“Locrian mode,” Rush says, breaking out of the chord for just a second. “It’s for opening up doorways.”

June pulls black candle stubs from her backpack. She sets them around the outside of the faerie ring, three steps between each, kneeling to light them. A tear slides down her face, drops into a sunken cup filled with shiny wax. At first I think it’s only the pain from her leg, but then she whispers, “Imogen didn’t let us do this for her. She might have made it out safely.”

“She was trying to keep us safe,” Lelia argues.

“That’s not how things work,” Hawthorn says, threading her arms across her chest. “She should have known better. If you want to do big magic, you don’t mess around, even if you think you have good reasons. You trust your friends, your coven.”

“Imogen should have told us about wanting to find Emma,” Rush says, tightening her grip on my hand. I watch her chest rise as she takes a deep, filling breath and adds, “She should have told me.”

I twist my fingers in hers, finding a stronger way to lock them together. I don’t want to leave Rush behind.

She nods me into the faerie ring. I take the first step, and then I can’t help glancing back. The look that Rush gives me isn’t a smile, but it has the seed of a smile in it.

“Don’t forget to come back,” she says as I disappear.

Part Five: Midnight

Danny: Now

I leave the Grays and Imogen in the grove. As I step deeper into the faerie ring, branches leave tiny all-over scratches on my arms, whispers of touch, each one telling me to turn back. I push forward, giving myself over to the faerie ring’s stifling dark. I hold the dowsing rod out like a weapon.

I think about Sebastian, and how scared he would have been if I had asked him to go into a faerie ring for our second date. I touch my lips. I should have kissed him while he was still here.

The air feels trapped, old, a musty sort of wrong. I try to convince myself that I’m not afraid of the next step, and the next. But the lies I tell myself are as thin as the space between worlds.

I walk in a wide curve, wondering how long it can take to wrap around fully, even if this is the widest tree in existence. I try to look up, but between the thicket and the tree all I get is a snatch of stars, like stealing one last good breath before dying.

I know what that feels like now.