“Izzy’s here?” James blinked. He knew he should have expected that. Petra rarely went anywhere without her half-sister, whom she protected intently.
Zane nodded. “They were talking about what will become of her once Petra zaps away into Morgan’s dimension. I think that Odin-Vann guy means to take care of her. Adopt her, maybe.”
James’ head spun for a moment. He couldn’t quite bring himself to imagine Petra abandoning Izzy, but of course it would be impossible to do otherwise. The Izzy in that other dimension, unfortunately, was dead.
At that moment, the door to Apollo mansion opened. Donofrio Odin-Vann stepped out, followed by a thin, young woman in jeans and a pale green jumper, her glossy dark hair pulled back in a ponytail.
At the sight of her, all the breath seemed to suck out of James’ lungs. The color faded from everything in the world except for the young woman as she came lightly down the steps, meeting his eyes, smiling at him, faintly, but with genuine affection.
She approached him, reached for him, touched his shoulders.
And then they were embracing. It was a brief reunion, but monumental in James’ mind. He had not touched Petra in years. Had only seen her once, briefly, on the night that she had created her Horcrux. In his heart, she had become something almost mythical—a towering icon of both hopeless love and impending tragedy. And yet now, finally, here she stood before him, in his arms, half-a-head shorter than him. Her hair smelled of lavender. The embrace of her arms was strong, warm, utterly human.
And then she was letting him go, stepping back, looking up at him.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
He shook his head at her, speechless. Was she sorry for the way she had recently blocked him out, closing off her end of the their shared thread? Or for including him on this possibly dangerous mission?
James couldn’t tell. Possibly both. Or perhaps she was sorry for something else entirely.
“You should go now,” Odin-Vann said. “We have very little time.”
James frowned, finally tearing his gaze away from Petra. “You mean… you aren’t coming?”
Odin-Vann nodded and drew a brief, heavy sigh. “I would be of little help where you are going. My mission is to stay here. I will keep Izzy safe, and watch the house. Should anyone approach while you are in the World Between the Worlds, I will need to remove the horseshoe key. I will send them on their way by whatever means necessary and replace it once the coast is clear.”
There was something off-kilter about the way Odin-Vann spoke and avoided eye-contact, but James couldn’t quite identify what it was.
“Where will Izzy be?” Zane asked, drawing his wand out of his pocket.
Petra answered, “She’s in the basement game room. The cellar isn’t part of the portal. She’ll be safe there with the Disarmadillo and Don just outside. And she has her doll with her, Betsy.”
James nodded hesitantly. It was strange hearing the professor referred to as Don, but he supposed that’s what all of his old friends and classmates called him.
Zane tugged the horseshoe from his other jeans pocket and handed it to Odin-Vann, who accepted it reverently. He turned toward the cornerstone and the engraved shape that, James knew, fit the horseshoe perfectly. The young professor glanced back over his shoulder.
“You have your means of communicating with Ms. Weasley?” he asked James.
James nodded, patting the Duck stuffed into his pocket.
“You both have a very important duty,” Odin-Vann said, looking at James and Zane meaningfully. “A grave duty more important than any other task on earth at this moment. Do you both know the true source of Petra’s powers?”
James did know, but hadn’t realized that Odin-Vann did. He nodded, a bit uncertainly.
Odin-Vann went on, more intently than James had ever heard him speak. “Petra is a sorceress. There may be none like her in all of history. Sorcery power is derived from a natural element. Petra’s is the first of her kind: her element is the city. Where you are going, I need not remind you: there are no cities. There never have been, and there never shall be. While she is there, she will be at her weakest, drawing on her stored power alone, like a Muggle battery. You two are to be her protection. You are wizards. You take your power with you. Use it well. Find and collect the symbolic crimson thread. And bring it and her back here safe. Do you understand?”
“They understand, Don,” Petra said. She placed an arm each around Zane’s and James’ waists, squeezing them both. “These two shall be my knights in shining armour, at least for the next hour. Open the portal already. As you say, time is short.”
Odin-Vann still glared at Zane and James, turning the silver horseshoe over and over in his hands. James had time to wonder: if the task of protecting Petra was so important, why was the professor not attending to it himself? He remembered his suspicions about the professor, about how he seemed to be magically stymied when under stress. It was almost as if pressure flustered him into impotence, turned him into a temporary squib. Was that why he was choosing not go himself, remaining to perform the much more menial duty of guarding the house?
Finally, Odin-Vann turned away and approached the huge conjoined cornerstone of Apollo mansion.
Petra stepped toward the door again, bringing Zane and James with her.
“I’m sorry,” she said again, glancing aside at both boys, first Zane, and then James. But then she smiled and added, “But it really is good to be together with you two rogues again. Tell Ralph I’m disappointed he isn’t here as well. And Rose, too.”
James nodded that he would.
A moment later, a blast of warm light exploded from Apollo mansion, silent but blinding, piercing from every window, keyhole, and door crack, even from the throat of the chimney.
Petra stiffened, drew herself up, and then gripped James’ and Zane’s hands on either side, squeezing. Together, the three stepped forward.
The door to Apollo mansion opened of its own accord, spilling a brilliance of colors, all fused into something rosy-golden, exerting subtle force against their bodies while simultaneously drawing them forward.
As one, they held their breath, stepped over the threshold, and vanished from the world they knew.
8. – The thread and the brooch
Absolutely nothing had changed since James had last set foot in the World Between the Worlds. He sensed it not just by looking around, but with something deeper and more pervasive inside his own heart and mind. He remembered someone commenting on it during their previous visit: time doesn’t take any time here, they had said.
He hoped it hadn’t been Lucy who’d said it. The thought of her made his heart as heavy and cold as stone.
Silently, James led the way out of the cave of the portal and up the curving stairs carved into the bare rock of the plateau. Beneath them, iron-grey waves crashed against the cliffs, sending up dull mists.