Page 30 of Soulmates

“Let him sleep, I think. Make sure he eats. Watch him closely.”

Santiago snorted a laugh. “I’ll leave that to you, buddy. Not like it’s any different from your normal vibe with him.”

Done pretending, Jake just said, “True.” He smiled, despite his fear. Maddox was his, and he would keep him safe.

Maddox didn’t move when they stopped for gas, which worried both Jake and Santiago. Their protective instincts were activated, but there was nothing to fight against.

They managed to rouse him when they stopped for lunch, pulling up to the side of a grungy but seemingly popular diner. Thankfully, Maddox blinked his eyes open when Jake nudged him. The last thing they needed was concerned citizens seeing Maddox falling over as if drugged while a giant dragged him. Maddox stared at them, eyebrows scrunched, for a while before shaking his head roughly, seemingly to try to jolt himself awake. After a few minutes, he declared himself suitable to go eat and that he had to pee.

Lunch went well other than a sneer from one of the patrons sitting at the bar top staring at their clasped hands. But the waitress was nice enough, and no one else had any comments or gave them any dirty looks.

They got back on the road with Jake driving. Maddox once again used Jake’s hoodie as a pillow, this time against the window. And once again, he fell asleep almost immediately.

“This is not okay, Jake,” Santiago said.

“What can we do? We just have to get him to this Cricket guy and hope like hell he really knows what to do.”

“Should we call Maggie? Maybe she has some idea to get us by until then?”

“Yeah, call her.”

Santiago did and put her on speaker. “Hello?”

“Hey, Maggie, this is Santiago.”

“Hey there. Are you doing alright? How are Jake and Maddox?”

“I’ve actually got Jake here on speaker with me.”

“Where’s Maddox?” Professor Hooper said, sounding panicked.

“Oh, he’s here too, sorry. He’s asleep. Very asleep. We’re in the car.”

“Don’t say where,” Professor Hooper said quickly. “What do you mean, very asleep? Can he hear me?”

“I doubt it,” Jake said. “He’s exhausted beyond what can be normal. He described it like he was weighed down. We got him up for lunch, but other than that, he’s been sleeping all day. He slept most of the ride yesterday too, but not this hard.”

“We’re hoping you might know what we should do,” Santiago said.

The silence on the line felt ominous.

“Maggie? Are you there?” Santiago said.

“Yes, sorry, Santiago. Give me a moment to think.” Professor Hooper didn’t speak again for a long moment, only the sound of rustling papers coming through the phone. “I don’t know that there’s much you can do given limited supplies. The best thing to do is get him to Cricket. I’ll call him and let him know about Maddox’s current condition. Make sure he eats and rests and gets enough to drink. If you can’t wake him, call me back. But I think you have time before it comes to that.”

“Comes to him, what? Not waking?” Jake said.

“Please remember that we know little about this soul exchange,” Professor Hooper said, sounding forcefully calm. “Forrester has been researching since you left, calling old contacts, but there aren’t many we can trust, so he hasn’t been able to get much other than it’s old and rare, which we already knew. Cricket won’t tell me anything over the phone, so I don’t know more than what I knew when you left.” Concern edged into her voice. "But powerful magic leaves marks, consequences. Maddox is bearing the brunt of this one at the moment.”

“Are we okay to stop for the night as we planned?” Santiago said.

“I believe so. But call me if he’s acting strange or anything else out of the ordinary happens. At the very least, I can relay it to Cricket.”

Santiago seemed like she wanted more out of Professor Hooper, but she just sighed. “Alright, thank you, Maggie. We’ll be in touch.”

“Be careful.”

Jake looked over at Maddox. “We will.”

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