The air shimmered like a mirage, a tear in reality started buzzing with forbidden energy.
Emily stood at the heart of Glastonbury Abbey, her stiletto heels sinking into the damp earth of Somerset, England, where ley lines converged in a pulse of ancient power. Her gold gown, a bespoke cascade of silk and lace, clung to her curves, its plunging neckline and sweeping train wildly impractical for the crumbling stone altar before her.
At twenty-three, Emily was known for excess. Her wardrobe is a spectacle of couture that stole breaths at London galas. Tonight, she'd decided to be late to a Mayfair ballroom for this, the forbidden ritual from her grandmother's journals. The sigils etched into the altar glowed golden under her manicured fingertips, thrumming along the ley lines like a heartbeat. To open a portal was to break every rule of her gilded life. She was finally breaking the rules set for her.
Her breath caught as the portal widened, a vortex of starlight and shadow tugging at her ash blonde curls. She should've been dazzling everyone in Mayfair, her diamond earrings glinting under chandeliers. She was meant to go to school and marry. But the pull of the unknown, amplified by the ley lines, was stronger than her family's demand to marry young or her love for velvet gloves and tailored capes. One step, and she was falling—through centuries or through worlds, her gown billowing like a flame.