Placing her hand on the strip of metal, Vi took a deep breath and cut off the funnel of magic to the flame over her shoulder. This would be easier to do as a Firebearer than risk blowing off the whole door withjuth. She pushed her magic into her palm—just enough, she commanded mentally.
Her overabundance of care made it agonizingly slow, but the metal eventually heated to the point where a soft, reddish glow began to illuminate the passage once more. When it was molten hot, Vi pushed, her feet scraping against the stone as she sought to put all her weight against the heavy door.
It gave way, and she breathed a deep breath of fresh desert air.
Vi turned, settling the door closed as softly as possible, pressing it flush once more.The door was one-way. On the outside it was nothing more than smooth stone about to nestle into place with the wall.
“Good thing I wasn’t going back in,” she mumbled as she caught her bearings.
The narrow alleyway the door had put her in dead-ended against the other buildings on one end, the center of the Crossroads on the other. Vi pulled up the scarf around her neck, situating it to conceal her face as much as possible. She gave herself one last assessment before stepping out into the light of the street lamps.
Her clothes were of fine make, but she didn’t think they screamed “princess”. Her face was shadowed and covered, the scarf she used was sun-bleached and worn from the desert. And, more than any of that, she was alone. No one expected to see the Princess Solaris alone, so hopefully they’d see no one at all when they looked at her.
Vi stepped into the main Crossroads and immediately headed right, away from the hotel.
She hugged the walls of darkened storefronts and avoided the welcoming glow of street lamps as though they were stage spotlights that could betray her. Her hands continually adjusted her headscarf, making sure that it was safely in place, and she felt her entire body tense whenever a passerby’s feet entered her field of vision.
Her heart was in her throat the entire time, yet nothing happened. She began to feel easier as she rounded the corner to the East-West Way—the great street that connected Norin, capital of the West, with Hastan, capital of the East. Along this street was the great market of the Crossroads.
She pulled the key from her pocket, looking at the now familiar iron rose at one end. The woman had said the curiosity shop was somewhere along here, and the embellishment on the key was all she had to go on. She began walking the streets, crammed even in darkness with empty stalls, archways, and sunshades that offered protection from moonlight.
There were doors by doors by doors, all nestled in every way they could be conceived to fit—like crooked teeth in a too-small mouth. They were wedged between stalls and cornered at alleyways. Vi studied the lock on each one, the signs, the embellishments.
Her feet came to a stop.
Across the narrowed street was an unassuming iron gate. Thorny bars knotted together to ward away anyone from even so much as leaning on it. They came together at face-height to fold into a rose insignia that was rendered with alarmingly life-like detail.
As if in a trance, Vi crossed to it, pulling the key from her pocket. She knew it would fit before she even inserted it into the hole and yet, as she did, there was a heavy weight to her every motion. The lock disengaged with a quiet metallic clang.
Taking a breath, Vi pushed open the gate and stepped into the darkness that awaited her at the next Apex of Fate.
Chapter Seventeen
The room was notthe sort of dark that fell over the land when the sun went to sleep. The darkness here was deeper, richer, and so impenetrable that not even light or noise seemed to exist within. It was so complete that Vi had to turn back to the gate leading to the Crossroads to assure herself that she hadn’t gone blind.
The gate… had closed behind her without so much as a sound.
In fact, there were no sounds in the void she now found herself in. Her breathing rattled her chest, hitching in a panic that rose with the tone of her voice as she almost squeaked, “Hello?”
If there was ever a moment when Vi was certain she was going to die, it was then. But she didn’t die. Nothing happened at all.
Vi took two more steps forward, bumping into a table in the darkness. She tilted forward, pressing both hands down for balance. Something crunched under her palms and Vi hastily lifted them, shaking away the dried flakes.
Did she even want to know what that was?
Summoning bravery and her flame, Vi looked. The whole table was scattered with flecks of deep crimson—but it wasn’t dried blood.
“Rose petals?” Vi picked one up and it nearly disintegrated between her fingers, time weighing too heavily on the fragile petal.
Far in the back, there was a sliver of light—a red glow she hadn’t seen before. It was ominous, terrifying, and she was certain it was where she needed to go.
Slowly, Vi stepped around the table. On the outer edge of the room were empty shelves—all save one, which held quills lined neatly in silver inkwells. They glinted in the light of her tiny dancing flame, as if winking back at her. Suppressing a shiver, Vi pressed on.
As she neared the sliver of angry light, a new scent tickled her nose. It was earthy, familiar, though Vi couldn’t place it until she felt the crunch of dried grasses under her feet.
No, not grass.
“Wheat?” Vi crouched down, looking back. Nothing but darkness pressed in on her. She couldn’t see the light of the Crossroads peeking through the iron of the gate. Both the table of rose petals and the shelf of quills were invisible to her now. “What is this place?” Vi muttered as she straightened.
