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CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

I t took them, exactly as Bitty had predicted, half a day to reach the Broken City.

Ava had expected the journey to be longer, but the Web seemed unusually cooperative, its twisting corridors and warping landscapes guiding them rather than hindering them. That worried her more than any obstacle could have.

“It’s like it wants us to get there.” She squinted into the daylight as they emerged from a tunnel formed by intertwined tree branches and vines.

Or, it was trying to shorten the amount of time she had to dwell on the fact that Serrik had kissed her.

Holy shit, that kiss.

It was really, really hard not to dwell on it. Because it had been unlike anything she’d ever experienced before in her life.

And all she wanted was to know what else he was capable of.

Not to mention the sick, twisted part of her that was curious what it was like to have sex with him in his true f?—

Bitty’s wings fluttered nervously. “The Web never wants anything good.”

Maybe it wanted good things for her, now that she was…becoming part of it. That was a miserable thought. The more it was helping her, the more it meant she was less herself.

Standing at the edge of a crumbling balcony, they stared out at the sprawling impossibility before them.

“Holy. Shit.” Ava laughed.

The Broken City wasn’t a city. She wasn’t sure what she was expecting. It was fragments—pieces of buildings from different eras, different continents, and hell, probably different worlds—all jumbled together in defiance of physics and logic.

It was a nightmare of a dream of a nightmare of a junk drawer.

Gothic cathedrals leaned against futuristic-looking glass towers. Ancient Roman columns supported the charred remains of what looked like part of a shopping mall with signs hanging off it in a language she couldn’t read. Streets and overpasses began and ended randomly, some tilting at impossible angles, others floating suspended in mid-air.

And interspersed throughout were books. Millions of them. Billions, maybe. Stacked in towers, scattered across plazas, spilling from broken windows and doorways. Books and scrolls and tablets and devices Ava couldn’t even identify.

And all of it was overgrown with trees, vines, and plants of every kind.

“Welcome to the Broken City, where forgotten things go.” Bitty smiled wistfully, her wings twitching. “Everything left behind ends up here eventually.”

“How does that make any sense? This place is a prison.”

“This place is a prison built on top of another thing though, isn’t it?” Bitty tilted her head to the side curiously. “Something older. Something bigger.”

Ava eyed Bitty with narrowed eyes. “How do you know that?”

The fae’s eyes went a little wide, and she took a step away from Ava. “Nos said something about it, once. I—I just listen, I swear, I don’t?—”

Ava sighed. It wasn’t worth fighting over. Everybody had secrets, and Bitty was old. “It’s fine. Yeah. You’re right. The Web used to be—I guess it still is, a big cosmic… thing, that apparently connected worlds? Serrik built the prison on it. Using it. So I guess this makes sense. It’s collecting forgotten refuse.” She looked off into the madness in front of her. “It’s like someone took every library and museum in the world, shattered them, and then reassembled the pieces while blindfolded.”

Bitty nodded. “That’s not a bad description. The Broken City is also where forgotten knowledge comes when it’s lost, no matter what it is, big or small.”

“That explains the books.” She paused, then laughed with a realization. “You must have a lot of computer passwords.” Ava adjusted her backpack, checking that Book was secure inside of it. Her arms were getting tired from carrying it. And it didn’t seem to mind being tucked away. “And the second key is somewhere in that mess?”

“Somewhere.” Bitty sounded less than confident. “I’ve only been here twice before, and never to the center. It’s dangerous to stay too long.”

“Why?”

“Um…” The tiny fae’s wings trembled slightly. “Some things are forgotten for a reason.”

“Fun, haven’t had someone say something ‘cryptic and needlessly foreboding’ in a while. Thanks Bit, I was just starting to get worried I was missing out.” Ava started picking her way down a crumbling staircase that seemed to have been ripped from a Parisian apartment building, with Bitty not far behind.

At the bottom, they found themselves on a street paved with cobblestones that gave way to marble tiles, then to electronic panels that lit up beneath their feet.

“So where do we start?” Ava tried to orient herself in the chaos, but she wasn’t sure why she bothered.

Bitty hesitated. “I’m not sure. The city changes. It’s never the same twice.”

“Great. A magical maze with no fixed solution.” And her magical tome had clammed up the past few days. It seemed to be pretty selective on when and how it wanted to help out. Lovely. Nothing like a convenient and selective plot device with a sick sense of humor.

“We could try to follow the books?” Bitty suggested, gesturing to where the stacks seemed particularly dense. “Most of the city is made of forgotten knowledge. Maybe they’ll lead us to what we need.”

“Sure. Maybe those books will be helpful, right, Book? ” She shouted over her shoulder. It was as good a plan as any. Namely because she didn’t have any others. They set off, navigating the chaotic landscape carefully.

The first street they followed ended abruptly, the cobblestones simply terminating in a drop of at least fifty feet to another section of city below. They backtracked, finding a narrow alley between what looked like a chunk of a Greek temple and the facade of an Art Deco movie theater.

The alley opened onto a plaza where stone statues with too many limbs stood frozen in poses of supplication. Beyond that, a marketplace where empty stalls still bore the ghostly outlines of wares long since disappeared.

Throughout it all, books. They were everywhere—forming unstable towers that reached toward the strange, sourceless light above, scattered across every surface, sometimes even embedded in the walls and floors themselves.

Bitty stayed close, occasionally fluttering up to get a better view before returning to Ava’s side. Despite her initial reluctance to have a companion, Ava had to admit she was glad for the company.

Through it all, though, Ava had one problem.

She felt like she was being watched.

Like, really, seriously watched.

As if countless eyes were watching from the shadows of its fragmented architecture.

Finally, she couldn’t take it anymore. “Do you feel that?” she asked as they crossed what appeared to be half of a Victorian-era iron bridge, its other end disappearing into thin air.

“Feel what?” Bitty landed beside her, wings folding against her back.

“Like we’re not alone.”

The little fae nodded, her expression grim. “The Forgotten watch everything. Best not to look back at them.”

“The Forgotten?” Oh, for fuck’s sake. “You mean there are things in this city?” She glared down at the little fae. “Things you may have neglected to tell me about?”

“Well—um—it—didn’t seem worth scaring you, since—since there’s nothing we could have done about it, and well?—”

“Bitty.” Ava wanted to scream. “What are the Forgotten?”

“Well…um…some things here could choose to remember what they once were.” Bitty’s voice dropped to a whisper. “Those are the dangerous ones. They don’t want to remember again. They don’t want to—to be taken back. To leave the Web. They’re the—the only ones who can, but they choose to stay.”

A chill ran down Ava’s spine. She thought of Serrik’s parting words. Not all forgotten things wish to be remembered.

What was more dangerous than something that wanted to leave a torture-prison?

Probably something that desperately wanted to make sure it never, ever did.

They continued through an archway formed entirely of leather-bound volumes, their titles worn away by time. Beyond it lay what might have once been a garden, though now the plants were things Ava couldn’t identify—strange crystalline structures that looked like flowers but chimed softly when the wind touched them, trees with pages instead of leaves that rustled with whispered words.

“This place is nuts, ” Ava murmured, ducking as a book flew overhead—not thrown, but flying under its own power, its cover flapping like wings. Acid trip. The place was definitely a complete acid trip.

“That’s one of them—the Forgotten. And that book isn’t from your world, it came here like that. We get things from all the worlds touched by the fae.”

Ava paused at that. “Do you know how many there are?”

Bitty’s metallic hair caught the strange light as she shook her head. “More than any fae has ever counted. The fae—the ones with magic—move between them, taking what pleases them, leaving what doesn’t.”

Another tick in the kill them all column.

They came to a building that resembled a medieval monastery, though its cloister surrounded not a garden but a pool of what looked like liquid silver. Books floated on the surface, their pages somehow remaining dry.

They continued on, passing through landscapes that grew increasingly bizarre. A street where all the buildings were constructed entirely of clocks, their hands moving at different speeds, some backward. A plaza where floating shelves held thousands of identical books. A garden of statues that seemed to change position when Ava blinked.

Nope. She’d seen that episode. She wanted nothing to do with that.

“Ever seen The Yellow Submarine, Bitty?” Ava chuckled. “I mean, you obviously haven’t. You probably haven’t seen a movie. But. Someday. Somehow. We’re going to watch The Yellow Submarine. And all this shit is going to make sense.” But now she had the song stuck in her head.

“I look forward to it.” Bitty seemed to mean that, even though she clearly had no idea what any of that meant.

Throughout their exploration, the feeling of being watched intensified. More than once, Ava turned quickly, certain she’d catch something following them—but there was never anything there. Just more books, more fragments of forgotten architecture, more shadows that seemed deeper than they should be.

“How big is this place?” She probably should have asked that before they started walking for what felt like hours.

Bitty, who had been hovering near a particularly tall stack of ancient-looking scrolls, shrugged. “No one knows. Maybe infinite.”

“Awesome. Great. Perfect.”

“I’m sorry.” The tiny fae sounded genuinely apologetic. “I don’t think anyone’s ever mapped it successfully. It changes too much.”

Ava sighed, leaning against a wall that appeared to be made of fossilized paper. “So we’re basically wandering randomly, hoping to stumble across the key?”

“Not completely randomly,” Bitty assured her. “The city has patterns. Things naturally organize themselves here. Important things tend to cluster together.”

“And the key would be important.”

“Exactly!”

She thought that over for a second. “So. Change of plans. We look for important things. And old things.”

“Okay. Yes! That!” Bitty’s wings fluttered in what Ava had come to recognize as agreement. “The oldest we can find.”

They changed direction, now paying more attention to the apparent age of the structures and objects around them. Bitty proved surprisingly knowledgeable, pointing out architectural styles Ava had never heard of, identifying scripts and symbols from civilizations long forgotten.

“How do you know all this?” Ava looked up at a wall covered in carvings that Bitty claimed predated human writing. Neat.

The tiny fae’s wings drooped slightly. “When you have no magic, you find other ways to be useful. I’ve spent two hundred and sixty years studying the Web and the things in it. Not much else to do.”

There was something so matter-of-fact about her acceptance of her circumstances that Ava felt a pang of sympathy. “Well, it’s definitely useful now.”

Bitty brightened, her wings perking up. “This way. These symbols get older as we go.”

They followed a passage where the walls were lined with books so ancient their pages had fused together into solid blocks. The air grew heavy with the scent of dust and age and something else—a faint, metallic odor that reminded Ava of blood.

The passage opened onto another plaza, this one dominated by a fountain that no longer flowed. In its dry basin lay hundreds of small metallic discs that Bitty identified as coins from dozens of different worlds and eras. “People always forget their small valuables.” She hovered over the collection. “Coins, keys, tokens…”

“Keys?” Ava perked up.

“Not magical keys.” She giggled. “Just ordinary ones.”

They carried on, the city growing more condensed around them, squeezing them through narrow passages between towering structures of increasing age and strangeness. Bitty had to fold her wings against her back to navigate some of the tighter spots.

The architecture became more primal, less recognizable as anything that might have been built by human, or even fae, hands. Structures that seemed to have grown rather than been constructed. Materials that felt alive under Ava’s fingertips when she brushed against them.

And the books changed, too. No longer bound volumes of paper, but tablets of stone and metal, scrolls made of materials Ava couldn’t identify, devices that hummed with contained information.

“We’re getting into really old territory now,” Bitty whispered, her voice tense. “Before the fae courts. Before most civilizations had names.”

They emerged into a broader avenue lined with what appeared to be obelisks, though instead of being carved with hieroglyphs, they were covered in the same shifting, odd symbols Ava had noticed on some of the older books. They were jagged and sharp, made of spirals and pointed, almost a Sanskrit-like shapes. And the symbols seemed to move when she wasn’t looking directly at them, rearranging themselves into new patterns.

“What’s that?” She pointed to the symbols.

“The First Language.” Bitty’s voice was hushed with what might have been awe or fear. “The one all others came from.”

“Can you read it?”

Bitty shook her head. “No one can. Not anymore. It’s been forgotten.”

“Then how do you know what it is?”

“Because it tells you.” The tiny fae chewed her lower lip. “Even forgotten, it makes itself known.”

Ava was about to ask what that meant when she felt something—a pull, like a magnet drawing her forward. It came from Book, tucked securely in her backpack, but also from the tattoo on her arm. Both responding to something ahead. “Bitty? I…think we’re getting close.”

The tiny fae looked alarmed. “How do you know?”

Ava didn’t answer immediately. She was focused on the sensation—like a tuning fork that had been struck, vibrating at a frequency that matched something in the city ahead of them.

“I can feel it. The key. It’s resonating with…whatever this is.” She gestured vaguely to her arm, where the tattoo lay hidden beneath her sleeve.

Bitty’s wings flattened against her in fear. “That’s not good, Ava. The Web is in you, responding to a piece of itself. It’s getting stronger.”

“Yeah. Trust me, I know.” Ava hesitated, then added, “I had another dream last night. With Serrik.”

“O—Oh.” Bitty’s eyes widened. “What—what did he say?”

“He said the key was here. In the Broken City.” She didn’t mention the rest—the kiss, the warnings, the way her body had betrayed her with its hunger for him. “But he didn’t say exactly where.”

“If he knows we’re here…” Bitty’s voice trailed off. “If he can see and hear what we’re doing?—”

“He’s always known. I’ve been bound to him since the beginning. But it’s also more complicated than that. This is—this is something I just have to do, Bitty. And it’s not about him, believe it or not.”

“I—I mean.” The little fae chewed her lip again. “I believe you. And you’re my friend. So I’ll trust you.”

Ava smiled at her. “I appreciate that.”

They continued down the avenue of obelisks, the pull growing stronger with each step. The structures around them became less recognizable, more abstract—geometries that shouldn’t have been possible, materials that seemed to phase between solid and liquid.

And everywhere, books. Or things that had once been books, before they were forgotten so completely that even their form had begun to blur, turning into mushy blobs of rot.

They turned a corner and found themselves facing what appeared to be a library—though calling it that seemed inadequate. It was vast, its entrance a yawning mouth flanked by columns that resembled spinal cords more than classical architecture. Within, rows of shelves stretched into darkness, filled not with books as Ava understood them, but with objects that pulsed with contained information.

The pull was coming from inside.

“Oh…I’ve heard of this place. It has no name, it’s been, well…forgotten.” Bitty clung to Ava’s arm in fear, her voice barely audible. “But I’ve never…no one goes in there.”

Tiredly, Ava deadpanned her answer. “Okay. I’ll bite. Why not?”

“Because,” the tiny fae said, her wings vibrating with tension, “it’s where knowledge goes to truly die.”

Ava stared into the cavernous entrance. The pull was undeniable now—Book practically humming in her backpack, the tattoo warm against her skin. “The second key is in there. I can feel it.”

Bitty hovered nervously. “Ava, please. We should be careful. Maybe find another way, or?—”

“There is no other way.” Ava took a deep breath, and let it out in a rush. “The Web led us here for a reason. The key is inside.”

She stepped toward the entrance. As she did, she noticed something she hadn’t seen before—shapes moving between the shelves. Not people, not anything with a defined form, but…something. Shadows that were darker than the blackness around them. Voids in the shape of readers.

“More of the Forgotten,” Bitty confirmed, following her gaze. “The ones who remember they once knew things.”

“Cool. I love nightmare fuel.” She waved. “Hi, nightmare fuel!” Pulling Book out of her backpack, she slung the bag back where it was. If she needed it, and her sometimes-useful, sometimes-not companion decided to wake up and be convenient, she wanted to give it the chance. Whatever waited for them—the key, the Forgotten, more of the Web’s machinations—she wanted to be prepared.

Because despite everything—despite the warnings from the Web itself, despite Bitty’s fear, despite her own growing suspicion that she was being remade into something she wouldn’t recognize—she had to keep going.

Forward was the only direction she had to go.

“All right, Bitty. I’m going in. You can stay here, if you want. But I’m—yeah. I’m doing this.” She stepped into the mouth of the cavern of books.

Bitty whined loudly, but bless her heart, she followed.

The darkness inside seemed to swallow them whole.