“Your sister is fine.” It was Patricia’s dad, sounding weary. “We just spoke to her. She’s safe, she was outside the impact zone. Unfortunately, we had just gone to Delaware for one of your mother’s seminars and we weren’t able to get out in time.”

“Wait. What happened? What’s going on?”

“It’s all over the news, we thought you’d seen. Allegra, it came ashore,” said Patricia’s father. “We’re in the basement of the convention center. They herded us all down here when the tidal waves hit. We can’t get the door open, and we think the building collapsed on top of us, plus the whole area is underwater. It’s a miracle we’ve got cell phone signal.”

“Hang in there, Dad.” Patricia felt her face soaking. Between the tears and the white flashes, she was blind. “I’ll find a way. I’ll get you out of there.” There had to be. There had to be a spell to get her to Delaware in a hurry, like a way to bend space. She just couldn’t think what it was, or just whom she could trick enough to pull off such a thing. Maybe just telling her father that she could save him was paradoxically a big enough lie that it would give her the power to save him. Maybe there was a magician in Delaware who could help—except anybody on the ground there was probably dead, or had their hands full. She couldn’t think, she couldn’t breathe, she choked.

“It’s okay, PP. I just wanted you to know that even though we were hard on you, and we disowned you after you ran away from home, we always loved you, and I’m … I’m … I’m proud that you became your own person.” Patricia’s heart shattered. She heard Isobel in the living room upstairs, shouting for Laurence to come and see on the news the scope of the destruction, streets become canals, air choked with debris. Like the heel of God’s hand.

“Do you want to talk to your mother?” Patricia’s father asked. “She’s right here. She broke her arm, but I can hold the phone up to her. Hang on.” There was a scuffling noise. The line went dead.

Patricia hit the callback function a dozen times, and nothing. Part of her thought maybe she should just stay hung up in case they were calling her back too and they got her voicemail, but she couldn’t stop hitting redial-redial-redial, she was bawling and shaking and her naked body was freezing and Laurence put his arm around her and she slapped him and then clung to him and the sound that came from inside her was like all the wounded animals she had ever fixed in her life.