Chapter 11

I snap pictures with my phone as we set out. I'm not an excellent photographer, but these are meant to be informative, not artistic. Food stalls and games, lanterns along the river, trees for wishes, an array of yukata. This will be a guaranteed hit on my travel blog.

Or it would be, if I were planning to actually write it, and not just use this as cover.

I can snap photos of Nariel, too. I'm not sure there's a point to that, except my vague sense that I want a record that I— we existed, that whatever our relationship is was real, that I was more than just a magic zealot.

Since I've spent most of my life only wanting to be a fanatic for magic, I don't examine this too closely. I made my choice in Costa Rica.

Instead I use just a trace of magic to flip my phone's camera angle for a selfie, only to find Nariel raising an eyebrow sardonically as I feign sneakiness.

I manage to get the picture before I crack up. Then I accidentally get a picture of that too.

"Not worried about saving up for tomorrow?" Nariel asks.

Magic, he means. I shake my head. "Can't you feel it? Even as densely populated as Kyoto is, there's still more magic in the air here. For just as little as I'm using, I'll have plenty of opportunity to restock before tomorrow. A great advantage of Shinto is that Japan's natural resources are well-tended and protected throughout the country."

"I'm surprised you don't live here," Nariel says.

"I have spent a fair amount of time here, off and on. But it's... sometimes it's soothing, to be able to feel so much magic—comparatively—in the air. But sometimes it also made me want to scream, because I couldn't actually do anything with it."

"And now you can."

Yes. With the access I have, there's enough in the air that I can just use small amounts of magic casually without even worrying about waste.

What I always wanted, I have at last. At least for now.

"Do you think you'll move here now? Settle?" Nariel asks.

"I won't need to," I say. "Because magic will be accessible everywhere."

This is true, as far as it goes.

I try to distract Nariel with another magic-assisted selfie, but he senses the magic and turns it back on me.

"How do you know how the camera works? Do you even have a phone?" I ask.

He rolls his eyes. "Of course I have a phone. Why would I spend rare magic to communicate with my people when there's a perfectly viable alternative?"

"And you still haven't given me your number?"

"We've only been apart long enough for you to use the bathroom," Nariel drawls. "And I shudder to think what sort of messages you'd fill my phone with."

Nariel, as far as I can tell, does not need to use bathrooms. This troubles me, existentially, but I'm unsure that I want an explanation about magical excrement so thus far have managed to contain myself from asking my questions.

"Let alone followed me on social media," I say blithely instead. "I'm pretty sure that means we aren't real friends."

Nariel snorts and holds out his hand for my phone. Unsure of what he intends, I eye him suspiciously, but I do pass it over.

Then I crowd in to watch over his shoulder as he scrolls through the photos I've taken—woops, tactical error, now he knows how many I have of just him—and then returns to the one of me laughing while his eyebrow is raised and texts it somewhere.

He passes my phone back, pulls a phone out of his pocket, and in short order has set that picture as his phone background.

I thought I was blushing with embarrassment a second ago, but at this my heart approximately stops.

"There," Nariel says, his voice cool as ever. "Now you have my number. It won't work between dimensions, but if we are ever separated in this world you will be able to reach me without magic."

I'd been teasing him, but this feels unreasonably intimate. What the hell is he playing at?

"I promise to send you only the best memes," I tell him solemnly.

Nariel smirks. "I will not promise the same."

I snicker but take the out to withdraw slightly, since I don't know what I'm doing and that seems careless.

I lead us toward the stalls and get in line for yakisoba. After a minute, Nariel murmurs that he'll be back in a moment and dissolves into the crowd.

It's the first time, aside from showering, I've been apart from him for longer than a couple minutes.

I don't like it.

I'm in fact amazed at how much I don't like it.

I can't normally stand people for this long at a time—even taking trips with my sister, I either arrange breaks or need a recovery period afterwards where I don't have to talk to humans for a few weeks. How did I go from a happily solitary person to craving the presence of one particular person so fast?

Maybe it's for the best this will be over soon. He doesn't need clinging in his life, and a swift break for him to go back and focus on leading his people to freedom will prevent me from having the opportunity to get on his nerves.

I walk a little ways until I find an empty bench by the river to sit on while I inhale my food. Nariel will be able to sense my magic to find me, and if for some reason he can't, now he can text me.

Just when I'm starting to wonder if despite the evidence Nariel has been acting all along and really did just need a break from me, he reappears next to me, coalescing out of shadow.

He must be cloaking too, because no one so much as bats an eye at us.

"Very smooth," I tell him.

"Just wait," Nariel says, amused. "Turn your back to me."

I raise my eyebrows but comply.

Then his hands are in my hair, and I feel him twisting it up and then the gentle tug of a clip. His fingers trail down my neck, and warmth rushes through me.

I turn over my shoulder to look not at him, but in the river, to see my reflection, lifting my hand to feel the textured clip he found for me.

And I look at us, our reflection in the water with the lanterns all around us, and I lean back against him and close my eyes. Nariel's arms wrap around me, and I feel warmer, more content, than I can ever remember. We stay there for a whole minute, maybe two. I'm not counting.

I'm trying not to cry.

F inally, I get myself under control enough to pull away. Nariel's expression is calm, like he's totally unaffected.

I think I know him well enough now to guess that he is hiding what he's really feeling because he's not sure how I will react. If close friendships are a dream for me, I can only imagine how impossible they must have been for him.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure how I will react either, but as much as I've resolved to make the most of my time, given what I've planned, pushing our relationship deeper doesn't seem fair. To him, mainly, but also to me.

Too cruel, to have even this glimpse of what could have been, then to render it impossible.

Or maybe this is all in my head. Maybe he's had scores of lovers over the years who've lived and died while he continues on unaffected, and I'm making more of it than it is. But I don't think so.

How can I possibly move us past this without him taking it as a rejection I don't mean? I can't just keep sitting here—

"As completist as you are about traditional fashion, I'm surprised you're not wearing a kimono," I say.

Not a perfect effort, but my emotions are a mess and it's what I've got.

"I like kimono perfectly well, but they're too hot this season," Nariel says easily. So easily.

Shit, did I offend him? Or is he fine giving me space?

I ought to just ask, but I'm afraid the answer will tell me something I'm better off not acknowledging.

I sigh exaggeratedly. "What a missed photo opportunity."

This, I'm not even joking about. Nariel dressed in a kimono like a goddamn samurai would be so hot.

Maybe this is for the best.

"Perhaps another time, then," Nariel says.

My throat tightens.

Enough.

I get to my feet and hold out a hand. "Shall we continue?"

He takes it and gracefully gets to his feet. The shadows seem to flicker around him. "It would be my pleasure."

So we do Tanabata.

I make Nariel try shaved ice, which I'm unable to determine if he really hasn't had before or if he's just enjoying my insistence about proper festivity.

Nariel showed me something special in Costa Rica. I want one night with him to dream, and to remember what I'm doing all this for.

We walk hand in hand through an arch of lights, and I cast a small spell to add magic to it, letting the lights swirl around as people laugh and marvel, not realizing it isn't a technical feat. We pass lanterns that I turn different colors and Nariel makes shadowy figures through them like a play. There's enough magic we can both spend it on small things like this frivolously and just enjoy it. We can let people see magic in a way that is all delight, celebrating through it like it's just part of the background for the night.

This is the world I've always wanted, and for one night, I can let myself have it.

As we prepare our wishes on paper strips, I'm tempted to write "more time." But instead I write what I always write: "magic."

Nariel seems to sense something and tells me, "You'll have more nights like this."

I don't answer, even though I can feel his attention sharpening on me, no doubt realizing there's something I'm not telling him, because whatever Nariel is, stupid he isn't.

I steel my resolve for what I promised myself I would do, the only possible choice I can make and not betray who I am.

That, I will never do.

I tie my wish on the bamboo.

And then this time it's Nariel who leads me back into the starry night and all its magic, as if determined to remind me what there is to live for.

T he next day starts early. We eat breakfast at the ryokan and then head to the train station.

Today I'm in shorts and a loose top—red, for boldness, and black, because I've become weirdly sentimental about matching Nariel even if he's never noticed—because today I have a job to do that involves physical activity and probably dodging bolts of magic.

I do still stick the hair clip in my ponytail.

Nariel doesn't comment.

At Kyoto Station, we pick up bento boxes for the road while we wait and then hop the soonest bullet train we could get to Hiroshima.

Unfortunately last-minute travel in Japan between two top tourist destinations during the summer means we couldn't get seats together. I'm sitting next to an elderly Japanese woman in a light kimono—nothing showy, but the kind of thing a person would wear day-to-day if they were a person who wore kimono on the regular, which is not most people—who is extremely polite and friendly and more surprisingly interested in practicing her English on me, which is a fantastic distraction.

Because whatever I think about making a clean break, and even after all the time we spent together last night and how much I wonder about whether I messed things up, it's like a goddamn itch that Nariel isn't sitting with me.

I don't even know what I would say to him if he were here. Probably nothing, given how hard I'm avoiding talking about anything that matters! And he's been all business this morning, which is super valid, because I ought to be focusing on the task ahead and probably that's how he's going to use our time apart rather than playing at silly magic with me.

Still.

I'm as selfish as I've always been, because if it's the last time I have, I want to spend it with him.

So I am actually grateful to be able to chat with the old woman about nothing of substance until the conductor finally gets to our car and checks our tickets.

And then shortly afterward, another shadow looms in the aisle.

Nariel sports a more impish look than I've ever seen from him as he affects shyness, rubbing a hand in his hair awkwardly and looking especially devastating, as he asks my seatmate in Japanese if she'd be willing to swap seats.

She glances back at me, presumably to confirm I do actually want this, and then whatever she sees in my face causes her to actually snort , in the most delicate and refined way, the wrinkles around her eyes creasing as her lips quirk with the gentlest amusement.

I did not think I could be embarrassed by a stranger without even a word, but here we are. Apparently my admiration of Nariel is that obvious.

She tells Nariel that since he is so polite, she will do him this favor, and then turns back to me and withdraws something from her purse.

"And for your kindness to an old woman," she says, "please accept this small token."

I am totally startled. My general experience of train travel in Japan is that people avoid foreigners whenever possible lest someone try to speak English to them and in so doing obligate an awkward interaction.

And then with a wink she hands me a small pouch clearly made from kimono fabric that matches my hair clip exactly, and I have the strangest feeling that magic must be involved in this somehow, though there's no kind of spell like this that I know.

The world is still full of magic even when I'm not using my wand, and it can still surprise me.

I fall all over myself to thank her, but eventually she manages to depart and Nariel slides into her seat and stares at me expectantly as I gaze up at him in total bafflement at what has just occurred.

Proving once again he is not actually telepathic, Nariel asks, "Did you think wizards were the only ones who could learn the many languages of this world?"

Okay, that's fair. His native language almost certainly can't be English, but I have no idea what it is. High Earthers use spells to make themselves understood by the Low Earthers they train, though I was there long enough that I learned some of the more common languages there. Do Bright Earth and Dark Earth have as many languages as we do in Low Earth?

It's a good question, but instead I find myself asking, "How long did it take you?"

"I'm not answering that," Nariel says with faux hauteur, clearly to make me laugh, and I do.

Stupid, stupid heart, to be so relieved that he wants to see me too, that he's happy to just be with me, that he's here .

Abruptly, Nariel elaborates, "I didn't start learning languages for a while after my exile. I'd known a few in Dark Earth but resented that my caring had cost me all my power, and I was so busy scrambling it was easy to pretend it simply wasn't a good use of my energy."

The matter-of-fact way he delivers this makes my heart ache. I can only imagine the mind-fuck of having tried to save spirits only then to be desperately killing them to stay alive. He must have been impossibly lonely.

Maybe that's why he gave me the time of day.

"I only started much later, once I began trying to actually work with spirits in Dark Earth—and then, of necessity, Low Earth—rather than against them." He glances at me. "You started where I ended."

I huff, even as my heart clenches. "A pretty thought, but I started learning languages here because it was easy and I wanted to keep the part of my mind that figures out spell patterns active, not to help people. Then it made it easier to get to places I wanted to go. It's selfishness and expediency, not a desire to forge connections with people."

To my surprise, Nariel regards me with a frown. "Surely you've known enough other travelers here to realize there are far more selfish ways to travel. And when I tell you I spent years killing, you don't accuse me of selfishness like you accuse yourself. You're allowed to want things, and to enjoy things, Sierra."

Shots fired.

It's an arrow straight to my heart, because while I desperately want that to be true, I don't believe it. Not for me.

Not when the one thing I dared to want without reservation has kept me spinning my wheels for years until it's finally put me in the impossible position of having it or sacrificing my own sister.

I'm changing that position, because fuck Evram, but not into one that makes me happier.

Just one I can live with, long enough for that to matter.

"You don't have to worry about me." I shrug. "I've always wanted one thing for myself, and I'm not giving up on magic."

"But are you giving up on yourself?"

My hands spasm on the gift I'm holding.

Softly, Nariel says, "That's what I thought."

Goddamn it. I didn't want to have this conversation.

But probably that would be unfair to him, wouldn't it? After all we've shared, after all he's done for me, I'm going to leave him alone again. Just because it's hard for me doesn't mean he doesn't deserve to at least understand.

As long as he doesn't interfere.

"I don't have a choice," I grit out. "Giving myself up is the only thing that will convince the grand magus that this world isn't a danger to him so he doesn't target it."

"Wizards in this world have been saying they have no choice for centuries, and you despise them for it."

"This is different. I caused this, when I stole magic back without any protections in place—"

Nariel's eyes are as intent as I've ever seen. " They caused it, when they stole this world's magic in the first place and have continued to choose, year after year, not to make amends. Don't blame yourself because other people made shitty choices. That is on them."

"Be that as it may, people here wouldn't be in danger now if not for me. Not when Evram knows what I can do."

He practically growls, "Then you make them safe , Sierra. You don't abandon the field to your oppressor."

Oh, that's fucking rich. " How , Nariel?" I demand. "Tell me another way, and I will be delighted to take it."

"That's not how it works, and you know it," he snaps. "I don't know your magic."

Some tiny hope I hadn't realized I was holding out dies.

The problem with being at the top of the field is that there's no one who understands enough to find something I've missed.

I don't think I've missed anything, though. That's the problem.

I can bring magic into this world, so everyone can have it. I can rescue my sister so she can be safe. I can make space for everyone else to use magic and be safe.

Just not me. That's the cost.

I slump back in my seat, balling my fists into my eyes. "Then don't lecture me about my choices if you can't help," I say tightly.

Nariel pulls my hands down from my eyes. I fight him, but he's physically a lot stronger than me, and I'm not actually telling him to stop.

But when I see how close his face is to mine, and the shadows swirling in his eyes, I know I should have.

But I still want all of him I can get.

"I don't know your magic," Nariel tells me forcefully, "and I will not sabotage your efforts. But I will be here , and I will believe in you."

I squeeze my eyes shut hard. "The way I have it planned, Dark Earth will be fine. You'll still have access to magic, and Evram won't have any reason to go after you—"

"I assumed that. That isn't why."

Gently, his thumbs brush my cheeks, where tears have started falling despite my best efforts.

I open my eyes and catch my breath at what I see there.

God, he has so much faith in me, unreasonably so, even though I've already failed my sister.

I've made the best choice I can. It isn't enough, but it's what I have. Even having him by my side won't change that. It just makes it harder—and easier.

How can I lose this?

But how can I not?

I squeeze my eyes shut again, and Nariel gathers me to him and leans my head against his shoulder and neither of us say anything more as I just cry into his shoulder.