He’s caressing the branches of the tree hosting the obsidian passage, examining it from every angle. “A few more years, and those roots would’ve blocked the passage altogether.”
All this time, this portal remained dormant above my head, a few creaking steps and a warded trapdoor away, our birthright tucked into the rafters.
“Maybe she stopped using it at some point,” I murmur. “Maybe it became too dangerous.”
“According to her diaries, she considered closing the passage a hundred times over, but given how emotional I feel right now, I can see why she didn’t,” Nick says.
“Did you sleep at all last night?” I ask, dumbfounded that he could’ve already gone through so much of the text we found.
“No,” he admits with a lopsided grin.
He’s right about Mabel, though. “Mabs lived the better part of her life in this forest. Destroying her way home would’ve been like tearing out a part of herself.”
“I bet she even crossed the passage once in a while.”
I nod at that. I bet she did, too. Just far enough to feel the bed of leaves beneath her bare feet, to touch the land and bring a little of its power back with her.
No wonder she was still the most powerful witch alive.
I take another step forward and glance behind me. The black shimmer we traveled through disappears, and the tree becomes indistinguishable from the other root-bound trunks around us. No visible seam remains.
The passage is buried beneath an illusion, warding runes likely shielding the opening from sight. I circle back, and the obsidian shimmer reveals itself again.
Nick drops his bag onto the forest floor and pulls out a thin leather-bound book full of colored tabs. “According to the map, there’s a safehouse nearby, but we should seal the passage behind us before we go any further.”
I swallow hard.
“Seal it?” E asks, mirroring my unease.
“Yes. The obsidian passage will not be destroyed when the Mist King shows up to collect the spindle and decides to make good on his threat to burn the house down. Logic dictates he could potentially use it to follow us here once the house is gone,” Nick says, flipping through the book. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want this creep to pick up our trail. When I combed through Mabel’s Book of Shadows and the other grimoires last night, I found a closing rite written in case she ever needed to cut the house off from Faerie for good.”
“But can you do that?” E muses, clearly unconvinced.
Without missing a beat, my twin glances up from the page. “Aye. All bridges between worlds are forged in shadow yet answer to blood. Wards drawn to keep strangers out are painted in blood, each line akin to a key turning in a lock. Closing an obsidian passage is like turning that key one final time and snapping it off in the mechanism.
“Bloodraven blood is the only ingredient needed to seal the portal forever, and the ritual looks easy enough. We can easily manage it between us.”
He’s kind to sayuswhen he’s never known me to be particularly talented at witchcraft. Almost all my successful spells were cast in the last week.
“But a bridge shattered is not easily mended,” E says quietly. “If you close the passage, it’ll leave us stranded here.”
Nick nods in agreement. “Once sealed, only the Shadow King may reopen it. If we do this, there’ll be no easy retreat. No panicked dash back to the house, to Scotland. Once we seal it, we can’t go back.”
My fingers drift to the curve of Lady’s body through the carrier, and I ground myself in the warmth of her fur and the soothing rhythm of her breathing. Then, I rest the lantern on the ground for a moment and tighten the straps of my backpack around my shoulders. The weight reminds me that I packed everything that mattered. Mabel’s pictures. My tarot cards. Spare clothes. Herbs and medicine. The tiny fragments of a life I could carry away before the Mist King reduced the rest to ash.
Some part of me must’ve known I wasn’t going back.
“Let’s do it now, before we change our minds,” I grumble.
Nick doesn’t hesitate. He slices his palm and lets his blood drip at the base of the tree. I follow suit and imitate him until our blood seeps into the roots and moss, dark and bright all at once.
“Dark One, heed our prayers,” I say, putting the spell in motion.
Nick begins the chant he found in Mabel’s book, and I join him on the second line, our voices threading together in a way only twins can manage.
“Shadows found and shadows grown,
Take this path and make it none.
