TWO DOORS CLOSED.
ELEVEN REMAIN.
Morgan stared at the marker.
The bell beneath the Mercer house rang again.
DC looked toward the floor.
“We should leave.”
Morgan didn't move.
“Morgan.”
“I heard you.”
“Your feet didn't.”
Thomas stood near the black door.
His hand hovered inches from the wood.
Morgan looked up.
“Don't.”
Thomas lowered it.
“I wasn't going to touch it.”
“Good.”
DC glanced between them.
“We are all becoming wonderfully trainable.”
Morgan looked at him.
“Outside.”
“Gladly.”
They headed downstairs.
Sheriff Hayes was waiting near the front door.
He straightened when he saw them.
“Well?”
Morgan kept walking.
“No.”
“No what?”
“No explanation.”
“Morgan.”
She opened the front door.
“Sheriff, there is a door upstairs that wasn't there yesterday, a man who disappeared in 1978 is standing behind me, and something underneath this house just rang a bell.”
Hayes stared.
Morgan stepped onto the porch.
“I'm going to need more than five minutes before I make that sound reasonable.”
Thomas followed her.
Hayes looked at DC.
DC shrugged.
“That was actually the concise version.”
Morgan didn't return to her grandmother's house immediately.
She went to the Lantern Room.
DC unlocked the front door and switched on the lights.
Empty.
Quiet.
Normal.
Morgan had developed a profound distrust of normal.
The younger Thomas entered behind them.
DC locked the door again.
Morgan noticed.
“Expecting customers?”
“No.”
“Then why lock it?”
“To keep Bellweather outside while we discuss the fact that apparently closing supernatural doors is bad now.”
“Reasonable.”
Thomas moved toward the bar.
His eyes settled on the stool Evelyn had used every Friday.
Morgan followed his gaze.
“You okay?”
He nodded.
She waited.
Thomas sighed.
“No.”
“Better.”
DC went behind the bar.
“Coffee?”
Morgan looked at him.
“You have to ask?”
“No.”
He started the machine.
Thomas stared at him.
“You own this place?”
“Yes.”
“Carter?”
“Unfortunately.”
DC glanced at him.
“Richard's my grandfather.”
Thomas nodded slowly.
“I can see it.”
DC stopped.
“That sounds threatening.”
“It wasn't.”
“Good.”
Morgan sat at the bar.
“Can we focus?”
DC looked at the coffee machine.
“I am focusing on the only problem here I know how to solve.”
Morgan almost smiled.
Thomas sat beside her.
She placed the marker between them.
TWO DOORS CLOSED.
ELEVEN REMAIN.
DC set a mug in front of Morgan.
Then another in front of Thomas.
Morgan picked hers up.
“What do we actually know?”
DC leaned against the bar.
“The doors are connected to the Gathering House.”
Thomas nodded.
“Evelyn was using markers to close them.”
“We thought that was good.”
“It probably was.”
Morgan frowned.
“Grandma just told us something wants them closed.”
Thomas looked at the marker.
“Those two things don't necessarily contradict each other.”
Morgan waited.
“A locked door keeps something from coming through.”
“Yes.”
“But it can also keep something in.”
DC looked at him.
“So Evelyn was containing whatever was behind each door.”
“Possibly.”
Morgan understood.
“And closing all of them…”
“Could complete something larger.”
“The Gathering.”
Thomas nodded.
Morgan stared into her coffee.
“Wonderful.”
DC looked at her.
“You keep saying that when things are very much not wonderful.”
“It's versatile.”
Thomas reached for the marker.
He stopped before touching it.
“May I?”
Morgan pushed it toward him.
He picked it up.
Nothing happened.
He turned it over.
Blank.
“What did Evelyn say exactly?”
Morgan repeated it.
“The Gathering House wasn't the first. It was built to contain the first.”
Thomas nodded.
“The house is a door.”
“Yes.”
“And the thing beneath Bellweather has been trying to open it.”
“Yes.”
Thomas looked at her.
“Then we have the order wrong.”
Morgan frowned.
“What order?”
“We've been treating the Gathering House as the source.”
DC straightened.
“It isn't.”
“No.”
Thomas set the marker down.
“Something existed first.”
Morgan thought of Clara.
The rules already written on the walls when she woke inside the Gathering House.
The counting game.
Gather thirteen.
Name what does not belong.
Open the door.
Begin again.
“Someone built the Gathering House around it.”
Thomas nodded.
“To contain it.”
“And Clara got trapped inside.”
“Yes.”
“Then generations of Bennetts kept getting pulled into the same system.”
“Apparently.”
Morgan looked at DC.
“So whatever is underneath Bellweather…”
“Predates the house.”
“And possibly the town.”
Thomas nodded.
Morgan leaned back.
“I liked the apple.”
DC smiled.
“I've been saying that.”
The front door rattled.
Everyone stopped.
Not a knock.
Someone was trying the handle.
DC looked toward it.
“We're closed.”
The handle turned again.
Morgan stood.
“Don't open it.”
“I wasn't going to.”
Thomas looked toward the windows.
Nobody outside.
The handle stopped moving.
Then came a woman's voice.
“Declan?”
DC froze.
Morgan noticed.
“Who?”
He didn't answer immediately.
“DC.”
“My mother.”
Morgan looked toward the door.
“Is she in Bellweather?”
“No.”
“Where is she?”
“Charleston.”
The voice came again.
“Declan, open the door.”
DC didn't move.
Morgan watched his face.
This was different.
The rooms had used her grandmother.
Kiara.
Their own voices.
Now it was trying DC.
“Don't answer.”
He looked at her.
“I know.”
The handle rattled harder.
“Declan?”
DC folded his arms.
Morgan recognized the maneuver.
He was anchoring himself.
She moved beside him.
Not touching.
Just there.
The voice softened.
“Honey?”
DC closed his eyes.
Morgan looked toward the door.
“Cheap.”
Thomas glanced at her.
Morgan continued.
“You already tried Grandma on me.”
The rattling stopped.
DC opened his eyes.
“You're antagonizing it again.”
“Yes.”
“I thought Margaret told you to stop doing that.”
“Margaret isn't here.”
“Excellent loophole.”
Something struck the door.
Morgan jumped.
DC looked at her.
She glared.
“Don't.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“You thought it.”
“You're becoming Margaret.”
“Take that back.”
A second impact shook the door.
Then silence.
Morgan stared.
The marker on the bar moved.
It slid several inches.
Stopped.
Then turned.
The blank side faced upward.
Letters appeared.
COME FIND THE THIRD.
Morgan sighed.
“No.”
DC walked back toward the bar.
“Good.”
Morgan followed.
Thomas remained near the door.
The message changed.
SHE IS WAITING.
Morgan stared.
“Who?”
DC looked at her.
“You just asked it a question.”
Morgan closed her eyes.
“Right.”
The marker moved.
Thomas stepped away from the door.
Morgan watched letters form.
EVELYN.
Her stomach dropped.
DC shook his head.
“No.”
Morgan didn't move.
The message changed again.
SHE CANNOT CLOSE IT ALONE.
Morgan stared.
Her grandmother had been dead for nearly a year.
Except she had just spoken to them through a room that apparently didn't care about chronology.
Morgan looked at Thomas.
“You saw Grandma in the black room in 1978.”
“Yes.”
“And I saw her today.”
“Yes.”
“Same room?”
“I think so.”
“Same age?”
“Yes.”
Morgan looked at DC.
“The rooms don't move through time normally.”
“Established.”
“So Grandma could have been using them before she died.”
DC frowned.
“You think she left pieces of herself inside?”
“I don't know.”
Thomas' expression changed.
Morgan noticed.
“What?”
“Not pieces.”
“What, then?”
“Memories.”
Morgan looked at him.
“The rooms remember what people don't.”
“Yes.”
“So the Evelyn we saw…”
“Could be a memory.”
DC frowned.
“A memory that knows what's happening now?”
Thomas shook his head.
“Not necessarily now.”
Morgan understood.
“She knew it would happen.”
Thomas nodded.
“She prepared.”
Of course she did.
Her grandmother had spent decades leaving warnings for a future Morgan who didn't even know she needed them.
Morgan looked at the marker.
SHE CANNOT CLOSE IT ALONE.
“What is the third door?”
Nothing happened.
DC raised an eyebrow.
Morgan shrugged.
“I already broke the no-questions rule. Might as well get something useful.”
The marker remained blank.
“Helpful.”
Then the lights went out.
