After everything – after all the shit we’ve been through – we miss it when midnight comes, and Misrule begins.

We’re all sitting around in the clearing where, two weeks ago, the Summer Door opened. Where the Riders came, carrying Phil along with them to be their ironheart, and I shoved her through the door to protect her. Where Finn and I did the impossible and brought something dead back to life. Where, for a few moments, we sat together, covered in blood, kissing frantically, until he went to save Phil, and I went to save him, and the prince made me make that awful, awful choice.

It’s also the clearing where I tried to perform open heart surgery on Julian, but judging by the fact that he’s sitting docilely beside Phil, gnawing his way through half the food we’d packed for this trip into fairyland, she’s managed to convince him that was all some kind of wacky misunderstanding. Maybe she’s the one that’s had real magical powers all this time.

She’s the one that notices that Misrule has begun. ‘Oh hey, it’s ten past twelve,’ she says, pressing the button on Julian’s smartwatch so she can see the time.

I don’t know how I imagined it, but it wasn’t like this. Misrule seems like something that should come with a bang. There should be fireworks. The ground should shake. There should be bells, big ones, ringing twelve times – no, thirteen, because this is a day when everything is weird and wrong and upside down.

But there’s nothing. The wind blows through the trees just the same. The moon and the stars overhead remain unchanged. The bush is exactly the same degree of dark and ominous as it was before: i.e. very, but in a normal way, not a magical one.

I hug my knees. It’s still freezing cold.

That’s good, I tell myself. If it’s still cold, it means it was a natural weather phenomenon, not a magical one. It means that yesterday – a midsummer day – wasn’t cold because the whole natural order of things was turned upside down. It was cold because it was cold.

Oh God, what if I did get the date wrong, though?

What if Finn was the one who was fooled all this time? What if his brother – I don’t know, uploaded him with the wrong fairy information? Or what if all these dreams I’ve been having haven’t been Finn at all? What if the prince has been in my head the whole time?

The Seelie have a thing for red-headed servants, and even though I’m obsessive about dying my roots back to blonde, I have red hair.

I stare hard at the gap between the trees where the Summer Door opened before. Open, I will it.

Nothing happens.

Good. That’s good. I’m not the prince’s minion. If I was, I’d be able to open the door.

Unless I was wrong about the date. Unless Finn was wrong. Unless Tam was right all this time, and Emily never got into his head, or he didn’t lie. Maybe Misrule really is Valentine’s Day, and I gambled on the wrong Blacklin.

Which means that in less than twenty-four hours, the prince is going to come to me again. He’s going to ask me the question for the third time, and I have no idea how I’m going to answer it.

I realise I’m breathing way too fast, and try to slow myself down. Settle, Linford, I tell myself, resting my head against my knees and imagining Finn’s fingers, cool on the back of my neck, his voice in my ear. You’ve got this. My brother’s gone to a huge amount of effort to hide this date from you, but he couldn’t hide you from me or me from you.

What if you have the wrong date, though?

I don’t. I’m a prince too, remember? Powerful enough to reach across dimensions with my mind and heal massive stab wounds? Do you really think someone could hack my brain that easily?

In through the nose. Out through the mouth. Deep breaths, like Mr Hunter taught me.

Plus, considering how much effort he’s gone to to hide this date from you, do you really think my dick brother would let the world announce it with a light show?

I imagine his arms around me, holding on.

‘I’m coming for you,’ I whisper to him. ‘Finn, I’m coming.’

Cardy starts pacing at about half-past twelve. ‘We’re wasting time,’ he says.

‘Just a bit longer,’ I say.

‘We’re walking into God knows what to pull off something impossible,’ he says. ‘We need every second we can get.’

‘The prince is an arrogant arsehole, but he’s not stupid,’ I say. ‘He’s tried like hell to hide the real date of Misrule, but he’s not going to assume anything. If we walked through that door on the stroke of midnight, I can guarantee there would be a massive trap waiting for us. We have to make him think we haven’t worked it out. We have to lull him into a false sense of security.’

‘Fine,’ he snaps. ‘I get it. But it’s past midnight now. Well past. Let’s go.’

‘Not yet.’

‘When?’

‘Soon.’

‘I have an idea,’ Phil says. ‘How about, to pass the time, we test out some Misrule powers?’

‘What do you mean?’ Holly says.

‘Well, you should have Emily’s powers, right? Do you feel any different?’

‘No. Maybe. I don’t know.’

‘Close your eyes,’ Phil says. ‘I’m going to hide something. If you can really find lost things, you should be able to find it.’

One thing I didn’t ever expect to do on Misrule was laugh, but it – well, it kind of turns into a game. We take turns hiding things in the hardest spots we can think of – up trees, under bushes, buried in leaves (okay, fine, there are really only so many places you can hide things in the middle of the bush) – and Holly finds them every time. Cardy picks up a rock and pegs it randomly into the night, and Holly comes back with it clutched in her fist within two minutes. ‘That landed in a giant mud puddle, you dick,’ she tells him.

‘Sorry,’ he says. ‘What’s the time?’

Phil looks at Julian’s watch. ‘Quarter past one.’

‘Not yet,’ I say, cutting Cardy off before he can even look at me.

‘We should test out your powers, Pearl,’ Holly says.

‘I don’t have any.’

‘For God’s sake, stop being so stubborn,’ she says. ‘I get it. You don’t want to be a pet. You think I enjoy it? But you are, so –’

‘I’m not.’

‘What do you want me to say? Ugh, fine, your love is a One Direction song. You and Finn still have some freaky mental thing going on, just like masters and servants, so –’

‘Wait,’ I say. ‘Who’s the most powerful fairy of them all?’

‘The prince,’ Holly says. ‘Obviously.’

‘And who has his powers?’

‘Can you stop being so condescending?’

‘I’m not – well, fine, sorry,’ I say. ‘But we should test Julian’s powers.’

‘I agree,’ Cardy says. ‘Let’s get him to open the door and get on with things already.’

‘I have a better idea,’ I say. ‘Oh my God, how did I not think of this until now?’

I turn to Julian. ‘Julian,’ I say, ‘blow up the prince’s brain.’

It turns out I did not think of this until now because it was a terrible idea. And if I’d thought about it for, oh, I don’t know, one second, I would have realised exactly why.

The prince can reach across worlds and blow his servants’ heads up with his mind because he is super strong. Finn can reach across worlds and heal his definitely-girlfriend-definitely-not-servant’s stab wounds because he too is super strong.

Julian might have the prince’s power, but he does not have the prince’s strength.

It takes about ten seconds before Julian’s eyes roll back in his head. Another five before he starts convulsing. Another five before blood starts seeping from his nose and mouth.

‘Shit, shit, shit, shit!’ Phil says, his blood smeared all over her hands. ‘Julian! Come on!’

‘Lie him down,’ Cardy says. ‘Let’s get him into the recovery position. We don’t want him to choke.’

They both spring into action, but all I can do is stare, horrified.

We never even made it to fairyland. I screwed it up utterly and totally and completely before we even set foot through the Summer Door and the prince is going to laugh until he chokes when he realises that he didn’t have to crack Julian’s head like an egg because I did it for him.

‘Pearl, what the hell are you doing?’ Holly says, shoving me in the back.

‘I’m sorry,’ I say. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’

‘Don’t apologise!’ she snarls. ‘Heal him!’

Heal – heal him. Heal him.

‘I can’t.’

‘Are you seriously sticking to this line now?’ she demands. ‘You’re not even going to try?’

Try. Try.

‘I’ll try,’ I say. ‘I’ll try.’

I kneel down beside Julian. I – I have no idea how to do this. How does Finn do it? How does someone go from being broken to whole? How –

Don’t overthink it, Linford, I imagine him saying. How often do you think I think about my ridiculous decisions? Just do it.

I put my hands on Julian’s convulsing chest. I want him to be still but he won’t be still, and suddenly it’s two weeks ago, and he’s begging me please please no don’t and I’m carving him up with a scalpel, and I made him bleed but Finn put him back together, and don’t overthink it, Linford and please be still please be all right please let me save Finn please please please –

He’s still.

‘Pearl?’ Julian croaks.

He scrambles away from me in fear, eyes wide. ‘Hey, hey, hey, it’s all right,’ Phil says. ‘She saved you. She saved you.’

‘She – saved me?’

‘You were having a fit. She brought you back.’

She keeps talking to Julian – telling him there’s nothing to be scared of, Pearl won’t hurt you, she’s not a killer, she just saved your life, Jules, she just saved your life – but all I can do is stare at my hands.

It’s not your power, Pearl. It’s theirs.

Finn’s power. I just used Finn’s power. On Misrule.

All this time – all this time –

I’m a pet.

I bury my face in my hands. My stupid, ridiculous, tame healing hands.

‘Well, I guess we didn’t need Tam after all,’ Holly says brightly.

‘Tam!’ Cardy says. ‘Oh shit, we need to go right now. Like, right now.’

‘What?’ Holly says.

‘He’s going after Emily, right?’ Cardy says. ‘What do you think’s going to happen when he finds her? She’s going to make a beeline straight for us, and she is going to murder us so horribly that they’ll never find all the body parts.’

‘Trust me, he’s not going to find her that fast,’ Holly says.

‘Holly, he’s got Emily’s and Finn’s powers! You just saw how powerful they are! He’ll –’

‘Sure, they’re powerful,’ Holly says, ‘but there’s some things they can’t do.’

A smile of such intense smug satisfaction crosses her face that I worry for a second that the prince has possessed her, despite Misrule. ‘I threw her off the headland into the ocean,’ she says. ‘I sure hope Tam can swim.’

Fairies like threes.

This is something that came up over and over again when I was doing my fairy research on the internet. Fairies, visiting humans three times before disappearing from their lives forever. Fairies, making humans answer three riddles. Fairies, allowing humans to ask them three questions.

Fairies, making you an offer three times.

It’s why I make us wait until after three a.m.

Three hours, the prince might make his minions wait for us on the other side of the door, but after three …

He said he was a creature of rules, and I’m banking on this being one of them.

After the let’s-explode-the-prince’s-head debacle, I expect it to be hard, but it’s almost terrifyingly easy. The hardest part is convincing Julian to actually try to open the door – ‘No, no, no, no, They’ll kill me, you don’t understand, They’ll kill me,’ he says to Phil. ‘They won’t, they won’t, it’ll be fine, and even if they hurt you, Pearl will heal you,’ she murmurs in response – but once he actually does try …

Julian Bishop opens the Summer Door at 3.14 a.m.

Like last time, it’s subtle. There are no explosions or fireworks. It’s not a magical silvery portal or a shimmering golden light.

It’s just a shift in the darkness. It’s a ripple of awareness over your skin, making all the hair on your arms stand on end. It’s a feeling in the back of your throat that the air you’re breathing is somehow different.

It makes me want to flee in the opposite direction, to start running and keep running, and to pray the earth is flat like those weirdo conspiracy theorists say it is so I can fall off the edge, fall into the Milky Way and keep falling, just so I can be further away from it.

It makes me want to fling myself headlong at it, to dive into it, to let it swallow me whole.

For a moment, everything is black, and thorns are leaching poison into my veins, and she’s slipping further and further away from me, and I need to hold on I need to hold on she told me to hold on I need to hold on.

I’m coming for you, Finn, I think as hard as I can, hoping he can hear me in his dreams. I’m coming for you, and we’re going to have a screaming argument about this pet thing, and you’re going to set me free.

I heft my backpack onto my shoulder, and finger the blade of the iron knife strapped to my belt, the knife I’m going to jam into the prince’s eye the second I get the chance.

‘Let’s go.’