"Maybe kinda cute. But only maybe." I put the stone back under my shirt. "Totally just you. I didn't think I'd see anything. The stone wasn't hot."

"It gets hot?"

"Yep, sometimes." I chewed my lip and thought about it. "That's actually why I looked through it at you the first time. It got warm."

"Was it warm when you looked through it at Aurox?" he asked.

"No, but I knew I had to look through it. It was like I was compelled to," I said. "And it'd been warm before when Aurox was around."

"Fucking old magick. It's a pain in the ass," he said. "You'd think there'd at least be a playbook that had the rules for it listed somewhere, but no."

"I should call Sgiach. I mean, she gave me the stone. She deals with old magick. Maybe she'd be able to give me some guidelines."

He gave a little snort. "Didn't you ask her for that on Skye?"

"Yeah," I said.

"If I remember right, she didn't give you any real answers."

"You remember right. She did say that she thought the only old magick left on this earth was on Skye."

"She was wrong," Stark said.

"Yeah, definitely."

"You know what I think?"

Stark moved close to me again and put his arm around me. I rested my head against his shoulder and slid my arm around his waist and said, "That I'm Crazy Town?"

He grinned and kissed my forehead. "You're not Crazy Town. You're Crazy Metropolis. Hell, Z, you're Crazy Universe. But I like me some crazy."

"Now you sound like Stevie Rae." We smiled at each other, relaxing back into the foundation of our relationship-our commitment to each other-our belief in each other. "So, what were you going to say? What do you think?"

"I think that I'm done with deciding what I'm going to do because of what other people say. Especially adult other people who hand us mysteries, or drop us off in the middle of a shitstorm without giving us any real help," he said.

"Yeah, I get that. I've been feeling like that since Neferet lost her mind and I was the only one who knew it."

"Okay, so, let's figure this old magick stuff out ourselves. Z, you have an affinity for all five elements. No one can even remember the last time that happened. You're a different kind of fledgling-a different kind of High Priestess. You're a young warrior queen, and I'm your Guardian. Together there's nothing we can't take on." His cocky smile was back. "We took on the Otherworld and won."

"Yeah, except for the part about you dying and all," I reminded him.

"Just a small detail. It turned out okay."

I squeezed him, pressing myself against his strong side. "It turned out better than okay." He kissed me and I drew strength from his taste and his touch and his love. Maybe Stark was right. Maybe there wasn't anything we couldn't take on together. I sighed happily and snuggled against him.

"Let's go to the stables." Stark jerked his chin forward at the long building not far from us.

"I guess we should. I'll bet Erin's there. Even from here I can see it looks soggy."

"Actually, I haven't seen Erin in a while." Stark shrugged. "Maybe that's because the stables are really better off than you'd think. Most of the damage was from smoke. All that really burned was a bunch of hay and bedding and one stall."

"Persephone's fine, right?" Twining my fingers through his, we started walking slowly toward the stables, letting our arms and hips brush against each other.

"She's good. All of the horses are good. Well, except Bonnie. She's acting pretty nervous. Lenobia put her in a turn-out with Mujaji to settle her down. Apparently the two of them get along. Which reminds me, a bunch of fledglings said they saw Lenobia kissing Travis before the EMTs took him away," Stark said.

My eyes got giant. "Seriously? I can't wait till Aphrodite and Stevie Rae hear that!"

Stark chuckled. "Stevie Rae already has-via Kramisha, who is telling everybody." He bumped my shoulder with his. "All that time you spent at the tree made you miss out on some good gossip."

I looked up at him, confused. "All that time? I was only there for, like, a minute."

Stark stopped. "What time do you think it is right now?"

I shrugged. "I dunno. I'd have to look at my phone, but we got to Thanatos's room at seven-thirty. We were probably there half an hour or less, so it couldn't be any later than eight-thirty-ish."