I threw my hand forward, concentrated, forced my thumb up and to the side to direct the spell, then cast fire magic. It was weak. I’d already told you about my limitations – when I wasn’t channeling spirit stones, that was. But if there was one thing the last few days of breakneck adventure had taught me, it was how to get the most out of my magic.

  The fireball slammed into the zombie’s head, not just throwing it off course with its momentum, but burning through the spell that manifested it.

  Now Winchester really did pause to blink at me in surprise. This would be where he would ask how I was so powerful, correct? Unfortunately, no. He turned. “You deal with them,” he demanded.

  He shot toward the book.

  Deal with them? All of them? The room kept filling with more and more, and while I was, indeed, a competent and very determined witch, one cannot fight an army all on their own.

  “Whatever it is, Winchester, we’ll get it later.”

  “It’s what my brother’s after. He’s always been after it. And he can’t have it,” I spat.

  Winchester threw himself at the plinth. It was just as a much larger zombie rose right behind him. I had no idea what the poor fellow had been in life, but he must’ve been a spectacular warrior.

  Standing at around 2.5 meters tall, he looked as if he had the force to pick up a horse all on his own.

  And it was up to me to push him away from Winchester before he could pick Winchester up instead and break him in half.

  “Winchester,” I roared until I could’ve stripped my throat of every single particle of flesh and left it dry and dead.

  I could try to use a fireball. It likely wouldn’t work. I would require my hands instead.

  I didn’t think of how likely I was to die. I thought only of the fact I had to protect Winchester. Nor, critically, did I think of why.

  It wasn’t the indenturing spell pushing me to do this. It wasn’t the witch magic Arlene had given me. It wasn’t even Wintersmith. It was… I could not put my finger on it and did not want to. It was something I chose to do with all my heart as I roared, leapt up the steps, tumbled deliberately down to my knees, and swiped at the large warrior’s left leg. I forced a magic-encased foot to jam against the back of his knee.

  But he didn’t even jolt forward. He was far too large, and his beefy muscles gave him all the balance he required.

  He reached around and locked a hand on Winchester’s shoulder just as Winchester plucked up the book. It sang in his grip as if he had always been born for this moment. His eyes burned with the kind of glory you only saw once in someone’s existence. It was as if he had found the path back to his very beginning, to his true purpose. He might’ve found that. But he’d also found fatal trouble.

  The warrior roared and picked Winchester up. There wasn’t a thing that Winchester could do. He twisted the book around and clutched it against his light brown waistcoat, but he couldn’t fight.

  So I would have to fight for him.

  I grunted, and once more I tried to kick the big brute in the back of the knees. But once more it was just as rewarding as attempting to push a mountain over with nothing more than an ant. If I truly wanted to take down this zombie, I would have to call on powers far greater.

  “We can’t let them have the book. If they get the book, everything will be over,” Winchester said. For a man I thought was more selfish than anyone I had ever met, Winchester suddenly spoke as if he didn’t care about his life anymore. He was insignificant. A mere speck of space dust. For this book, in the wrong hands, apparently, could condemn all.

  I already had a grand mission to protect this city. I already knew what it felt like to be thrust right to the front of a lonely army. I did not, however, have the strength—

  Why finish that thought? Let me show you an example of it instead. I tried to climb up the back of the big brute’s body, but he thrust his shoulder out and up. It slammed into my stomach. It sent me spiraling back. I struck the wall. I was at an angle, and my head was buried down through the plaster.

  My ears rang. My face pulsed with pain as I swear my cheekbone broke. I felt blood cover my hair. And my head… oh, my head felt like it was unscrewed. Such a ringing picked up in my skull, I thought I would… it was… over.

  Or at least it ought to be.

  “Don’t you dare, don’t you dare give up, Lisbeth McQuarrie,” Winchester roared.

  I thought the large warrior had him in hand. But there was something I should have appreciated by now. Winchester Stone would wriggle out of your grip if you let him.

  Every time I tried to figure out exactly what he was and who he stood for, he certainly wriggled free. But now, he fortunately attacked at the same time.

  He angled his elbow up and back. Either through timing alone or perfect skill, he forced the tip underneath the fleshy side of the man’s throat. What a fabulous, direct blow. It should have toppled the fell brute. Should have. If he were alive. But he was not. And wasn’t that the trouble?

  The warrior replied by squeezing his arms tighter around Winchester’s wriggling form.

  Winchester fought at first, but soon, he lost his strength. I watched his eyes boggle wide. The brute… oh, how ghastly, but the brute wouldn’t squeeze Winchester in half, would he?

  I could see the desire playing in the foul, dead man’s gaze. Though it wasn’t his gaze that was foul. It was whatever creature was controlling him.

  … Controlling him? Of course. Though I hadn’t had a chance to capitalize on it yet, the communication strand remained – the red line of light I saw filtering through the Ley lines. It was my only chance now. Only… chance.

  I had injured myself when I’d been thrown into the wall. My ears still rang. It was such a calamitous orchestral piece, I was certain it was the last thing I would ever hear. It was as if every single memory had suddenly picked up an instrument, and they were ready to offer a dirge as I slipped into death. That would not happen until I had my wizard back where I needed him.

  Wintersmith would surely be proud if he could hear me right now. My wizard? Winchester was a cad, a fool, and a gamble.

  But indeed, I would still claim that statement. For he was still mine.

  With blood sliding down my temple, dripping into my eyes, and coloring the world with a crimson hue, I spied the Ley lines. There, the red communication strand. It was just out of my reach. It was too high to jump to. And the other zombies seemed to know what I was thinking, for they thrust up the stairs, roaring riotously, their combined shouts enough to tear down heaven.

  Behind me, meanwhile, I heard the worst sound of all. It was Winchester Stone spluttering, right there, right there on the edge of death.

  I had a moment to turn to him, a moment to make eye contact. Rarely will time get out of your way. It is there to harangue you, to constantly force you forward like a pack of wolves at your back. It is never your friend. But right now, for me, it was. For it offered me just a moment’s reprieve – a single second to stare into Winchester’s eyes and to appreciate his predicament.

  And he stared back.

  He had no force. I could tell that. So why did he clutch his left wrist? Why expend the last of his breath to hold his hand, to reveal his indenture mark?

  It struck me. Winchester’s final act would be to release me.

  I should let him. It would solve so many problems. But it would create another.

  All through this, my heart had been beating faster and faster, not just with the adrenaline of a breakneck fight, but with a promise I’d never heard, a promise that did not come with words but with a concept far beyond them.

  Eternity does not exist. It is a mind game humans play.

  Everything comes, everything goes. And one day, even this great universe will fall.

  But I still found a version of eternity as I stared at Winchester. As I realized I could not let this end. Not here. And not now. There were too many things I wished to experience with him. Too many secrets to be revealed and too many missions to complete.

  I found that power beating deep in my heart – the same power I had called to on only one other occasion now. I let it out. Let it out in this great blast of fury.

  When a witch is truly in tune with her emotions, she can take them to a place no one else can reach. And I leapt up with mine.

  I let magic charge around me, forcing into my feet, throwing me higher. If I had been out in the sky, perhaps I would have even flown. It was enough, however, to grasp hold of that strand. I wrapped my fingers around it, and I cracked it. It was just as Winchester gave a rattling breath – likely his last.

  The zombies screamed and hurled themselves at me, even climbing one another to reach my height. But it was too late. The strand was snapped.

  I fell back down against them. They groped at me, but their fingers were weak. Their movements were now far more instinctual and less controlled. And with every second, the remaining control only dwindled more.

  My ears rang. My blood, why, it felt as if it had turned to fire. But it had yet more to burn. For as I thrust up, I saw that Winchester had fallen unconscious or worse.

  The warrior clutched at his left temple. He roared. Then he looked at me. There was no intelligence there – nothing but the instinctual stare of a spell gone wild. It might’ve been controlled previously. Now it was raw, edgy, and violent.

  He dropped Winchester. He clearly no longer had any clue that Winchester and the book were his targets. He locked his vicious attention on me instead and shot forward.

  I was still lying atop the zombies. They grasped at my arms. I tried to buck back, but they would not let me. For one looped a very strong grip around my middle, forcing their bicep against my chest and pushing in until I couldn’t even breathe.

  I tried to scream. Now, what was the point? That would waste my breath a second before the warrior could waste it for me. With a rounded, forceful hand, he punched me.

  It felt as if he had ruptured my liver. It felt as if he pounded every other organ to dust.

  I watched through one sleepy, bleary eye as he punched me again. Blood splattered my lips.

  I had found new power in my heart. I had climbed to another level of force. But in the end, it would mean nothing. For in the end, I was still fighting dark magic. Something had called the zombies from the ground, and even though that thing could no longer control them, base dark magic still could.

  It was as if the zombies wanted to make me and everything pay for the fact their eternal sleep had been broken.

  The other zombies behind me cried and groped at my face. They scratched my cheeks. Some even went to gouge my eyes out. But who cared about them when the big brute would be the force to ultimately break me?

  Time did it again, but this time it was no longer on my side. This time, it wanted to accentuate the moment, to force me to appreciate how much I had lost and that the ultimate loss – death – was moments from striking me.

  The brute roared.

  Then he forced his fist forward.

  I didn’t close my eyes. I didn’t see the point. Let my failure come. Let my death come a moment later.

  But it did not.

  There was a roar from behind the warrior accompanied by a flash of magic and the movement of a man who could never be held down. My bleary gaze couldn’t track him, but a moment later, Winchester appeared nonetheless. He found the singular strength to throw the brute back before he could punch me one last fatal time. Then Winchester reached me in a moment I would never forget.

  I didn’t honestly care what time chose to do. I was over that. I created my own moment, carving it out from the background, letting it sink into my mind as it forced my body to close around it like a box to the greatest treasure you owned.

  As Winchester’s face pressed close, as his hand locked around mine, as my hair flared up and tickled around his cheeks, my heart beat once to remind me I was still alive, then it beat one last time to tell me what to do next.

  I threw myself at Winchester, wrapping my arms around his neck.

  I had never made a more instinctual move, never gone through with something so very raw and necessary.

  We can spend our whole lives thinking we’re in control. But we’re only truly in control when those lives align with what we truly want. And isn’t life, in some ways, the journey of finding out what it is we really need? Why we were born, and critically, who we will live for?

  “Winchester—”

  “Hold on. And while you’re there, Lisbeth, lend me your magic.”

  In the middle of this mayhem, he placed a hand on my face. Flat and true, his grip felt like an invitation to dance with him beyond this mess, to glimpse eternity and to forever hold it in our eyes.

  Forgive me for my lyrical mind, but the moment could not be ignored because my surging feelings wouldn’t let it be.

  I stopped, however, and finally appreciated what he’d said. “Lend you my magic—”

  “Through the indenturing spell, I can borrow your force. Now,” he said with no need to finish that statement and no time to try.

  Now indeed.

  With his hand flat on my face, he called to my force. I let it rise freely.

  It reacted to his touch, his need, his everything. And it dragged out of me more magic than I had ever used.

  It rushed out of my body, spun around my face, and sank into his palm.

  And Winchester Stone reached his hand out just as that warrior rocketed to his feet again and threw himself mercilessly at us.

  Every other zombie in the room did the same. From the broken, deadly looks in their eyes, they would rip us apart. But they’d never get the chance.

  We both roared just at the same moment, just as our magic sank into the warrior and tore him apart.

  Now he wasn’t being controlled by a greater external force, he was merely a zombie. Though that indeed was a fearsome creature, it was a creature with a certain weakness. As I had already shown you, fire could deal very well with the corpses of those who had risen. It was often the method used to deal with dead bodies in the first place.

  Our spell, our magic spiraling around one another, slammed into the warrior, pulled him off his feet, and ripped apart his molecules.

  There wasn’t the sound of singeing flesh, and nor did some horrendous smell fill the room. There simply wasn’t the time.

  The other zombies reached us, but, one hand on my hip, the other still on my face, Winchester spun with me.

  At the same time, I let my magic out freely, let it do what it needed as it soared into Winchester’s hand.

  It was… almost like we were dancing, though it of course was the most macabre scene.

  You tell that to my heart, though, for it leapt and rose, reaching new heights as Winchester fixed his hand on my hip harder.

  Our magic combined together to spiral around our shoulders.

  It shot out into the zombies, forcing them back.

  The first few burnt up, then the rest.

  Then finally, finally it was over.

  And Winchester stopped.

  Though I suppose the right word was froze.

  He stared at me just as the last dust hailed around us and fell silently to the floor by our feet.

  He watched me with eyes that darted left and right, up and down. Eyes perfectly designed to find your every secret, for they were possessed by a man who didn’t stop. Certainly not when it came to me.

  I suddenly realized I hadn’t breathed for some time. I forced one into my lungs, but when it came to inhaling yet again, I simply couldn’t manage it.

  I became stuck staring at him.

  “Lisbeth McQuarrie,” he said in a voice I could not track. It was a voice the likes of which I had never heard. A voice possessed of an entire planet full of emotions.

  I’d often felt that Winchester was an iceberg. A man who kept his true self locked behind a thick, solid door.

  Now… now I saw who was really within.

  “Lisbeth McQuarrie,” he said again, voice somehow dipping lower, throat sounding parched. But the look in his eyes suggested you could destroy his very throat – he would still find some way to say this anyway. “Lisbeth McQuarrie,” he began one last time.

  I finally found my own breath, though just a fragment of it. Enough for my lips to part, enough to whisper, “Yes?”

  “Is there something you need to tell me, Lisbeth?”

  He still had his hand on my hip, the other on my face.

  Something… I needed to tell him?

  For the most startlingly silly moment, I wanted to reveal everything. Not just who I was… but maybe… how I was starting to feel.

  “Lisbeth,” he said again, voice deeper, “have you been keeping a secret from me?”

  On the word secret, I finally remembered he was touching me. I’d referred to it multiple times, but I suppose I hadn’t appreciated it like I did now.

  With his hand flat on my cheek, with his other hand on my hip, he couldn’t get closer. And nor could I. You see, I could stare quite freely into his eyes, the seat of his soul. And I could let his own gaze draw me deeper.

  “I suppose… I have been keeping a secret from you,” I admitted.

  He paused. Paused right there, never letting me go, not with his hands and certainly not with his eyes. “And what’s that, Lisbeth?” His voice became deeper again.

  I went to close my eyes.

  He grunted. “I think you should keep your eyes open for the next bit.”

  My stomach squirmed with more nerves. Then I… why, I did it. The one thing I had always wanted to do but the one thing I had kept myself back from doing my whole life. “Winchester, I’m a—”

  “Dead practitioner,” he spoke right over the top of me. “Just like me.”

  Silence filtered in after the admission. Or accusation, rather.

  He’d gotten there first. He’d robbed me of my moment.

  And now he stared at me, and I stared back.

  The magic from our combined attack had done some terrible damage to this room. Winchester had the book by his foot. And, presumably, somewhere, the palace was waiting for news from the zombies.