fter our talk with King Arthur and Dorothy, I checked my Hole Tracker. There wasn’t another wormhole of any kind opening until 8:30 a.m. the day after tomorrow, which meant we were stuck in Neverland.

I was dismayed by the news. The sun had gone down, so we only had five more sunsets before the Vicennalia Aurora. We had less than a week to find Excalibur, return to Oz, and free Paige’s mind from the memory stone. Time was of the essence and it was highly inconvenient that we had to waste a full day waiting in Neverland.

Then again, if I was honest with myself, I was also secretly relieved. I was glad we had a day to rest. I felt guilty thinking that, but it was true. With the myriad of obstacles in Camelot that Arthur and Dorothy had described, I knew more trials would soon be upon us. I was grateful we were being forced to take a breather before diving in again.

Neverland was the perfect place for a day off. Between the big feasts, the amicable company, and the fun and games, it was the ideal environment for an exhausted, recently heartbroken protagonist to recover.

I sat with Blue around the bonfire—my belly full of pancakes, chocolate milk, and cured meats. Daniel and Jason were on the opposite side of the bonfire circle. I could see their faces through the flames and they were laughing about something. I wasn’t sure why, but seeing Daniel smile made me smile.

SJ was off talking with Dorothy somewhere. The two had really hit it off. Dorothy had a lot of potions experience from her time spent in Oz working with Julian, plus she had a rather colorful backstory. For starters, apparently she wasn’t from Kansas; that was just a creative choice one of the earliest storytellers who’d written about Oz made to make her more relatable to his audience. She was from some place on Earth called England. I was sure Blue would probably ask her a million questions about it tomorrow, but for now my cloaked friend seemed more interested in relaxing than research. A first for her. I guess she must’ve been exhausted too.

I felt a bit bad about upsetting Dorothy with my talk regarding Julian. On SJ’s suggestion, we’d decided to drop the matter for now. There wasn’t anything we could do to prove Julian was guilty, and we still didn’t know for sure what had happened to Ozma. I was pretty firm in my beliefs about his treachery, but the uncertainty was clearly making Dorothy uneasy, especially given that she could not leave Neverland.

“What are you thinkin’ about?” Blue asked. Her cheek was bulging from the enormous lollipop she’d taken from the candy dish being passed around.

“The journey ahead,” I replied. “And how glad I am for this intermission.”

“Intermission?”

“Yeah, you know, the break we’re experiencing from our quest.”

“We finished our quest, Crisa,” Blue said. “We found Paige, which was what we wanted to do at the start.”

“Technically that’s true, but I feel like this story with Paige is incomplete. Finding her only opened our eyes to the bigger quest of freeing her mind, which we’ve barely even begun.”

Blue took the lollipop out of her mouth. “Not all stories are tied with a perfect bow at the end, Crisa. Especially not those with so many characters and story arcs in play. I’m calling a wrap on our current venture. The day after tomorrow we’ll take the next wormhole and navigate our way through this new story that’s unfolding. We’ll best Camelot and every obstacle it has to offer and find a better ending, and you’re going to lead us there like you always have.”

“That’s an awful lot of confidence to place in me, Blue,” I commented.

“Well, you deserve it.”

“Because I’m so noble?” I teased.

“No,” she said simply. “Because you’re my friend. And I know you’ll always do right by me and protect us to the best of your ability.”

I smiled. My Limbo with Blue was gone. I no longer felt guilt about keeping Jason’s secret and I fully agreed with what Blue had just said. I would always do right by her. And I would protect her, SJ, Jason, and Daniel with all that I had.

I put one of my arms around my best friend and gave her a playful side hug as we watched the improv play being performed around the fire. Blue popped the lollipop back in her mouth and tilted her head in Jason and Daniel’s direction.

“Do you think he knows that I like him?” she asked.

I was surprised she’d brought up the topic. Jason was a sensitive subject for Blue and she usually got defensive when I mentioned anything about her crush.

“I doubt it,” I replied. “You guys have always been good friends, so your closeness and protectiveness of one another is nothing new. I’m not even sure SJ and I would know if you hadn’t told us.”

“That’s good,” Blue said. “I don’t want him to know yet. I need to play it cool. Though I wish I hadn’t made an idiot of myself earlier in front of him.”

“What are you talking about?”

“In Sleepy Hollow.” She pulled the lollipop from her mouth again. “I totally humiliated myself. Falling asleep in the middle of a fight, being carried to safety by Jason—I’m so embarrased.”

“Oh, come now,” I said. “I hate the idea of being seen as a damsel in distress as much as you do. But if I can make peace with getting saved every now and then when I truly need it, you can deal with this. I guarantee you that Jason doesn’t think any less of you for needing help today. He just wants to protect you.”

“Getting saved isn’t the issue here, though,” Blue said. “The problem is that I embarrassed myself in front of a boy I like.”

“How’s that any different from embarrassing yourself in front of a boy you don’t like?”

“I don’t know. It just is.” She huffed then looked at me. My grin caused her to break into a smile too.

“We have evil to fight and people to save and we’re talking about boys.” She shook her head and laughed. “We’re hopeless, Crisa.”

“No, we’re human,” I said, still smiling. “And I think that means we’re anything but.”

I excused myself from the bonfire to make a couple of calls on my Mark Two.

The first was to Liza. I wanted to update my magical mentor on where we were, what was happening, and where we were going next. I also told her about how I had used my magic recently. She was proud of me for being wise enough to restrain the majority of my magic when I was feeling such strong emotions in the Ruined City. But she was upset that I’d pushed myself to such an extreme state of Magic Exhaustion in Oz.

When the conversation and nagging were done, I promised that we would talk soon. Liza said goodbye with her all-too-familiar final words.

“Try and stay out of trouble, Crisa.”

I smirked wryly. “I’ll do my best.”

When the call concluded, I stared out at the darkness. I’d climbed up a tree again, but tonight the sky was not clear. A ceiling of cold-bearing clouds blocked the moon and stars. I took a breath and gathered the strength and calm to make my final call.

“Alex,” I said.

I knew Mauvrey had a Mark Two so I’d hoped Alex had one of his own. My compact started ringing and a moment later, he answered.

“Crisa.” He sounded surprised.

“Hey,” I responded.

My emotion didn’t rise and my heart didn’t beat faster on seeing him this time. I think finally facing the truth about how I felt in Limbo had allowed me to move past that. I wasn’t completely healed, but I wasn’t heartbroken anymore either. I’d accepted what had happened and I’d accepted who he’d become. By letting go of the hope that my brother was still the person he used to be and that he could come back, I’d found peace. It was a sad, cold kind of peace, but I preferred it to the rage that had clouded my focus these last couple of days.

“I wanted to ask you something,” I said, getting straight to the point. “Why were you and Mauvrey headed to Camelot? You said you weren’t helping with the search for Paige Tomkins. I want to know what other reason you could have for going there.”

This had been bothering me since my friends and I had learned about Excalibur and changed course. We didn’t know that we needed to go to Camelot until we discovered that Excalibur could free Paige’s memories. And we didn’t know about needing to free Paige’s memories until we found her in the Maze of the Mindless and she explained the whole situation with the brainless scarecrows, Glinda, and the memory stone.

So why were Alex and Mauvrey already on their way to Camelot this morning? Arian hadn’t found Paige yet. By now he’d probably located her, escaped the maze, and forced Julian to share the same information about Excalibur and Glinda’s memory stone, but he hadn’t known earlier. Which meant the antagonists had another, separate mission in Camelot.

“He wanted us to retrieve something,” Alex said with a shrug.

“Wow. Real cryptic,” I said, rolling my eyes. “And here I thought you’d moved past beating around the bush after you let your girlfriend electrocute me.” I released an exasperated sigh. “Different question then. What do I have to do with your new mission? In the Ruined City, Mauvrey said you needed me as ‘a spare.’”

Alex didn’t answer that question either. He paused as a shadow of guilt passed over his face. “Crisa,” he said. “About what happened in the Ruined City—”

“Save it,” I cut him off. “I accept who you’ve become, Alex. You don’t need to explain it, because I don’t really care. There are allies and there are enemies, and today I finally accepted which you are. Let’s stop pretending that we’re anything more to each other, all right? I think it would save time.”

He hesitated for a moment but finally nodded. “Fine,” he said. “If we’re enemies, then I don’t owe you any answers. But I’ll tell you something, Crisa. Whatever happens next, I stand by what I’ve said. We may be on different sides, but I will try to protect you whenever possible. I won’t always be able to, like today when Arian’s orders complicated things, but I’ll try.”

“Knock yourself out,” I responded. “It doesn’t matter to me anymore.”

I truly meant it. I finally saw Alex Knight clearly for the first time in a long time.

“Arian found Paige today,” Alex said after a moment.

I shrugged easily. “I figured as much.”

“He said he ran into you in the Emerald City, so I take it you probably found her as well.”

“You figure correctly. Which means now your little task force has more than one reason for being in Camelot.” I paused. “You know, soon enough I’ll figure out what your other reason for being there is.”

“I know,” he said.

“Then I guess there’s only one thing left to say. See you soon, bro.”

I hung up my Mark Two without further regard for my brother. He was going to continue to be a main player in my story; it was unavoidable. But from now on I would not mistake his character in it. He was an antagonist. I was a protagonist. Not because we were chosen by anyone, but because we’d chosen the roles for ourselves. The thought sat strongly with me as I breathed in the evening air.

Soon I’d climb back down the tree and rejoin the chaotic world, but up here, there was stillness that seemed to go on forever. I let it absorb into my spirit like lotion on the skin.

My thoughts drifted to other realms.

I hoped that my parents were okay. The quest I was on and the enemies I had to fight kept me from thinking too much about all we’d lost in Midveil. I didn’t know if my parents were sufficiently distracted staying at Chance Darling’s family castle. Once I returned from this mission I needed to connect with them. Now that they were short one child, I owed it to them to step up for the family.

I was glad that Pietro was there for my parents. He was a true brother and prince. We were all lucky to have him. While I still felt kind of bad for suspecting him of treachery, that story arc—and realizing his true goodness—had made me feel closer to him than ever before.

Funny how people kept surprising me.

Although several characters I cared for had turned on me over the course of the last few months, I could not overlook the fact that there were others who had changed for the better, and who I was glad to give more room in my life to, like Girtha back at school and maybe . . . maybe even Chance.

I smiled slightly at the thought of him, the prince I’d left behind. I didn’t know if I hoped he would succeed or fail in his endeavor to prove himself to me. Nor did I know how he would even go about it. But after everything that had happened, I knew not to rule anything out.