by May Dawson
He shrugs. “I don’t know.”
“Make it better,” she hisses at him, her eyes flickering to me. In a whisper—a whisper everyone can hear—she says, “You hurt her.”
“I know,” he hisses back.
She makes a small gesture toward me.
“It’s not that easy.” I walk backward toward the stairs. “Let’s just get the book. My feelings don’t matter right now.”
“Look at that,” Stelly mutters. “Feelings don’t matter. Aren’t you boys proud of yourselves? You’re turning her into a spy too.”
The only thing worse than discussing my feelings with Cax is discussing them with everyone.
It’s a relief to spin around again and begin the long climb up the stairs, to look for some godforsaken book of old magic that no one should have. Not Lerak, not the True, and probably not us either.
23
Just as we reach floor eight, Cax comes alongside me. I’ve been steaming up the stairs as quickly as I can, which has left my chest heaving more than I want anyone to see, and he keeps up with me far too easily.
“Hey,” he says. “I’m sorry, Tera. I didn’t mean for you to hear that.”
“That doesn’t make it better.” There’s not much emotion in my voice. Because of the panting.
“It was a lie!”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t want anything to do with Raila. With everything I said to her, I was thinking of you and your safe—”
“Shut up, Cax Roman.”
As if to punctuate the thought, my dragon raises her copper-colored ears out of my pocket, her bright golden eyes glowing in the dim light, and hisses at him. I stroke between her ears with a fingertip. I should name her for that soft, beautiful fur. Penny. I’m going to call her Penny. The thought softens me, just a little; it’s hard to be enraged while one pets a dragon. Who knew?
He shuts up, following me as I storm across the darkened library floor. The balcony is to my right; moonlight trickles through the enormous stained-glass dome above. We’re on the top floor. It’s beautiful and mystical in here, and any other time, I’d be awestruck. Tonight, I only register the beauty as a moment lost. I can’t enjoy it now.
Maybe I shouldn’t be this angry at Cax, but that’s the thing about being hurt. Sometimes I don’t realize just how broken I am until someone breaks a little piece of me all over again.
There’s another long table against the balcony railing, with the elaborate gilt-framed mirrors in a row. Suddenly they all flicker to life. Three disembodied heads say in unison, “The book you seek is at the end of the second aisle.”
“You know, we had this thing Earthside called the Dewey decimal system,” I say, to no one in particular, “which was confusing, but also wasn’t creepy as hell.”
No one laughs at my joke. I tug at the ends of my ponytail as I walk down the aisle. Although I can’t shake the feeling we’re walking into danger, it might be my restless anxiety flaring as it so often does, unrelated to things like creepy libraries or evil wizards.
At the end of the aisle, the wooden shelves are enclosed in glass-fronted cabinets. I cup my hand between my forehead and the cool glass, peering in to look at the titles. They’re all old books, the titles written on small pieces of paper mounted in front of them. The ink has long since faded from the leather covers. When I wrap my fingers around the brass knob to pull open the cabinet door, it’s locked.
When one of the disembodied heads appears in the reflection of the glass, I jump back so fast I knock into the bookcase behind me. I swallow a strangled scream.
“You have not earned access to the book you seek,” the creepy library face tells me.
I press my hand over my fluttering heart. “How did you know I forgot my library card again?”
Airren rests his hand on my shoulder. “All right, thank you. Unlock the case, please.”
He brushes his palm over the front of the glass, and when nothing changes, he frowns.
“First you must answer a riddle,” the head says.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Airren says. “This doesn’t happen in real life.”
I use my finger to mime between Airren and me. “So this isn’t a thing in your world either? Not in your world and not in mine?”
“This is your world,” Airren reminds me, his fingers gently squeezing my shoulder. He sighs before he addresses the bookshelves. “All right, tell us your riddle.”
Half to himself, he mutters, “Corum just keeps getting weirder.”
I can’t help but feel like that’s my fault.
“What’s the difference between blood and wine, something more personal than drink and vine?” The disembodied head intones.
Another half-forgotten memory—one that I wanted to leave behind—unfurls in my mind. A dark stain down a woman’s dress, laughter in the air, a sloshing goblet. A sacrifice. That was the night I tried to breathe life into a dead man, and proved my teachers right: that’s the one impossible magic.
Airren runs his hand through his hair. “Forget it, the library is drunk. I’m breaking the glass.”
I grab his forearm. “No, let me answer the damn thing.”
He raises an eyebrow at me.
“Do you have to do it in rhyme?” Stelly asks.
“God, I hope not.” I chew on my lower lip as I look back at the bookcase. Out loud, I muse, “There’s nothing more personal than blood.”
Whether that blood is yours, or whether you see it spilled, or whether that blood is used to stoke magic, blood is always personal.
“Incorrect.” The library head is haughty. And it adds, “Also, you must indeed answer in rhyme.”
I throw my hands in the air.
“There are spells that use wine.” Stelly slides in next to me, her shoulder brushing mine. “Especially old spells.”
“Why am I not surprised you know that?” Cax says.
“You know my mantra. Beach, booze, etcetera.” She flashes him a grin over her shoulder. “Just kidding. I wrote my senior thesis in secondary school on the magical properties of wine and cheese. Convinced my mom to let me drink with dinner for like three weeks straight because I am a genius.”
“So help me out here,” I say. “True use blood for magic, we all know that.”
“But so did the old wizards, before magic was bound,” she says. “Blood or wine, any sacrifice.”
“But blood is a sacrifice of life.” Mycroft’s cut wrist wrists in my memory, his fingers pale against the blood streaming down his wrist. “And wine is just a sacrifice of…fruit.”
“We offer wine in a sweet bouquet,” Stelly says to the bookcase. “We offer blood and offer decay.”
“And Mom thought all that angsty poetry you used to write would come to nothing,” Cax mutters.
Stelly doesn’t even look at him as she throws out her fist, but there’s a soft thud as her knuckles slam into his shoulder. He shakes his head at her, and only after a few seconds, when he thinks no one is looking, does he rub his hand over his shoulder.
The cupboard clicks open.
“Angsty poetry for the win,” I say.
“If you really feel that way, you can come to my poetry slam,” Stelly says.
24
“Let’s take this back to Rawl House and wait for our new friends to come claim it,” Airren says.
When he taps his wand against the doorway, then opens the door, it opens into someplace wrong.
Penny chitters anxiously, running across my shoulders, sinking claws deep into my skin.
Airren is jerked through the door. My instincts say to run away, yet I find myself running after him, toward the door. Cax is already stepping in front of me, trying to get between me and danger, and his tall, lean body looms in my vision.
The floor seems to tilt beneath my feet, and my momentum carries me toward the doorframe, even if I wanted to run away now. The air pressure changes, pressing painfully against my ears as the door sucks me through.
I
look back for Stelly, wanting to know if she’s okay. Her face is white. The pressure on my eardrums swells as if they’re going to burst, and I press my fingers into my ears, before the door slams shut between us. Stelly is still safe on the other side, thank God. The plain wooden door is familiar.
Raila stands in front of the printing press, her arms crossed. Somehow, she’s high-jacked our portal and sucked us back into the apartment above the bakery.
“Thank you for bringing my book back to me,” she says, “although I wasn’t hoping you’d be the messenger.”
Her words are light, but the way she eyes me seems as jealous as I feel toward her.
“Yeah, me either.”
“I guess Lerak thought you were disposable,” Raila says archly.
Cax demands, “What are you doing?”
“Building a future for Avalon. What are you doing?” She crosses the distance between them, resting her palm against his jaw. Cax leans back, his eyes flinty.
“So, you really do like the little girl?” Her smirk is mocking.
“Don’t be jealous,” Cax chides.
“Are you serving the Crown after all, Cax? Like your parents raised you?”
“It turns out they gave good advice.” He takes her wrist in his hand, his touch gentle but dismissive when he drops her hand between them so she no longer touches his face. “About who to avoid.”
“I knew you were lying to me.” She leans closer to him. “I can read you, Cax. Always have, always will.”
“There’s no always in our future,” he promises her.
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” She holds out her hand toward Airren, her eyes still on Cax. “Give me my book, please.”
“You’ll have to take it from me.” Airren has the book under his left arm, and his wand is in his right hand.
She finally turns her head and meets his eyes. Then she throws her arm out toward Airren, extending her wand.
Cax pushes me down and throws the table onto its side. The printing press slams to the ground with a thud that shakes the room while he covers me with his body behind the table as sparks fly. From both Raila and Airren’s wands come threads of magic, sizzling through the air, as the two of them battle each other.
Cax pulls his wand from inside his jacket pocket. “If you get the chance to get out of here, Tera, go and don’t look back.”
“I’m not doing that.”
“I’ll assume you’ve forgiven me, don’t worry.” He casts quickly, jumping to his feet and holding out his wand as a silvery rope streaks out from the end of it; the tendrils wrap around Raila, and for a second it looks as if they will bring her to her knees.
“Don’t make any assumptions,” I tell Cax. “You’re going to have to live to see if you can redeem yourself.”
“Harsh,” he says, before jumping onto the edge of the table and over, launching himself toward Raila.
But just as he does, the doors burst open and half-a-dozen True flow into the room.
Wands flash and magic crackles in the air like a dozen bolts of lightning. It’s a terrible place to be without magic.
Then one of the wands explodes. The sounds is a loud pop in my ears, and then I hear a low constant humming. The man who was holding the wand screams, staring at the remnants of his wand.
There’s another pop, another set of screams, and Raila shouting at her frantic men as they mill in the smoke.
I throw myself into the legs of a True who aims a blast of magic at Airren. His blast darkens the ceiling as he falls backward.
“Thanks,” Airren says, whirling to cold cock a True who jumps out at him.
I start to climb to my feet to retreat—even without his wand, I don’t like my chances against the massive True I just tackled—but then a wand presses against the back of my neck, between my shoulders.
“If you are fond of her at all.” Raila’s voice is a whip-crack through the scent of burning and the smoke in the room. “You might want to put your wands down before I sever her head from her shoulders.”
“Most men seem to prefer their women without a head of their own in my experience,” I say. I’m not sure the words make sense, but at least I haven’t caved completely to the sudden dryness in my mouth, the dizzy blur of panic that threatens to swallow me. The thin knob of the wand’s end pressed against the base of my neck is painfully cold, colder than ice, and my skin burns.
Within seconds, silence reigns. The bright threads of magic wilt away to nothing. Cax tosses his wand to the ground, his jaw tightening as he raises his hands to his shoulders. Airren’s eyes are quick and calculating as he stoops to let his wand fall between his feet, where he’ll be able to reach it quickly. One of the True puts a foot between Airren’s legs and kicks the wand away
Another True steps in behind Airren and slams a boot into his calf. Airren lands on his knees, then glowers at Raila.
Then he catches a glimpse of my face, and his expression shifts in a second to relaxed, as if there’s nothing to fear. He winks at me.
“Lerak is an idiot,” Raila says, “but neither of us could get that book out of the library without your help. Putting a spell on it was the best I could do.”
“What are you doing?”
“I’m going to make myself a dolly.” The wand traces down my spine, making every nerve tingle in my body with the instinct to run or fight. “Like mother, like daughter.”
The memory of my mother as a shell rises again for me—Lord, how I hated my mother when I wanted her to be real and all she could do was smile when I tried to tell her my secrets, and how I hated myself for hating her—and my hands close into fists. No one will ever make me Padrick’s shadow, and no one will make hers, either.
“After all, Donovan’s daughter has a useful face, but that’s all she’s has to offer. If she has magic, I imagine she would have used it instead of cowering behind a table.”
My stomach drops. If Raila knows that—if this secret leaves this room—I’m done. Avalon is already spinning away under my knees. Losing this battle could mean losing my world.
The wand leaves my skin, though I can feel her looming over me, so close behind me. Instead, she pokes my dragon with the wand. Penny makes a small squawk of protest, claws sinking deeper into my shoulder as she flattens herself to me, and then hisses at her.
“She doesn’t even have a real dragon.” Raila’s voice is amused.
“You don’t have any dragon at all.”
She laughs her fake, but lilting, laugh. “Well dear, I’m about to have yours.”
The dragon hisses at her again, raising her head. Raila slaps it off my shoulder with her wand. There’s a small, soft thump as the dragon’s tiny body hits the floor.
I turn, throwing myself at Raila. When I catch her around the waist, her wand skitters across the floor from her hand.
The room behind me erupts in battle, but I’m focused only on getting Raila down. Is my dragon safe? If she’s hurt it, so help me God—
The dragon is growing.
Suddenly it isn’t a wide eyed copper kitten.
It’s a red dragon the size of a small car, and it is righteously pissed.
The door flies open, but this time it’s the cavalry. Mycroft and Cutter, and Cutter’s uniformed police, pile in.
But by the time they roll into the room, yelling directions and threats, my dragon has its teeth deep in Raila’s throat.
“Easy, Penny,” I tell my dragon.
When every last True has been handcuffed and led through a real portal, Cutter says, “I ought to arrest you all.”
His eyes fix on Penny, who’s a little bit smaller each time I look at her, though I can’t quite catch her shifting. She’s down to the size of a bread box.
“You don’t mean it,” I say, bending down to offer my arms to Penny. When she comes to me, I lift her up to my chest. “I’m growing on you.”
Cutter raises an eyebrow. “I’m going to let you get some rest tonight. I’m not sure I can deal with
the four of you without a night’s sleep and two cups of coffee. But I want a full statement tomorrow.”
I raise two fingers to my eyebrow in a mock salute. “Of course.”
“Are you all right?” Mycroft steps impatiently in front of Cutter and tilts my chin up with his fingers. Gold-flecked brown eyes examine my face carefully.
Penny runs up my arm and chirps from my shoulder, where she’s trying to hide in my hair. I wince; she feels heavier than usual, but she’s still shrinking.
“Where were you?” I ask.
His face clouds. “I came as soon as I knew you were in trouble. Stelly sent me a message—”
“I don’t need you to try to be a hero for me, Croft,” I say tartly. “You don’t have to go off and find my magic for me. I just needed you here.”
“You needed me?”
“Obviously.”
“Cutter would have come anyway. I didn’t do anything.”
I glance away. I needed him when I didn’t know if I could trust Cax. I sure as hell can’t trust Mycroft with my feelings, but it feels like I can trust him for everything else.
I turn and walk away. “Come on. I need some rest. For a bunch of guys who are supposed to look after my needs, we don’t spend nearly enough time in bed.”
Cutter gives one of his long, low sarcastic whistles.
I give him a different kind of salute as I head out the door and into the cool night.
I’m done with portals for a while.
25
“Will you come sleep in our room tonight?” Cax’s normal long, quick stride brings him alongside me. Then he jams his hands in his pockets as if he’s not sure how I’m going to answer.
It’s the first time I’ve seen confident, easygoing Cax look so…lost.
He looks like I feel so much of the time.
I don’t know what to say, but then his deep green eyes meet mine. I need to at least talk to him.
“Do you think we could talk tomorrow?” I ask.
He nods, his face neutral, although there’s hurt in those eyes.
