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Isatonthebed in my cell with Beverly snoring softly next to me. The portal outside the barred window spat out some random guy in a rabbit costume who soared through the air and out of sight of my tiny window. Then the portal vanished. It had been coming and going for a while.
For once, I wished Juniper was trying to break me out of prison. At least I would have her help. At least I could ask her if the Eclipses were safe or… simply gone, which the existence of portal magic in Silver Springs suggested.
I fidgeted with Ram’s phone in my lap, its screen smooth under my fingertips. I thought I had escaped his machinations. I had helped stop him from stealing magic, and even though I had been locked up with him for nearly two years, I hadn’t fallen for any of his tricks.
More than that, I had escaped my tendencies to fuck everything up. I had been free—in a way—while in prison. On a path to being better. Someone who looked out for others and made things better rather than consistently worse.
But now I was in Ram’s web, and I had no choice but to fuck up my best friend’s life: either I let Ram snitch, or I set him free to enact his vengeance on her in another way.
At least she wouldn’t be on the run from the entire legal system. She could keep her regular life—she’d just have to kill Ram if he didn’t kill her first.
“You look like the alien invasion has started and you’re waiting to be hit by a phaser,” Jag said. He leaned in the cell doorway and flashed me a small smile.
If I was going to stage a prison break, I would need backup. Ram might attack me the moment we were past the ward, so Beverly needed beaver guards to protect her while I handled him. But if I was about to let Jag, Elliot, and Moe out of prison, I needed to know what I was unleashing on the world.
And if I should unleash them at all. I knew a few prisoners who were in for minor crimes and who I would be okay with letting out if they were willing to risk a life on the run and a longer sentence if caught.
I unlocked Ram’s phone and opened the internet browser. Of course, it was connected to the prison’s Wi-Fi, which was only supposed to be for guards and the busted-up computers in the lab.
“Hey.” Jag’s hand rested on my shoulder gently, as though he was unsure if it was okay. It sent a pleasant tremor down my back. “You’ve been down since talking to Ram. What did that cheese fart say to you?” His voice turned hard as bedrock.
The hardness, and the rage under it, like the magma beneath the hard crust of the earth, was comforting.
“What’s going on?” Elliot said in his soft voice. He and Moe crowded in my cell doorway.
Moe stared at his feet and tapped the doorframe with his toe, as though he didn’t want to look at me.
I didn’t blame him. Shrugging Jag’s hand off my shoulder, I lied to them. “I’m fine.”
Jag frowned, clearly not believing me, but he didn’t argue. “You got the spoiler blogs on that phone? Fuck, I miss my morning spoilers.”
“Noooo,” Elliot said softly.
“Spoilers make everything better,” Jag said. “I get surprised first, then I get to watch everyone else be surprised when they watch it. Double surprises!”
As they argued, I searched for a band called JEM. “You won’t believe this live performance,” read the first link. I tapped on it, and it went to a video on Screech, the social network for supes.
It showed a small outdoor stage with a black room divider in the middle. The band must have been behind it because I didn’t see anyone. But I heard the song.
A string and woodwind instrument weaved together like the yarn that makes a cozy sweater. Even though drums weren’t usual for this type of music, the gentle, steady beat fit perfectly, like resting your head on a loved one’s chest. A voice as deep as a cavern sang in a language I didn’t know, sounding like something primordial, almost haunting, against the warm instruments.
It was as if fantasy elves and dwarves did a musical collab.
My skin goosebumped from my feet to my neck, and a shiver went through me. It was beautiful.
“Turn it off!” a voice roared.
Blinking, I looked up to see Elliot trying to push past Jag as he reached for the phone. He was so soft-spoken that it was startling to hear him shout.
If he didn’t want me to see this video, then I definitely had to know what was in it. I jumped to my feet and out of his reach as Beverly lifted her head and grunted as though to ask what was going on.
I backed up to the end of the cell and faced Elliot, ready to fight him if I had to.
But he simply wilted and ducked behind Jag, whose face was turning red. From the cell door, Moe said, “Hey, it’s our performance!”
In the video, someone threw a sparkling ball at the stage. Assholes at magical concerts loved to pull shit like that. While normies tossed beach balls, witches shot orbs that glowed and sparked like fire without the actual heat.
The ball hit the room divider, and it toppled backward. The music cut off. Someone from the band must have instinctively pushed the falling divider off themselves, because it crashed down onto the stage, revealing the people behind it.
