Melia’s fingertips brushed against Eleanor’s temples. Melia looked deep into her eyes. For a moment Eleanor felt only her cool touch, and then there was a sharp pinch that shot down to the very center of her body.

It felt like she was a pumpkin getting its guts scooped out. It didn’t hurt, exactly, but it might have been better if it did.

Melia was kind, at least. She took Eleanor’s fear first, so there was only one quick blaze of panic and then she could stand calmly as other parts of her were sheared away. She hadn’t understood what it would mean to be Empty until she felt it happening. Grief—gone. The memory of her mother’s face with the hedgewitch’s eyes peering from it didn’t inspire any sadness anymore. It was just a fact.

Friendship—that was torn away, too. Pip and Otto were people she knew, but she couldn’t quite recall why she spent so much time with them.

The delight of her cousin Naomi’s babble faded. The warm comfort of Jenny’s arms wrapped around her went, too, and the simple wonder of looking up at the night sky. She wasn’t truly Empty. Her memories remained, cluttering up her insides. But none of them had meaning anymore.

With every piece of her that vanished, the garden grew. Flowers bloomed; vines snaked up the walls. Was that where everything in the garden had come from? Pieces of people who had been Emptied?

“I have to leave you something,” Melia had said. “Tucked away, but still there. Otherwise none of it will grow back.”

When Melia stepped away, it took Eleanor a few dull seconds to find the fragment of herself that had been left. It took her another moment to realize what it was.

Determination.

They were going to get out of here.

“Eleanor?” Melia said. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” she said. Her voice was flat. All of her was flat.

Thea whimpered when Melia started to Empty her. Eleanor remembered that she would have felt bad for the girl a few minutes ago, but that was gone now. Soon enough, the garden was lusher than ever, and Thea walked over to Eleanor, standing placidly beside her.

“Now me,” Melia said, and straightened her shoulders. Ash grimaced as he stretched out his hands, but Melia hardly blinked. It wasn’t long before he stepped back, a frown on his face.

“Is something wrong?” Eleanor asked.

“No,” he said. “It’s just . . . that was easier than I expected.”

“Because you are growing more skilled,” Melia noted in a monotone. “May I begin?”

He nodded, and she reached for him.

When she was done they all stood, drab but not entirely colorless, and surveyed each other without emotion.

“I will need to apply the illusions to complete the effect,” Melia said tonelessly.