Chapter 17 flashes back to a time when Paige was six, and her older cousin, Finn, took her to an anti-Scion protest in Ireland. Scion responded to the protest with tanks and gunfire, and Finn and his girlfriend were arrested, possibly killed. Back in the narrative’s present day, Paige awakens from this dream of her childhood, shivering in her sleeping bag. Warden is nowhere in sight, but he has left a note that her second test will be to find her way back to Magdalen using only her voyant ability. He has left a few basic supplies, along with a circle of salt around her campsite, which is possibly intended to ward off spirits. The note warns her not to go south, but she ignores the warning in the hopes of achieving her escape.

She winds her way through a thick forest—past the boundaries of Sheol I—alert to the presence of guards, predators, and land mines. When she stumbles upon a skeleton—the victim of a land mine—she summons a spirit for help. It leads her back to her camp, and she heads north, trying a different route, but soon, she hears footsteps—a red-jacket; and then, another sound, not human: an Emim.