by E. E. Holmes
The artwork I had so painstakingly copied and transferred to my skin was gone. Not just faded or smudged, but gone. As though it had never existed at all. As though it had been nothing but a dream.
“How did… when did that happen?” I asked.
“About twenty-four hours into your Rifting,” Finn said. He was still holding my other hand, stroking my palm with his thumb. “We thought it might mean that something had gone wrong, and so we tried to bring you back.”
“I… I think I remember that,” I said slowly.
Flavia looked up in surprise. “You do?”
“Yes,” I said, nodding as this element of my journey settled itself in my mind. “There was a point where the Rift sort of started rocking and lurching around. I remember I was talking to someone, and I kept losing my balance and having to grab onto things. Eventually, I just fell right back through the door.”
“You were talking to someone?” Finn asked eagerly. “Who?”
“I… I’m trying to remember. It’s still hazy. A… a woman, I think,” I said, trying to sift through the scattered thoughts still fluttering down in my brain.
“Don’t force it, let it come,” Flavia advised me. She disappeared into the bathroom to fill the kettle at the sink.
“So you really had no idea how long you were gone?” Finn asked me quietly.
I shook my head. “Not a clue. The details are hazy, but it felt like I was there for hardly any time at all.”
“How opposite our experiences have been, then,” Finn said with a wan smile, “for these have been two of the longest days of my life.”
“I’m sorry, Finn,” I said. “I had no idea it would be so—”
Hannah came bursting into the room, Milo on her heels, looking flustered.
“Good luck explaining that dramatic exit to the Council,” I heard him mutter before Hannah descended upon me like a wailing, leaking, hugging tornado. It took a solid ten minutes to calm her down enough to even begin to have a conversation, by which time Flavia had successfully brewed me a cup of tea. It felt as good as a hot bath after a long day running down my throat, and seemed to clear my head a little.
“Well?” Hannah finally said when she had blown her nose one last enthusiastic time.
“Well, what?” I asked.
Her left eye gave a spastic twitch as she glared at me. “What do you mean, ‘well, what?’ What did we put ourselves through all of this for? Savvy? The Tansy Hag? The secret code that Agnes Isherwood left for you? Haven’t you found anything out, or did we all just torture ourselves for two days for nothing?”
Thunk. The rest of my confettied thoughts hit the ground like lead. And now that they lay still, I could finally see them clearly.
Oh, God.
“Oh, God,” I whispered.
“What? What is it? Did you remember something?” Finn asked.
“I… I remembered everything,” I choked.
“Well, what? What is it, tell us!” Hannah cried.
“Start from the beginning,” Flavia cut in. “The order of events matters.”
I took a shaky breath. “I woke up in a tansy patch.”
Milo frowned. “What’s a tansy—”
“Flowers,” I snapped. “A little patch of flowers. Don’t interrupt me, okay? Just… just let me get through it.”
“Right, sorry, shutting up now,” Milo muttered.
“It was like that picture we found, Flavia,” I told her. “The one in the archives, in that old children’s book, remember? I was one of the little girls in the meadow, wearing a white dress, and Eleanora Larkin was there with me, making flower crowns.”
“Eleanora?” Hannah asked, wonder in her voice. “What… how was she?”
The question baffled me for a moment until Flavia jumped in to answer it. “It’s not like that. The Rift is just a heightened mental state, not an actual place. Jess saw Eleanora because Eleanora was in her subconscious. The spirit uses what’s available in the brain as a sort of tool kit to explore within the space.”
“I was less confused before you tried to explain it,” Milo said, shaking his head.
“Anyway,” I broke in before Flavia could go down a scholarly rabbit hole. “She made me a crown, and while she was doing it, I could see the Tansy Hag waiting for us in the woods. Oh, yeah, there were woods. They just kind of appeared behind us. So, then Eleanora put the sun in her crown and we walked through the woods…”
“She put the sun in her crown? Holy shit, so this is like… heavy hallucinogenic stuff, huh?” Milo asked, leaning his chin on his hand and gazing at me, fascinated. “What’s in those herbs, huh, Flavia?”
Flavia smirked but did not reply. I went on, each image becoming clear in my brain as I spoke them aloud.
“Then Eleanora told me it was time for bed, but the bed was actually a tomb and I had to jump down into it, and I landed in the spirit ward of Skye Príosún. Savvy was there, waiting for me, and…” I stopped suddenly. “Savvy! Oh my God, what the hell is wrong with me, I didn’t even ask… how’s Savvy?”
“The same,” said Finn solemnly. “There’s been no change—no change at all. But we’ll get to all that, Jess. This is important. Tell us what happened in the Rift.”
“I… okay, right. Sorry,” I said, trying to pick up the thread of my memory. “So, yeah. Savvy was there. She didn’t speak to me—just pointed me into the Tansy Hag’s cell. But when I got into the cell, it wasn’t a cell at all—it led right into the central courtyard of Fairhaven, right to the Geatgrima.”
Everyone was rapt and silent. No one moved. Hannah seemed to have stopped breathing.
“But the Geatgrima was gone. Well, not gone, exactly, but damaged. Most of it had crumbled away, and Irina was there, trying to rebuild it from a pile of stone.”
Flavia looked shocked, too. “Irina? Really?”
“Yup. She was just as cryptic as ever. Then I looked up and she had turned into the Tansy Hag.”
Hannah gasped. “You’re not telling me… you don’t think she really was the—”
“No,” I said firmly, shaking my head. “The Tansy Hag lived centuries ago. Her spirit’s been trapped in the príosún ever since. There’s no way she and Irina are the same person in real life. But for some reason my brain connected them—probably because they were both Travelers. Anyway, the Tansy Hag pointed me toward the Geatgrima again, and it had disappeared and turned into a door.”
“See?” Flavia clapped her hands together in triumph that this detail, at least, was how she had predicted it would be. “What did I tell you! There is always a door. That’s how it works. You can always choose to come back by simply walking through it.”
I shook my head. “Not that door.”
“What do you mean?” Flavia asked, her smile fading.
“The door was there, the one you’re talking about. I could always see it and it was always open just a crack, just to let me know how easy it would be to walk through it. But that’s not the door I’m talking about. The door that appeared on the dais was tightly closed. I tried over and over again to force it open, but it wouldn’t budge.”
“But what was this second door?” Flavia asked, her face a blank slate of shock. “Why did you try to open it instead of just going back through the first one—the door you knew would lead out of the trance?”
“Because I didn’t have any answers yet!” I said. “Nothing was any clearer, and the Tansy Hag told me that this new door would… would lead me to…”
“To what?” Hannah and Milo cried out at the same time.
“Vortimo,” I whispered. “Truth.”
“So, what happened, then?” Finn asked. “When you couldn’t open the door?”
“My artwork was the key,” I said, looking down at the bare white flesh of my forearms, imagining that I could still see the delicate vines and leaves and runes unfurling across it. “I pressed first my hands, then my arms against the wood of the door, and it sort of… lit up, revealing the same hidden artwork c
arved into the surface. And then the door opened and… and she was there.”
“Who was there?” Finn asked.
“Agnes. Agnes Isherwood.”
And even as I said her name the entire conversation came flooding back to me, and it hit me with the force of a tidal wave. I gasped with the force of it, startling everyone around me.
“Our gift… our gift is stolen!” I said it out loud to get the awful truth out of my head, but hearing it out loud only made it worse—more real.
“Huh?”
“Jess, what are you on about?”
But I was on my feet now, panic infecting my veins like poison. “I have to see Celeste! I have to warn her!”
I stumbled toward the door, but Kiernan looking alarmed, stepped in front of it. Finn intercepted me, grasping me by my upper arms both to steady me and to prevent me from leaving. “Jess, calm down! You can’t go see anyone until we know what’s going on!”
“Please, it’s the Geatgrima! It’s taking the Gateways back! It’s going to happen all over! We’re running out of time!” I implored him, my voice cracking fear.
“Kiernan, help me!” Finn said, and I realized as he looked at me that he was as scared as I was, though for a different reason. He was looking warily into my eyes, searching for a spark of reason.
Kiernan hurried over to help Finn drag me over to the chair by the fire, kicking aside the mess of mattresses and clothes and food debris as they went. I struggled against them as they worked together to muscle me into the chair.
“Let go of me!” I cried. “I have to…”
“Blast it, Jess, you’re not going anywhere until we understand what the bloody hell you’re talking about, so you might as well stop fighting us and just explain!” Finn grunted.
“Focus, Jess,” Flavia said, her voice a lullaby as she came over to sit beside me. “Tell us exactly what happened, everything you can remember, just like the rest of the vision.”
I tried to master my ragged breathing, but my heart felt like a wild animal caught in my chest. “I… Agnes Isherwood was there—on the other side of the door. She said she’d been waiting for me for a very long time.”
“Good, good,” Flavia said, nodding encouragingly. “Go on.”
I felt Finn and Kiernan release their grips on me ever so slightly. I took another uneven breath. “She led me to her tower. Well, it’s Fiona’s tower now, but it was her tower then. And she told me… told me that there was no ‘where’ and no ‘when’ in the Rift, and that she had created the door so that she could meet me and give me a warning.”
“Go on,” Flavia repeated, though her voice had a distinct tremor in it.
“She… she told me that I had done well. She had the same artwork on her arms, she showed me. She told me a Traveler woman had helped her with it, but when I asked her if it was the Tansy Hag, she didn’t know what I was talking about. Then she… she asked me if something strange was happening in my time with the Geatgrimas.”
Everyone looked at each other, clearly stunned.
“I told her about Savvy, and it was almost like she was expecting it. Then she told me… she told me about the Gateways.” I took a deep breath, afraid that the words wouldn’t come, that they would cling to my insides, refusing to be spoken aloud, refusing to let the terrible truth be brought to light. “Hundreds of years ago, in Agnes’ time, the Gateways did not reside in our blood. They lived in the Geatgrimas themselves. The Durupinen were only meant to lead spirits to the Geatgrimas so that they could Cross on their own, when they were ready. But then the Necromancers grew powerful, and they launched attacks against the Durupinen fortresses. The Durupinen couldn’t hold them off, they knew the Gateways were in danger—and so they created a Casting that would strip the Gateways from the Geatgrimas and hide them in the Durupinen bloodlines.”
No one spoke. No one even seemed to be breathing. Every horrified pair of eyes was fixed on me, waiting for what devastation would next cross my lips.
“They had no choice, she said. It was either that or let the Gateways fall into Necromancer hands. Agnes was a Scribe at the time, and she was the one who figured out how to do it. But she warned them that it could not last forever—that one day the Geatgrimas would collapse or something like that—and now it’s happening. Whatever it is she feared—it’s happening right now, right out in the courtyard.”
Hannah found her voice first. “What is it? What’s happening?”
“The Sentinels have begun their watch,” I whispered.
“What does it mean?” Hannah asked.
“I don’t know,” I said. “She couldn’t explain it to me. Or wouldn’t. I’m not sure. Anyway, we ran out of time. But she told me who would know, so we’ve got to go, now!”
I stood up and stumbled toward the door again, but stopped with my hand on the doorknob. I turned around. No one had tried to stop me. No one had followed me. Everyone was just sitting there, staring at me.
“What are we waiting for? We have to go! There’s not a lot of time!”
“Jess…” The tone of Finn’s voice was so hesitant, almost frightened. “Jess, you need to slow down. Just… just stop and think for a moment.”
“I’d love to, Finn, but Agnes made it pretty clear there’s no time for that,” I said, throwing up my hands in exasperation.
“Finn’s right, Jess,” Flavia said, and she too, sounded strange, like she was trying to convince me to put down a dangerous weapon or something. “You just came out of the longest Rifting I’ve ever seen. You’re exhausted and confused and famished, I’d imagine. You need to gather yourself and get some rest so that we can start interpreting what you experienced.”
I glared at her. “What do you mean, interpret it? I’ve just told you what it means. Agnes told me everything we need to know.”
Flavia’s eyes flicked toward Hannah, who met her gaze warily. “Jess, you… you didn’t really speak to Agnes Isherwood. Or Eleanora Larkin, or Irina Faa, or anyone else for that matter. You’ve just been dreaming, in a sense—allowing your brain to explore and interpret information that has come about as a result of your spirit connection.”
“What do you mean I didn’t talk to her? Haven’t you been listening? I…” I stopped short, the realization hitting me. “Oh, my God. You don’t believe me. None of you believe me, do you?”
“Of course, we believe you, love,” Finn said at once. “It’s just…”
“Just WHAT?” I cried.
Finn looked lost and turned to Hannah, who cleared her throat. “We’re just trying to help you, Jess. If we all put our heads together, we can probably make sense of the vision.”
“I don’t need you to make sense of it!” I snapped. “Agnes explained everything to me. She went into the Rift and put that door there so that we would find each other. That’s why it took me so long to come out of the trance. It wasn’t a normal Rifting trance at all. I went somewhere else, somewhere deeper, and Agnes Isherwood is the one who created that place, so that she could find me.”
“But… she’s been dead for centuries, Jess,” Milo said, in a voice that almost begged me to make sense.
“Don’t you think I know that?” I cried. “And anyway, she explained that part to me. She told me our… our lives are threads, or… something… but anyway, it means that time doesn’t work the way we think it does, okay? It made sense when she said it.”
“She didn’t say it, Jess, your subconscious did,” Flavia said gently.
“NO, IT FUCKING DIDN’T!” I shouted, making them all jump. “Look, I’ve been in the Rift before, okay? It was like a weird acid trip, like a dream. It started out that way again just now, but then it changed, do you understand? I went through that second door and the place it took me wasn’t really the Rift at all. It was… more real, more solid. And Agnes wasn’t some strange hallucination who was there one minute and gone the next. I could see every unchanging detail of her. I could feel the warmth of her hands when she took mine. I could see Hannah and mom in t
he color of her eyes. I could smell herbs and smoke when she turned her head.”
“Okay, Jess, let’s just say all of that is true,” Hannah began.
“It is true, Hannah, for the love of—”
“Okay, okay! But, Jess, if she really did make that door, and somehow waited there for you in… like… another dimension or something—how did she know to wait for you? How did she know you would be coming? And how did she leave the clues for you so that you would know how to find her?”
“She had a vision of me!” I said. “You know she was a famous Seer—she just… Saw me! And as for the clues… well, I told her to leave them for me.”
“You… what?” Milo asked weakly.
“The last thing she asked me before I woke up was how I knew what to do—how I found her sketches and everything. And so I told her about the call number. She had no idea what I was talking about—the tapestry hadn’t been made yet. Hell, she wasn’t even High Priestess yet. But I told her how and where I found the number so… so I think I actually left the clues for myself.”
“But that’s… I can’t… does that even make sense?” Milo asked in a whisper.
“I don’t know!” I shouted. “And honestly, I don’t fucking care at this point. It’s like she said, time doesn’t work the way we think it does! You want to hear something else insane? She hadn’t even made the Prophecy yet. You know, the one that literally created the law that Hannah is trying so hard to overturn, the one that destroyed our parents and separated us for our entire childhoods and set us on a collision course with destruction? That little Prophecy? Yeah, she had no idea what I was talking about. I was the first one to mention it to her. So, I’m not sure if I’m supposed to apologize for that, or if I’m somehow responsible for it now, but there it is.”
No one interrupted me now, and I couldn’t tell if it was because they were starting to believe what I was saying, or because they were more scared than ever that I’d lost my damn mind, but I didn’t care. I just plowed forward, telling them the things they needed to hear, the things I couldn’t bear to be the only one to know.