Neve has a cold and awkward dinner with her mother. Neve accuses the Queen of not protecting Red. Queen Isla says Neve should think about wedding preparations.

Neve drinks too much wine and sees a group of priestesses heading toward the gardens, led by Kiri. Neve follows them to the Shrine. She finds Arick, who has a bandage around a cut on his hand. Arick says he found a way to save Red.

Red spends her days in the Keep reading. She notices it always seems to be twilight in the Wilderwood. New sentinels keep appearing in the hallways. Red pulls a hangnail to capture a drop of her blood. Eammon catches her before she can pour her blood on a tree. She wants to try using her blood to heal the trees, because she fears her magic. Eammon insists she isn’t terrible. Red hears the Wilderwood saying they must be bound, that “[m]agic is stronger when there are two” (131). Red reconsiders and decides she will try to use her magic.

Eammon suggests he and Red form a thread bond. It is a type of folk marriage, and he thinks it will make him able to assist her with controlling her magic. He thinks the Wilderwood wants them to recreate what it had with Ciaran and Gaya. Red is nervous, but she agrees. They both cut a lock of each other’s hair and tie the threads around a piece of white bark. Red feels the tight coil of her magic loosening.

Red is wary as she enters the tower of the Keep, which she finds inviting and beautifully furnished. Eammon says the Keep sprang into being when Ciaran and Gaya first made their pact. He explains that the Wilderwood’s power can affect growing things, but is otherwise limited. He says, “Wounds can’t just go away—they’re transferred” (142).

The Wolf and the Second Daughter can control the Wilderwood because, when Ciaran and Gaya made their pact, the sentinels rooted in them. In the ancient languages, Wolf means Warden, which is why Eammon cannot leave the forest. He says he doesn’t mind people thinking him a monster. He presents a small vine for her to influence, but when Red opens to her magic, she feels it taking over her, and she imagines people dying.

Fife reports there was a breach on the Border and someone fell through. Eammon leaves to help but tells Red to stay in the Keep.

Fife explains that, when the Wilderwood was formed, there were people at the Edge who were trapped. They have lived in isolation for centuries but keep trying to find a way out. Fife has a Bargainer’s Mark from bargaining with the Wilderwood to save a girl he knew. Red has a vision of Eammon facing a shadow monster. She decides to go help, and Fife goes with her.

Red finds Eammon, bleeding, facing a man who has been shadow-infected. Another man Red doesn’t recognize prevents Red from interfering. The shadow creature wounds Eammon in the stomach. Red cuts her palm, presses her hand to the ground, and calls for it to stop. The pit of shadow from the breach disappears. Red remembers she was told, “If you give the Wilderwood blood, it won’t stop there” (157). Eammon tells the Wilderwood it can’t have Red.

The shadow creature turns into an injured man. He is one of the villagers from the Edge, a man named Bormain. The other stranger, Valdrek, says he will take Bormain home. Fife explains that the border on the northern side of the Wilderwood is more permeable than the border with Valleyda. Valdrek refers to Red as “new blood,” and Eammon says she is Lady Wolf. Bormain mutters that Solmir says hello.

Eammon is stunned at the name Solmir. Red recalls that Solmir is one of the Five Kings, along with Valchior, Bryiand, Malchrosite, and Calryes (161). Red has the sense that the Wilderwood wants something from her. Eammon takes the cut on her hand onto his own palm. Red admits she had a vision of him, she thinks because of the thread bond. She notes Eammon is bleeding from where the creature clawed him, but he won’t let her help.

Red asks what happened to Bormain. Eammon explains, “The Shadowlands imprison shadow-creatures and mythic beasts and the Old Ones,” as well as the Five Kings (165). The Kings bargained to make the Shadowlands to imprison the monsters, but the Wilderwood took up all the remaining magic in order to contain them and created the sentinels to stand guard. Ciaran and Gaya, who wanted to live in the Wilderwood, agreed to become Wardens. 50 years later, the Kings decided they wanted the magic back. They tried cutting down a sentinel and instead were sucked into the Shadowlands. Eammon wants them to stay there.

Neve sits with her mother and the Advisor of Trade, who is explaining that a caravan is stuck in the Alperan Pass. Neve notes that Queen Isla does not look well. With them sit Kiri and another priestess, Tealia, who hopes to become the next High Priestess after Zophia.

Neve has been secretly working with Kiri in the shrine to learn how to pull magic from the Shadowlands. Kiri claims this will weaken the Wilderwood and Red might escape. After discussion, they decide to pay to reroute the caravan to the Florian coast, though there are rebels. The Florian coast is choked with seaweed this time of year, but Kiri proposes she pray to demonstrate the power of their religious belief. Kiri proposes that Arick, the Florian heir, come with her.

Neve approaches Kiri afterwards and learns that Kiri wants to demonstrate her power so she might be made the next High Priestess. Neve notes that the veins in Kiri’s wrists are dark, “as if shadows ran there instead of blood” (177). Kiri hints that Neve can acquire more power if she gives her blood.

Red is in her room when she hears a sound outside her door. She steps into the hall to find sentinels scattered through the hallway. Suddenly, the forest erupts in her room, destroying it. Red runs inside to grab her red cloak and manages to escape before the room disappears. Eammon comes running and uses his magic to push the forest back. He says it’s never been like this. He tells Red she can sleep in his room.

Red follows Eammon to his bedchamber, which is messy. She notices his wounds and offers to help bandage him. She feels that his closeness sparks her power and makes her stronger. Red insists that he let her take some of the wound, the way he has taken hers. This time, she feels she can control her magic and gets caught up in it. Eammon stops her before she can take all of his wounds on herself. Red notices her veins turn emerald when her magic is working, just as Eammon’s magic changes him.

Eammon gives Red his bed and arranges a blanket on the floor. He tells Red about a girl he was with, a long time ago, though they were separated when the Wilderwood closed after taking the Kings. Eammon asks what Red would do if she could do anything, and she says, “I would let my sister know I’m safe” (195).

Neve wears black to attend the funeral of the High Priestess. Kiri has returned from Floriane, her prayers successful. Kiri has given Neve a pendant made of the shadow-traced white wood, but Neve does not wear it. Isla looks very ill. Raffe offers Neve his support. Arick is there too, with a bandage around his hand. Kiri insists what they are doing is working, and the Wilderwood is loosening its hold on Red.

When the time comes to select a new High Priestess, Neve nominates Kiri. Her mother overrules her, citing tradition, and names Tealia. Raffe visits Neve’s room to talk, but Arick interrupts them. He appears drunk and leads Raffe away. Neve drinks wine until she falls asleep, feeling that she has failed.