Wish I had practiced jogging more. My legs felt like lead. Wheezy witches aren't supposed to run, we've got brooms to fly on! Air as poisonous as the Nuckelavee's breath filled my lungs while I ran up the gravelly ground with my robe fluttering behind me. You can't believe how fast that monster was. It tore through trees like a locomotive while its long, telephone-pole arms crushed boulders like they were cotton.

One such boulder waited at the autumn grove's edge. It couldn't protect me, but I could hide. I sought shelter behind the rock before I cowered down, cuddled Siris like a teddy bear, and watched the gigantic undead centaur battle Darcy from afar.

The Nuckelavee's rider spun its arms around its axis with bone-cracking flexibility. Had Darcy not been flying on her staff, these club-like arms would've turned her into a slush pile.

When Darcy flew closer, I noticed two dolls in her hand: One of a horse and one of a human rider. She swooped closer to the Nuckelavee, bathed her poppets in the monster's acidic breath, stabbed a nail through the rider doll's chest, magically ripped open the Nuckelavee's torso, and dropped one of my Molotov cocktails to finish it off. The monster didn't flinch. It healed its chest wound before losing even a single drop of blood and regenerated its burning skin faster than the Molotov flames devoured it.

I wished I could help, but I didn't stand the slightest chance. This thing was invincible. It was as far beyond the helltree and hellhound as those two were above a kitten. Dad, where are you? I hugged Siris harder.

"Air!" Siris said. "I need air!"

"We need more water," I said. "It will be too paralyzed to use its healing factor and we can destroy the head."

"Too bad it's not a cat," Siris said. "I swear, I even a small bucket is enough to scare me toothless."

If Dad only was here, he might have an idea. But Darcy said he used to be here.

While Darcy tossed water bottles against the monster, I noticed the glint of a book leaning against the edge of a maroon-leaved Alder tree.

"Remember that curiosity kills the cat!" Siris said.

"Guess it's only you who dies then," I said.

I left my boulder's cover and stormed towards the Alder tree. I didn't turn around, I didn't think of the monster behind me, but it made its presence known. The Nuckelavee slammed its arms against the ground loud enough to send me stumbling. My poor knees. Don't tell me the potion gave me a cat's sensitive ears and reflexes. I got up, dusted the dirt off my robe, and continued running. Don't turn around, don't look at the monster, focus on the book that'll save your life.

I reached the tree, panting, and took cover behind it until I didn't see the monster anymore. If I can't see it, it can't see me either!

I picked up the book at the tree's root. It was a despicable, old tome, clad in a sharp-edged red envelope full of thousands of white pages. I scanned through them, careful not to destroy one as I turned the pages, and froze as I saw a page I'd remember for life. Much like all the other pages, it was empty, except for two elements the others didn't have. One of them was an ink-tipped quill glued to it by adhesive tape. The other was the name "Carter" written in my Dad's handwriting. The book quivered in my hands.

Letters appeared below it in blood and explained what I was seeing.

"Unfortunate, is it not? This Domain is designed to be inescapable. Your father, however, escaped when his last name appeared in my book. Translate your father's last name into your handwriting and any misfortune I bestowed on him shall perish and you and your fellowship will leave this Domain, too. The Erlking."

My heart pumped as the Nuckelavee screeched in the distance. "Darcy said pieces of my Dad were at the edge of this grove. He must have touched this book!"

Siris' black eyes became small as he read the name and looked at the book's envelope. "Throw this thing away," he said. "Burn it, feed the ash to a hellhound, kill the hellhound and feed its flesh to a real dog. I'm not kidding, this isn't a good book. Reading Marquis de Sade's works or Mein Kampf is healthier for your mind than this."

"But what if he gave Dad the Hestermoan?" I said. "Simon said the only way to cure it was to transfer it to a relative."

"Has your school not taught you anything about the fairies? They always say things that are technically true, but misleading. Look at his word choice. He says your father escaped when his name appeared in the book. This doesn't mean these things were causally linked."

"But he also said this Domain is inescapable. And that we won't get out unless we fulfill his condition. What room is there for interpretation?"

"Well, he says you'll get out, but not how. Maybe you leave with a ton of diseases or while you're cut in two pieces."

I flipped through its pages and found the names of many victims. Mrs. Turner's name was here. As was that of Detective Devons. This was it. The Erlking's ultimate murder weapon. If he was responsible for the attack on my basement, the evidence could be found here.

"Marissa, throw it away," Siris said. "The only way to win a deal with the devil is by outsmarting him and, to be blunt, you aren't experienced enough."

My fingers were glued to the book. As much as I wanted to drop it to the ground, I just couldn't open my hand and remove my fingertips from its smooth envelope. Where was the quill? Oh, there. Its ink was so fresh. It was just begging to kiss the parchment. I couldn't let Dad die. What if I cheated? What if I just crossed his name out instead of writing mine?

"Throw. It. Away!" Siris said.

I put the quill down for a moment. Instead, I freed my Magia Phone from my belt where I had carried it sandwiched between two potions. It had a camera app that could, if I was fortunate, survive a few seconds here to record a video. And, as the life energy counter app showed, these things were designed to detect aether signatures.

"B-boss, what are you planning?" Siris asked, sitting on a rock.

I handed him the phone. "Siris. If I die now, I want you to know that you are a wonderful familiar. But we have a mission. Together, we wanted to become strong enough that nobody could harm us. The most important power is knowledge. If the Erlking rips out my soul, makes me sick, or whatever, I want you to record it. In most stories, deals with the devil harm people in specific ways, but it's only understandable in hindsight. I want to know how he does it. Give Darcy the video so that she can pass it on."

"You mean, you're planning to-"

I activated the recording as I pressed the phone into Siris' paw. "No. I don't want to die. But the Nuckelavee could make me any moment. You said it yourself: He doesn't lie. No matter how we get out, we will get out. If our experimental data doesn't get to the outside world, we'll die in vain."

"Yikes," Siris said. "Humans and their martyrdom. I'm betting those nightmare visions the mare showed had nothing to do with that."

The Nuckelavee's long arms ripped off the crown of the Alder tree I was hiding behind. It saw me. The monster was close enough that I could see its horse's one-eyed skull and feel its poisonous breath in my nostrils.

Darcy was too tired to keep flying, but she did everything to keep the beast distracted from me. She shrouded her staff in a cloud of aether and threw its iron tip against the monster's flesh like a javelin.

I didn't even pay attention to its screams. My vision dimmed once I inhaled the Nuckelavee's poison breath.

Didn't I bring a medical mask below my balaclava and my kitten mask? This stuff was useless!

Like an airborne hellhound venom, the Nuckelavee's poison assaulted my soul and brought back unpleasant memories of the mare's visions. I recited my mantra ("Bi-bi-di-ba-bi-di-boo") and leaped away from another blow. I was gonna die. The poison in my system sealed my fate, so why not go out with style? I opened the book and crossed out Dad's name in a single elegant quill stroke. To my horror, merely touching the pages transferred my Dad's handwriting into mine. "Carter". I wrote this.

A winged creature jumped into my mind. I couldn't make out its shape, other than it being vaguely bat-like, but its power dwarfed anything I ever experienced before. Aether as powerful as a high-voltage current flooded my soul and the phone Siris clutched between his paws failed to measure clear numbers, only an ambiguous message.

Demon. Neither fully Christian nor fully pagan. Energy difficult to quantify.

This new energy felt dark and twisted enough that it removed any blindfolds reality forced me to wear. I saw so much clearer now. Reality itself tore apart while the Darcy flew loops around the Nuckelavee. Holes formed between the dimensions. In the darkness of the black lake, a portal revealed purple hedges growing in mire while another portal revealed a water boiler missing one of its pipes. Almost as if a hellhound had knocked it off.

Siris watched the phone. "The plot thickens."

Another portal formed right beneath my feet. I sank as if through a lake and, well, everyone knows that witches can't swim. Everything became dark before I felt the dry, frigid library floor again. I saw nothing. However, I felt the presence of paper and an empty wooden frame around me. Once I opened my eyes, my night vision noticed Darcy lying next to me on the plywood rack of a toppled-over document shelf.

A scene of total devastation met my potion-enhanced eyes. Shelves upon shelves worth of files lay toppled over like cracked domino pieces. The aisles between them suffocated in cardboard pieces and paper envelopes strewn across the floor.

Amidst all of this, I saw the cause of the destruction. The Nuckelavee had materialized in the mortal world. The massive feet of its horse cracked three fallen shelves at once while the head of the rider just barely fit below the warehouse's ceiling. At this distance, it stood just far enough away to kill me should it decide to swing its arms.

"Siris, what just happened?" I asked.

"It's a mystery why there are so many Veil breaches, remember?" Siris said.

"Yeah."

"I think the Erlking got these people to sign his book so that he could barter their names to a higher entity. This entity gave him the power to change human history and his victims paid the bargain's price for him."

"So, I just helped the Erlking's ritual mojo and now his Nuckelavee openly walk in our world?" I asked.

"Precisely," Siris said.

"And Isa said this Klaus Kringle guy granted people wishes and after that, something bad always happened to them. Could it be that-"

"Klaus Kringle and the Erlking are the same and the Erlking is responsible for the basement attack?" Siris asked. "It's possible."

"And my oath said I shouldn't seek the advice of beings from beyond the gates of reality or human comprehension," I said.

"Yeah, you just broke that and the Council will hate you. Like mother, like daughter. Now, you owe me twenty mice, boss."

Oh, great. I was glad that the Nuckelavee staring me in the eyes was my most immediate problem now.