Beautiful Darkness

Sea Change

It felt like we had been walking forever, as if the bridge in front of us only got longer the closer we got. The farther we went, the less we saw. The air became brighter and heavier and wetter, until suddenly my feet came to the edge of the weathered planks -- and what appeared to be an impenetrable wall of fog.

"Is this the Great Barrier?" I squatted down, touching the place where the wood ended. My hand felt nothing. No invisible Caster stairwell. Nothing.

"Wait, what if this is like a dangerous force field or some kind of poisonous smoke?" Link pulled out his shears and gently pushed them into the mist, then yanked them back, perfectly intact. "Or maybe not. Still, pretty creepy. How do we know if we go through that we're going to be able to come back?" As usual, Link was only saying what the rest of us were thinking.

I stood at the end of the bridge, facing the nothingness. "I'm going through."

Liv looked insulted. "You can barely walk. Why you?"

Because this whole thing is my fault. Because Lena was my girlfriend. Because I might be a Wayward, whatever that is.

I looked away and found myself looking at Lucille, her claws digging into Ridley's shirt. Lucille Ball was no fan of the water. "Ouch!" Ridley put her down. "Stupid cat."

Lucille took a few deliberate steps across the wood, turning to look at me. She cocked her head.

With a flick of her tail, she took off and was gone.

"Because." Turns out, I couldn't explain. Liv shook her head, and without waiting for anyone else, I followed Lucille into the clouds.

I was in the Great Barrier, between universes, and for one second I didn't feel like a Caster or a Mortal. All I felt was magic.

I could feel it and hear it and smell it, the air thick with sound and salt and water. The shore at the end of the bridge was pulling at me, and I was overwhelmed with an unbearable sense of longing. I wanted to be there with Lena. More than that, I just wanted to be there. I didn't seem to have a reason or logic for it, apart from the intensity of the longing itself.

I wanted to be there more than anything else.

I didn't want to choose one world. I wanted to be part of both. I didn't want to see only one side of the sky. I wanted to see it all.

I hesitated. Then I took a single step and walked out of the fog and into the unknown.