She clasped Atlas’s hands to his heart. “Please don’t kill him. If you do, I’ll never have a chance to make things right.”
Brooks waded closer. When they stood inches apart, he closed his eyes. He squeezed Atlas’s hand, which was strong and muscular, a boy’s. He let go and drew his hand near Atlas’s face but didn’t touch it. When he opened his eyes, Eureka watched him struggle to see her spirit.
“What now, bad girl?” he asked.
She laughed with unexpected relief. “You’ve been inside the Filling.…”
Brooks nodded, but seemed reluctant to elaborate, or to remember.
“Delphine brought you back with a special tear. If I can do the same from inside Atlas, I can mend some of what I broke. You were right, there’s no way out for me, but maybe there’s hope for the rest of the world.”
Her vision blurred and she lost sight of Brooks. She thought it was Atlas surfacing, but quickly realized someone else now shared his body.
“Did you think I’d simply die and go away?” Delphine spoke through Atlas in a slow, terrifying voice. “I am the puppet master. I get the last word. This has always been my story to complete.”
Eureka took control of Atlas’s voice. “I know how your story ends.” She fought Delphine for Atlas’s eyesight. Brooks was a dim, distant throb of light at the end of a dark tunnel. “You made an enemy of other people’s joy because it threatens you. But I’m giving it back to Atlas. I’m going to make him feel so much it undoes the ghastly things you and I have done.”
Atlas laughed with Delphine’s icy viciousness. “You don’t have it in you.”
The ghostsmith resurrected the sharpest doubt, what Eureka thought she had shredded on the coral reef. Eureka’s sadness had caused so much pain. How could anyone reach the level of joy needed to undo that? Fear sent Eureka’s mind reeling toward the knife-edge of the dead white coral, but just before it cut her thoughts apart, her vision focused briefly.…
She thought she saw Brooks take the dagger from Atlas’s hand.
Don’t, she tried to tell him, but she’d lost control of Atlas’s voice.
Then Atlas screamed, and something bright drew near Eureka’s mind, something that hadn’t been there before. It felt—even though she could not feel—as if someone had taken her hand. Brooks had discarded his own body and entered Atlas, too.
You’re not supposed to be here, Brooks.
I’m supposed to be with you—she sensed him all around her—until the end of the world and the ride home after.
It was the end of the world, and maybe the beginning, too. Brooks had found Eureka when she needed a lift more than anyone ever had.
Joy hatched at the back of Atlas’s throat. Eureka sensed from his body’s stiffening that the king had never cried before. When her tears sprang in the corners of his eyes, they were joyful—but they were also vulnerable and rueful, yearning and optimistic.
No emotion was pure. Joy was grief turned inside out, and grief was joy in different lighting, and no one could feel one thing at a time. The tears she’d cried when she flooded the world must have done some good somewhere, because they were tears born of love for Brooks. Those were the tears that brought Solon’s wisdom into her life, the tears that had allowed Cat and the twins to discover their quirks. They were the tears that freed Ander from Seedbearer bonds.
Keep going. She felt Brooks urge her on, even as she knew he knew she couldn’t stop. Her mind was a waterfall of memories: The twins sharing a swing under a powder-blue canopy of sky. Diana slinking behind Dad in their old kitchen, adding too much cayenne to his soup. Rhoda cleaning closets. Eureka running and running and running across bayous into sunsets. Climbing oak trees to meet Brooks at the top of the moon.