“C’mon,” Rory whispers. “And no talking now.”

  We follow her through the cased opening at the bottom of the steps.

  The air is damp and stale. The loop’s familiar smell of rot mingles with the regular basement smells. But there’s another odor too. I know that smell. It’s the smell from the dumpster behind Dundalk High. Rats.

  The glow of the candles does nothing to warm the room, despite the fact that there must be a hundred or more. They line the space, spanning across stretches of the floor and the sheet-shrouded furniture. The floor is piled with wilted greenery. Magnolia leaves and tiger lilies. Calla lilies and those little yellow daisy-looking flowers with the black eyes. In the center of the room, the flowers are arranged into a figure eight on the floor. A handful of robed figures surround the figure eight, silently watching as we each file into the basement.

  I follow the one who I think is Blythe to the far corner of the room, but as more and more robed figures emerge from the stairwell, I lose track of who’s who. This is not good. How are any of us going to find Charlotte if we can’t recognize each other? We’ll never get out of here this way.

  Still, I take a deep breath and remind myself that Blythe said she would have an opportunity to subvert the memory during the actual ceremony. I cross my fingers and pray that she’ll keep her word this time. But I know I can’t trust a Lily.

  I scan the crowd, hoping to get a glimpse of someone’s face. From this side of the basement, I realize that the flowers at the center of the room are not actually arranged in a figure eight at all. It’s a ten-foot-long infinity symbol. Obviously.

  Smart, Drew. Very perceptive.

  Grandma Simmons’s diamond ring simmers against my flesh. This all started with her. She and her friends formed a secret club and named themselves after a girl who vanished. It’s a strange thing to do in the first place, but inventing this kind of ritual out of thin air is even stranger. I picture her in her hospice bed wrapped in a green hooded cloak topped with a flower crown. The mental image makes me shudder.

  In front of the infinity of flowers, blindfolded girls are lined up and told to kneel. The voices from under the hoods are cold and sharp, not quite human. They seem more . . . feral.

  The blindfolds stay on.

  When I was here the first time, everyone was gone. Well, almost everyone. The place felt hollow. Empty.

  The energy in the room now is solemn and fierce. There’s something vicious about the slow movements and stinging whispers. It makes me think of pack animals, wolves surrounding their prey.

  I avert my eyes, searching for something else to focus on, a momentary escape from this deep uneasiness. Then I see the door. I know the room that’s on the other side. I know what happened there. Or, actually, what will happen there.

  Death does too.

  I ward the thoughts away from me. That memory isn’t the one I’m reliving at the moment. If everything goes to plan, I won’t have to relive it at all.

  The memory I’m reliving at this moment, the one I’m standing and breathing in, fortunately, doesn’t belong to me.

  So why do I feel like it does? Why do I feel somehow responsible for what might happen to the girls in the blindfolds?

  Because, Death whispers, you chose to be here. You each chose to be here.

  I did it to survive, I argue. I chose Archwell because of my grandmother. She wanted the best for me and Mom.

  She didn’t know you, Death hisses. She only knew this. She helped build this. And you are complicit in the horror reaped here.

  Suddenly I’m crying, but I can’t make a sound, so there is no release. I let the tears collect in the crevices around my mouth, too afraid to move my hands and wipe them away.

  I stare at a spot on the wall, trying to find a way back into myself. For the first time, I notice the large metal box inset into the brick. It’s about as big as one of those fire extinguisher cases, but this box contains some kind of switch. One of the spiderwebs clinging to the heavy-looking handle flutters in the candlelight. The words Duck & Cover are painted across the top of the box in chipped, faded lettering.

  Duck and cover? My brain conjures a mallard underneath a blanket.

  Unhelpful, brain, I think.

  Then I realize it’s a reference to bombs.

  The box is an old, defunct alarm system, likely from the time when Grandma Simmons was a student here. Air-raid drills, I learned in history class, were common then.

  I think of the mallard’s green figure one more time and shake my head at myself.

  Smart, Drew. Truly visionary.

  Someone steps forward from the crowd of robed girls. She is wearing a ring of flowers over her hood like so many of the others, but this one is particularly menacing. Pink lilies are woven in between branches that extend toward the ceiling, like points on a tiara. The pink tint isn’t quite natural looking. The hue suggests poison.

  This girl is an evil queen. When she speaks, I don’t recognize her voice.

  “Lilies,” she says. “Reveal your initiates.”

  Several robed and crowned figures step forward and approach the kneeling, blindfolded girls from behind. They each pull back the new initiates’ hoods, revealing the top of each girl’s head. The blindfolds stay on, but without the hoods, I am starting to recognize the new crop of Lilies. There’s Faith Harlow, her hair flat ironed into submission. Next to her is Alice Tran, who’s biting her bottom lip. There are a handful of others who I don’t know, but among them is the unmistakable red hair . . .

  Charlotte is facing slightly away from me, kneeling in front of the infinity symbol and the queen. Instinctually, I look for Blythe among the girls in the inner circle, but I don’t see her. Shouldn’t this be the moment to strike? To right the wrong, save Charlotte, and get us the hell out of here? I remind myself that there’s more to this. The initiation has to go wrong before any of us can make it right.

  I look at Charlotte and I wonder if she’s scared, like me. Or maybe she’s excited. Some of these girls live for all of this, I’m sure.

  “Ut sacram memoriam,” the queen says.

  “Ut sacram memoriam,” the room responds in unison. I nearly forget to say the words. When I do, they are acrid on my lips.

  Then the queen begins to speak the familiar words: “Her memory is sacred, beyond the bounds of time. But as the clock hands turn, memory erodes the mind. Her secrets are best buried in a loop that turns to dust, where the present turns to past and past remains unjust. Therein lies infinity . . .”

  Here the queen pauses and gestures to the loop of wilting flowers laid across the cellar floor. “. . . the place where she survives—while we protect our sisterhood, our secrets, and our lives. For only when her sisters’ wrongs are once again made right will she escape anew and take her place within the light.”

  Her voice grows, hurdling from wall to wall. “And so shall four return again beneath the waning moon to resurrect the memory, or find our way to ruin.” I catch myself thinking the words along with her and wince. I wish I hadn’t committed the lines from Grandma Simmons’s mystery note to memory. I wish I didn’t know the Lilies vow by heart.

  “Ut sacram memoriam,” the queen cries.

  “Ut sacram memoriam,” the crowd echoes again. I can’t bring myself to chant along. The feeling of being sick to my stomach is back.

  Someone lays their hand on my shoulder. I’ve forgotten that I’m not invisible. I flinch away from the sensation.

  “Drew?” I recognize the fearful whisper as Veró’s. Thank god.

  “How did you know it was me?” I breathe.

  “You didn’t say the second part of the vow along with the others.”

  I nod, careful to keep our whispers to a minimum. I would hate for someone to hear us and for the memory to reset again, only to decay even more. This gathering of the Lilies is already creepy enough.

  I shift my position in the crowd so that Veró and I can stand side by side. The backs of our hands brush against each other. Electricity springs from my palm up through my arm. I don’t want to pull away, but it feels impossible to focus on what the evil queen is saying. I think of what pulling away would mean. It feels like it would be closing a door, choosing to stay in the darkness of this basement alone. I’ve made choices like that so many times, mostly out of self-preservation.

  This time I wonder what it would mean to make a choice based on what feels right, not what feels safe.

  I grab Veró’s hand and squeeze. She squeezes back and doesn’t let go.

  “Not everyone has what it takes to be a Lily,” the evil queen says, distracting me from the sudden surge of euphoria flooding my brain. “Only a special kind of young woman is chosen for our society. Each and every one of you has something that sets you apart. Something that makes you exceptional.”

  I sense Veró’s body tensing next to me, hardening against the evil queen’s words. It’s not just her icy tone, it’s what she’s saying. I don’t know what she means by “special.” I don’t know what sets the initiates apart. But I do know that someone, maybe a host of someones, thought that I didn’t have “what it takes” to join the society, despite Grandma Simmons’s hand in its creation. It occurs to me that maybe I’m glad I don’t have “what it takes.” Maybe “what it takes” is so much worse than anything I could imagine.

  “With each initiation,” the evil queen continues, “new Lilies must reveal their deepest secrets. Each revelation strengthens our sisterhood. Our pasts—no matter how horrible—bind us all together as we build a brighter future.”

  My ring finger aches as Grandma Simmons’s diamond infinity symbol flashes white-hot again. Something horrible happened here. Something that planted the seed for the Lilies to grow. But this isn’t just a memory: something horrible is happening right now, right in front of me. In front of all of us.

  “Lilies,” the evil queen calls, “form your ring.”

  The girls in the flower crowns step away from the blindfolded initiates and form a circle. They surround the group of new Lilies, the infinity of greenery in the center of the room, and the queen herself.

  “To become a Lily,” the queen goes on, “you must endure the trials of your own demons and be strong enough to relive your past. We Lilies summon our demons with this.” She holds up a little crystal medicine vial above the crowd. Its silver cap nearly touches the arched brick ceiling. Pinched between the queen’s thumb and forefinger, it catches enough of the candlelight to reveal that it is filled with something white.

  “Initiates,” she says, “I want to address something about sand. We use it during initiations because it enhances the experience. It brings your thoughts and memories to life. But I want to address the rumors you may have heard about it. Stories of girls getting lost in their own memories, their minds abandoning them. Those stories are false. Fairy tales designed to weed out the weak. Those who aren’t cut out to be among us. Sand is a means to an end: it’ll help you exhume your secrets. It’ll open the door to relive your past.”

  With these words, three of the girls encircling the group break rank and take a step toward the queen. The others in the outer circle close the gap in the perimeter and drop to a kneel as if commanded. The woozy feeling descends into my legs. The Lilies were right, I don’t belong here. Every molecule within me is screaming, begging me to push across the room toward Charlotte, grab her by the hand, and make a break for it. Something about this is horribly wrong.

  The three girls face the queen and reach out their cupped hands. The queen lowers her crystal vial and uncorks it. The low ping ricochets around the basement. Then I see that the girl to the queen’s far right is shaking ever so slightly. Her hood is beginning to slip back, her flower crown seems to be ill-fitting. My gaze lands in the shadows of her face.

  Oh god. It’s Blythe.

  Finally.

  A candle’s flicker reflects against one of her cheeks. She’s crying. Why is she crying? What does she know that I don’t?

  “Each of you will grow into a Lily tonight,” the queen says to her initiates. “Remain in the circle and relive your past. You’ll each take a turn recounting your deepest secret to your sisters. Your demons will come out to play, but you’ll rely on each other, and push through.”

  As she speaks, the queen shakes out the sand into the outstretched hands beside her. Blythe takes her little handful of the powder and approaches the kneeling, blindfolded Faith at the far end of the line of initiates. The queen’s other hooded helper does the same.

  “Once you do this . . . once you pass this test—you’ll have proven yourself: you will have shown everyone that you have what it takes to be a real Lily.” The queen’s voice seems to brighten as she finishes. Her words are poison honey.

  I keep my eyes on Blythe, who is standing in front of Faith. She opens her palm and holds it in front of the blindfolded girl’s face. “Breathe in,” she murmurs. Faith does. The sand lifts into the air, grain by grain, forming a tiny cloud. The powder must be so fine. Faith inhales each sparkling particle. She coughs. Chokes. Blythe winces, but she doesn’t intervene.

  Silently, Blythe and the other hooded henchmen work their way down the line of initiates. Each new Lily takes a breath, freezes, then begins to choke. Some fall to their hands and knees. Others try to stand, but the Lilies surrounding them hold them back and force them down. Eventually the choking subsides and the girls grow silent and slack-jawed. Blank. The blindfolds, however, stay tied to each of their skulls.

  My skin crawls as I watch Blythe move back and forth, slowly doling out breaths of sand to some of the kneeling girls. Her eyes are crinkled, mouth twisted into a repulsed scowl. I wonder how she’s doing it. How can someone be so clearly disgusted by their own actions and keep going? Sometimes I forget how powerful fear can be, how quickly it transforms to self-hatred and shame. I see these feelings churning inside of Blythe, transforming into something sticky and toxic. Something that has trapped her from the inside. She’s locked into the same pattern. The same thing, over and over.

  She stands in front of her last initiate. Charlotte’s hair gleams in the dim; a small flame, one that’s about to be snuffed out.

  “Wait.”

  Blythe stands in front of Charlotte, her face frozen.

  “Wait . . . could I . . .”

  The voice is high and scared in a way I don’t expect. It isn’t even Blythe’s voice. She’s not trying to right the wrong, to break the cycle. Charlotte is the one grinding everything to a halt. “Could I just . . . ?” she whispers, voice quaking, unable to finish her sentence.

  The flowers wilt. Gazes sharpen as the queen of the Lilies bristles.

  “Is there a problem?” The queen’s words are a gutting knife. The question isn’t really a question: it’s clear that there better not be a problem. It’s too late for that.

  Charlotte can’t pause her initiation now. It might as well have already happened.

  I remind myself that all of this has already happened.

  “Never mind,” Charlotte rattles. “Go on.”

  I shut my eyes. I can’t bear to watch and wait anymore. When is Blythe going to put a stop to all of this like she said she would? Veró squeezes my hand, signaling to me that we need to step in and do something. My breath catches in my chest.

  No escaping fate, Death whispers.

  “No!” Blythe cries.

  My eyes fly open. “I reject this!” she screams. “I won’t do this again!”

  Bong!

  It didn’t happen like this.

  Bong!

  Time rips open.

  Bong!

  And swallows the room of Lilies whole.

  17

  Blythe

  Back when I was initiated, the bigs didn’t know what sand would do to me. Really, they didn’t know what it would do to any of us. “You can’t ever know another person’s mind,” Grandma Rose used to say. And she was right. The Lilies didn’t know that sand would take me back to the protest in Lafayette Park. They didn’t understand how—to me—the basement under the Archwell library was beginning to flood with tear gas. They didn’t understand that the feeling of losing Salim and Sean in the crowd all over again broke something inside me. They didn’t understand why getting lost felt like the worst thing that had ever happened.

  They couldn’t understand. They didn’t know that I still felt lost.

  You can’t ever know another person’s mind.

  Not even when they take you by the hand and walk you through their worst memories.

  I know that now.

  I didn’t know that when it was my turn to start initiating new Lilies. I didn’t understand what had happened to me. I couldn’t see the Lilies Society for what it was.

  Reliving the night of Charlotte’s initiation brought the ugliness into new focus.

  Laying splayed on the closet floor, I realize that we haven’t escaped. Our plan didn’t work.

  “This fucking closet,” Rory steams to herself.

  “But . . . I don’t get it. How are we right back where we started?” Drew says. “The vow says that escape is possible when the wrongs are made right. So . . . I don’t get it. Blythe stopped the initiation before anything could happen to Charlotte. The wrong was made right . . . We shouldn’t be back here again.”

  “Hold on,” Veró says. “I just want to see . . .” She reaches for the closet door.

  “Careful!” I blurt, but it’s too late. Veró pulls the door open a crack, releasing the smell of decaying memory into the closet. Ignoring this sign, she leans into the doorframe and peers through the gap. “Shit,” she says. “Party’s still going. The clock says nine twelve p.m.”

  “We’ve been over this. Multiple times,” Rory says. “Blythe’s and my memory needs to play through all the way, as it happened, so the loop can close. I don’t see why you would need more justification than that.”

  “It’s not hard for you, is it?” Veró asks Rory, rustling some of the closet’s hanging gowns as she shifts away from the cracked door.