Gage looked around. “Then it’ll know ours too. We need to move before it pulls more tricks.”
We followed Arlo’s image. The terrain shifted — hills forming, vanishing, trees twisting into new shapes. It was like walking through a dream that kept changing the rules.
Every so often, flashes of light flickered in the distance — like portals opening and closing, pulsing with the same dark energy we’d seen near the border.
Then Gage stopped, his body going tense. “Wait.”
“What is it?” I asked.
He frowned. “Do you hear that?”
At first, I didn’t. Then I did — soft crying, faint but real.
Gage’s face paled. “No. It can’t be…”
A girl’s voice echoed through the trees. “Gage? Help me…”
My stomach dropped. It sounded like Lilly.
He ran forward before I could stop him. “Lilly!”
“Gage, wait!”
