Page 65 of Mama Si's Paradise

Then Mama Si got on the boat, and Assa didn’t follow.

“Face the ocean, Fall Doll. And sit down,” she said.

Since my legs were so numb I eagerly obeyed, stepped over the bench and sat on the side of it, thinking she’d join me. Thinking,who is going to row this tiny boat on the ocean?

I got the answer a moment later, when Mama Si went to stand at the very front, her back turned to me, and we started moving.

I kept forgetting that one special word—magic—so I was still trying to figure out if an engine was attached to the boat, or if someone or something was maybe pulling us forward—or any explanation at all as to why we were moving without anyone doing anything.

A look back, and Assa, Mike and Marissa were gone, the rocky beach in front of the massive mansion empty.

A long breath slipped from my lips. “No cliff.” There really was no cliff that I could see here, when just a couple of hours ago I was lookingdownat this very ocean from my window. I was over a cliff, and now I wasn’t.

“The Paradise is an incredible structure,” Mama Si said, like she could read the thoughts in my head. Her voice was almost lost to the wind as we sailed ahead, picking up speed little by little. “It can be two things at once. It can give you the illusion that you’re at the front of it through one door and at its back through the next.”

“That’s amazing,” I said, turning to look at the mansion again and again to convince myself that it really existed. I’d really lived inside those walls for a whole month. It was a real place.

“It is, indeed.” Mama Si nodded. “You’re comfortable, I assume.”

“I am.” The bench wasn’t soft by any means, but I had plenty of space. “How are we even moving?” I got that it was magic, buthow?

“Ennaris is taking us where we need to go. The waterknows,” said Mama Si, like that was supposed to make perfect sense to me. “It won’t be long. We’ll get there in about an hour.”

An hour. That was much sooner than I thought.

Then she asked, “Have you rested enough?”

“I have, yes. And there’s so much I don’t know yet. I searched for you, but you were gone.” For three days I’d searched for her, but all they told me was that she was busy. “I was actually hoping to talk to you before we set sail, but…”

“We can talk here,” she said, slowly turning to face me.

“Do you want to—” I waved at the bench to my side, but she shook her head.

“I’m perfectly fine, doll. Tell me, what questions do you have?”

Oh, an hour wouldn’t cut it to ask them all, but I could start with the most important one. “I have a lot, but first I need to know, what exactly happens if I get chosen? How will I know where I’ll end up?”

“If we’re lucky and you do get chosen, you will know where your place is. It will be decided for you, and it will be easy once you belong to these lands, Fall Doll.”

Easy.“And if Idon’tget chosen, when you said I’d belong to Ennaris forever, do you mean I canneverleave the mansion?”

“Notnever,but you will be weak out there, and you’ll only feel whole close to your roots. Whether you stay or leave will be up to you to decide,” she said, and I nodded.

Achoice.I could live with that.

“And what about the curse? What about the ritual—is there something I should know? Is there something I should prepare for?”

Mama Si smiled. “Nothing whatsoever. The ritual is fairly simple. You won’t have to do anything but get in the waters ofthe Whispering Woods, and let Ennaris make its choice. No word is required from you.”

“How will we know if I am chosen?”

“Oh, we will, doll. We’ll know right away.”

“But—”

“The curse you asked about,” she continued, and my mouth clamped shut because other than what would happen to me, the curse was what I wanted to know about the most. “It was cast upon Ennaris close to five hundred years ago.”

Impatience got the best of me when she stopped to breathe for a second. “By whom?”

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