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I didn’t put her through everything Brighton told me. She loved my dad too and doesn’t need these visuals. “Brighton’s been carrying this on his shoulders alone for months,” I say as I roll over to my side, and my latest wound aches. “I get why he couldn’t keep it together.”
“He was wrong to share it in an outburst, when you were least expecting it.”
I’m not denying that.
I keep trying to focus on the good memories of Dad, like when he rented a car and drove us all to the Poconos for a surprise family vacation, or when we marathoned these nature specials about phoenixes in the wild, just the two of us. But all I can think about is what must’ve been going through his head during his final moments. Did he want to apologize to Brighton for spitting blood on his face? Was he happy, even a tiny bit, that if he had to go, he was at least with his only biological son?
I’m facing the facts. My parents were only expecting to bring one son home when Brighton was
born, but when Dad stepped out of the hospital to get balloons for Ma and discovered me out on a street corner, he brought me back, thinking I was abandoned. He had no idea that I wasn’t a newborn, but instead someone who was reborn in a blaze of fire. None of us knew until a few weeks ago when we pieced it together with the Spell Walkers. I know Dad loved me. But if someone put a wand to his head and asked which son he would’ve wanted with him when he died, it makes sense now more than ever that he would’ve chosen Brighton.
“Hey,” Iris says as she walks in with a phone in one of her bandaged hands. “How are you healing?”
“Getting there,” I say. Movement is one thing, but the infinity-ender blade is built to kill phoenixes and prevent them from resurrecting. The first time I was wounded, my powers were still there, but weaker. I’ll have to see what’s good with them when the time inevitably comes for me to use them again. “How are you doing?”
“Punching through bricks put a strain on my fists, but the salve they put on me should have me demolishing more walls in no time,” Iris says.
“Thanks for getting us out of there,” Prudencia says. “It was getting close.”
Iris nods. “What’s the deal with Brighton?”
I’m not sure how to answer that in the grand scheme of things. “I don’t know.”
“Well, you need to talk to your mother. Carolina keeps threatening to hop on a bus from Philadelphia to get back here if one of you don’t call her.”
“I’m not telling her about the Reaper’s Blood,” I say.
“Your family, your business,” Iris says. “We haven’t told your mother we’re camped out in Gleam Care, but our plan is to have Eva and Carolina arrive tomorrow afternoon. Wesley will hopefully have figured out our next haven by then.”
“More hiding,” I say.
“Feel free to take your chances back at your apartment. Let me know if the Blood Casters come knocking on your door again.”
I first joined the Spell Walkers after Ness, posing as Atlas, surprised me at home to lure me back to Luna. But thankfully the real Atlas showed up and saved me and Brighton. There’s no world where we can ever live there again without freaking out every minute, worrying that the Blood Casters, or anyone else who wants me dead, will kill us all in our sleep. More havens it is.
Iris dials a number. “Eva, babe. Is Carolina around? I’ll put Emil on the line. . . . Great . . . I love you too.”
It’s beautiful that Iris and Eva, and all the Spell Walkers, have been able to pull off love while existing in the heart of this war we’re fighting. But I don’t know how to factor in romance while trying to survive. Atlas’s death doesn’t make me any more eager to figure it out, but I’m regretting not exploring that energy with Ness when I had the chance. Maybe it would’ve been better to have loved, lost, and all that.
I take the phone from Iris and talk into it. “Ma?”
“My Emilio, what’s going on? Why haven’t you reached out sooner?”
I step out into the hallway and walk toward Brighton’s room. “Sorry, Ma, there’s been so much going on. But Brighton and I are together again.”
“That’s the only reason I haven’t completely lost it. Eva says you all won. You stopped Luna. So it’s all over now.”
“We won,” I say. The greater truth behind that victory is going to break her heart. “But I don’t think it’s over yet. We still have some loose ends to tie up.”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t worry. I’m going to take care of everything.”
“Where’s Brighton? I want to talk to him.”
Through the triangular window of Brighton’s door, I see he’s staring at the sky. “He’s resting right now. Have you been able to sleep?”
“No, but Wesley’s wonderful girlfriend, Ruth, has already prepared a bed for me. I can try to sleep now that I’ve heard your voice.”
