“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.”
It helps so much to know that she’s got something good going for her in Philadelphia. “Please rest, Ma. Call us in the morning when you’re on the way.”
“I will. I love you boys so much.”
“Love you too.”
We hang up.
I’m going to get Ma the closest-to-normal life that I can, a life that Brighton better get on board with because I’m over all of this chaos and what it’s done to our family. If I can’t save him with the power-binding potion, then Ma is going to know that I did everything in my power to keep her only biological son alive. It’s the least I can do for all the trouble I brought into her life.
I return to my room. Prudencia is resting on my bed, and Iris is picking at one of her bandages.
“Thanks,” I say, giving Iris her phone back.
“Carolina calming down?” Iris asks.
“Yeah, but once she finds out about the Reaper’s Blood, it’s going to set her off. I have to focus on the power-binding potion.”
“Which you were already doing,” she says.
“No, my focus was split because of the Crowned Dreamer. But now that I held up my end of the deal and stopped Luna, I’m giving my full attention to this potion to save Brighton.”
Iris doesn’t argue. “The world thanks you. Well, the whole world isn’t thanking any of us. But you get it.”
“What’s the plan?” Prudencia asks.
“We haven’t been able to figure out what those ingredients in Bautista’s journal mean. I bet he and Sera were close; we just got to finish the job. It’s time we straight-up ask an alchemist to decode everything for us, and fast, so we can save Brighton too.”
Iris scoffs. “Sorry, but you do realize that the majority of senior alchemists in New York swore allegiance to Luna, right? Even some of the younger alchemists who didn’t agree with her still respected her work. It’s unlikely that Luna survived that attack, and once word gets out that you had a hand in killing her, they’re all going to try and make a name for themselves.”
“And what better way to do that than getting us,” Prudencia says.
I can stop fighting all I want, but that won’t stop others from hunting me.
“Then we don’t ask an alchemist,” I say. “Dr. Bowes studied alchemy. She might recognize the ingredients.”
Prudencia considers this for a moment. “After everything with Kirk, we have to be careful. Do we trust her?”
“She hasn’t sold us out,” Iris says. “Yet.”
“Dr. Bowes wouldn’t. She has loved the Spell Walkers her entire life.”
“It’s a start,” Prudencia says, headed for the door. “The journal is in the car.”
I follow her downstairs, and when we get to Iris’s car, she unlocks the trunk with her power. The journal is inside her backpack, and I’m so damn grateful she didn’t leave it behind in Nova when I was busy trying to protect Gravesend. Prudencia hands me the journal, and hope sparks in me, looking at it again. It’s cased in dark blue leather, and there’s an illustrated fire-orb on the cover, gold like the flames Bautista could create. In the elevator back up, I flip through and find the pages with the ingredients we couldn’t translate.
We find Dr. Bowes’s office, and her door is open. She looks up from her computer. “Emil, Prudencia. Come in, please.” We sit on the little yellow sofa she has in her office, and I breathe in the smell of the pink roses beside me. “Fifteenth anniversary last week,” she says when she sees me eyeing them. There’s a picture of Dr. Bowes with her family in Egypt and another of her in a ball pit with her son. She should be home with her son and husband, not working overtime to keep us all alive. “What can I do for you?”
“I hate to ask, but we need your help,” I say.
“And discretion,” Prudencia adds.
Dr. Bowes straightens up. “I’ll do my best.”
“I know we can’t fully eliminate the essence of creatures once they’re introduced into a human’s body, but we’re hoping that if we can lock away all the powers that come with being a specter, they’ll stop eating away at Brighton.” I tap the cover of the journal. “This belonged to Bautista and Sera Córdova.”