“The place beyond death?” Marci repeated, brows collapsing into a scowl. “Wait, so you knew I was going to die?”
The little red dragon gave her a sideways look. “Youarea mortal. No spoilers, but—”
“I meant diesoon,” Marci snapped.
“Oh, well, that was less certain,” the dragon admitted. “But my brother is a seer, so I might have had an insider tip. But don’t be angry! I’m here to help you.”
Marci didn’t buy that for a moment. “You died to help me?” she said skeptically, and then her face fell as she realized what that meant. “Wait, when you say you’re dead, too, do you meandeaddead?”
“As a doornail,” Amelia assured her. “I’m ash on the other side.” She flapped her tiny fiery wings. “This is the last of me.”
Marci gaped at her. “Why?”
“Because I saw a chance to do what no one else could,” the dragon said proudly. “Even Bob can’t see what happens here, so the details were a bit fuzzy, but all our best guesses said that you still had a good chance of becoming the first Merlin even after you died. You’ve actually already done the hardest part, which was getting here. All that’s left now is to clinch the deal, and if there’s anyone who can clinch a deal, it’s you.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Marci said. “But how does my becoming Merlin help you? You’re still dead.”
“Ah, but I’m also still burning.” Amelia turned to point at her glowing ember plumage. “Remember when I told you that so long as even a bit of her fire was still going, a dragon could live on? Well, you’re seeing theory in action. I might be only a fraction of what I was before, but so long as I burn, the core of Amelia the Planeswalker, Greatest Dragon Mage of All Time, lives on. More importantly, I’m livinghere,on the other side, where no dragon has gone before. And speaking of...” She swiveled her head to look over the house, the car, and the silent shell of on-ramps that caged them in. “Swanky digs. Are all mortal deaths this enormous?”
“No,” Aldo Novalli said quietly. “No, they are not.”
Amelia jolted at his voice, almost falling out of Marci’s fingers. “Who’sthat?” she cried, scrambling up Marci’s arm.
“He’s my father,” Marci said, unsure why the dragon was only noticing him now. “Dad, Amelia the Planeswalker. Amelia, this is my dad, Aldo Novalli.”
Aldo gave her his famously charming smile, but Amelia was still staring at him as though he were an impossibility. “How did your dad end up insideyourdeath?”
“It’s a long story,” Aldo said. “But the short version is that I died, was forgotten, and was then restored to my daughter to help her find her way.”
That sounded unnecessarily cryptic to Marci, but Amelia looked like he’d just explained the secrets of the universe. “I get it now,” she said, nodding appreciatively. “That clever cat.”
“Well, I wish you’d explain it to me,” Marci said, exasperated. “Because I have no idea what’s going on.”
“It’s very simple,” Amelia said quickly. “We’re in your death, right? Right. And do you know where your death is?”
Marci shook her head. “My dad said it was the impression left by life, but he didn’t have a location.”
“He wouldn’t,” Amelia said. “Modern mortals don’t have a clue when it comes to death, though he was right about the impression thing. This place”—she waved her claw at the house, the gravel driveway, and the dirt lot beyond—“is a crater formed by the impact of your life. It’s literally your mark on the world, sort of like the giant grooves dug by humanity’s collective fears and hopes that become Mortal Spirits, but on a one-person scale. Following so far?”
Marci nodded, looking around at the wall of on-ramps, which she now saw that, unlike the real version in the DFZ, had no tunnel leading out. “I get that this is the mark made by my life,” she said, turning back to Amelia. “But what did I make a markin?”
“The magical landscape, of course.”
“Wait,” Marci said, leaning into her. “You mean there’s aliteralmagical landscape? As in the place where spirits have their vessels?”
“The very same,” Amelia said, nodding. “To understand what that really means, though, you first have to understand how magic enters the world.”
This was what she’d been waiting for her whole life. “Tell me.”
Amelia smiled and rose up on her hind legs, pressing her forefeet flat together. “Like most other magically awakened planes, this realm is really two halves sandwiched together: a physical world, and a magical one. The classic example is two sides of a coin, but I find it easier to imagine a plane as a sheet of paper: two distinct faces, but still one whole. A wrinkle on one side—say a mountain—causes an equal but opposite formation on the other—a Spirit of the Land. Following?”
Marci nodded rapidly. What Amelia was explaining was similar to several already popular theories, but none of those could explain…
“How are humans magical?” she asked. “If there are two sides, then we definitely live in the physical one. So where does our magic come from?”
“The same place all magic does,” the dragon explained. “Here. Just because you think of yourself as living on one side doesn’t mean you don’t touch the other. Remember, they’re not actually separate places. We’re talking about two halves of a whole. As a native species of this plane, humans, just like every other magical creature, exist in both halves simultaneously, meaning you have a physical self, your body, and a magical self—”
“The soul,” Marci finished excitedly.
