“As such,” Elaine went on, ignoring them, “Fillory has another side. A verso, if you will.”

“What’s on it?” Quentin asked. “What’s over there?”

“Nothing. And everything.”

When this was over Quentin was ready for a long vacation from gods and demons and all their cryptic utterances.

“There is another world there, waiting to be born. A world for which Fillory was in a sense merely a rough draft. You might make an analogy: the Far Side is to Fillory as Fillory is to your Earth. A greener place. A realer, more magical place.”

This was a new wrinkle. He and Poppy and Josh got up from the sand, feeling a little silly. They brushed themselves off and stood at attention.

“Each of you has a choice, whether to go or to stay. I cannot guarantee that anyone who passes through the door will be able to return here. But if you do not go now, there will never be another chance.”

“But what’s really there?” Quentin said. “What’s it like?”

She looked at Quentin, calmly and directly.

“It’s what you want, Quentin. It’s everything you’re looking for. It is the adventure of all adventures.”

There it was. The real end of the story, the happy ending. All he could think was: Alice. She could be waiting for him there. Elaine surveyed the group, where they stood in a loose half circle in front of the door. Her eyes met Eliot’s first. He shook his head slowly.

“I’m High King.” His voice was as serious as Quentin had ever heard it. “I can’t go. I’m not going to leave Fillory.”

She turned to Bingle, who still had the sloth on his back, peeking over his shoulder like a baby koala. Bingle closed his hooded eyes.

“It was never my destiny to return,” he said. He stepped forward. So he was right after all. Quentin supposed that by now Bingle had earned a free pass on the dramatics.

“I also will go,” the sloth said over his shoulder, in case anybody had forgotten about her.

Elaine stood aside and indicated that they should proceed. Without hesitating Bingle walked up to the doorway and opened it all the way.

He was silhouetted against the immense twinkling emptiness. In the night sky beyond him a comet rocketed past, sparking and sputtering merrily like a cheap firework. This was what passed for outer space in Fillory, Quentin supposed. At the bottom of the doorway he could see just the tip of one of the silver moon’s horns. It was rising, on its way to its regular appearance in the night sky of Fillory.

It felt like you could be sucked out through the doorway if you got too close, like through an air lock. But Bingle just stood there, looking around.

“It’s down,” Elaine said. “You have to climb.”