Using Holly’s key, Fern, Rose, and Holly sneak out at night to the river by the fallen tree to work a curse before Rose’s parents arrive to take her away. Following Miss Parcae’s instructions, they scratch a nine-foot ritual circle into the dirt, build a muddy altar, and place their makeshift tools: a stolen steak knife, the measuring string, bowls of river water and stolen salt, and a chicken heart pierced with bent sewing needles.

They strip and wash in the river, and Fern feels the baby inside her respond as if drawn toward the water. Zinnia refuses to come, insisting the only priority is saving Holly, but Fern and Holly stay with Rose because Rose wants revenge for Blossom being taken. In the circle, Rose invokes Aradia and Cernunnos, purifies the space with saltwater, burns the chicken heart, and sets an upside-down metal helmet from the attic over the fire like a cauldron.

Rose places a poppet (sewn by Holly and linked to Miss Wellwood using Miss Wellwood’s kerchief and coffee-soaked string) into the helmet and names it “Wellwood,” declaring that Miss Wellwood’s pain will be returned threefold. Fern leads the rite’s memorized words and gestures at the compass points, and the coven’s sense of power intensifies as Fern feels vast hidden water beneath the land echoing the “sunless sea” within her womb.

To “pay the price,” Rose chooses pain: she uses the knife and pliers to rip off multiple fingernails, then throws the nails into the helmet and lets her blood drip into the fire onto the poppet. Rose calls on Hecate, and the three chant and circle until the ritual crescendos—wildlife gathers, crawling creatures carpet the ground, and the girls’ dancing lifts them off the earth. They rise into the night air as if flying, and Fern senses an enormous presence noticing them before the experience abruptly ends.

At dawn they wake on the ground, cold and stunned but grinning at what they felt, while Rose insists they not cheapen it by talking. The poppet has burned into fine brown powder in the helmet, which Rose claims is “the magic.” They rush back before Mrs. Deckle arrives; later Rose hides her injured hand by telling Nurse Kent she caught her fingers in a door, while Zinnia refuses to hear about the ritual.

After dinner, Rose sets the next step in motion: she recruits Fern to help her get close to Miss Wellwood and mixes half the brown powder into Miss Wellwood’s coffeepot on a silver tray, saying the other half must be given on the twenty-second, thirteen days away. Rose delivers the tray while pretending to apologize and ingratiate herself, and Fern listens as Miss Wellwood drinks the coffee, unknowingly taking the first dose of the spell.