The car stops in front of Mickey’s house, and Mickey is out and through the Door as fast as I am. The moment he ends up in Torin’s realm, he calls up two beasts and climbs onto one of them.
“It’s that way,” I tell him, pointing.
I’m given no choice as I clamber onto the other creature that races after Mickey, who is already twenty feet from me and gaining. I cling on, convinced I’m going to die before we even make it to the Door at this speed.
We reach the area where Torin and I had been earlier—just a desolate field locked in time. When I drop off the creature’s back, the petrified flowers turn to dust beneath my feet. I hurry forward to the spot where I can feel the remains of the Door. “It’s here,” I say.
Mickey nods as he dismounts, digs through his bag, and opens a different book. “I’ve never opened a Door before.”
“Do you even have the magic to?”
“Not to create a Door, but using this book and this very handy mage I’ve brought back from the dead, we’re going to give repairing this one our best shot.” He waves a woman I hadn’t seen appear over to help him.
While he does that, my attention drifts back to the spot I’d been drawn to earlier. I know I shouldn’t go near it since the last time I did, I lost myself to the magic and ended up unconscious with Torin carrying me back. But before I can stop myself, I find my way back to it, the strange magic buzzing around me as I reach down and try to scoop the dirt away. Whatever it is that is pulling me isn’t very deep, hidden more by the passage of time versus someone burying it. When my fingers touch something oddly cold beneath the surface, I bring it up and brush my fingers over what appears to be a metal medallion about the size of my palm. It looks like it was once connected to something, but I don’t have much time to examine it before Mickey calls me over.
“Well… it’s open,” Mickey says, staring at the newly repaired Door. “Not… quite sure how good of a plan this is.”
“We’ve definitely had better ones,” I comment as I take in the ominous black glow of the Door. “Mickey… why don’t you stay here?”
“I’m not letting you go alone.”
“Do you really think we’re going to accomplish this?” I ask. “You could just… stay here. Stock up on food, hide here…”And keep Torin company if I die… I don’t mention that last part out loud.
Mickey grabs my hand and pulls me around to face him. “Riley, you’re my best friend. You’re the only living person I’ve ever met who has treated me like a normal person. I’m prepared to go to hell and back with you. So let’s go.”
“Thank you.”
“You owe me so much after this is done, though. I expect you to carry me everywhere we go.”
“Deal,” I say as I step up to the Door, well aware that traveling from here, across an unknown realm, and out the other Door might not be anywhere near as simple as we’re hoping. Mickey squeezes my hand, prepared to hold on while we pass through it.
I step through the Door a second before it cracks and an explosion throws me forward, ripping Mickey’s hand away from mine as I hit the ground. Thankfully, I keep Kit tucked close into me, but as soon as I land on my hands and knees, all of my magic cuts off and I’m immersed in darkness.
“Mickey?” I call anxiously as I press my hand against Kit’s back to reconnect my eyes to hers, but it’s almost like my magic is dead here, unreachable. The only magic I can feel is the unfamiliar one I still don’t know how to use. I also notice that the medallion I’d picked up is starting to warm up. I slip it into my pocket and feel the heat radiating through it even from inside there.
I can’t do this. There’s no possible way I’ll ever find the other Door while blind. I have to go back through. I have to get to Mickey. If I’m forced to be without Kit’s sight, then I need someone to lead me through this realm.
“Kit, where’s the Door?”
She jumps off my shoulder, and I listen to her as she moves forward. With outstretched arms, I take a step after her, and my hand bumps against something hard. I can tell it’s the Door so I reach for the handle, but when I turn it, the handle crumbles beneath my touch.
“No, no, no,” I beg while I feel around the Door, but all I can feel are cracks running across the surface, spreading before I can do anything. “Fuck.” I try to pry the Door open with my nails, but I can’t get it open, and the more I try, the more it crumbles beneath my touch.
Maybe Mickey can reopen it… but do I have time to wait? It’s not like I can do much else when I can’t see anything, though. I’m going to get Kit and myself killed. I’m not going to be able to help Torin. I’ve fucked everything up.
Worry and anger churn inside me, but more than anything, I can feel that magic swirling around me, and I can feel the medallion in my pocket growing hotter and hotter. I debate throwing it out but there’s something that draws me to it, and when I press my hand against my pocket, I discover that it makes me feel more at ease.
I take a step away from the Door and my foot immediately begins to sink into water. I jerk back as I question if I’m on the edge of a river or a pond. I drop to my hands and knees and reach out, but I feel water everywhere I go around this Door.
And that’s when I hear something splashing in it.
“Kit, here,” I call to her. She rushes over and jumps into my arms before I set her on my shoulder, and her tail anxiouslywraps around my neck. I hear something moving in the water, but I also hear the sound of heavy chains with each step.
I turn and face whatever it is, but as soon as I do, it stops moving. I can’t tell whether it’s five feet away or fifteen. I can’t tell whether it’s going to kill me or ignore me. But the foreign magic that’s wrapped around me reaches out for it, like it wants it… or maybe it belongs to it.
I hear another splash of water and the sound of those heavy chains as it starts to move away from me. I slowly take a step toward it, my foot sinking into the water before I realize that it’s only up to my knees.
I shift back to the Door, unsure if I should wait in case Mickey is currently working on repairing it, or if he’s evenableto. The chains stop moving… is it waiting for me? But why the hell would I follow it? Because this uncontrollable magic that has harmed me as much as it’s helped me wants to follow it?
