The Grim sniffled a little, then hung his head low. He had burrs in his fur, and he looked a little thin. Everything about him was gangly and puppy-like, especially his big eyes.

“Hi,” I said back. I was too shocked, at first, to say anything else. Then I asked, “Is the rest of the pack nearby?”

Tomas’s shaking increased.

The Grim laid his ears back against his head. “I’m alone.”

I asked, “What are you doing out here all by yourself? You’re too young to be a rogue Grim, aren’t you?”

The Grim opened his mouth, but instead of answering, he flopped to the forest floor. He put his head on his paws and let out a long, terrible whimper. Tearily, he said, “It wasn’t my fault!”

There was nothing much sadder looking than a lost baby Grim weeping into a forest floor.

“Oh, hey, don’t cry—” I started to stoop, but the closer I got to the Grim, the higher Tomas’s allergies made him float.

“Hang on,” Tomas said, grabbing hold of a tree branch overhead. When he had a secure grip, he released my ponytail. “Okay, I’m good!”

I rubbed the spot where my hair had been pulled and kneeled by the Grim. “I’m sure it’s not your fault. What happened?”

It took a moment for the Grim to calm down enough to tell the story. He rubbed his nose on his paw. “My pack was asleep, but I heard something in the woods. I went to look, and there was this cat—it was huge! And so … I chased it, because that’s fun, you know? But then when I stopped and looked around, I was …”

“Lost?” I suggested.

The Grim started to whimper again. He was making those big, ratty snuff-snooooooffff sounds you make after you’ve been crying for a while. I very carefully extended a hand—he was a wild animal, after all—and patted him on the head. When I did, he crumpled toward me, a mess of black fur and paws and weight.

“Is he mauling you?” Tomas shouted from overhead. “I brought some hydrogen peroxide for the wounds!”

“He’s not mauling me!” I called up, even though the baby Grim was sort of suffocating me. He didn’t mean it though, so I wrapped my fingers in his fur and patted him until he stopped crying.

“Listen,” I finally told the Grim. “I bet I know where your family is. Grim packs migrate to the same place every year. My aunt will definitely know where the closest Grim migration point is. We can take you right to them!”

The Grim lifted his head to look at me, and I saw his very impressive bright white teeth. They flashed as he spoke. “Why would you help me?”

“Well, for starters, because it’s a nice thing to do,” I said. Gently, so that it didn’t sound like an accusation, I added, “But also, because you’ve been eating Fuzzles, right?”

The Grim nodded and licked his lips. “They’re all I can catch. I tried to catch regular food, bigger food, but … I’m just not fast enough yet …” His eyes wobbled like he might cry again.

“Okay, okay!” I patted him again. “Well, it’s just that since you’ve been eating them, they moved into our town and keep burning things down. So once we reunite you with your pack, the Fuzzles will be able to come back to the wild. Everyone will be happy!”

“Except the Fuzzles I already ate?” the Grim asked.

“Well, yes, but let’s not think about that,” I said, cringing. “Stick with me and you’ll be safe.”

That was the moment Tomas’s allergy medicine kicked in. He crashed to the ground beside us, emptying the remaining contents of his pockets. He bent to pick up the various packages of gauze and lip balms and spare batteries.

“Leave it! We have to go!” I said. We hurried toward the edge of the woods, which no longer seemed so far away or mysterious now that we had the baby Grim following us. As we reached the sunlight, I told Tomas, “Show me your watch!”

It was 10:35. The Fuzzles only had twenty-five minutes.

Tomas’s shoulders slumped. “We’ll never make it back in time!”

“If we go straight back!” I said.

“You know that won’t happen! Regent Maximus will see a puddle or something and stop and we’ll never make it!”

I couldn’t believe it. We’d come all the way out here, found the Grim, and now the Fuzzles were still getting exterminated?

“No!” I said. “No way! Come on.”

We ran to the bathrooms, where Regent Maximus was still waiting with his eyes closed. He seemed to be listing things he wasn’t afraid of:

“Clouds, except not the ones that are dark or fluffy. Honeycomb, when it’s not in hard pieces. Clouds. Honeycomb. Butterflies. Wait! No, not butterflies. Clouds …”

“Regent Maximus!” I said, voice a little louder than I meant to. His eyes flew wide-open. He looked at me, then at Tomas, then his eyes went even wider—the Grim was standing just behind us.

“He’s going to eat—”

“No!” I said again. “Regent Maximus, this is a baby Grim. And he is lost and scared. Unless we get him back to the clinic, all of those Fuzzles are going to die.”

Regent Maximus didn’t seem swayed. Actually, he didn’t seem anything. I think he might have been literally frozen with fear.

“Is he going to hurt me?” the baby Grim asked meekly, looking at Regent Maximus’s horn. He was quivering a little. “Mom and Dad told me not to go near animals with horns. They’re only used for poking.”

Regent Maximus blinked. He screwed his eyes up at the Grim. For a moment, I thought he was preparing to run, but then he said, quite plainly, “Oh, you don’t need to be afraid of me. Do I need to be afraid of you? Are you going to bite my ankles?”

“I don’t bite ankles!” the Grim said, sounding offended. He leaned forward and very, very tentatively sniffed Regent Maximus’s tail, then jerked back, still unsure.

I don’t think Regent Maximus had ever met anyone who was so obviously afraid of him. He looked almost proud, really, and tossed his mane a little. He allowed us to lead him outside to the water fountain to get on his back.

“All right, Regent Maximus. Close your eyes!” I said. The Unicorn squeezed them shut. “We’ll have to go fast this time if we want to make it,” I added.

“I’ll try,” Regent Maximus said, shaking a little. “You’ll warn me if there’s something scary?”

“Absolutely,” I said.

“And if I see something scary, I’ll growl at it!” the Grim offered, wagging his tail a little.

So off we went, me and Tomas on Regent Maximus, the Grim running alongside us.

Hey, I thought, we might just be able to save the Fuzzles after all!