“What happened?” Judy asked.
I took a deep breath. “The oracle spoke to me. It said there was danger and that the guardians were falling…no, that they remain…I can’t remember. I texted Malcolm.”
“That’s not what scared you, though,” Viv said. “You looked like you’d seen a ghost.”
A semi-hysterical giggle escaped my lips. “I guess I did,” I said. I giggled again, and then I was laughing like a madwoman, completely incapable of controlling myself. Tears ran down my cheeks, and in my hysteria I couldn’t tell if they were tears of laughter or fear or sadness. I hugged myself and mentally screamed at myself to pull it together as Viv and Judy exclaimed over me.
Distantly I was aware of a calm, collected central Me, and I reached out to her and felt I’d found something more real than my fears. I held onto that central self until calmness radiated out from it, stilling my laughter and shaking and tears. I wiped my eyes and said, “Sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” Viv said. “Hel, you’re scaring us. What happened?”
I took another calming breath. “I think I had a flashback or something. I mistook one of the players for Mr. Santiago, and I freaked out.”
“I didn’t even think about that possibility,” Judy said. “I’m sorry we came here.”
“No, it’s okay.” The shakes were almost completely gone. “I think I was on edge because of the oracle’s warning, and the guy was the same size as…anyway, I’m not going to avoid everything that might remind me of past traumas, because I’d never go anywhere.”
“I don’t know much about PTSD, but I know you have to be careful about the things that trigger those memories,” Viv said. “I think putting a gun in your hand was a mistake.”
“It sure scared the guy I shot,” I said with a chuckle that didn’t sound at all manic. “Maybe you’re right. It’s not like I’m losing much if I never play laser tag again, right?”
“I don’t want to downplay your emotional reaction,” Judy said, “because it worries me, but shouldn’t we also worry about something happening to the named Neutralities? What if Abernathy’s is under attack?”
“I don’t know what to do,” I said, gratefully seizing on this as a way to stop thinking about Santiago. “If it is the store, we shouldn’t go there, and it’s not like we can reach the other two Neutralities.”
“Back to your house,” Viv said. “Malcolm will have learned what’s going on.”
As Judy navigated the freeway at higher speeds than I was comfortable with, my phone rang. “Malcolm,” I said, my heart in my throat. “What happened?”
“Invaders attacked the Sanctuary,” Malcolm said. “They made an assault by air.”
My mental image of invaders in tiny parachutes resurfaced. “Is Samudra okay?”
“The Sanctuary’s protections are more robust than even I knew. Not one invader reached the premises. I’m told they were vaporized mid-air.”
Now my mental image expanded to include falling invaders burning up like meteors in the atmosphere. “That’s such a relief.”
“How did you know it had happened?”
“The oracle spoke to me.” Now that I was well away from the scene of my nightmare, I could reflect on that impossibility. “It’s never done that to me before. Not when I wasn’t in Abernathy’s.”
“Except when it was touching your dreams—but that’s not quite the same.”
“No.” I shifted into a more comfortable position and glanced at the speedometer, then wished I hadn’t. “I don’t know what it means.”
“Are you coming home?”
My phone buzzed with an incoming text. I glanced at the display in time to see Samudra’s name. “Yes. Samudra just texted me. We’ll be home in a few minutes.”
“Lucia sent enforcers to the store, in case the invaders tried a simultaneous attack,” Malcolm said. “Take care. Just because they’ve never attacked a custodian outside their Neutrality doesn’t mean it won’t ever happen.”
“I will. I’m pretty sure Judy could outrun them.” Judy snorted amusement. “I…I’ll be home soon.” I felt awkward about repeating my experience for him in front of Judy and Viv, even though they’d seen my emotional outburst and wouldn’t judge me if I had another.
“I love you,” Malcolm said. “Stay safe.”
I ended the call and checked my texts. “Malcolm said invaders attacked the Sanctuary and were driven off before they even touched the ground,” I said, “and…Samudra says everything is fine and wants to set up another video call with me and Claude.”
“That’s good,” Viv said, too casually.
I glanced back at her. “Okay, what are you not saying?”
Viv met Judy’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “We know you’ve been through a lot, Hel,” Viv said, “but you’ve been acting strange ever since Montana, and we wish you’d say what’s bothering you.”
“Which is a polite way of saying ‘talk, or else,’” Judy said. “Which is what I’ve wanted to say for the last four months, only Viv convinced me it was better to let you decide to come clean on your own. But it’s clear we’ve gone past that point.”
I turned my head to look out the window at the freeway speeding past. Lucia had said—but Lucia’s primary concern was the welfare of all magery, and she was paranoid when it came to her responsibilities. I’d obeyed her wishes, but now I wished I hadn’t, because my primary concern was my Neutrality, and I knew better than Lucia what mattered most to myself and Abernathy’s.
“Lucia made me promise I wouldn’t tell,” I said, not looking away from the window, “and I thought she was right, which is why I didn’t say anything. But now I think maybe that was the wrong decision.” I took a deep breath. “Four months ago, the oracle told me it had seen its end, and mine too.”
Viv sucked in a startled breath. Judy said sharply, “You mean death? Or some other kind of ending?”
“See, that’s why I should have told you. I assumed it meant death, but Claude, and now you, pointed out that that’s not the only interpretation. It’s been telling me it and I are going to end for the last four months, and it’s wearing on me. Between that, and the attacks on the store, and everything else that’s happened to me since I became custodian—”
“I’m amazed you’re even sane,” Viv said. “Helena, you know you don’t have to worry about us spreading the news. That’s why Lucia told you to keep quiet about it, right?”
“Yeah. And I’m sorry. I guess, in part, I also didn’t want people treating me like I’m fragile. Except it turns out I am, so I’m not sure what the point of that was.”
“You’re not fragile,” Judy said. She took the next exit and turned right, heading toward my neighborhood. “You’ve faced tremendous challenges and survived. So you’ve got a little emotional scar tissue. Nobody would blame you for backing down, but you never have. I was more worried about you when you were pretending you didn’t have a problem.”