“It wasn’t like that!” Hope stomps down on the gas pedal, and I grip my seat belt a little tighter. “Or … okay, it was like that—but I swear I didn’t know what I was doing. You weren’t the only one he told me to listen to; you were just the only one he cared about.”

“It’s okay,” I mumble, thinking about the woodcut she sent me. Whatever else she did, Hope took a risk trying to help me out. “I’m not blaming you.”

“They’re the ones who told me where to be this morning,” she reveals at last. “A week ago—after they did … whatever they did that they needed your hair for.”

“A week ago?” My tone shoots up an octave or two. “Wait, you’ve known about all of this for a week, and you—”

“I didn’t know.” She’s emphatic. “I didn’t want to know, either. My uncle said the witches wanted to see me, and I freaked out that a coven that powerful even knew my name. Being in the room with them was … terrifying? Overwhelming? I had all these questions, but I was too scared to open my mouth, and they knew things about me I had never shared with anyone.” Hope shudders all over. “They told me to be at that corner this morning, and it wasn’t a request. It wasn’t until last night that they revealed all the who and why, and said Adriana had to be there, too—or ‘darkness would fall upon the world.’”

She finishes in a choked whisper, and Adriana adds, “After dropping you off yesterday, Abuela went to confront them. Whatever they said to her, whatever they showed her … it scared the shit out of her. She believes them now.”

“How can she be sure it wasn’t more bullshit?” I ask, trying to control my rising panic. “Twenty-four hours ago, she said not to trust them, but now we’re going to an emergency meeting with them?” Silence fills the car, and I start sweating some more. “What if it’s a trap?”

Adriana grips her jacket a little tighter around her shoulders. “You didn’t see my abuela’s face after she got home, Auggie. It was like she’d seen a ghost—getting axe-murdered by another ghost. If there’s even a chance you meeting them could stop whatever’s coming? It’s worth it. Anything is worth it.”

We make the rest of the drive in silence.

Our destination turns out to be a high-rise on Chicago’s north side, an ordinary building in a busy neighborhood, less than a mile from the lake. There are rainbow flag stickers on the doors of shops and restaurants—something I’ve never seen in Fulton Heights—and if I weren’t currently terrified of being cursed forever by a group of undead mastermind sorceresses, I’d probably find it exciting.