Very quickly, we got to the pack house. I feared for Gilly. She had been through enough.

“What happened, Rachel?” I asked Rachel as we descended the stairs to the medical wing.

Rachel looked at me nervously and unsettled. “I found her talking in her sleep again. But this time… it was different. She was muttering strange words, phrases I didn’t recognise. I wrote some of them down. They sound like witch incantations.”

“Witchcraft?” I whispered.

Rachel nodded. “It’s not normal, Serena. She’s burning up too, as if something inside her is trying to fight its way out.”

We reached Gilly’s room, and I hesitated just a moment before entering....