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Mom and I settled down in porch chairs next to one another with our steaming mugs of coffee with the outdoor coffee table in front of us, and gazed out at the front yard.

“Gramps was particular about the trees,” I repeated back to my mom. “In what way do you mean?”

I met my mom’s eyes. “I know you don’t want to lose me… but we have no proof that this book is actually what made Grammy sick, or that it’s what made Gramps lose touch with reality. And what about the people in Miralore? What about what they will lose? You can’t tell me you’re willing to let a bunch of innocent people die in Miralore, just to keep me from maybe contracting some kind of illness no one even knows about.”

I stared at my mother. “You knew about Miralore?”

A half-hour later, we were on my parents’ front porch. My parents were early risers, so I wasn’t surprised to see shadows moving inside the house through the front curtains.

We all headed out to the car a few minutes later… and Ayric nearly lost his mind.

I found Tyler sitting on the edge of the bed in the spare bedroom he was planning to sleep in, staring at the floor. The bed and a small path to it from the doorway were the only things in the room not covered in stacks of boxes.

Tyler texted Mom and Dad that he was staying late to help me go through boxes, so they wouldn’t wait up for him at the other house, then we got to work.

Ayric and I were still perched on stools at the kitchen island, eating our second slices of pizza, when Tyler and Mav re-entered the kitchen. They’d been tearing open boxes and shoving them around upstairs so furiously for the past few minutes, it had sounded like a herd of elephants upstairs.

The moment we stop fighting, we have already lost.

“I believe you simply write in the book,” Ayric said, “and your words will send me back to fulfill what you have written. The story I was told in childhood was not detailed on the particular process.”

Something twisted in my chest at the way Mav’s eyes were looking at me, but I pushed it aside—now wasn’t the time for those feelings again.

Mav laughed. “You’re kidding, right? One book to rule them all? This guy copied his dramatic story straight from—”

“What have you done?” Ayric leaped for the book, but froze with his fingers inches from it, then stared up at me in horror. “You could have damaged it! Do you not understand what—“ His fingers hovered above the book. “I should not touch it. You are the Guardian. Please... please remove it from the floor.”

My heart lurched. I still didn’t know what was happening, but it seemed bad. Was it bad? Was it my fault?

I gasped as I took in my new surroundings. What the—

Tyler followed me into Gramps’ office.

I packed my unmentionables into a spare gym bag while Tyler and Mav were distracted boxing up my books.

I didn’t feel awkward about holding Mav’s hand until we got closer to the house and Tyler’s eyes caught on our clasped fingers.

Mav stood a few feet away as I stared into the line of trees. The sun was setting beyond them, lighting their branches with a golden glow. The huge cypress I’d noticed earlier stood in this line, a few spots from where Gramps’ hole had been dug. Behind the trees sprawled about twenty feet of grass, edged on the far end by a wooden fence—the back end of Gramps’ property. Of my property, if I accepted it.