Whether Pan had let her catch up, or whether she’d really made it just in the nick of time, Jo couldn’t be sure—and she didn’t much care. With a breath, she pushed the door open all the way, only to find that, even with the light filtering in from the hallway, the room beyond was completely shrouded in darkness. No. Not just darkness.
Emptiness.
“Well? Why don’t you come inside?”
The voice echoed from deep within, a sing-song lilt that Jo knew all too well. And she knew instantly she shouldn’t obey it, had never known such truth, but she could also feel herself being tugged inside, a firm grip deep in her core that refused to let go.
She couldn’t have turned away if she tried.
Chapter 24
Pan’s Room
The door shut behind her with a bang so loud its echoes seemed to shake the very foundation of the Society.
Assuming she was even still in the Society. Something about where she now stood felt distinctly different, as though she had been transported to another plane of existence entirely. It was like a superior version of the recreation rooms in concept, but in execution was pure nothingness.
The darkness around her was a tangible thing. Jo never knew there could be so many shades of black until she was standing in that primordial void. It seemed to swirl and change, condensing until it was almost tangible before wafting away again on a breeze that Jo could not feel.
She wanted to ask what it was. Every molecule in her body knew it should be terrified of this raw. . .essence. Yet she was not afraid and, if anything, the lack of fear was what put her on edge most. Jo pressed her mouth into a thin line, not letting a question slip or an emotion find its way onto her face. She would not give Pan the satisfaction of her curiosity.
Eventually, when Pan had no doubt grown bored of her silence, a voice manifested right over her shoulder. “What do you think?”
Jo turned on instinct toward the sound. It was as if Pan had whispered right in her ear, soft and throaty, yet the words reverberated on the infinite corners of a room that did not seem to quite exist. The door to the room should’ve still been at her back, but there was only more darkness. Far, far away, an animal-like sense told her the exit was beyond her reach.
“Come closer.” A teal-nail-polished hand gestured from the darkness, and then an arm. It hovered, seemingly mid-air, the body it was attached to still obscured. Pan beckoned her with a curl of her index finger, a light sweep through the air, and then—
Jo was falling.
Air rushed around her as the unseen floor gave out underneath her feet like a trap door. A shout of surprise ripped open the terse line of her lips. Cackling was the only response to the sound. The darkness seemed to vibrate with sheer amusement.
Light glowed up from her feet, drawing her attention just in time to see the black fog-like magic beginning to disappear. She slowed, plunging through the bottom like an airplane on its final descent. Her toes touched the ground first, and then the balls of her feet.
A forest glade surrounded her. Sunlight streamed through the boughs from the trees, striking beams of light onto the mossy floor below. Motes of—well, Jo didn’t quite knowwhatthey were. Little balls of light, like fireflies but much larger, danced through the air, swirling around each other before flitting away.
She spun in place, searching—it was not a spot Jo recognized. But it was a time that seemed somehow familiar. It was like trying to remember a place someone described for you while you were both drunk. The darkness from before was kept at bay behind the bars of the trees, tendrils of living smoke tried to swirl out, but could not penetrate the space—save for one.
What seemed like a blur of darkness sped over her shoulder with awooshof air that pulled her hair in its backdraft. Jo jerked, but it was of no threat. The beam solidified into some kind of lance,an arrow, and plunged into a strange carving made in the bark of a pale tree.
Jo turned to face the source.
Pan stood—no, not Pan, but like Pan. It was Pan’s eyes and hair, but something was different. In her cheeks and lips Jo saw. . .herself.
The woman—Oblivion, Jo realized—was swathed in tight leather of all colors. It was wrapped around her bodice, and flapped in a rainbow of shades around her legs as she moved, shifting from darkness to light. Her hair seemed to float, hovering against gravity in the air, changing shades of color with the rustle of an unfelt breeze through the trees. In her hand she held a wide arc of darkness that evaporated between her fingers.
“Hunt. Foolish woman. Thought this would bring us down. But it was not, was it?”
“What?”
Jo pivoted to look back at the—
The carved tree and the spear of black vanished. In its place was a long hallway. Iron lanterns hovered in a ceiling that Jo would’ve guessed to be over twenty feet tall. At the far end was a door, the crack of light it struck on the ground dangerously inviting.
It wasn’t like she had a choice.
Jo steeled herself and pressed forward into the madness. The door stayed just out of reach, never seeming to get closer. Jo picked up the pace, faster and faster until she was practically sprinting.
All at once, she burst through the door, tripping down a step and tumbling into a room filled with every curiosity imaginable. Tapestries lined the walls with a jeweler’s vault’s worth of gems and jewelry dangling from them. Herbs hung between strips of meat on the ceiling that was covered in all kinds of painting. Mechanics whirred on one wall, cranking sparks on occasion from the strain of the mysterious tasks they were performing.
