“Is it real?” I asked. “Is it done?” The sky was so blue. I might never see it again, but I had it here—in my memory.

She smiled, her lips too red and an overabundance of blush on her cheeks. “Let Al in. Only Al. This needs to be remembered. They all need to remember this.”

I had no idea what she meant, but I thought of Al.

A quiver went through me and the world seemed to hiccup. In a cascading wash, he spilled into my mind as if he had been there waiting, and when I opened the door, he fell in. He stood beside me in his Mesopotamia robes, his mouth open and his pupils so small his eyes were like pools of blood. Shock poured from him as he saw what I had done—and fear, but if it was because of what I had done or because now he had to peel it out of my brain, I didn’t know.

“My God,” he whispered, taking it in. “She even has the old ley lines.”

“Al?” I warbled, scared, and it was as if he caught my soul as he grabbed my shoulder when my knees gave out. He hoisted me into his arms, trying to see my construct and search my eyes at the same time.

“Take it, Al,” Newt said softly. “Before she loses consciousness.”

Al took a frightened breath, his eyes fixing on mine. It hurt, almost, and I wanted it out of me.

“Let me in,” he said, seeing the pain in me, and I closed my eyes, unable to refuse.

I started to cry as he took my soul and lifted me out of the collective, leaving only the memory of the afternoon at the Petrified Forest. Carefully he peeled back bits and pieces of the construct, freeing little parts I hadn’t known were attached to it, the shape of a rock that I’d seen before on the beach, the color that was akin to a sunset when I was ten, the caw of a rook that sent shivers down my spine—I’d heard it before at camp. Al carefully drew the associated memories back, taking my soul from the construct to leave something that could be made real.

Slowly the pain lifted as I was made whole, and still he looked, making sure nothing was left. “I think,” Al whispered, “I think I got all of her. I’ve not done this before. Oh God, I hope I got all of her.” I felt him turn. “Newt. The word to fix it—” And then his voice cracked. “Memoranda,” he croaked out, and I felt a ping through me as the thought severed completely.

Things that must be remembered, I translated silently, waiting for the rising crest of imbalance, but nothing came.

And then, though my eyes were shut, I knew that every single demon who had been in Dalliance was with us. I hadn’t brought them in; Al had moved my memory to them. It was fixed. It was real.