We stand in a circular room with burgundy walls that rise and rise until darkness swallows them. Twelve black doors are spaced evenly in the walls.

We aren’t the first ones back.

Barry barely spares us a glance as he pulls open one of the black doors to reveal a wall of bricks. He slams it so hard my teeth knock together, and then he’s on to the next, pulling it open on another brick wall.

“He’s already checked them all,” says a girl sitting cross-legged on the floor. She tugs her two strawberry blond braids. She’s the girl who pulled carnations from her sleeve for the opening test. She looks even younger up close, maybe only fourteen. Too young to be here. Where are her parents? It’s a ridiculous question I should know better than to ask.

“Shut up, Lucy,” the boy growls, slamming another door.

Lucy shrugs at us, nibbling on one of her fingernails. “That’s Barry. He’s been here the longest.”

“Try magic,” Lucy says.

“Fine.” Barry steps back.

I’m surprised they haven’t already. Magic pulses thick and heavy in the room.

I step toward him, then stop. Gold letters are inscribed on the black marble floor. DON’T CHOOSE, JUST DESIRE repeats again and again in a circle around the room’s center.

Of course. The magic controls everything here, shifting the rooms and passageways to take the magicians where they want to go.

Barry clenches his fists.

“Wait.” I gesture to the writing on the floor. “Did you read this?”

He turns to me with a scowl. “Of course. I know how to read.”

“I don’t think we should use magic to force ourselves through. All we have to do is want it badly enough, and the door will let us pass. Let me try.”

Barry’s face contorts with rage. “Nobody wants this more than I do.”

He swings the door open again, faces the bricks, and hurtles a blast of power so strong the floor buckles. The bricks turn to dust, revealing darkness beyond.

Barry tosses me a smug look.

I recognize the faint hiss, but I don’t have time to register what it belongs to.

I don’t have time to save him.

Not before a black arrow sails from the dark and pierces his throat.

CHAPTER 22

My instincts have been honed on survival for as long as I can remember—Parker’s and then my own. Nobody else’s really mattered to me until now. Parker’s not here, and so my first instinct is to save myself and Willow. My arm flings out in front of her.

Barry goes down on his knees and then falls backward.