“I don’t know what you mean,” I respond, but the panic from earlier returns, crawling up my throat.
“I think something... changed in me,” Lydia says.
My first instinct is to comfort her. “You—” It takes everything in me to say “died” without sobbing again. “I think anyone would be changed by that.”
“No,” Lydia whispers. “I think I came back different. Not wrong—” She searches for the words. “But not... what I once was.”
My blood turns to ice. I force myself to look at Lydia more closely than I have been. Her back has been to me for most of our conversation, but now I truly see her.
Her skin glows so dimly, it would be easy to convince myself I was imagining it, and in her eyes, there’s a spark of light, as if from the Otherworld’s double moons.
She is still my sister, but I can also sense that she’s more than that somehow.
“What do you mean?” I ask in a whisper.
“This place brought me back to life. I can feel its magic flow through me now, like blood in my veins. We’re tied together.”
“No,you and Iare tied together.” My voice breaks.
Lydia’s face crumples. “Not like this.”
The joy at seeing my sister alive is swallowed by a wave of sadness.
“You don’t know that,” I argue, my voice sharp. “Don’t make assumptions with no evidence. Go on, open the door. Just try.”
Lydia sighs like she’s placating me and waves her hand in an arc.
A portal to Kensington Park opens in the middle of the room, showcasing a great oak tree, ablaze with orange leaves that flutter to the ground. The gentle breeze floats into Lydia’s room and scatters the stack of sketches on her desk.
I stand and thrust one foot through the door to England, so I’m straddling our two worlds. I offer Lydia my outstretched hand and she sighs, but takes it obligingly.
Cool autumn air envelops me as I step through completely, but the pressure of Lydia’s hand in mine disappears, floating away in a wisp of white smoke. When I turn back, she’s staring at me sadly through the portal, feet firmly in her room in the Otherworld.
“No,” I rasp.
Lydia offers me a sad smile. “You can always come visit me.”
“But Mama and Papa—” I hiccup as a cry I can’t stop escapes my lips. We’ll never again drink tea in our family’s drawing room together, or snicker behind our fans at a bad pantomime, or walk through Belgrave Square arm in arm.
It feels as if I’ve lost her twice in one day.
Lydia’s eyes shine with tears. “Mama and Papa can come visit, as can you, any time you wish. In fact, I insist upon it.”
I step back through, into the warmth of her room, and seal the door behind me. “But I’m going to miss you so much.”
Lydia wraps me in a tight hug. “It was always going to be this way, whether I married Percival Chapwick or became queen. Life was always going to force us away from each other. But it’ll be better this way, won’t it? Knowing that I’m exactly where I’m meant to be.”
I sleep next to Lydia that night, but by the time I’m awoken at dawn, the space next to me is cold.
Eloree nudges me gently awake and dresses me in one of Lydia’s gowns, something pale pink and gauzy. “Is everything all right?” I ask blearily.
Eloree nods. “Your sister requests an audience.”
In the great hall, I join a crowd of equally exhausted-looking courtiers, in various states of dress.
Emmett finds me quickly and pulls me into a crushing embrace, then plants a kiss on top of my head. “I missed you. Do you know what this is about?”
“I thought you might,” I reply, and he shakes his head.
