Snow nodded, allowing her tocontinue.
“State A would be the world where the prime minister is alive andwell.”
“And will keep living,” he added. “State C would be a world where the prime minister isdead.”
“But the Bstate. . .”
“In your example, those in the Society would assist with maneuvering the prime minister into a perilous situation,perhaps.”
Jo thought about it a long moment. “Not just killhim?”
“I am the Wish Granter. Any changes made outside of reducing that margin by any member of the Society other than myself can risk serious implications for the overall success of thewish.”
“Gotta keep yourself useful?” She grinned smugly. “Everyone else is doing all the heavy lifting. . . Jumping from A to C is too hard for you, so you make it so that you’re the only one who can flip the finalswitch?”
“That jump is dangerously easy,” Snow correctedominously.
Jo was distracted from any follow-up.
The narrow, office-lined hallways of the Ranger compound opened up into a large meeting space. Men and women sat at round tables, eating, working, talking—all oblivious to the specters in their midst. Snow and Jo walked the length of the room to the wall of glass that overlooked a much more familiarsight.
Picturesque hills rising into purple mountains could stay in their postcard-land of the Society of Wishes. This was the world sheknew.
Dallas swept out before her underneath the towered headquarters of the Rangers. The gray sky loomed over a metropolis of straight-lined, industrial buildings. Every tower competed for light by trying to smother the next in its shadow. Other official government buildings bore large flags with two horizontal bands of red and white and one vertical band of blue with a single white star and five blue stars inside—an adjustment made to the original Texan flag back in the days of pre-WIII USA. Highways stacked over highways, congested by a meaningless rat race that Jo had longavoided.
She’d always placed herself outside the norms of conventional society. Why should it be any harder to place herself outside of realityitself?
“Is this real?” she couldn’t help butask.
“It is, fornow.”
“Until someone makes anotherwish?”
“Possibly.”
“How many?” Jo’s voice had dropped to a whisper. “How many wishes have there been that have changed the worlditself?”
“Too many tocount.”
So, nothing was real. Nothing had ever been real. It was all luck of the draw crafted by a handful of people who were playing at power by making wishes using an ancient ritual they didn’t even understand. At least, she hadn’t understood it. Not really. Not atall.
Jo remembered what Wayne had said: “Reality is what we make it.” This was supposed to be her new reality now. An odd existence outside time and space, where she was magic and nothing beyond the Society waspermanent.
Her mother came to mind. Jo gripped her sweatshirt over her stomach, trying to quell the uneasiness there. Could her mother blink out of existence with one wish gone awry? If Snow was to be believed, her mother didn’t even know who she was. So, she shouldn’t feel sad about losingher.
She wouldn’t feel sad, Jo insisted to herself; she was stronger than that. “I’m ready to go backnow.”
“Back?”
“To the mansion.” Jo swallowed hard and wiped her cheeks, making sure no more rogue tears had continued their bold escape. “Home.”
Chapter 6
Because Magic
THE RESTOF the walk through the compound was done insilence.
Snow led Jo back to the supply closet where she’d started her futile attempt at escape. She contemplated telling Snow it was locked, but before she had the chance, he reached for the handle and wrapped his hand around it. The moment those elegant fingers made contact with metal, the door shifted, like a veil giving way. One second it was the wooden door of the supply closet; the next it was the solid steel door of the briefingroom.
