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“Great.” She sighed. “I don’t want to stay tethered to Grinn. I just…”
“Don’t want to unleash him, triggering a world-ending fiery apocalyptic war the likes of which could tear this whole dimension apart at the seams, starting an endless chain reaction of death and chaos that might devour reality as we know it?” Doc grinned. “That?”
Gwen blinked. And stared. “Holy shit, man.”
He tapped his finger against his temple. “They say I’m not right up here. I’m starting to believe them.”
“Who’rethey?”
“I don’t know!” He laughed sharply and turned back to his work. “Anyway.”
Yep. He was insane. An insane wizard who didn’t remember his own name. Just when her life couldn’t get more complicated.
“I was also just getting used to having fire powers. That was terrifying at first, but now it’s kinda cool.”
“Fire is a pretty cool power. At least you aren’t the elemental of mayonnaise.”
She made a face. “There’s an elemental of mayo?”
“No. Wouldn’t it be gross if there was?” He snorted. “I had yougoingthere for a second, didn’t I?”
“I hate this. So much.” Putting her head in her hands, she placed her elbows on her knees and tried not to scream or cry. Or both. She counted backwards from ten. Not to keep herself from having a panic attack, but to keep herself from burning this guy’s house down anyway.
Doc was quietly snickering. “I also don’t get visitors much.”
“I can’t imagine why.” She ran her hands over her hair, tugging on the strands, using the sting to center her thoughts. “Is there a way to split us up and not have Grinn go on some terrible rampage?”
“Hm. Probably not. But I’m a wizard, not a psychologist.”
“I don’t think I can spend the rest of my life tethered to that demon.” She chewed her lip. “I just don’t know what else to do.”
“Mordred could stop him. Stopped him once before.” The wizard pushed up from his desk and walked to a cabinet. Sorting through it, he found a bottle and uncorked it. Sniffing it, he coughed, made ablechksound, recorked it, and placed it back on the shelf before trying it a second time. “You could always beg the bastard for forgiveness.”
Looking down at her hands, she sighed. “He won’t. I betrayed him. That’s his thing.”
“I know. And you’ll probably do it again. But that’s what people do.” He walked back with two small glasses and poured the oddly greenish liquid from the bottle into them.
“Betray each other?” She arched an eyebrow. “Not you too. I can barely deal with one grumpy, jaded bastard. I don’t need two.”
“No, well, yes. But—” He picked up a glass and handed it to her. “What I meant was, people make choices. And regret most of them. That’s what they do.”
Looking down into the glass, she sniffed the liquid. It tasted like the worst kind of Easter candy. “What is this?”
“Absinthe. Sip it.”
Deciding to take his advice, she did just that. “Oh, gross.” She coughed.
“Yeah, but it hits the spot.” He downed his glass in one go and refilled it. Something told Gwen he drank a lot of the stuff. He offered her more.
“I’m good, thanks.” She put the glass back down in front of her. “And I don’t know if I regret my choice. I mean, Avalon couldn’t stay the way that it was.”
“I agree. Quite boring, it was. Imagine me, a sorcerer with no magic to use. I took up a lot of hobbies. I was garbage at knitting to begin with, but if you have alotof time on your hands, you can get good at anything. Would you like a scarf? I have about twenty thousand of them.”
“Sure, maybe later.” She laughed. He was weird. Definitely insane. But she kind of liked him anyway. “I just don’t know how to fix this. Or what I’m supposed todo.I just wish I had a plan.”
“Plans are funny things.” He scratched his head. “They make you think you’re on solid ground, when you’re really on a bridge to nowhere. Overrated things. Your problem is that you don’t know what youwant.”
“I know I don’t want Avalon to be sucked back into the Crystalorthrown into a terrible war. I just don’t know if I have any power to keep either of those things from happening.”
