“I have a feeling,” Plum said, “that it’s a little bit late in the day to start over.”

—

Back in the fourth-floor workroom, Quentin opened the red door again. He was starting to hate the sight of his land. It was a stillborn thing: he’d meant to make something fresh and real, and instead he’d produced this cold, sterile photocopy. Something had gone wrong, and more and more he was starting to think that the problem was him.

He sat down at the worktable and stared at his notes, thinking about what Plum had said and waiting for some kind of signal to emerge out of the noise. Should he just walk in, stand there, look her in the eye? Maybe he should.

There she was, right there in the doorframe, watching him as if she knew what he was thinking.

“I’m here,” he said. “Alice. It’s time we talked. It’s time we figured this out.”

She floated there, free-falling in place, staring right through him. Something was missing: if they were going to talk, and if it was going to count, it should be here in the real world, not the copy. He wanted to bring her through, to force her out into the open, onto his ground. It would be a terrible risk. A niffin in lower Manhattan—if he lost control he could be looking at a magical September 11th. But you could talk yourself out of anything.

“Come here.” Could she? “Come out here. Let’s finish this.”

Faint smile, but nothing more. Alice couldn’t or wouldn’t come through on her own. That meant he had to help her.

He began with a series of erasures and banishments and antimagic attacks, each one more powerful and violent than the next, but the land was tougher than it looked. They didn’t scratch it. It wasn’t going that easily, not without a fight.

He changed tacks: he picked up his staff, his lovely black wood and silver staff. It took five tries, whacking it against the brick pillars in the workroom, but he broke it in the middle and then twisted apart the two halves.

And even then the land persisted. Alice looked like she was enjoying the show. Maybe this wasn’t a question of brute force.

He walked up to the threshold and stood six inches away. Closing his eyes, he willed the land to go away. He imagined it giving up, surrendering its existence, letting its cold substance dissolve as if it had never been. It never should have been. It didn’t want to be. Let go.

Yes. He opened his eyes.

“Out, brief candle,” he said, and blew softly, one puff.