Just waiting for me to slip back into the Emmy-shaped space I’d left behind.
“I got you,” I told Linden, looping an arm around her waist, trying to stifle my unease at how natural all this felt. “Talia, do you want to come, too?”
She shook her head hastily, wrinkling her nose a little.
“Oh, no, I don’t think so. This . . . type of thing isn’t really my scene.” She chewed on the inside of her lip, then patted Linden’s shoulder so gingerly I nearly laughed, as if emotional distress might have turned Lin into spun glass. “But be sure to ply her with lots of sugar for me. I’ve heard that helps.”
“On it,” I promised. “So, I’ll see you soon?”
She nodded, tipping me a glimmering wink over her shoulder as she turned away, fluttering one hand in a coy little wave.
Trust Talia Avramov to make even “goodbye” feel taboo, more a tantalizing promise than a farewell.
10
Upon My Mark!
The midday sun wavered on the surface of the lake like a sunken coin, caught in the reflected ring of trees that circled the water’s edge. Bright sprays of purple clustered all along the banks, the Scottish thistle that grew wild and abundant up here lending the town below its name.
I’d forgotten how tiny the town looked from here, as if you stood much higher than the 512 feet listed in the tourist guidebooks as the official height of Hallows Hill. It was another of those quirks of Thistle Grove—a lake vaster than it had any right to be, atop a hill that measured much smaller than it felt. It almost made sense, given that Lady’s Lake was Thistle Grove’s enchanted heart, the central font from which magic gushed like a geyser before flowing throughout the town. Theories abounded as to what made it so special; maybe a sorceress of untold power drowned here millennia ago, or some minor goddess claimed it for her own. Or the veil between this world and the next had torn somewhere far beneath the water’s surface, letting the magic come coursing in.
The lake was too deep to properly plumb—and even if it hadn’t been, there was probably nothing there to see. So the story remained that some lady, at some unknown time, rendered it magical through some unknown means. And just for kicks, threw in a whole mess of fancy fish you didn’t normally find in Illinois.
I stood on the south end of the lake, with Thistle Grove directly to my back. The combatants were arrayed at the other three cardinal points, an audience of family members clustered behind them at the tree line to cheer them on. They stood too far away for me to make out their faces—which was too bad, given how badly I was itching for a glimpse of Talia, whom I hadn’t seen since the night of the opening three days ago. Poor Linden’s mini breakdown had only devolved after we left The Bitters, and I’d ended up sleeping over at her place to make sure she was okay. She’d been too drunk and distraught to make much coherent sense, so I just sat with her instead, washing down Emilio’s famous day-old dozen with boxed white wine and letting her cry against me. I’d woken up back-to-back with her, with crumbs and frosting sticky in my hair, feeling more at peace than I had in years. There was something uniquely magical about sleeping cozied up with a best friend, a primal sense of safety and contentment that couldn’t really be explained.
It had just been really, really nice to be with her again.
Just as the sun arced into noon overhead, a faint blue glow began to radiate from within the Grimoire where it sat on a portable pedestal in front of me. This time I’d chosen to stand alone, feeling confident enough to shrug into the Arbiter’s mantle myself.
Scratch that, not just confident. Downright eager, practically aching to immerse myself in that heady exhilaration again.
As soon as the mantle settled over my shoulders, there came that sense of surging growth, followed by a giddy head rush as each of my senses kaleidoscoped into dazzling life. I expanded until my head all but brushed the canopy of creamy clouds, until I could see all the way to the clear horizon; past the web of streets, orderly orchards, and rolling woods of Thistle Grove, past even the fields of crops that spread out far beyond.
A strange, deep conviction sang through me, almost like a summons. You were born for this.
When I looked back down at the Grimoire, words had coalesced into my first prompt.
Vying scions from the families three, eager to don the Victor’s Wreath,
You must hurry, and hasten, and demonstrate your speed!
By west and south and east and north,
Hie thee bring the flower forth!
So it would be speed first, then, I thought, a thrill corkscrewing through my belly as the Grimoire’s glow melted from blue to a delicate rosy gold. The light spun up into filaments, spooling into a ball that hovered just above the pages. Petals peeled off and unfurled from its center, forming a gilded flower, a filigreed rose made of softly pulsing light. Then it zoomed straight up like the prettiest-ever UFO, glow intensifying as it lifted, its radiance eliciting a chorus of gasps from combatants and spectators alike.