away long enough to get the hunk of bread involved.
“Magic will revive when the storm hits,” she said, “maybe sooner. It’s difficult to know. These things don’t calendar well.”
She walked to Zayvion’s bed, brushed her fingertips across his forehead. She had done that a hundred times for me in the last few months I’d been training. Her touch brought a sense of soothing, an ease of pain. She said it wasn’t so much magic as it was a knack. A little like my father and I have a knack for Influencing people, she said, she and her kin had a knack for settling the mind, soothing the body, easing, just a slight amount, the pain magic made you pay.
If Shame had the knack, I had no idea. I’d never seen him use it.
Zayvion didn’t move, didn’t so much as stir at her touch.
“He’s in a coma, isn’t he?” I asked quietly.
Maeve nodded. She folded her hands in front of her, fingers twined. I’d never seen her look helpless. “We think he’ll come out of it. When magic stabilizes.”
I was pretty sure she was trying to convince herself of that, because I wasn’t buying it. I’d seen Zay fall. I’d seen his spirit, his soul, get sucked into the gate. And I didn’t think magic coming back was going to fix that. Fix him.
Well, unless it blew open a gate. And if Zayvion was still capable of finding his way home through that gate, maybe that would work.
“He went through the gate,” I said.
Maeve looked over at me. I’d never seen that expression on her face before, but I knew what it was: horror.
“He what?”
“Went through the gate. Chase and Greyson opened it. I watched Zayvion’s soul cross over the threshold.”
It sounded like I’d just said he died. And in a way he had. But he was still breathing. He was right here in the room with me. Still fighting to live. I refused to give up on that.
“I see,” Maeve said, no more than a whisper. “That changes things.”
“How?”
She just shook her head. “Let me talk to some people first. When I know, I’ll tell you. Right now, you should rest. I want you to stay here until you are feeling better.”
“I’m fine.”
She raised one eyebrow.
To prove how great I was feeling, I pushed the tray away from the bed and then the covers away from my legs. Pajamas, plain blue, flannel. Not mine, but nice not to be in nothing but panties.
I stood, and brushed my hair back behind my ears. My hands didn’t even shake. Much. And the good thing? I wasn’t dizzy.
“You want to leave?” she asked.
“I’m not staying in bed.” I took a few steps. My body didn’t ache, really. Other than the hollowness of magic not in me, I didn’t feel like I’d done much more than work out really hard.
“Can I do anything for him?”
Okay, I’ll admit it. I was afraid to touch Zay. Afraid that if I did, I would have to come to grips with him not being there, not being present in his body. That I’d realize he was little more than a breathing corpse.
No. I pushed that thought away.
Maeve wove her fingers together again. “I don’t know.”
Three words I didn’t want to hear.
“So there’s not a lot about this in the histories?”
She shook her head. “Did you see him go through the gate with your bare eyes, or were you using Sight?”
“I don’t remember. I don’t think I was holding magic. It all happened so fast.”
She sighed. “I’ll talk to Sedra. To Liddy. To Victor. To Jingo Jingo. We’ll contact other members of the Authority outside the city. See if anyone has experienced this before.” She was suddenly all business again. Busy was her default mode when she was faced with an emergency.
“In the meantime, you’ll stay here. Not because I don’t think you are well enough to leave. We may need you once magic flares again, once the wild-magic storm hits. It would be easiest for us if you were nearby.”
“I’ll stay awhile,” I said.
“Good.” Maeve looked over at Shame, who had been sitting quietly, head back, eyes closed, for most of the conversation. It didn’t take magic to see how her body language changed once she looked at him. She was worried for him. She was afraid for him. I’d never seen her doubt Shame’s strength. Not even when magic had taken him to his knees.
“Will you sleep?” she asked like this had been a point of contention.
“Not