Revelle

When I was learning to hone my magic, my vision blackened if I held a single lightstring for more than a few seconds. With practice, I built a tolerance to the pain. Fainting hardly felt voluntary, but it was also a relief. Evidence that I, too, was making sacrifices.

Tonight my pain would not stop me. My health would not stop me. This performance wasn’t just about propping up Dewey, it was our chance to prove to the world that they could burn our homes and our tent, but the Revelles would not be crushed. Our show went on. Always.

I’d broken Jamison’s heart. I’d conjured shadow magic. I was going to marry a vicious man, from a long line of vicious men, so my family could have a fighting chance at a future. And then I was going to poison him.

Tonight would be extraordinary. I’d make sure of it.

Swing, flip, dance. Grab more lightstrings. Dance some more, then return to the trapeze bar. Head high, back straight, toes together.

When my vision clouded as the pain reached its crescendo, I had a choice: Give in to the darkness or refuse to collapse. Fight through the pain and override my instinct for self-preservation.

As long as I was still breathing, I was going to earn every jewel for my family. We’d need them to face whatever tomorrow brought.

The audience was on their feet, their applause roaring in my ears as the curtains closed for intermission. The fancy electric lights backstage were as blinding as the lightstrings floating away from my grasp. I could still see them, but I didn’t dare reach for them, not with that stabbing in my chest during every inhale. My inkwell was long gone, but in the hollowness where my magic once lived, a different sort of power lingered.

I could hardly hear my family’s excitement as I stumbled backstage, dark clouds gathering in my periphery. Loving hands patted my back, offering comfort and praise. Years of practice allowed me to keep smiling until I reached the privacy of my dressing room.

As soon as the door closed behind me, I collapsed on the sofa. Never before had my hands shaken so badly.

Breathe.

My magic was a problem for the second act. For the next ten minutes, it was okay if I let go of Dewey’s lightstring. The audience was ecstatic, and he was, too. Within the hour, Wolffe would declare him Charmant’s new mayor. He didn’t need me to fix his mood.

Air wouldn’t come, my windpipe shrinking to a straw, rasping, breaking . . .

Breathe.

If Jamison were here, he’d tell me to drink water. With trembling hands, I poured myself a glass, then pushed him out of my mind. I certainly couldn’t think of Jamison now, when I needed to keep my wits about me. Intermission was so short, and I didn’t have much time, and the audience was expecting me, and my family needed me—

The door burst open.

“There she is!” Millie flung herself onto the couch, her cheeks shiny and flushed. “You were amazing. Wow, Luxe, I’ve never seen anything like that.”

Something cool dripped from my nose. I wiped the blood with my towel before they could notice.

Ever the hawk, Colette leaned closer. “You don’t look right.”

“Leave her alone. Wasn’t she great?”

Colette poured more water into my glass and pressed it into my hand. “You were a little late on that third jump.”

“Col—” Millie warned.

“Other than that, you were incredible. I’ve never seen you so focused.”

“And sexy, too.” Millie’s eyes glittered. “I bet you’ll star in quite a few fantasies tonight.”

I nearly choked on my water, setting off a coughing fit. They giggled.

The cough continued to hold me in its iron fist, not letting me breathe.

This wasn’t another fainting episode—this was slow and heavy, like concrete poured over my chest, hardening. Even if that poor Strattori hadn’t said a thing, I would have known something was terribly wrong.

I needed air, needed it desperately.

Colette pried my fingers off my mouth as I continued to cough. Pressing the glass to my lips, she forced me to take small sips of water. The cool liquid slid down my scorching throat.

“Thank you,” I rasped, placing the glass back on my changing table.

My cousins ignored me. They stared at the glass.

Scarlet clouds trailed through the water, rising and twisting in strands much like lightstrings. It would have been pretty, had it been anything other than blood.

“Luxe?” Millie’s voice was robbed of all its gusto.

I opened my mouth—to explain, to lie, I wasn’t even sure anymore—but the coughing seized me again, and a cool numbness started in my hands, my feet.

Not yet. Not when I still had another act. Not when the audience was packed, their pockets full of jewels to throw to us during our final song.

Not when Dewey still lived.

Colette pressed her handkerchief against my mouth. It smelled like coconut, just like her. The coughing slowed as I tried to breathe in my sweet cousin.

When I removed her handkerchief from my lips again, it was stained with blood.

Colette jumped to her feet. “I’ll fetch Dr. Strattori.”

“Don’t.”

Millie frowned. “Luxe, this is serious. This isn’t something you can ignore.”

“I know!” I squeaked. Deep breath. “I know. Just don’t bother, okay? She can’t help me.”

Colette took her bloodied handkerchief from my hands and spread it. “What the hell?”

The familiar urge to lie bubbled to the surface. I didn’t want them to worry, or to be complicit in Dewey’s death.

But I was so tired of pretending. Of lying.

I was so, so tired.

“Turns out, my magic is different, too. And not a good different, though for a long time I thought it was.”

“Magic is doing this to you?” Millie asked.

Time slowed as I blinked. Our mothers pregnant together. Three little girls with ribbons in their hair hiding backstage. The meals we shared after they drowned. The way we’d linked pinkies in silent support when one of us cried through the night. How long I’d pined for their affection, watched them laugh without me, live without me. Their hurt when I pulled away. Their willingness to let me back in so easily.

“Shadow magic,” I managed to say. “I’ve accidentally been using shadow magic for years. But unlike Dewey, I haven’t been hurting anyone else. Just myself, somehow.”

They stared, waiting for me to crack a smile, to tell them it was all a joke. But the coughing seized me again. Colette held the glass to my lips, her gentle hand on my back.

Once the coughing slowed, Millie crouched in front of me. “Stop it, Luxe. Stop whatever it is you’re doing to yourself.”

“I’m trying.” If only it were that simple. Even now, when I wasn’t calling to my magic, fear-tinged lightstrings danced over my cousins’ heads.

Still holding the bloodied glass, Colette studied me. “This is how you found Jamison during the fire.”

I nodded. I had no fight left.

“What? How?” Millie demanded.

“The fainting,” Colette said.

Another nod.

“The weight loss.”

And another.

“This is why my father named you the star.” She looked away, her throat bobbing. Years of being my backup had made her doubt herself. Her talent.

“It should have been you.” Somehow, those words were harder to utter than anything else I’d shared. “He knows I can charm the audience without jewels. I make them believe they’re having the time of their lives.”

“Without wasting any gems.” She covered her mouth, shaking her head. “All these years, I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong. If I didn’t smile enough, or didn’t look enough like my mother, or looked too much like my mother. But it was never about me, was it?”

Tears shone in her eyes. That I’d made her doubt herself, her talent, her beauty—that was unforgivable. “I’m so sorry, Col. It should have been you.”

The lights dimmed. Millie glanced toward the shut door. “Damnit. Intermission’s over.”

“Let’s go.” I forced myself to stand.

Colette blocked the door. “You can’t be serious! A breeze could knock you over.”

I squared my shoulders, my limbs growing heavier with every moment I remained upright. “Dewey can’t know anything’s wrong. The show must go on.”

The lights blinked again. Still, Colette held the knob. “After the show, you’re telling us everything, okay? And don’t you dare use your magic, not if it’s making you sick. Deal?”

“Except she’s getting married after the show,” Millie said under her breath.

In silence, we walked back toward the rafters. For our final act, Millie would start at stage right. Colette would swing in from stage left, and they’d do a brief routine before my grand entrance.

Colette insisted I climb the ladder first. We settled into our usual rhythm in uncomfortable silence: hands dipped in powder, jewels pressed against us for strength.

As we waited for Wolffe’s signal, Colette studied me. “You have a plan, don’t you? Other than just marrying the guy.”

Marrying was the easy part. Killing him would be much harder. “I’ve got some ideas.”

She arched a brow. “Nothing reckless, I hope.”

“Nothing you wouldn’t do.” I straightened my shaky legs and stretched.

She glared at the front row, where Dewey sat tall, those flowers in his lap. “I’d kill him.”

I nearly laughed. The Revelle drums quickened, readying for her entrance.

Her head whipped to mine. “Jesus Christ, you’re going to try to kill him, aren’t you?”

Always too smart for her own good. “If something happens to me tonight, there’s a small vial in my dressing room.”

“You can’t kill a time traveler!”

“It’s next to my lipstick. All it takes is a few drops.”

“Luxe.” She grabbed my shoulders, her determined face the only thing in my field of view. “We’re going to figure this out together. Okay?”

The same thing Jamison had said. I managed a nod.

A moment later, she was on her feet, gripping the swing, her shoulders squared and her back arched. Every muscle in her lean body was honed for this, like a bird with hollow bones.

The crowd’s excitement hit new highs as she swung off the platform.

Their lightstrings were exactly where I’d left them: elated and excited and thoroughly enraptured. From the front row, Dewey’s smoky one brimmed with pride. The votes were nearly all counted. He was about to have everything he wanted, and he’d gathered an enormous, adoring crowd to witness his victory.

I couldn’t turn the lightstrings off, but I didn’t dare grab any, not when that thick metallic taste still lingered in my mouth. I was no good to my family dead.

A few auras glowed backstage. Two tourists and a Revelle, climbing through a window. I leaned over the edge to signal to Dewey’s guards to help the lone Revelle take care of the overzealous fans—

Wait.

I knew that lightstring, even if it was heavy with worry. Even if the gold tinge was nearly gone.

Impossible.

I scurried down the ladder. At the bottom, Nana grabbed my arm. “Where are you going?”

“Give me a moment.”

“You have to be onstage at the end of this song. Wolffe’s going to announce the winner!”

“I know.” I shook myself from her grasp as gently as I could.

If Dewey or any of his guards saw, Jamison would be shot without hesitation. He’d declared him persona non grata before the show. A wanted man in our theater, dead or alive.

And even if Trys traveled to save him, Dewey had all the time in the world to hurt him again and again and again . . .

Trys’s jet-black bob slunk behind a wardrobe. I grabbed her. “What are you doing here? You need to get him out before—”

“Before what?” Trys narrowed her eyes. “Before you stomp all over his heart again?”

The crowd gasped at a particularly complex maneuver of Colette’s. I was running out of time. “Before your brother kills him.”

“My brother’s not a murderer.”

“Luxe?”

Jamison’s voice knocked the air from my lungs, as if I’d fallen off the trapeze and landed square on my back. Frozen, I stared at his unruly hair, his crumpled shirt, and the dark shadows framing his dimmed eyes.

“What are you doing here?” I pulled him between two wooden props. It was hard to be mad when every inch of me relished his proximity. He stared at where my hand lingered on his arm, and his face softened.

I retreated. He was supposed to be far away. Safe. “You need to leave.”

There was no time. I needed to be on that platform. If I was even a second late, Dewey would wonder why I’d missed my cue.

Those bright eyes held my gaze. “I won’t let you sacrifice yourself for me.”

“You have to go,” I pleaded. “Dewey has his guards crawling all over the place. They’ll kill you without thinking twice.”

He took in my blood-peppered costume, my pallid skin, before settling on my engagement ring. “You can’t marry him. He’s the one behind the fire. He’s the one behind the attack in the alley that day. All summer long, he’s been trying to keep us apart.”

Much longer than that, I desperately wanted to say.

The crowd gasped at something Colette and Millie did. It was time for my leap.

My head weighed a hundred tons as I turned away from him. “I don’t need saving, Jamison. I want this.”

“I don’t believe you.”

His lightstring was liquid in my grasp. All it would take was a tiny bit of magic. A smidge to exaggerate his lingering doubt. The insecurities he’d managed to beat back long enough to return to Charmant, despite how I’d decimated his hopes.

Crushing him was the right thing to do. But in what universe was it right to break the heart of a good person over and over again?

“I marry him, and you’re safe, and my family’s safe . . .” My voice broke on the words, and he wrapped his arms around me. I hadn’t the strength to push him away again.

“No one’s safe, Luxe.” His voice was quiet, his heart beating steadily against me. “That’s the hard truth: no matter what you do, no one is ever a hundred percent safe.”

Tears burned behind my eyes. If Dewey realized I wanted him dead, he’d have no one to blame but me, as long as I acted alone. But if he thought Jamison helped me . . .

The band played the note signaling my entrance.

“Just let me try,” I whispered, pressing my hands to Jamison’s face. He had come back for me. Of course he had come back for me. “Let me try to fix this.”

He kissed my palms. “I can’t let you trade your life for mine.”

I’m dying, I longed to tell him.

The band repeated my entrance riff.

“I’m sorry.” I let go, the world spinning—

The shiny wood floors slammed into me.

His lightstring flashed with worry as he knelt beside me. I took his hands as if I could pull myself to my feet.

But I couldn’t.

“I need to do this,” I pleaded. “Go, Jamison. Just leave.”

He pressed my hands to his heart, its beating somehow slowing my own pulse. My body always responded to his, even that first night.

“I couldn’t live with myself if I let you do this. So I’m staying. Even if you don’t feel for me what I feel for you.”

Hope dripped from every word. Part of him still expected me to reject him, still didn’t believe I could love him.

“I already told you what I want,” I forced myself to say. “Now leave.”

“Liar.” He hovered over me, dark hair falling into his eyes as he held my gaze.

He wouldn’t believe me, not without my magic. And I was so tired of lying.

I wrapped my arms around his neck and pulled him to me. It was a brief, gentle kiss, but it soothed the burning in my chest. “Go to the slide you recognized. Find somewhere to hide nearby. Once Dewey’s asleep, I’ll find you, okay?”

He kissed me once, twice, his smile growing. “I love you,” he whispered.

“I—”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Dewey spat.

Every inch of me plunged into ice.

Dewey stood in front of the curtain, his lightstring a storm of rage. Even without seeing it, Jamison angled himself between us.

The protective movement didn’t go unnoticed by Dewey. “Get onstage, Luxe.”

I shook my head.

“Your audience is waiting. Get on the stage.”

“No.”

Dewey blinked once. Twice. “Guess we’re going to do this the hard way.”

Everything happened quickly.

Dewey lunged toward Jamison, his elbow cocked and ready to jab.

Jamison turned toward me, his back taking the brunt of the blow.

Dewey reached into his topcoat, the one with the diamond-shaped clock, and pulled out something dark silver. A gun.

He has a gun!

I couldn’t get the words out soon enough.

He cocked it at Jamison, who was trying to shield me, his back still to Dewey. I tried to scream, but I was too slow, and Dewey was too close—

“Stop!” Trys leaped between them, spreading her arms to block as much of Jamison as she could.

My body sagged with relief. Trys was here. Dewey wouldn’t hurt Jamison with Trys here.

Her cane clattered against the floor as she gaped at her brother, at the gun in his hands.

Dewey kept it aimed at us. “Get out of the way.”

“How could you?” Her eyes welled as she stared at him, her hands still spread in front of her.

“Get out of the way, Trysta. Now.”

Her outstretched arms trembled. “If you shoot him again, I’m just going to travel again.”

Again?

My knees threatened to buckle. Jamison stepped closer, his back pressed against me.

Dewey looked pained. “There’s no way for you to stop this. You’ll be the only one aging.”

“This isn’t you. You’re not a killer.”

Dewey’s finger twitched over the trigger. “I have given everything for her! He is the only thing standing in our way.”

“It’s not that simple,” Trys pleaded. “You know that.”

“If you’d only seen what I’ve seen, you’d understand. The things we will achieve together. Our children will move mountains!” His wild eyes flitted to me, pleading.

He meant every sickening word.

We were at a standoff. Trys shielded Jamison. Jamison shielded me.

And still the band circled back to the same chord, waiting for my dazzling entrance.

“Stop!” Trys begged. “He’s my best friend.”

“I’m your brother. You’d protect him over me?”

“I’m protecting you both. Please, just put the gun down.”

“I didn’t want it to be like this.” Regret flooded his lightstring. There was still a human heart in him, and it was hurting.

Trysta’s face softened. “I know, Dewey. You’re a good—”

The gunshot roared in my skull.

I grabbed for Jamison, pulling him down to the floor with me.

A second shot exploded. Blood rained onto my bare arms, and Jamison cried out—

Trys crumpled to the floor, red pouring from her chest.

A sound of pure anguish tore from Jamison’s throat. He lunged for Trys, but Dewey swung the gun to him.

“Do what I say, and I’ll bring her back.”

All the color drained from Jamison’s face. Trys remained motionless, save the blood seeping from her chest.

So much blood.

Footsteps thundered all around us as people came to investigate. Roger skidded to a halt and threw out his arms, keeping the rest of the family back. Tears spilled from Jamison’s devastated eyes as he yelled to him—to protect him from Dewey or the sight of Trys—but he was too late.

Roger’s jaw slackened, his lightstring dimming to blue-black. “Trys?”

“Stay away from her!” Dewey spat, but Roger lowered himself to Trys. His hands—hands that were strong enough to perform trapeze for hours without so much as a tremble—shook violently as he searched for the wound. As if he could stop the bleeding.

As if it weren’t already too late.

“What did you do?” Roger’s voice was a raw, broken thing. Trys’s blood ran through his fingers like crimson paint. Jamison tried to reach them, but Dewey swung his gun wildly. At Jamison. At the backstage crew fanning out around us, all Revelles.

“Stay back! Come one step closer, and I’ll shoot.”

He was going to kill us all.

Pain barreled through my skull as I tried to access my power. It radiated down my chest, my stomach, to each of my limbs.

But no magic answered my call.

The band played my entrance melody more insistently.

“Please, Dewey,” I pleaded. “Let’s just go talk somewhere.”

“So you can charm me and lie to me again? Absolutely not.”

“My sweet—”

“Trevor!” Dewey barked.

Trevor poked his head out from behind a curtain. Our eyes met. Go! I shouted in my mind. Get help.

But what would help do? Dewey would just restart the clock and none of us would even remember what he’d done.

No, there was no escaping Dewey.

As Trevor approached, Dewey swung the gun around in a sweeping arc. “If you stay calm, everyone will be fine. Everyone.”

“It’d be a lot easier to believe that if you’d just put the damn gun down!” I cried.

His jaw set in resolve. “This is for your own good.”

Roger’s lips moved in quiet prayer as he pressed his hands to Trys’s wound. I’d never seen him so broken, not even after Margaret. “Let me get Dr. Strattori. Please!”

Dewey didn’t even acknowledge him. His eyes were trained on Jamison, who shook beside me, his lightstring a dark and tortured purple.

Still the band played on.

“Just tell us what you want us to do.” My voice was steady now.

“I need Jamison to answer one simple question for me.”

From where he cradled Trys, Roger’s face snapped toward Jamison. “Don’t say a damn thing.”

Dewey’s lightstring calmed by the second. He knew he had us. “He doesn’t need to answer. All he has to do is think of the answer, and Trevor will fill in the blanks for me.”

My limbs went cold.

If he were to shoot Jamison again, without Trys, Jamison wouldn’t survive. There were no more second chances.

“Where did the three of you meet?”

Jamison’s gaze tore from Trys’s body. “What?”

“You, Trysta, and Roger. Where did you meet?”

I imagine it works differently for you, as a Revelle, but the lightstring leads me through their past. It weaves through whatever door they’ve entered, and keeps going, back and back until the moment they were born.

He could end Jamison before we even met. “Don’t tell him anything!”

“Trevor, is Jamison thinking of where they met?”

Trevor’s mouth twisted as if trying to separate from his own body. “Yes, sir,” he said through gritted teeth.

“No!” Roger cried.

I dug deeper into my magic, despite the burning in my lungs. I scraped every corner of myself in search of lingering power. Shadow magic drained lifelines. I was still alive. Somewhere in me, I still had life to give.

“Tell me where,” Dewey commanded him.

Trevor stilled. Dewey was so accustomed to Trevor’s obedience, he hadn’t even phrased it as a question.

I searched even deeper, hardly registering the claw of pain down my lungs, scraping the very core of me.

“Now, Trevor.”

The Edwardian’s voice was small as he replied, “This isn’t right, sir.”

“Really? After everything we’ve been through together, you’re going to make me force it out of you?”

“Yes, sir, I am.” Trevor took a step back, readying himself to run—

Dewey swung the gun around to his assistant, pressing it against his forehead. Trevor paled.

This was hopeless. Even if I could muster the magic to knock Dewey out, as soon as he woke, he’d come right back at us. He would never quit, not unless I somehow managed to stop his heart from beating before he had a chance to jump back in time. And if Dewey died, Trys was gone forever, because there would be no one here to travel and bring her back.

With the barrel of his gun still pressed against Trevor’s head, Dewey still managed to look wounded. “You’re really going to make me ask?”

“Yes,” Trevor whispered. “You don’t have to do this.”

The heavy diamond on my finger warmed. The ring Trevor gave to me. Could I charm him into lying, into avoiding the cost of his own magic?

“You won’t even remember that I’ve done this,” Dewey said. “But I’ll remember where you stood when it mattered. Now tell me: Where did the three of them meet?”

The jewel’s magic was silk between my fingers, easy and cool. You wish to stall, to give a detailed description of the wrong place . . .

Trevor’s mouth wrangled itself open, the involuntary need to respond fighting the magic from my diamond. His wide eyes snapped to mine, understanding dawning in them. Just trust me, I whisper-shouted in my mind. Name any other place. If I could keep him calm and keep the truth from his lips, Dewey would travel to the wrong place, and Jamison would live.

Roger shouted and stomped on the floor, trying to drown out any answer, and I dug deeper into that sweet jewel magic, diamond dust raining from my hand—

“Tell me now,” Dewey ordered. “You have one last chance.”

You long to name Florida. California. Anything but the truth. I looked at him in horror as his lips twisted, my magic colliding with his. Any answer, and Dewey would leave him alone.

Trevor’s lips ceased struggling, and his eyes found mine. “Tell Millie I’m sorry.”

The gun went off, and Trevor hit the floor.

A deafening ringing exploded through my mind, drowning out the music, the screams as I stared at a gaping pink hole in Trevor’s head where his face used to be.

I tried to yell for him, tried to reach him, but Jamison held me back as I crawled, hands slipping on the bloodstained floor, oh God, the blood . . .

“He did it to himself!” The gun shook in Dewey’s hands.

There was nothing recognizable left of my friend. No sign of the eyes that had struggled against my magic, the horror in them as he realized I was charming him.

What had I done? If only I’d left him alone. Or if I’d charmed him into running away, or falling asleep, or literally anything else.

I doomed him.

More Revelles now, skidding to a halt. Dewey swung the gun wildly at all of them, and they disappeared, taking cover behind the crates, the wardrobes. If they yelled for me, I couldn’t hear them, not over the roar of the audience, the ringing in my ears.

Jamison pulled me against him. Little pink chunks clung to my fishnets. Trevor.

The muzzle of the pistol dug into the back of my skull. The ringing sound ceased, replaced by the band’s upbeat melody.

“Tell me where you met.” Dewey’s voice broke. “Now.”

Jamison went still.

My magic didn’t answer my call, only pain. “He won’t hurt me,” I rasped. “Don’t answer.”

Dewey simpered at us. “Is that a risk you’re willing to take?”

“He’ll travel and kill you before you even know who he is. Don’t say a word.”

Jamison gripped me against his chest, his lightstring tortured. He’d just lost Trys. Trevor still bled on the floor. Jamison was so afraid of me being next.

“He won’t,” I repeated, this time quieter.

Dewey made a disapproving noise. “Fine. But I will shoot him.” He swung the gun to Roger. “I can kill him right now. Or I can travel back to right before the three of you met and prevent your paths from crossing. No pain for Trysta and Roger. They won’t even miss you.”

“Don’t you dare!” Roger roared. Trys’s graceful frame hung limp in his arms.

Jamison stared at them, his eyes wild.

“Your friendship or their lives,” Dewey said calmly. “You have three seconds to choose.”

“Don’t do it,” I begged him. “He’ll kill you!”

“Two.”

“What do I do here?” Jamison pleaded.

I grabbed onto Dewey’s lightstring, but it hardly flickered.

Dewey yanked Roger by the shirt. “One.”

“In Washington, DC!” Jamison cried out. “At the train station in Washington, DC.”

Dewey lowered his gun, beaming at me the same way he had after he’d wiped the Strattori’s blood off his knife. As if everything he did was for my benefit. I wanted to claw that smile right off his face, but any sudden movements and he’d travel.

It was over.

No amount of magic could make Dewey forget an actual memory. I had no idea how shadow magic worked for him—if he could use the blood he’d spilled tonight, or if there was more ceremony involved—but he was going to kill Jamison, and he wouldn’t age a drop in the process.

The band played, their tune wild and upbeat. But I was back here.

It didn’t matter. Any moment now, this would all be erased.

Utterly wrecked, Jamison’s knees buckled. Roger buried his head in his hands. Trysta remained motionless. And Trevor, sweet Trevor, my friend despite everything . . .

Dewey couldn’t have looked more pleased with himself. He ran a hand over his suit jacket, brushing away bits of the carnage he’d caused as he circled Jamison. A victory lap.

“You’re not as wonderful as everyone believes you to be. Your parents, on the other hand . . .” He chuckled to himself. “It took years before they cracked.”

All the blood drained from Jamison’s face.

Dewey cocked his head, a predator relishing his kill. “You have no recollection of all the different versions of yourself I’ve seen. Loving, doting parents made you an arrogant little boy. The orphanage made you soft. But in every version, you’re a rat, sneaking right back in to take what is mine.”

My limbs went cold.

Jamison staggered back. “You—You killed my parents?”

“Technically, the electric chair fried them.”

“Impossible,” Roger growled. He was baiting Dewey, buying time. But for what? “No one can travel back that far. Not even you.”

“I’m still getting used to my newfound talents, but I assure you, it can be done.”

I closed my eyes and searched within for any part of me that felt alive. Anything I had left to give.

“Bullshit,” Roger sneered. “You tripped and fell into the past. You think that makes you powerful?”

“Not just one time. Many times.” Dewey grinned as if he expected them to be impressed. So desperate for adoration, even now.

Jamison stepped toward Dewey, thrumming with anger. “You took my sister?”

Pain choked every syllable, his devastation filling the spaces between words. I dug deeper into my magic, searching.

“I’ve killed you, you know. Drowned you on that beach you’re so fond of, your chubby little arms splashing as if you could stop me. But for some reason, in that timeline, Luxe’s magic never developed.” His face scrunched with distaste.

Catherine Revelle alive, Jamison Jones dead. Colette is the star, but Luxe’s magic is weak and Catherine keeps her from me. George wins.

Catherine dead, Jamison dead. Luxe is the star but her magic’s weak. Luxe despises me.

“Time is a fickle thing. If you have a terrible accident far from Charmant, before you’ve met your friends, life here will be unaffected. I just need someone with magical blood to lead the way.” He grinned at Roger.

Shadow magic. Using Roger. To kill Jamison before any of us met him.

Dewey glanced around at the Revelles inching closer, then at Trys’s body, and his smile faded. “Well, as enlightening as this has been, it’s time.”

He’d kill them both, undo this summer, undo everything—

I emptied myself, letting the claws of my magic scrape against everything I had left to give. The pain burned my flesh, the pressure so great in my head that blood vessels burst in my eyes. Fighting the urge to collapse, I dug deeper into it, into all the things that made me alive. The Strattori said I was emptying my own lifeline. As long as I was still alive, magic was still within my reach.

Memories flashed behind my eyes as the darkness closed in. My mother fixing my curls in pigtails, humming the Revelle theme song. Nana sneaking me candy backstage, my mother pretending to be mad. My aunts teaching me trapeze with Colette and Millie. The thrill of growing up under the same roof as my best friends, of chasing them through the winding halls of the Big Tent. Performing together, closing my eyes as I threw myself into the air, knowing they’d catch me. Lying on the beach with them, Colette’s pinkie linked with mine. Jamison’s thumb pressed to my pulse on the Ferris wheel. Our stolen kisses in the sand.

I dug into every moment I’d felt loved. Every moment I’d lived.

Dewey’s face slackened, and he turned to me, slowly, realization dawning too late.

You love me, and I love you, and you’re tired, so very tired . . .

The gun clattered to the ground. Dewey’s eyes fluttered, his knees buckling.

“Catch him!” If the fall woke him, all it’d take was a split second, and he’d travel.

Roger leaped forward, gripping Dewey with his bloodstained hands and easing him onto the floor. He looked up at me, jaw slack.

“I charmed him,” I tried to say, all the while gripping Dewey’s lightstring so hard, my chest felt like it was about to explode. Finally, his eyes began to close. “I think I— No!”

Jamison pressed the gun to Dewey’s temple and squeezed the trigger.