“Call me. We can talk more about Circe, about this place, or maybe something else altogether.” Before I had a chance to respond, she swept out of the room, glancing back to look me square in the eye. “Bye, Briseis.”

The way she said my name sent a flood of warmth through me—and not the kind that brought flowers to bloom. She disappeared down the hall. Not a minute later, my parents were standing in front of me.

“Spill it,” said Mo. “Who was that? And why was she lookin’ at you like that?”

“She said she was gonna pay you a hundred dollars for some seeds?” Mom looked extremely concerned. “What kind of seeds? Opium? Kids gettin’ high out here in the sticks?”

“What? No. It’s—it’s plants.” I needed to let them in on at least some of what was happening so they didn’t worry. “Circe and Selene were running an apothecary. We figured that, but the thing is, they were growing and harvesting everything themselves in that garden I told you about.”

“And there are already people willing to pay money for this stuff?” Mo scanned the shelves.

“That’s why random people have been showing up,” I said. “The place has been closed for a while, but now that word has gotten around that we’re here, I think people are hoping we’ll reopen it.”

“Will we?” Mom asked. She turned to me. “You want to do this?”

It wasn’t that I wanted to do it. I felt like I was supposed to. The only thing I’d ever been really good at in my life was the one thing these random people needed me to do. It wasn’t a coincidence. It couldn’t have been. “I want to try and reopen the apothecary. I’ll take care of the plots and see if I can bring back the plants. We could run it like the shop back home. Maybe you can help me figure out the business side?”

Mom sighed. “It might be similar, but it’s still a business. It’s a lot of work.”

Mo looked thoughtful. “We’re not paying rent for the space, and the inventory would be whatever you’re growing in the garden, right?”

“I’d grow everything myself,” I said. “We’d only have to pay for bags, maybe labels, but that’s it.”

“And you’re not worried about, you know, the way it makes you feel?” Mom asked.

I shook my head. “Not if I don’t try so hard to control it. When I let go, it’s easier.”

Mo smiled. “Startup costs would be nothing. It’d be almost one hundred percent profit. I think we’d have to steer clear of making promises about what this stuff can and can’t do for legal reasons, but other than that, I think it’s doable.”

We sat quietly for a moment. We were all thinking it through, figuring out if our plan could work. I could see Mom worrying about every detail, looking at it from every angle, and Mo seemed to have decided it was a done deal. She was already scratching out supply lists and possible business hours on the back of a paper bag. After talking it through a half-dozen times and establishing a schedule based on how quickly I thought I could restock the contents of the apothecary, we had a solid plan for reopening it.

Mom and Mo talked excitedly as they meandered upstairs and into their room for the night. It made me happy to think we could stay, that I could spend some more time with Karter, and hopefully see Marie again. Her face was emblazoned in my mind.

I closed up the apothecary and went to my room. I brushed my teeth and put on a bonnet. As I walked past the fireplace, the plants by the hearth tangled themselves together and knocked over their planters.

As I righted them, I noticed something odd. Unlike thefire-place in my moms’ room, this one didn’t have any debris inside. The raised grate where the logs would sit looked brand-new aside from some dust. It didn’t look like anything had ever been burned in it at all. I crouched down and craned my neck to look up into the chimney. I couldn’t see anything, but figured it was probably blocked like the other one had been, so I grabbed the chain and stood as far away from the opening as I could before yanking it down.

I waited for the metal on metal grinding as the flue opened and braced myself for the subsequent shower of dead birds and leaves. Instead, I was met with a low rumble, a sound that might have been mistaken for distant thunder, as a cloud of dust engulfed me. The hearth sank into the wall, then rolled to the right, revealing a small room.

I stumbled back coughing, my eyes watering. I expected Mom and Mo to come running but there was only quiet. This wasn’t exactly the same as a strange door appearing out of nowhere like in the scary stories I’d talked about with Karter, but it was close enough to make me briefly consider taking a flying leap out the closest window.

The fireplace wasn’t real. It was a false facade, and behind it was a space the size of a large closet. A rolltop desk sat against the far wall, a wooden chair tucked underneath. Above it, a large map was pinned to a corkboard. I grabbed my phone and turned on the flashlight, sweeping the light upward. There were three pins stuck in the map, right over Rhinebeck, and three more scattered across different continents.

The desk itself was dusty, covered with loose papers, sketches of plants, and books arranged in neat stacks. I pictured Circe or maybe Selene sitting and studying the map and drawings. Carved into the dark cherry wood of the desk’s surface was a symbol I recognized—the same crest from the hidden door in the Poison Garden. I traced the lines and curves of the three faces with my fingers.

I swept my light to the wall behind me. There was only one other thing hanging in the musty space—another painting of Medea. It was bigger than the ones in the turret and set in a heavy, silver frame that was tarnished with age. Medea sat front and center, her big dark eyes staring out at me, her hair down, the tight coils brushing the tops of her bare shoulders. Her hands were cupped together in front of her, and in her palm sat six seeds.

I backed up against the opposite wall to take in the entire painting, and as I did, I saw Medea wasn’t alone in the frame. Standing behind her, taking up the entire top half of the canvas, was another figure. A woman dressed in billowing black robes stood directly behind Medea. Her eyes were the color of ink and her skin was like the velvety petals of the calla lily, Black and beautiful. She had a jet-black mass of thick, lustrous hair framing her head. Set among the valleys and peaks of her natural hair was a crown of golden gilded rays.