He will find himself here again, though this time not alone. Four of them will stand in the ash, each one a part of a whole.
Blood and bones and heart and soul.
This is where their story ends.
35 EMORY
THE TIDE WAS LOW WHEN the Selenic order stepped onto the shores of the Aldersea, dark blue steel beneath sullen skies. The wind of a coming storm breathed down their backs. The sea would be ruthless today, and if what they attempted didn’t work, it would be swift to swallow them whole.
The sun hid behind clouds. Its eclipsing could not be seen, but Emory imagined she could feel it lending her strength.
As they approached the cave mouth, Emory couldn’t believe how quickly she and Keiran had managed to convince the rest of the Order of this irrational plan, if it could even be called that at all. They were attempting to open the door and call the Tides sooner than expected, all so she might save Romie.
Lizaveta was the only one who’d been opposed to it.
“This is madness,” she’d nearly yelled at Keiran, at Emory. “We’re not ready—we don’t even know if what we’re doing is going to work—and most of all, we can’t trust her. Haven’t we jeopardized our standing with the rest of the Order enough as it is?” She’d turned to Keiran. “After what happened yesterday, the lengths you went to, to keep her secret safe… Are you seriously willing to risk it all on her?”
“Everyone else is on board, Liza. Don’t you want to see Farran back?”
Her desire to see her friend again had won over in the end. Though it hadn’t stopped her from accosting Emory as they’d made their way to the beach.
“You should have run when you had the chance, Tidethief. Whatever happens is on you now.”
Emory tried not to let those words get to her.
Everyone had armed themselves with synthetic magic hastily inked on their Selenic Marks. Except her. She thought it best not to alter her magic in any way, so as not to mess with the door-opening ritual. The synth was imbued with a few different magics—one for every lunar house, she was told—so that the others’ power would be amplified. It also carried a drop of her own blood, to serve as protection. A talisman of sorts to get them into the Deep and out unscathed.
Keiran had come through for her—again. He was a pillar of unshakable belief, a steadfast presence at her side, and that was all that mattered. He offered her a hand with a fierce, determined look in his eye. Emory took it, and it felt like anything was possible.
For a third time, she stepped into Dovermere.
The darkness greeted the Selenics as kings and queens, masters of death, as if the ancient rock around them recognized their magic, the power each of them had once wielded to survive these strange depths. It might have been what kept the umbra from their path, though Emory knew the creature must be waiting for them somewhere deeper, eager to feast on their souls.
Or maybe it was dead, though she doubted it could be so easily killed.
Together they advanced, the path before them illuminated by the lanterns each of them carried. Emory couldn’t find it in herself to be scared. The others’ presence was reassuring, and every step she took away from the beach and into this strange, dripping place only made her feel surer. Whatever weight had pressed down on her before lifted, and all she knew was this pull and the steady beat of her heart as she forged deeper into the cave, toward its own heart of stone and silver.
“We’re here,” Nisha said up ahead.
The Belly of the Beast opened around them. The umbra, Emory noted uneasily, wasn’t here. She glanced furtively at her watch. Five hours left until high tide—until this place became the death trap they would once again have to survive.
Virgil whistled a low note as he approached the Hourglass. “Never thought I’d have to see this ugly thing again.” He arched a brow at Emory. “You’re certain this is it? It doesn’t look the slightest bit like a door.”
“Romie said the Hourglass opened for them the night of the initiation,” Emory said.
“We have to believe it will again,” Keiran added, “under the right circumstances.”
With all five of the lunar houses and her to serve as key. The same as last spring. It struck Emory how nearly identical this was to then, though where there had been nine of them last time, there were only eight now. Still, all that mattered was that each house was represented: Ife and Louis of New Moon, Lizaveta and Nisha of Waxing Moon, Keiran and Javier of Full Moon, Virgil of Waning Moon, and Emory for the Eclipse.
“Let’s get on with it, then,” Lizaveta said stiffly, setting down her lantern at her feet. “The quicker we see if this works, the sooner we can leave.”
Virgil smirked at her. “Is that fear I detect, Liza?”
“Bite me, Virgil.”
“If that’s an invitation…”
“Four hours and thirty-five minutes until high tide,” Ife said pointedly. “Let’s get into formation and do this, yeah?”
Emory did a double take at her watch. She had just looked at it—there was no way nearly a half hour had gone by in the span of what felt like mere minutes. But such was the nature of time down here, to slip away too quickly and without notice.
Keiran produced a switchblade and handed it to Emory. “The honor’s all yours.”
She sliced the blade across her palm. The blade was then passed from person to person, and once blood trickled from each of their hands, they stepped onto the platform the Hourglass was built on, forming a circle around it in the order of their lunar phases. Emory stood between Virgil and Ife, between the waning moon and the new one.
Across from her, Keiran gave her a reassuring nod, and Emory blew out a sigh.
“Here goes nothing.”
In unison, all eight of them brought their bloodied hands against the column, intoning the sacred chant.
“To Bruma, who sprang from the darkness. To Anima, whose voice breathed life into the world. To Aestas, whose bountiful warmth and light protect us all. To Quies and the sleeping darkness she guides us through at the end of all things.”
For a second, or perhaps a minute, or an hour—time, they knew, tended to slip in these depths—nothing happened.
And then everything was as Emory remembered: a change in the air, a prickle on her wrist. Silver droplets detached from the striated rock, hovering around them.
A whisper, a draft, like wind through a door left ajar.
A breath in, a breath out. The rhythm of the sea.
Bright, silvery light flooded the Belly of the Beast, and the droplets rearranged themselves in front of them, flocking to the middle of the Hourglass. They concentrated on that narrow finger of rock where stalagmite and stalactite fused together, creating a bright silver demarcation between up and down, and Emory thought it looked curiously like a lock. One that might open at her touch.
This was it. The way in.
And then—darkness. Great vines of it slithered around the Hourglass, snuffing out the silver light drop by shining drop. The shadows reached for the eight hands still tethered to the rock. Virgil swore as he tried to pry free, and Emory watched in horror as a rope of darkness wound around his wrist, snaked up his arm.
“What is this?” Nisha cried out, trying to wrest her hand from the rock.