caught in her chest. She could feel Kevin and Opal standing behind her in the hallway, waiting. Glenn took a deep breath and stepped into the room. As she drew closer to the bed, her head swam and she had to reach out and brace herself against the wall.
Opal lit a candle behind her, then another, filling the room with an uneven amber light. Glenn fixed her eyes on the wall above the bed.
She couldn’t bring herself to look at her. She flinched as shards of the world outside cut through the haze of the nightshade. More fire. More steel. More pain.
“If we remove the bracelet,” Glenn said, “she’ll go back to being what she was. She’ll be able to stop Sturges.”
“Yes,” Opal answered. “But, Glenn — ”
“Can
Opal said nothing. Glenn drew the blanket aside until she saw the edge of the bracelet. It was huge on her mother’s birdlike wrist. Its jewel shone dully. Glenn touched its surface, feeling the ridges and planes. It was strange to see someone else wear it. For a confused moment, it was as if she was in a dream and looking down at her own body ravaged with age. Somewhere far away, the air was torn with another explosion. It hit Glenn like a fist to her chest. She had to get this over with. She had to put things back the way they were.
Glenn wrapped her hand around the bracelet.
“Glenn?”
Her hand froze. The voice was thin and dry. Weak. Glenn stared at the bracelet. She willed her hand to take it off, but her fingers wouldn’t move. Her mother said her name, gently, quietly, and then again. Glenn drew her eyes up along her mother’s narrow hips and over the dark stain of blood from her wound, until finally their eyes met.
Her mother’s eyes seemed to be the one thing about her that hadn’t changed. Their beauty was unearthly. Bright blue, the color of lapis. Glenn wanted to look away, and as she did, her own eyes burned.
“Glenn.” The bedclothes rustled as her mother reached for her, but Glenn retreated to the edge of the bed, beyond her grasp. Glenn crossed her arms over her chest and focused intently on the rough weave of the bedcover.
“The Colloquium is here,” Glenn said, forcing the words out mechanically as if she were working through a report in school.
“Without you to stop them, they brought their soldiers across. They’re bombarding towns all along the border.”
The bed creaked. Her mother had drawn the covers to her waist and was leaning against the wall behind her. Glenn fought for the strength to look directly into her deep blue eyes.
“Do you understand?”
Her mother held her gaze, then glanced at Kevin and Opal. “Can we have a moment, please?”
“We don’t have time for that,” Glenn said. “We have to — ”
“A minute, Glenn. That’s all.”
Opal and Kevin stepped away, leaving the room achingly silent.
Glenn gnawed at her lip and tried to hold herself as tightly as possible, her arms straining to still the whirlwind battering away inside her.
“You — ” her mother began and then stopped herself with a small humorless laugh. “I was going to say you cut your hair. But of course you have. It’s been a long time. You can sit, at least. Can’t you?”
Glenn didn’t move.
“Your father made this,” her mother said, her eyes on the bracelet.
“Didn’t he?”
“Yes.”
“How is — ”
“Don’t ask me how he is,” Glenn snapped, a cord of tension ratcheting tighter within her. “Don’t ask me how I am.”
“Glenn, I don’t — I don’t know what I can say to you.”
“You don’t have to say anything.”
“I wanted to come back.”
“But you didn’t.”
“Glenn — ”
“Don’t tell me you couldn’t!” Glenn cried. “Ever since I took that bracelet off, I’ve felt exactly what you felt and I fought it. I stayed who I was. If I could do it, then why couldn’t you?”
“It was different. I — ”
“You didn’t want to! You wanted to be here!” Glenn charged to her mother’s side and bore down on her. “Do you know what happened after you left? Do you know what it did to us? To Dad? To me?!”
Glenn’s throat constricted and the angry tears she had been fighting burned down her cheeks. She hated them, but she couldn’t stop it now.
“It killed him. It killed us!”
“Glenn, wait!”
But Glenn was already out the door, slamming it behind her. She blew past Kevin and Opal, tore through the kitchen and out the front door.
The night was icy cold, with a long moan of wind blowing up from the river. Glenn sucked in gulps of air, but they only made the shudders that were racking her body worse. The Magisterium rushed in around her, desperate for a way in. The grass and the trees thrummed with life. The earth churned. The nightshade was fading. Glenn tried to push back the tide, but it hammered at her over and over. She’d be helpless against it soon.
“Here. Take this.”
Aamon was kneeling beside her, a bowl of the nightshade in his hand. After what she did to him in the house, a rush of shame filled her to be so close to him again.
“Hurry,” he said.
Glenn took the bowl from him and forced the liquid down her throat, nearly retching at the foulness of it. As it sank into her, it became a little easier to push the thousand sensations pressing into her away, but only slightly.
“It’s not working like it did,” Glenn said.
“Your body gets used to it. It doesn’t matter. We’ll get you and Kevin home.”
“I can’t go home,” Glenn said. “I can’t ever go home. Not now.”
Aamon said nothing. What could he say? It was true. As the
nightshade did its job, Glenn’s head began to clear, as if a curtain had been drawn down between her and the world. A tremor shook the thin woods around her. Another explosion far off.
“You knew she was here the whole time,” Glenn said. “Why
didn’t you tell me?”
“I thought you might try and see her.”
“When you came for her,” Glenn said, “did you know what
would happen to her if she returned?”
Aamon lowered his head. A broad silence fell between them.
“I knew it was possible,” he said. Even through the nightshade, Glenn could feel the keenness of the pain inside him. “I was created to serve the Magisterium. Farrick and his revolution wanted to destroy that. I did whatever I had to do to stop him. When your grandparents were killed, your mother was next in line to rule. It was my responsibility to bring her back. That’s all I knew or cared about. But then she told me to stay with you, to look after you and … you said you thought it must have been horrible, being Hopkins, but it wasn’t.”
Aamon moved his hands over his blood-matted arms.
“It was a relief.”
The lines of Aamon’s face and the splashes of blood were at once alien and so familiar. She had seen him like this before, long ago. A small broken thing needing to be saved. Glenn reached out and took his hand.
“I’m sorry,” Glenn said.
“For what?”
