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Rafe pouts. “I take it the private conversation didn’t go so well?”

“It went exactly how you thought it would go.”

“Would you have rather I kept the truth to myself?”

“I would rather the truth not be true.”

I can’t stop seeing the mark—those spidery tendrils curling around Jude’s ribcage. Fear has had me by the throat ever since. A terrible, strangling, sickening fear. So acute I would rip the veil open with my bare hands if I could.

But I can’t.

A fact that has heat gathering in my lungs all over again.

“How do I stop him?” I ask, myself more than Rafe.

He answers anyway. “For starters, you’d have to get to him.”

“I don’t know how,” I reply with gritted teeth. “I tried opening a rift last night with a plant that attacked me. And any other time I’ve come across a rift, it explodes.”

“Let me guess. You’re with Jude when this happens.”

I open my mouth to retort—does it matter?—but the question freezes on my tongue. Because yes, in fact. I have been with Jude. On both occasions. I think about that gremlin, hopping through a doorway in the woods, a rift as stable as any rift ever was. But then I returned with Jude and it slammed shut. The same thing happened in Lainey’s basement.

“I’m fairly confident,” Rafe says with a condescending smile, “it’s acting out of self-preservation.”

“What is?”

“The Overlay.” He prowls to my other side, frozen detritus crunching underfoot. “You and Jude broke a curse that has been feeding it for 268 years. Your antics made the entire dimensionglitch. It’s all very romantic, and very destabilizing. If I had to guess, I’d say it doesn’t like the two of you together very much.”

“You talk about it like it’s a living being.”

“It’s more like an immune system.”

I look out over the pond. A bare plinth rises from the center, along with several statues of nymphs covered in lichen.

“An immune system,” I repeat, letting the idea settle.

So then, if I were alone…

If it were just me.

If I could somehow knock out Lainey Sikes, bring her here, where Vorat is holding his hostages, use her wrist to open a rift?—

“I really wouldn’t, if I were you.”

“Wouldn’t what?” I ask.

“Play the hero.”

“Did you gain ESP while you were trapped in the Overlay?”

“As fun as a gift like that would be, I’m no mind reader.” He folds his hands behind his back. “Your thoughts were written all over that pretty face of yours, Selah. You’d be a horrible poker player.”

“I’ll keep that in mind the next time I’m at a table.”

Across the pond, a crow lands on the marblebench. Its wings flare, its talons reach as it settles on the cathedral-like backrest.

I shove my fists into my pockets, only vaguely aware of the pain in my forearm. It’s been nothing more than a dull ache since Jude stormed out of Evermore.