And this sad and unsettling feeling passed over me as I realized I hadn’t—not really anyway. I had never pictured what I would be, where I would go, or what I would do.

“I don’t,” I said, shocked by this sudden revelation. “I don’t think about my future.”

“Neither have I, really.” Alex flopped back in the sofa, his face twisted with confusion. “All my life I’ve focused on one thing…and that was being the Keeper my father wanted me to be.”

I slowly leaned back against the sofa, my brain running a million-miles-a-second. What would I do when this was all over? What would I do if I saved the world? What would I do with my life?

“We could go somewhere,” he said, meeting my eyes. “You and I.”

I raised my eyebrows. “Just you and me?”

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “Why so doubting? Think about it. You put the vision back to what it was, and we no longer have to worry about my father playing out his crazy world-ending plan and you and I can actually do whatever we want for once.”

“Whatever we want.” The words felt funny rolling off my tongue, but in a good way. “Where would we go?”

He shrugged, his eyes twinkling in the pale pink light that was flowing through the living room window. “Where do you want to go?”

God, the possibilities were endless, yet I couldn’t choose one. “I don’t know…someplace warm, I guess.”

He laughed softly and it was a genuine laugh; the kind of laugh that lit up his bright green eyes; the kind of laugh that made my heart skip a beat. “And we’ll fly there, like how normal people travel because we’ll have all the time in the world…” he trailed off, his face growing serious. “We’ll have all the time in the world to spend together….forever, like we promised.”

I would have said something, but I was choking on the rapid thudding of my heart. I looked away at the floor. It sounded like such a nice plan…and what if it actually ended up happening—could it actually happen?

I felt his fingers graze across the back of my neck—across my Foreseer’s mark—moving downward until they were touching my shoulder blade where my Keeper’s mark was tattooed.

My eyelids fluttered. Oh my God.

“Gemma,” he whispered with so much want.

And suddenly I knew what I wanted.A life I had never pictured before—a life I never thought I could picture. I jumped up and left Alex sitting on the couch with his mouth hanging open. I barreled up the stairs and burst into my bedroom. I ran over to my dresser and grabbed the mapping ball from out of the top drawer.

Yes, I knew what I wanted more than anything.

I wanted to fix it all, so I could live a normal life with the boy waiting for me downstairs.

Chapter 25

“Should we wake everyone up?” Alex asked when I returned to the living room with the mapping ball glittering in my hand.

I shook my head, my smile way to inappropriate for the situation I was about to put myself into. I knew what I was doing was dangerous, for the clear fact that I didn’t know what I was doing. All I could hope was that I would be able to find the vision and change it back to what it was. All I had to do was erase my dad, before he ruined everything.

It sounded so simple, yet it wasn’t. I mean, first off, just how many memories was I going to have to sort through before I made it to the right one? Nicholas had said the answer was in my mind, but what did that even mean? And then, there was always the concern that Nicholas had been feeding me a line when he told me all I had to do was erase my father before he recreated the vision.

Here’s the thing, though. I had a mom upstairs, branded by the mark of evil; a beautiful vampire friend, who was so sad it made my heart break every time I looked at him; a witch friend who was afraid to show who she really was; and a gorgeous guy sitting next to me who I wanted to lean over and press my lips to his, yet I couldn’t.

All this…well, it was enough for me to want to go in there and risk whatever I needed to, so I could fix it. So I could take the pain away from everyone and give them a future without death, loneliness, and despair.

So, I stood in the middle of the living room, opened my hand, and let the Purple Flame ignite. And I had to admit, it made me feel kind of powerful.

The purple glow lit up the worry in Alex’s bright eyes, but he didn’t say anything. He was letting me go be the Gemma I was supposed to be.

“Don’t worry,” I told him with a small smile. “This is what I was made to do.”

And with those last words, I set the mapping ball in my hand, right into the Purple Flame.

Then, I was gone.

Chapter 26

Actually, no I wasn’t. I thought I was, but when I opened my eyes, I was still in the living room, the Purple Flame burning as the glittering mapping ball sparkled in my hand.

“It didn’t work.” Alex’s mouth slipped into a frown.

I frowned too, glowering at the mapping ball. “But, why didn’t it work?”

Alex came over and examined the mapping ball without touching it. “I don’t know…maybe the Purple Flame wasn’t what we needed. I mean, you did get the idea from a note left on your bed.” He leaned away. “We don’t even know who left the note.”

Someone who smelt an awful lot like Nicholas, I thought, remembering the smell of flowers that had lingered outside my window after I found the note. But I didn’t say anything about this out loud, not wanting to look like a nut job and all.

“Yeah, but, I mean, the Purple Flame existed.” I glanced at the flame burning brightly in my hand. “It’s got to be used for something.”

We stood silently, staring at the flame, trying to put all the pieces of the puzzle together. But the only answer we got was the tick of the clock.

I sighed, removed the mapping ball from my hand, and smothered out the Purple Flame. “Dammit, I thought I had it.”

“Maybe that’s the problem.” Alex dragged his finger across my lip and I found myself growing more frustrated because I was supposed to be fixing everything so I could kiss his lips. “Maybe it’s because you’re trying too hard…sometimes your power doesn’t work when you drain yourself dry.”

“Yeah, I guess that could be it.”

He quickly brushed his finger across my cheek, the touch was enough to make me shiver…and want more.

“Maybe you should go lie down and try to sleep for a bit, and then try again when you wake up.” His voice cracked and I wondered if he felt it too—the want.

“Okay, I will.” And then I practically ran upstairs, figuring the sooner I got to sleep, the sooner I could wake up and fix all this. And the sooner Alex and I could have our future.

Okay, so the sleeping thing wasn’t working. I was too restless to sleep. I couldn’t stop thinking about Alex. The prickle was also going wild, pouring all these weird feelings through me. So, instead of sleeping, I ended up lying in my bed, staring up at the ceiling, trying to decipher the meaning behind these feelings. But it was ending up being as difficult as getting into the mapping ball.

And that’s when I heard it. The voice—that’s what I was calling it.

“The answers to your problems aren’t in your ceiling?” It said.

I gave a quick glance from left to right. “Who’s there?”

“That’s not the question you should be asking.” The voice tsked me. “You’re not focusing on the problem.”

I sat up, wondering if I was losing it. “Are you the one who left the note?”

He made an annoying buzzer sound. “Wrong question again.”

“Who are you?” I asked, climbing off my bed. “And why does it sound like your disguising your voice like a game show host.”

“Gemma.” The voice sounded so disappointed. “You need to stop focusing on other things and start focusing on saving-the-world.”

“That’s kind of what I’ve been doing,” I said, offended. I walked over to my closet and threw it open expecting to see someone hiding inside, but nope. It was empty.

“Come on, Gemma, ask me the right question?”

I shook my head, frustrated that I was now hearing voices while I was awake. But I decided to give it try. “The right question…How can I get into the mapping ball?”

“With the Purple Flame.” The voice answered in the same annoying talk-show-host tone that I knew was a disguise.

“I already got the Purple Flame,” I told the voice. “It didn’t work.”

Silence.

I sighed, and mimicking the annoying talk-show-host tone, I asked, “How do I get the Purple Flame to work with the mapping ball.”

“Ding, ding, there you go,” the voice said with an exaggerated cheerfulness.

Oh, my God. This was the weirdest thing ever.

“Now look at your arm,” the voice commanded.

I did. “Okay…it looks like an arm, well, except for the ugly olive-green lines tracing my skin.” I turned my hand over and looked at the hideous lines Stasha left on my skin when she tried to kill me. “Wait, is that what’s doing it?”

Silence.

“Hello,” I called out, trying not to be too loud on the chance that someone might hear me and think I had gone off the deep end.

“You can’t restore life with death in your hand,” the voice said in a serious tone.

Strangely enough, that actually made sense. “But it’s permanent, so how can I make it go away?”

“Go back and ask her to take it away.” The voice was fading.

“Are you crazy?” I said, glancing under my bed, wondering if someone was hiding under there. “Stasha will kill me.”

There was no one under the bed so I stood up and put my hands on my hips. “Okay, so are you suggesting that I go to the person who tried to kill me and ask her to take her death out of my hand?”

Nothing. No response. No annoying ding, dings.

Great. Now what? I sighed. I guess I was going to Stasha’s

I decided it was best not to go alone. I might sound like a coward, but I didn’t care. Visiting a girl who had tried to murder me was making me a little bit edgy. I needed backup just in case something bad went down, and I was guessing something would.The best person I could think of to take with me was Laylen because a) unlike Alex, he had never dated Stasha, therefore, his presence would keep any jealous fits of rage to a bare minimum and b) Laylen was immortal so Stasha’s touch wouldn’t kill him.

It was still early as I tiptoed down the hallway to the room that Laylen was sleeping in. Alex was still downstairs—I could hear him moving around as I crept by the stairway. I decided not to tell him I was going, because he would want to come, and like I said, this just didn’t seem like a good idea.

I cracked open the door and peeked my head in. “Laylen,” I whispered, but all I got in response was a snore.

Great. I hope he is decent.

I slipped inside, shut the door, and flipped on the light. “Laylen.”

I scared him—I got that as he jumped out of the bed, arms flying, ready to attack.