menu on the wall, done in iridescent wand-writing, with a notice at the bottom that proudly declared, We are happy to pack picnic baskets for two or two hundred—and our famous ices are guaranteed not to melt for at least eight hours.
Titus rarely injected himself into these reveries. But now he saw himself walking into Mrs. Hinderstone’s and asking for one of those picnic baskets. He could see Mrs. Hinderstone’s round, smiling face as she took down the particulars of his order. He could feel the weight and coolness of the coins he handed over. And he could sense the curious gazes of the other patrons, at the presence of the Master of the Domain.
But where would he take Fairfax for their picnic? In the Labyrinthine Mountains, overlooking a slope of brilliant red poppies, on the deck of a sailboat anchored in a sheltered bay south of Delamer, or on the great lawn of the Conservatory of Magical Arts and Sciences itself, in the shade of a late-blooming starflower tree, as bells tolled the passage of leisurely hours?
His mind, so adept at processing danger and making split-second decisions, was incapacitated before this cornucopia of pleasurable options. He did not want to choose. He wanted only to wallow in the endless possibilities of such a future.
He did not need to die, whispered a small voice inside. It was too soon, too unnecessary. His mother’s grand vision had proved, if not outright false, then highly misdirected. There was no Chosen One, no certain path. There was no obligation to do more—not on his part, at least, he who had already sacrificed his entire childhood.
While other boys played, he had toiled. When he was not taking lessons from his ancestors in the teaching cantos, he was fighting every creature with teeth and claws in the fairy tales. Instead of sunshine and fresh air, the scents of his youth were old books and the scorch of dragon fire.
He had lived so little. When was the last time he took a walk in the Labyrinthine Mountains for pleasure? No, when he had time to spare, he had instead run on those unforgiving slopes, to make sure he would be fast and nimble when the time came.
Had he ever taken a day just for himself?
He dragged his mind back, gasping with effort. There was a reason he only thought of her in that mythical future: when he included himself, this monstrous greed for life burst forth, willing to destroy everything in its path for one more day, one more hour, one more breath.
But it was too late to turn aside now, too late to embrace cowardice.
He swallowed a dose of vaulting aid, closed his eyes, and pictured Naples.
Naples. Rome. Florence. When he materialized in Florence, he experienced a sharp pain behind his eyes. Instead of sitting down somewhere and waiting for the discomfort to pass, however, he used his recovery time to acquire some nonmage clothes that were better suited to Europe than the Sahara Desert: essentially buying everything off a dress dummy on display. But then again, he was handy with tailoring spells, having had hundreds of hours of practice so he could make sure the clothes he had prepared would fit the elemental mage who would assume the identity of Archer Fairfax.
Fairfax.
When he thought of the future this time, there was only her on the picnic blanket on the great lawn of the Conservatory, a book on her knees, a half-eaten sandwich to the side. But she did not remain alone. A friend would come by and sit down, then another. Soon a sizable cluster had gathered around the picnic blanket, and she was surrounded by laughter and joie de vivre.
He closed his eyes again.
Genoa. Turin. Geneva. Dijon. Auxerre.
By the time he reached the bell tower of Auxerre’s largest cathedral, hunched over, his ears ringing, he knew he had taken one vault too far. This part of France was too densely populated for flying on a carpet, so he bought a coat—in sunny Italy he had underestimated the amount of clothes he needed—got on a train, and let himself be transported by nonmage technology, clickety-clacking the remaining distance to Paris under a gray, rainy sky.
Two hours later he exited Gare de l’Est in Paris and hired a hansom cab to take him to the sixteenth arrondissement. Streetlights flickered to life along the broad boulevards of the city. He stayed in the hansom until traffic degenerated into a logjam that did not budge in any