I wasn’t sure how my mother factored into that world. Maybe the version of her I’d met under the lake was a completely different person. Maybe my real mother had gone down at some point in the ten years between this beach visit and the present to try to stop her evil doppelgänger from becoming too powerful, and had accidentally stayed too long and been eaten up by her.
Swallowing down these thoughts, I took a deep breath and tried to focus. The truth was, I might never know what had gone wrong under the lake. But I did know this: I needed to stop it from ever happening, both to protect the world below from the Russian investor and to save my brother’s life.
I stood and started heading down the stairs, not sure what my plan was but knowing I had to make one, when I almost walked right into a man heading up to the apartment. He was young and barrel-chested, smelling of expensive cologne, and wore a neatly pressed suit. It took me a moment to recognize him, but when I did, I felt my whole body shudder.
He was my mom’s Russian boyfriend from the world beneath the lake. Alexei. That was his name.
“Excuse me,” he said, the slightest bit of an accent apparent in his speech. He looked about twenty-five years old, and was very handsome, but in a cold and menacing way.
“S-sorry,” I stuttered.
“Are you a friend of John’s?” he asked, nodding to the stairs I had just descended. They only led to one place.
“No,” I answered, perhaps a bit too quickly. “I mean . . . I’m just lost. I was looking for my room.”
“Ah, what’s the number?”
“Four. Fourth floor. I had the wrong one.” I laughed, trying to sound casual. “I know where it is now. Excuse me.”
I edged past him, heading down another flight of stairs and trying to walk at a measured pace.
Once I got to the lobby, I sat down and pretended to read a newspaper someone had left on a coffee table. I was right about the Russian investor, it seemed. It was, in fact, Alexei. And if he was here, was I already too late to stop the portal from being built?
It was very late when the group from the upstairs apartment finally came down, dressed for dinner. My brother looked tired, and a glance at the clock over the reception desk told me it was after eight. But my mother pulled him along in a possessive way. John was deep in conversation with Alexei, but even from a distance, I could see Alexei’s eyes drifting over to my mother.
They all joined a stream of other guests headed to the dining room. None of them had the suitcase. At the last moment, Sage turned back, muttered something to the others like “just a moment,” and then strode over to the front desk. I watched from over my newspaper as she plopped her purse down on the counter, asking the front-desk girl for something or other.
The girl nodded, and Sage followed her into the office, leaving her purse behind.
This was my only chance. That suitcase was somewhere in the apartment upstairs, and Sage’s keys were surely in her purse. I ran up and grabbed the whole clunky, heavy bag, bolting up the stairs while I frantically searched through her collection of tissues, receipts, and lipsticks.
I found the keys jangling together at the bottom of the bag and got lucky on the first try as I heard the lock click open.
Bounding into their apartment, I discovered the suitcase by the bathroom. I knelt down to open it, all while glancing intermittently at the door. How much time before Sage discovered her purse was missing? One minute? Maybe two?
I opened the suitcase and let the top of it fall back. Inside was a small glass jar, like a beaker, narrow at the top and plugged with a cork, wedged into some Styrofoam padding that had been cut specifically to fit it. A pink solution sloshed around inside. It had a glow about it, an iridescence. I picked it up and stared at it, and I could see the liquid splash against the glass enclosure as my nervous hands shook.
The footsteps on the stairs were muffled at first, but then I could hear Sage’s bracelets clinking together. She was humming to herself, obviously convinced that she had left her purse upstairs.
I stood, clutching the beaker to me, and ran for the front of the apartment. There was nowhere to hide, as it was all one large room. I eyed the bathroom furtively, but I knew I’d never get there in time. Instead, I pressed myself against the wall by the door. If she opened it all the way, I would be hidden behind it.
But when Sage came in, she only opened the door enough to pass through. I was completely exposed behind her. She was distracted, at least, looking around for her purse. So once she was a few feet into the room, I turned and ran out the door. I could sense her spinning to see me.
“What the—” she started. “Stop! Someone’s in here! Thief! Someone stop her!”
Luckily, as Sage’s apartment occupied the whole top of the building, there were no other guests nearby to hear her. I flung myself down the stairs, hearing her jewelry clucking like a scared hen behind me.
I knew she wouldn’t be able to catch me. I ran so fast, the world turned into a blurred soup, and I didn’t stop until I was deep in the woods, halfway to the lake.
There was only one person who could
