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He couldn’t. He couldn’t make that right. It wasn’t possible.

In his moment of abstraction, Tacey quite unexpectedly arrived. She was moving slowly and with effort but also with determination.

“The Scholar said you were out here,” she said.

Mercury scrambled to his feet, slipping an arm around her. “Why have you left the safety of the tower? You aren’t strong enough to outrun the people who are here searching for all of us. What if they’d snatched you? What if you’d become lost in one of the moving corridors or trapped in a room?”

“I had to find you,” she said. “The Scholar told me about the Rending Rock.”

Mercury nodded. “This book makes me think it is an actual place.”

“It is. I’ve seen it. And I can show you where it is.”

11

“When the Vanns first visited, I would return to Larissa Lodge by a less direct path. I was hoping to avoid being cornered by them,” Tacey explained as they walked toward the far end of the estate.

Mercury had his arm around her middle. Her legs gave out every couple of steps. She barely managed to keep moving forward. Several times, he offered to stop, but she insisted they move forward.

“There is a rock near that path,” she said. “The most unusual rock I’ve ever seen. I think it’s the one you’re looking for.”

He stopped short, turning shocked eyes on her. “Is it actually broken? Literally?”

She nodded. The movement was weak and small. He swore the color was draining more from her face.

“I don’t know how much longer you can go on,” he said. “You have to turn back. You have to go back to the house.”

But she shook her head. “This is the rock you’re looking for. I know it is. And you have to go now.”

“That rock will still be here when you’re feeling better.”

“This is tearing me in pieces,” she said. “I don’t think it will stop unless this is fixed.”

“But I don’t know how—”

Her legs buckled under her. Mercury barely managed to keep her from falling all the way to the ground. He knelt down, with her still in his arms. She leaned heavily against him. Even breathing seemed to be difficult for her.

“You have to go back. We have to take you back to the house.”

“The house is tearing itself apart, too,” she said.

“It’s designed for the rooms to move, a certain magic the house has,” Mercury assured her. “It’s not a sign that it’s broken.”

“It is breaking, though.” It wasn’t Tacey who answered, but Zizzy, floating up beside them. “It’s breaking. The ghosts have all fled. And the intruders are slipping free as well.”

Mercury looked back in the direction of the house, but he couldn’t see it anymore.

Tacey was holding too still for his peace of mind. She was breathing, but she was no longer looking at him, no longer trying to get back to her feet.

“I will stay with her,” Zizzy said. “I think you need to go there.”

Mercury felt the same tug. And yet, how could he leave Tacey? How could he just walk away when this place that had been home to him for so long and that he’d begun letting himself imagine as their home was draining the life out of her?

“Go,” Tacey said quickly but quietly. “Fixing this is the only chance any of us have.”

He took her face gently in his hands and kissed her.

“We’re going to get through this somehow,” he said. “Do not give up.”