The rest of his warning died on his lips. Kai’s head snapped backward as shadows rushed him and bound him, filling his open mouth until he was choking on them. Something grabbed his neck, claws cold against his skin. A giant umbra towered over him. A cloak of billowing shadows trailed behind it, and atop its head sat a crown of obsidian. It had no mouth to speak with, but its voice—old and guttural and melodious all at once, a voice he had heard before—spoke in Kai’s mind.
Fear Eater. Nightmare Weaver. Have you come to free me at last?
Kai struggled against its grip, feeling himself drift toward unconsciousness as the creature’s shadows suffocated him. He knew then, without a doubt, that what had been plaguing his nightmares these past few months wasreal. The ultimate nightmare, a creature the umbrae bowed to as their king.
If the sleepscape was a world of its own, a whole universe yet to be explored, then this, he knew, was its ruler.
And it wanted nothing more than to escape.
19EMORY
THEY LEFT BY MIDDAY, WITHAspen guiding them into the woods, her mother’s map of the ley lines tucked safely in her pocket. They were cutting across the spiral ley line to get directly to its center, where Mrs. Amberyl confirmed the door should be. After what happened with Bryony, they all thought it best to remain off the ley line, in case what had possessed her turned to one of them next.
Emory had thought Mrs. Amberyl might come with them, or maybe try to convince Aspen not to go. But it seemed she was finally trusting her eldest daughter to set off on her own. As they said their goodbyes, Emory couldn’t help but overhear Mrs. Amberyl saying she wouldn’t leave Bryony’s side, and that was why she wasn’t coming. She wondered if, deep down, Mrs. Amberyl was staying out of self-preservation. If watching Aspen go through the door would only break her heart further, thinking how she might not see her again.
“Don’t sacrifice too much of yourself,” Mrs. Amberyl said as she gripped Aspen tight.
Sacrifice: that was the only thing the High Matriarch knew was needed to open the door. Emory thought back to Dovermere and the ritual that the Selenic Order did around the Hourglass. A slice of their palm, an offering of their blood. Blood—which was a key element to their lunar magic. An unsettling thought came to her, but she dared not voice it. Not if it meant risking Aspen backing out or Mrs. Amberyl deciding she didn’t want to grant Emory and Romie leave after all.
The deeper into the forest they went, the worse the rot became. Trees here were completely decayed, and the very air around them was putrid. Dead animal carcasses littered the ground, full of maggots. Flies droned around them like bad omens. Death lingered, and any magic that might have thrived here once seemed depleted now, affected by this blight.
“It feels like something is watching us,” Romie said at one point, even though there was nothing but them and the rotting woods for miles around.
Aspen perked up at that, frowning. “You feel it too?”
A chill ran through Emory. “Let’s just keep going.” She sensed it too. Something looming near, like a predator on the loose. She thought of the demon that had possessed Bryony and couldn’t help but wonder if it had escaped somehow, slipping into this world to claim them next.
With how on edge they were, making camp for the night in these dark woods seemed like the beginning of an all-too-real nightmare. Even with the fire Aspen built—painstakingly so, for every other piece of wood they found was rotted through—they couldn’t help but jump up at the slightest noise, glancing over their shoulders to peer into the darkness at the edge of the firelight.
As they ate cheese and bread, Emory noticed Romie stealing glances at her. She’d been doing so all day, as if monitoring Emory’s every movement.
“Okay, out with it,” Emory snapped.
“What?” Romie asked with her mouth full.
“You’ve been staring at me like you think I might grow a second head or burst into flames.”
Romie kept chewing quietly, as if delaying her response. “I guess I’m still trying to figure out why you didn’t Collapse.” Her eyes were trained on Emory’s wrists and the bluish veins at her pulse point. “I saw the silver. Youshouldhave Collapsed.”
It was Emory’s turn to go quiet. She had been mulling it over all day, and the only explanation she had was this: “I think being on the ley line stopped me from Collapsing. Like it lent me some of its power or something.”
“Or something,” Romie muttered, voice laced with doubt. She eyed Emory with suspicion. “What about if you use magic now that we’re off the ley line? Will it throw you over the edge?”
“I used Memorist magic yesterday and was fine.”
Romie cocked a brow. “Fine? You threw your hands over your ears and looked like you were under the worst sort of torture. And it’s not the first time you’ve acted so strangely after using magic.”
So shehadnoticed. Emory sighed and decided on a sliver of the truth. “After the ley line, all that magic… it made me see ghosts.”
“Ghosts.”
“I figured I must have tapped into my Shadowguide magic and drawn them up. Or maybe I was imagining them. I’m not sure. But I swear, I have it under control.”
“Do you?” A harsh laugh slipped from Romie’s lips. “Tides, you don’t even realize what you did.”
Emory tried to fight the embarrassed flush that rose to her face. Suddenly it felt like she was back in the past, nothing buta mediocre Healer sulking in Romie’s shadow. Except the stakes were higher now that she was a Tidecaller. An Eclipse-born who might Collapse at any moment just like Romie’s father had. A pang of understanding hit her. Of course Romie was wary of her, after seeing the devastation her own father’s Collapsing had brought on, and then seeing Emory nearly Collapse the same way.
Still, the lack of faith hurt her more deeply than she could say. She was compelled with a desperate need to prove herself capable, but fear kept her from calling on her magic here in these woods, so close to the ley line they were tracking.
