Free Magic at the Gate by Devon Monk Page A

because with my current dexterity, I’d probably behead us both, then looped my arm around his waist to support his weight as he took a step forward.
    The contact hit me like lightning.
    Vertigo rushed over me. I fell. Into Zay. Or maybe Zay fell into me.
    Allie, he breathed.
    I inhaled, gorging myself on the luscious textures of him, filling my mind, my body, and my soul. He stretched through me and waves of pleasure followed. He was worried, joyful, sad.
    This is forbidden, he whispered.
    I don’t care.
    I wanted this, needed this, needed him to know I loved him. If I could just hold him closer, run to him faster, breathe in his breath, we could have everything, life, death, and all magic, at our fingertips. I knew it was true, reveled in the knowledge. Joined as one, we could make everything right in the world.
    Zayvion , I called, my voice, my thoughts echoing through me, through him, through us.
    Pain filled me, a hammer shattering the middle of my brain.
    Inside my mind, my father’s voice rang out like thunder. Let go, or he will die.
    I couldn’t let go. I wouldn’t let go.
    And I didn’t.
    Zayvion did. He pulled away, pulled back. Pushed me when I grasped at him, slipped between my fingers as I tried to hold him.
    No, I whispered. Don’t leave me.
    What have you done? he growled, primal, angry, painful in my mind. Do not touch me.
    He yanked, out of me, out of us. Yes, it hurt. Holy loves, it hurt.
    I gasped, sucked air, sobbed out a moan. Opened my eyes, just my eyes.
    I was on the ground. Stone stood above me. Stone was covered in black fire. And there was an angry intelligence shining out from those eyes that was not his.
    I lifted my hand, amazed I could do that much, and touched Stone’s snout.
    “Zay?”
    Stone growled and jerked his head away from me. He stepped back.
    Which meant I couldn’t breathe. Except I could. Enough to fill my lungs and roll onto one hip. I felt like every rib was bruised. Why could I breathe?
    A moth-wing flutter snapped at the back of my eyes.
    My dead dad was in my head—and having him there allowed me to breathe. I was now neither fully alive nor dead. And I had almost done the one thing I’d sworn I wouldn’t do—become so much a part of Zay, I lost myself. Holy shit.
    Mikhail did not seem to care about any of this.
    He sang. I thought I’d heard glimpses of that song, in my dreams, in my fevers. It tugged at me. Made me sad and hopeful. But as soon as each note faded away, it was lost to me. The song brushed over me like a slow wind and left no echo behind.
    He cast a glyph, and even though magic was visible, I could not follow the pattern he wove.
    The rose in his hand, my rose, my magic, pulsed, sending tiny chains of ribbons into the spell he wove.
    I ached inside.
    The gate opened, a burning, beautiful filigree that pushed apart the reality of the room, creating a window. There was grass beyond it, trees, life.
    Seeing life again, grass again, cleared my head.
    I didn’t know how close to Maeve’s inn the gate was, but I did not care. I’d get Zayvion and Stone there somehow. I pushed up onto my feet.
    Stone looked back at me, his ears pricked up. Not my happy lug. There was more Zen in that look. More intelligence.
    It was really, really weird to see Zayvion looking out from that stone exterior.
    “Go now,” Mikhail said. “Stand strong.”
    New Dad raised his hand. “Good-bye, Angel.”
    The gate had almost burned open to its widest points, creating a hole big enough that I could get through it if I ducked and stepped up a little.
    I walked as close to it as I could without stepping through, Stone-Zay at my side. I glanced once over my shoulder.
    Saw Mikhail open another door, just a regular door, across the room. Caught the glimpse of a woman lying prone upon a bed draped in gossamer and white lace. He crossed to her, knelt beside the bed, and placed the rose, my magic, upon her chest. A bloom of ribbons poured out from the rose and sent threads, like