I run after him immediately. I’m only a few seconds away, but a few seconds is all it takes. When I enter, the alley is empty. No one is around, not even an oblivious human. I lose all reason and scream his name. I demand that he come back to me. Then I notice it. The pendant he was wearing, our only weapon against Baarish, lying on the ground. I am standing frozen, staring at it, when my sisters arrive.

Paheli: The Maze and the Minotaur

In times of crisis, every second appears an eternity. Some streets over, a car honks aggressively. The sound forms the background score for a moment that will forever be etched in my mind.

“Paheli?” Valentina says, a rare note of hesitation in her voice.

I will fall apart later. I can’t afford to right now. I reach down and pick up the pendant on the road. The clasp of the chain it was hanging from is broken. Probably in the struggle when Taraana was taken. Why didn’t I ensure the chain was stronger?

“Is that the pendant—” Etsuko breaks off, horror draining her face of color.

I ignore her and turn to the newest member of the Wild Ones. I didn’t expect Tabassum Naaz to hang around after she did her part, but here she is. Valentina grabs my arm and swings me around. I don’t meet her eyes. I can’t.

“Did you tell Baarish not to use the Between?” I ask Tabassum Naaz.

She nods, looking from me to Valentina and back again. “I told him he might not be successful if he took the Between.”

“Okay,” I say. I am standing here on this noisy, dusty street, but inside, I am falling apart. “All right.” I nod to show people I am okay. “And you are sure he is going to take Taraana to”—I pause—“Lucknow?”

“Yeah, he has a longtime lair there. That’s where he originally kept Taraana,” Tabassum Naaz replies.

I nod again. It makes sense to move my head up and down, pretending I know what I’m doing. And I do. I planned for everything. I am terrified because he is in their hands, without a single weapon to defend himself. But he said he believed in me. He did.

“He borrowed his friend’s private jet.” Tabassum Naaz continues talking. “The flight from Cairo to Lucknow will take seven hours and twelve minutes.”

I nod. Again. It’s easy to do. “If we leave now and use the Between, it will take us three and a half hours to arrive in Lucknow. We will be there before him. We can find a way to return the pendant to Taraana.”

The girls take my word as fact and don’t seem as concerned. All of them, apart from Valentina. I can never have any secrets from her.