Romie chuckled. “And go where?”
“The neighboring towns we heard of. The ones without witches. We could ask them for protection.”
“We don’t even know where those townsare. Besides, the witches are supposed to be our allies. In the book—”
“Oh, screw the book, Ro. This is nothing like it.”
The harshness of her words caught them both off guard.
Emory sighed, brushing the hair from her face. “Look, we were clearly never meant to come here. I think you’re right, that in going through the sleepscape, coming here, it messed with the balance between worlds. Maybe it is what’s making the woods rot, what woke that thing in the sleepscape, what attracted the demon that possessed Bryony. The only way to fix all of it might be to just go home.”
“And what if it fixes nothing? What if we leave and the woods keep rotting, and the witches lose their magic, and things just get worse and worse for them?”
Emory’s face was set in grim determination. “If the alternative is them sacrificing us to heal their woods? Then I say we save ourselves while we can.”
Romie stared at her friend in disbelief. “You have all this incredible power running through your veins, all this potential as someone who can open literal doors between worlds… and you want us to run back home like cowards?”
“That’s not fair.”
Romie gave a harsh laugh. “It’s the truth, though, isn’t it? We have the chance to do some good here, because yes, I believe we’re here for a reason, that there’s some semblance of truth to Clover’s story and that we were chosen to see it through. We heard the call ofgods, Em. If we abandon this idea now and just go home, it would mean everything we went through, everyone we lost, was for nothing. Would you be able to live with that? ’Cause I couldn’t.”
Emory averted her gaze, seeming to fight back tears. Romie feltbad, but she didn’t take any of it back, her conviction unshakable. She’d always been the type of person who got bored chasing after dreams and goals, abandoning them whenever things got tough. This was the first time she wanted to see something to the very end despite all the complications, all the things she’d lost to get here. She couldn’t give up now.
At last Emory gave a heaving sigh, and Romie knew she’d won her over. “Fine,” she said, “but if they burn us at the stake for this, I’ll never forgive you.”
Romie threw her arm over Emory’s shoulder, unable to hide her smile as she dragged her out of the herbarium. “Come on. Let’s start by finding this damn door. No point arguing over something that might not even be there.”
They were steps away from the garden gate when a voice echoed behind them.
“Where are you going?”
Aspen stood there with her arms crossed.
“We’re not prisoners here, are we?” Romie asked with a raised brow. “Not now that the ascension’s done, anyway.”
“It’s not safe to go into the woods on your own.”
“So come with us.”
A pause. “Where?”
“The waterfall where you found us. We want to make sure we didn’t miss anything last time.”
Aspen threw a look behind her as if debating whether it was worth displeasing her mother. Finally she crossed the garden gate ahead of them. They followed.
The woods seemed normal to Romie as they walked through them. But the deeper they went, the more obvious it became that something was wrong. An eerie stillness. A stench in the air. A state of decay that was unnatural for autumn.
Even the waterfall was all wrong, seeming completely driedup. There was, of course, no door there. Just like last time they checked. The rot was worse here, the ravine nearly black with sludge. Aspen’s face blanched at the sight. Then Romie noticed what she was staring at: a dead deer, its hide decomposing, flies swarming over its shedding antlers.
Romie covered her mouth. “Tides, that’shorrifying.” Her gaze drifted to Emory, who wasn’t looking at the carcass, but rather at the decaying leaves beneath her feet, her fingers splayed out in front of her as if she were running them through water. Romie swore she saw a ripple of silver beneath her skin. A trick of the light, there and gone in a flash. Unease gathered in her stomach. “Em, you okay?”
Emory looked at her with an odd expression. “Don’t you feel that?”
“Feel what?”
“It’s like there’s an electric current running under my feet, and the air feels… charged. Alive with power.” Again she ran a hand through the air in front of her, mesmerized by whatever invisible force she was sensing. Her breathing picked up, chest heaving as if she were running. She pulled her hand back and looked at Romie with something like fear. “Don’t you feel it?”
“I can’t say I do.”
