Arturo stepped across the hall and knocked on the door to Relia’s private suite.

  “Come in!” a cheerful voice hollered from the other side. It sounded like Relia, but it couldn’t be. When was the last time she sounded that happy?

  He grabbed the door’s wooden handle and slid it open on its track. The sitting room beyond matched his own—polished wooden floors, exposed beams across the ceiling, and a low table surrounded by cushions. An overpowering scent of perfume stung his nostrils. Not a single scent, but dozens mixed together.

  Arturo stepped through another sliding door and found Relia jumping on her bed, wearing nothing but her undergarments. The mattress squealed beneath her, and her red hair flew wildly around her face.

  “Hey, um . . .” Arturo studied a nearby pillar and scratched his head. “You did say to come in, right? I didn’t hear that wrong?”

  “Yep, you’re good.” Relia stopped mid-bounce and looked down with sudden curiosity, cupping her breasts with both hands. “Huh. These things really move, don’t they?”

  “What the hell, spira?” Arturo tried to cover his eyes, but failed. “I . . . what the hell?”

  “Sorry, I should have explained! This is Glim. Relia’s letting me front for a while.”

  “Okay . . .” Arturo’s brain short-circuited before he turned away again. “You wanna stop groping yourself and put some clothes on?”

  “I have,” she said. “It’s not groping if you have permission.”

  “Just put some clothes on.”

  “Fine, fine!” Relia—or Glim—jumped off the bed and grabbed a random flannel shirt from the floor. She’d clearly been experimenting with dozens of outfits, judging by the mess of laundry around the bed. A foldable pocket dimension sat in one corner of the room, surrounded by several open suitcases.

  Arturo took a few steps back into the sitting room. “Don’t forget pants.”

  “Pants hurt!” Glim said in Relia’s voice. “I mean, I think they do. Or is that how they’re supposed to feel?”

  Arturo had absolutely no framework for answering that question.

  “There,” Glim said after a long pause. “All dressed in my human clothes.”

  Arturo kept his back turned. “Did you button up the shirt?”

  “Um . . . I can use dream mana to make it buttoned. Would that work?”

  “You kidding me right now?”

  “What’s the big deal?” she said. “Relia shows way more skin in her swimsuit.”

  Arturo ran a hand over his face. “Trust me on this.”

  “Well, buttons are hard.” Her voice took on a petulant edge. “You need to move all your fingers at the same time. And there’s of them. Eight buttons, I mean. Not eight fingers. You’ll be waiting for me all day.”

  “Then pick a different shirt.”

  “Good idea.” More fabric rustled behind him, sounding louder and more chaotic than it should have. He heard her mutter something about “arm holes” and “neck holes.”

  “Okay,” she said. “All good now.”

  He turned around and found her wearing a red pullover hoodie with “Koreldon University” printed in gold letters across the chest. She also wore a short white skirt that might have been backwards, and a pair of socks that didn’t match. One was striped with pink and white, the other solid black and higher on her calf. Strands of red hair clung to the inside of her hood, while the rest hung in a tangled mess around her face,

  “Serious question.” Glim pointed down at her feet. “Are humans supposed to cover these? I can’t remember.”

  “I thought you had an eidetic memory.”

  “I do.” Glim gave him a frank look. “But none of these rules make any sense. Relia can wear a bikini, and that’s totally fine, but—”

  “Never mind.” Arturo held up his hands in a placating gesture. “It’s fine to go barefoot in your bedroom. Just not in public.”

  “Great.” Glim sat down and yanked off her mismatched socks. “Wait a second . . . there was this one guy who jogged shirtless and barefoot in the Darklight’s old neighborhood. Master Greenleaf. Was he breaking the human rules?”

  “Guess there are exceptions for exercise.”

  Glim’s frown deepened, and she gestured back at the bed. “But I exercising! Didn’t you see me bouncing?”

  “Fine. I don’t know the rules, either. Go ask . . .” Arturo trailed off. He’d been about to say “Elend” but stopped himself at the last second.

  “Yeah.” Glim’s smile faded, and she stared down at her bare feet. “He always knew what to say.”

  “Sorry.” Arturo ran a hand over his face. “But what’s the deal here? Is Relia okay?”

  “Oh, yeah.” Glim tapped the side of her head. “Relia’s still in here. She’s just letting me drive the body for a little bit.”

  He blinked. “Didn’t realize you guys could do that.”

  “Yep, mana spirits can switch places with their human hosts. It’s like what Akari and Kalden do with their soulbond.”

  Arturo shook his head and looked away again. “This is still trippy as hell. Can’t you look more like . . . yourself?”

  “Good point. Wouldn’t want to confuse people.” Some violet dream mana flowed from her fingers, shimmering in the afternoon light. Her hair and eyes shifted to a deep shade of mana blue. “Better?”

  “Not really, no. You just swapped some colors.”

  Glim furrowed her brow and released a second mana technique. Her pronounced jaw and cheekbones took on a softer, dream-like quality. Her eyes grew slightly bigger, while her nose and mouth seemed to shrink. By the time she’d finished, Glim looked more like her usual self, but with pale skin instead of blue. “There. How’s that?”

  Before he could reply, she turned to face the full-length mirror on the other wall. “Ohh, I look good!” She pressed her face close to the glass, fogging it with her breath.

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  “Glad you think so,” Arturo muttered. “Seriously though—where’s Relia? Can she still hear?”

  “Not right now, no.” Glim started poking her own cheeks in the mirror. “She’s asleep.”

  “Asleep?” His eyebrows shot up at that. “What’s that even mean?”

  “Just like it sounds.”

  Arturo crossed his arms. “How long has she been like this?”

  “All morning,” Glim said with her gaze fixed on the mirror. “And . . . most of yesterday. And the day before that.” Her voice grew quieter with each admission. “She told me not to say anything. Didn’t want you guys to worry.”

  “Shit,” Arturo said. “And we didn’t even notice.” A full day had passed since Akari jumped ship, and the rest of them had been busy preparing for the Shadow Garden. Well, Kalden and Zukan were busy preparing. Arturo had been looking for a good excuse to bail out.

  They’d still seen Relia at meals, and she kept insisting she was fine. He should have known better.

  “I know.” Glim sank down on the bed and hugged her knees. “It’s bad, isn’t it? She didn’t have to go to sleep. But she liked it this way. Maybe a little too much . . .”

  Arturo stepped over toward the tall glass window, taking in the snow-covered courtyard below. Several of Kenzo’s students trained with their Veilcords, shifting the weapons between their whip and blade forms. “Did she say anything before she went under?”

  “No, but she kept dreaming about Elend.” Glim looked down at her hands and flexed the fingers experimentally. “She blames herself for what happened. But she told you guys she wouldn’t. Now she feels bad about that, too.”

  Arturo cleared some clothes off the desk chair and plopped himself down. “Shit . . .”

  Glim put her hands on her hips. “Is that all you have to say?”

  “What? I’m the tech guy, remember? Not so good with words.”

  “But you must have come up here for a reason.”

  “Yeah.” Arturo rubbed at his face again. “I was gonna ask if she wanted to meet my parents.”

  “Perfect!”

  Arturo put his hands over his ears. “I’m sitting two feet from you, spira. Why do you keep shouting?”

  “Sorry,” she ducked her head. “Still working on that—vocal cords, airflow, all that stuff. Do you know how many parts have to work together just to make sounds? There’s the lungs, and the throat, and the tongue, and the teeth. And it’s hard to practice when you’re alone.” Glim shook her head as if to clear it. “Anyway, I’ll wake her up now.”

  “Wait.” He held up a hand. “What do I say to her?” Arturo’s own parents were still alive and well. What did he know about grief, or trauma, or any of the stuff she was going through?

  “I dunno. Try to cheer her up? Make her laugh?” Glim wrinkled her nose. “Actually, no. I’ve been trying that all week, and it didn’t work. Just . . . be yourself, okay? I’ll go somewhere else while you talk.”

  Glim closed her eyes, then her features shifted back to Relia’s. The blue hair faded like watercolors on a wet canvas, bleeding back into red.

  Despite everything, Arturo felt his shoulders relax at the sight of her—the real her. This was the friend he’d fought beside for the past two years. From Creta to the qualifying rounds. From the tundras of Vordica to the streets of Koreldon City.

  Relia’s eyes fluttered open, and she blinked several times as if waking from a long sleep. Her gaze drifted around the room, taking in the scattered clothes. Then she spotted Arturo sitting in the desk chair across from her

  “Hey, spira.” He forced out a smile.

  “Hey.” She glanced down at her disheveled state. For a second, she looked like she might get up and put herself back into order. But then she slumped her shoulders and gave a tired smile. “Serves me right for leaving Glim in charge.”

  He almost told her to stop being so hard on herself, but the words died in his throat. Akari and Kalden had already tried the tough love approach, and it clearly hadn’t worked.

  Instead, he asked: “You doing okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine.” She tucked a strand of red hair behind her ear. “Glim said you wanted to talk about something?”

  He nodded. “My parents' airship just crossed the border into the Zekuro Province. ”

  “Oh.” Surprise flickered across her face. “I didn’t know your parents were coming here.”

  “Yeah. You wanna come down and meet them? Kalden and Zukan will be there, too.”

  “Of course.” Relia ran a hand through her tangled hair. “Do I have time to get ready first?”

  “You’re all good,” he said with a chuckle. “Zekuro’s a big province. It’ll be a few hours before they land.”

  “Perfect.” She returned his smile, looking surprisingly normal. Then again, she’d looked the same way at dinner last night. “Thanks for thinking of me. I should be ready in a few minutes.”

  That seemed like Arturo’s cue to leave, but he forced himself to press on. “Glim said she was . . .” He trailed off, trying to remember the exact word she’d used.

  “Fronting,” Relia said. “That’s what it’s called when a mana spirit controls a human body.”

  “Right, that.”

  “Elend never let her front,” she continued. “I mean, he , when they were kids. But then he freaked out and put some extreme boundaries in place. She’s been waiting more than fifty years to feel the physical world again.”

  Arturo had figured as much, considering the whole mirror rule. A rule that seemed to vanish with Elend’s death.

  “So it was a win-win.” Relia picked at a loose thread on her sleeve. “Glim got to exist in the physical world, and I got a break.”

  “A break?” Arturo asked.

  Relia shrugged. Her smile never faded, but it looked stiffer than before.

  “You don’t have to pretend for me, spira.” Arturo leaned forward in his chair, elbows on his knees. “You were closer to the Darklights than anyone. Plus all that crazy stuff with your dad. It’s okay if you’re having a hard time.”

  Relia seemed to find a sudden interest in the laundry scattered around the room. She got to her feet and started retrieving several pieces without comment.

  Arturo waited in silence, letting her gather her thoughts. Outside, the Veilcords cracked and whistled through the air.

  Relia folded a shirt, then another. Her hands moved on autopilot while her mind was somewhere else

  Arturo crossed the room in two slow strides, his footsteps deliberately heavy so he wouldn’t startle her. He reached out and let his fingers graze the back of her hand. Her skin was exceptionally smooth, but that made sense for a life artist.

  Relia stood rigid for a moment, then she dropped the shirt and met his eyes again. She looked like she wanted to cry, but seemed to think better of it. “I don’t know what to do. I mean—it’s only been a week, but Akari and Kalden just want to keep going. Full speed ahead.”

  “Those two are crazy,” he said without missing a beat. “So are Zukan and Glim. Not gonna lie, spira— you and me are the most normal ones on this team.”

  Relia cocked her head to the side. “Did you just call me normal?”

  “Well, I meant it as a compliment.”

  She laughed—not a big laugh, but something small and real that seemed to surprise her. “I know, it’s just—no one’s ever called me that before.” Her smile faded. “It’s usually . . . well, you know how it goes.”

  They’d all promised not to bring up the Motago Bridge again, but her eyes said it all.

  “I know,” Arturo said. “But it’s true. You never asked for any of the shit life threw your way. Your condition, your aspect, your parents. It all got shoved on your lap, and you made the best of it.”

  “True,” Relia said. She picked up the shirt she’d dropped and started folding it again, slower this time. “I’m like Akari, but backwards.”

  “How do you figure that?”

  “She was born normal and wanted to be a freak of nature.” Another ghost of a smile crossed her face. “I was born a freak and just wanted to be normal.”

  “Come on,” Arturo said. “You’re still normal. Sure, you’re the deadliest Master on the planet, but you don’t let it get to your head. That’s the important thing.”

  “Deadliest Master?” Relia considered that for a moment. “No, I’m pretty sure that honor goes to Glim.” She paused, grabbing another shirt from the bed. When she spoke again, the words came out in a rush, like a confession she’d been rehearsing. “She can use my body better than I can.”

  “Wait, what?” That last comment set off all sorts of alarm bells in Arturo’s head. “You do realize Glim can’t even button a shirt, don’t you? And that wasn’t even the worst part.”

  Relia shrugged as she added the folded shirt to the pile. “Glim knows way more than she pretends. She just . . . tries really hard to make us laugh.”

  “She’s not that funny,” Arturo said. In fact, entering this room had been one of the most awkward encounters in his life.

  “Elend made her that way,” Relia said in a distracted voice. “Now she can’t help it.”

  Arturo nodded in vague agreement. “I’d rather hang out with you any day.”

  She shrugged again. “Doesn’t mean you're safer with me.”

  There it was. The wound she kept picking at when no one was looking.

  Instead of more words, Arturo reached out and pulled her into a hug.

  Relia stood stiff for a second, then her shoulders sagged, and she leaned her forehead against his shoulder. Her hair smelled like vanilla and cherry blossoms, and all the other perfumes Glim had been testing. Beneath that, he caught the faint scent of life mana, like morning dew and phoenix feathers. It kept her body in perfect condition, even when her mind was falling apart.

  “I know everything sucks right now,” Arturo muttered. “But I meant what I said before. You’re the heart of this team. Things wouldn’t be the same without you.”

  She pulled away and met his eyes. “What if I was faking it before?”

  “Faking what?”

  “I dunno . . . being happy.”

  “No way.” Arturo shook his head. “I’m pretty good at reading people, spira. I know I’ve seen you happy before. You’ll feel that way again soon. I promise.”

  Relia smiled, but she clearly didn’t believe him.

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