The Between moves. It’s impossible to see it, because all there is to see is nothing, but somehow I can feel the space shifting around me. Ripples of light appear beneath each of my footfalls, matching the shade of the Location spell, like a pathway is being built beneath us with every step. The spell tugs on my soul.

“What happens at the other side?” Zyneth asks. “When we reach it, will it pull me through?”

“No,” I say. Somehow, I can still feel there’s a distance ahead of us. Not a real distance, not a place that can be walked to, yet that feeling of a great expanse remains. “We stepped in one side, and we’ll have to actively step out the other. However, don’t let go,” I add. “The Location spell is providing the bridge between the two worlds, and without it, you’ll fall back to your reality.”

Wordlessly, he tightens his grip.

I let the spell lead me. The Prismatic is gone. The stone beneath our feet is worlds away. Everything is darkness, timelessness, spacelessness. My void always reacted to my instincts, so I use that here as well: Focusing on me. On my body. On the moment I left.

Then, finally, a light. My spell is leading us straight toward it, like a lure at the end of a line, only that small pinprick is rapidly growing, until there’s suddenly a bubble of white right in front of us. It’s twice our size, opaque and swirling. Somehow, I understand that all I have to do is reach out and touch it, pop the film of reality, and then the bridge will be complete.

My soul flutters. I’m here. This is it.

Zyneth breathes in deeply. “Can you smell that?”

“No.” But the light is changing, gaining color, like a lens out of focus.

“It smells like nature,” Zyneth says. “Like a forest.”

Not something I associate with Los Angeles. But I can’t think about forests now, in case somehow that accidentally changes where the portal will open to. I keep focusing on my body. I keep trying to manifest the moment I left.

The light slowly morphs into blurry shapes, and I can feel a distant warmth—sunlight. Zyneth’s right, wherever this is on Earth, it’s outside. Bird chirps echo from the scene, muted and distant. I know I must only have a couple minutes left, but still I don’t reach out—I can’t bring myself to say goodbye. Instead, I concentrate on bringing everything into focus.

Slowly, the scene resolves.

There’s a tree in front of us, and though I can’t see its source, I can make out the distant but oh-so-familiar sound of traffic, a sound that’s been absent ever since I arrived in Valenia. My soul tightens with longing. It’s really Earth.

But that begs the question: Where is my body? Why did the portal open up in a park of all places? Did I do the spell wrong?

“This is where you were before coming to our world?” Zyneth asks.

“No,” I say, drifting closer to the boundary. “No, I was in the studio. This is still Los Angeles, I think, but…” As the scene continues to resolve, my gaze falls on the grass. Or, more specifically, the headstones that litter the grass.

My chest seizes up. I feel light. Dizzy. No, but I thought I could get back to the exact moment. I thought the Between existed outside of time. I thought…

“What is it?” Zyneth asks as I sink to my knees. “Kanin what’s wrong?”

“Too late,” I say, dazed. I feel hot and cold. Pins and needles. My mind is buzzing, spinning, thick. I sink down to my knees. “It’s gone.”

Somehow. Somehow it was never actually real until this moment. Despite knowing I died, I never actually felt it was true. It always seemed reversible. Temporary. If I was clever enough, I could find a way out. A way back. All I had to do was give it my all, and I’d be able to go home. Get my job back. My life back. My body back.

But it’s buried six feet under my gravestone.

In Loving Memory of

Kanin Reed

1996-2024

“Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player.

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

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and then is heard no more.”

My grip goes slack, but Zyneth squeezes tighter before my hand can slip away. “Don’t fall apart on me now,” he says. “Not here. I need you. If you can’t go through, then we have to go back.”

I distantly understand he’s right—I can’t go through. There’s nothing to go back to. If I step over that boundary, there will be no body to bind to, and if my bond with this one is severed, all that’s left is the afterlife.

And I don’t want to die. I don’t want to be living this half-life, either, but I’m not ready to be dead. It just hurts. It hurts so much.

Shakily, I let Zyneth help pull me to my feet. “I can’t believe it,” I moan.

“What?” he asks softly. “Talk to me.”

“They used a Shakespeare quote. For an actor.” I cover my face. “It’s just so fucking cliche.”

“It sounds like you have a lot to work through,” Zyneth says.

He tugs me away from the portal, and I let him. The image drifts a few feet away. I should let it go. I should end this spell, and never look back.

“Perhaps we can do that back in reality,” Zyneth suggests.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, he’s right. I can’t bear to look at this anymore anyway. But if we’re heading back to reality, and I’m coming with—

I realize what I should have been paying attention to with a lurch of fear. The predator. I grab our tether. Where is it? Can I pull it back? I can feel its eager excitement through our distant bond. Anticipation is thrumming down the string and into my soul. I try to yank it back, but it resists me. I’ll need all my mental focus for this. If only I wasn’t still battling with the emotional trauma of seeing my own grave. Come on, Kanin, keep it together. Just calm down. Focus. And—

I double over as pain rips through me. I feel something inside my soul tear. The predator is filled with elation—and then that elation is met with malice and hunger, and its mind is multiplied tenfold.

Oh. Oh no.

I Check the Predator’s Influence Stat. Echo’s hardly crackles through the Between, distant but discernible.

[Predator Influence: 99.98%]

“What’s wrong?” Zyneth puts a hand on my back. “Are you hurt? We should get out of here.”

I fight through the mental pain, forcing myself upright as I turn to face the direction of the predator. Our tether is vibrating as it rushes toward me. Its hunger drums against me like physical blows.

“It escaped. All of it.” I draw my blade—Zyneth’s blade—then press it into his hands. “If it comes to it—”

“What?” Zyneth asks, horrified. He tries to push it back into my hands. “No. We’ll fight it.”

Maybe. Maybe we could. I don’t think it can be killed, but it’s at least been knocked back before.

But can we risk it? The second it gets here, I’ll be lost, and Zyneth will be left facing it in the Between. He won’t have the upper hand.

My hands shake as I push the knife back into his grasp. “If it comes to it,” I repeat, and neither of us need for me to finish that thought. I heard him talking with the predator. I know he’ll do what has to be done if there’s no other option. That’s the only reassurance I have.

I let go of the knife and Zyneth. “Run,” I tell him.

I suddenly flash back to Attiru’s bookshop, to me telling Noli the same thing, terrified and shaking as the predator’s mind pressed into me. I try to still my shaking now. Even after everything, I haven’t changed, have I?

Our tether whips back and forth as I feel the predator approaching, imminent. I can’t escape it. I’ve already lost. But Zyneth—

Without me to anchor him, he’s drifting away—drifting back to Emrox.

“No!” Zyneth snatches for my hand, but we’re not really in the same place, it only seems that way. Gray stone spreads beneath his feet as he slips back into reality. Good. That’s as much as I can do to help him. I Check the Planar Linkage timer: The spell will be up in just over a minute.

I end the Location spell. The line of light pointing me to Earth evaporates, and the bubble of reality begins to shrink. Maybe if both sides close, I’ll remain Between when the predator reaches me, and we’ll both be trapped here. I hope that will be enough.

NO.

The void crashes into me, and I only put up the smallest, most pathetic excuse of a fight, taking that last gasp of air, before—

Our magic slams into this new body, wrapping around the glass, pulling memories from our other selves to weave our shadows into a familiar form. Yes, this body is much better than before. Our soul has gotten stronger. But it won’t be enough—not enough to sate our hunger. We take quick stock of our surroundings: Two openings into reality, both closing fast. We leap for the nearest one.

The spell holding the portal open might have already ended, but we are not one to give up on reality so easily. Or void stabs ahead, puncturing the fragile bubble of spacetime. Our tentacles hiss as they make contact with this reality—this place where magic shouldn’t exist.

We can’t go through—but we don’t need to.

We grasp the boundary between Everything and Nothing. We yank the shrinking hole wide. The effort tears at our essence, at the wrongness of this, but we must anchor this place, this time, in existence.

A small, white ball of light drifts through the gateway and into Between. Then a second. Then a third. We stab a spear of black through the nearest one, devouring it with a flood of horrifically familiar ecstasy. It’s a soul.

They’re all souls.

They’re falling through the portal every second, sometimes several at a time, and the longer we hold the gateway open, the more we collect. We snatch up the souls and gather them in our void, keeping them from dispersing Between and moving beyond—we can’t eat them all now. We’ve learned that much after last time—we need to ration them.

This can’t be happening. Not again—this can’t be happening again—

We snuff out the horror like a doused match, amused. We’re still sorting through all these new thoughts—all these new memories we don’t remember having. It’s a lot to parse at once, but we need information. This time will be different. This time, we won’t fall for the same tricks and be cast back into the Between. Speaking of which…

The other portal is closing. We can keep this end open a few moments longer, collecting more souls, but we can’t hold both sides open at once. Tucking our prizes close, we release our grip on the second world—Earth, the word comes to us—then fall back to the other side.

There’s someone already there, waiting for us. Prey—the cambion—Zyneth. His face is set and grim. Lightning flickers to life in his twin blades.