Page 62 of Until the Stars Fall

He broke eye contact with me and left the room.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The electrical system switched over to support the shields, and the lights went out, leaving me alone in the eerie blue backup lights of the engine room. I took the stairs, sobbing all the way up to the bridge, my hands trembling, my anxiety spiraling. My magic caused my parents’ crash. How was that so hard for him to understand? It could cause his death in space, no problem. What if he can’t tell the difference between a fear and a divination?

I couldn’t stop seeing the tears on his face. I hated myself for hurting him. But if anything happened to him because of me… Living with the guilt of my parents’ death was devastating. Adding Beck’s death to the marks against my soul was more than I could bear to think about. He was hurting now, but he’d get over me. He’d find someone else. That thought was a knife to my heart, but it was for Beck’s highest good.

I wiped my face before walking onto the bridge, but tears slipped continuously down my cheeks. The numb shock my body felt over what I’d just done must’ve been the only reason I wasn’t wailing and sobbing. Everyone stood in front of the main windows with their backs to me, Beck on the far left. I crept up beside Zola on the opposite side.

“Holy shit.” Summer’s voice was barely above a whisper. The wormhole loomed larger and larger, cowing us all into silence.

The Bifrost was a star-speckled sphere on the space horizon, and the lights of the surrounding stars bent around it like a psychedelic hallucination. As our ship approached the mouth, the sphere grew larger and closer, like a great, black planet whose atmosphere we were about to enter. Clouds of gases emerged, whirling in its throat, and beyond lay our starry destination. Even though it was far across the galaxy, the Heimdall station that guarded the other end seemed right in front of us. After a moment, we were inside the throat, miraculously traversing a shortcut through space and time.

Everyone stared open-mouthed out the window, but I watched Beck watch the Bifrost, his eyes alight with equal parts fascination and abject fear. If I were a better woman, I’d have him in my arms right now. He’d tell me everything he knew about it, his whole body animated by his great passion. But his face was impassive, tear streaks glistening on his cheeks above his beard. Did he need my hand to hold just when I’d taken it away from him? Fresh tears streaked down my face.

He glanced at me, his dear features transformed with grief, then he looked down and rubbed his chest. “I think that’s about all I need to see of that,” he said gruffly, clearing his throat. “I’m going down to check the spells and…maybe say my prayers.” He turned and left the bridge.

“Fuck, seriously,” Eyre said.

With that exchange, the Bifrost’s spell on us all was broken, and Eyre and Summer went to their stations on the dark bridge to navigate us through.

The Bifrost was terrifying. My Beck was terrified. And sad. And alone. I did this to him. I gulped back a sob and rushed from the room.

“Gemma, wait!” Hannah called. “What’s wrong?”

I kept going, right out onto the Star Deck. But I stopped halfway across. Where was I gonna go? I belonged down in the engine room with Beck, except I didn’t. I belonged back with my sister, except I didn’t. Outside the windows the throat of the wormhole was swallowing the ship whole. I wanted it to swallow me whole.

Footsteps. I turned my back to them, trying to hide my face.

“Gemma, what’s wrong?” Zola asked.

Hannah came around to face me. “Honey, why are you crying? Are you worried about the Bifrost? Do you want us to get Beck?”

I shook my head and cried harder. She pulled me into her arms with a soft cry.

“Gemma, love. What’s wrong?” Zola hugged me from behind so I was sandwiched in between my two sisters. “What happened?”

But I was crying too hard to even tell them. Thank God I’d worked that spell with Beck, or my magic would be erupting out of me. Now, I was just empty.

“Come sit down with us. Tell us what’s wrong.” Hannah pulled me to the cozy rug area, and they sat on either side of me. “Did something happen with Beck?” she asked gently.

I shook my head, a lie already on my tongue. If I started talking about him, everything would come out. But maybe it needed to. I nodded. “I pushed him away. I—” I sucked in a sobbing breath. “I broke up with him.”

Hannah pulled back, fixing her big blue eyes on me. “No! Why? You two are perfect for each other.”

Zola pushed a tissue box into my hands, and I wiped my face. I owed Hannah the truth. So much more than the truth. Zola too.

“Because I’m a monster. I’ve been lying to you. For years.”

Hannah frowned, moving my hair out of my face. “What are you talking about?”

“Do you want me to go?” Zola asked. “Am I intruding?”

“No, you need to hear this too.” I grabbed Hannah’s arm and laid my hands on the long scar from her bike accident. “Actually, let me show you.”

I focused on the scar on her skin, the scarring beneath it, and healed the bump in her bone where the simple fracture had been. Hannah gasped. Her magic rose up to meet mine, just as curious as ten-year-old Hannah was the night she showed up in my room and caught me doing magic, holding her teddy bear by one of its feet and asking, “Whatcha doin’ Gemma?” with her big blue eyes wide.

There beside me on the Star Deck, Hannah’s magic stepped in like a good little soldier. I gave it tasks—mend these cells, bind these proteins—and it dutifully accomplished them, reporting back for another assignment. A wholly different feeling from healing Beck. After only a few minutes, my Hannah’s arm was whole, and I took my hands away.

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