I live a dual life. Heads—I’m the lead researcher in multiverse travel Quinlan Fairview and grant partner of Uri Gunay; legendary theoretical physicist, video game enthusiast, and one hell of a cook. We’d known one another since we were eight, studying and striving toward the same ambition.In vowing to unlock a way to sustain the needed flow of Dark Matter over time to travel between worlds, it would prove several theories both our families researched for decades.Tails—Science is meaningless. A kingdom within the folds of time belonging to Merlin the Patron God of Alchemy, written by my pen and mind, was sustained by pure Dark Matter, otherwise known as Mana. My people were terrified as their world crumbled on the edges, wearing away as my Mana stores lessened.No Cathar can walk between worlds without their conduit for long. All alchemy came at a cost, and the caster didn’t always pay it. Even being in his presence was enough to keep my world from unraveling. Anything was better than asking him to pay the price for my sins. Reality is finite … and I learned that lesson the hard way.