by Erin Bowman
Piper crossed the bridge and scrambled onto the statue’s pedestal. Clinging to the rod that supported the twisting infinity symbol, she leaned down and fitted the key into the keyhole. She saw her reflection briefly in the water below, but when she turned the key, the water rippled. There was a thunderous rumble, and for an instant, Piper feared the pedestal was giving way, collapsing into the water, where she would be sucked to the bottom and drown.
Only it wasn’t the pedestal that was falling. It was the water. Piper watched the surface level sink down into the pool, lower and lower, until it had completely drained, leaving only a few small puddles on the uneven stone bottom.
Empty, the infinity pool reminded Piper of a well, and at its center, instead of a bucket for drawing out water, was the giant stone column where she stood, a set of stairs wrapping around it and leading into the depths.
Piper looked to her friends. They stood wide-eyed at the pool’s perimeter. “Go on,” Teddy urged. “What are you waiting for?”
She descended the stairs in a bit of a trance. There was supposed to be a third trial, but the pool had drained immediately. Maybe the trial was waiting behind the trapdoor. Soon she was in the belly of the pool, bathed in shadow, the wrought-iron handle of the trapdoor in her palm; she was shocked to find it unlocked.
It was almost too easy.
The door heaved open with an ancient creak and a puff of stale air. Piper fanned it from her eyes, and when it cleared, she found herself looking down on a shallow cavity. Inside was a corked glass bottle, round with a slender neck, its liquid a brilliant ruby red. Piper picked it up, fingers trembling. The bulbous part of the bottle fit neatly in her palm.
Here it was. The drink that would save her father.
In the bottom of the cavity, carved into the stone, was a short inscription.
For this magic to work, it must willingly be traded.
Have you truly earned it? Is this fated?
Piper frowned. She’d clearly earned it, because the elixir was in her hands. She’d passed every trial, proven herself a worthy recipient. She’d broken the concealment, and now all that remained was getting the elixir to her father.
She looked up, finding her friends high above, heads craned over the edge of the pool. She lifted the elixir for them to see. Julius beamed. Camilla gave her a thumbs-up. Kenji shook Teddy’s shoulder with excitement.
“Bring it up,” Julius called. “It’s time to teleport outta here!”
But when Piper turned around, a gleaming black portal was materializing at the base of the stairs. Unlike the fear portal she’d entered with Teddy, this portal wasn’t pure black. She edged nearer, peering into the darkness. If she stayed still, looking very carefully, she could make out something in the distance. Blurry lights and shapes. There was something long and rectangular and white. A peach smudge above it. Squares beyond the smudge. The shapes pulsed and sharpened, like an image coming into focus.
A pattern appeared on the long white shape.
The squares framed sky.
Piper knew what she was seeing, where this portal would lead. Of course it would appear now, bringing her—the finder of the elixir—exactly where she longed to be. She wouldn’t need her mother to drive her to Atticus or for Kenji to teleport her to safety. She didn’t need anyone.
Distantly, she heard her friends calling for her, but Piper’s attention was focused on only one thing: the hospital room, with its stiff bedsheets and sterile windows, and her father lying atop the bed. She could see the heart monitor now. Hear it, even. It was beeping—faint and weak—but there was still time. And at the end of the day, the truth was that Piper didn’t care what she’d promised. Now that the elixir was in her hand, she knew she’d break any promise she’d made to save her father. The way to him had materialized before her. All she had to do was take it.
She glanced up at Teddy. He gave her a quick nod, as if to say, Do it, and that was all the encouragement she needed.
Piper squeezed the elixir bottle and stepped through the portal.
Chapter Twenty-Four The Elixir of Immortality
When Piper’s father had told her she’d have to spend the summer at Mallory Estate, there’d been only a week left in the school year. The humidity of summer was beginning to creep in, and the air-conditioning was the only good thing about the hospital. Still, she’d have sat in their muggy bungalow all summer without complaint if it meant Atticus could come home.
The cancer, however, had made other plans.
“But I don’t want to stay at Mallory Estate,” she’d argued when Atticus dropped the news.
“And I don’t want to stay at the hospital,” he responded, “but here we are. Life doesn’t always give us what we want.”
That was an understatement.
Her father had looked weaker than she’d ever seen him, worn away like a pebble in a stream, only instead of becoming smooth, he’d grown jagged. Sharp jaw, hollowed cheeks, bony shoulders and elbows.
“Then let’s just go home. Together. We can do the crossword every morning, promise!” It was a desperate offer, because Piper hated the crossword, what with its twisted riddles and wordplay. Was it so difficult just to be straightforward and direct? I bet doctors love crosswords, she remembered thinking.
“I would if I could, Pipes. You know that. But I can’t. They want to try a final round of chemo, and it will be easiest if I stay at the hospital.”
“How often will I see you?” she’d asked, sniffling. “Will Mom bring me? Or Grandma? I want to come every day.”
“I don’t think that will be possible. But you’ll be able to come when I need you. I’ll make sure of it.”
At the time, Piper hadn’t understood what he meant. Now, stepping through the portal, it was clear. Atticus couldn’t bear for her to see him like this, withering away. She’d be allowed to come when he needed to say good-bye.
The black walls of the portal dissolved and Piper found herself standing at the foot of her father’s hospital bed. His eyelids—paper thin—were closed. The heart monitor crooned in the corner, its tune slow and irregular.
Piper walked forward, still clutching the elixir in her hands. A breakfast tray sat beside the bed. Scrambled eggs and strawberries and a can of tomato juice with a clear plastic straw poking from it. The meal hadn’t been touched. Piper wasn’t surprised. Toward the end of the school year, she’d overheard a conversation between the doctor and Aunt Eva when they’d visited Atticus at the hospital. He’d been eating less, losing more weight. There’d been talk of providing more nutrients intravenously, but the cancer was so advanced, the chemo now doing so little, that they decided against it.
Piper uncorked the elixir and a sweet smell wafted from the bottle. She grabbed the straw from the breakfast tray, wiped it clean on a napkin, and dropped it into the drink, then brought the straw to her father’s lips. “Dad?” she said, touching his shoulder. “Drink this. Please.”
His papery lips found the straw and he sipped daintily. Piper watched the vibrant liquid travel up the straw and disappear into her father’s mouth. Eyes still closed, he pulled back and reclined on the pillow, exhausted.
Piper squeezed the bottle in her lap, lips trembling. Did he have to drink all of it, or would a simple sip do? She watched her father, waiting for his eyes to open, for him to sit up, for color to return to his cheeks. Instead his breathing shallowed, the heart monitor continuing to beep at uneven intervals. A doctor burst into the room.
“Is he all right?” Piper asked. “This was supposed to save him.”
But it wasn’t a doctor at all, just an elderly man wearing a gray tweed suit. He had a pronounced mustache, and a pair of wire-frame spectacles rested on the end of his long nose. “It will only work if he takes it willingly,” he explained.
So that was what the inscription beneath the trapdoor had meant.
“And even then, it won’t cure him, Piper,” the man went on. “It will merely stop him in this moment, freezing the man he
is now and preserving it for all eternity. Is that really what you want?”
The stranger stooped down and picked up a briefcase Piper hadn’t noticed from the foot of the bed. The name F. MALLORY was engraved in the leather.
When she looked past the wrinkles that mapped his face and the sadness in his eyes, she could see the resemblance to the portrait at Mallory Estate.
Frederick Mallory.
“Consider this carefully, child, because it cannot be undone. To be immortal is to live forever, and forever is a painfully long time indeed. Not even the stars can comprehend it.” He smiled kindly at Piper, then slipped from the room.
Piper glanced at the bottle in her hands, then at the heart monitor. Its rhythm was changing, growing more erratic. Atticus Peavey was dying. Her father was dying, and no matter what Frederick Mallory said, Piper couldn’t let him die. If he had to willingly accept the elixir for it to work, she’d just have to wake him.
Because he would choose to stay with Piper.
He’d want the drink.
“Dad?” Piper touched Atticus’s shoulder, shaking him lightly. “Dad, wake up. I brought something for you.”
He stirred beneath her touch, groaning.
“Dad?” she tried again.
This time his eyes flickered open, squinting in the hospital light. When he found her sitting on the bed, he frowned. “Piper. What are you doing here?” His voice was dry from lack of use, and the words came out slowly, as though each one drained him even more.
“This will solve everything.” She held out the bottled elixir, pointing the straw at him. “Go on. Drink, please. It will let you live forever.”
Atticus’s thin lips spread into a smile. The smile reached his eyes, and for the first time in ages, Piper was sitting across from the father she knew—vibrant, beaming, bright. Then he opened his mouth and said the last thing she expected to hear: “I don’t want it.”
Piper shook her head, shocked. “Sure you do. Go ahead. Take a sip.” She thrust the bottle toward him.
“No,” he said quietly.
“You’re not thinking straight. You can’t want to leave. You just can’t.” Piper couldn’t keep her voice from cracking.
“Of course I don’t want to leave. But I don’t want to live forever, either. Then I’d have to watch you die someday.” He tilted his head slightly, taking in the sight of her. “Death is part of life, Pipes. We all greet it eventually.”
Piper felt her lip tremble. Finding the elixir was supposed to be the hard part, not getting her father to drink it. This was supposed to be easy, this moment right now. This was where Piper was supposed to fix things. “I don’t understand,” she managed.
“A journey is worth taking because it ends. It has a destination, a finish. Life is the same. I don’t want to be stuck in place while everyone moves on around me.”
“Dad, if you don’t drink it, you’re going to die.”
“I know,” he replied softly. “And I will miss you more than you can imagine. I hate that I have to leave you. I’m sorry about that. It’s not fair. But you’re strong—you always have been. And I know you’ll be okay. I love you, Piper. I love you so very much.” Atticus reached forward and squeezed her knee, so softly Piper barely noticed. Then he leaned back against the pillow and closed his eyes.
Piper’s eyes stayed fixed on her father as the heart monitor droned on, the beats growing more irregular.
A nurse burst into the room, racing to the bed. Doctors followed. Real doctors this time, not Frederick Mallory.
Piper backed away as if in a trance, the bottled elixir still clutched firmly. Her eyes stayed rooted on her father’s feeble form even as the darkness of the portal closed in, swallowing the hospital from view.
* * *
When the emptied infinity pool materialized, Piper was beginning to understand her father’s decision.
She hated that she did, because the truth was so much harder to accept than believing that the elixir would fix everything. The truth broke Piper’s heart.
She wouldn’t be saving her father if she convinced him to live forever; she’d be trapping him, just as the apparition of Frederick Mallory had warned.
She had to let him go. To allow him to greet the end of his journey and maybe to start a new one. She’d be okay, just like he’d told her. Not at first. And she’d never be okay with his death. How could she, when a piece of her heart would love and miss him forever? But she would learn to live without him, because that was how it had to be.
The elixir glistened in the bottle, and the contents changed from ruby red to metallic blue. Piper knew, deep down, that the elixir would work now. That before, it was merely dormant.
Have you truly earned it? Is this fated?
Piper had unlocked the ancient magic. She had to be willing not to use the elixir to actually obtain it. This was the third trial. The elixir would now make anyone who willingly drank it immortal.
Piper looked up. The morning was gray and humid. Storm clouds gathered overhead, but it was still early. There was still time to say good-bye if she moved quickly. And Kenji …
She didn’t know how she hadn’t considered it before. If the kids were going to teleport to safety, why couldn’t Kenji bring them to the hospital—or near it, if he’d never been there before? Maybe this was what Teddy had been about to propose earlier, on their walk to the fountain of Fates. He’d said he’d speak with Kenji while Camilla saw to the keyholes and threads.
She flew up the stairs, two at a time.
“Was that a trial?” Julius yelled. “In that portal-thing?”
“Who cares? It’s adoption time!” Camilla cheered.
“Did it work?” Teddy asked, glancing at the bottle still in Piper’s hand.
But Piper was barely listening. “The first jump we take has to be to my father in the hospital,” she announced after she crossed the invisible bridge.
Julius frowned. “I thought he was traveling for work.”
Teddy gave her a look, as if to say, It’s now or never.
Piper steeled herself and spilled it all. She told them about the cancer and how she’d wanted to get the elixir to Atticus to save him, how all this time she’d intended to use it on him, but how she now understood that the magic would only trap him in a life of suffering. She even explained the deal her mother had made her: the elixir for a ride to the hospital.
“But we won’t let her have it,” Piper said, cradling the bottle of bright blue liquid. “She’ll use it for all the wrong reasons. You guys deserve to get adopted. I just hope that before you go teleporting off to find my grandma, Kenji can jump me to the hospital—or at least to an adult who can drive me to the hospital.”
“Kenji broke his arm before coming to Mallory Estate,” Teddy announced.
The boy nodded. “It was set at Hartford Hospital. I can jump you directly to your father!”
Piper swallowed the lump building in her throat. If she tried to say thanks, she worried she’d burst into tears.
Camilla cocked her head to the side, peering at Piper. “Why didn’t you tell us sooner?” Her brow was furrowed, her expression pained. She believed Piper this time, didn’t detect even a hint of a lie. Piper’s desperation was that obvious.
Piper shrugged. “I didn’t think you would let me use the elixir to save him. I knew how badly you wanted to be adopted, so I planned to save him and then ask him to help you guys find permanent homes. Turns out going solo isn’t always the best. Sometimes you have to team up with unexpected people.” She glanced at Teddy and his Red Sox tee. He beamed.
“I’m glad you came to your senses,” Camilla said, “ ’cause we can’t allow any liars on our team. So, no more secrets?”
“None,” Piper agreed. “Promise.”
Camilla grinned, and just like that, Piper felt it. They were friends now, Piper and this talented girl who kept everyone at a distance.
“Well, what are we waiting for?” Julius asked. “Let’s get outta her
e.”
“No way am I strong enough to do more than one of us at a time,” Kenji said. “But I’ll take Piper first and be right back.” He stepped alongside Piper and wrapped an arm around her torso. With his free hand, he flipped the collar of his jacket.
Nothing happened.
Kenji gritted his teeth, furrowed his brow, and flipped the collar again.
Still nothing.
“What’s wrong?” Piper asked.
“I don’t know. It’s like …” He stepped away from her and flipped his collar a third time, vanishing from view and reappearing on the other side of the infinity pool. Another flip and he was back beside her. “I think my affinity is only working within the garden.”
Piper’s stomach twisted. “The concealment must keep everything contained. Our affinities work, just within the garden’s borders.”
“We better get to the patio, then,” Julius said. “Through the portal above the stag. Then Kenji can jump us.”
“Yes, quickly. Before Mrs. Peavey is up!” Camilla agreed.
Piper nodded and broke into a jog. Soon she wasn’t just jogging, but sprinting. Away from the infinity pool, back to the main path. The hospital waited. She had to get there before it was too late.
Her legs pumped faster.
She could hear her friends behind her, following.
The oak alley appeared, and as Piper passed beneath the first few branches, a figure stepped from behind one of the ancient trees.
Piper froze.
It wasn’t one figure, but two.
The first tall and elegant.
The other small and white.
Sophia and the Persian.
Chapter Twenty-Five Mind over Matter
The shock of seeing them made Piper falter. She wanted to disappear, to hide, but her affinity felt like a stone in her stomach. Genuine fear gripped her. “H-how did you get in here?” she stammered. Behind her, Piper could hear her friends approaching. Their racing feet ground to a halt when they spotted Sophia.