“Where are we going?” Though Beau’s shout tore through my senses, I ignored him, pressing harder. Faster. Blood roared in my ears as we followed the fissure, tracking its path through West End, past the Tremblays’ townhouse, and skidding to a halt outside Brindelle Park. Buildings crumbled now. Witches and melusines alike scattered.

Claud stood in the middle of the street, completely and carefully still. He faced the spindly Brindelle trees.

He faced Coco and Lou.

The fissure ran directly between them, cracking wide, forcing them to leap apart. “LOU!” Her name shredded my throat, but I shouted it louder. I shouted it crazed. When her face jerked up—her eyes meeting mine—a cold fist of fear gripped my heart. Though I cast for a golden pattern, none could’ve prevented this. None could’ve stopped it. She tried anyway, flinging both hands toward the ground. Her entire body strained. Trembled. The sharp scent of magic exploded over the grass, the rocks, the trees—stronger than ever before—but this fissure was stronger, deeper, older, than even La Dame des Sorcières.

Together, helpless, we watched as the earth broke open completely.

As Claud plummeted into its depths without a word.

As the fissure kept growing, kept spreading, until Brindelle Park—until half of the entire city—fractured from the rest, separated by a yawning chasm. Still it grew. Coco’s voice rose to join mine, and she backpedaled, preparing to take an impossible leap—

Beau caught her shirt at the last second. He ripped her toward him. “Are you crazy?”

“Let me go!” She pounded his chest, stomped on his feet, twisted to elbow him viciously. Only then did he release her with a gasp.

“Please, Coco, don’t—!”

But she didn’t leap this time. Instead she dove to the chasm’s edge, hands latching onto a blood witch’s wrist. Another. Screaming, they dangled hopelessly. Their nails clawed at rock, at Coco’s skin. Realizing her intent, Beau dashed to help, and together, they pulled the witches to safety, collapsing together in a heap.

When the dust settled, Beau, Coco, and I stood on one side of the chasm.

Lou and Célie clutched each on the other.

Behind them loomed Morgane le Blanc.

As We Started

Lou

The horror on Reid’s face, the absolute terror, was an image I’d never forget. Though he charged up and down the chasm’s edge, searching for the narrowest lip, for a pattern, for a miracle—it was better this way. Truly. Whatever happened now, it would be between my mother and me.

Just as we’d started.