I raise my mug to him and take a drink—and then stifle the shudder that passes through me. Oh, my God, that coffee is strong. Crazy strong. Like, if I drink this whole mug, I might be able to see through time. Apparently, if you wanted to drink coffee before the invention of the filter, you had to mean it.
“She shouldn’t go into the tombs alone again,” Paul suggests. “I’m happy to go with her.”
Theo’s face falls as he sees the opportunity one second too late. Maybe I ought to feel sorry for this world’s Theo, but I figure he can take care of himself. “I’d like that,” I say, and Paul smiles. It feels good to see him smile again.
Twenty minutes later, he leads me into another tomb—down another ladder, this time into a far larger passageway, one where it’s easy to stand up and walk. The lantern in Paul’s hand illuminates a long corridor that seems to stretch into infinity. As he holds it up, its light reveals the hieroglyphics and paintings on the wall. The entire Egyptian pantheon stands before me painted in ochre, cobalt, and gold: Horus with his curved beak, Isis with her arms outstretched like wings, Anubis with his dark jackal head waiting to take the dead to the underworld.
“This is amazing,” I whisper. My fingers reach toward the symbols, but I know better than to touch them.
“Almost intact.” Paul sounds proud. “With the help of your sketches, we’ll be able to translate them. People who died three thousand years ago will speak again.”
I flip open my sketchbook, which I hadn’t yet taken the time to look through. Here, I draw as much as I paint, if not more—sometimes with colored pencils, sometimes with plain—and my work reveals much more meticulous detail than I’ve ever used in my artwork back home.
“You’re the only one who hasn’t studied Egyptology,” Paul adds. “Not formally, at least. But you’re the one who might make the greatest discoveries of all.”
That’s when it hits me: My dad wasn’t joking about me being in the “family trade.” Here, I’m an Egyptologist too. This time, I’m not just along for the ride. I work alongside Mom and Dad. I’m part of the team. That’s never happened before.
Wait, no. It’s true for Wicked—she’s as much a part of the Home Office’s plans as anyone. But she shouldn’t get to be the only one, because this feels incredible.
See, my parents have never made me feel bad for not inheriting their science-genius genes the way Josie did. They’ve always encouraged my artwork and never even suggested that my kind of creativity was less important than theirs. Still, they’re the ones who have redefined the laws of physics. I’m the one who has had exactly one gallery show in my life. It’s hard not to feel insignificant when your parents are basically Marie and Pierre Curie. What would I have to create to match the Firebird? The Sistine Chapel, maybe.
But here, my parents need my artwork. I’m part of their discoveries and their triumphs. The knowledge fills a hole in my heart I hadn’t even known was there until this second.
Maybe you’d think being a perfect traveler, a journeyer through the dimensions, would have been as fulfilling. The difference is, that’s something that was done to me. As great a gift as it is, the burden of it is real. And the danger. And the wrong I’ve done. This, though—these sketches of Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics—this is pure. Totally my own, born out of the art I love.
Compared to the terrible stuff that’s happening throughout the multiverse right now, this consolation isn’t much. But maybe I need it more. I’m grateful for even this brief wonder, this moment that could almost be called happiness.
I hug my sketchbook to my chest, and Paul laughs softly. “You seem . . . excited to get to work.”
“I am.” For as long as I’m stuck in this universe, I intend to do my best.
Paul hesitates before saying, in his thick Russian accent, “I always wished I could draw and paint as you do.”
“Really?”
He nods, his eyes not quite meeting mine. Sometimes it’s adorable how such a large, strong man can be so shy. “We find so many artifacts of a lost civilization. A broken statue. A buried jar. We see shards and scraps. Mere pieces of what was a glorious whole. When I think about this, I wish I could put it back together again. Not as it was before—that is of course impossible. But enough to see it, truly see it, as it once was. The art you create—that’s as close as we ever come.”
Not as it was before. I remember racing through the dimensions, trying desperately to put the pieces of Paul’s soul back together again. Can he ever be the same? Or will I only see him the way this Paul sees Ancient Egypt—in paintings, in memories, and in dreams?
I refuse to believe that my Paul’s soul is lost. He’s not broken. Not one of the ruins that surrounds us. He can make it.
Then Paul’s eyes widen, and he steps back, grimacing as if in pain. He slumps heavily against the wall as if the paintings weren’t even there.
“Paul!” I go to him, alarmed. “Are you—”
My hand touches his chest, and beneath his shirt I feel the unmistakable outline of his Firebird. It’s my Paul, here at last.
I want to hug him, but he holds out his hands as though for balance. He’s still disoriented. “Where are we?”
“Egypt. This is an ancient tomb, and we’re all exploring it together. As dimensions go, this one is pretty freakin’ awesome, right?” I’m trying to make him smile, because if I can, that means he didn’t have to see the dead body of Londonverse’s Marguerite. But Paul’s face is pale, and his gray eyes tormented, and I know the last thing he saw in that world. “I’m sorry.”
“You could’ve died.” Then his body tenses. His eyes widen. His voice drops to a growl as he says, “Maybe you did.”
“Paul?”
He doesn’t answer—instead he pushes me back so roughly that I nearly hit the opposite wall. Something in his gaze reminds me of the cold-blooded Mafiaverse Paul, who unloaded bullets into Theo without even flinching. “Prove who you are.”
“What?”
“You could be her,” Paul says. His hands grip my shoulders so tightly that I could never wrench myself free. “You could have killed her, and waited here to kill me too. So prove it. Prove that you’re my Marguerite or I promise you—”