"Well, thanks anyway. Thanks for everything really. You guys were both so nice to me when I showed up. Thanks for helping me deal with my parents, and for keeping us safe that night. I hope wherever you are, you're happy." Nikki knelt down and set the flowers on top of the simple markers. "I grew these myself, Aaron, using your spell. Only took me three days. I hope you like peonies."

  She wondered if they were an appropriate flower for a gravestone. Her mother had always obsessed about having the right flowers for particular occasions—which, of course, meant that Nikki actively rejected learning a single thing about it.

  "Tha' was nice," said Rufus, setting down his own bundle of flowers. "I'm sure they're glad you stopped by."

  "You still come here every day?" Nikki asked.

  "Ev'ry day." Rufus turned and started walking back to the main clearing. Nikki hurried to follow, falling in next to him. "It's prob'ly e'cessive, I know. But I feel like someone's gotta keep 'em company. Jus' seems righ'."

  "What about you? Who keeps you company?"

  "Birds and the bears, girlie!" Rufus laughed. "There's an ol' mama black bear 'round here. She and I are good friends. I leave her snacks sometimes."

  "You aren't scared?"

  "Black bears are more a'scared of us than we are of them. 'sides," Rufus gave a short, high pitched whistle.

  A few moments later, a huge grey wolf padded out from somewhere deep in the forest. She eyed Rufus fiercely, as if admonishing him for calling her unnecessarily.

  "Ah, sorry Gwen. I was makin' a poin'. We're safe." Gwen turned and loped away without hesitation. Rufus shrugged. "That girl's always 'round, even if you don' see her."

  "I didn't realize we knew where she was."

  "I don' know where she goes at nigh'," Rufus corrected. "but she's never fail'd to show up if I call. I don' think she likes me much, but Natalie tol' her to keep us safe. She's holdin' to her word. Or her howl, I s'pose."

  "You think she'd come if I whistled too?"

  "Probably. Worked for M'koto. Speakin' o'which," Rufus added, giving her a sidelong glance. "What's this I hear abou' you castin' spells on him?"

  "Not on him." Nikki frowned. "He told me to practice by trying to find stuff out about him. I never actually cast anything at him."

  "Even so. Seems a bit risky, don' it?"

  "It's perfectly safe, and Makoto doesn't mind." She shrugged. "To be honest, he's had a totally boring and ordinary life too. It's kind of depressing. Up until he ran into Cinza on campus, he did a whole lot of nothing."

  "He's a good man," Rufus warned. "Don' you go messin' with stuff you can't fix."

  They emerged into the clearing. She said goodbye to Rufus and crossed the wide expanse to her new home. As she neared the bridge, she saw Ruby standing in the center, arms outstretched. She was concentrating on a patch of grass ten feet away, while Cinza and Makoto watched with interest.

  It emerged, slowly at first, but in the same unsettling, unearthly way. The material of the ground seemed to give way as it pushed up into existence. A six foot, faceless grey monstrosity, with only a thick column where its legs should go, and arms as large as cinder blocks ending in square fists.

  Nikki shivered. Until quite recently, the idea of using the golems was such a taboo that not one of them had even suggested it. After the news report of Mr. Hendricks' resurfacing and Jerry Hauserman's death, it wasn't an option anymore. They needed to be ready for more golems. Ruby was the best at the spell, and had spent hours every day practicing it ever since. This was the first time she'd managed to get the golem to emerge completely from the ground.

  As Nikki walked closer, she felt her entire face prickling. Her eyes began to water. Her nose tickled. She burst into a sudden sneeze, even though she'd felt totally fine all day.

  The golem collapsed a moment later, as Ruby fell back onto the cushions laid out on the bridge, totally spent. Instantly, Nikki's discomfort subsided.

  Cinza was watching her with interest. "Nicole?"

  "I… I'm not sure."

  "Allergies?"

  "I've never had them before." Nikki frowned. "You think I'm—"

  "Allergic to Creation magic," Makoto finished.

  Cinza nodded. "It's not unheard of. There were a few known magical allergies in Rallsburg, Rika's being the most prominent."

  "Explains why I couldn't ever do the golem stuff," Nikki sighed.

  "You never felt allergic before, correct?"

  "No, not once."

  "Not even when we were up against Brian's golems the first night…" Cinza trailed off thoughtfully. "So allergies do not emerge until you are awakened."

  "I'm ready to go again," Ruby called.

  Cinza was about to object, but Nikki held up her hands. "I'm going to my place anyway. Please, keep going. Just warn me if I'm getting close, all right?"

  "Of course."

  The cabin was still under construction, but they'd completed the most important component first, at her request. The stone chamber sat in the exact center, smooth cut and perfectly square. In the floor, Ruby had carved out the star symbol of the Grimoire, with a candleholder set into the walls where each point ended. It was wonderfully gothic and primal. Just walking into it, Nikki felt closer to magic than she ever had before.

  Josh was standing nearby, waiting for her.

  "Hi."

  "Hi yourself," he replied.

  Josh looked like he woke up on the wrong side of the bed, as usual. Though he'd gotten his own cabin and every amenity they could provide, it was always painfully clear that he didn't belong. It wasn't the wardrobe—they didn't actually wear their robes all the time, particularly when doing any difficult physical labor—it was his personality. Josh was a city person, or at least a suburb person. Being out in nature all day, every day, wasn't doing him any favors.

  "Ready to get started?"

  Josh laughed. "You do all the hard work here, I just sit around and make stupid guesses."

  "You help out a lot."

  "If you say so." Josh followed her inside the chamber and closed the door behind them. He snapped his fingers and the candles all lit simultaneously.

  "Hey, you finally got it!"

  "You know how hard that was to time? No wonder real magicians plan this shit out." Josh took a seat in the armchair they'd set in the corner. If they were planning to do real ritual magic, they'd remove it to avoid interference, but since this was just normal spells, he could afford to relax a bit. He pulled out his notebook and pencil. "Where were we at?"

  "Birthdays, I think?"

  "How the hell did you not know anyone's birthday?"

  "We had more interesting things to talk about?"

  He shrugged. "Whatever. At least it's something they won't care about."

  Nikki sat down and closed her eyes. It took a few minutes for her mind to find its way back to that special state, where she could begin to feel the mass of threads and their nearly infinite intertwined pathways. At first, it was so intimidating that she felt like breaking down just trying to comprehend such a vast wealth of knowledge.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

  However, as she kept working at it, bit by bit she began to build a routine she could follow. It would often lead to the same pathways, which meant she couldn't get new information without trying to push herself outside the comfortable threads, but it also meant that her existing routes were reliable and much faster to traverse.

  In that way, she could combine the path to such a basic piece of information—a few digits representing a birthday—with the vague essence of Josh, sitting in the room with her. Something about her state of mind allowed her to feel his very presence nearby, though not in any useful sense outside her own spell. She took the thread that felt like Joshua Miller and traced it, as far as she could, until she found more and more familiar splits in the path. It only took a few quick traces to reach the answer she wanted.

  "September nineteenth."

  "Year?" Josh asked in a bored voice.

  "Ninety-seven."

  "Another win for the column." Josh marked it off with his pencil.

  "You're bored."

  "No shit, but this is still useful stuff. You're getting consistent."

  "But we need to know more about what works and what doesn't," Nikki pointed out.

  "So keep trying stuff until it doesn't work."

  "Shouldn't we be more scientific about this?"

  Josh laughed. "The only difference between science and fucking around is writing shit down. We've got no clue what we're doing. Any data right now is useful data. Once we start seeing patterns or exceptions, then we can start getting really scientific about this."

  "...Who's next?"

  They went through the rest of the list. Rufus Hill, born on November 14th, 1962. Yusuf al-Fayed, June 14th 1982. Matthew Wilkins, October 8th 1987, and Brittany on September 22nd, 1988. Makoto Kirishima, November 6th 1995. Each one took her only a few minutes, though she could feel her body beginning to strain from the effort, particularly in her lungs.

  When she reached Aaron McGregor, though, something went wrong. She conjured up every memory she had, but for whatever reason, she simply couldn't feel his essence. She tried to dig for his thread, but came up totally empty. It was as if he didn't have one—like he had stopped existing entirely.

  "Shit…" Josh said, once she'd explained the problem. "Any ideas?"

  "What if it's because he's dead?"

  Josh winced. "Maybe." He frowned. "Try Morton too?"

  She did, and got nothing. "They're both just… gone."

  "Huh." Josh frowned, glancing down at the notes he'd taken. "So what the hell's an essence feel like, anyway?"

  "I dunno. It's like their spirit, I guess? I picture them in my head, anything strong I can remember about them, and then I try the spell. I reach out for the thread that starts out feeling like that memory."

  "Hang on a sec. Let me try something." He closed his eyes. Nikki could feel him attempting the spell from the vague energy that hung in the air. Josh was pushing energy straight into the world as he tried to examine the same wall of threads she'd discovered. In only a few moments, he'd totally exhausted himself.

  "You okay?" she asked as he started coughing heavily. He doubled over for a second, looking like he might be sick.

  "Yeah. Fucking hell… How do you do that?"

  "It's my thing, I guess."

  "Jesus," Josh muttered, before another coughing fit overtook him. Nikki waited patiently for him to recover, sitting on the cold stone floor while he got back to a sitting position in his chair. "Okay. Good news is, I found Morton's cold-ass essence just fine. Bad news, I'm never fucking trying a Knowledge spell again."

  "Yeah, please don't."

  He grinned weakly. "You keep your territory, Nikki. That shit is fucking poison."

  "So it's not because they're dead," Nikki continued, trying to get back on track.

  "Nah. I think it's something to do with when you last met them." Josh flipped back through his notes. "You said you had a hard time finding Jessica's essence, but after the next time Hailey flew in, you didn't have a problem with it. I think you gotta meet them now that you've been awakened. You're basically collecting 'em as you go."

  "What counts as meeting them?" Nikki wondered aloud.

  Josh shrugged. "Fuck if I know."

  "I've talked to Julian a couple times online since he left, but I haven't seen him since I awakened." More importantly, he was someone she felt zero guilt about invading his privacy without asking. She concentrated, and in only a few minutes managed to find his essence. It felt much more vague and unfocused than usual, but it was there. She started down the threads, following the path to his birthday once again, but she stopped partway down.

  Josh felt the change in energy, now that he was familiar with it from both sides of the equation. She could sense his movement across the room, but forced herself to stay on the new thread she was following. She didn't want to just stop at a simple birthday this time. She wanted something more detailed.

  None of them knew where he'd ended up after the split in B.C. She was going to find out where Julian Black lived now.

  Nikki started chasing the threads, deeper and deeper, faster and faster. Her mind struggled to contain the breadth of information pouring into it, the many individual strings trailing off into the distance. Each of them held their own stories, their own pieces of data. She had to focus.

  Julian Black. Deliveryman from Rallsburg. Awakened. Kind of a dick. The only guy I know who could accurately be described as having 'henchmen'.

  She hung onto his essence tight as she plunged even deeper. The strain on her mind was beginning to burn into her throat and lungs. Her stomach seized up. She coughed once, sending Josh upright in alarm. Normally, any physical reaction was her cue to stop, since they couldn't be sure how much she could take before she crossed the line into permanent damage.

  Nikki refused to give in. She could feel the destination approaching, though she wasn't sure if it was the one she wanted.

  She pulled the energy from the amethyst stones resting below her neck. Two of them shattered into dust instantly, but they sent her mind careening forward. She felt a rush of exhilaration as her mind and vision went blank.

  Flashes filled her eyesight. Julian Black, walking through a thick forest. She wasn't sure where. She could only see the area immediately around him. It could be any forest in the Northwest. He turned, looking away. He started talking to someone. She couldn't tell who.

  She pressed in closer. Another crystal on her chest burst, practically evaporating off her skin. A wooden sign behind Julian resolved itself. Price. She knew that sign. The Price family mansion, the outer gate.

  Julian is still in Rallsburg?

  The other person slowly resolved as well. She knew his face. She'd spent plenty of time laughing at his jokes in class, and an equal amount pissed off at his entitled bratty personality. Nate Price, the heir to the Price fortune.

  Her vision went black. For a brief, panicked second, Nikki thought she might have gone blind from her effort. It took her a few agonizing moments to realize she just had her eyes closed so tight her eyelids felt numb.

  As she opened them, she saw a very concerned Josh watching her, looking like he might bolt from the room at any second.

  "Too scary?" she joked, her throat raw.

  "Warn me when you're about to do shit next time," Josh muttered. "The fuck was that?"

  "I was trying to scry someone."

  "Scry?"

  "See where they are right now."

  "Oh." He hesitated. "Did it work?"

  "No," she sighed. "I was trying to see Julian, but all I saw was him and Nate at Nate's place way back. Nothing useful. Just a memory like the other ones."

  "Huh." Josh scratched his chin. "You could find his essence though, right?"

  "Yeah. It was weaker though. I guess that means it's easier if I've met them in person."

  "Sounds good to me." Josh wrote it down in their notes. "You uhh… seem to have broken a few things though," he added, nodding at her necklace.

  "Shit," she muttered. Like he'd said, half of the amethyst crystals were totally gone. "I'll have to ask Hailey for some more."

  "I'll add 'em to the list." He made another note. "Here's an idea though. Julian's a pretty weak connection, if I'm understanding this essence shit right. Maybe someone you knew better?"

  She thought for a minute. "I guess I could try Dan. I don't think he'd mind if I tried him, and I loved eating out at his place."

  "Let's do it."

  "Said the guy who just sits there with a clipboard."

  "And the world's worst fucking pencil. I need to steal some of Ruby's next time."

  "Good luck with that."

  Josh grinned. "Nate told me once where their secret passage lets out."

  She rolled her eyes, before letting them slide shut once again. She hunted for Dan Rhodes' essence, and found it easily enough. It was much more familiar to her than Julian's had been, and much warmer. It felt like something she wanted to follow, rather than one she felt vaguely repulsed by.

  The route along the threads was no less terrifying than the last trip. Nikki felt afraid, but she was compelled forward by the magic, and by her own ambition. She had to reach the end. She would accept nothing less.

  As the amethyst burst and her body began to seize up once again, she pushed through, bit by bit. She had to find him. The enormity of her goal threatened to overwhelm her brain. Nikki felt like she were looking at the entire universe at once, only barely scratching the surface of truth. She had to reach him no matter what it took. Dan was somewhere on the other end of the passageway, and Nikki Parsons would find him.

  She burst through the final gateway, while crystal splinters showered her legs. Nikki's vision went pure white. She slowly found herself viewing a clearing, where four men stood around a campfire. She wondered who they were. One of them was Dan, and as she focused, the man nearest him resolved into old man Boris. The other two were a mystery to her. It wasn't that she didn't know them—she couldn't see them whatsoever. Not even their outlines, though she was somehow aware they were men nonetheless.

  She focused only on Dan, looking very afraid, standing in a cold forest somewhere she could not determine.

  No, not four people. There were five. One of them was further apart. Who was he? Why was he so far apart?

  Why was he laying down in the bushes?

  Nikki opened her mouth, as if she could somehow shout a warning to them. No sound emerged. Her ears hummed with pressure, like she were underwater. Though her body was fighting against her at every step, Nikki forced the pain away. She flew down to the fifth man, focusing every bit of concentration she could muster into piercing through the vague shadow.

  The last amethyst crystal on her necklace, her largest and personal favorite, didn't just evaporate. It shattered with explosive force, shoving her back. She fell against the floor with a painful thud. Nikki nearly lost her concentration, but just barely managed to hang onto the thread for dear life, afraid it might tear her mind to shreds if she let go.

  She saw the man clearly. She had no idea who he was, or his name, but she knew where he had come from. He was from a small town west of Rallsburg, whose name she'd forgotten, and he'd been sent there for the same man she'd tried to find.

  He'd been sent there to kill.

  She screamed a warning, as loud as she could. She doubted anyone could hear her. Dan was about to die, and her cry was for nothing.

  Nikki Parsons blacked out. She'd pushed far beyond what she'd ever dreamed of accomplishing, and now she would pay the price. As the magic overwhelmed her brain and shut her down, she heard the vague sound of a gunshot hundreds of miles away, mixed with the panicked cry of Josh only a few feet away.

  So much for being special, she thought bitterly, before the entire world plunged into a silent void.