A sharp banging against her front doors sent Cate’s heart spiraling higher. Her chest constricted, breathing turning difficult as she struggled to focus on the matter at hand.
“Break down the doors!” Gianna’s voice commanded from outside Dunhaven Castle’s library.
Time stood still as she pressed a hand against her sweat-beaded brow. Her mind swam and the room spun. Damien lay bleeding on her foyer floor after imparting the fateful news that she needed to travel twenty years into the future.
She’s wanted to know more, but Marcus had carried her–kicking and screaming–to the library, bolted them inside, and demanded she leave in the time portal.
Marcus stretched out his arms, a twinkling sparkle glowing to life in front of her. “The moment the portal opens, you must go.”
Cate’s lower lip quivered, her knees buckling as the portal's wind scattered papers around her in a chaotic swirl. She nodded, tears welling in her eyes.
The dark hole yawned in front of her. “It’s open, go!” Marcus shouted.
She glanced back at him, her features pinching in anxiety. Taking a deep breath, she turned toward the shimmering veil of the portal. The air thickened as she approached, the boundary between her world and the unknown manifesting as a curtain of swirling mist and pulsing light. With a hesitant step, she crossed the threshold, the familiar world fading into a corridor of eerie luminescence and shadow.
The dark space surrounded her, but before she could navigate it, the sharp crack of the doors splintering sounded behind her.
But what followed made her heart plummet. A single gunshot pierced the air.
The bullet whizzed past her, somehow entering the portal.
She held her breath as suddenly, everything shifted. The portal snapped closed.
