In the dark underbelly of the Dire Woods, the madness found her. It knifed inside, twisted and wrestled to weaken her. The forest never played fairly, for there were no rules once you entered. No direction, no time. What seemed like a mile could’ve only been mere steps. A minute, a handful of hours. Torment that stretched beyond reality wanted you to feel it, until even the strongest couldn’t survive. Kallia felt her resolve cracking, signaled for Sun Gem to gallop faster, as if she could outrun sound itself. But her head was full of Jack’s voice, her bleary gaze catching hints of his form following her between the shadows of the trees encompassing her.
Were the Woods just humoring her with the guise of escape?
Would she find him at the end of her path, waiting?
She shivered, the possibility haunting. Their steps, feeling numbered. Until the horse soon shuddered to a lighter canter, then a stop.
The motion sent Kallia reeling as she looked to the sky to anchor her—finding the tree branches lacing the sky. And in between them, tall walls with gated tops.
The Glorian border. It looked so different from how she’d viewed it from her greenhouse. Always a fixture in the distance, not one she would ever meet.
Everything fell silent. The howling of the wind in the trees, Jack’s voice. The world around her fell still in the face of the immense stone wall curving to the iron-wrought gates.
Larger than Kallia imagined it would be. On the roof, it looked more like the brimstone rim of a teacup. Here, it was an impenetrable fortress. So tall and imposing that, after always looking at it from afar, it didn’t seem real.
Glorian.
Impatiently, Kallia dismounted. She almost twisted her ankle in her intense yet graceless battle to reach the ground, but Sun Gem stayed firmly in place, ears perked and alert. Kallia could hear her following behind toward the gates, the gaping archway that interrupted the stone expanse.
Kallia stroked the horse’s neck sadly. “I’m sorry girl, I can’t take you with me.”
Sun Gem blinked as Kallia’s fingers smoothed back the spot between her ears. She found the fastenings of the saddle and unbuckled them one by one, letting them drop to the ground and kicking them aside. In this city, Sun Gem would only be tied down again, to a carriage or another stable. It was not fair to escape one prison only to fall back into another.
The horse gave a soft huff before backing into the forest. In no time, Kallia heard her hooves galloping away, running farther and farther from the wall. The retreating sound, both comforting and cold.
Kallia was alone.
Light peeked from behind, grazing the tops of the wall in a smattering of sunrise. She could barely feel the exhaustion seeping in, not when she was just breaths away from Glorian, of feeling the sun she’d always known on a different side of the Dire Woods.
With each step, more of the city’s music filled her ears—birds chirping and wings flapping, hammers hitting away in the clamor of construction. Kallia soaked in these new sounds. They were no different from those she’d heard around the House on a busy morning, but there was something exhilarating in the rise of an entire city rather than a household.
A smile touched her lips as she finally faced the entrance.
She’d imagined it a thousand times over.
The black gates were flung wide open, welcoming and sleek in the morning light. The stacked stones of the walls shone dark gray, but the gates that completed it were smooth and just as striking. When her eyes worked around them, the designs and the intricacy, Kallia laughed. From afar, they’d only appeared like odd wired forms. Up close, she devoured each circle and block, star and triangle, all twined in the corners. Symbols steeped in mystery. A new hand ready to be dealt.
Kallia walked through the gates, entering the city of cards.
ACT II
ENTER THE DEVILS:
THE BEASTS THAT HUNT, AND THE GHOSTS WHO HAUNT
The master of the House had not left his room all day. The entire night before, he had searched the Dire Woods on horseback, her voice teasing his ear, whispering that she’d returned. That she would never leave, happy and satisfied right where she was.
Only a fool believed the forest and its lies. When he’d found her dressing room drowning in flames but no sign of her, he’d taken to the Woods. It was a risk to venture out