The magic I worked on her wasn’t like the spell Jamison had performed this summer, to fade when the magic did, but a true cure. Julie’s physiology was now the way it was supposed to be.
I withdrew as Julie sat up and gasped.
I flowed away, to the outskirts of Magellan again, found Fremont and Flora staring at each other in front of Fremont’s house, and encouraged him to kiss her.
I found Drake where Mick had stashed him on the other side of the railroad bed, and fed his dragon self back into him. I left him, gasping and astonished, and wended my way north to Flat Mesa.
In the medical center, a man who’d been rushed there by his wife after a massive heart attack would live, his heart strong and sound again. A woman with pneumonia suddenly got better, those germs dead.
I could do anything, I realized, cure anyone. I could fly around the world with Mick and never have to worry about my goddess mother and the vortexes again. In fact …
I zoomed my awareness out to the vortex, lifted another two feet of desert floor over the wash, and slammed it down. Did I hear a faint cry of anguish from the goddess below? Maybe I should open up the cracks, go down there, and finish her off entirely.
“Janet, stop.”
The voice was Elena’s. She was standing in the gaping hole between saloon and lobby, my grandmother and Ansel behind her.
I could cure Ansel as well, I realized. Take away the magic that had made him a Nightwalker, and let him rest in peace. He’d be dead and dust—he’d died all the way back in 1942—but he’d be free of his curse. Ansel seemed to sense my intent, and he backed away, his eyes wide with fear.
Elena, now. She had vast magics that reached back centuries. She could flatten this place and both towns, and she knew it. I reached out my hand to take all she had.
“Don’t even think about it,” my grandmother said in her stern tones, pointing her walking stick at me.
“You know, you never let me have any fun,” I told her.
I swept my hand in her direction, jerked the cane from her fingers, and cured her arthritis. Grandmother jumped as her pain flowed away, and her joints and limbs became supple again.
I pushed my magic past her and out again, finding Gabrielle, who was heading back toward the hotel with Colby in the minivan. I flattened my hand, refilled Gabrielle with her Beneath power, and saw her clutch her chest and cry out. The minivan swerved to the side of the highway and stopped, Colby reaching from the driver’s seat to take Gabrielle into his arms.
Now back to Elena. With her magic, and mine, and what I’d taken from Emmett, I could eliminate poverty from the native peoples, give them back their land and their world. I could punish everyone who’d ever harmed them, from the ancestors of the people who’d hurt my ancestors, down to their descendants.
“No,” my grandmother said. She rubbed her left arm, as though the newfound agility ached. “The world is more complicated than that. An eye for an eye sounds simple, but it causes ripples of pain that never go away.”
How she knew what I had in mind, I don’t know, but Grandmother always did.
But I could take her power, and Elena’s, and Cassandra’s, and Mick’s, and no one could stop me.
Another voice came to me, the low velvet rumble of Coyote. He sat in the parking lot, under the moonlight, his coyote face brushed with silver. You can’t play god, Janet. That job’s already been taken.
I could steal Coyote’s power too. Then I’d truly be unstoppable.
Don’t mess with things you don’t understand, Coyote said, a snarl in his voice. What’s inside me would kill you instantly.
What was inside me could probably mitigate the difficulty, but Coyote was wise. I needed to figure out how to handle his power before I took it. Only a matter of time, though.
A sheriff’s SUV pulled in beside Coyote. I started, wondering how I hadn’t seen it coming down the road, but what emerged from it was a patch of nothing in all the amazing light and heat of the world.
How Nash could live like that I didn’t understand. It must be lonely and cold, which was why he needed the fireworks of Maya.
Maya was with him, bright and exuberant as she climbed out of the passenger seat, not letting Nash out of her sight. I imagined the argument about her coming with him had been strong. Colby and Gabrielle probably had found them boinking.
Colby himself came charging up in the van, Gabrielle slumped against him. He headed quickly to the back of the hotel, out of sight. I knew he’d take care of Gabrielle, and I shifted my focus to Nash.
Nash was coming for me, climbing over the debris and ruined walls. I was sure he’d try to arrest me—but could Nash touch me now? I could reach out and remove the magic that had made him a null, and he could go back to being ordinary, crabby Sheriff Jones. Maya would thank me for that.