But she didn’t look at him. Instead, her gaze trailed to the front of the classroom. Domenic followed it, then cringed at the sight of Syarthis—sputtering, jerking, unbonding.
A desperate idea seized him. When the wielder of a Living Wand died, a new magician could succeed them, even on that very same day. And the wielder, so exsanguinated that his gums had shriveled back from his teeth, was certainly dead.
This would be the start of Domenic’s great story. He would rise to become the hero. He would save them all.
Yet as he tried to crawl forward, he couldn’t. He was paralyzed,aching, petrified. And when he turned to look again at his best friend, for three agonizing seconds, they held each other’s stares, and they knew.
Nothing they’d promised was ever going to happen.
Then, as Domenic braced himself to die, Hanna’s expression hardened.
Whimpering, she dragged herself forward.
Domenic tried to shout to her, but he couldn’t speak. He tried to reach for his training wand in his backpack, but he couldn’t move. He could only watch, worthless, as Hanna crawled over each broken body of their classmates, until at last, she grasped the Living Wand around the handle, and she let out a piercing scream.
The Gardens were Domenic’s refuge in Gallamere. Unlike Valley Park, which was flocked with tourists and reeked of days-old garbage and cigarettes, in the Gardens, you could almost forget you were in a city at all. The trees shrouding the pebbled trails obscured the high-rises. The chorused birdsongs and buzzing of honeybees muffled the all-hours din of traffic. And though it didn’t compare to the meadows where he’d grown up, when Domenic lay here, cradled in clover and wildflowers, he could almost grasp that feeling—when magic had been nothing but wonder.
“I thought I’d find you here.”
Domenic peeked open one eye. Hanna stood over him.
“Guess you’ve heard,” he said blandly.
“Yeah. Glynn told me. Said he scheduled the vigil for the first day of Winter. Thinks that’ll make it seem fortuitous or some bullshit.”
One of the many reasons Alderland believed Valmordion Chose its wielder from birth: they could bond with the wand at any time after its thawing, regardless of the previous wielder’s death day.
Hanna nodded at the dandelions piled atop his stomach. He’d been mindlessly plucking whichever ones were within reach. “You look like a corpse, you know.”
“I’m practicing.”
Hanna didn’t laugh. Instead, she sat on the ground beside him and gazed grimly around the Gardens. They were always crowded as Winter approached, but this year, every wrought-iron bench was occupied, every plot of grass claimed by a picnic blanket. People basked in the sunlight with collars unbuttoned and lips stained red from the last of Summer’s fruit. They counted the passing clouds as if counting their blessings.
It would’ve been a pleasant sight if not for how starkly it contrasted with the rest of Gallamere. Already, salt littered the sidewalks. The supermarket shelves had been gutted clean. Half the windows were boarded, nonessential shops closing for the season. Toilet paper was selling for twice its usual price.
“Syarthis has a collection about Valmordion, you know.” Hanna’s words were half-garbled as she simultaneously bit at her cuticles. “A whole wing. Goes practically all the way back.”
Domenic stifled a cringe, wondering if that was what had filled Hanna’s overtime hours these past five days—visiting the bowels of Syarthis’s Archives. Domenic had heard rumors it was a ghastly process to watch, but Hanna always spoke about it casually. Maybe that was for his benefit. On more than one occasion, Hanna had come home with blood crusted in her lashes or the veins of her eye sockets bulging like burrowed roots. She always avoided him those nights, her door closed but her light still on. And he, like a coward, never knocked.
“What Valmordion is capable of…” Hanna continued. “It’s more dangerous than anyone realizes.”
Domenic forced a chuckle. “And to think, it’ll soon be in the hands of some lousy seventeen-year-old.”
Hanna squinted at him as if searching for some detail she hadn’t noticed before, some fine print she hadn’t read.
“What?” he asked.
“You’re not worried it might bond with you?”
He scoffed as he propped himself on his elbows. “I’m more worried about blowing up the moment I lay a finger on it. I’m the last magician that wand will Choose.”
“Well, you should hear some of the stuff they’re saying about you, since you and Caldwell took on that winterghast. That was… pretty incredible, Dom. No one knew you had it—”
“I’m not a hero, no matter what anyone thinks,” he snapped. “And I’m pretty sure that’s a prerequisite.”
With fingers already stained yellow with pollen, Domenic ripped dandelions from the grass, one then three then six of them. Hanna sucked on her bleeding nail bed. And before Domenic even uttered another word, her face crumpled. Like she already knew what he was going to say.
The two of us—we promised to join the Order together.
