The Last Spell 40.1

Guilt clawed at Cyrin’s heart.

He’d felt levity for a moment in time when he'd seen Shane running his way in the ballroom, eyes bright with joy, and he'd felt a matching grin spread on his face too. It had been possible to forget everything and share in the relief of his survival and their reunion. But when Shane had pulled back from the embrace, his smile was still there, and something about it had struck Cyrin like a punch to the stomach.

Shane had dimples.

He’d never seen them before because Shane didn't smile. Or he hardly did. Now, Cyrin could imagine Shane being a radiant smiler once, dimples always visible, before… everything. And it ached to know that he was the reason that smile had been an unfamiliar, shocking sight.

He didn’t deserve Shane’s joy that he was alive. That thought ate away at him as he moved through the crowd.

“So— hold on,” Kaja cut in, walking at their right. “Who are you?”

“Are we playing twenty questions or something?” Cyrin glanced over their shoulder to check that Casper wasn’t following. He wasn’t. Good. They didn’t need a human headache for company.

“You said you were his brother,” Kaja said in disbelief. “How would I not know about that?”

“An easily distracted public and a family happy to forget your existence does wonders there,” Cyrin said. “You should know the tabloids have a short attention span.”

Kaja was silent for a moment. “You’re a Bridger,” she said. “The middle child. The… easily forgotten one.”

“Unfortunately.”

“I knew that,” Shane said. “But not how you got disowned.”

The words were said carefully, like he was reluctant to ask the question and possibly get shut down. Cyrin didn’t love the idea of answering. But they owed Shane just about everything, and honesty in response to his curiosity was only fair.

And it was a dumb, hopelessly stupid thought— but they dared to imagine that the more Shane knew of them now, the higher the chance that they might exist to him as more than just a murderer later.

“It’s… complicated,” Cyrin said distractedly, scanning the crowd for threats as they kept slipping past guests. “There’s no one singular reason it happened. My family had been looking for one for quite a while.”

Anyone would want the ghost in their midst to leave. It was an overdue process.

“Their excuse was me switching career paths. I changed my major from business to cultural studies after I had a fulfilling internship at the Museum of Fine Arts in Crystal City my sophomore year. That went over poorly, because—” Cyrin huffed. “Well, let’s just say we were always more of a business than a family, and they thought the humanities were pointless. It was my father’s decision, but Casper was the one who demanded it.”

“And then he tried to kill you?” Kaja asked. He could tell she was still processing.

“No,” Cyrin said. “That came directly first.” Somehow, I was still the one they wanted out.

“I knew he was bad, but I wasn’t picturing him on the level of an utter psychopath,” Shane muttered. “Why does he… Does he hate you?”

Cyrin side-stepped past a partygoer and left the ballroom, frowning at the question. He wished it was easier to answer. Or, rather, he wished it were easier to say the answer.

“I believe… he would rather grieve my death than see me alive,” he said carefully.

In a sense, it was a rightful desire. That would’ve been the natural order of the world. Except Cyrin really fucking sucked at following the rules of life and death.

“And you are— you are alive,” Kaja said dubiously.

“All evidence points to it, yes,” Cyrin said.

“Are you going to tell us how you did it?”

“No.” Cyrin took the first step up the stairs.

“Do you know how you did it?” Shane asked.

“Also no.” Cyrin sighed, glancing over their shoulder to see that the two Heirs were close on their heels. “It’s… also complicated.”

“Who are you, really?” Kaja pressed. “Who do you have to be to manage that?”

They had some regret at allowing this interrogation to move onto the questions that didn’t have great answers. “I told you that.”

“I still feel like I don’t know,” she said plainly.

“That makes two of us,” Cyrin said. “But if it helps, publicly, I’m a paint chip namer.”

He heard Shane sputter. “A paint chip namer?”

“I had to let my family believe I was up to something,” Cyrin said, amused at the astonishment in Shane’s voice, as they passed the second floor. “It’s a fake job. Allison’s idea— she thought it might spite the parents.”

“No actual way,” Shane laughed. “So if I looked up your job profile, that’s what I’d see? A resume of paint color experience?”

“That’s right.” Cyrin smirked. “It’s too bad it’s made up. I would be so good at it.” He paused. “Moody Macchiato. Coastal Retreat. Kejvan White.”

“You’re a natural,” Shane said.

Kaja shook her head. “You’re unbelievable, that’s what,” she muttered.

Cyrin was about to accept the label before he stopped abruptly in his tracks, instinctively putting a protective arm in front of Shane and Kaja. A woman was slumped on the stairs in front of him, clearly unconscious, with a knife loosely clutched in her hand.

“Who—” he started to say.

“That’s Favia,” Shane interjected, stepping around him. “Our bodyguard. But it must be a part-time job, because she’s actually been working for Sparrow this whole time and tried to kill me.”

Kaja cracked her knuckles. “She’ll be a full-time inmate once this is all over.”

Cyrin stared at the traitorous bodyguard, shaking their head. So, they’d missed some action tonight.

“Leave it to Sparrow to have a trick like that up his sleeve,” they said, resuming the climb upstairs. “Let’s keep it moving.”

The next moment, however, they were having to catch an unbalanced Shane, because the lights all went out at once.

Cyrin winced as Shane’s foot collided with their shin, but they held him firmly by the shoulders as his weight fell backwards. They heard Kaja swear loudly, footsteps echoing as she seemed to spin around in outraged confusion.

“This can’t get any better, can it?” Kaja grumbled from somewhere in the darkness.

“Was that Mireya?” Cyrin asked, as Shane pulled away with a murmured word of thanks.

“It’s not the plan, that’s for sure,” Kaja said. “Either she had to drain the power for something, or someone doesn’t want us seeing anything.”

Cyrin reached for his MagicBox, confirming with a glance downwards that it was still close to full. Relieved, he hurriedly wove up a Flare spell of light, not fire, that cast a bright and warm glow over their faces and nearby surroundings. Small sparks burst out of the shining orb, like a miniature sun.

“There’s that problem solved, at least,” Shane said.

“Sparrow might be trying to sneak around us.” Cyrin flicked his wrist, sending the ball of light to hover a few feet ahead of them. “Or he’s trying to cause panic among the guests, setting off a distraction for the event’s security. I’m sure they don’t like being plunged into darkness.”

“Probably both,” Kaja muttered, stomping on a spark that had sizzled to the stone of the stairs. “He’s conniving like that.”

“You’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg.” Cyrin gestured ahead. “Let’s keep going. I made the enchantment so that the light will follow with us.”

“Like some kind of pet?” Kaja asked, squinting skeptically at the glowing spell, which Cyrin had to admit didn’t look impressive enough for that kind of design. It spat another ember in her direction.

Cyrin shrugged. “Sure, if that helps.”

“In that case, I’m thinking of naming it Cracker,” Shane said.

Cyrin and Kaja both turned to him with a slow blink.

“Like— like a firecracker, although I thought a nickname would be more affectionate,” Shane said, with awkward defensiveness.

Kaja shook her head. “Do you name everything after food? You named your cat Crab—”

“His name is Shrimp,” Shane interrupted.

Cyrin had to smirk at how oddly endearing that was. “It’s good to stay in theme,” he said, stepping forward. “Shane, Kaja, Cracker— because why not— let’s get moving.”

~ ~ ~

Cyrin hadn’t seen the magical library on the third floor of the Palace outside of pictures before. Those pictures had failed to encapsulate just how vast it was. The glow from their spell—or Cracker, they supposed— barely extended to the top of a towering mahogany shelf, and those shelves went on in an endless seeming array, each filled to the brim with old books. Up above, a glided domed roof reflected the light back at them, the patches and streaks of gold making it seem as though they were looking up at the night sky. Every so often, a book would rise from its place on a shelf and float through the air to find a different spot, and the action reminded them of birds flitting between trees. Kaja craned her head back to watch a blue-spined book gracefully land on the shelf at their right.

“The whole library is enchanted with Force to move the books around,” Shane explained in a hushed tone, as they took in the landmark before them. “It would’ve taken Summer ages to artifice, but that’s not the most astonishing part. The books fly around to find others in a similar category, but they’re always on the move even though people aren’t picking up these books and rearranging them. It’s because those categories are ever changing— it’s as though the library has a mind of its own and keeps coming up with new ways to keep itself organized. No one’s figured out how Summer made that spell work.”

“He was one of a kind,” Cyrin murmured. “And he left a lot of unsolved mysteries behind.”

Kaja turned in a circle. “Is this floor where the locked room is? The one with the magical seal no one’s managed to break?”

“It’s further ahead,” Shane said. “Another one of Summer’s trade secrets.” He gave Cyrin a slightly playful nudge. “Feel like taking a stab at it?”

Cyrin let out an amused huff. “I’ll pass, because I’m not exactly the prodigy mage of the century.”

Shane sighed. “Aw. I’d have loved to see what’s behind it.”

“There was once a deal floating around the Arcade to break into the room and pillage it—I think it was made by the owner of the Fortune herself.” Cyrin took a quiet step forward, glancing down the next row of shelves before proceeding. “No one took it because they were all convinced all there was to find would be eight centuries’ worth of dust.”

Shane frowned as he and Kaja followed, keeping the conversation at whisper-level. “Wait. Is the casino named the Fortune, as in the fate meaning of the word?”

“Seriously? No, it’s the Fortune as in luck,” Cyrin said.

Shane threw up his hands in disbelief. “That’s what I fucking thought!”

Cyrin couldn’t help but grin with amusement. Kaja stared wildly between the two of them.

“I’m sorry, am I missing something?” Kaja asked. “Shane, why do you keep asking people that question?”

“I keep getting different answers!” Shane seethed in a whisper.

Cyrin bit the inside of their cheek to keep from laughing. “It’s so painfully obvious that you’re new to the Arcade.”

“Did I fail some kind of test?” Shane asked. “The Fortune bartender said we must not know what it means because we were new, Sparrow laughed at my first guess for luck, Mireya corrected the answer he gave me, and now you— why do I feel like I’m on the outside of some kind of joke?”

Cyrin shook their head. “We were all there once. It’s no fun if I spoil it for you— you’ve just got to hang around and figure it out.”

Shane groaned, and Kaja rolled her eyes at them, but they could only offer an unapologetic shrug.

“I don’t see why we’d be spending more time in the Arcade after this,” Kaja said. “Unless you and Mireya have some kind of discount for returning customers?”

“We do,” Cyrin said. “I’ll give you a promotion code to apply at checkout.”

No later than had he finished speaking, he heard the distant but unmistakable sound of a book falling to the floor with a thud that echoed through the library.

The three of them froze, silent except for their breathing. Cyrin’s gaze darted up to Cracker, then to the hallway of shelves extending ahead. Was Sparrow himself here? Or was it simply a mercenary having a clumsy moment?

A flashlight’s glow appeared around a bookshelf, getting brighter and brighter as the person holding it got closer to turning the corner. Cracker would have to go.

Cyrin made a mental apology to the pet spell as he extinguished the Flare with a quick Acid spell, plunging them into darkness, before he shoved Shane and Kaja behind the cover of a wall of books.