A small, windowless room took shape as my eyes adjusted to the gloom. A glass enclosure sat directly in the center. Immediately above it, a cylindrical shaft as big around as a can of soda was cut into the ceiling. I peered into it, and while I could see some light from the outside, it wasn’t strong enough to penetrate all the way down.

I turned my attention to the waist-high enclosure. Hinges ran between panes of cloudy glass. I tried to open one, but it didn’t budge. I shone my light in and caught my first glimpse of what it contained. The strange plant bore an unmistakable resemblance to a human heart. My phone slipped out of my trembling hand and hit the floor with a loud crack.

I scrambled to pick it up as the flashlight flickered on and off. A spider’s web of cracked glass stared back at me as I checked the extent of the damage. I sighed. I should have stayed my ass aboveground.

Turing back to the enclosure, my light glinted off something set in the stone near its base. I pushed up my glasses and crouched to read the words engraved on a rusting placard.

ABSYRTUS HEART

I slowly stood, my gaze locked on the glass housing. The plant from the big book was real, and for whatever reason, Circe had put me through an entire scavenger hunt to find it. It was behind a locked gate, a locked door, and a gathering of toxic plants that would put most people in the hospital—if they lived long enough to get to one.

The confines of the room pressed in on me. The Heart stood within the enclosure like something out of a nightmare. The plant was rooted in a small circle of dirt ringed by shining black stones, and directly next to it was a second circle of dirt where nothing grew.

I searched for a way to open the glass and found a small keyhole marked by the same crest as the door above. Using the bone-white key with the ruby heart, I unlocked the case. Without the foggy glass in the way, I studied the plant. It was even stranger up close. It looked like the drawing in the big book, but it wasn’t pink and plump. It was crumbling and ashen. The artery-like stalk snaked into the bone-dry dirt. Without thinking, I reached out to touch one of the broken leaves. Maybe it would perk up like the plants in the shop back home.