiple plotlines-some of which, thanks to time travel, feature the same characters and even figures killed off in previous episodes-come to simultaneous heads in a whirl of short chapters. Scott tops off his deservedly popular series with a heaping shovelful of monster attacks, heroic last stands, earthquakes and other geological events, magic-working, millennia-long schemes coming to fruition, hearts laid bare, family revelations, transformations, redemptions and happy endings (for those deserving them). Fans of Karen Cushman’s Catherine, Called Birdy (1994) and Matilda Bone (2000) will welcome this new tale of a strong-minded young woman coming of age and holding her own in a hostile medieval world. Unlike clashes of arms, this is a battle she can fight, and fight she does, using words and silence as weapons, ultimately winning her tormentors’ sympathy, and grudging respect from the dying king.

Here, Marjorie tells her tale, alternating between her past as a tempestuous young princess forced by the advancing English armies to become a fugitive while her father and uncles are off fighting for Scotland’s independence, and the present, in which she sits, filthy, underfed (starved, later on) and caged while jeering locals pelt her with rotten fruit, and wily Edward himself pays daily visits, seeking to break her spirit. Just after the turn of the 14th century, King Edward “Longshanks” captured several women of Robert Bruce’s household, including his 11-year-old daughter Marjorie, and displayed some of them in cages.

Yolen and Harris ( Queen’s Own Fool, 2000) once again dish up an intense drama drawn from Scottish history.

Girl in a Cage by Jane Yolen