“WHAT DO WE DO NOW, RYE?” Emmett asks, massaging his temples. “We’re fresh out of clues and Hattie’s heart is…you know…”

“Actually,” I start, choosing my words cautiously, “we do have a new lead.”

“We do?”

“When you were unconscious, a bearded man came to speak to me.”

His eyes widen. “Was he the one who gassed us? What did he want?”

“He said that in order to find what I seek, I need to return to the very beginning. To where I first started.”

He facepalms. “Another riddle? Ugh, I’m sick of puzzles.”

“And right before we left, I saw the Haetae. The real one.”

“The Haetae?” He shakes his head. “I don’t even know what you’re saying anymore. I thought things were cray-cray enough when the goddess turned up with her ladle. But then came the little horse dude with an inferiority complex, and the pecking bird–books, and now a uni-horned lion beast? I mean, I knew magic was real, but all this is literally breaking my brain.”

I put an arm around his shoulders. “It’s a lot, I know. But stay with me. Because the Haetae showed me some visions, and I think they could be our next clue.”

I lead him over to a nearby bench. “Let’s sit a minute. You can check to make sure Boris is okay while I gather my thoughts.”

I have to be careful about how much to share with Emmett. The first scene I saw in the Haetae’s bell floods my mind. The Horangi clan were standing protectively over a glowing ax, and Emmett’s mom spelled it away from them. That had to be the seventh artifact—the sunstone ax.

The Cave Bear Goddess had told us that the fallen star would grant divine power. I also remember Auntie Okja telling me that the Horangi had figured out a way for witches to become as powerful as the goddesses. And when the other five clans tried to stop them, the scholars attacked. They’d left a path of destruction and despair, just as the Cave Bear Goddess had said.

These things could not be a coincidence. Maybe all the artifacts were fallen stars…which means that, if the letter is correct, she wants us to find the eighth, and seemingly last, one—whatever and wherever it might be.

Then I think of the second scene in the Haetae’s bell, in which a man with an onyx teardrop stone just like mine stood above Mrs. Harrison’s dead body. A man with angular features…just like mine. Emmett’s mom must have been killed for trying to keep the seventh artifact out of the Horangi’s clutches. By my biological appa, no less.

There’s no way I can reveal my true identity to Emmett now. But the lies are stacking up like pancakes, and I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up.