Page 218 of The Mortons

Sebastian smiles. “They’ll let you back in, as long as you bring them something. Like my head.”

“Cousin.”

“It’s okay, as long as they don’t take me alive. Don’t tell me ahead of time. Just put it in my morning tea.”

He doesn’t drink coffee anymore. He has trouble sleeping.

“You’re being dramatic,” I say. “What would I do without you?”

“You’d go home. Play with the dogs. Teach the kids.”

“They wouldn’t have me.”

Except that’s not true. Without Sebastian, the last remaining changes in me will unravel. I’ll become a true Morton again, cold and fearless.

That’s why he can’t abandon me and rejoin Care. I know too much and care too little. I’ll tell my family everything, betraying Regina, Bianca, Gertie, and Arabella; Sebastian will have nothing left but enemies.

Neither Mortons nor revolutions can tolerate loose ends. Neither of us can leave the other without destroying them.

I push the poison toward him.

“I’ll never use this, cousin. Maybe you should.”

“Maybe,” he says. The look he gives me is measuring—I am not afraid. “But we’ll both breathe easier, knowing it’s here.”

We keep it on the shelfbeside the electric kettle.

Every morning, I make him tea before we work odd jobs, or research how to burn down the freeports, or go on a hike in the national park nearby.

And every morning I make a decision.

Do I remain with this beautiful man in this small, homely existence, well fed, aloof from the neighbors, always unmoored? Or do I choose today to go back to the embrace of my ancient, gracious, broken, glorious, cruel, everlasting family?

Every day, Sebastian looks at the tea I make him, then smiles, closing his eyes.

With all the recklessness of hope, he drinks the tea.