[TWENTY YEARS LATER]

They never returned to the towers Abby had raised. They never called the ship Bobert again. They never let another witch walk away.

Jonah didn't know if his men actually believed him or if they were too afraid to question him, but the effect remained the same.

[FIFTY-TWO YEARS AFTER]

Flanked by Adam and Karl, Jonah marched down the main street of a burning island. Lines of scorch marks from witches' magic and the accompanying fire had turned a quaint farming island into a warzone. Rippling fields of green just beyond the stout houses filled the air with the smell of plants beneath the sting of smoke. All around them, Jonah's tattooed men -- now numbering in the dozens -- dragged people from their homes.

The streets were cobblestone, the space between stones filled with watery blood. Seventeen witches -- young ones -- piled up in the middle of the street. Dead as doornails.

Razo stood next to the pile, blood spatters dried like freckles across his round face. A filthy sword leaned against his leg as he cleaned his nails. He looked up as the others approached. Jonah smiled, clapping his shoulder in a quick embrace and evaluating the carnage.

"Damn! You do all this yourself?" Jonah looked around.

Razo shrugged. He wasn't hiding anything, Jonah would feel it. "Aye, sir. Never seen this many in one place, though."

Jonah agreed. Seventeen was a lot, especially these days. He prodded one of the bodies with a foot, encountering something solid. He knelt down to take a better look. Her coat pocked bulged around something rectangular. A book. He pulled it out. Unfamiliar characters stared back at him, but he recognized the diagrams.

The glossy pages twisted at his chest. It was a physics textbook.

"Raz?"

"Yeah?"

"Did you notice anything particular about their magic?" Jonah asked. It could be nothing. It should have been nothing.

Razo shrugged again, his noncommittal attitude finally starting to grate at Jonah's nerves. "Nothin' to write home about. Didn't really give 'em time, y'know?"

Jonah scowled and handed the book to Adam, who took it silently. Jonah didn't let go. A spasm of confusion passed through their connection before Adam shut it down, leaving an empty silence between them as there had been for the past few years. Of course, Adam wouldn't leave him. Couldn't. There was nowhere else to go.

"Burn every book you find," Jonah said. He kept his eye on Adam's face, relying on his decades of familiarity with his friend instead of magic to read his emotions.

Adam nodded.

He took the book under his arm and relayed the order, ice cold. It would have worried Jonah if it weren't exactly what he wanted. A man shouted from the crowd of trembling civilians, breaking through the shroud of fear and racing right at Jonah with a kitchen knife in hand.

A tug on his men's tattoos and they all let the man through without a sound. Adam sidestepped the attack and Jonah caught the man's weapon in his bare hand.

He was old, with a short white beard and sagging brown skin. Dark eyes dripped tears, maintaining their furious glint despite encountering Jonah's immovable strength. Jonah cocked his head. His own blood dripped down his wrist, gripping the blade.

"What were you even trying to do, dude?"

A wad of spit smacked him in the face. Jonah closed his eyes instinctively. He whistled, impressed, opening his eyes and squinting. His tattoos laughed along with him. "Hot damn. Been a while since someone's been this fucking stupid."

"Monster," the man hissed. "You will burn for this."

He had a heavy accent, his words stilted. It increased the ominous effect. Jonah still scoffed, plucking the knife from his hand and tossing it onto the pile of bodies. Adam and several others had started tossing books onto the pile of witches' bodies. Blood seeped into the pages. There weren't many, just a couple dozen. It was only when they started shoving wood – precious wood – onto the pile that people started getting rowdy.

Wails replaced the frightened screams, begging. Jonah looked up, still holding his attacker's wrist.

There had been about a hundred people on the island. A third were dead now. The rest clustered at the edge of the street, corralled by Jonah's men. Jonah himself hummed and nodded.

He snapped the man's wrist like a twig.

Howls pierced his ears as the crowd exploded into screams and the man dropped to his knees. He ignored them and held his hand out to Razo. Loyal and understanding as ever, Razo placed his sword hilt-first in Jonah's hand.

He needed to put on a show. His tattoos hugged him, excited.

Adam knew what he was doing. They were close enough – had been for long enough – that they practically had the same mind. He poured stolen fuel over the books and corpses and waited.

Jonah turned his attention back to the screaming man. He ground the shattered joint together. "You shouldn't tell people to burn."

The man's shaking face twisted in hatred and pain as he looked up at Jonah.

"It's rude."

He shoved the man onto the pile and slid Razo's sword through his leg, pinning the man to the witches' corpses and books. A lit match fell from Adam's fingers. The pyre caught in moments.

Orange light and heat swirled around Jonah, burning his clothes and skin. He straightened, staring down at the screaming man.

His tattoos healed the burns as quick as they came, barely giving him time to feel the pain. Pages curled and charred, blood boiled, skin melted. The man kept screaming, turning to coughs, to wheezes as he cooked alive.

Finally, Jonah stepped out of the fire. He brushed flames from his clothes. Finding the streets silent save the crackle of fires. Jonah sighed.

"You know the rules!" He shrugged. "You live on my turf, you live by my rules. No fucking witches."

Jonah tilted his head, thinking.

"Actually – let's add to that. From now on, it's English only. I catch any books in other languages, or people speaking other languages, you die."

He smoked as indignation sparked through the air, none so powerful as Adam's. His best friend knew better than to question him in front of anyone. Still, the connection went taut and Adam loomed at Jonah's back. This is wrong.

So's everything else we do. It's fucking annoying when I can't understand someone.

[SEVENTY-SEVEN YEARS LATER]

"Which one's this?" Donovan asked.

"Another new one," Ian breathed. He bounced on the balls of his feet and rummaged through his bag for his book.

They were talking about the island that their ship had landed at. It hadn't been there the last time Donovan guided them through this route, and it was completely empty. Green stood out among houses. Jonah scowled as he stepped onto the asphalt street.

It seemed familiar. Uncomfortably so.

Ian scribbled as many details as he could before he even stood up, eyes drinking in the structures. "American suburbia. It has to be an older witch, then. One who remembers the old world."

Donovan nodded and walked further in, the white picket fences making him look startlingly out of place in battle-worn black. Donovan hadn't aged – none of them had – but dark bags and slouching shoulders made his greying red hair seem elderly. "It looks –"

"Familiar," Jonah finished. He didn't need to use the tattoos to figure that out. He felt it, too.

"Lila."

This was the suburb that Lila had built as a child. The rows of houses, the beginnings of a city, the church.

Ian stopped scribbling. "Wait – if Lila did this one, do you think she made all the others?"

"It's possible," Jonah bit out.

"Then maybe she's on our side. She fought with us back when she was a kid, maybe the magic hasn't completely screwed with her head." Ian grew more excited with every passing second. Jonah wanted nothing more than for him to shut up. "Think about it – every island has a water reserve and fertile land – she could be trying to help reestablish civilization. She's integr –"

Jonah didn't even realize his gun was out before he pulled the trigger. Ian jerked where he stood, blood spattering the road on the other side as his head rocked. He collapsed.

"No!"

Jonah looked up. Donovan had run over, hand outstretched as if he could stop what had already happened. Jonah blocked him with ease, controlling the tattoos to keep his old teacher still.

Donovan's eyes welled with tears as he looked down at Ian, mouth falling open. A sob shook the older man's shoulders.

Jonah cradled him gently, shushing him as they fell to their knees together and Donovan completely fell apart. He stroked his hair. "Come on, prof. Like you haven't thought about doing that."

Despair welled up through the tattoos.

"This isn't you, Jonah," Donovan said. His voice was quiet and broken, barely a whisper. "It's not you."

Jonah sighed. "I don't think it is, either."

It was Greymark. And Greymark was stronger than Jonah. Strong enough to get the world back from the witches, from the deadwater. After all, he'd made a promise to his sister.

[NINETY-TWO YEARS LATER]

Jonah stared at a map of his islands.

The world's islands.

Same thing.

There were so many. Jonah could barely count how many he had. And among them, somewhere, was Adam.

His best friend. Former best friend. Their connection was still there, still humming. He could feel when Adam was hurt. When he was scared. When he wanted to die. Now? He was happy. So violently happy that it made Jonah sick.

His fingers traced the inked lines on the map. If he wanted to, he could pull the strings and find Adam in moments. The happiness made him second guess himself. 

It came in waves, deep and warm. A satisfying weight that felt better than any kill Jonah had ever done.

He had to protect that. 

Jonah chewed his lip as he stared down the map. There were too many islands. Too many ways he or his hunters wouldn't be able to stop a witch in time. Witches weren't the only threat, either. Humans were difficult to contain even when they had a working society. Jonah hissed under his breath and tapped his arm.

He needed a new system. 

Or a very old one. 

He smiled. Monarchies were stable enough. Faith-driven monarchies were stronger still. 

[ONE-HUNDRED YEARS LATER]

A black rabbit stared at him from across his room. The ship creaked all around them, light from the moon pouring in through the porthole. The rabbit didn't move, black eyes fixed on him.

Abby crouched beside the black rabbit, Lila on the other side.

The rabbit was what captivated him, though. It didn't tremble or freeze when he stood up and touched its soft fur. His fingers sank in. They came back coated in red blood.

Abby smiled. "Just wait for it. You'll see."

He blinked and looked back down to the rabbit. Lila's hand stroked its back, her hand clean.

"What am I waiting for?"

Lila smiled, too, startlingly similar to her mother. "Us."

Teeth sank into his hand, a massive jaw. He looked down again. The rabbit had been replaced with a snarling black hound, blood streaming from its maw and not all of it Jonah's. The hound's fathomless black eyes looked human.

Jonah jerked awake, eyes darting around his room. Steel walls. No Lila, no Abby, no rabbit. No dog.

[ONE-HUNDRED AND FORTY-SEVEN YEARS LATER]

The ship docked at a small island. A city this time.

Most of Jonah's hunters were spread thin among the Kings he'd appointed across the globe, leaving only himself and the barebone crew for his ship. 

There weren't any people on this island, but the pale spires fascinated him. His feet hit the dock and he knew that this one was going to be different. There were houses, some farming areas, but what caught his eye was the massive dome in the center, a spire nearly touching the clouds rising from its top. Donovan and Razo followed. Or, tried to, at least.

Jonah left them all behind in favor of a beeline for the center. It called him.

He pushed open a massive double door made of carved and polished wood, stopping at what he saw inside. Sure, some of the islands were grand, but this was ridiculous.

White moldings, oil paintings, stained glass, were all features in other islands. 

The high, soaring ceiling, fountains and tiles, carved wood and dozens of unique doors, were different. His breath caught on the beauty. 

He scanned the doors, light streaming from the windows and lighting the carvings in perfect relief. He knew those faces. Those carved wooden faces staring back at him. Lois. Ian. Those first witches.

Donovan, Adam, and Abby, too. Posed in various events that Jonah vaguely remembered. 

When he came to the one of himself, he stopped.

Dark wood made him seem ominous, tall, standing like a giant among skyscrapers. Above him, angels fell from the clouds. He swallowed. His fingertips brushed the polished wood. The door creaked open slowly, heavy, startling him enough to jerk his hand away.

The hall inside was lit by vertical windows, much like an empty church. The long room was also tall, with beautiful white walls and more paintings.

At the end was an altar. 

On the altar sat an old woman.

Her feet swung back and forth, and he knew who she was. Sure, her face was wizened and sagging, her hair thin and white, but he knew those blue eyes.

"Lila," he breathed.

"Hey, uncle J." Her voice was thin. She was thin. Her white dress was stained with mud and paint. "Do you like it? I made it for you."

He walked forward, his knees shaking. His tattoos roared to life. They screamed at him to kill her, to fulfill his promise. He pushed them down with an iron hand. "I thought you were -- "

Lila wrinkled her nose as she smiled. Jonah got closer. Neither of them made any move against the other.

"You haven't aged at all, have you? None of you did." None of you. Jonah flinched at the memory of all his allies -- his friends -- whom he'd betrayed. One way or another, he'd stabbed them all in the back. 

He swallowed against his dry throat. "Neither've you, baby girl."

"Oh, stop it." Her laugh rasped deep in her throat. She sighed. "I want to tell you everything. The things I've seen, what I've built. You'd love it."

Jonah smiled. "I saw."

"Oh  -- the islands?" Her head rocked down almost bashfully. "Those are pretty special, aren't they? I spent twenty years perfecting those and before laying them out for you. But -- that's not it." 

He worked his jaw. "Mind explaining for an old man?"

"For the longest time, I thought it was Mom's fault. That she'd brought you back wrong or pushed you too hard." Lila's smile faded. "If she had, you'd've killed me the moment you laid eyes on me."

Jonah stopped walking a few feet away from the altar.

"I wasn't sure," she continued, "still wasn't sure until a few minutes ago. Now I know. God, I wish I could take it all back. This may be what the world's turned you into, but it's still you." 

He gave a mirthless laugh, low and short. "You might be the only person who got that message."

"Well," she cocked her head, "I suspected. You built your empire, my dear uncle. I made my own. And they're clever. They're so clever."

"The witches have been getting weaker."

"Magic is a tide. It's yours now. But give it a century or two and it always comes back." Her blue eyes welled with tears. "And I want you to know that I loved you. Right up until the moment you walked in that door, I loved you."

She gave a watery smile, and the decades fell away. Jonah's breath left him in a choked heave and he cleared the distance between them, wrapping his arms around his niece's frail shoulders and holding her close. His chest and eyes burned. His tattoos burned, too. He ignored it all and pushed his face into Lila's hair. She smelled like flowers.

"I loved you, too," Jonah said. "I loved Abby -- I -- "

"I know," she whispered. "But I that changes nothing. My daughters are patient, uncle. My granddaughters even more so. They'll kill you for this."

He gritted his teeth and pulled back. 

Her eyes, once bright and nearly perfect replicas of Abby's, were duller than he'd thought they were. He brushed a white strand of hair from her face. "Tell me where they are."

"I'm a hundred years old," Lila said. "Not stupid."

"Lila -- "

His tattoos screeched at him, the change in magic so sudden he barely had time to breathe before jerking out of the way. The blade of his own knife grazed his windpipe. Lila kicked off the altar and pushed herself into him with a tightening of magic. He caught her wrists, stopping the blade an inch away from his eye. The momentum forced him down, knocking the air from his lungs as he hit the stone floor. His vision filled with Lila, eyes full of hate, and the business end of his own knife.

The tattoos burned and writhed under his skin, filling him with just enough strength to keep the knife from plunging into his face.

Lila's magic thickened. The air warmed. She was going to burn him. She meant to kill him. He choked, staring at her blue eyes. 

He flung his head as far to one side as he could and let go. The blade plunged down, clear through his cheekbone with a crunching noise. His free hand fumbled around his handgun, shaking from pain and shock, relying on his tattoos to guide the weapon. He pulled the trigger as soon as it was aimed at Lila. 

She yelled and lost her grip on the knife, magic dissipating for a brief moment. Red witch blood bloomed on her side. 

Jonah sat up and fired again. And again. 

Blood misted the air and smeared the floor she'd so lovingly made for him. He didn't recognize her face among the gore. He couldn't see anything but her blood.

He closed his eyes, the satisfaction of her death ringing hollow even though his tattoos filled him with a contented warmth. His cheek twinged as bone and flesh knit back together.

"Jonah!" 

He jerked. Looked up. 

Donovan stood at the entrance, eyes wide. Jonah reached for their connection, only to find an unreadable wall between them. Jonah swallowed hard and stood on his shaking legs. He took long, purposeful strides, clearing the long hall between them. "She -- "

"Lila," Donovan said. 

Jonah stopped in his tracks. His old teacher's eyes were full of tears, his steps faltering as he entered the room. He didn't look away from the bloody corpse of a girl he'd once known. Something in Jonah ached at the knowledge that, even now, even as she was, Donovan recognized her.

"That was Lila, wasn't it?" Donovan continued, steps short. "This was all -- "

"She was a witch, prof," Jonah snapped, "you knew that. You knew it would come to this if we saw her again."

He finally looked back up at Jonah. A hardness settled in his eyes.

Jonah steeled himself and reached through their tattoos again, feeling for any hint of his longtime friend. All he felt was a solid hatred. Jonah sighed. He dropped his gun, the clatter as it hit the ground cutting into his head, throbbing through the nearly-healed stab in his face. 

"Are you gonna kill me?"

He wouldn't. No matter how much Donovan hated him, he would never kill one of his beloved students. He could never. Jonah was the only one left. The old man's heart wouldn't take it. That soft heart was one of the reasons Jonah liked him so much.

Donovan pulled his own handgun out, sending a flicker of doubt through Jonah's mind. His iron gaze pinned Jonah over the sights. 

"You won't," Jonah whispered. "I know you, old man."

When Donovan made no move to lower his gun, Jonah recalculated. They were about ten feet apart. Either one could clear the distance easily, but Donovan had the advantage of a loaded gun. He wouldn't miss at this range. Jonah would have to attack first.

The thought of attacking, of killing, seemed so terribly exhausting after all this. 

What he wanted was for Donovan to lower the gun. He wanted to pretend he was sad and have his old teacher comfort him. He wanted Adam there to have his back. 

The gun wavered. Jonah smirked. "See? I know you."

Donovan blinked once, slowly. "I thought so, too."

Faster than Jonah could think, Donovan bent his arm and settled the gun under his chin. He pulled the trigger. His head snapped back.

Jonah might have yelled. Might have screamed. He cleared the distance, just as he'd predicted, just fast enough to catch Donovan's body before it hit the ground. Silver leaked from Donovan's clothes, red from his hair. Jonah's breath came in shuddering half-gasps as Donovan's corpse settled in his suddenly weak arms. 

Blood clung to the air, thick and sweet. 

[ONE-HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS LATER]

Greymark stayed in that island. He leaned against the altar and spoke before the place where their blood had pooled. 

He buried Jonah with Donovan. 

Adam never returned to his side, either dead or hiding. He couldn't feel his emotions anymore, either. Greymark couldn't fault him for that. He knew what he was, he knew what people said of him. He knew he hadn't been worthy of a best friend in decades.

With a reputation like that, very few people ever challenged him.

A young prince, barely in his double digits, lifted his chin at Greymark and glared. The boy's grandfather knelt at Greymark's feet and begged.

"Please, my lord -- he's only a boy, a fool boy who doesn't know anything -- " It was one of Greymark's Kings. One of the people he'd chosen so long ago to rule the world. He was old now, wizened and shaking from more than just fear. His grandson had more iron in him.

Greymark waved him off. King Ryker shut his mouth.

Razo stood at his flank, one hip leaning against Lila's altar. More hunters -- dozens with sigils and even more apprentices undergoing training -- stood along the walls of the long room. The middle was cleared out for the prince and King to plead on the stone floors. But the prince did not plead.

The prince's pale eyes were shadowed from lack of sleep. The set of his jaw betrayed no weakness.

"Why?" Greymark asked. Best to keep it simple. To the point.

The prince lifted an eyebrow. "I was curious."

"Curious enough to stash a witch?" 

"Obviously."

"What were you trying to accomplish, exactly?"

The prince's lips twitched toward a smile before settling into neutrality. "Don't you want to know how magic works? How a witch can do what she does and how to take it for yourself?"

Greymark tilted his head. "Maybe I need to rephrase. What did you accomplish?"

"A portal." The prince's voice cut through the massive room, leaving the tension even thicker in its wake. "A mirror, actually. Like Alice in Wonderland."

Murmurs shuddered across the room. Greymark tugged everyone's sigils to silence them. Razo's dead-fish-eyed apprentice looked around, excited.

"Yeah, so," Greymark smiled, "I already forgot your name."

"Wilson."

"Wilson. You wanna be King?"

Ryker made a surprised noise, eyes darting to Greymark. Wilson remained silent for a long moment. Greymark could practically see the wheels spinning. "Yes."

"Great." 

From behind him, Razo pulled a long blade from his belt and passed it hilt-first to the prince. 

"Okay." Greymark walked up to the prince and pressed the hilt into his hand, maneuvering his fingers into the right position. He closed his hand around Wilson's smaller ones. "There are two things that I need you to promise me."

Wilson didn't move.

"First, you're going to spend every waking moment tracking down the one the witches call their King. She's the strongest one. She's the one who can really change shit."

The prince nodded, eager.

"Second, you need to kill your grandpa. Actually -- you need to kill your entire family. I'm not doing that shit for you, got it?"

Wilson's eyes went wide. His pulse fluttered under Greymark's hand. For a brief second, he wondered if the boy was going to refuse. 

"Deal."

Greymark let go of the boy's hand and turned him toward his grandfather. The old King just stared.