She yammered on in his head about magic and physics and underlying logic, and how she had four cousins who had the aptitude to do advanced magic but onlytwowho had ever mastered advanced science ofanystripe, and she only knew one person, ever, who had known how to do both, so obviously she was making this up as she went along ....
She knew this had to be intolerable, but it was like the notion of escape had let in so much fresh air that she was getting giddy from all the extra oxygen.
She wasn’t surprised when he interrupted her, because she almost wanted to interruptherselfat that point.
But Logan didn’t say, “Okay, I get it,” or even, “Slow down,” and he didn’t sound frustrated or even amused.
He soundedshocked.
> he said. >
Chapter Eleven
Logan tried to tellher a story, but Iz could tell he was having trouble finding words again. He was sputtering, stuttering inside his own head, and she was torn between giving him time to smooth it all out and telling him that he didn’t have to. She didn’t know what would be better.
She erred on the side of time. >
She felt a rush of wordless gratitude, and then the movie started unfolding.
It was nothing like any movie she’d ever seen, and it wasn’t just because it starred a bunch of hellhounds in a mystical underworld. It was because it was like IMAX on steroids. It made every so-called immersive theatrical experience she’d ever had feel like the equivalent of watching a bunch of stick figures projected on a bedsheet. No amount of 3D, vibrating seats, surround sound, or even soap bubbles blown out at the audience had ever felt anything like this. Not even Logan’s impression of the taste of lobster with butter sauce had come close to it. This was as intimate as her own thoughts ... maybe evenmoreintimate.
It took her breath away. It was something deeper than communication. It was like Logan was pouring his soul into her.
A fiery-eyed hellhound, even bigger than Logan, stood alone on some kind of foggy, desolate plain.
One by one, people came before it, and the hellhound grew or shrunk so that it could meet their eyes perfectly. Some of them didn’t want to look at it, but they always met its eyes in the end.
The hellhound’s stare peeled away all their illusions about themselves until there was nothing left but the truth. Its attention burned like the sun through a magnifying glass. It saw everything. Sometimes it would let out a terrifying, ferocious growl, and a ghostly figure, made of filthy smoke, would leap out of the person, like the bad parts had been scared away from them.
> Logan was saying, like a subtitle on this imaginary screen. >
Iz nodded, breathlessly caught up in what he was showing her.
Other hellhounds walked the earth, invisible to humans. One of them settled down to watch a man paint, and as the hellhound looked at him, his talent unspooled from his soul in glorious colors. The hellhound could see it in the air. It nuzzled the man’s hand as he reached out to clean his brush, and its strength and insight poured into him.
The man would paint many canvases in his life, but this would always be his favorite, the one that felt transcendent.