***
“Are you going to hurt me, Morgan? Let me make it easy for you.”
***
“We can end this.”
***
And then she paused. She had time for one goodbye.
***
Tai and Cody sat across from her at Little House, sharing a catfish po’boy and potato wedges. Ellory knew at once that this wasn’t real—or rather, that this was another memory she had plunged into—and yet she took the time to enjoy it. Afternoon sun slanted through the blinds, and Tai was wearing one of the corset tops that made her breasts look amazing. Cody, in their soccer uniform, fed Tai a potato wedge, and Ellory instinctively made the same grossed-out face that she’d made then, even though there was nothing disgusting about two people so deeply in love.
Especially not when it might be the last time she ever saw it.
“Are you sure about this?” Tai said after she’d swallowed her potato wedge. “Who’s to say Graves is even being honest with you about how much he knows about magic? He didn’t tell you about it in the first place, right?”
Cody pried the blinds apart with two fingers, and Ellory realized that it wasn’t the sun that cast lines of light and shadow across the table. There was nothing outside the restaurant but a network of roots, each glowing blue. Lightning shot through them, erupting like fireworks outside the window.
A network of borrowed power, calling for her attention. She was so close to freedom, to the light, to ending all this. The spell was nearly complete.
Ellory ignored it for a little while longer, reaching across the table to take her friend’s hand in hers. They were still asleep, in the waking world, but she would save them soon. And if she didn’t, well, at least she got to see them one more time.
“I’m not sure about anything,” she said. “But I have to try. I have to protect us.”
“Who’s going to protect you?” Cody asked, carefully separating a shrimp from the sandwich. “And don’t say Graves. I don’t trust him either.”
“Then trustme, because I do.” Ellory took Cody’s hand, too, the one that wasn’t covered in shrimp grease, and she smiled soothingly at both of them so they wouldn’t notice her memorizing their faces. “Hudson will help.”
“Okay,” Tai said without hesitation. “I trust you, Lor. Of course I do.”
“And we’re here,” said Cody. “If you need us for anything. You might have to work with Graves, but you don’t have to do it all alone. Got it?”
Light flashed in the corner of her eye again. Her reckoning waited only for her to reach out and take it.
“Got it.” Ellory drew her hands back, fighting tears. “I have to go.”
“We’re not finished eating,” said Tai, eyebrows drawn together in confusion.
Ellory squared her shoulders and headed for the door. “It’s time for me to remember.”
***
Ellory awoke in a bed both familiar and unfamiliar. She recognized the soft feel of these thousand-thread-count sheets, but it had been so long—too long—since she had seen the world from this perspective. Books stacked precariously on every flat surface, covering the floor except for a narrow trail cleared between the door and the bed.Reel to Realby bell hooks annotated on the side table, an ornate bookmark just pages from the center of the novel. A constellation of glow-in-the-dark stars on the ceiling, the only compromise on the subject of a night-light in the room.
The door opened.
She sat up as Hudson strolled in wearing a pair of frayed black jeans and nothing else. Thin black hair spanned the skin between his pectorals down to his dark brown nipples. A trio of tattoos lined his inner bicep: the alchemical symbols for salt, sulfur, and mercury. His toned chest and soft stomach glistened with water. A small mint-green towel hung from around his neck.
“This,” he said with a smirk, “is the liminal space you’ve created, is it?”
Ellory settled against the bed frame, admiring the view. “You’re welcome.”
Hudson left the door open as he dripped his way across the room. She leaned into his touch like a flower in the sun, her eyes sliding closed as he pressed their foreheads together. He smelledlike bergamot and shea butter, momentarily distracting her with a memory of the first time they had showered together and she had complained, for three days after, about his expensive, though fragrant, Yves Saint Laurent soap.
“We don’t have much time,” he said, trailing kisses down the line of her nose. “I can keep talking for only so long before they get suspicious.”
