An Arcane Inheritance by Kamilah Cole - 36

Ellory had expected it to be difficult, if not outright impossible, to find the hidden clearing again, but it was as if Riverside Campus were eager to suck her back into its concealed areas. Fear made her surroundings smudge together. Every sound was an Old Master seconds away from capturing her. Her vision blurred, and her chest burned, and she was sure she must have looked unhinged to anyone who saw her, but the campus was empty and dark. She could see only the path ahead, which led her all the way to the lake without injury.

Tai and Cody needed her. Hudson and Boone, if they were sleeping there as well. She wouldn’t let them down.

She was in the middle of drawing a summoning circle—frantic edges, bare of offerings—when the ghost light appeared to lead her way. It vibrated, as if it, too, were in a hurry, as if it knew that she wasn’t safe lingering here. The rotting pile of fish had been cleared since she’d last been there, but the flowering rushes drooped like they were considering an early grave, too.

She had her Taser in one hand and her phone in the other. It did little to stave off the anxiety of knowing that she was being hunted like a duck during the fall season. Everything Colt had revealed tumbled around her throbbing head, the proprietary way he’d said, This won’t hurt , as if that would be her only problem with what the Old Masters were doing. With what they had done. It made her sick, even more sick than not knowing what she would have done if they had inducted her. Would she have given up on her investigation, ignored all red flags like Boone, just for a taste of that same power? Would she have forgotten the Lost Eight if she’d been given the magic to keep Carol healthy for the rest of her life?

She didn’t know , and she hated herself for that.

Every time she blinked, she saw Hudson’s face: his half smiles when he didn’t want to admit he found her funny, the aloofness he wore like a shield against being taken advantage of by a populace who saw his last name first, all the soft affection he poured into his friendship with Boone. He had been the first person to believe her, the person who had helped her most, and at some point, he had become a support system she couldn’t bear to lose.

They had taken him from her as easily as they’d tried to take her power. And that, she knew, she could never let stand.

Let the rest of the world forget him. That was their mistake to make.

She would remember and remember and remember.

The ghost light zipped through the trees, and Ellory hurtled after it. She slapped branches and leaves out of her path. She skidded over rocks and twigs. Her foot caught in an exposed root that sent her tumbling onto the leaf-coated ground, scraping her palms and sending another zing of pain from her hip down to her ankle. Light hovered over her, waiting for her to get her bearings, but the cold earth had slapped some sense into her. Riverside Campus was alive with rustling and shouts, the Old Masters bearing down on her, and she was running out of energy. Even if she made it to the hidden tower, what then? Another creature could be waiting. Or, worse, they could surround her and starve her out.

How could David take on Goliath? Even with a Taser, not a slingshot, Ellory felt outmatched.

Yet Letitia Rose had sent her a guide, a way to escape the fate that she hadn’t. Ellory owed it to Tai and Cody, to Hudson and Boone, to the Lost Eight and to herself, to keep going.

She pushed herself up and hobbled onward.

The shingled roof of the schoolhouse crested the trees, like a lighthouse directing her through rocky waters. Ellory was so busy staring at it that she almost didn’t notice the person who stepped into her path. She slipped to a stop, inches away from colliding into the broad chest of Liam Blackwood.

“No.” The word fell from her lips in a breathless plea. “Not you. Please not you, too.”

“It doesn’t have to be like this.” Liam looked like he had the first day she’d met him: white-and-black-striped polo and loose blue jeans, clean-shaven jaw and swooping chestnut hair. He was so handsome that it pained her, though not as much as his presence. “They’ll stop chasing you if you stop running. Don’t you want to stop running?”

Ellory shoved past him, but he caught her by both wrists. She was on a mission, but he was lacrosse captain. Her struggles for freedom were laughable in the face of the easy strength he was using against her. She could use magic, but she felt too raw, too volatile right now. She might kill him. She didn’t want him dead .

“I don’t understand.” Her eyes stung, but she refused to cry any more tears over this man. “If you’re one of the Old Masters, why did you even ask me out?”

“I’m not one of the Old Masters.” Liam looked sad , like he knew whatever he said next would be no better. “I’m a part of your dream, Ellory.”

“Sorry… what ?”

She stopped fighting, stopped moving, stopped everything . Colt had said something similar, but the desire to escape and rescue her sleeping friends had pushed the bizarre revelation about herself to the back of her mind. Now, trapped and forced to face it, she could feel her surroundings blur as though the backdrop to this conversation were unnecessary. As though she and Liam were the only two people in this world.

“You’re dreaming. You’ve been locked in a dream for three years now, and you’re only now awake enough to recognize the truth. This is how the Old Masters siphon magic. They’ve crafted a spell that lets you slumber while your magic feeds theirs. The magic allows you to live a full life in the world the dreamers have created, occasionally moderated by an Old Master. In your case, your moderator was Preston Colt. Your part of the dream was me.” He looked down as though seeing himself for the first time, his black plimsolls lined with dirt from his trek through the hazy forest. “It’s an amazing likeness, but the real Liam Blackwood doesn’t know who you are. I’m just a story you were telling yourself, encouraged by the spell to distract you from the truth you’d forgotten.”

“Hudson,” she whispered. “I’m in love with Hudson.”

“You were,” Liam admitted. “In your waking world. Until the Old Masters found out. And found you two.”

Ellory’s mouth opened, but she couldn’t speak. Tears streamed steadily over her cheeks. She didn’t remember being in love with Hudson, but she’d felt it, hadn’t she? Every time they’d been together in this fictitious version of reality, she had been focused on him above all else, like he was the only real thing she knew. Those half conversations had been lost memories, returning to her whenever they bonded anew, giving her the strength she needed to break free of the spell’s control. And he’d disappeared because she’d overplayed her hand.

He was in danger, and it was all her fault.

He had loved her, and her love had destroyed him.

“Wait.” Ellory shook her head before the guilt could debilitate her, her thoughts snagging on something Liam had said. “You—you’re the one who forced me to admit that I had feelings for Hudson. You basically pushed me into his arms. Why would you do that if you were just a distraction?”

Liam finally released her. He slid his hands into his pockets and shrugged.

“It wouldn’t make any sense for the spell to do that,” she continued as the ghost light sailed around them, illuminating them in a circle of sunflower yellow. Reminding her that she was free, that she had to move, that every second she wasted was another second her loved ones were in danger. “If you were just a distraction, you would never have let me go. You would have fought for me. You would have done anything to keep me away from Hudson, from the truth about the Old Masters.” She stepped forward until she was close enough to place her hand over his chest. His heart beat beneath her fingers, strong and true. “Maybe this world isn’t real. Maybe you aren’t either. But what we felt was real, Liam. You love me. I saw it. I still see it.”

Those chocolate-brown eyes melted under her scrutiny. Real or not, this was a man who was still not over her. His heartbeat raced beneath her touch. He leaned closer to her, as if aching for a kiss, and then turned his face away to look at the forest behind them. “I do. Love you, I mean. I want you to stay here with me. Everyone else has forgotten about Hudson, and I’m sure you can, too. We can have a real shot if you just…stay.” He reached up to cover her hand with his. But this time, he wasn’t trapping her. This time, he was pleading. “Please, Ellory. Don’t fight them. Stay.”

“I can’t,” she murmured, her free hand reaching up to turn his face back to her. She wanted him to see how serious she was. She wanted to see the love that she was giving away. “I’ll die. And even if I don’t—even if it’s not for a while—they’re never going to stop until someone stops them, Liam. People have died, and people will die, unless I stop them.”

“That doesn’t have to be your problem.”

It was every doubt she’d ever had, every time she’d felt scared and alone, every turned back and ignored epiphany in her quest to eke out some normalcy from her school year. Liam was right. She could take his hand and stop running. She could give in to the Old Masters, let them take her memories of Hudson and Boone, let them take her magic along with it, and build a life here in this constructed space. If she really was creating a dreamworld, then she and the others could make it kinder and softer than the one she’d left behind. She could succeed here in ways she never could out there, instead of making herself miserable fighting something stronger than herself.

She could. But Ellory knew she wouldn’t. And if Liam really was a part of her, then he knew it, too.

“ Someone needs to make this their problem,” she said, her voice quiet but firm. “If I’m going to die, I want to die experiencing all the pleasure and pain the world has to offer me. I want to die doing, being, and feeling something real . Something better.”

Liam’s throat bobbed as he swallowed. He leaned into her touch with a heart-shattering smile that was painful to look at. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“This is exactly what I like about you, Ellory. You actually give a shit, you know? So many people have forgotten how.” Reluctantly, he extracted himself from her grip and stepped past her to face the looming trees. “I’m not part of their spell, Ellory—I’m part of you. I am your creation . And I’ll hold them back as long as I can. You go. End this.”

Ellory fought back a sob. “Will you be okay?”

“I don’t exist, remember?” He glanced at her over his shoulder, and this smile was more like the ones she remembered, golden and bright and devastating. “Just do me a favor? Give the Liam out there—the real Liam—the chance to get to know you when you wake. As friends. He deserves that chance.”

“I will.” She wiped her damp eyes. “I love you. Even if it’s not like that, I want you to know—”

“I know,” Liam said warmly. “Goodbye, Ellory.”

“Goodbye, Liam.”

The ghost light shot onward. With one last look back, Ellory followed.