A green trail of fog rushes in the void, mingling with the gray that already exists. Azsis tries to reach out for it, but after a few seconds, the green changes into the same gray. Beyond the glass, Lia’s body is a crumpled heap next to Carter and Gran. The magic was hers.
This is my chance.
I pull the black dagger from my boot, and use the void to prop up Azsis. His eyes are wide, staring at me.
“We can still do this,” he says, but his voice lacks the same confidence. It’s barely a whisper. “You and I are one, Penelope. We are cut from the same. I wanted to be loved, but God chose his humans. You want to be loved, but they all chose others. Not you. Never you.”
I shake my head. “You’re wrong. All those people out there, they chose me. And I choose them.”
His eyes widen when he sees the black dagger. He mutters incoherent words, but what he has to say isn’t relevant. Not anymore. Without my lifting a finger, the dagger tunnels into his chest. He falls to the ground and a high-pitched whistle fills the room. His body lights up in flames and the smell of burning eggs fills the void. I see his magic rejoin the void, and then he’s ash and the dagger clatters against the floor.
I stand there and the void takes over my body. Where’s the essence? I try to pull it back, but there’s nothing that comes. Even with my family outside the window, I can’t connect to it. I’m too late. It thinks I’ve chosen the void. A cry bubbles in my throat, but like a switch my worry fades. The void calms me. I could stand here in its center source and let it flow from me forever. In and out. The magic is a seduction, and as much as I shouldn’t, I want it. I want the magic to be part of me. To never let go or leave.
“Penelope,” Pop yells, pounding on the barrier between the void and that room.
I find Carter’s gaze next to him. “Pen, stop. It’s nearly dawn.”
Dawn. I only have until dawn to make the sacrifice, to choose one side of magic to survive.
I push the void away so I can be in control, but it doesn’t work. I can’t make it stop. The void gets stronger. Burns hotter. Blows faster. Then, I don’t want to stop, even though I should. This isn’t what I want to happen, but the magic coaxes me. It tries to make me forget the stakes. To bask in being this powerful. To being the sole witch who can stand in its presence.
“Come out here,” Gran yells through the glass. Gran, Pop, Connie, and Carter are all staring at me. For them, I try to push the void out, but it refuses to leave. To let me move through it. I can’t do anything. It’s too powerful.
I didn’t perform the ceremony, so the witch world is safe. My family will live, but I won’t be with them. I’ve made my choice, even if I didn’t mean to, and my fate is here. Sealed. The void won’t leave me and the essence won’t come to me. I can’t stop this. Not now. I’m not a witch anymore. The void has claimed me, forever.
“I can’t go out. Just leave.”
“We’re not leaving you,” Carter calls.
“Go! I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” I look at Carter. “I love you. Go.”
A new feeling rushes into me, knocking the breath from me. The essence. I try to reach for as much of it as I can access, and it flows in. The void and the essence pull at my insides, both trying to reclaim me. They twist together my stomach, latch on to my nerves, fight inside me—and I scream.
Chapter Forty-Six
Carter
I stare at Pen through the glass and hear those words. Somehow they’re an anchor in the noise and chaos. When she screams, I can’t leave her, not like this. I want to be here for her. I turn to Connie and her grandparents.
“You have to go,” I say.
Connie grabs my arm. “What are you doing?”
I look toward Penelope, giving her sister my answer. I can’t leave her here to deal with this alone. I move toward the glass and Penelope calls my name. Somehow, maybe because I’m a halfling, I push through the glass and straddle the line between both sides. One foot in the void and one out of it. Immediately the void pushes through my skin and it stings. It burns and lingers, like getting punched in the gut, stabbed in the eye, choking on popcorn all at once.
“Get out of here, Carter,” Penelope yells through the foggy void.
But I can’t. Not without her. I open my eyes. It’s hard to see in all the swirling mist, but she’s clear and bright like stars. The girl draped in fire and smoke. The sole witch, marked with magic on both sides. Without thinking, I move toward her. The magic burns at my skin, like a windburn and a sunburn, like the times my father and I used to go sailing near Annapolis. Tears sting at my eyes. It feels like the skin is peeling off my muscles, but it’s a good pain. A purposeful one.
I find her hand somehow, and I am walking on clouds. It’s the sun up here. The void is stronger than any drug could be. My brain is mush. If this is what it feels like for her, then it’s no wonder that Pen couldn’t stop using the void. No wonder my mom chose this over me. No wonder that Pen chose this, even to the point of it destroying her. She let it fill her up until it poisoned her, until she became something else. Until she popped.
The image of the red balloon flashes in my head. Then the blue balloon. My father popping it.
That’s not how we use magic. This is not how Prescott men act.
I’m snapped back into the moment as the pain comes rushing to the surface of my head. I can’t handle it. The void grows stronger around me, and everything is fuzzy. I fall to my knees. I still see the memory. The red-turned-blue balloon popping. My dad’s face.
Popping.
My hand touches a pile of dust and then hard, cold metal. I look down and the symbols of the dagger shimmer up at me. I pick it up. The dagger releases, but it also severs a connection. It’s the one thing I needed to stop this. To stop her. And here it is, in my hand.
Pop.
I can stop this.
Somehow, I make it to my feet, and Penelope is screaming, crying out, glowing and shining like the sun, fire and heat. The void is burning my face, but all I see is her. Each step closer toward her is needles in my skin, movement against the wind, but finally, she’s in my arms. I don’t need to see the clock to know we’re almost out of time. I need to sever this before the time is up. When it’s up, she’s gone from me forever
“Get away from me. Get out,” she yells through tears.
“I won’t leave you.”
“Then we’ll both die.”
I pull her closer to me. “I love you,” I say. I press her lips to mine and I want to kiss her. I want to kiss her while the world we live in goes to hell. Literally. Forget it all here with her. So, I do. I enjoy the moment with the girl, the feel of her lips on mine.
And then I slide the dagger into her side.
She falls into me, and I stand with her body bleeding into my shirt. She glances up, tears in her eyes. “I love you,” I repeat. I say it over and over, hoping she understands what I did. The dagger severs a connection. It was the only way. To make it stop, I had to sever her connection to the magic.
Lightening flashes and the fire fades away, seeps out of her skin and into the room, and she starts to look like herself again.
Then she turns white, and I swoop her into my arms. The void thrashes against us as I carry her out. It almost feels angry. It’s lost the thing it wanted. Each step I take with her makes it push against me. My legs are stiff in the wind of the void, like walking through quicksand during a snowstorm. I hold Penelope as tightly as I can in my arms, even as the void pulls at her, at me.
When I finally reach the other end, the glass lets me through, and I fall to my knees. My skin is still burning, and when I look I can see that I’m bleeding everywhere. Little marks stitched across my skin. Pen’s blood on my shirt. Her head in the crook of my arm. Her family gathers around us, and then there’s a cracking sound.
“Get down,” Frank shouts out a protection spell as there’s an explosion and the glass shatters around us, pulverizing everything like an unexpected downpour.
&nb
sp; Chapter Forty-Seven
Penelope
I wake up in my bed still sore. I’m not sure how long it’s been, but I force myself up, and a dull ache forms in my gut. Everything that happened is fuzzy. I remember pieces, images. I remember everything clearly before I stepped into the void. The attack on the Observance, that Lia was really Emmaline, that Azsis brought in my family to motivate me. I sort of remember this feeling, that I had all this power at my fingertips, but I can’t place what it felt like to be there.
I can see flashes of Azsis’ body as he walked to me in the void, his skin falling apart, and I remember Carter’s face with the fog swirling around him. Then I woke up here with doctors and medicine. What happened to everyone?
There is something gone. It is not so tangible, unexplainable really. Just gone.
I anchor myself on the dresser as I try to move. I only take a couple of steps before my door opens and Carter rushes to my side. He looks the same, except for the small red cuts that cover his skin.
“You’re awake,” he says. I look up at him and he freezes, his face changing slightly.
“What is it?”
He shakes his head. “Your eyes.”
I look past him at the mirror on my wall. Even in the distance, I can see it. My once blue eyes are now an emerald green, bright, and deep. “Holy cow,” I say, taking a step toward the mirror. My eyes are green now. Green like a demon. This is because of the void? “I have green eyes.” I have to repeat it to be sure.
Carter rests a hand on my shoulder. “I like it,” he says with a smile. His eyes reflect back at me, a little lighter than mine. Not green like a demon’s, green like Carter’s. But having these eyes, after all the things I’ve done, the witches will never accept me. Not once the news spreads.
What I’ve done. I’ve caused so much damage. I grasp onto Carter’s arm. “What happened? Are the demons still causing trouble? I didn’t know they were going to attack the Observance. How many people were injured?” The words keep tumbling out, like the weight of the guilt I’m feeling is pushing them all to the surface. Tears force out of my eyes. “And the Statics? Carter, what happened to everyone? I did this. I caused all of this. How many people died because of me? How could I do this?”
Carter pulls me into him, and I gasp for air. He’s trying to calm me down but I want answers. “Tell me, please,” I manage.
He strokes my hair and lowers me to sit on the edge of my bed. With a sigh, he sits next to me. “The Statics—it all went away. The witches still have magic, but the Statics don’t. It disappeared while we were…there, I guess. The demons are still here. The balance is in check.”
I exhale. “How many died?”
“I don’t have a number.”
I close my eyes, trying to block the tears. Carter’s hand rests on mine. “The Triad and the council are trying to clean up and recover. They want to have a meeting with us. I’m going tomorrow to answer questions, and they’ll want to talk to you when you’re better.”
“What will they do to me?”
Carter exhales. “I have no idea.”
I look back at the mirror, and the feeling returns, the emptiness. I focus on the magic that I usually pull from Carter, the intensity of the void trying to get out of me. I picture using the magic, making what I want a reality. Nothing happens. Gran, Pop, and Connie are downstairs, and I could focus on them. Focus on using the essence that I can pull from in their presence. But looking at my eyes and feeling the nothingness, I know. “I don’t have magic anymore.”
Carter meets my gaze in the mirror. “What?”
“It’s gone.” He looks surprised, but he’s resigned. I replay the moments in my mind. I only had the void, then the essence came out of nowhere.
“The dagger severs a connection,” I whisper. I was using them both when Carter stabbed me. “It severed both connections.” The only reason everyone is safe again is because I don’t have magic. I can’t be the sole witch or a halfling or a demon queen. Without magic, I’m not a threat to anything.
“We can figure out a way to get it back. I promise, I’ll figure it out,” Carter says.
I stare at myself, at the green eyes, and suddenly, I don’t want magic. Magic got me into this mess—I never felt like I was enough without it. Everything I did was to get it back. I’ve spent years working toward that goal, toward finding Azsis. But he’s gone. It’s gone. Maybe I’m not meant to have magic.
“I don’t need it,” I say. Carter looks surprised, but also a little relieved. Happy, almost. “I’m a Static now.” As I say it, the weight of that rushes over me. I don’t have magic, and if I’m Static then I can’t be part of this world. I’ll have to leave everything behind.
Carter wraps his arms around my neck and kisses my cheek. “I love Statics.”
…
Gran, Pop, and Connie all stare at me in silence when I finish telling them everything. “I’m sorry for all the things I did,” I say. And I am. I wanted to protect them all from what I did, and I broke my family more than anyone else.
“Please tell me that you’ll all forgive me. Whatever happens with the Triad, I need you.”
Gran nods in my direction. “We love you, Penelope, but it’s going to take some time for us to forget all of this. We have a lot of repairing to do in our family.” Gran looks between us. “No more secrets. We have to trust one another.”
Pop takes her hand, and looks at me. “And that you’re grounded until further notice probably goes without saying.”
“That’s all?” I say.
“For now. Let’s wait until we hear from the Triad.”
Gran moves first across the living room and pulls me into a hug. She wraps her arms around me so tightly that it hurts to breathe. I don’t complain, though. I like this moment. I needed it. Wrapped in her arms, I cry. Gran doesn’t let go. If anything, the tears make her hold me tighter.
She presses a kiss against my forehead, and whispers in my ear that it will be all right. I stay in her arms like that until the crying stops. I don’t deserve them.
“You don’t have magic at all?” Connie asks.
I shake my head. “It’s probably better this way. I think I’ve had enough of magic forever.”
Pop raises an eyebrow. “It will certainly make things less interesting around here. We could all be well-served with that.”
Connie smiles at me, her eyes soft. “I love you.”
Considering she was asleep for nearly a month of her life, she’s taking all of this extremely well. My sister, ladies and gentlemen, classier than I can ever be.
“Maybe this means I will always win at rock, paper, scissors,” she adds.
I shake my head with a smile. “I’m still your big sister. I know how you think.”
She holds out her fist. I do the same. We move our hands three times and Connie holds out paper, which I knew she would do. I pick scissors.
I could let her win this one, but I don’t want her to think I’ve gone too soft.
…
Later, I step outside to call Ric. He talked with Connie while I was sleeping, but that was before anyone knew what happened with me. I owe him an apology and explanation. Nerves creep up in my stomach. He has every right to completely deny me forgiveness, to make me beg. I’m prepared for that. I’m prepared for worse, I realize, as I pull up his number. For flat out rejection, for him to ignore me, for…he answers on the second ring.
“I am the worst friend and if you never forgive me then I totally understand,” I say in a breath.
He laugh-sighs into the phone. A sound of relief, almost. “I wondered when I’d hear your voice.”
I gulp back tears. I guess once you cry, it’s harder to turn off the emotions that brew under the surface. “The things I said were horrible. I have not been supportive of you at all through your loss and the rest of everything. I know you were trying to help.”
“I was so worried when Connie told me you were conked out too,” he starts. Ric doesn’t
sound angry, which is good. Angry Ric isn’t someone I’ve ever been able to reason with. “I texted every hour. Like, for real, you Grey girls are such drama queens.”
I laugh, and the tears squeeze out of my eyes. “Maybe we like to steal the spotlight.”
“To steal it and dance in it for three encores.”
I laugh, which was what he was going for. The tension seems to slip away, at least for this moment. It does give me strength to face whatever happens next. “I’m so sorry.”
“I forgive you. You’re my family,” he says. He is my family, too. His voice gets louder and seems to drift at once, and I turn the volume up on my phone. “I’m not complete without you—you’re the queen of stupid.”
His voice has a weird echo. “Are you in a tunnel or something?”
“No, why?”
“I hear two of you.”
“Oh! That’s because I’m behind you,” he says. I turn around on the porch and he’s already on the bottom step. He slides his phone into his pocket and smiles at me. His eyes are big, rimmed in red from a lack of sleep or crying and his jaw has the thin scruff of a red beard. That’s new for him. His hair is darker, a light brown now, and it’s been shaved. I like this look on him. He looks thinner than he did when he left, but still strong. Still able to kick someone’s ass, at least with some sleep.
He holds his arms out for me. Wordlessly, we hug each other. It feels right here. He squeezes me so tight I think he may snap me in half. I don’t complain, though. “I thought I’d lost you, too,” he whispers.
“You’re stuck with me,” I say back. “Unless you squeeze me to death.”
He laughs and loosens his grip a little. We stay that way a few more seconds, and when we part, Ric keeps his hands on my forearms. “Girl, you better believe you are going to tell me every single detail. I’m going to call you stupid, over and over, and then I’m going to make you sit through every detail of my recoveration.”
I smile. “I can’t wait.”
His hands fall away from my arms and he’s staring at me. I know why before he says, “Wow, your eyes. You can definitely make green work.”
Storm: a Salt novel (Entangled Teen) Page 26
