The Final Day

  Cross had a number of books I was looking for. He’d even sorted them by how useful they were for whatever he was researching. As I’d been considering, or as I’d feared, they were all about soul magic. As such, nearly every book he’d taken from the library was exactly what I would have expected. A Fae tale for children. Soul magic was the monster that lived under children’s beds. It wasn’t real, and it didn’t follow the rules of magic I understood. That was the only reason I even thought of it, really.

  Margaret could control the dead, and she could control the earth. Luke can control the mind, and he has water magic. A mage gets a single focus. One. I am a time mage because I was born a time mage. It’s one reason my grandmother resents me so much. Because of my unique focus. I couldn’t teach it to her any more than Cammie could teach flora magic to me. And a mage can’t cast from across a city. Perhaps with enough aura and a clean line of sight, but mages don’t have control over anything that is entirely unknown to them, like another place. Even the level of access I had to events in Beddenmor was only because my magic seemed to be knotted up with whatever spell was trapping the city. Which I realized must also be soul magic.

  But both of the mages I have fought were new to magic, as far as I knew. They had more power they could use for longer than any mage I’d ever met, they had magic outside of their focus, and they could cast it in an instant on people they’d never seen before. Margaret could, at least. I was still uncertain about Luke. He seemed to need his ritual for full control of the mind. But I was fairly certain my emotions were being altered from halfway across the city.

  Soul magic.

  I’d had the idea in my mind for some time, but near confirmation of the idea made me feel sick. I didn’t know how the magic worked. I stayed up all night in Cross’ study. I read as much as I could until my weary body refused to read more. It was almost all stories, and they all contradicted each other. I didn’t know how aura could manifest a soul, or how it could be used to grant magic to someone without a focus of their own. The only thing every book seemed to agree on was that the soul had more power than aura. That a soul mage was bloody, and desperate, and terrifying. They were always the villain in their stories.

  I had one idea. But I pushed it to the back of my mind. Not because it was unlikely. It was the only thing I could think of that could tie everything together. But it hurt to imagine, because it implied such pain, and to an extent, it implied my complicity. And if I were right, there would be no quick way to stop it. So the truth would simply torture me until I broke the loop. If I broke the loop. I did ask Margaret, of course. It would only hurt more if I chose not to learn the truth for too long. But, as I expected, her memories of using her magic were spotty and blocked off. She remembered the spells, but not how they worked. I realized I would have to ask Luke, which brought me back to my original plan. Gather aura, and confront him again.

  “Are you sure about this?” Margaret asked. I stood at the door of the Cross mansion, my hands gripped tightly around my grimoire and a few books I found most promising from Cross’ collection.

  “I’m never sure about anything, really. I haven’t been for a long time,” I answered. “But I don’t know if I can stand to waste more time.”

  “Luke’s cult may still be looking for you. They almost definitely are,” Margaret warned. It was interesting, hearing her say as much. After she’d pushed so hard before, she wanted me to wait until the end of the loop before exploring again. She was like waves on a shore that way, pushing and pulling. Pressuring and backing off. I hated it. I felt the pain of each death she‘d inflicted on me, regardless of which, and I was never certain if either was real. It all tasted like unseasoned oats, with the faint hint of rot. I pushed past that. I didn’t want Cammie to feel that way about me, so I refused to feel that way about Margaret.

  I glanced at the sunbeams stretching through the windows. They were short, like the sun was near its highest point. I’d slept much of the final day away, once I finally allowed myself to sleep at all. Sleeping at a stranger’s desk wasn’t restful, but I’d been exhausted. I shook my head. “They are, I’m sure. But, by now... there won’t be many left. The Quiet will have taken them. And I’m not going far,” I answered. She was right about the risk. Being taken by Luke again could trap me in this loop. But everyone was already trapped, and... the more I thought about the soul magic, the more urgent it felt to escape the loop as fast as I could. And I still remembered a trail of sparks leading to another house in the neighborhood. That same trail still danced at my feet, even as so many around it had ceased to exist.

  I didn’t wait for Margaret’s response. I knew what would happen if I did. I would embrace the excuse. I would talk, and I would argue, and I would stay safe until the loop was over. But I’d already decided. The loop didn’t matter. What I did in each loop did. And I needed to help someone. After Vel’s death, I needed to help someone. So I opened the door, and I stepped outside.

  My destination sat quietly across the cobblestone road. Every home in this neighborhood towered over me and screamed at me with its silence, but something about the one I was headed to felt just a little more welcoming. The sparks leading to the mayor's house were there as well. But I followed the path to the strangely gentle house. Each step I took was too loud. There wasn’t enough sound in the city, and those that were left were likely playing out Luke’s sick fantasy that nothing was wrong. The silence made my skin crawl, and I hurried across the road.

  As I entered the gate, I was first greeted by abundant life. Trees and bushes growing well past the tidy style of most mansions, but not abandoned. It wasn’t like Cross’ mansion, clearly neglected for too long, and all of this hadn’t grown in the last few weeks. It was almost an organized disorder. It was also what hid the death which greeted me next from anyone outside the grounds. Dozens of fresh graves, recently dug and marked with wood and awkwardly carved names. I recognized none of them, but it felt as if the graves had been filled days before I got there. Strange as it was to think, that was comforting. Vel’s father had denied him grief for his mother. Graves here meant someone still owned their mind enough to dig them. And they were the one who needed help.

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  It also scared me, a little. Because, as far as I knew, the trails were leading to people hurt by the Quiet. People attacked by Margaret’s corpses or trapped in Luke’s service. If whoever I was approaching wasn’t being controlled by Luke, then what could I help them with? The third burst of magic flying from the central spell flashed through my head. There could be another mage out there. One I hadn’t met yet, and I had no idea what to do about that if I discovered it. But I couldn’t avoid everyone who needed me just because of worries and possibilities. Everyone would suffer here forever if I did that.

  I made it to the front door and raised my hand to knock. I had to stop and take a deep breath. “We can still go back, you know,” Margaret finally said. I tensed, nearly forgetting she was following me, but I let out a breath and shook my head. I knew I needed to stop feeling so tense around her. She was on my side. But for some reason, I just couldn’t help it. I didn’t have time to think about it. The door opened before I had the chance to knock, and an older man in a uniform stood on the other side. He was perhaps seventy summers old, and he stood upright and proud, in open defiance of the ocean of grief behind his eyes.

  He opened his mouth to speak, then stopped, thinking better of whatever he was about to tell me. His eyes looked past me, and into the sky. He listened to the quiet as I stood in front of him, then finally, he looked into my eyes.

  “Do you, perhaps, need a friend?” he asked. “For the end?” The question was a tired and desperate one, like it had been spoken in his head a hundred times and never out loud. I tilted my head. This was far from what I expected.

  “Do you?” I asked in return. He curled his lower lip in, and his eyes glistened with tears he was refusing. But he nodded, once, and stood to the side in invitation.

  It was quiet in the estate. It was quiet as I waited for him. For the tea and lunch he'd insisted on making. I wasn’t really hungry, but I knew I should have been. So I allowed him to cook, and I wondered. I wondered what I was supposed to do for this man. Why the sparks had led me to him. And it was him they led me to. They connected us like a thread, following him wherever he walked. No one else appeared in the home, and he clearly didn’t work for Luke. I could only think that I was there to do exactly what I’d offered. To be there, for the end.

  He eventually put a hot plate of food in front of me. Some kind of beef, I thought, with gravy and bread. I fought to stop my nose from wrinkling, but I didn’t pick up the delivered silver either. Instead, I asked a simple question. “Are you alone here?”

  The man sighed. “I loved this job, you know? Perhaps I shouldn’t have. I held little love for my employer. But I did love the work. I loved the guests, and the grounds, and I loved caring for the children,” he responded. The silence in the house seemed to punctuate every word.

  “How long have they been gone?” I asked.

  “The last died three days ago. One of the maids, actually. The entire staff lasted longer than anyone who employed us. It was almost a relief, at first,” he answered. His words were resigned in the way personal stories shared with a stranger always are. I could feel it. The way he was confiding in me not out of trust, but because I would listen. “They wouldn’t acknowledge the Quiet. Not until it took them. My employers, I mean. And it was a relief. Being afraid without shame. We didn’t change much, actually. We still performed our duties, even as we buried the man who paid us to perform them. We didn’t discuss the Quiet. Not constantly, anyway. For a day or two, it was just us, taking care of the home we lived in because we loved it far more than its owner.” he paused, and glanced at the meal he’d served me.

  I suppressed a grimace and picked up a piece of bread. I took small bites of it and nodded so he would continue. I could see two things in his eyes at this. First, that I wasn’t fooling him, and second, that he appreciated the lie. He gave a soft nod, and continued. “I wasn’t supposed to be the last one left, though. No one was, I suppose. But, even as the number of graves climbed, all of us believed we’d be leaving someone behind. Someone to dig our grave. Someone to be with us, when we went. I suppose everyone was right but me,” he lamented. I looked down at the brown gravy, sitting still but ready to move on top of the meat.

  “Alright,” I agreed. “I can do that.” The man seemed to grow taller in an instant and finally took a seat opposite me a moment later. No longer was he stiff in the way those of his profession often are. Instead, he was simply an old man, relieved to hear that someone would sit by his bed as he went.

  “I believe you,” he whispered. There was no reason to. As far as he knew, I would die before him, as everyone else had. But I wouldn’t, and I knew it. I would be there to dig his grave. I’d even brought a grave keeper. And he believed me. I supposed that made sense. He did say he never really believed he’d be the last. I didn’t need to hear all the details of his story. I understood. “And... I’m sorry.” I shook my head.

  “Don’t be. I’ve always known I would be alone when it happened. I don’t know if I’m prepared for that, but I at least won’t be surprised,” I explained. This seemed to comfort and hurt him in equal measure, but he didn’t press me for details. He just closed his eyes and rested in his seat. As he did, the meat in front of me slowly started to look like food, and I picked up the knife he’d delivered with it.

  He wasn’t a victim of Margaret’s violence or Luke’s control. He was a victim of the Quiet alone. And there was nothing I could do to save him. Still, the sparks had led me to him. And I had to consider what that meant. I ate in silence, and I actually did feel better.

  We were there for hours. We spoke a little, but not much. It was exactly like he said. He was simply living in the house he loved, but no longer alone. When he finally died, the teal sparks came from him like a wildfire. That was all I’d needed to do to help him. Wait with him until he died. Make sure he wasn’t alone. He was cold and still in his seat, and the sparks he created flooded my veins with power and purpose. Enough to wash the fatigue of my overused magic away in an instant. Again, I smelled the sweet scent of fresh fruit falling from healthy trees. Again, I felt a far-off embrace.

  I’d never asked the man’s name, but as he died, his soul filled my aura and offered me a now familiar and fleeting peace.

  End of the Final Day