"They need a body to leave." Julia eyed Quentin closely. He was staring off into space in consternation.

"You can only bring one of us back." Julia's shade spoke up from beside her older counterpart. Lilly glanced between the young shades, with Martin holding onto the hem of her jacket like he expected to be separated at any moment.

"We take Alice." Julia declared, nodding her head as if she had just now convinced herself.

  "Jules, what the hell?" Quentin's eyes went wide, and his brows furrowed, making it look like his eyeballs were about to fall out of his head.

"This isn't up for debate." Julia looked down at her shade forlornly. If she did this, she would never have her back.

"This decision affects all of us, so yes, it is." Lilly crossed her arms in defiance. Quentin nodded, taking a step closer to Julia. He leveled his gaze with hers, his eyes betraying how conflicted he felt. Despite being Shadeless, Julia still avoided his gaze, as if she knew that with one look, he'd have her pinned. Perhaps she did it out of habit, or maybe she just didn't want him to see how empty she was inside.

"We came here so that you could--"

"Yeah? So? Things change." Julia snapped. It wasn't harsh, just solid and unwavering.

"Julia." This time it was Lilly who moved closer. Her voice was soft, sympathetic. Quentin stepped aside so that she could take his place before Julia. "I want to save Alice. Stop her. You know I do. But this is the only chance you have to get your shade back. With Alice, we have other options. There are other ways." She didn't like to think of what those options were. "If you give up your shade, you give up everything that makes you, you. The kindness, the love, the sadness. The good and the bad, all gone."

"I want to do it. For Quentin." Julia swallowed and took Alice's hand in hers. The little girl looked up at her with sadness in her eyes. Julia would be giving up so much. The finality of her decision was something that weighed heavily over them all. The air was thick with tension, and when Quentin finally spoke, it was with resignation.

"No. I can't let you." Quentin swallowed hard, blinking away tears, and knelt before Alice. His face was almost level with hers, just low enough that he had to tilt his chin to meet her eyes. "You were the first person I let myself truly fall in love with. You understood me in ways no one else did. But I've been wasting my life clinging onto what we had. The truth is, our relationship broke long before I cheated on you." He took both her hands gently in his and held them as if to make a promise. "You will always be my best friend. I love you, and because of that, I can't live with myself If I'm the reason Julia never gets to experience a love as we had. Even if it's just as fleeting. We had our time. What kind of friend would I be if I chose my selfish wants over Julia's life?" He watched Alice's face, willing her to listen, to understand why he had to leave her behind. Lilly could practically feel his heart-wrenching grief. Alice cupped his cheek with a tiny hand and smiled.

"I understand, Quentin. I want you to be happy. I think you already are. You just need to look around you. There are so many people who love you. I know for a fact you love them, too." Alice was sweet as sugar, so pure and light. Lilly thought that this was what Alice was in life too. Without all the circumstances weighing her down on earth. She was pure, and she was happy.

"God, I miss you so much." Quentin choked out. This time when he tried to blink away his tears, they poured down his cheeks.

"I miss you, too," Alice whispered, and Quentin had to purse his lips to hold back a sob. Lifting herself on her tiptoes, Alice craned her neck to scan the sitting room. She waved to someone across the room, and soon a little boy, blonde, blue-eyed, and beaming, bound over to them. He skipped along like he was running through a field of colorful wildflowers.

"Don't worry about me. I'm not alone here." Quentin looked over at the boy who stopped beside them. Alice pulled the boy closer, and he waved frantically in response. "This is Charlie." Quentin's mouth went slack. His eyes darted between them in disbelief. It was so obvious now, looking at the two of them beside each other. They could've been twins, with the same glint of intelligence in their eyes. This was the Charlie who they'd tried to summon all those years ago. The Charlie that brought them all together. The one that Alice had gone to Brakebills to find. He'd been a Niffin too. They were together now. Here, where they were purely themselves, without the pain that life caused.

"It's nice to meet you." Quentin's voice cracked as he gave them a watery smile. Alice's grin grew to show nearly all her teeth. Alice would be alright, he thought. He could see it now. He'd been fighting so hard to bring her back. Beating himself up time and time again for letting her go. All along, she was taken care of. She was with Charlie now.

"Q, it's time." Lilly placed a hand on his shoulder and squeezed. He took a shaky breath, his eyes darting back to Alice to soak in every last second of his friend's Shade. It would be the last time he'd be with her. Alice nodded in Lilly's direction. She was right, Quentin couldn't stay.

"You have to go now. There's a portal in there, back to reception." Alice pointed towards a door to their right. "I'm glad we got to say goodbye." Quentin sniffed and wiped at his cheeks. Then he took her hands in his, gazing deep into her eyes.

"Um, I'm gonna be back here for good one day, and I am going to find you."

"Okay." Alice wrapped her arms firmly around Quentin's neck. He held her so tight, wishing he didn't have to let go. But he did. Lilly bent down and pulled Martin into a long hug. He gave her an encouraging nod, and she wondered if he somehow knew that things would turn out for the best. She stood, placing a soft hand on Quentin's back, and guided him over to the portal. When he looked back at Alice, she was smiling. Charlie's hand was in hers, and together they waved off the three Magicians and Julia's shade. As Quentin turned away, he knew that Alice would be alright. So would he. Even if it took a while, he'd be alright again.

Evelyn was waiting for them just outside the main lobby when they arrived. Tucked away in the adjacent hallway, they wouldn't be disturbed by bellhops or secretaries. She smiled fondly at her daughter, holding her arms open for Lilly to walk right in. Taking a deep, long breath of her mother's perfume, she committed it to memory. A splendid mix of Peony and something she couldn't identify. She wanted nothing more than to take her home. Evelyn could meet her father, see the life she should've had. Fate had different plans. Lilly pulled back, and there were tears in her mother's eyes.

"I love you, darling."

"I love you too, Mum." Lilly meant the words with every fiber of her being. She squeezed her mother's hand tight, then let it slip away.

"Now, get out of here." Evelyn shooed her lightly. "Live your life." Lilly smiled at her mother and looked over her shoulder to Julia and Quentin, who watched the scene from a respectful distance. Lilly jerked her head towards the Lobby. With her mother beside her, they stepped into the same place they'd arrived. The welcome video played on a constant loop with a fresh batch of souls watching intently. They made sure to look like they belonged, which wasn't particularly difficult. But as they passed the final pillar and arrived before the elevator Lilly stopped short with a strangled gasp.

"What the fuck?" Quentin stared ahead of them at the person who'd just stepped out from the Elevator.

"Penny?" The blood drained from Lilly's face as she stared at the man she loved, standing mere feet away from her. Penny was wearing the same clothes she'd seen him in that morning when he'd kissed her goodbye as he always did. His perfectly tailored suit that The Library required of all their employees. It was so very out of place on him. There was a girl beside him, sixteen at the most, with long dirty blonde hair. She wore a sweatshirt and jeans, and she looked between Penny and Lilly with recognition.

Penny's dark eyes met Lilly's, and once the flicker of shock had passed, there was deep sorrow pooling within them. All at once, Lilly felt like she'd been shoved down a well of grief and agony. The more she struggled against it, the higher the murky waters rose around her until she'd be forced to succumb to its depths. There was only one reason he could be standing in The Underworld, only one reason he ended up in that elevator.

"No." she couldn't tell if she'd actually said it or if it had been an exhalation of breath. But Penny stepped towards her, hand outstretched in a way that should've been comforting. It was anything but. She sucked in a sharp breath, jerking back as if she'd been burned. Her eyes were wide with panic. Clutching her stomach for support, her hands trembled furiously.

"That's her?" The girl asked Penny, pointing to Lilly curiously like the world wasn't crashing down around them. "She is pretty." Penny pushed her aside without a second thought.

"Not now, Sylvia." A soft touch brushed along the small of Lilly's back, and without looking to see who it was who'd offered comfort, she rolled her shoulder to push them off. Every attempt to calm her seemed to stir the wild tangle of roiling nerves within her even more, like stoking a dying flame back to its blazing peak.

"You can't be here."

"I'm so sorry."

"This isn't real." Her words overlapped with his in a storm of apology and denial. It was all just too much, too much, too much. His presence, once a comforting hand in hers, was now a fist closed around her throat, and she found herself gasping for air before him.

"I tried so hard to make it out--" Tears had begun to pool in his eyes as he tried desperately to make contact with her. She shook her head over and over as if the movement would somehow make it so.

"No!" Lilly's hand jutted out to halt him from coming any closer. He stalled a few feet away, his gaze darting to Evelyn with pleading eyes, then to Quentin and Julia, who watched with both pity and unease. A few heads had turned, and now their moment had become a spectacle.

"Lilly, we have to go," Quentin whispered, his eyes searching the lobby for the bellhops or any of the Underworld workers they'd spoken to earlier. Lilly turned on him with blazing eyes, teeth clenched, and nostrils flared with fury, but he could see that beneath it all was a festering wound that had just sliced open again. Before his eyes, the pain that she'd lashed out with surfaced, her lips pursed, nostrils tightened, and tears began to spill over and onto her pink cheeks.

Lilly looked back at Penny, and a wracking sob ripped from her chest. It was this release of pain that prompted him to rush forwards and pull her into his chest. He was warm and strong beneath her trembling hands that twisted into the fabric of his shirt. She buried her face into his chest as if she could disappear within his familiar scent and loving arms. If she shut her eyes, she could almost pretend they were home, laying intertwined within their bed, listening to the morning rain roaring against the rooftop.

"I'm so sorry." He buried his face in her hair, and she could feel the wetness of his tears as they fell atop her head.

"You need to go. They have likely already been notified." Through broken sobs, Lilly heard Evelyn mutter the warning to Quentin and Julia. She tightened her grip on Penny as a surge of panic roared through her chest. Her breath came in short spurts of rough air, the sobs taking over completely.

"I need you to know that I love you," Penny whispered so softly that only she could hear. His warm breath tickled the tips of her ears. "I love you more than I could ever say."

"Please don't go." Her words muffled against his chest, but he tightened his grip on her to show that he'd understood.

"I wish I had a choice." Lilly clung to him as if her life depended on it as if he was her life raft amidst a roiling sea. If she lost him, she would be swallowed whole by a sea of despair.

"I'll stay. I'll stay with you." The conviction in her tone was jarring, and Penny pulled back, pushing her far enough away so that he could look into her eyes, red and puffy as they were. His hands came up to cup her cheeks, they were hot and red and soaked with salty tears, but he forced her to hold his gaze. She shied away from the intensity there.

"No, you have so much left to live for. You have your people, your friends, your grandfather." Each word was as forceful as if he'd shaken her out of a maddened thought. "You are not done yet." He said it with such conviction, such passion, that for the slightest second, she almost believed it. "None of that means anything if you won't be there with me."

"I found them!" A man shouted from across the lobby. All five of them jerked their heads towards the sound at once. Tom, the receptionist who'd checked them in, and ordered the removal of the Shadeless man, was pointed straight at them, his head bobbing above a crowd of departed souls. "Stop!"

"Lilly, we need to leave, right now." Quentin stepped forwards and tried to grasp onto her arm, but she slapped his hand away. "We have to go." Lilly let out a rough sob, her chest heaving as she threw herself upon Penny, her arms wrapped so tightly around his neck that he had to take a step back.

"No, no, no, no, no." She repeated the word over and over like a prayer, hoping that somehow, someone would listen to her. That someone would put a stop to this madness. She'd had enough. She wanted nothing more to do with any of it. Wanted the life that they'd planned together. A life of I love you's and unbroken bonds, not this. "You can't leave me. Please don't leave me. not you, too." Lilly buried her face into his neck and breathed in the scent of him, cinnamon and cloves. It wouldn't be long until she'd forget his face like she'd begun to forget Evelyn's. Each time Penny tried to pull her away, she'd cling to him tighter.

"I have to." He choked out. Each word of denial from her lips was like a hammer to his heart.

"No, I can't, I can't." Her fingers dug into the skin of his back enough that he felt pinpricks of pain. He didn't care. "You promised me! You promised you wouldn't leave me."

"I tried. I really did. I fought till the last second, but I couldn't win." Penny shook his head. He hated himself for being so careless. He hated that she was in pain, that it was because of him. "Listen, I need you to tell Kady that it wasn't her fault, not yours either. It was my choices that lead me here. If I could take it back, I'd do it in a second."

"Come on, or we'll lose her, too." Julia beckoned Quentin towards her, her eyes flicking to the group of guards pushing their way towards them at an alarming rate. Any moment now, and they would be on them. If Lilly, Quentin, and Julia were still there, then none of them would be returning to life. Penny gave up trying to push Lilly away, and with a deep trembling breath, he pulled her against him and buried his face in the crook of her neck.

"I love you." Penny's eyes locked with Quentin's, and with an almost imperceptible nod, he lifted his right hand to the back of Lilly's head. By the time Lilly realized the pattern in the way his fingers trailed across her scalp, it was too late. She recognized the sleeping spell just a second before it was completed. Her hands tightened around him, just enough for him to feel the last burst of resistance, before she collapsed into his arms. "Take care of her." He gazed longingly down at her head, draped limply over the nook of his elbow in a mess of blonde waves. Quentin took her from his arms and threw her body over his shoulder.

"I promise." He said and hurried into the elevator. Penny followed him all the way there, ignoring the shouts of the guards pushing their way towards them. He felt a hand wrap around his. It was soft, soothing, and when he looked down, Evelyn was there beside him, her eyes rimmed with sparkling tears.

"You can't take that Shade!" Julia reached across Quentin, her left hand holding that of her younger self, and pressed the elevator button. The doors began to close just as the guards burst through the crowd. Quentin stared forward, ever conscious of the heavy weight across his shoulder. Through the crack in the doors, he saw Penny and Evelyn standing together, their hands intertwined as they watched the woman they both loved dragged off to live a life without them. Quentin managed one last nod of solemnity before the doors sealed, and they were both gone forever.

"It's all going to be okay, Quentin." He looked down as Julia's shade took his hand and smiled. It was such a hopeful smile, one of pure joy and optimism. He only wished he could believe her.