And then it’s finally time to leave this place.
I’m about to portal us out when a soft murmur against my chest stops me. “The Arcana objects,” Stevie says, so quiet I have to strain to hear her.
“Already packed up,” I assure her. “Kirin’s got—”
“No,” she says. “We can’t take them.”
“So what do we do?” I ask. “Toss them back into the Void? Take them back to the Fool’s Grave?”
She reaches up and touches my face, fixing me with a determined, don’t-fuck-with-me stare that would have a lesser man pissing his pants.
Then, in a voice much stronger than it was only seconds ago, she says, “We have to destroy them.”
* * *
Standing in a circle back at the spiral caves, the five of us stare down at the objects assembled between us. Each one pulses with blue light.
The Sword of Breath and Blade.
The Wand of Flame and Fury.
The Chalice of Blood and Sorrow.
The Pentacle of Iron and Bone.
For millennia, they were hunted, chased all over the globe by so many people on so many wasted expeditions, eventually they faded into legend.
But we found them. The most powerful, most magickal, most valuable artifacts our kind has ever known.
And now she wants to obliterate them.
“Stevie,” Cass says for the hundredth time, “are you sure about this?”
She nods emphatically. Wrapped in Kirin’s hoodie, trail mix dotting the front of it from her hasty meal, she looks much healthier now than when we found her. It’s almost as if this mission has given her new life.
I’ve never seen her so adamant.
“The magick of the Arcana was a gift from the original elemental beings,” she says. “It belongs toallwitches and mages. We lost sight of that over time, but the truth is, these objects are just that—objects. And as long as they exist, they’ll always be hunted, and so will we.”
Ani sighs, casting a longing glance at the Wand. “But their power—”
“It’s symbolic, guys,” she insists. “That’s all. They’re powerful because the First Fool and the Elemental Beings made them so. But that power? That magick? It’s the same exact stuff that runs through the veins of every witch and mage in existence. It doesn’t belong solely to the Light Arcana any more than it did the Dark. It belongs toallwitches and mages—to anyone who wishes to understand it. And we don’t need these symbols to make it so.”
Her blue eyes shine bright behind her mud-streaked face, her voice firm and clear. A soft white light seems to glow from within her, illuminating her.
Whatever happened in the Void, it changed her.
My heart thuds against my ribs. My love for her is damn near overpowering.
“I agree,” I say. “Stevie’s right. These things are relics. It’s time to let them go.”
She beams at me across the circle.
I beam back.
Goddess, I fuckingadorethat woman.
After only a moment’s hesitation, the other mages finally agree.
