Page 98 of Liminal

What is it about those six, if not genetics?

“Not much opportunity.” She grins weakly. “I only found out about it a few months ago, and my blockhead brother won’t teach me. So, do I get in?”

As if rushing to answer her, the card appears between us, the line at the top decorated with her name in black cursive writing before popping away.

That might be the fastest the building has ever decided on a person. The door swings open behind me. I’m expecting Edlynnto gasp as she looks through my body to the space beyond, but her small frown confuses me until I look back and realise that the Arcanaeum hasn’t admitted her through the foyer as it usually would.

Instead, it’s bringing her straight through into my tiny office, where North is already pacing.

No doubt the Arcanaeum ushered him here. How convenient.

Edlynn wheels herself through without hesitation, and I follow dumbly behind her. The pieces are lining up: North’s confrontation with his father, his begrudging determination to learn magic and get into the Vault, his curiosity about my ability to use restoration magic.

The door slams closed behind me, sealing me in with the Acklands. I can’t help but feel like I’m being dragged into yet another pile of arcanist crisis as North levels a guilty look my way.

“I take it this is what you wanted to ask me about?” I say, crossing my arms. “Why exactly is a liminal who has never used magic asking to enter my Arcanaeum?”

“You didn’t tell her?” Edlynn asks, rounding on her brother. “I thought you were going to ask…”

“Forgot there was a lecture,” North mutters, rubbing the back of his neck. “Anyway, Eddy, this is Kyrith. Kyrith, meet my twin, Eddy.”

Twin?

“Let me guess, Josef Ackland is blackmailing you with treatment for whatever is wrong with her.” It’s so predictable I could groan.

Of course, someone like North would need some incentive to just work for a father who swooped in out of nowhere. Dangling the cure for his sick twin over his head is the logical play.

“After he orchestrated the crash that put me into hospital in the first place,” Eddy supplies.

My jaw drops, and the papers on the desk shuffle restlessly.

“I was going to ask if she could have Sanctuary,” North mutters. “And…you healed Jasper.”

My brows are climbing up my forehead at the audacity of the Ackland heir, and the soft snort that comes from his twin tells me she knows it, too.

“So you want me to grant Sanctuary to a liminal who is practically an inept, heal her from an untold illness, and let me guess…” My jaw clenches. “Lie to anyone who asks where she is? After you tried to break into my Vault, intruded on an intensely private moment, and?—”

“I’ll owe you one,” he cuts in, the words resentful and angry.

“And me, too!” Eddy grins easily. “When I’m an all-powerful sorceress, I bet I can do something to pay you back.”

The twins are staring at me, two sets of Edmund’s eyes piercing into me, begging me to say yes. It makes me uncomfortable enough that I put the desk between us, pacing the small space behind it.

“The Arcanaeum isn’t a guest house, nor a hospital,” I mumble under my breath. “Do you realise how rare it is for… Even I barely remember the last time I granted Sanctuary. Now there are three of you. And what do you plan to tell Josef about how she miraculously disappeared? I’m already facing the wrath of the Carltons.”

“Josef won’t know,” Eddy insists, pausing to suffer through another round of wheezing coughs before she can explain. “North made this fake version of me. We’ll put it in my hospital room, and they’ll just think I died in the night. I’m a pneumonia risk after the last time, and they don’t think I’m going to last much longer, anyway. No one will suspect a thing.”

This is a terrible idea. So of course, the pushy building is carving the word ‘YES’ into the wood of my desk in big blocky capitals.

“Where am I supposed to put her?”

The Arcane Clock Keeper’s Handbookappears in mid-air and falls onto the desk with athud.

Great. In my room?

I’ve never had a roommate. And what if I want privacy? Plus, what about the wheelchair? The clock tower doesn’t have a ramp. I haven’t even bothered to even out the old and rickety stairs.

They’re all excuses. When I heal her—and I will, because she seems to have suffered enough just by having North for a brother—the stairs won’t be an issue. The Arcanaeum is already creating a second bed in my sanctum for her use. It’s small, but she won’t be there long… This is a temporary thing.