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Willa stopped.

The handle was largely untouched but for a few branch-like protrusions snaking their way toward the base of the lever. Halfway down the plate, globs of gold with a grainy texture stretched up along the plate. What once was a keyhole was now a gaping hole with pieces of gold and iron dangling like rounded, metal stalactites from the top rim, and hardened grey-and-gold dribbles decorating the gold encasing the bottom of the plate.

Grace got to work.

“Stay back,” she told Willa and Garrick, hustling Willa as far from the door as she could in the space of a second.

“Hey!” Willa said.

Grace ignored her and turned to the door, examining the plate.

The gold hadn’t spread to the oak boards externally, but the inner mechanism of a lock had empty space. It could have dripped into the wood where Grace couldn’t see. Next, she searched the porch below the door. No drops of gold there.

Grace didn’t know how, but she offered a prayer of thanks.

“Get me a pry bar, and a barrel to prop the door on.” She had to get this door off and to her parents without letting that gold touch anything else.

The cousins stared at her but didn’t move.

“Hurry. A pry bar, a chisel. Something to get this door off its hinges.”

Willa crossed her arms. “Where do you get off telling me what to do on my own property, Robbins? That’s not your old flame’s door anymore. It’s mine.”

“I don’t care whose door it is, I’ve seen this stuff. It will keep spreading and warping as it goes.”

Garrick shifted closer. “It spreads? But it’s metal.”

“The key hole is melted! Why couldn’t it spread?” Grace really hoped they’d quit asking questions. It was clearly too late to keep the presence of gold a secret from the sheriff and mayor—Garrick would go reporting to them within the day—but the less she mentioned, the better.

But she also had to make sure they didn’t touch the Zerudorn gold, and these two were stubborn.

“Is it soft?”

Grace jumped. Willa had snuck up beside her, the wide end of a large frond in hand. Before Grace could stop her, she poked the stem of the leaf into the gaping hole and thumped it against the gold.

“No!”

After a few seconds, the reverberations liquified the gold. Grace recoiled, falling on her back end and scooting back as a small stream of gold slithered down the plate and onto the oak door, gathering in droplets. Some dribbled down onto the stem, and Willa cried out, dropping the plant and scuttling behind Grace.

The gold started to solidify, altering in form as it did. On the door, dribbles spread and warped into blocky protrusions reminiscent of the tree knot in the patterning on the door. The frond sprouted thin, fan-like sheets of veined gold.

“Wha… What is that?!” Willa’s hardened defenses cracked a bit, and her fingers bit into Grace’s shoulder.

Garrick, too, stood frozen in a state of horror. “I’ve never seen the likes of it.”

“I told you. I’ve dealt with this before. Now, please...”

“A pry bar,” Garrick said, and headed toward the square in hurried steps.

“And an axe!” Grace called. She was beginning to realize they’d have to do a bit more than take the door off its hinges.

Willa straightened. “There’s a barrel in the back the vandal didn’t smash.”

“Wait,” Grace said. “Get my parents instead. Tell them to bring the mystic ice. And our oldest wheelbarrow.”

Willa stared at her in confusion, but glanced at the frond, and dashed off.

With both of them gone, Grace carefully shifted to get back on her feet and examine the spread of the gold. She was grateful this estate sat far back from most of the manors. She really didn’t need anyone else to come investigate the Zerudorn gold.