A Crack in the Heart

Chapter 1“Please, someone. Kill me. Kill me now.” “Aiden! Don’t say that. It’s dangerous,” Cassandra Koo prodded his thigh with the extremely pointy toe of her boot, but he just shook her off without lifting his head from the pile of exam books scattered over his desk. She prodded him harder. “Aiden! I’m talking to you.” “Ow!” Aiden Lobo snapped his head up to glare at her, rubbing his thigh where she’d jabbed him. Two exam books slid over the edge of the desk to flutter sadly to the worn wooden floor. “What was that for?” Cassandra rolled her eyes. “Like that actually hurt, you big baby.” She flipped her hair over her shoulder and crossed her arms in one practiced move. Her hair was jet black and so thick, Aiden occasionally wondered how she didn’t snap her neck when she did that. “Be careful what you wish for, remember? Do you want someone to hear you and think you mean it?” Aiden snorted and shook his head. “I’m sure that whichever deity happens to be listening can tell the difference between hyperbole and a genuine request, Cass.” He bent down and snatched the two exam books off the floor, then scowled at them before slapping them back onto the pile. “Mr. Sneddon here wrote a detailed essay on how the Diet of Worms, rather than, say, having anything to do with the Protestant Reformation, was apparently a meal fed to elder demons so they wouldn’t destroy Nuremberg in 1521.” He took off his glasses, then closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose, grimacing at the indent his glasses had left there. “How could he get the year right but nothing else? The first confirmed Crack only appeared in 1915.” “Well, that was the confirmed one,” Cassandra said diplomatically. “You know there’s plenty of anecdotal evidence from before that.” “Not at the Diet of freaking Worms.” “Fine, then. Was it funny, at least?” She tapped the equally large stack of her portion of the exam. “One of mine confused Archangel Michael with Michelangelo. That was kind of hilarious.” “No.” Aiden slid his glasses back on, shoving his hair away so the lenses wouldn’t trap any of it over his eyes. It’d officially grown out of “too long” into “shaggy,” but he never had time to cut it. Unlike Cassandra, whose fair skin contrasted beautifully with her dark hair and eyes, Aiden had not terribly remarkable, almost-black hair that more or less complemented his light brown skin. He did think his eyes were cool, though. Cassandra said they were “whiskey colored like in a romance novel.” Tanner said they were amber, which Aiden liked even more. But now his hair kept falling in his whiskey-amber eyes. “Hey,” he said, turning to Cassandra. “Do you know any haircutting spells?” Cassandra didn’t even blink at his non sequitur. “I could conjure my spirit knife.” “No, thanks.” He let out a long, frustrated sigh, then glanced at his watch and began to slide the books into a pile. “I can’t believe how late it is. I haven’t even finished half of these stupid things. Remind me to never agree to assist with a summer school course again.” “Hey, you were an undergrad, too, once,” Cassandra said very seriously, which she immediately ruined by smirking. “A long, long, long time ago. I’m sure you did badly on at least one freshman course. Oh. Are you leaving?” “I’m twenty-three, which makes me exactly one year older than you. And I never confused the Diet of Worms for an actual diet.” Aiden managed to snap the three large elastic bands over the stack of exam books without getting more paper cuts, then carefully shoved them all into his messenger bag. “And yeah, I’m leaving. I can’t take any more marking tonight. Do you want me to walk you to your apartment first?” “That’s such a kind offer.” Cassandra scraped her own stack into a loose pile and shoved it into her backpack, apparently unconcerned with crumpling the pages. The grin she gave Aiden was sly. “I’m sure you don’t have any ulterior motives, with a kind, gentlemanly offer like that.” Aiden stopped strapping on his sword belt to frown at her. “I can be kind!” “I know. Oh, don’t give me the sad-puppy eyes.” Cassandra came over and enveloped Aiden in one of her typically enormous hugs. “I know you really want to walk me home.” “Well, not anymore.” Aiden tucked her head under his chin as he hugged her back. “Now I’m just going so I can see Tanner.” Cassandra laughed. “Jerk.” She let go, then had to pull away the few of her hairs that had gotten caught on Aiden’s chin scruff. She stopped him before he could shoulder his messenger bag. “Hang on a sec. I want to redo the protection spell.” She deftly fished under the collar of his T-shirt to pluck out the stone amulet he wore on a leather thong around his neck, then laughed at the carving of a happy face on it. “That kills me every time. You are such a hardcore nonsectarian.” Aiden shrugged, grinning. “I needed some kind of symbol, right? You know what they say—’let a smile be your protection.’” “That’s ‘let a smile be your umbrella,’ doofus.” Cassandra shook her head in obviously put-on exasperation. “I learned a new spell yesterday and I want to try it.” Aiden lifted his eyebrows. “So I’m your guinea pig now? Is that even legal?” “It’s a protection spell,” Cassandra huffed. “It’s not like I’m slapping wings on you or anything. And I practiced it loads of times, and the prof says I’m really good. So shut up.” “Well, if the prof says you’re good, I guess it’s okay, then.” Aiden laughed when Cassandra scowled at him. “It is okay, dumbass. Now stop talking so I can do this.” Aiden grinned, but then waited patiently as Cassandra closed her eyes and began chanting. She had one hand closed around the amulet and the other holding his bicep. She mostly used Korean for her formal casting, because as her second language it meant she had to work at it, and the effort showed respect to the divine. But this time Aiden recognized some ancient Egyptian as well, when she chanted a prayer to the cat-goddess Bast, invoking her aspect as a goddess of protection. After that, Cassandra switched back to Korean to request the presence of Gwan-eum, the Korean goddess of mercy. He was sure she asked for help and protection from other deities as well, but magic and invocation in general were far from his realm of expertise. He did understand her request for intervention on his behalf from protective spirits residing in the places he might go, as well as his eudaemon—his personal guardian spirit—and his guardian angel. He could see how hard she was concentrating on the spell, but Aiden had no facility with casting and no idea if it was working or not. Cassandra was very good, especially for a twenty-two-year-old in her last year of a master’s degree. But this spell seemed especially complicated and difficult. It also took longer than Aiden expected; a good five minutes passed before Cassandra finished the spell with a final word of thanks and finally let go of him. “There.” She had a little bit of sweat at her temples, but she only looked satisfied as she dropped the amulet back behind Aiden’s collar then patted it through his shirt. The stone felt warm against his skin, but that could have just been from Cassandra’s hand. Aiden quirked a grin at her. “How many different beings did you ask to look after me? I’m not that hopeless, am I?” “Well, your protective symbol is a smiley face. I’m kind of at a disadvantage, here.” She sighed deeply. “Face it—you’re a lost cause. It’s tragic.” Cassandra belied her sad expression by laughing, then patted his chest again. “But even if I’d asked a thousand different deities and spirits to look after you, they’re all facets of the divine, right?” She shrugged. “A lot of casters don’t bother with the separate names, but since they’re always present, I think it’s better to ask. It’s more polite, you know?” “And goodness knows you’re nothing if not polite.” Aiden smirked at her as he ducked his head through the strap of his bag, then grimaced as the bag slapped against his thigh. The exams weighed a ton. “But they’re not facets. They’re all one and the same. Like, why bother differentiating between a eudaemon and a guardian angel? They’re exactly the same thing.” Cassandra snorted. “I’m a f*****g pillar of virtue, and you’re lucky to have me as your friend. Especially when you talk blasphemy like that.” She shouldered her backpack. “That’s like saying a pickup truck is the same as a sports car, because they’re all cars. Sure it’s kind of true, but actually true? Not really. And eudaemons whisper advice in your ear, but don’t intervene. Like, your eudaemon would say,”—she dropped her voice to a whisper—”‘hey, don’t walk in front of that truck,’ but an angel might actually push your stupid ass out of the way.” “I actually did get hit by a car riding my bike once,” Aiden said musingly as he locked the office door. “I don’t remember anyone telling me to stop or pushing me out of the way.” “Obviously they knew it wasn’t going to do any permanent damage. Unless you weren’t wearing a helmet. In which case it explains so much.” Cassandra slid one of her bracelets down her wrist until she could hold her casting amulet securely in her hand. She’d made her scryPhone into her own amulet of protection—there were apps for that—but she said it worked much better to “go old-school” for casting spells. Aiden just used a sword. He’d gotten straight As in sword fighting in high school, and his parents had given him his genuine, antique cutlass and scabbard as a graduation present. He practiced with it a few times a week, and knew he could defend himself with it. He also liked how it made him look pretty badass. “You’re not hopeless, by the way,” Cassandra said, as if she were worried he’d thought she meant it. She hit the button for the terrifyingly ancient elevator, but didn’t complain when Aiden tugged her toward the stairwell instead. “It’s just…” She made a face. “Just what?” Aiden asked, when they’d gone down all five floors and she still hadn’t said anything. He stroked his hand over the head of the nearer lion statue at the foot of the stairs, thanking it for protecting the old building. “It’s just, I hate the fact that you can’t do magic, okay?” Cassandra blurted, stopping in the vestibule. She tilted her head to look up at him. “I hate how vulnerable you are because of it. I just want you to be protected.” Aiden blinked at her. “You’ve known that about me since we were little.” Cassandra rolled her eyes. “No s**t, Sherlock. And I’ve hated it since then. But I didn’t know a good enough general protection spell until now, or I would’ve used it before.” She flattened her lips, looking at him as if she hoped to see signs of his newly minted safety on his face. “It freaks me out that the only things you have to protect yourself with are an antique sword and an amulet with other people’s spells on them. It just sucks, that’s all.” “Hey, my antique sword and other people’s spells work just fine, thank you very much,” Aiden protested, though he looked more carefully around them, suddenly a little nervous himself from Cassandra’s worrying. But the dark wood paneling and the fussy portraits of the long-dead department heads only looked the same. The two touch-smoothed wooden lions guarding the stairwell they’d just come down were glossy and still as always. He undid the snap that ensured his sword wouldn’t slide out of the scabbard anyway, to make drawing it faster, then touched the second lion. Just in case. “It is what it is, Cass—some people are natural casters, and some can’t do magic at all. I’ve never had a problem before.” “Yeah. Let’s hope you stay that way.” “Well, no problem unless you count the exams,” Aiden said, then grinned, pleased when Cassandra smiled. He started walking again, determinedly shoving his anxiety away. He held open the door for Cassandra and they went out into the night. It was fresh and clean on his skin, a perfect antidote for the stuffy History Department building they’d just left. Solar vines climbed the brick walls like ivy, glinting copper in the light from the building. He automatically put his palm out near them as they passed by, and could still feel the heat of the day’s sunlight radiating off the stems.