The Witch with No Name

“I’m okay,” I whispered, and Trent gasped, holding me so tight I couldn’t breathe. I patted his back, smiling as Ivy’s eyes opened. They flashed black, then spun back to her normal brown as she found Nina. The glow of their auras was clear, mixing but not, there but unseen. I could see it, but it faded even as I watched.

Ivy began to cry in joy, and she sat up and held Nina’s face with her hands as she tried to see past her tears. “Your soul is so beautiful,” she sobbed, and they kissed, clinging to each other as if they’d been apart for years and years. But maybe that’s the way it felt. I smiled. It was good. It was just.

But the demons were gone. Newt, Al. All of them. And it hurt.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Trent said, and I nodded, grief for the demons welling even as I was happy for Ivy. I’d wanted to do so much more. The demons. The familiars in the ever-after. There just hadn’t been time.

“Of course my itchy witch is okay,” Al said, and my head jerked up in the new glow of a handheld lantern to find him bending over us, expression wry. Bis was on his shoulder looking proud and exhausted. He’d broken the lines. The two worlds had collided. We had survived? Where is the Goddess? “Rachel is a pus bucket full of miracles,” the demon added, eyes rolling. “Thank you, Bis. I don’t know these new lines yet.”

“You’re here!” I exclaimed, then hunched into myself, coughing to get rid of the last stardust. Al’s light spell glittered with the clarity of a new sun, almost rivaling the demon’s good mood. He was here, his smut was gone, and his magic glowed with an amazing beauty. “I thought you were sucked into the new reality!”

“We were.” Al set his glowing lamp on the pool table and extended a thick, ruddy hand to haul me to my feet. I felt his strength meet my shaking hand and I rose from Trent’s arms as if being pulled from the water. “It was the only way to get everyone across,” he muttered, as if embarrassed.

“But . . .” I wavered on my feet, scuffing the bits of ceiling laying upon the floor.

Al grinned wickedly and yanked Trent up as well, the fast motion sending Bis to one of the remaining ceiling supports. “You saw us etch the lines to fasten it to reality, didn’t you? You think they only go one way? Stand up. Fix your hair. My God, you still haven’t learned how to dress yourself.”

“But you were trapped,” I mumbled, listing to the right until Trent slipped an arm around my waist. He was grinning. I’d never seen him do that before. Ever. “All of you! Newt and the Goddess!” Fear slid through me and I looked at the hole in the ceiling. “She knows where I am.”

“Don’t worry about her.” Al’s eye twitched. “Newt . . .”

His words trailed off and his head bowed. “Gone?” I echoed, looking over the church as if I might see her, praying I would. “She became, didn’t she. Newt . . .” I couldn’t say it. There was no way that Newt could survive that. She was gone, both Newt and the Goddess destroyed as they became something new. Perhaps it was fitting. Perhaps . . . But I just felt as if I’d lost someone tied to me in more ways than I’d ever know.

Jenks hummed before us, hands on his hips. “Someone better tell me what happened or I’m going to stick my sword into all of you!”

“I think,” Trent said as he lifted me to sit on the edge of the pool table beside Al’s light, “that Rachel made a new ever-after and the demons etched new ley lines to keep it from collapsing.”

“And Newt became the new Goddess,” I whispered, tingles coming from where Trent still held me, refusing to let go. I couldn’t help but wonder how the demons and elves would handle that: The Goddess was a demon?

Trent frowned in consideration as he figured that one out, but Al was clearly pleased, making me think this might be the only way that the demons’ pride would allow them to begin to forget. “I’m going to have my hands full explaining this,” Trent said, and I could see him already planning his next speech.

“Perhaps.” I played with the tips of his ears, and he jumped, his startled eyes meeting mine as I smiled. “But they’re going to listen to you now. I’ll help. It will be easy.”

“Easy,” he muttered, reddening as he took my fingertips and kissed them.

“Must you do that where I can see?” Al harrumphed, but it was all show. “It’s a damn small reality, but far more stable than the one we sang into existence last time. Dali did a last sweep before the collapse, but we might have to let the familiars go.” He winked, putting a finger to his nose. “Just not enough room for them, the undead souls, and whatever gargoyles had been clinging to the memory of their past.”

“And you’re not trapped there,” I whispered, knowing it was true when he smiled.