Page 106 of The Alchemists

“They don’t support you?”

Tori laughed sharply. “Thank Vexiliar for trust funds, and legal adulthood, and illusion charms.”

Lily let the armchair swallow her.

Tori ate a miniature scone.

“I really appreciate you telling me, trusting me.” She raised her eyes to Tori’s, not sure how to go on. “But…”

“But you want to know why I brought you here just to tell you I’m trans?”

“Something like that.”

“I told you because we all have our curses, our private griefs—some are more straightforward, or easier to bear, than others—mine was being born in the wrong body, yours is dying early.”

“But—”

“Yeah, yours is an actual curse, stamped and sealed, je sais. I’m just saying, if I didn’t have the resources available to me to transition, I would have easily traded nineteen years as myself for a lifetime in the wrong body.”

“What does this have to do with Sebastian? What’s his curse, then?”

“That’s for you to figure out, if you haven’t already. But Sebastian knows everything, everything, about me. He knows every skeleton in my closet by name and deed. He was there for me, accepted me, loved me, when my parents stopped. He’s one of the good ones.”

Tori’s words awakened a pit of snakes in Lily’s stomach. So Seb loved Tori, great. That was all well and good, but when it mattered, he had walked away from her.

“So what?” She didn’t bother to keep the venom from her voice. “So, you’re telling me to take him back if he happens to change his mind?”

“That’s your choice. But he’s scared shitless, Lily. I’m not asking you to forgive whatever idiot things he said or did, but he loves you so much, and I know you know it.”

“Tori,” she said, teeth grinding, “why did you bring me here?”

“I brought you here to ask you what the hell you’re doing with the rest of your life.”

“What do you mean?”

“You have six months to live. We’re young, and rich—well, I am—and full of Magic, and you’re…what? Moping around the Hudson Valley trying to solve some stupid riddles? Don’t you want to go to Paris, or sit on a sailboat in the Virgin Islands drinking wine until your blood is half rosé?”

Lily stared. “I can’t tell if you’re being incredibly insensitive, or…”

“I’m offering. I actively loathe most people, but somehow I care about you, and I think it’s fucking awful, what you’re dealing with. This is all I can offer, to try and help make it suck a little less.”

“So, what, you’re offering me Make-a-Wish, Curse Edition?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I am. Just don’t ask to meet Batman.” She sighed. “We have three weeks of winter break left. Let’s use it.”

“And what? We’ll all go, like a big party? All four of us?”

“If you want, or it can be just us two. Fuck boys.”

Lily gazed into her tea, so overwhelmed that she thought she might dissolve.

What do you want to do? Where do you want to go?

She had no idea. She’d never gone anywhere, not really, except for the odd dance competition and once to Florida. They’d never had the means for big trips, and she’d never bothered trying to imagine, because what was the point in wanting things you couldn’t have? People said “dream big,” but there was only pain in the unattainable, and for the most part, Lily liked what she had.

She looked up at Tori. “I honestly don’t know. What would you do if you were me?”

SEB