The Atlas Six (The Atlas, #1)(23)

“Can’t you do that by, I don’t know,” Ezra posed with tacit disapproval, “doing something different?”

He made that sound so simple.

“Look,” Libby said, “chances are, only one of us is going to make the cut when the… fellowship,” she remembered, narrowly avoiding giving more details away, “determines the final members for its—” A pause. “Faculty.” Another pause, and then, “We have the same specialty, which means we’ll draw the most obvious comparison. So either he’ll be picked and I won’t, in which case I’ll be back in a year or less, or I’ll be picked and he won’t, in which case—”

“In which case you win,” Ezra exhaled with a hand around his mouth, “and we can finally stop worrying about whatever Varona is doing?”

“Yes.” That much, at least, was fairly obvious. “Not that you have to worry about Varona now.”

Ezra stiffened. “Lib, I wasn’t—”

“You were, actually,” Libby said, picking up her glass. “And I keep telling you, there’s nothing there. He’s just an asshole.”

“Believe me, I’m aware—”

“We’ll talk every night,” she assured him. “I’ll come home every weekend.” She could do that, probably. Maybe. “You’ll barely notice I’m gone.”

Ezra sighed. “Libby—”

“You just have to let me prove myself,” she told him. “You keep saying that Varona’s not better than me—”

“—because he isn’t—”

“—but it doesn’t matter what you think, Ezra, not really.” His mouth tightened, probably resentful that she was so dismissive of his admittedly very thoughtful attempts to reassure her, but on this, she couldn’t make allowances. “You hate him too much to see how good he really is, babe. I just want the opportunity to learn more, to prove myself. And proving myself by going up against the best in the world means going up against Nico de Varona, whether you believe that or not.”

“So I don’t get a say, then.” Ezra’s expression was slightly grim, but mostly unreadable.

“Of course you get a say,” Libby corrected him. “You can say, ‘Libby, I love you and I support you,’ or you can say something else.” She swallowed before adding, “But believe me, Ezra, there are only two answers here. If you don’t say one, you’re saying the other.”

She braced herself, waiting. She didn’t expect him to make any unreasonable demands, exactly, but she definitely knew he wasn’t going to be thrilled. Closeness was important to Ezra; it had been his idea to move in together, and he expected a certain amount of what a therapist might call ‘quality time.’ He certainly wasn’t going to savor the fact that Nico would be there in his absence.

To Libby’s immense relief, though, Ezra merely sighed, reaching across the table for her hand.

“You dream big, hotshot,” he said.

“That,” she murmured, “isn’t really an answer.”

“Fine. Libby, I love you and I support you.” She was briefly permitted a pause for relief; and then he added, “But be careful, okay?”

“Be careful with what,” Libby scoffed, “Varona?”

Nico was laughably harmless. Good, certainly, even great if he put his mind to it, but he was hardly capable of schemes. He could get under her skin, maybe—but even then, there was no danger of anything aside from losing her temper.

“Just be careful.” Ezra leaned across the table, brushing his lips against her forehead. “I would never forgive myself if I let something happen to you,” he murmured, and she groaned. Just the usual white knight shit, then.

“I can take care of myself, Ezra.”

“I know.” He touched her cheek, smiling faintly. “But hey, what else am I here for?”

“Your body,” she assured him. “Plus you make a mean bolognese.”

He had her out of her chair in a flash, pulling her into him as she laughed in unconvincing protest.

“I’m going to miss you, Libby Rhodes,” he said, “and that’s the truth.”

So it was final, then. She was really doing this.

Libby wrapped her arms around Ezra’s neck, clinging to him for a moment. Maybe she wasn’t a damsel in distress, but it still felt nice to anchor herself to something before casting herself into the unknown.





III: BATTLE





CALLUM



IT HAD NOT BEEN A PARTICULARLY COMPLEX MATTER deciding to join the Society at Atlas Blakely’s invitation. If he didn’t care for the experience, Callum reasoned, he would leave. It was how he generally lived his life: he came and went as he wished. People these decisions affected, if they were angry about his mutability, did not typically stay mad. Preternaturally or otherwise, Callum had a way of ensuring that people came around to see his position on the matter, one way or another. Once he’d made his point, they could always be compelled to act reasonably from there.

Callum had always been aware that word used for his specialty by the Hellenistic University of Magical Arts was not the right word. The manipulist subcategory of illusionist was more often applied to cases of physical specialties: people who could warp things, make them into something else. Water could be convinced to be wine, in the right hands, or at least made to look and taste like it. One of the particularities about the study and reality of magic was that it only mattered, in the end, how things looked or tasted; what they were meant to be, or what were at the start, could be easily dismissed in favor of achieving the necessary result.