“The plot thickens.” He arches his hips ever so slightly, just enough to give me a preview of the situation unfolding behind his teeny-tiny zombie pants. “And by plot, I mean—”
“Yes, I know exactly what you mean, and on that note, wow! Would you look at the time?” I laugh, breaking out of our heated embrace. My throbbing core might disagree, but as much as I’d love a red-hot, joint make-out session with the Devil and the Tower in the realm where all things are possible… Right.Sooonot the moment.
I turn around and readjust my dress, trying to talk my lady bits off the ledge and remember why we’re here.
The answer seems to hit us all at once, a dark, heavy melancholy that sweeps in through the front door and blows across the living room, ushering in the cold.
I let out a deep sigh. Our flirty, joyful reunion was entirely too short.
“So what’s next?” Baz asks, the heat in his eyes a distant memory now.
Resigned, I drop onto the couch, trying to figure out the best play. “We need to find the stone cathedral. The swordshouldbe there.”
“Maybe it’s in here somewhere,” Kirin says, inspecting a collection of glass chess pieces arranged on an ornate marble pedestal. “Hidden in plain sight.”
“Trust me, it isn’t,” Baz says. “We should go. Now.”
Kirin picks up the king piece for a closer look. Seems expensive. The wholehouseseems expensive, every piece of furniture, art, and decor custom-made to announce its utter opulence.
“Whatisthis place, anyway?” Kirin asks.
“Someplace better left forgotten.” Baz removes the King from Kirin’s hands and sets it back on the pedestal, his energy turning chilly.
“Far as I care, this place can burn,” Baz says. Then, without warning, he grabs the King again and whips it at the fireplace, shattering it into dust. The Queen follows, and then the rest of the set. A vase. A chair. A framed mosaic of the desert and a ship’s clock from the mantle.
Piece by elegant piece, Baz destroys nearly everything in that living room, smashing and tearing, pulverizing, crushing. When the walls have been stripped bare, when the furniture has been demolished, when there’s absolutely nothing left to break, he drops to his knees and unleashes a roar from the very depths of his soul. It rattles the very foundations of the house, shaking with fury, with rage, with pure agony.
My heart feels like the chess pieces, chipped and shattered. I don’t know what’s happening, can’t see the demons that haunt him, don’t know how to read the wild torrent of his energy. I don’t know how Kirin and I can help him—how anyone could.
I’ve never felt so lost and helpless before. Not even when my parents drowned. At least on that day, I knew what was coming for them. Knew I didn’t stand a chance against that powerful rushing water. The sharp rocks beneath.
But here, Baz fights an invisible enemy Kirin and I can only guess at.
So together we stand behind him in silence, holding hands while our brother falls apart on the floor, trusting he’ll come back to us when he’s ready.
I don’t know how much time passes, but eventually he gets on his feet again. Turns to face us.
His eyes are red and glassy, his face aged a hundred years since I last saw him on Academy grounds. All I want to do is run to him, to figure out a way to put him back together again.
But before any of us can move, a deep rumble rolls up from the ground.
And all around us, the house of Baz’s tormented childhood collapses.
Baz and Kirin dive at me, knocking me to the ground and shielding me from the worst of the debris. But as terrifying as it is, the quake is over almost as quickly as it began. By the time the dust settles, nothing of the house remains.
In its place, surrounding us in a perfect circle, seven sandstone slabs rise from the snow-packed earth, each topped with a perfect stone sphere.
The cathedral.
Sixteen
STEVIE
The moment we step outside, the snow melts away, revealing a mirror image of the stone circle we discovered in the real Breath and Blade lands back on campus.
It’s exactly where we need to be—exactly where we’ve been trying to get to ever since we entered the dream realm with Professor Broome’s spell. But despite the small victory, something tells me our battles are far from over.
“What now?” Baz asks, reaching for my hand.
