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“Of course. She taught me that too. Idiots can be useful. The banshees cracked the sky. Every note of their song made a bigger break, one that won’t heal. The Between is open. The Empress is free. She owes me, and she’ll grant my wish.”

“She’s a primordial being. You can’t control her.”

“I don’t need to. I freed her. She owes me a boon, one wish. I just have to find her.”

“What will you ask for? What’s this world you plan to make?”

“Haven’t you guessed? I’ll ask her to bring them back together, Alfheimr and the Between. Otherworld and the spirit realm, your world too, just because you were so nice to me. From five to one.”

“Billions would die.”

“Not exactly. I’ll have her mix all of you together, then whoever is left will be like me.”

“North—”

“I have to go, Adam, before your friend Jack can trace me. Don’t chase me. I’m warning you.”

North disconnected.

On the laptop, the video call showed no other participants.

“We’ll take this to RCC,” Silver said.

Adam didn’t respond. He already knew it wouldn’t help. North knew how to cover his tracks.

34

Sitting on his knees, alone in the apartment, Adam shuffled his tarot deck.

They had not found North. He was not surprised. The Guardians were looking, but they were nicely distracted by the boggins that had surged from the forking crack in the sky.

Their best scholars were trying to find a way to close it.

Still technically on probation, even though they hadn’t taken his sword, they’d sent him home.

They’d bury their dead, the knight included, according to their customs.

He was left with one heavy secret, which would be moot if the world ended. That seemed so much bigger than even his need to protect Ian. His future wouldn’t matter if there was no world for him to live in.

For the moment, it was just him, on his knees in his boxers, sitting in a sunbeam and trying to decide on a spread. With a sigh, he cut the deck.

“The intent or purpose of the journey,” he said, and drew the Empress reversed.

It was both a surprise and not.

Jesse had drawn her on a comfy lounger rather than a throne. The heart at her side was a throw pillow, with the symbol of Venus embroidered on it. The trees to her right were pines, the kind you saw if you drove just a little way into the mountains outside of Denver.

Traditionally, the reversal said that he needed to reconnect with Mother Nature. He couldn’t disagree. Without a garden or backyard to regularly play in, to sit and dig his fingers into the soil, he felt he was losing his link to the earth, to the part of himself he’d just been starting to find living at Bobby’s.

In this case he’d take the card literally. The Empress was out there. Silver and Argent’s mom. She’d been imprisoned for millennia, had a score to settle, and would grant a wish to whoever freed her.

The second card, the traveler, representing himself.

Then he drew and laid the Seven of Wands on the floor.

Here the stave-wielding warrior wore a leather jacket not unlike Adam’s old one. His biker boots didn’t match, which Adam’s Aunt Sue had said meant that the figure had been caught unprepared or was uncertain of his stance.

The card meant Adam had to persevere, and he had. Some days it felt like he’d done nothing else.