* * *
Razor took the lead when we crossed into the wyldwood, sometimes leaping through the branches ahead of us, sometimes scurrying along the ground like a huge spider. In the eternal gloom of the wyldwood, the gremlin made a bright yet difficult to follow guide. His huge eyes and neon teeth were clearly visible in the murk, but he was easily distracted by every small thing that moved through the branches or undergrowth. He also left a faint but definite trail of corruption behind him—withered grass, dying leaves, yellowed vegetation—as Iron fey still had an adverse effect on the rest of the Nevernever. Thankfully, Razor was small enough for the damage to be minimal, though this worked against us, too. Once, something large moved through the trees ahead of us, causing the gremlin to flee back to Kenzie and not budge from her shoulder for several minutes.
So we hadn’t traveled very far into the Nevernever when night began to fall, making me nervous as the shadows lengthened around us. Though I wanted to keep moving, I knew we probably shouldn’t press our luck. Traveling through the wyldwood in the dark was never a good idea; the things that stalked the woods at night were things you generally wanted to avoid.
“We should stop soon,” I told Kenzie, who was watching Razor scamper along an overhead branch, green eyes bobbing in the darkness. “The wyldwood gets pretty dangerous at night. We should find a place to hole up until morning. Unless we’re really close to the trod.”
“Well, Razor says we are, but I’m not entirely sure about his definition of close,” Kenzie replied. “Anyway, I think stopping soon is a good idea. I’ll see if he can find us somewhere safe.”
A few minutes later, when the wyldwood was almost at full dark, we trailed the gremlin to a stand of massive trees so huge, a ring of six people wouldn’t be able to fit their arms around the trunks. They soared overhead until they were lost to the canopy and the darkness, so high I couldn’t see the tops of the branches. Luminescent blue moss hung in curtains from the trunks and lower branches, fluttering in the wind like glowing lace curtains.
I crossed my arms, looking at Kenzie. “Here? How is this considered a safe place to stop? We’ll be right out in the open. Unless your gremlin thinks we’re going to climb the trees.”
Razor wrinkled his nose at me, then buzzed quietly in Kenzie’s ear. She nodded, then stepped forward and pushed back the moss like a pair of drapes, revealing a large, dry, hollowed-out space in the enormous trunk.
“Okay.” I nodded, as Razor shot me a look of triumph. “That’ll work.”
The strange moss bathed the inside of the trunk with an eerie glow, as Kenzie knelt and unzipped her backpack. The night was warm, and the trunk blocked the wind, so it wasn’t cold enough for a fire. Which was good, because I didn’t think open flames in a large wooden room was the best idea.
“Here,” Kenzie said, handing me a power bar and a bottled water. “That’s dinner for tonight, sorry. I only have a couple each. There was lot of stuff to pack, so I had to make some sacrifices for space.”
“No complaints here.” I settled against the wall and tore open the wrapper. “That magic bag of yours has already saved our hides a couple times now. At this point, I keep expecting you to pull out a car or something.”
She chuckled. “I’m gonna have to stock up on salt, it seems. I had no idea it would be so effective. I wonder if there’s a way to make salt grenades.” She took a sip of water and leaned close, her slender arm brushing mine. Razor crawled up the wall until he found a small ledge jutting from the trunk, and perched there like a tiny gargoyle. “Do you think Guro is all right?” Kenzie asked after a moment.
“I hope so,” I muttered, crumpling the wrapper in my fist. “The Forgotten were after me, not him. I just hope they keep looking for us and leave him and his family alone.”
Kenzie went quiet, chewing on her bar. I fell silent, too, thinking, and in the stillness, the questions rose up, taunting me. Now that we weren’t running for our lives or trying to find a way through the Nevernever, a thousand uncertainties crowded my mind, slipping past my defenses. Annwyl. Was she alive? Could we find her and the amulet before it was too late? My parents. Was Mom crying herself to sleep every night, waiting for me? Would I ever get to go home?
And Keirran. My stupid, stubborn, infuriating nephew. How were we going to deal with him? To get his soul back, Guro said he had to destroy the amulet himself. Willingly. I remembered the Keirran at the war council, the faery with flat, cold eyes, and the impossibility of the task seemed overwhelming. That Keirran was not going to do anything we asked of him. That Keirran would probably shove another sword through my guts and then cut off my head to make sure he killed me this time.
“Ethan?” Kenzie asked in a hesitant voice, staring straight ahead. “Can I ask you something?”
Apparently, I wasn’t the only one with questions. “Sure.”
“You were gone for over four months.” Turning, she gazed at me, not angry, just puzzled. And maybe a little hurt. “Why didn’t you tell me you were still alive? All that time, back in the human world, I thought you were dead. Why didn’t you send word, let me know you were okay?”
I swallowed hard. Oh, yeah. She hadn’t known I was asleep that whole time. Maybe I should’ve explained that little fact earlier. “I couldn’t,” I murmured back. “After Keirran stabbed me, I was in a coma for a long time. I’ve really only been awake a few days now, and when I woke up, everything was crazy, with Keirran and the war. I didn’t have time to do anything.” She blinked, looking relieved that there was an explanation, that I hadn’t just forgotten about her. I could see it in her eyes, the fear that I’d left her behind again.