Belinda linked her arm through mine, and we set off for Conventicles Crossing after Skye made a request that I should’ve seen coming. Skye was doing the least amount of porting.Conventicles Crossing to Creatus, and that was it. The rest of the journey was going to be on foot.
We passed multiple Anti-Human Initiative propaganda posters on the way, some I didn’t understand. A human wearing a paper towel bib and eating a sticky rack of ribs. Humans asking for money, holding signs saying they didn’t have a house or a way to feed their family — some had dogs with them.
“Is it really like that?” asked Belinda, still holding tight to my elbow. “People don’t have places to live?”
“Oh.” I thought for a second. “Sometimes. In some places it is.”
“And your leaders do nothing? They don’t care?”
“Um.” I pressed my lips together, then parted them. “Some do.”
Belinda was a Seven, so it felt unkind to mention Everden had its own problems. The majority of Aspirants forced to deteriorate and work menial jobs. Dark Witches outcasts on the mainland. There might not have been a housing crisis, but certainly some people lived better than others. And I’d only seen Hartik’s Hollow, the capital, the wealthiest part.
Skye’s green eyes enlarged to the size of moons, her mouth quivering as she looked up from under her dark lashes, holding out her arms like she was carrying a large box. “Did you see the one about the kitties in the field?”
“Oh my Goddess, yes!” Belinda said, and stroked Pepper’s head to soothe her. “How could they!”
Belinda finally let go of me when we reached Conventicles Crossing, but only because that section of Varanus Street, with its hordes of witches bustling from ingress to egress in a constant, chaotic stream, was too crowded for her to keep holding on.
I briefly lost Skye, but after getting spun around a few times in my search for short black hair and a dozen stud earrings, I found her a few paces back from the madness, standing like a sad tree.I wove through the crowd to where she was. Beside her, Nova’s back was contracted in a high arch, her black hair standing on end as she hissed at the silver gateway to Creatus. But Skye only looked vaguely forward, silent and unmoving, not even checking her back the way she always did so diligently. The length of black hair that swept over the left side of her forehead hung flatly.
“You doing okay?” I asked.
“Do you know how long it takes to walk to Creatus?” she asked.
“I don’t,” I answered.
Skye flipped her transmitter around to show me. “Fourteen days if we don’t stop. We could make it before Selection.”
“Isn’t Selection here in Hartik’s Hollow?” I asked. “So, what, we’d have like four days to walk back here for it?”
“Yeah,” Skye sighed. “Maybe if we took a horse . . .”
“Oh, Skye,” Belinda said, stepping forward, her face swelling with an unnatural amount of empathy. “Do you really want to do that to the horse? You’d need likegallonsof water at your fingertips. Is that something you have?”
“No,” Skye sighed again.
“Come on,” I said, taking her hand. “The worst part is the lead-up . . .andthe motion sickness afterward. But you’ll survive. You’re very strong and manly.”
“I am,” Skye said a bit pathetically as we dragged her to the egress.
We hurtled through the roaring tunnel of light, my stomach swooping more violently than the last few times I’d ported.
Midway through the portal, Belinda turned back to us with her cheeks flapping. “It is,” she shouted, “unanimously agreed. That this is the worst porting route. In all of Everden.”
I understood why. Whatever magic had come together to forge the path between Hartik’s Hollow and Creatus seemed hellbent on splitting that vortex apart.
I had to brace my hands on my knees when it spat us out.Skye rushed for the first random building in sight, clutching her stomach. When I straightened, a heavy gust of hot wind smacked me in the face, bringing a million different smells that hit me all at once. Iron and rust. Peppers and potatoes. Sweet and heavy smoke. And the earth — dusty, warm, baking.
In the distance was a desert, but the center of Creatus was essentially Manhattan. It had some of the tallest buildings I’d ever seen. Glittering and shining, sleek, silver and steel.
Then there was Skye. Retching over a potted shrub.
“So,” I said, not sure what to do with Belinda’s brown eyes twinkling up at me as we waited. “How’d you get stuck with this job?”
“Oh? Me?” asked Belinda.
I blinked at her, wondering if I’d misread the expectant way she’d been looking at me.
