spine tingled as she took in the white circle on the floor, the heavy curtains on the windows. The shelf full of dusty old books.
“So that’s where your family does their rituals,” she said, turning to Juniper Saunders. The older woman stood beside the velvet curtain, staring out at the woods, the crow’s-feet at the edges of her eyes crinkling with focus. She looked uneasy in here, which Harper supposed made sense. It had to be full of strange memories for her.
“It’s supposed to be a secret,” Juniper said. “But in light of the last few days, it feels like one you need to know.” Harper didn’t mention the fact that, though she’d never been up here before, Violet had already told her about it.
“Welcome!” Violet spread her arms wide. Orpheus’s head peered up from the trapdoor, all ears and giant yellow eyes, before the gray tabby loped cautiously into the room, following Violet as she gestured emphatically. “Here you’ll see the place where my entire family willingly traumatized ourselves for a hundred and fifty years. Please note the lovely aura of despair, as well as the circle that may or may not fling you into the Gray.”
“You’re being very flippant, Violet,” Juniper said, a slight note of disapproval in her voice. “Harper is the first non-Saunders ever to set foot here?—this is a big deal.”
“You never took Augusta?” Violet drawled.
Juniper glared at her. “Absolutely not.”
Harper cleared her throat. “Then why me?”
The two Saunderses paused, turning to look at her. Harper was struck for the thousandth time by how alike their movements were, even though neither of them seemed to see it.
“Because,” Violet said finally, “I told Mom we could use your help.”
“And I agreed with her.” Juniper walked over to the bookshelf and pulled out a dusty wooden tube. “Your training has hit a bit of a wall, Harper. I’m sure you’ve noticed that.”
Harper nodded. Noticed was an understatement. Training sessions with both Augusta and Juniper had shown her that turning things to stone was not the problem. The problem was stopping, or reversing the damage, and she had yet to come close to figuring out either.
“It’s very clear that this block isn’t about ability,” Juniper continued. “It’s mental. For some reason, you aren’t ready to wield your powers. So today, I’ll be giving you both a little bit of a history lesson that might help you understand the stakes we’re dealing with here.”
Juniper pulled a large sheet of rolled-up paper out of the tube and spread it out on the floor, piling books on the edges to keep it flat. Then she sat beside it and gestured for the girls to join her. Harper understood immediately what she was looking at: a map of Four Paths, almost identical to the one the Hawthornes possessed.
It was illustrated beautifully, green-and-brown etchings of trees interrupted by tiny drawings of town landmarks. But there was a key difference between this map and the one the Hawthornes had.
Drawn over it, in sharp black lines, was the founders’ symbol: a circle with four lines cutting through it, not quite meeting at the center. The founders’ symbol sliced perfectly through the four landmarks Augusta Hawthorne had talked about: Harper’s family’s lake, to the east. The Saunders manor to the north. The hawthorn tree to the south. And the Sullivan manor in the west.
“You should update the map,” Violet said from beside her, tapping on the manor. “It’s just ruins now.”
“Not just ruins,” Juniper said, looking up at them. “It’s corrupted. Just like the hawthorn tree.”
Harper shuddered, remembering the corrupted lake she’d seen in the Gray. She’d never seen anything so grotesque, so wrong.
“Something is off about all of this,” Juniper continued. “I grew up in Four Paths. When the Beast acted on its own, its attacks were always random. But it’s clear by now that there is nothing random about the way the corruption is spreading.”
She tapped the map again, more meaningfully this time, and Harper understood.
“It’s targeting the founders.” It wasn’t a question. “The hawthorn. The Sullivan ruins. The sheriff told me those are important places for us.”
Juniper nodded. “That’s why we brought you to the spire,” she said solemnly.
“Because you think it’s next?”
“Because I know it is. Our spire, your family’s lake, and…”
She pointed at the center of the map: the place where the four lines did not quite meet. Harper’s heartbeat sped up. She knew exactly what was there, at the center of everything.
“The founders’ seal,” she said slowly. “Where the founders