And then the moment passed, and Kite was in her body once again, hair slick as seaweed against her face. Pain rocked her body, and she curled up on the floor like a child, waiting for it to pass.
A show of strength, then. A reminder of what the Witch Lord could do. Unravel her in a moment, steal her skin, reabsorb her power.
“Welcome, essence-daughter,” said the Witch Lord.
“Lord Mother,” whispered Kite.
“Are you ready to take your rightful place in the Coven?”
Kite scrambled to her knees and bowed again, pressing her forehead into the earth. Her mouth watered at the scent of delicious dirt.
“It is time, daughter, to declare you Heir Rising.” Excitement bubbled up in Kite, water dribbling from the corners of her lips.
She had been the Heir Dormant for so long that she had stopped believing the Witch Lord would ever allow her to use her full powers.
“You have shown loyalty by rejecting the human-touched girl, but there are some on the first ring who still have their doubts. You will dispel their doubts, command their faith and their bodies, and take your place as my right hand in the war against the children-abominations who even now rise up against us in acts of treason.”
Eli. Of course. Kite should have known that her attachment to the made-girl had not gone unnoticed. No true witch would befriend an object. And the Heir Rising was more than a witch, more even than a symbol of the Witch Lord’s rule: they were the right hand of the Coven. She shared a modicum of the Witch Lord’s power. She might even rule distant planets in her mother’s stead.
“It is my honour to serve you, Lord,” said Kite.
“Bring back the Heart.”
“It will be done, Lord.”
“Swear with your essence, and prove your loyalty to me, who was and am the source of your magic. Magic above material.”
“Magic above material,” Kite repeated.
Again, she found herself stripped of her body. But this time she was not alone. Another essence, glowing white but rainbowed, gleaming different hues and shades of brilliance, so beautiful it hurt, reached out a tendril of light and
touched.
Kite screamed with no mouth, a soundless prayer of obliteration.
When the pain passed, Kite’s bluegreen essence bled with shades of pink and gold. Kite felt a rush of power burn through her body. And knowledge, sweet and crisp as pear on her tongue.
Kite now understood how to steal magic.
“Bring back the Heart, and I will give you more power than you can imagine.”
Then the Witch Lord was gone. The air lightened; the dark lessened, retreating. The whimpering stopped. Kite lay on her back, panting in the dirt, pain pulsing through her entire body. She rolled over and vomited ink. The Beast shuffled forward and lapped it up.
Kite smiled.
She had done it. She had become the Heir Rising.
Three
TAV
Then —
The bus had been late.
The bus stop was abandoned. The shelter was covered in posters for suicide hotlines and band stickers and blocky marker lettering spelling out catchy phrases like LIVE LIKE NO ONE IS WATCHING and DANIELLE IS A SLUT.
People really sucked sometimes.
It was November, and frost was beginning to paint itself up the sides of the Plexiglass shelter in floral bouquets. Tav was shivering under the threadbare peacoat they’d thrifted from Value Village last year.
It had been a shitty day.
Sure, they’d gotten ten out of ten on their biology quiz, but their teacher had deadnamed them again, and then someone had written slurs on the locker of the only other Black kid in Tav’s year (no, they’re not related). To top it all off, the vice-principal had just announced that the GSA was being cancelled due to lack of funding — as if the kids didn’t know it had everything to do with the provincial government and anti-LGBTQI legislation being put in place. Teachers acted like all teenagers were stuck in the 1950s with only a crappy radio or smudged black-and-white newspapers to learn about the world. Tav had been on social media since they were a kid — and damn, the kinds of information they had been able to access.
Not that they needed to read the news to know how Black queer people were treated in Canada. Tav’s classmates liked to say that Canada was better than the U.S., that Ontario was better than Quebec, that a city like Grace didn’t have “those problems.” But they were liars.
Something in Tav was changing, a seed of knowledge that was beginning to grow. The world was damaged, and it needed to be fixed. The sad adults they saw every day had given up on hope and change, had resigned themselves to the everyday grind of life and fear and hiding. You could tell when you looked into their tired eyes, the light leaking out like a broken egg yolk: they didn’t believe.
But Tav did. And days like today reminded them how much needed to change. If no one else was going to do it, then they would. The anger was hot and fierce and it warmed their body even as their fingernails turned blue and the bus still did not come.
Someone joined them. Or maybe — something? The person (were they a person?) was wearing a wool scarf that covered their face and a bulky parka. They looked a bit like a mirage, not quite real. When Tav stared directly at them, they could see through the body — but when they blinked, the body was solid again.
Tav and the ghost waited for the bus in companionable silence.
Laughter cut through the quiet like a knife. It was the kind of laughter that made the last few autumn leaves turn brown and fall from the trees, that caught the breath in your lungs and pulled it out through your mouth until
