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Felicity reaches out tentatively. “You believe that leads to the realms?”
“On the night of the fire, the Winterlands creature came to take Sarah,” I remind them. “And Eugenia Spence offered herself in Sarah’s place. She threw her amulet—this amulet—to my mother and sealed the door into the realms. The East Wing burned. All traces of the door were gone.”
“We don’t know that this is the same door,” Ann says, shivering. “It could lead anywhere. To the Winterlands, perhaps.”
“I’m willing to take that chance,” I say, embracing the glimmer of hope I’ve been offered.
“W-we c-c-could be trapped,” Ann says.
“We’re already trapped,” Felicity says. “I want to find out what has happened to Pip.” She takes my arm. I grab the lantern.
“Ann?” I reach out, and she slips her cold fingers into mine, holding tightly. I take a deep breath, and we step forward. For a second, it feels as if we’re falling, and then there is nothing but the dark. It smells musty and sweet.
“Gemma?” Ann’s whisper.
“Yes?”
“What has happened to Felicity?”
“I’m here,” Fee says. “Wherever that may be.”
I swing the lamp in first and am able to see a few feet ahead. It’s a long passageway. The lamplight falls on high arched ceilings of pale stone. Roots dangle through cracks here and there. In back of us, Spence sleeps, but it’s as if that world lies behind glass, and we push on.
As we pass, the walls flicker with a faint glow, like hundreds of fireflies lighting the way ahead, while the path behind us shifts into darkness again. The passageway twists and turns in a confusing fashion.
Ann’s jitters echo in the tunnel. “Don’t get us lost, Gemma.”
“Will you be quiet?” Felicity scolds. “Gemma, you’d best be right about this.”
“Keep walking,” I say.
We come to a wall.
“We’re trapped,” Ann says in a shaky voice. “I knew it would come to this.”
“Oh, do stop it,” Fee barks.
It has to be here. I won’t give up. Let the magic go, Gemma. Feel it. Unleash its power. Something’s calling to me. It’s as if the stones themselves are waking. The outline of another door appears in the wall, fierce light bleeding around its corners. I give the door a shove. It swings open, accompanied by a flurry of dust, as if it has been sealed for ages, and we step into a meadow redolent of roses. The sky is a clear blue in one direction and the golden orange of sunset in the other. It’s a place we know well but have not seen for some time.
“Gemma,” Felicity murmurs. Her awe gives way to jubilation. “You’ve done it! We’ve made it back to the realms at last!”
CHAPTER NINE
“IT’S SO BEAUTIFUL!” FELICITY SHOUTS. SHE TWIRLS ABOUT, making herself so dizzy she falls down in the tall grass, but she’s laughing as she does.
“Oh, it is like the most wondrous spring I’ve ever seen,” Ann murmurs. And indeed, it is. Long velvet ropes of moss hang from the tops of trees like gossamer green curtains; branches blossom with pink and white flowers. A gentle breeze sweeps them onto our upturned cheeks and lips. They nestle in my hair, making it smell sweet as new rain. I rub a flower between my fingers, inhaling its scent; I have to be sure that it is real, that I am not dreaming.
“We’re really here, aren’t we?” I ask as Fee entwines herself in the moss as if it were ermine.
“Yes, we are,” Fee assures me.
For the first time in months, hope flutters up through my soul: If I can do this, bring us into the realms, then all is not lost.
“This isn’t the garden,” Ann says. “Where are we?”
“I don’t know,” I say, looking about. Tall slabs of stone have been erected in a seemingly random pattern that puts me in mind of Stonehenge. Winding through them is a faint dirt path that reaches from the door to the realms beyond. The path is difficult to see, as if it hasn’t been used in a very long time.
“There’s a little trail here,” I say. “We’ll follow it.”
