“And ever since then, he’s just been super weird around me. Like, hot and cold. One minute, I think he’s back. And then it’s like he doesn’t even know me, and has to remind himself who I am.”
“Yeah, I know. He’s definitely out of it. But he was in the realm a long time, Stevie. I’m sure it’s just that.”
“Has he talked to you guys about what happened there? What he saw, or whether he ran into Judgment?”
“Kirin and I tried to ask him about it the day after he woke up, but he didn’t want to get into it. Just kept saying there wasn’t much to tell. Doc got the same response that night we barged in on you guys.”
“All Ani said to me when he woke up was that it was absolute hell. But beyond that, nothing.”
“What did the cards say?” I ask, but there’s only one. The Sun, reversed.
“This is actually the eighth attempt. The first three spreads I did? All our old friends showed up. One, Five, Seven, Twenty—Magician, Hierophant, Chariot, Judgment.”
“Statistically impossible.”
“Yep. So I pulled them out of the deck, set them aside, and tried to do a new spread without them.”
“Isn’t that cheating?”
“Their energy was completely overpowering my readings. I felt like I needed a clean slate. But every time I turned another card, it was this one—Sun Reversed. I shuffled it back in, mixed up all the cards, tried again. Four more times. And each time, this card either dropped out on its own, or I pulled it on the first try.”
“Any idea what it means?”
Her shoulders sink, her eyes filling with sadness and worry. “Do you remember the night I brought the black dahlias out of my nightmares?”
“Not something I’m going to forget anytime soon, believe me.”
“Well, in that nightmare, Judgment called Ani the Black Sun.”
I shudder, remembering when she told me about it. Judgment said something about how Ani would rule over the Dark armies that would usher in the new magickal order.
I can’t lie. Seeing this card, hearing her interpretation, remembering the nightmare she told me about… Goddess, the very idea of Ani going dark is supremely fucked up, and supremely terrifying.
But I can’t say it’s impossible. Not after all the other shit we’ve seen.
“No way,” I say anyway, shaking my head. “Ani came back to us. If he were dark, he’d be stuck in the realm with the rest of those assholes.”
“Phaines wasn’t stuck in the realm.”
“But Ani came back,” I say again, my voice weak and pathetic.
“But the Ani who came back… Itisn’thim, Baz. Not totally. He was in the dream realm longer than any of us. He won’t talk about what happened there, or why he took the dream potion in the first place instead of just waiting for us. He hasn’t even mentioned anything about the news from his hometown, or whether he’s worried about his sister, or anything else going on outside. It’s like he just wants to pretend that everything’s totally normal—like we’re all just here in this house for an extended winter break party while the rest of the world is about one lit match from total annihilation.”
“Are we interrupting?” a voice calls from the doorway—Cass, with Kirin bringing up the rear.
“Yes,” I say, at the same time Stevie invites them in, scooting over to make room for them on the bed.
“We were just talking about Ani,” she says, showing them the reversed Tarot card.
She tells them about her Black Sun theory, Judgment’s dire warnings.
“Maybe it is Judgment’s influence,” Doc says, “but that doesn’t mean he’s turned. It’s possible he’s just being haunted, not unlike you were after your return. How are you feeling, by the way?”
“I haven’t seen the mark in a few weeks.” I lift my shirt and show them the exact spot on my chest where the blazing XX used to appear, but there’s nothing there now. “Maybe he’s gone.”
“Exactlya few weeks?” Kirin asks, narrowing his eyes. “Or roughly a few weeks.”
“Does it matter?”
