CHAPTER NINE
My head is spinning like a clock out of gear, whirring as it tries to cobble together a plan. “Save the world”. What a grand declaration to make with no substance.
After checking in with the ghosts (all intact, if not very grumpy), I fall to the same comforting rituals that I’ve adapted from my prior life: a long bath in the warm springs, followed by errands that keep my hands busy and head clear.
I’m organizing my trunks, folding my piles of clothes, and mentally parsing through all my knowledge on time-healing when the tell-tale sound of crunching gravel catches my attention.
Ghosts don’t step on gravel, and Valentin’s fast asleep. Which means there’s only one culprit.
“You know I can hear you pacing out there,” I say warily.
“I didn’t want to interrupt,” Everest says, slipping through the entrance, bringing with him a clean, earthy scent that curls around my legs like Cillian.
It’s rare that he ever asks for permission; normally my tent is a free-for-all.
His hands close over my clothes and I watch as he sorts them into their assigned shelves.
I’ve missed him, I realize, a familiar sense of calm overcoming me.
I missed him when I woke up and he wasn’t there, and I missed him when I showed Valentin around, picturing him lounging in all my favorite locations.
It’s a dangerous thing, to miss Everest, when I’ve never been sure if he’s capable of missing me back.
“Thank you,” I say. It’s strangely quiet for the night. The wind may be to blame, but the distant chatter of the ghosts feels far removed from the peace in my tent.
“It’s the least I can do after fucking up our last trip.” He descends to the floor, stretching his legs out in front of him.
I join him on the ground, my knees brushing against his calves.
We’re both wearing thick pants, but the slightest bit of friction between our clothing feels like I’ve brushed bare skin.
I shift to put a hint of space between us.
“Oh, you haven’t made up for that yet. You can repay me by taking over Beam-babysitting duties at the eclipse. ”
Everest rolls towards me, pressing his knees against my thighs, completely immune to the less-than-ideal effect that all this contact has on me.
He’s solid and warm, two things I have little access to anymore.
Of course it messes with my head. “I regret ever saying that she’s allowed to drink wine on that day.
She tries to make up for an entire year’s worth of abstinence in one evening. ”
“You reap what you sow.”
“I guess I’ll deserve it if she vomits on me after deciding to hang upside down from trees again,” he says, wrinkling his nose.
Silence falls, crackling with all we’ve left unaddressed.
I’m all too aware of the proximity between us and how it tugs at my core, the regret I’ve wrestled with since yesterday, and the sadness left in its wake.
Everest’s face turns contemplative, his gaze distant.
He says softly, “We haven’t fought like that in a while. ”
In decades, probably. I don’t know if it’s because we’ve gotten more used to each other, or because we avoid hot topics like the plague.
“Thought we’d broken the pattern,” I say, wanting to inject some humor into the exchange. “When was the last time, again? Oh, right, you said you’d take that quester home since I was sick.”
Everest kisses his teeth. “Yup, and instead, I left with Calliope to have her scales polished. Really thought I’d be back sooner.”
I laugh now, even though nothing was funny when I had to take that boy home through the carousel while fighting a raging fever from too many consecutive trips. Back then, my body still felt human, and I was highly sensitive to the consequences of time travel.
“And before that, I left without giving you a new supply of string,” Everest remembers. “And here I was, thinking I’d gotten better.”
His face is downcast as he plays with the cuffs of his trousers.
Despite his flaws, Everest has sincerity in spades, and in the stretches between our quarrels, I wonder if I could see something more with us.
If I want something more for myself. In moments like this, when it’s just us two and he’s so close, when I notice how his eyes betray every hint of emotion he’s feeling and how his body is a counterweight to hold me afloat…
the answer to that question tilts more in the direction I never thought I’d go.
Regardless, he’s one of my closest friends.
“You have,” I promise. It’s true. He’s worked hard at understanding me, and vice versa. We’ve both come a long way since I arrived at the fair. “And nothing’s been as bad as the first one.”
The ghosts still whisper about our first legendary showdown.
Everest clears his throat. “Definitely not. But as much as I love reliving our past battles, that’s not why I’m here.”
I do my best to look appalled, fighting my disappointment at his clear desire to not talk about that day. “So you didn’t come here to grovel?”
“Would you like me to get on my knees?” he asks.
I laugh him off, but he reaches out and takes my hand in his.
Something sparks at the contact and bubbles through my whole body.
“I’m sorry for acting foolish, Ryka. I should have told you what I could do, and I shouldn’t have steamrolled you at your own job. I got carried away.”
Warmth settles in my chest, thawing all the anxiety and fear caged inside. “I’m sorry too,” I say. “You didn’t deserve the things I said. You’re the one that got us out of a sticky situation, while I just…froze.”
And there it is: the embarrassment that’s been at the heart of my foul temper. My inability to adapt and succeed at the very thing I’m meant to be an expert on. Everest was right. I don’t do well with unpredictability.
“You would have figured it out had I given you the chance,” Everest says with fortifying confidence. “Don’t let one bad trip make you forget you’ve always come out on top. Have you ever needed me to rescue you before?”
“God, no.”
Everest shrugs. “Maybe I just wanted to feel useful to you for a change.”
I blink at him. Of all the things I expected, that wasn’t it. The heat of his palms is scathing around my fingers, but then he pulls away.
“I came here to talk to you about the carousel, too, and what we should do next.”
“Oh?”
He leans back against my bed. “After the trip, I’ve been trying to feel out the threads some more, see if I can parse out what’s going on with them. And I think I can feel the knot, the core of the issue.”
I sit up straight. He’s been speaking about his powers a lot more candidly since the extensive rot began, and it’s opened up conversations I’d long given up on.
I’ve always wondered if the carousel was an extension of his being.
The logistics of how it works, between Everest and his siblings, the river, and the threads of time that spin around in the heart of the fair, is a patchwork I’ve cobbled together.
Everest puts his hand, palm up, in front of me.
His eyes press shut in deep focus, and the pressure of holding his intense gaze fades.
I study the creases that stretch from the corners of his eyes, settling between freckles that run from the bridge of his nose to his carved cheekbones.
My stolen assessment lasts only a second, because a silver light fills my tent, and I gasp as an orb manifests right above his hand.
It looks like a ball of yarn, except the threads are multi-colored, ranging from silvers to blues to blush pinks.
The structure itself is dynamic, swirling a few inches above his palm.
A supernatural disco ball. The glow casts a kaleidoscope of colors on the wry smile he reveals.
“Haven’t done that in a while,” he says. “But since you expressed such passionate interest in seeing the full breadth of my powers, I thought I’d prepare a demonstration.”
I nudge him impatiently. “Are you planning on preening like a peacock or actually elaborating on said demonstration?”
He smirks, then uses his free hand to unravel the tightly coiled threads.
“I’ve been trying to isolate the issue, but it’s been difficult.
You see, whenever I trace the end of one thread, I come upon another.
This here is our timeline,” he says, drawing out a string so pale that it looks white-gold in its color, but the light it radiates illuminates the space between us in silver.
He then pulls at another string that ties to the end of our timeline, this one with a rose tint.
“This here is the court. Now, usually, I’m able to run my finger along the connection, glean a sense of where the lines have crossed over where they shouldn’t. Kind of like a mini-carousel model.”
“I cannot believe you’ve never shown me this before,” I accuse.
“This would completely transform my research on proximity between timelines. I mean, with a dynamic model like this, we could test my hypotheses, collect measurements with more ease, study connections from a lens that’s impossible with the actual carousel, and–”
I pause, expecting Everest to be gearing up with his defense of his indefensible actions, but he’s staring at me with a soft smile.
“Better late than never?” he asks, hope lighting up his face.
“Definitely.” I reach over and squeeze his arm. “But we can discuss you helping with my research later. Back to your findings?”
“Right,” Everest says, turning his attention back to the orb. “So, sensing the other timelines works well and good. But when I try that here…”
I’m holding my breath as he runs his thumb along the small node. An explosion of string unfurls, burning a red that I’ve only ever seen in the embers of a fire.
“What is that?” I ask, getting on my knees and leaning forward until my nose is inches from his hand. Despite my best efforts, I can’t see anything except a gnarly tangle that would take an eternity to smooth out. Unfortunately, we don’t have an eternity.