I believe him.
THE TRIALS.
They were nothing.
I am Randall of Dragons.
I MET another wizard.
He’s….
Arrogant.
Irritating.
He thinks he knows so much when he obviously knows very little.
I cannot stand the sight of him.
He smirks at me like he knows me.
It’s infuriating.
I don’t have time for people like him.
I have work to do.
HE SEEMS enchanted by me.
I wish for his death daily.
When will he leave?
BREAKTHROUGH TODAY.
I understand more than I ever have before.
I was staring down at an equation that I’ve been studying for years, the solution out of my grasp, when all of a sudden, it made sense. I don’t know how I never saw it before. It seems so simple now. If Myrin hadn’t bumped my elbow when he had, spilling the ink, I might have—
Wait.
He’s not—
It can’t—
Oh no.
TWO WIZARDS? Together? Absolutely not!
Is what the Great White would say.
Cornerstones. They are useless.
They distract from what’s important.
I find myself agreeing with him.
But still….
What if?
No.
It’s better if I don’t even think about it.
MYRIN BROUGHT me a flower today.
It was a dingy little thing that looked as if it’d been sat upon after being ripped from the earth.
He was grinning when he handed it to me.
I took it, only because he would have continued to stand there with that dopey look upon his face.
It doesn’t mean anything.
Obviously.
(DRIED FLOWER petals pressed between the pages.)
MYRIN STARES at me when he thinks I’m not looking.
It’s creepy.
I must watch him closer when he’s not looking at me.
JUST ONE date, he says.
You won’t regret it, he says.
Give me a chance, he says.
No, I say.
No and no and no.
THE GREAT White accused me of being distracted today.
I don’t even try to understand how I know that.
He’s like this… presence. In my head.
It’s dragon magic. It has to be. He doesn’t have to open his mouth and I know what he’s telling me.
And he’s accusing me of being distracted.
If only he knew.
MYRIN KISSED me today.
That asshole.
HE’S MY cornerstone.
He’s my cornerstone.
He’s my cornerstone.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck—
IT IS of the mind. But it’s also of the air and the earth, the plants and the trees and the sky and the stars. Magic is everywhere. But it starts in the mind. I can’t say if it’s the same for other magical creatures, but they don’t think like we do. They see things differently. I’m sure the elves probably say the same about us, but then they’ve always been of the superior sort. It’s not as if there are many around anymore as it is.
But it starts in the mind.
It’s a… spark.
And it gathers.
I can see so much of it now, so much more than I could even after the Trials.
The outlines. The construct. How it builds and builds and builds—
I need to tell the Great White. So he’ll—
Myrin’s here. I can tell him too.
I HAVE to make a choice.
The Great White.
Or Myrin.
He’s making me do this.
That giant bastard is making me do this.
How dare he.
How dare he do this to me.
It’s not as if—
I—
Gods.
Can I do this?
“WHY CAN’T you trust me to know what I’m doing?” I asked the Great White today.
And in my head, I got an image of a toddler crawling on his hands and knees.
Message received, loud and clear.
He’s not wrong.
To him, we’re all children.
But he doesn’t understand.
What it means to be human.
What it means to care for another.
He—
“TRUST ME,” Myrin told me. “This will be the best thing for the both of us.”
“How can you be sure?”
He smiled at me, sunny and bright. “Have I ever steered you wrong?”
Gods, I love him.
I FELT the Great White’s anger.
His rage.
His fury.
But underneath it all, I felt his hurt. He was hurt by my decision.
It doesn’t change my mind, but….
I didn’t expect that.
OH, WHAT’S in a name?
Myrin the Bright Star.
It’s… fitting.
I don’t know why.
David’s Dragon are the brightest stars in the sky.
Randall of Dragons.
Myrin the Bright Star.
We were meant to be.
The Great White didn’t know what he was talking about.
I AM the King’s Wizard.
I have an apprentice.
I have my cornerstone.
It’s everything I could have wanted.
MYRIN WAS whispering something to the King today.
He smiled and winked at me when he caught me watching.
I wonder if he’s planning a surprise.
For some reason, I like surprises, but only when they come from him.
MORGAN IS… bright. Inquisitive. Studious. Focused.
I will expect great things from him.
THE KING seems… off lately. A shadow of his former self. He says he’s fine, but….
I’ll need to keep an eye on him.
MYRIN IS gone.
He left a note saying he’d be back in a few days.
He didn’t say where he was going.
This is the third time he’s done this.
I know he has a wandering spirit, but I thought this would be enough.
That I would be enough.
It’s okay, though. I have plenty to keep me busy.
THE KING had a scare today.
He was speaking in front of his court and then just trailed off, staring into the distance.
His eyes were unfocused and his jaw slack.
I thought it was a precursor to a seizure.
I reached for him, but Myrin was there first.
I could have sworn Myrin said something to him, but I didn’t see his lips move.
The King snapped out of it a moment later.
He said he hadn’t slept well the night before.
Bad dreams.
I’ll make him a calming draft for tonight.
MORGAN ASKED me today if I’d felt the shift in the wind. “It feels like something’s coming,” he said.
I laughed at my apprentice and patted his shoulder. “Of course not,” I said. “Everything is fine.”
I hate lying to him.
THE KING executed a thief today.
It came out of nowhere. One moment the man was being judged and most likely faced a few days in the dungeons, but then the King said he needed to set an example.
“Death,” the King said. “By beheading.”
I was too surprised to say anything.
“Are you sure?” Myrin asked him. “It doesn’t seem—”
“Are you questioning me?” the King asked.
Myrin bowed in deference.
The man screamed.
An hour later the executioner’s ax was bloodied, and that was that.
MYRIN AND I went for a long walk today.
It’s been some time since it
was just the two of us.
I held his hand.
He kissed my cheek.
He said, “I wonder what it would be like if this was all different.”
He smiled at me when I asked him what he meant.
And that’s okay. I’m just happy to be with him.
THEY’RE CALLING him the King of Sorrows now, for all the strife he’s brought down upon his people. He won’t listen to me, no matter how hard I try.
I don’t know what to do.
IT WAS Myrin.
It was Myrin.
It was Myrin.
It was—
“YOU LOVE me,” he said.
“I do.”
“Then why?”
“Because you have to be stopped.”
“Randall, you are constrained by the rules that have been placed upon you. My mind has been expanded in ways you wouldn’t believe. Magic is so much more than what we were taught. Please. Listen to me. This—everything—it can all be ours. If you just—”
“Don’t.”
“I love you.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry, then.”
I don’t remember much after that.
I DON’T know how I never saw this coming. How I never saw any of it. He’s so strong. And the Darks have gathered behind him.
Gods.
My heart.
How it aches.
A SEAL could be made if needed.
After casting someone to the realm of shadows.
We could—
No. No. No.
If I don’t—
I have to kill him.
MORGAN CAME to me today.
He begged me.
He begged me to do what I could.
Then he showed me something. Something I never thought he could do.
Containment.
Compression.
Maybe—
I LOVE you, Myrin.
Even now.
IT’S DONE.
We almost died, but it’s done.
He’s locked away.
He screamed and screamed and screamed, but in the end, we were stronger than his rage.
Gods help us all.
HE’D BEEN dripping poison in the King of Sorrows’s ears for longer than I thought.
I was barely able to bring him back.
But his eyes cleared.
I HAVE to be strong. For Morgan.
But it’s there, isn’t it?
At the back of my mind.
I have to be strong.
I LASTED longer than I ever thought I could.
But it’s still not enough.
I must flee this place.
Castle Freesias.
It’s my last hope.
I LEFT gifts for the dragons in the cave.
Their feathers are extraordinary.
The shadows are crawling along my skin.
It won’t be long now.
GODSDAMN YOU, Myrin.
You did this, you did this.
I loved you, and you did this to me.
(THE NEXT pages are illegible, covered in unrecognizable symbols. Some have been torn out.)
HE SMILED. When he saw me.
I wanted to kill him.
“Randall,” he said. “I—”
Morgan barely escaped.
If he returns, it will be the last thing he does.
I CAN breathe.
The sun, it’s… bright today.
A WOMAN named Vadoma came from the desert.
Morgan seems disturbed.
I think she’s a liar.
HIS NAME is Sam.
His name is Sam, and he’s real.
I wonder what he’ll be like?
HE’S AN asshole.
MORGAN WANTS to tell him the truth.
He wants to put upon his shoulders the weight of his destiny.
No.
No, we can’t do that.
Not if it never comes to pass.
Maybe the gods were wrong.
HE HAS a cornerstone.
Because of course he does.
I want to strangle him as much as I want to keep him safe.
That idiot child.
IT’S MYRIN.
I should have seen that coming.
Because of course he would find a way.
Tenacious. Always.
Why do I still love him? After everything?
I COULD….
Death is a cleansing.
It frees you from the shackles of this world.
The veil is crossed.
Sins are forgiven.
And Sam….
Well, he can bring things back, can’t he?
He doesn’t know I know.
I could….
I must think on it.
I CLOSED Randall’s Grimoire, mind racing.
Ryan lay sleeping beside me in the bed, his hand curled against my hip.
It was late, and my eyes were burning. The candlelight flickered low.
Randall had said I’d find the answers I needed between these pages.
But so far all I’d gotten was that Randall and Morgan were fucking liars and that every wizard treated their Grimoire like a dia—a journal.
“Give you so much crap,” I whispered tiredly.
They hadn’t seen Myrin coming. Or by the time they had, it’d been too late.
They’d underestimated him.
Much like Myrin had done to me.
I didn’t know what I was supposed to be seeing.
It was curious, though.
Both Morgan and Randall had written that magic came from the mind.
That it was like imagination.
Why can’t you just wish him away, Mama had said.
Why indeed?
There were rules, right?
Ceilings.
It wasn’t limitless.
But hadn’t I always been told normal rules didn’t apply to me?
That I wasn’t like those that had come before me.
What if I could—
“Why’re you still awake?” Ryan mumbled next to me.
I startled a little. “Thinking.”
“About?”
“Wizarding things.”
“Sounds complicated.”
“Maybe.”
He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “Need help?”
Don’t ever leave me. “Not now. Not tonight. Sleep. It’s late.”
“You too.”
“Yeah. Okay.”
As I slid down in the bed, he pulled the comforter up and over our shoulders. We lay on his pillow, our noses and knees bumping together. The candle sputtered, the shadows dancing along his glittering eyes.
He said, “You can’t do anything stupid.”
I snorted. “You might need to clarify that.”
“Self-sacrificing.”
I hesitated.
“Sam,” he said, taking my hand in his. “Promise me.”
“But what if—”
“No. There’s no what-if. It’s not an option.”
“We don’t know what’s going to happen.”
“We don’t. But that doesn’t mean—”
“I won’t.”
He searched my face. I didn’t know if he found what he was looking for, but he nodded slowly. “I’m going to hold you to that.”
“Then that means you can’t do it either. And you can’t pull your but I’m a knight and I have to be chivalrous and stupid and flourish my sword like an asshole so everyone loves me.”
“I don’t sound like that.”
“Pretty much.”
“You’re so dumb.”
“Yeah, but that seems to be something you like.”
He smiled slow and sweet before reaching out and tracing a finger over my eyebrows. “I guess so. Randall’s planning something, isn’t he?”
“I think so.” But so was I.
“I’m not going to like it, am I.”
“Probably not. I mean, it’
s a plan. From Randall. I doubt anyone is going to like it.”
“You don’t think….”
I frowned. “What?”
“I mean, I know it’s not—but. You don’t think he’d…. What if he’s still trying to save Myrin? What if he’s using you?”
And Sam….
Well, he can bring things back, can’t he?
You think… that if he were to die, I could bring him back. And he would be… cleansed?
Yes. But I am wrong about that, Sam. We were wrong. To keep him trapped in the shadow realm, to not have ended this when we had the chance.
You knew. About the bird. You already knew. And… what. You were going to use me?
The briefest of thoughts. It did cross my mind. Then I remembered the truth of all things. Myrin has chosen his path, and he will continue upon it, no matter what we do. And I realized that death is final, Sam. Death is the end. It is the cleansing of life, the breaking of the shackles. It is an ending. You cannot course-correct that ending, even though your heart is aching.
“I trust him,” I said simply.
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?”
He shrugged. “Okay.”
“Sleep,” I told him.
He did.
AND EVEN though I should have left it for the light of day, I couldn’t wait. Ryan was snoring softly; the fire was barely crackling. Just embers, really. The candle was almost gone. All I wanted to do was sink back down into the mattress, curl up next to Ryan, and follow him into sleep.