“Oh, Darrius,” she says, breaking their kiss and gazing up at him adoringly. “Where did you go? Who did you see? Why do you torture me?”
These inquiries bother him: the answers are none of her business. Hasn’t he taught his followers—even his favorites—not to question anything he does?
So he kisses her again, harder this time. Then even harder. She tries to pull away, but he only grips her tighter. Her fingers flutter, her body trembles and shudders—
Then Darrius steps back, and Sybil simply crumbles. Her beautiful face dissolves; her skin turns gray and shrivels into cinders. In a matter of seconds, there’s nothing left of her but a small, silvery pile of ash.
The entire room goes deathly silent—no one’s even breathing. The Family members have just witnessed their first spontaneous cremation.
Darrius allows himself a tiny smile. “I’m a very bad boy, Sybil,” he whispers. “I trust you know that by now.”
Then he calls to the fat kid nearby, the one staring at him in awe and terror. “Simon,” he says, “get over here and clean up this mess.”
Chapter 12
Whit
I THOUGHT I KNEW every inch of this City—and unlike Wisty, I’ve got a pretty good sense of direction. But here I am, shivering on a dark street I couldn’t name if my life depended on it. There’s no one else around. There isn’t even a light in a window.
I shiver and pull my jacket tighter around my shoulders. My footsteps sound like gunshots.
I’ve got to get home.
Where is home?
I walk in confused circles for what feels like hours, but then suddenly, I catch a whiff of a familiar scent—of flowers and spring and warmth. My heart skips a beat.
“Celia?” I whisper. “Celes, is that you?”
A gust of wind makes the scent grow stronger, and a dull ache blooms in my chest. My first love was killed—murdered—a long time ago, but I guess some wounds don’t ever fully heal.
“Are you there?”
I hold my breath until she flickers into view, just as I remember her: the bright blue of her eyes, the dark soft curls of her hair. But she’s so faint—fainter than she used to be.
“Hey, you,” she whispers.
“Hey, you, back,” I say. I smile and hold out my arms, as if I could hug her, but I know that I can’t. She’s a Half-light, a ghost. Trying to hold her is like trying to hold a wisp of fog.
I wait to see that perfect smile that lights up her whole face—but it doesn’t come. The cold, creeping dread I felt moments ago returns in a rush. “Celia, what’s wrong?”
Maybe it’s Janine, I think. Maybe Celia doesn’t want me to move on after all.
She reaches out to touch me, and I feel the slightest breeze—but nothing else. “You’re in terrible danger,” she whispers. “You and your sister and the whole City.”
“What else is new?” I joke, although I grimace instead of smile. And I can’t help but blurt out, “When are you going to show up with good news, Celes?” Because she has a habit of turning up in my dreams as the harbinger of doom.
But she ignores my jab, and the words come faster now. Frantically. “Powers of darkness and evil. They’re coming. Their strength is building every second.”
She gathers herself, trying to go on, but she’s so faint. I can see that the effort to say even these few words has cost her, that she wants to say so much more. “I see… great movements of people. I hear screaming.” She pauses for a breath. “I see an army of horses. They’re coming, Whit.”
“Horses?” I repeat incredulously.
Her eyes are so genuinely terrified, their blue seems almost black. She reaches out to me again, and her ghostly hand passes through mine. “I want to protect you, but I can’t. You see how faint I’ve become. You have to be prepared, Whit.” She begins to dissolve, her hand still trying to hold mine.
“Celia, wait!” I whisper urgently, but she’s already just a glimmer—and then she’s gone.
I wake with a start, shivering from head to toe. Janine’s arms are tight around my chest.
“I’m right here,” she whispers. “It’s okay.”
“Janine,” I say. I grip the sheet in my fists. “Something terrible—”
“It was a dream, Whit.” She kisses me on the cheeks, the lips. “Take it easy. You were just talking in your sleep.” She tucks the covers around me and snuggles her head against my shoulder. “Close your eyes, now, and go back to sleep. Everything’s fine. I promise.”
I want to believe her, but Celia has always tried to warn me when there’s imminent danger. What did her cryptic words mean?
Then Janine, already half-asleep, murmurs, “I wonder why you were dreaming about horses…?”
And it takes all my willpower not to say, According to a ghost who is usually right about these things, they might be coming to destroy us.
Chapter 13
Whit
THE OLD MAN’S BODY is covered in purple bruises and deep, oozing gashes. It looks like he challenged a couple of grizzlies to a fight and lost.
But it wasn’t bears that did this to him—it was the Family. They took his wallet, which was probably practically empty, and left a scrawled note: Why beg when we can steal?
Janine, in scrubs that are already bloodstained, points urgently at the victim. “There’s major blunt-force trauma to the ribs. We need to secure the airway and prep for anesthesia,” she says. “Get a double-lumen endotracheal tube. Keep up cricoid pressure!”
But there’s no one else in the room to take her orders. Either the other medical personnel are attending different patients—or else they don’t want anything to do with me. The lifesaving is going to be up to the two of us alone.
“Janine, I don’t know what any of that means,” I say through gritted teeth.
“He’s got class-four blood loss and a possible flail chest!”
“So what you’re telling me is that this guy is on death’s doorstep and he’s ringing the bell?”
She nods sharply. “Flail chest means he’s got a piece of broken rib floating around in there. If it punctures a lung, he’s going to be stabbed to death by his own bone.”
At that moment, the old man’s eyes flutter open. “Just let me go,” he whispers. “I’m ready.”
I shudder, remembering that this is the same thing that Sasha, a Resistance leader and one of our best friends, said as he lay on the ground with an arrow piercing his chest. I couldn’t heal Sasha that day, and it nearly broke my heart. But I’m going to heal this old man if it kills me.
And if trying to heal Pearl was any indication, it just might.
But I shake my head firmly. “Sir, I’ve been to Shadowland and trust me, you don’t want to make that trip.”
It feels like a miracle when he offers me the smallest sliver of a smile. Then his eyes close.
“His heart’s gone arrhythmic,” Janine shouts.
She stays close by, monitoring his vitals. “His bones are brittle,” she says. “They’re not going to be easy to get back together.”
“Nothing about this is going to be easy,” I answer.
I concentrate intensely as my hands hover over his body. The air beneath them seems to shimmer as the magic flows from my fingers down into his wounds. My arms tremble with effort, but I need to stay calm and listen. I hold my breath, focusing, and then the old man’s heartbeat pounds in my ears. The air through his lungs sounds like wind through dead branches.
Steady, I think. Just keep breathing.
My fingers feel electric, like they could burn just as easily as heal. My arms ache from the strain, but this time I’m not going to fail.
I close my eyes. My whole body’s shaking violently. I can tell that I’m seconds from losing control… and then, maddeningly slowly, it begins to happen. I can sense the severed blood vessels reconnecting, the floating rib finding its place.
I hear Janine’s relieved voice. “He’s stabilizing.”
I keep my focus on t
he old man. I hardly feel my own pain anymore.
Janine’s right next to me now, her hand on my shoulder. “It’s amazing,” she whispers. “The contusions are fading.”
The old man stirs. Moans. Then he blinks confusedly. “Where am I?” he asks.
I smile weakly at him. I’ve probably spent an entire week’s magic on dragging him back from the brink of death. “You’re in the hospital, but don’t worry, we’ll get you out soon.”
“The pain,” he says, touching his chest. “It’s gone.” His wonder-struck eyes search my face. “Who are you? Are you God?”
“Sometimes he seems to think so,” Janine quips.
And just like that, the tension in the room breaks, and the three of us are laughing like maniacs. Relief floods my body. He’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.
It’s a fantastic moment for the ten seconds it lasts. But then hospital loudspeakers come to life, and they start blaring my name.
Chapter 14
Whit
THE HARSH VOICE over the crackling speakers orders me to report to the office of Dr. Amos Keller, the head of City Hospital, immediately. Like I’m some kind of truant kid, instead of the guy who just saved a man’s life.
Dr. Keller’s secretary won’t meet my eye; he just points me toward the right door, a look of distaste on his face. I swear I hear him spraying disinfectant after I leave.
The doctor is waiting for me behind a giant black desk. He’s long-armed and hairy, with a big, wrinkled forehead. I can see why the nurses call him the Chimp behind his back.
“Sit,” he says sharply. It sounds like he’s talking to a dog.
I sink down into a chair so small that my knees practically touch my chin. Dr. Keller glares at me for a long time, his arms folded across his broad chest. I shift uncomfortably as I wait for him to say something. The silence is excruciating.
“So,” he finally says, “you think you can come in here with no training whatsoever and interfere with proper medical procedures?”
“Well, sir,” I try to say calmly, “I think I’ve been helpful—”
“I couldn’t care less what you think!” Keller interrupts, a vein pulsing in his forehead. “What I do care about is protocol: ensuring our patients receive modern therapeutic care and conventional, scientifically tested medicine. Not hocus-pocus, faith-healing, spell-chanting crap.”
Now I’m a lot less calm. “My powers are not crap,” I yell. “I just saved a man’s life!”
But it’s like he doesn’t even hear me. “Do you know what a hallux valgus is?” he demands.
“No.”
“How about gastrodynia?”
“No.”
“Cephalgia, then.”
When I shake my head, Keller lets out a snort of disgust. “If you can’t identify such simple problems as a bunion, a stomachache, or a headache, how on earth do you call yourself a healer?”
“I don’t need to know what it’s called to fix it,” I argue.
This infuriates him. “You fool, you probably don’t even know where the spleen is.”
“The magic knows how to heal,” I tell him. “It’s bigger and more powerful than I am.”
His eyes grow cold. “Your ignorance is outmatched only by your hubris, Whitford Allgood.”
“I’m practically killing myself down there to save other people. I’m trying to help!” I shout.
He stands up and pounds a hairy fist on his desk. “Do you really want to help people, you charlatan? Then stop your reckless, dangerous practices immediately!”
I stand up. He has no idea how many people I’ve saved! “But, Dr. Keller—”
“Don’t speak to me again,” he shrieks, flecks of white spittle flying from his lips. It’s like he’s completely lost control. “I can’t stand the sight of you! If I hadn’t taken the Healer’s Oath, I’d stab this pencil through your trachea.”
I begin to raise my fists. I’d like to see you try, I almost say.
But then suddenly Keller seems to calm down. He eases back down into his chair and adjusts his tie, like he didn’t just threaten to murder me. “One of my best trauma nurses, Janine, defends you. She says you must be allowed to stay. And you will be… as long as you sign here.”
He shoves a piece of paper across the massive desk. I reach for it, and my eyes dart down the page until I see what I’m dreading. Authorization to remove unnatural and potentially sinister capabilities…
I look at him in outrage. “You want me to submit!”
“You have one day to think about it,” he says sternly. “Now leave my office. You’re getting blood on the desk.”
I put my hand up to my face, and it comes away red: my nose is bleeding.
The same dizziness I felt after trying to heal Pearl washes over me, but I shake it off. I’ve got to get out of here. Wiping my face with my sleeve, I stumble into the hallway.
The secretary shrinks away from me, but the look of disgust on his face is still there. As far as these people are concerned, I’m a mortal enemy—and a walking biohazard.
Chapter 15
Whit
I DON’T THINK I slept at all last night, and by the looks of it, I’m not the only one. A line of bleary-eyed people snakes along the sidewalk outside the Government Lab. They’re pale and nervous and talk in agitated voices as they shuffle forward, one by one, to meet their fate.
They’re all magic makers, and they’re here to be Excised.
Patriotic music plays from loudspeakers, and motivational banners hang from the lampposts: THE BEST POWER IS HUMAN POWER, and BE NOBLE! BE NORMAL!
Janine’s holding my hand tightly. “ ‘Just Say No to Magic’?” she reads. “What genius came up with these slogans?”
I don’t answer, because I’m staring at the sign that reads THE ORDINARY IS EXTRAORDINARY in bright-blue letters. Though it’s hard to admit, I realize that I kind of agree. My life was pretty great back when I was just a high school foolball quarterback. The biggest worries I had were my scores on my algebra tests and whether or not I’d get sacked on the playing field.
And if someone back then had said to me, Okay, Whit, I’m going to give you some awesome, mind-boggling powers, but in exchange you’re going to have to spend the rest of your life fighting evil wizards, would I have agreed?
The truth is, I don’t know.
Janine scoots closer to me on the bench, across the street from the crowd. I’m jittery with nerves and the five gallons of coffee I drank, and I tell myself that we’re just here to look.
I need to see this. I need to know if there’s a good reason a person would give their magic up.
A woman in an EXCISION IS EXCELLENT T-shirt walks up and down the line, handing out buttons with the same phrase. “I did it,” I hear her telling a nervous-looking teenager, “and I’ve never felt better in my life. I finally feel free.”
She’s basically bouncing up and down with happiness. I try to remember when I last felt that upbeat, and I can’t.
I have to ask myself: Is magic really the burden she makes it sound like? I’ve always thought of it as something that produces undeniable wonders. Sure, it has its drawbacks, like when bad magic wreaks total havoc, and good magic doesn’t always work.
Just ask Pearl.
Oh, right, you can’t.
I turn to Janine. “I see plenty of people going into the Lab. How come no one’s coming out?”
“There’s probably a recovery period, like with any other surgical procedure,” Janine replies. “Or maybe there’s just a back door.”
“Yeah, I’m sure that’s it,” I say grimly.
Excision. I haven’t thought about anything else for twenty-four hours. But I still don’t know what I should do.
My sister would say it’s a choice between who I am and who everyone else thinks I should be. But I don’t think it’s that simple. Like I said at the Council meeting, I’ll consider anything that I think will help our City stand strong together. So my decision has a lot to do
with honor and duty (a couple of things my beloved sister might not be that good at).
If all citizens shared the same, ordinary talents, wouldn’t it be easier for us to unite? Wouldn’t we stand strong and fearless together?
Janine, sensing my muddled mood, tries to distract me. “You know, when I was a kid,” she says, “I had a magic cape. I was convinced it made me invisible. And everyone played along. Hey, where’s Nini? they’d say, even when I was standing right in front of them.”
I smile, imagining it. “Nini, huh? I bet you looked cute in it.”
“For a while, maybe,” she allows. “Then it got so old and holey that my mom finally hid it from me. I cried for weeks. And you know what she said? ‘You don’t need a cape to be invisible. The magic is in you.’ ” Janine laughs at the recollection. “Which is crazy, because I don’t have any magical powers at all.”
As screwy as I feel, I can’t help but laugh, too. “So the moral of the story is…?”
Janine shakes her head. “I have no idea! That my mother is nuts?”
“Or that she figured out a way to get you to stop whining about your ratty old cape,” I tease, and Janine giggles and jabs me in the ribs with her sharp little elbow.
The lighthearted moment passes quickly, though, as the line moves forward and the patriotic songs get louder. I can’t help but think about how my mother never said a thing to me about magic powers when I was a kid—and she knew I had them!
The hard thing is often the right thing: that’s what she used to say to me. The phrase is haunting my thoughts now.
“I don’t know what to do, Janine,” I say, watching an old woman and a little girl enter the Lab hand in hand. “What will life be like with no magic?”
“Well, I like it just fine,” she says. “Actually, it’s better than fine. A lot better.”
And the way she looks at me now tells me that some part of her wishes I were normal, the way she is.
“Whit,” she says, “there will always be something magical about you. Nothing and nobody is going to take that away.”