He Could Not Escape

For Quinn, there’s nothing more comforting than a morning hangover. His pounding head rings to the tune of cheerful memories. But, more than anything, it’s the proper penance for his nighttime—sometimes daytime—festivities. The toll for elation greets the drowsy mind like clockwork, so the night can be enjoyed guilt-free—knowing tonight’s merry will be tomorrow’s despair. Because, the price for happiness always comes; it came for him last night.

It wasn’t the excruciatingly painful eye-gouge. That was just a chip of interest on the sizable, overdue bill teenage Quinn racked up. The price was a relapse into the traumatic world of magic that appalled Quinn, seeing its permanent malfiguring on his metamorphosis into adulthood. Emi used to feel the same before she decided to visit her family in rural Japan—wearing the same coldly precise expression as earlier. She’d conquered the averse emotional terror of magic not once but now twice. Good for her. Quinn didn’t need that.

What Quinn did need was to loosen the everlasting chokehold of a haunting guilt. Emi had come to collect on the years of his ignorant, self-absorbed teenage pleasure that she shouldered the cost of. If it means braving the magic world, then so be it. That morning under the pounding of his skull, Quinn found himself breathing slightly easier.

Clad with nothing but lounge shorts, Quinn stumbled into the living room around noon to find Kallum and Emi chomping down on take-out burritos in the meager dining room, facing each other with a puzzled look.

“Did you order me anything?” Quinn indignantly asked, navigating through the maze of furniture to take a seat with his friends.

“Yeah, breakfast burrito for ya,” Kallum replied with a cheery smile and compassionate eyes poking through damp, white hair that’d been crudely dried.

Quinn felt Emi’s careful gaze as he rested his hips down on the foamy cushion upheld by the black, metallic chair frame. A stiff smile did little to relax the thin eyebrows on Emi’s naked face, but she jumped right into catching him up to speed on the couple’s morning.

It started with an early rise. Kallum was jumping off the walls like a boy on Christmas morning, so he cooked an omelet full of love and brought breakfast in bed for a drowsy Emi. Some affectionate platitudes later—during which Quinn zoned out—Emi went over the calculated summary given to Kallum. She explained Talitia’s trial required accumulating Guide Stones from other mages, leaving the deadly implications of doing so unspoken. Interactions between the type and quantity of stones would provide assistance and clues to revealing the goal of Heaven, but all had dowsing features in quantities of two, conveying a palatable sense of caution in Kallum. Finally, she explained the reward, New Magic. An ocean of diverse magical spells that could be cast without rules or limit, understating the magnitude of how fundamentally paradigm shattering that was.

On the flip side, the explanation fanned the flames of Kallum’s curiosity, spawning questions Emi genuinely had no answers to. Eventually, she wrangled the fire down to Kallum’s candle lighting magic, which was a genuine oddity to Quinn. The two spent most of the morning running trials to deduce its origin and scope, but it was hardly fruitful. Hours of frustration led to Kallum taking a break to shower while Emi took a breather to grab the lunch presently clutched in their palms.

“So, what do you think?” Kallum asked Quinn, with a hint of desperation in his emerald eyes. Attention had completely shifted from his meal and to Quinn’s thoughts.

“Obviously, it’s not any variety of restoration,” Quinn replied earnestly. The words felt uncomfortable leaving his mouth and brought light dissociation. He pushed through for Emi, and Kallum. “Maybe a super weird variety of transmutation, but extinguishing the flame rules that out.”

“It does?” Kallum questioned.

“It turns junk into jewels, not the other way around,” Quinn said. “That’s the idea behind it at least, from what I’ve seen.”

Kallum turned to face Emi, who was clearly more interested in her burrito than the conversation. Perhaps she was dissociating as well, Quinn considered. Though she’d traversed this road once before, so it might be unfair to project that.

Emi shrugged, chewing while staring through the paper plate under her perched hand. “I didn’t know. There’s no magic school, Kallum. You just learn what your parents tell you.” Emi’s unspoken estrangement from her family naturally arose in Quinn and Kallum’s mind, but Quinn knew they held very different understandings.

“Ahhhh!” Kallum let out a rather loud breath of exasperation. “We spent almost two hours trying to figure that out. It was our last lead.” Kallum threw his back against the chair and slumped into the seat. His dejected eyes clung to the ceiling.

“That means it’s gotta be divine magic. It’s the most common and most likely answer.” Quinn said, unwrapping his breakfast burrito that unfortunately had run a bit cold. He took a bit into the sausage and egg stuffed tortilla. It could have benefited from a bit of salsa.

“Emi said it’s not,” Quinn said. His defeated expression remained while his body sank lower into the chair.

“Again,” Emi said, still engrossed in her meal, “no magic school, but Kallum is too indifferent towards fire. Plus, it doesn’t even make sense. Like, the type of magic.”

Quinn understood Emi’s qualms, but there wasn’t any other alternative. “Kallum,” he asked, “what do you remember about magic. In your childhood.” Quinn shocked himself with the proactive question into the matter. Though Kallum’s infectious eagerness tended to do that.

“Well,” Kallum adjusted his posture and sat upright, placing down his half-eaten burrito on the paper plate before him. “I only remember lighting candles for hours a day in the basement. Day after day. For years. That’s about all.”

“Makes sense,” Quinn said, taking another bite from his burrito. “It’s a weird magic for sure. There’s not really a point to developing that, but that process is about par for divine magic.”

“Huh…” Kallum fell into contemplation. He remained silent, giving Quinn the cue to take his meal seriously. So he thought.

“What about you?” Kallum asked.

Quinn coughed up a bit of food.

There were two ways Quinn could take the question. Either Kallum was asking about his own experience of divine magic, which he very much did not want to share right now, or he was asking what kind of magic Quinn used. There was no world where he answered the first one, disclosing his involvement with Kallum’s girlfriend.

“I don’t know,” Quinn replied, banking on the second interpretation. “It’s divine magic, but I don’t know what it does.” Even answering this was painful enough. He swallowed before divulging the information to Kallum. There was no reason to do so, but it felt necessary. “All I know is that it only works with people I love.”

“Whelp, that settles it!” A slam jostled the paper plates a few inches away from its epicenter: Kallum’s palm. An ear to ear grin plastered his face, resembling the manic expressions Quinn would catch in his own reflections. “Looks like we gotta recruit!”

“What?” Quinn asked. “Like other mages?”

“Yeah, a mentor-type leader. Like Gandalf or something,” Kallum said indignantly.

To seal the insanity, Kallum abandoned his meal to begin digging through the antique 17th century flat-top dresser that displayed Quinn’s ceremonial plates. Even Emi paused her meal to watch the scene unfold. From the clutter inside, out came a revolver; the one Shailene had.

“Dude!” Quinn reflexively shot from his seat.

Kallum, with the most casual expression it is the natural course of things, cocked his head slightly. “We need offense right?”

At a loss for words, Quinn turned to Emi for support, but she shrugged it off and returned to finishing the last bite of her food. “Gimme your keys,” she said, mouth full of tortilla. “I’ll drive.”

“Help me find them,” Quinn snapped back, grabbing Emi’s small forearm. He yanked her along with a roughness that conjured depressing memories; likely for both of them. Quinn pulled Emi into his room and slammed the door, explicitly disregarding whatever tumultuous emotions Emi might be feeling. The situation has reversed.

“He’s treating this like some fucking game!” Quinn hissed.

Emi refused to look at him, but she couldn’t hide without her signature hat. Instead she gazed to the side and let out a despondent reply. “If he gets hurt, I’ll heal him.”

“What if he’s shot? Or gets blown up? Or set on fire? Or mind-controlled?” Quinn’s list built along with his anger. Emi wasn’t listening. She stepped away to grab keys from the beer cluttered nightstand. The burning fury inside him wasn’t enough to melt her frigid demeanor. Rather, it extinguished his flame.

Emi stopped right before leaving and faced Quinn straight on. Her icy expression made his hairs stand on end. Teeth clenched and jaw locked, as if frozen in place, her seething words carried an excruciatingly hot disdain. “Since you clearly fucking care, why don't you try using your magic. You wanna protect him? Do it. I pushed through. Twice. Are you going to be a pussy forever? Or will you man the fuck up and take accountability for once in your life and do what I asked?”

Quinn watched Emi compose her emotions and open the door. She stepped into the hallway, and Quinn, like a well trained puppy, followed.

-----

Kallum popped the tab of another Hazy IPA as he flopped onto the second-hand couch in his modest one bedroom, one bath apartment. Kicking his bare feet on the coffee table, he reclined and gazed at his Guide Stone between his fingers, wondering if it was as useful as Emi claimed. The magical purple hue felt dull under the matching light radiating from the smart bulbs affixed to cheap standing lamps. A disillusioned depression draped over Kallum.

Quickly, the trio found out the dowsing feature of his Guide Stone was broken. According to Quinn, when the stones touch, it’s like a sudden epiphany where you remember that last stash of imported Tequila was left in your suitcase five months ago; only, the tequila is a mage you’ve never met before. Emi suspected it’s probably the same reason he didn’t receive the initial run down: too inexperienced. It didn’t make sense how Quinn was any more experienced than he was, considering he could at least use magic—utility of it aside. Either way, Kallum had to rely on his friends to navigate finding a competent mage willing to partner up with them. But, hours of riding through L.A. streets ate away his soul, eventually questioning if the ‘trial’ is some strange hoax. How could one of the biggest cities in the United States be devoid of any magical communities? Apparently, there’s a ton of solo mages, but Quinn and Emi insisted those were last resorts. When they did find a group—twice in all ten hours of searching—the path was swiftly cut off by a cacophony of police sirens that forced them back.

Kallum took a massive swig from his Hazy IPA and let its bitter aftertaste linger on his tongue. A sigil of Kallum’s mood. He’d gotten excessively churlish with the two after they called off the hunt. A well of curiosity sprung forth last night with a promise for answers about his childhood; the days spent in that basement, lighting candles ad nauseam at his father’s behest. God be damned if that was going to dry up in a day, and he made that abundantly clear to his friends, with or without their help.

“We’ve reached an agreement,” Emi said, stepping out of their bedroom where she had been discussing with Quinn long enough for Kallum to get through two pints of canned beer. She wore the same tense expression that’d stuck after stumbling on the first parade of cop cars. Quinn silently brushed past Emi and walked into the living room, standing tall right in front of Kallum.

Kallum took a sip from his IPA as Emi sat next to him, hips touching. Even the stomach fluttering effect of Emi’s light perfume couldn’t lift the blanket of depression wrapped around him.

“We’ll hit the solos if I can get this to work,” Quinn said. His voice shook ever so slightly. “Otherwise, we’ll pay a visit to Victor…” Quinn trailed off.

A flame of hope ignited in Kallum. He’d brought up the suggestion of visiting Quinn’s father, Victor Cullbrook, for guidance, but it was shot down by both of them so violently that he dropped the topic immediately. Meekly, Kallum then considered speaking with his adoptive mother, Quinn’s aunt. That got shot too, Quinn stating she’d deliberately stepped away from the family and wouldn’t appreciate her adopted son learning about magic.

Quinn closed his eyes and stretched his arms outward into an awkward t-pose, seemingly expecting something to happen.

“What are you doing?” Kallum asked, struggling to parse the situation through a haze of alcohol.

“Trying to use magic.” Quinn replied, presumably to concentrate on casting said magic. His voice was still shaky. “You are supposed to want to hug me really badly right now.” Kallum wasn’t sure if that was a joke, but he rose to his feet nonetheless.

Before he could wrap his arms around Quinn, his phone started vibrating on the coffee table next to the two empty beer cans he ran through earlier. It was from an unknown number. Normally, he wouldn’t pay any attention, but there was still another unresolved issue that he’d been wrestling with; Shailene.

He’d sent some texts in the morning, trying to clarify what happened that night. How’d she know what was going to happen? Why’d she have a gun on her? The curiosity nipped at his brain, but apparently that was his exclusive problem. The other two didn’t so much as mention her. So, while Quinn fumbled about the room in thought, he bent down over and picked up the phone.

“Hello?” Kallum asked eagerly. He felt Emi and Quinn’s puzzled looks for picking up the phone at this moment.

Kallum? It’s me.

“Oh, Shailene? Where are you calling from?” Kallum asked, curious about the random number. The mention of that name turned confused looks into scowls.

“That fucking bitch,” Emi murmured.

“Call her a bitch,” Quinn hissed while pointing at the phone. Kallum ignored him.

I broke my phone, so I got a new one.

All of a sudden, Quinn began to pace heavily around the room, panicking intensely. It seemed like his plan failed, but it caused Kallum to wonder what his plan even was. Were those weird requests supposed to be magic? He pondered the idea for a second.

Um, so Kallum. There’s something I wanna say.

”Yeah? What’s up?” Kallum came back to reality, catching a frantic look of terror swirling on Quinn’s face. He followed the line of sight to its source. Emi, standing with the revolver aimed at Kallum’s thigh. There was a confident look in her eye, a look Kallum learned from their time together in that dingy choreo room. A plan had brewed in her mind and she was about to execute. He trusted her fully, as he did back then.

No matter the outcome, he’d be making progress towards understanding magic; and the paltry spell his father left him. Worst case scenario: few seconds of pain before Emi fixes him up.

I have a secret that I need to tell you.

“Oh?” Kallum murmured. He’d momentarily forgotten that he was speaking to Shailene. There was little energy to spare as his mind braced itself for an imminent tearing of flesh. He closed his eyes and clenched his teeth. A gunshot echoed through the tiny apartment.

Kallum! Kallum, where are you?

The pain never came.

Opening his eyes, Kallum caught Emi’s nervous smile of relief.

“At my place,” Kallum said, turning to confirm this moment for celebration, but Quinn’s face was absent of joy. It bore a red hue that rivaled Emi on a night of binge drinking. “Shit, gotta go. Tell me when you get here.”

“You insane fucking cunt!” Quinn bellowed. Spit flew across the living room. Kallum jumped to his feet and slipped his arms under Quinn’s shoulders from behind, pulling tight to catch his lunge. Flinging his weight backwards, Kallum chained Quinn to the couch with his hold.

“You’re welcome,” Emi said. “Now we don’t have to see Victor.” Kallum’s face was pressed between sofa cushions and Quinn’s back, but he didn’t need sight to tell the quivering unease in his girlfriend's voice. “And you can use magic.”

The weight above him relaxed. Kallum tentatively loosened his grip as Quinn jerked away, but the worries were unfounded. His focus had shifted to acquiring an IPA; stat.

“Too far, Em. Way too far.” Quinn benignly scoffed in Emi’s direction, heading straight to the kitchen.

Kallum received another nervous smile from Emi as she sat next to him once again, hips no longer touching. He returned her smile with a comforting one. The inner conflict was apparent, but it came from a loving place. Like the cigarette burn Emi left when she caught Quinn smoking after quitting for a month; now, he’s a year clean.

More importantly, Quinn used magic. Real magic too, like Emi. It protected him from a fucking bullet. A feverish warmth spread through Kallum’s body.

Cloudy wisps of doubt burned away at the realization of this development. The blanket of depression tossed aside because he was more than warm enough now. Invulnerability and healing is the ultimate defensive combination. They’d grit and survive whatever life brings, so it’s just a numbers game now. How long till Kallum can find a mentor; someone knowledgeable about magic to guide him.

He felt Emi’s abrupt touch pull him back. The purple hues that filled the living room seemed so vibrant now. “So, what’s the plan now?” she asked.

“Probably start with the nearest mages and work our way outward,” Kallum replied. “It’s just a numbers game now.”

“No. I mean Shailene.”

“Shailene?”

“Yeah, Shailene. The girl that held a gun at me last night.” Emi’s voice was irate. “Please do not tell me you invited that girl with no plan in mind.”

“I just wanted to talk about it,” Kallum said hesitantly. “That’s all.”

“You can not be serious, Kallum!” Emi screamed. “She pointed a fucking gun at me!”

“What? You want us to jump her or something?” Kallum began mirroring her irritation.

“Yeah, I kinda do.”

“Woah, guys. We’re all friends here,” Quinn said, strolling back into the living room with a half-chugged beer in hand, gesturing us to calm down as if he hadn’t lunged at Emi earlier. The calming effect of alcohol on him was magic in itself.

“Easy for you to say,” Emi snapped back, her eye-catching hair swiveling with her head. “Shailene doesn’t hate you for just existing.”

“Okay, okay,” Kallum said. “I think all of our emotions have been running hot since last night. We should take some time to cool down and figure things out.” Quinn nodded in agreement while shoving the cheap Ikea coffee table back with one foot and sitting cross-legged on the carpet in front of them.

It was intended to be a platitude, but Kallum quickly realized how true it was. Quinn’s outburst, Emi’s outburst, his outburst; all in under twenty-four hours. It was so rare for this to happen among them—Emi and Shailene’s reactions aside. That reality likely hit all of them at the same time. Kallum watched Emi pull away to the other side of the couch and ball her knees together, her signature—

For the first time today, at nearly eleven p.m., Kallum realized Emi hadn’t worn her hat at all today; her signature hat. There’s no way she left it at Quinn’s, or it would have come up. He’d once joked she would wear it on her wedding night. How could he have missed this?

“I’m not talking to her unless she apologizes,” Emi muttered. Her face was lowered, staring at the middle cushion between them, but the distance felt so much greater.

“That’s valid,” Kallum replied, turning back and draping his arm over the couch and swishing the remaining liquid in his beer can, contemplating. Contemplation turned to dissociation. Disturbing levels of dissociation. Quinn picked up on it.

“Yeah, I think this might be a Greatest Battles of All-Time’ angle.” Quinn said, sitting between the two and activating the Roku TV with his phone app. It certainly didn’t fix anything, but the sensory experience of snappy music and bodies moving certainly helped ground Kallum. They made it nearly to the end of a twenty-minute crew battle—featuring some of Kallum’s icons—before the front door wildly swung open and a distraught, heavily panting Shailene barged through.

“Oh my God, you’re okay!” She screamed, nearly on the verge of tears. It'd been years since Kallum had seen her this emotionally turbulent.

“What the fuck?” Quinn had probably never seen her this emotionally turbulent.

Shailene charged the short distance across the living room into a before Kallum blurted a concerning observation.

“You’re covered in blood.” Kallum noticed residual blots on his shirt, almost black under the purple lights. The giveaways were tiny specs of fleshy bits that clung to the black fabric Shailene wore.

“Yes, I am,” she said frantically. The anxiety level hadn’t dropped a bit since she came running in. “We need to get out of L.A. Now. They’re coming for you.”

“Woah, woah, woah,” Quinn said, pulling Shailene away from Kallum. The tv paused on a b-boy mid air flare behind him. “Do we need to 5150 you? Who’s they?”

After everything that just happened, Shailene’s spastic ramblings sent Kallum spinning. All he wanted now, more than anything, was a calm environment. Somewhere to get his head straight. A private space where he and Emi could chat and figure out this rollercoaster of events.

“Whatever the fuck this is, I don’t care.” Kallum blurted his inner thoughts aloud. “Sorry,” he immediately corrected himself. “Can you two actually leave? I’d like some time alone right now. With my girlfriend.” Simultaneously, Kallum and Emi both turned to give each other considerate looks.

“No!” Shailene stood firm, and her emotions snapped into place. Her ability to find composure no matter the situation was honestly frightening. “Another agent is coming to kill you.” She turned her head slightly toward Emi and nodded, “And you too.”

“I said I wanted to tell you a secret,” she continued. “The secret is I’m fucking in love with you, Kallum. I’m in love with you so I failed. I kill mages, but I didn’t kill you, so now someone else is going to do it instead.”

Silence hung.

A normal person couldn’t handle this kind of information all at once, and certainly Kallum was anything but a normal person; but right now he sure felt like one. His tongue tied in a knot as he tried processing Shailene’s words.

Annoyed, Shailene briefly faced Emi, “And I’ll tell you about the Japan stuff.”

Kallum attempted groping around for the words that Emi found instead.

“We’ll go,” she said, standing up. “Give us five minutes to grab our things.” She broke Kallum out of stunlock and pulled him into the bedroom where she immediately began to empty her backpack of school supplies.

“I—I thought you weren’t going to talk to her,” Kallum stammered out. It was the only thing his mind could handle at that moment, but once the thought pushed through his mouth, he found reason slowly returned to him. He immediately began emptying a backpack of his own while Emi replied.

“She apologized in her own way,” Emi said. Kallum could’ve sworn he caught a faint smile, but Emi would never admit to that.

“I’m sorry,” Kallum said while grabbing a handful of underwear and stuffing it into the front pocket of his vacant backpack. “I didn’t even notice you weren’t wearing your hat today.”

“Oh.” Emi paused while grabbing a fistful of dolphin shorts. “You’re right.” She curiously touched the top of her head to confirm what Kallum said was true. “I think I left it at Quinn’s.”

That statement made Kallum’s stomach churn. He’d never felt more disconnected from the girl he loved than over the past day. The intimate conversation he shared with Emi last night replayed in his head.

“We should talk, once we’re safe,” Kallum said.

“I agree,” Emi replied, planting a quick smooch on Kallum’s lips as she left for the bathroom, grabbing their toiletries.

Then a warm realization hit Kallum, that would ease his worries for at least the night. Without sharing a single word, the two had seamlessly packed every memorable piece of clothing and essential item between their backpacks; a product of their time spent together.

-----

Kallum slammed the passenger door shut and straddled the overstuffed backpack in his lap. Shailene’s Lexus was filled with an overpowering stench of car freshener, that took on a new meaning with the reveal of her profession. Kallum fastened his seatbelt and the force of the car threw him forward as Shailene reversed out of the parking lot. Emi let out a small yelp from the backseat, followed by the tumbling of her equally stuffed backpack.

Kallum turned around to check on her and she returned a comforting smile. Quinn, on the other hand, was languidly staring out of the window while he held another IPA can for the road in his lap. Since his condo was where the incident happened, it was too compromised to return there and grab any essentials—likely bottles of Tequila.

“So where are we going?” Kallum asked Shailene, holding onto the door handle for stability as she shot down the street roads going 70 mph, almost double the speed limit.

“Vegas,” Shailene replied, while the car let out a terrifying screech as it drifted through an intersection. “Safehouse there.” Kallum’s back immediately slammed against the car seat as it accelerated.

It started to make sense why Shailene was such a good driver. This honestly wasn’t the first time the group had experienced this level of calculated maneuvering, but it also wasn’t under life threatening circumstances; so she was banned from driving them—D.D. withstanding. She swerved onto the 405-North freeway, causing everyone to lurch left.

Rearview lights swung in and out of vision while weaving through the congested L.A. traffic, rarely dropping speed. The bluetooth came to life and started blasting derivative Drift Phonk to Shailene’s chagrin. Kallum checked the rear view mirror to see Emi shooting Quinn a disappointed look.

“What? If we’re in some death chase then it should feel like it,” he said.

The two quibbled over the music a bit, settling on some breakcore which made Shailene particularly eager to chime in on the conversation with songs to queue. The scene made Kallum almost feel at ease, tethered back to the reality that existed for the past three years. It stayed there for a while, long enough for them to reach San Bernardino, but reality kept slipping further back. Back to memories of candles.

“Okay. Elephant in the room,” Kallum said, interrupting their innocuously heated discussion on if good Drift Phonk artists existed. “How did you know what was going to happen last night?”

The car jostled back and forth as Shailene pulled around a car deemed too slow—a paltry 85 mph—as an attentive hush filled the car, along with rapid fire drum kicks and high pitch synths. They’d reached the 15 towards Vegas just now; the lengthy trip had only just begun.

“We all knew,” Shailene said neutrally. “February 22nd, once the clock strikes midnight.”

“Who’s we?” Quinn chimed in, searching for clarification to what Kallum suspected was left intentionally vague.

“All the agents,” Shailene said. Vague, as predicted.

“How did you know us specifically?” Emi asked, trying to clarify what Kallum really meant to ask.

For a second, Shailene took her eyes off the road to look into the rear view and catch Emi’s gaze. “You know why.” It was almost a somber tone, or perhaps reverential? Kallum couldn’t quite pin it, but it was oddly not aggressive considering their normal interactions.

“Why is that?” Kallum asked generally, hoping to dig a bit more information. The rapid kicks broke into a soft 70s synth hum lightly floated up and down. The sound lingered in the car for a few moments.

“That’s up to her to answer,” Shailene answered. There was a lot more concern in her voice that she would normally display outwardly. Kallum couldn’t catch Emi’s facial expression then, but he noted it for their later conversation. A foreseeably difficult conversation.

Slowly, the atmosphere repaired itself through artist comparisons, arguments over campy Netflix shows, and calmly listening to a queue of the group's curated music. Feeling loose and comfortable, he once again felt tethered to that earlier reality.

The empty flats of Nevada shot by and the overwhelming night sky wrapped Kallum like a cozy blanket as he settled into the familiar banter between his friends. Undoubtedly secret pasts and trauma had all regurgitated themselves at once, stinking up the amiable group environment; but it could be cleaned up. Right now was proof of that. Guide Stones, Talitia, and even magic be damned. They were friends first and foremost. Kallum closed his eyes and savored the moment.

It could have been a few seconds, maybe a few minutes, he couldn’t tell, but his serenity was shattered by Quinn’s shouting and the car swerving. Swerving so hard that Kallum opened his eyes to the night sky whirling underneath him. Once, then twice, before it stopped.

The car—perhaps specially reinforced for Shailene’s job—held mostly firm, though a torrent of glass still found its way inside. Shailene’s side of the car also took the brunt of the damage, and there might have been some blood splatter; but Kallum was unaware. Naturally, he was fine from Quinn’s divine protection, and his eyes were trained on the figure illuminated by the shattered headlights—source of the wreck.

A girl, unmistakably in her late teens, was eerily squatting in the middle of the road. Paying no heed to the cold desert night, she wore light rags that swayed not with the wind but the bushy fox tail oscillating behind her. Yellow and red ringed eyes, visible from across the road, fiercely observed Kallum, staring into his soul. Fuzzy pointed ears, jutting from the top of her unruly, long orange hair, twitched with his rapidly beating heart. Amidst the groans and hisses from smarting cuts and welting bruises that filled the car, Kallum was giddy; that was a mage.