Eleanor resisted the urge to tell Melia to hurry. Melia already knew she needed to move quickly. Rushing her wouldn’t help. But once Pip was free—“Boredom hates a locked door”—Eleanor leaned in to whisper to her.

“Have Gloaming ready. The umbral hounds are near.”

Pip nodded. Melia unmade the keys with a gesture, and Pip gave a shiver as the sliver of boredom slipped back into her.

The growling that Eleanor had heard earlier came again, closer this time. The hounds were close. She reached for the Wending—and found nothing. She frowned. She’d found it before. Why wasn’t it there now? She reached again. This time, she felt it—the way between worlds. It was faint, but growing slowly brighter.

It wasn’t the only faint thing. All the bright threads that joined her to the others had faded almost to nothing. All her connections to people. All the connections between worlds.

Come on, Wending, she thought. Her whole self was coming alive again, and any minute the Empty would sense her or the hounds would arrive.

“Now,” Ash said, tearing her attention away. “How are you getting us all out of here?”

“I’m going to open something called the Wending,” Eleanor said. “It will take us to another world. Hopefully the right one, this time.”

“How?” Melia pressed. “Is it some spell?”

“No. It’s just—well, me,” Eleanor said.

“You can open the way between worlds yourself?” Melia asked sharply. “It’s not an object or a spell or a potion. It’s you.”

“That’s right,” Eleanor said impatiently.

“Then you’re the one we need,” Melia said, her voice cold.

“What?” Otto said, alarmed.

“Melia?” Thea asked uncertainly.

“You will serve our parents and open the way to other worlds, so that our armies can spill across them and conquer them all,” Melia said. Her voice was flat—no triumph. No guilt.

“What did you do?” Ash demanded.

“I played along to find the information I needed, like you should have,” she replied.

“You told Mother and Father what we were doing,” Ash said.

“They’ll be here soon,” Melia confirmed, as the others stared in horror.

“How could you?” Thea asked, eyes filling with tears.

Ash’s voice was shaky. “I noticed it when we were making ourselves look Empty, but I thought I must have been mistaken. You’ve Emptied yourself, haven’t you? What did you take?”

“The parts that hurt,” Melia said. “I couldn’t bear the things Mother made me do, Ash. It was the only way I could survive. It gave me clarity. Peace. You could have that, too.”

Ash rounded on Eleanor. “Get us out of here. Now.”

“I’m trying,” Eleanor said, but the threads of the worlds were still slipping from her reach.