CHAPTER 11
Messiliah doesn’t answer the door at first.
I knock again. Harder.
“You brought it back wrong,” she says through the wood.
“I brought him back,” I say. “You didn’t say there’d be a difference.”
She opens the door just enough to look me over. Her eyes linger on my throat, where the ritual words burned.
“Everything that crosses twice changes,” she says. “That’s the rule.”
“Is he dangerous?”
Her mouth presses into a line. “No.”
Relief hits so fast it makes me dizzy.
“But,” she continues, “he’s a door now.”
I swallow. “To what?”
She opens the door fully. “To everything that wants to wear a life.”
At school, Jack is already a problem.
Teachers like him. Students orbit him. Someone starts a group chat with his name in it before lunch.
Power finds him easily.
It scares me how naturally he holds it.
After school, we sit on the bleachers. Empty field. Overcast sky.
“Say it,” he says.
“Say what?”
“That you’re scared of me.”
I look at him. Really look.
“You’re still you,” I say. “That’s what scares me.”
He exhales, shaky. “Good. Because I don’t know how long that lasts.”
