‘Where is he?’ Phil demands. ‘Holly, where is Julian?’

She shakes her head, wide-eyed. ‘I don’t know.’

‘Look,’ Cardy says.

He holds out the red wool threads tied to his belt loop, the ones that had linked him to Julian. They’ve been neatly and perfectly woven together into an intricate rope, and the other end is tied to Phil’s backpack, as if Julian had never been in the line at all.

But Phil’s looking at Holly, not the rope. ‘He’s a lost thing!’ she exclaims. ‘So find him!’

‘I’m trying, but –’

‘Try harder!’

‘He’s not anywhere!’

‘What do you mean, he’s not anywhere?’

‘It’s like he doesn’t exist!’ Holly says. ‘The – the thread – however it is that this works – I can feel Finn on the other end, like when someone has hold of the other end of a rope and it goes tight. The other three kids too. But Julian …’

‘He’s dead, isn’t he.’ Phil’s voice is flat. It’s not a question.

‘We don’t know that,’ Cardy says. ‘Like Holly said before: Emily didn’t have perfect control of her, so she might not have perfect control of her powers.’

‘Oh, and they just picked right this second to crap out,’ Phil says. ‘How incredibly likely!’

‘Guys, we’re in deep shit now,’ Holly says. ‘What if there are more doors between us and Finn, like the one in the hillside? We can’t open them without Julian.’

‘And we can’t get back out,’ I say hollowly.

This is it.

This is the end.

We’re dead. I’m dead.

I am sure you must understand why I cannot let such a slight go unpunished.

The prince said that to Helena right before he ripped her head off. And what I’ve done is so, so much worse.

I’m Finn’s pet. That might mean something to some of the fairies here, but he’s not awake to protect me.

Misrule is going to end, and the prince is going to come. He’s going to find me. And he’s going to punish me. Oh, you naughty little kitten, he’ll say, you must learn to be obedient, and he’s going to give me to someone else, and my mind will be torn apart in the process, because a servant cannot have two masters.

No. He won’t give me away.

He’ll keep me for himself.

We keep going, because there’s nothing else we can do but keep going.

I try to distract myself from the growing wave of despair by asking myself questions.

If the prince knows we’re here – why take Julian?

To trap us.

Why bother? It’s coming up on six o’clock, and I’d have to be pretty delusional to think that even if we found Finn and the other three, we’d be able to get out again before Misrule ends.

To scare us. To make us lose all hope. To make us give up.

Why let Julian live in the first place? My head could crack like an egg. Why didn’t it?

The prince knew what I was planning. Even if he tried to hide it, he must have known there was a chance I’d find out the real date of Misrule. And even if Plan A was hiding the date, the prince is not the kind of arsehole that doesn’t have a Plan B, and a Plan C, and a Plan not-enough-letters-in-the-alphabet.

I didn’t. I only had Plan A. And if the prince had exploded Julian’s head like he exploded Dave’s, then my Plan A would have failed before it even began.

So why let Julian live?

Ohhhhhh shit.

I looked him in the eye and called him a liar, and he laughed, because he’s been telling me the truth the whole time. Every time he asked me that question, he’s been telling me nothing but the truth.

He wanted me to come to fairyland. And he wanted me to do it now – on my own, today, or with him, tonight. He wanted me to come, and not be able to leave.

But why me?

And why now?

We come to a fork in the road.

‘We have to make a choice,’ Holly says.

I close my eyes. Of course the prince would make sure I had to make another choice. Why rip me apart when he can make me do it to myself?

‘Or split up,’ Holly adds.

‘We’re not splitting up,’ Phil says. ‘I’ve seen enough horror movies to know that that’s a sure way to die.’

‘Then it’s a choice.’

Holly points down the left-hand passage. ‘Finn’s that way.’ She points down the right-hand passage. ‘But the three kids are that way.’

‘That doesn’t make any sense,’ I say. ‘Finn’s with Oyster. I know he is. The prince threw him on the same death rose bed he keeps her on.’

‘Oh, sorry, my actual magical powers are wrong.’

I pinch the bridge of my nose. ‘Okay. Let’s be logical about this.’

We discuss. We yell. We discuss.

‘We’re running out of time,’ Cardy says, and then proceeds to argue some more.

We take a vote. Three to one. I get my way.

We don’t walk for long before we come to the cliff.

The roof soars high above us, a glittering cathedral, afire with lanterns and the reflections of jewels. It’s so bright it’s hard to look at – like staring into a galaxy of shining stars all at once – but even its shimmering light isn’t radiant enough to illuminate what’s below.

This is the moment when one of us should pick up a pebble and drop it off the edge. We should all stand there, waiting for it to make a noise at the bottom, and swallow nervously when it never comes.

But this is fairyland, and the fairies are too damn tidy to leave something as convenient as a pebble lying around.

‘We have to jump, don’t we?’ Cardy says.

Holly nods.

‘Can you sense Julian?’ Phil asks her. ‘At all?’

‘No,’ she says. ‘I’m sorry. He’s just …’

‘Gone.’

She nods again.

We stare over the edge, into the impossible depths below.

‘We could go back,’ Holly says. ‘We could take the other path. There’s still time.’

‘No,’ I say. ‘This one. It has to be this one.’

I take Phil’s hand. She takes Cardy’s. He takes Holly’s.

‘Count of three?’ I say.

‘Count of three,’ Phil affirms.

‘One,’ I say. ‘Two …’