But sometimes they wondered if the Earth was worth saving.
When cops marched in Pride and Tav’s dead sisters were left in dumpsters, when the land was slowly being peeled back, layer by layer, and forest fires burned like a vigil to the god of death, Tav sometimes thought that humanity deserved to be destroyed. Maybe it was better to let the world be destroyed by the witches, sacrificed to a magic that neither loved nor hated, but treated every object and animal and body with the same uncaring indifference.
And now Cam was gone. Cam, who had created a drink he christened “The Tavengers” for their nineteenth birthday (grenadine, whiskey, and olives, served in a Thor pint glass. It was horrible). Who sucked at Mario Kart but was amazing at DDR. Who had filled in the cracks of his broken heart with glitter and gold, and who had showed Tav how to live with grief. Who had crossed between worlds for them.
They hadn’t saved him.
“We try again tomorrow,” said Eli, cleaning one of her blades.
Tav glared at her. “I need to rest.”
“We don’t have time to rest. You didn’t see what I saw, the Earth —”
“Is dying. I get it.” Tav took a sip of bitter tap water and then set their glass down on the table too loudly.
Eli looked up. “You don’t understand.”
“Death? What, only murderers get it?”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Assassin. Whatever.”
“I’m not an assassin anymore.”
“Then what are you?” Tav spun around, letting some of their fury trickle into their words. “Why are you still here? You got your freedom. I thought you’d be gone by now.”
Eli leaned forward, crocodile eyes never blinking. Pearl blade clutched with tense fingers. “I’m here because you need me.”
“We don’t need you. We just need the Heart.”
Tav was picking a fight and they knew it. The old Eli had been quick-tempered and would have lashed out or stormed off, leaving Tav alone. (They wanted to be left alone. They didn’t want to be left alone.)
Eli, this Eli, the one who sometimes turned into light, who spoke to the moon on cloudless nights, this Eli stared at Tav for a long moment. She leaned back and lovingly slid the blade back into its sheath.
“I miss the forest,” she said finally.
Tav said nothing.
“It’s the weirdest part about being this new person, how much I miss the forest. And the Labyrinth. And the wastelands. It’s not like missing a childhood home, it doesn’t feel like nostalgia. It feels like … like a wrongness. Everything feels wrong. And the magic — it feels weak. Like it’s dying. Like I’m dying. I don’t think the Heart is supposed to be here. God, I miss the forest so much it hurts.”
Sometimes it was easy to forget that Eli, who looked the same as when Tav met her — the same freckles, glasses, and long bangs — was no longer just the made-thing with a spine of thorns raised to kill and to survive at all costs. Eli was the Heart of another world.
It was hard, having to get to know Eli all over again.
“The humans are killing this world all on their own,” Tav’s voice, harsher than they’d intended, broke the silence. “Do we save it just to let them kill each other, kill the land, burn everything? Maybe we should let it die. Maybe we should end it now, before things get worse.”
Silence. This thoughtful, quiet Eli made Tav uncomfortable.
“You should listen to the ghost,” she said. “He understands what we can’t. He’s seen a world die.”
“He talks to you?” Somehow that hurt Tav. The ghost had come to them, had followed them. Besides, Eli — the old Eli, who broke through the surface now and again — hated ghosts.
“Neither of us belongs here.”
And where do I belong? Bitterness and hurt pulsed under their fingertips. Again, Tav wished Cam were there, with his jokes and his jazz music and his twirly moustache. He always made them feel better, or at least less alone.
But they had let him down, and now he was gone.
“I thought you said the ghost was dangerous.” Tav pushed away their grief.
“He is. But he’s also … sad.”
“How do you know?”
“He showed me.”
Envy flared up again. Why did the ghost speak to Eli and not Tav? Why was everyone abandoning them?
“Cam will be fine,” said Eli quietly. “He’s made of stone. He’s part of the wall.”
The grief poured back in, thick and syrupy. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”
Eli nodded. “Okay. I don’t know if he’ll be fine. But I do know that we can’t help him right now.” She stood up and walked to the window, pressing her fingertips to the glass. The blades glittered at her hips like planets orbiting a sun.
That was the truth, and, like most truths, it bit down on the vulnerable part of Tav’s heart and wouldn’t let go. Tav’s hands curled into fists. They were ready for a fight. They were ready to be held. They waited for Eli to turn around and look at them.
But Eli slowly faded out of existence, leaving only a few fingerprints on the windowpane to prove she had been there. Then it was just Tav alone in an empty room.
Just what I wanted, they thought miserably.
Tav was dreaming again.
The smell of engine fuel and something sharp and green. They rubbed their fingers together and brought them to their nose — they had been picking cilantro.
“I’m afraid,” they said. “The world is dying and I don’t know what to do. I need your help.”
Their mother smiled, her face reflected in the chrome of the bike. “Every teenager thinks that. I thought that. Nuclear destruction, climate change; the planet is more resilient than you think, love.”
“The threat of nuclear destruction is real. And so is climate change.”
“I know, baby. But we can’t live in fear all the time. Here, help me.” She tossed a rag at Tav, blocking out the light, blocking out everything.
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