Page 4 of Overwhelmed By Magic

It hasn’t worked.

I tilt my head to the side, watching as Harlow stomps over to the nightstand and rips open the drawer. A growl tears from his throat as he slams it shut and then rips the furniture away from the wall where a small stack falls to the floor. He holds it up triumphantly before disappearing out of existence and then returning, clapping his hands as if he just took out the trash.

“Where the fuck did you take that?” My brows furrow in confusion. My little human self still can’t wrap my brain around the fact that outside of our existence, there is something else in which Harlow can slip in and out of with ease. Is it a void? Hell? He’s never truly explained it. “You know what? It doesn’t matter. I don’t have much time before your graduation starts. Why aren’t you dressed yet?”

Harlow shrugs and plops onto my bed. The mattress doesn’t move beneath his nonexistent weight and yet, I somehow still see it sink beneath him. My eyes have to be playing tricks on me even though there are times when Harlow is more than essence floating around.

“There’s no need to go. Magila are kind of high-strung. It’s all just pomp and circumstance.” Harlow leans back on his hands, crossing one leg over the other as he fiddles his lip rings with his tongue. Something indecipherable flashes in his expression.

“You’re a Magila.”

“Don’t remind me, Skye. Look, we don’t need to go. It’s just graduation.”

I grab another towel to start drying my hair, needing the distraction from his gaze that follows me everywhere. “Why do you keep saying that? You’re not graduating, are you?” I’ve had an inkling that Harlow wouldn’t pass. That his eccentricities would cause him to fail. The very defined rules of essence within the seven elements seem to break where Harlow is concerned. From the moment he dragged me into a hug after I saw him drown, I’ve never believed that he was a spirit.

The problem is that failing out of Astral Academy doesn’t just mean summer school or remedial lessons to understand his essence. In a world so accepting of Mother Nature’s gift, Magila teach us that there are only seven elements. Nothing more. Nothing less. Anything that doesn’t fit is broken, vile, unacceptable.

If Harlow failed, his future lies in being shipped off to Grimrose, an academy many Magila never return from.

A reform school.

A prison.

My lungs constrict as I step away from him, concerned for Harlow’s well-being. He doesn’t let me get far, drawing me into his chest. Chills wrap around me as his presence solidifies and I can feel all of him pressed against me. “Babe, if I could change the outcome of that day, I would but I would never wish this existence on anyone.”

I lean back far enough in his arms to catch his expression. He’s talking about the existence he always escapes to.

“There’s days I don’t want to exist. Days when the noise in my head gets too loud. Days when I think it’s better for me not to be here, for you to grow and love and live a life worthy of you. Not with someone who isn’t even supposed to be here. The problem is that… with this form,” He holds up his hand, waving it as it solidifies and then completely disappears before returning. “I can do that. I can step out of existence. Sometimes, I’m just not here. I can’t always control it. It’s terrifying, staring into a void that doesn’t end and not knowing which way is up. I feel like I’m swimming through a thick sludge of darkness, screaming to get back to you. So far, I’ve always returned. But I don’t know that I always will.”

That thought is horrifying; that Harlow can somehow exist between our world, the plane of existence, and death. For many years, Harlow was classified as being blessed with the spirit element but nothing he does fits into that perfect little bubble. He definitely died. I watched the priest bury his body. He’s not a zombie and definitely not a ghoul of some sort—both of which do not exist. I need to understand his essence just as much as I need to understand the strange symbols on my wrists.

Harlow places a kiss on the bridge of my nose. “Uh huh, that big brain of yours is working overtime again. Stop it.”

I scrunch up my nose as I untangle myself from him “Don’t make fun of me. I’m just trying to understand it. If I can understand it then maybe I can answer my questions and if I can do that…” I can bring you back. Never in the history of essence has anyone revived a dead being but I’m sure that there has to be knowledge somewhere.

“Come here,” Harlow chuckles. “Let’s give that big brain a rest. We’ve still got an hour before graduation.”

Now that I know where his future lies, I no longer want him anywhere near Astral Academy. “You’re not going. They’ll send you right to Grimrose.” There’s no escaping that place and it might be selfish, but I’m not losing Harlow. For some reason, though, I still feel compelled to attend, to show up and pretend that my boyfriend is walking across that stage to accept his invitation to mingle with the human world.

“Skye Bardot, listen to me for one fucking second!” I freeze as Harlow steals all of my attention. “I have no idea what reason you feel compelled to attend that graduation when you know it’s fucking illegal for humans that aren’t staff to do so.” He steps closer, cradling my head in his hands, his lips hovering over mine. “However, I know that you get these little inklings to do the craziest things and they always turn out right. I’m going with you, though. The professors and other staff might throw you out but the students won’t be as kind with you in what they think is their sacred space.”

I want to throw back at him that those students were his classmates but I don’t feel like fighting anymore so I close the distance between us, tasting the chill that always accompanies his touch. His rings press against my skin, my favorite piercing swiping across my lips before it pushes inside of my mouth. For several moments, I cling to him, wishing that our future involved a happy ending. “Just stay out of sight,” I whisper when we part. “No one sees you.”

Harlow doesn’t answer me.

I finish buttoning my shirt and head for the door. Something twists in my gut, my vision tunneling for a second. I fear that it’s my nightmares coming to ruin me again, that spirit after my soul seeking me out. I stumble forward, swallowing down a whine as I brace for the inevitable.

Instead of the darkness, however, there’s a light pink film hovering over the doorknob, dancing along my fingers. I pull my hand back, the aura following, wrapping around my hand, and then disappearing into the symbols along my wrist.

I can’t be a Magila.

I refuse to be.

“Babe, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I weather my expression and throw him a sloppy smile so as not to draw attention to what just happened. It’s probably just a fluke. “I have. You.” The joke doesn’t land as nicely as I wanted it to, my heart nearly beating out of my chest as I head for the cafeteria. None of my reading has explained something like this. No one has ever presented this late. Worse, no one has presented with that kind of aura.

Not based on the seven elements.

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