And here we are, at the final chapter. I'd love to continue is story, but I have, or I'd like to believe that I have, moved on from the Magicians. I loved being a part of the fandom, and I loved the show for a time, but I just cannot support what it has become, and I can't subject myself to another ruthless heartbreak like the one that I faced at the end of season 4. I may revisit this story or this fandom, but for the time being this is the end. I hope you enjoy.

"You want to get coffee or go to the book shop first?"

The sky was sinking into a musty orange upon the horizon, only visible through the slight gaps between the skyscrapers that towered above them. The world was all slanting shadows and rumbling car engines. Quentin couldn't help but take each thing in one at a time, slow and meticulous, an observer from the outside in. He'd always been like that, an audience member rather than the star of the show, but he didn't mind it. It was peaceful, quiet.

Eliot had come to him that morning with hashbrowns and the suggestion that they get out of the apartment for the day. It took Quentin two hours to finish off the hashbrowns, another six to finally find the willpower to get out of bed and manage to look semi-put together. When he finally emerged from his room Eliot stood from the couch and smiled at him like he hadn't just left him waiting for an entire day, asking him if he was ready to go.

Now they walked side by side, weaving in and out of the bustling crowds of people in relative silence.

He couldn't help but look at Eliot too, his skin taking on an unearthly golden glow in the light of the afternoon sun. He'd recovered more quickly than anyone expected, the sallow tone and the bruised eyes fading within a week, and he'd put the lost weight back on easily, looking decidedly less frail and a lot more like his old self. Appearances aside, he didn't act like someone who had been possessed just two months before. But he didn't act like Eliot either.

There was small things, like the way he dressed. They were the same clothes, but less severe. In the first days he'd held tightly onto that old person he used to be, the persona he'd worked so hard to create and uphold. But along the way he must have realized the effort was futile, as he'd lost that long before the Monster had come along, and slowly but surely he had completely discarded all the excessive vests and handkerchiefs and silk shirts from his wardrobe. Most days he usually went with a nice fitted pant and a simple button-up shirt, something familiar but altogether different in a way that unnerved him. It was a level of casual Quentin had only seen in Fillory, when Eliot had finally let his walls down, when their old Earth clothes had finally withered into threads and they let all they used to have drift into the past and started to look on into the future.

But there was something else different about him that Quentin just couldn't place. Something underlying, something inherent. He couldn't imagine what it must have been like being possessed. From what Eliot had told him, it didn't seem like a walk in the park. And Quentin sure wasn't about flaunting your trauma on your sleeve, but he looked unusually. . . happy. Once Julia had made a habit of being his own personal morphine drip and he was able to actually get out of bed, he'd taken to making breakfast early each morning for everyone in the apartment. Quentin could always hear him singing show tunes through the floor of his bedroom as he bustled around the kitchen. He lit up everytime the other man entered the room, like the wilting, unshowered form that slunk through the halls was the greatest thing to walk the Earth. He had an uncharacteristic ease to him, unlike the more poised, controlled ease he'd held in their Brakebills era. It was real now. He made his way through each day like he knew exactly what he was doing, like he'd found something deep within that prison the Monster had crafted for him that had given him a new lease on life.

Like he'd found the answer.

Eliot looked back at him and raised an eyebrow, a playful smirk curling on his cheeks. "A bit distracted?"

Quentin could feel his cheeks warm. He didn't realize he was staring.

He turned away and cleared his throat. "Uh, the book shop sounds good."

Quentin wandered through the aisles, fingers trailing lightly along the worn book spines, aimless. He didn't know what he was looking for. Was he looking for anything? He hadn't read for pleasure in years. It was just research, whether it be to pass a spellcasting exam or find out how to kill a god. Books used to be an escape for him. The used bookstore in his hometown had been like a second home. The fantasy novels had started out as a casual hobby, but as the years went on and the world opened up to him in all its depressing glory, he'd throw himself deeper and deeper into the fantastical stories until he finally fell in too deep, and decided he wanted to stay there.

It was just his luck that it would all turn out to be real.

For as long as he could remember, Fillory had been his home. He'd spent years pretending he was one of the Chatwin kids, that he was a part of their adventures, went on the quests, met the strange creatures, saw all the stunning places. All he wanted was to run away like they did, to live in a world of magic and wish-granting rabbits and velveteen horses where life wasn't so full of sadness and dread. God, he wished he could go back and tell his younger self what a fucking idiot he was.

"Hey Q, come here." Eliot's voice drifted from a few rows over, shaking him from his thoughts. He followed the sound until he found the taller man in front of a section labeled FANTASY CLASSICS , a small brown book held out in his hand.

He felt his stomach drop.

There it was, Fillory and Further: A World in the Walls, book one of the Fillory and Further series by Christopher Plover.

Eliot pressed it into his hand. "It's a first edition. I know that creep signed your only copy, and look, this one's in pretty good condition."

He froze. The book felt like it weighed a hundred pounds, a stone weight in his grip.

"Do you want it?"

He stood there for a moment, eyes hung upon the clock printed upon the cover, the silhouettes of the children who climbed so eagerly through. Did they have the same dreams? Did they too wish to escape their lives, to escape their pain and their loneliness? Those poor kids, lured into believing that that world would save them. They couldn't have known what would come from stepping through that clock. The very clock that sat, waiting, in the living area of the Physical Kids cottage.

He remembered that day by the Rainbow Bridge, after Eliot had been chosen as the new King of Fillory, what felt like a lifetime ago. Their problems then seemed so small now. The Beast was coming for them, he and Alice had just broken up, and he was mad that he wasn't the main character of this story. But in that brief moment, as they played kings and queens like little kids, everything seemed like it might be okay. Quentin couldn't have known what a monumental can of worms he was opening that day. He couldn't have known he was leading his friends to their own graves. He couldn't have known Fillory's grasp would reach so far, consume so much. He was just a sad kid looking for answers. But he had lost everything.

He put the book back on the shelf then turned and headed for the door.

Eliot sipped at his coffee and played with the crumpled napkin on the table in front of him. Quentin hadn't touched his drink, shoulders tense as he stared out the window. The mood had soured. The sun had gone down. The street lamps were dim and yellow and washed out the faces of the people walking by. They looked like ghosts.

He chewed the inside of his cheek. He felt sick. His head hurt. He wanted to lie down, wanted to curl up under his covers and never get up again. He wished he had never left the apartment in the first place. He knew Eliot was just trying to help, just trying to be nice, but the sight of the book had sent him spiraling. He was angry. He'd been angry for a long time. The past months had given him a lot of time to sit and think. Think about his mistakes, think about his regrets, think about his life. In that time he'd come to a conclusion that terrified him. He'd gone back and forth on it for weeks, mulled it over until he was blue in the face, but in the end he always came back to it. He couldn't ignore it any longer.

"I. . .I don't want to do magic anymore."

It was quiet. There wasn't anyone else in the cafe except the barista, who was tucked away in a corner on her phone. Eliot didn't react for a moment, though his hand stilled on the tabletop, his eyebrows creasing minutely.

Quentin took a deep breath in through his nose, preparing for backlash, preparing to argue and get nowhere then go home and not talk to each other for a day.

Eliot lifted his head and looked straight at him, gaze unnervingly earnest. "Okay."

Okay?

He wasn't expecting that.

He shuffled in his seat, feeling as if he'd been knocked off his axis, wobbling off-beat and unguided. He didn't know how to continue. He'd been coasting through the day in a comfortable haze, content to detach and zone out until he could make it back home and shut out the world again, but with that one sentence he had brought everything into a blinding clarity, sharp and raw and loud and all too real.

The man across from him sat back, arms falling into his lap and his face relaxing into something between stern and benevolent as he spoke gently.

"Tell me why."

He wanted to laugh. That was a tall order. Should he start at the beginning? His parents' divorse? The hospitalizations? His failed relationships? Should he skip to the good parts? Summoning the Beast? Watching his girlfriend die? Killing a god? Or what about last month when he nearly blew up a New York block in a last desperate attempt to expel a murderous ex-god from the body of the man that had slowly become his only reason to keep living? One of his therapists had told him it was best to start at the present and work backward, find the connections. But what did that matter, it was probably all bullshit anyways.

His chin fell to his chest and he sniffled bitterly. "You know, I think I lost faith in it a long time ago, I just didn't want to admit it to myself."

He looked at his hands, sitting palm up in his lap. Back when he first started at Brakebills, he toiled through months of Poppers and hand exercises before he was actually allowed to cast a spell. He couldn't even recall what it was, but he remembered the warm, pinprick sensation of magic channeling through his fingers, the overwhelming feeling of awe as he stood there, staring at his own two hands which had just made real motherfucking magic for the first time. It felt like a dream.

He shook his head and curled his hands into fists.

"I don't deserve this power," he muttered. "I've made far too many mistakes with it. I've endangered too many lives. It's dangerous, and it should have never been placed in my hands. I know Jane Chatwin thought that I was the one, that I was the only one who would stop the Beast, save Fillory. I don't know why. She saw firsthand how many times I failed. It took me forty tries to finally get it right. But did she really expect me to keep getting it right after that? Why did she have so much faith in me?"

His gaze drifted out the window again and he paused for a moment to watch the group of people talking by the lamp post down the street. They were smiling, laughing. Unburdened. Would he have been that way, had he never known about magic? Would he have ever found peace?

"Nothing good comes from meddling with magic. Solving one problem always leads to the creation of another, bigger one. And it just snowballs until you are faced with the end of the world. Was it worth it? Was all the destruction worth it for the sake of magic? Was it worth the lives of my friends? Was it worth my own father? Was it worth my sanity? I can't believe it took me so long, losing so much, to finally see the light. I really thought I'd cracked it. I really thought that magic could solve anything. I was so deluded, thinking I'd finally found that missing piece, the part of me that felt unwhole for so long. I suddenly couldn't imagine a world without it. And when I was confronted by that world, all I knew was that I had to get it back. But of course, that only lead to another, bigger problem."

His voice was shaking now, throat growing tight. He blinked away the hot tears gathering in his eyes and finally looked up, a fruitless attempt to match the monumental weight of Eliot's gaze.

"I think it was the thought of losing you again that finally made everything click."

"Q. . ." Eliot breathed, his hand reaching out across the table, reaching for him. For the briefest moment, he hesitated, eyes settling heavily upon the upturned palm. But he took in a shallow breath and laid his hand upon the other man's, whose long fingers instantly wrapped around his, warm and grounding.

He'd wanted so many things in life. He wanted an escape, and he got it, then he lost it. He wanted magic, and he got it, then he lost it. He wanted love, and he got it, and he almost lost it, but here it was, right in front of him, alive and safe and he didn't want to risk losing it again. Wanting endlessly only lead to loss, but keeping hold of the things you had and cherishing them, that had to be something. That had to be a solution, because if it wasn't, Quentin didn't know what the world wanted from him.

"I don't want to be the hero. I don't want the weight of the world on my shoulders. I thought that was the life I wanted, but that's not me. That's a fucking delusion I dreamed up as a teenager just to get through each day. I get it. I learned my lesson. That's the end. That's the end of my story. I just want to be normal again."

Their coffee had long gone cold. The barista was wiping down the tables and putting the chairs up. He could hear the fluorescent lights buzzing above them.

Eliot leaned forward, bringing his other hand up to encase Quentin's, eyes a bit wide as they searched the wood grain for the right words before flicking up to meet his.

"I get it, Q, I definitely do. I'm not a fucking king," he laughed, shaking his head. "I'm just an egotistical theater kid from Indiana who dreamed too big and pushed my luck one too many times. I learned my lesson too. I don't need hand-sewn vests from Italy or the crown to a mystical land or silly magic tricks. All I need is you and I'll be happy," he said, lifting his hand up and pressing a chaste kiss to his knuckles.

Quentin sat up in his seat, sputtering in momentary surprise. "Y-you don't have to give all that up for me."

He gave him a fleeting smile, a slight roll of the eyes. "I'm not giving it up. I'm deciding that that's not what I want. Like a mature adult. Just like I decided to go sober. It's for the best and it will only help me in the future."

"Wait, really?" He was so genuinely caught off guard that he couldn't even bring himself to tease. "That's great!"

He waved a hand in dismissal. "Well, I was already halfway there by the time I got back, thanks to you, so I thought, why not just see it through?"

"Seriously? That's a huge change. A really fucking difficult one, that's for sure." He picked up his untouched coffee and held it up in invitation for cheers. "You know what, I'll give up drinking in solidarity. Smoking too, I should have never started back."

Eliot dropped his head onto their linked hands, letting out an exasperated sigh. "Quentin, you don't have to do that."

"Like you said, I'm just deciding that's not what I want. Like an adult." He shrugged, cheeks warming. "And, I'd do it for you anyways."

When Eliot's eyes met his again, there was an alarming sort of intensity to his stare, a tension in his jaw that he couldn't place. But then the beat passed and the corners of his mouth twitched up and he plucked his mug off the table and clinked it against Quentin's. Something in him expected some serendipitous fireworks to go off somewhere in the city, signalling the start of a new chapter, but the moment just faded graciously into the deep blue night marked by the halos of passing headlights and the hum of tires along the cooling streets.

"So that's it, we're giving up magic?" Eliot quipped, almost in disbelief.

"And drinking, and smoking, and recreational drugs, apparently. It's been a busy day," he chuckled, and he felt good, better than he had in a long time. A weight had been lifted, his mind was now clear.

"It's not like it's that big of a deal," continued Eliot, "we lived without magic for the majority of our lives, well, our lives within the linear flow of time, so it shouldn't be that difficult. And it doesn't have to be set in stone. Maybe we need a break, just put it on the back burner for a bit while we figure everything else out. It's like you said, we just need a bit of normalcy for once."

"If we can even figure out what that's supposed to be," he muttered, and Eliot laughed, and it was suddenly the most beautiful thing he'd ever heard.

The other man twisted his hand so he could intertwine their fingers, his slotting between Quentin's like fine machinery, made for each other. "Yeah, that might take a while."

And for a second he faltered, feeling as if the ground had been ripped out from under him, breath catching in his throat because in that moment it all finally clicked.

Because Eliot was giving him that look again, the same look he gave him that day in that park all those months ago, in those precious few seconds after he'd broken free from the Monster and spoken to him for the first time since Blackspire. He had looked at him like he had found the one thing he'd spent his whole life searching for.

He was looking at him like he was the answer.

He blinked a couple times, vision going out of focus. His body trilled like a rung bell, a steel grip clamping around his heart. How long had it been, how long had it been since Eliot decided that he. . . Why did he think that he was. . . Why him ? He had said that he would never have chosen him, but somewhere along the way he had, sometime between their past lives and now he had decided Quentin was all he needed. Had it been a conscious decision? Did he have any doubts? Why him? Why the clinically depressed supernerd who had a big problem with staying alive? Why the man who had dragged him to hell and back chasing a dream he would never reach? Why the man who was so afraid of losing him again that he wouldn't tell him he loved him?

He felt a tug on his hand and Eliot was standing before him, saying they needed to go. He left himself be pulled from his seat and out the door, the street lights and signs bleeding and blending together, his feet stumbling underneath him as he blindly followed, still numb from shock.

His heart was aching, pounding against his ribs. Eliot's hand was gripped tightly around his. He wanted. . .he'd wanted for so long. . . He was tired of wanting. Eliot was right in front of him, waiting for him with open arms. He'd had him for so long, why had he been holding back? Was he scared of finally getting what he wanted, of not having anything to lack, of not being empty anymore? Was he scared of finding the answer? Or was he scared that there may not be one?

He stopped in his tracks, their hands slipping apart, his falling to his side like a dead weight. He felt dizzy, like the world was whirling around him and he was stock still, there at the center of it all.

He was absolutely terrified.

"El?"

And he was right there, right in front of him, the concerned lines of his face casting strange shadows across his features. But even in the dingy yellow light and his plain button up he still looked just as stunning as the day they first met, when he thought that he'd found what he'd been missing within the sprawling campus of Brakebills, when in reality he'd left it behind on the front lawn with barely a second glance.

When he'd gotten him back from the Monster, that first day, Eliot had told him something about being brave. He told him that he loved him.

Quentin stepped forward and roughly took Eliot's face in his trembling hands, dragging him down so he could bring their lips together at last.

God, it had been so long.

He had missed this. The hot pressure of his lips sliding against his, the strong hand grasping the back of his neck, the long fingers trailing down the notches of his spine. He shivered under his touch, burrowing further into the warmth of his chest, hands tracing the curve of his neck, the slope of his shoulders. The bitter taste of coffee stained the inside of his mouth, the musty scent of dusk clinging to his skin.

It was only when the other man pulled away that he realized he was crying again.

Quentin's hands curled into the folds of Eliot's shirt, and Eliot gently wiped the tears from his cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. He didn't know why he was crying, but he did at least know that for once he felt okay. It wasn't the end of the world. Everyone, for the most part, was alive and okay. There was nothing to worry about, for the moment. And Eliot was here. He was here holding him in his arms like there was nothing else in the entire world.

Something had shifted in him. Like tectonic plates that have been grinding against each other for years, causing the very ground to quake, only to finally shift apart and settle into a quiet peace. He'd spent the majority of his life running from the idea of mundanity. Living in a quaint little neighborhood, working a nine to five job each day, seemed like it would be the death of him. He always believed that he was meant for greater things. But why did he have to be? Those years at the mosaic had been the antithesis of all of his childhood dreams, but he had been happy. Going on quests and fighting monsters, that had brought him nothing but suffering.

He wanted mundanity. He craved it. And he wanted it with Eliot. He had told him as much, all those months ago after they'd remembered their long past together in Fillory. He'd wanted to do it all again. But after Eliot had turned him down, he pushed those feelings down, masked them in front of Eliot, then in front of the Monster for the sake of his own survival. He hid them so far away that he thought they had faded away completely.

But there on that sidewalk outside the coffee shop in the looming shadows of skyscrapers, everything came rushing back in a wave so forceful it nearly knocked him off his feet.

"God, Eliot," he choked out. "I-I. . .I love you."

The other man took in a shallow breath and pressed his forehead against his.

"I love you too."