I shook my head in disappointment. “This was not the way.”
“I know that now. But I wanted you to be safe.”
“Did you tell anyone about the well? About Yig and that I’m trying to banish it?”
“No. Headmaster Colin knows something, of course. I don’t know how much. But Seth and Davien are entirely clueless. I made sure of that.”
“Good.”
Corri was finally starting to put two and two together. She’d known all along that I was trying to find the universe of the cosmic beings, but she’d probably never thought I was going to succeed.
“You went there, Mistress?”
“Yes. A few times. It didn’t… go well…”
“They hurt you…”
“No, I didn’t even see them.”
“But their world hurt you. The air, their presence… whatever you found there.”
I nodded. “I can’t give up, though.”
Adrian closed the distance between us. He grabbed me by the shoulders and made me look into his eyes. Corri flew away annoyed, muttering about how rude he was.
“You can’t go there, Yoli. I won’t let you. It’s too dangerous, and if you try again… who knows if you’ll ever return. Gilgamesh never returned.”
“I know you’re worried about me, but…”
“It’s not worth it.”
“It is! If I find the flower of youth, then you can give it to your daughter, and she will get to live a normal life. She will get to live for as long as she wants.”
He sighed. He released me and took a step back, turning away from me. He didn’t want me to see how much he needed me to help his daughter. I’d been locked up at the Karmic Asylum for half a year. How much had she aged during this time? A whole year? More? I was tempted to ask him, but I doubted he wanted to talk about it.
“Hey,” I whispered. “I can do it. I’ll figure out what I did wrong and try again. My Aunt Katia has done it a bunch of times and never got lost. She never went insane, either. I must have missed something, that’s all. I’ll figure it out, and then it will be safe.”
He shook his head. “It will never be safe.”
“Adrian, I have no other choice. This is my destiny. I can feel it. It’s not only about getting the plant for your daughter. It’s about finding a way to banish the Great Old Ones from our universe, so they can never hurt us again.”
He chuckled lightly. “Why you, Yoli? You don’t have to be the hero…”
“Jesus!” Okay, so I was starting to lose my patience. “It’s not about being the hero. It’s about doing the right thing. I am the only one who has everything she needs to get this right. I’m a dream jumper, I’ve mapped our network of parallel dimensions when I was a kid, and I have a cousin who’s a revenant. I know about Yig. How many dream jumpers do you think know about the Great Old Ones and are skilled enough to travel all the way to their cosmic network?” When he simply shook his head, I felt victorious. “Thought so. I have to do what I have to do, and I won’t let anyone stop me. Now,” I turned to Corri. “Let’s get me out of here.”
“I can teleport you out,” the pixie suggested.
“No. I don’t want it to be an escape. We have to do this right. I have to convince my doctor that I’m ready to be released.”
“How? You’re not exactly feeling… great.” Corri was such a sweetie. She didn’t want to tell me that I looked like hell, that I was as thin as a skeleton, pale, and my eyes were still unfocused and foggy from the meds.
“I have a batch of Akkadia Aeterna hidden in my suitcase. Go get it. I have a feeling it’s going to solve all my problems.”
Corri clicked her heels, saluted me like she always did when she was about to execute one of my requests, and disappeared in a cloud of gold pixie dust. While she was gone, Adrian sat next to me on the edge of the bed. We were only inches apart.
“I’m sorry.”
I took a deep breath and released it slowly. “I understand why you did it.”
“Your pixie is right. You are right. I should have tried to get you out sooner.”
“It doesn’t matter now. It wasn’t like I was lucid enough to ask you to get me out sooner.”
“I want to make amends.”
I smiled. “Okay. Then there’s something you can do for me. Talk to Headmaster Colin and tell him it’s time for me to return to Grim Reaper Academy.”
Corri was back some minutes later, holding a jar that was almost as big as her. Inside, there were three dried stems of Akkadia Aeterna. I asked her to take one and use her magic to make a concentrated infusion. I noticed Adrian was staring at the jar with unmasked interest. My heart ached for him. I took one of the remaining stems and gave it to him.
“For Inna.”
“No, I can’t possibly…”
“Please.”
“You don’t have much left, and your aunt risked her life to get it for you. I can’t.”
“You must,” I insisted. “I should have done this sooner.”
My tea was ready, and while I drank it, Adrian considered my gift. Eventually, he wrapped the dried flower into a sheet of paper he ripped from the notebook that sat empty and ignored on the table and put it in his pocket.
“Thank you.”
I set the cup down and covered my mouth with my hand. No matter how many times I drank the concoction, it never got better. It stank to high Heaven, and tasted like old, dirty socks. On the bright side, I was feeling better already.
“It will slow down the aging process. It can’t make her younger than she is right now, but it will freeze her body and mind at the age she’s at. From my experience, I believe it will last her for about 30 years, maybe 40.”
“That’s more than I could ask.”
Adrian left, eager to talk to Headmaster Colin as soon as possible. Corri stayed with me. Little by little, my mind cleared and my memory started coming back. I remembered what had happened in semester two, I remembered how I’d felt and what I’d seen each and every time I had jumped to the universe of the cosmic beings. I remembered the cave, the candles flickering in the dark, melting as I climbed onto the edge of the well and looked deep into the dark abyss.
I closed my eyes and focused on my breath. I’m alright. I’m here, I’m breathing. I’m alive. No, I hadn’t tried to kill myself, but the monster living under the Academy had. It had infiltrated my mind, altered my thoughts. It had called to me, and I’d followed.
“Mistress?”
I snapped my eyes open. “I’m fine.”
“You do look better. What next?”
“Next?” I grinned. “How about you use your talents on the good doctor? He might need some convincing that I’m ready to go home.”
But I wasn’t going home, was I? For the first time since I’d started attending Grim Reaper Academy, I thought that I might never return home after it was all over.