A few hours later, Aviend had come back with the pieces that Delgha hoped would fix the machine. She looked better, fresher, than she had when she left. It was as though the doing something had shaken off a layer of mental grime and dust.

“I’m starving,” she said, searching through the containers in the kitchen area.

“You’re always starving,” Kyre said.

“Only when I’m hungry,” she said. “Aha!” She lifted some tiny brown cakes covered in a towel, clearly Thorme’s handiwork, and set them on the table.

“She’s probably saving these for something,” Kyre said.

“Probably,” Aviend said, as she broke one in half and held it out to him.

The cakes were sweet and savory, heavier than they looked. Crumbs fell into the indent of the Q that was Quenn’s name, recently carved into the wood. Kyre blew them away. He wished he could ask Quenn about the ghosts; did he think they were brighter now than they used to be? Or–

“You’re thinking about ghosts again, aren’t you?” she said. “Me too.”

“I don’t know if I love it or hate it when you do that.”

“Let’s go with love so you can tell me about it.”

Kyre ran his finger around and around the Q. “Quenn said that when the ghost touched him, it was like he went somewhere without going somewhere,” Kyre said. No, he had that wrong. “Like he’d traveled, but was somehow still in the same place? Something like that. He disappeared, just for a moment. Maybe it took him to the star.”

“Do you think?” She licked a crumb off her finger, seemed uncertain.

“Honestly, no,” he said. “But I can’t think of anything else.”

“Are you saying we should go touch some ghosts?” she said.

“I’m sensing a theme here… with the touching of things.”

From across the table, she looked at him like she was about to make a sly remark.

“Focus,” he said. “And, yes, in case you were wondering, I’m talking to both of us here.”

“Touching,” she said.

“Ghosts first,” he said.

“What if we don’t find any ghosts? Can we go right to the other stuff?”

“Yes,” he said.

“Then let’s go look.” Aviend grinned and grabbed a couple more cakes and tucked them into her pockets. “For good luck.”

“I thought you didn’t want to find ghosts.”

“Right. It’s good luck for me. Not for them.”

They found ghosts. Or a ghost, almost right away. It was wandering along the edge of Slisto Swamp, stepping carefully, as if trying not to get its feet wet. They were getting brighter, he thought, more solid. This one looked like it was wearing a cloak, and he swore he could nearly see a ring glinting on one finger.

“Just my luck,” Aviend said. But her voice lifted as she said it, in excitement. “I can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I think you should be the one to touch it.”

“Do you?”

She nodded. “You know more about what to expect, because you saw Quenn do it. But I’ll be right here with my cakes in case you need saving.”

“Please tell me you have something other than a cake-weapon.”

“These are so heavy. They’re perfect. I’ll just throw it at its head.”

“It’s a ghost, Aviend. Intangible energy?”

In her fist, not a cake at all, but a tiny spray canister. Sly.

“Sleep inducer,” she said. “I got it from Delgha.”

“Got or stole? Also, you can’t put a ghost to sleep. Also, I’m starting to be a little afraid of you. Every time you open your fist, you’ve got some new device in there.”

“It’s not for them. It’s for you,” she said. “If the ghost tries to go somewhere with you, I can put you to sleep.”

“How’s that going to stop it from taking me somewhere?”

“It won’t,” she said. “But you’ll be asleep, so you won’t notice. What? It’s what I had in my pocket.”

“This is definitely one of our better plans.” He knew that she had other things in her pockets. She always did. Despite their banter, he had no worries that if something went awry, she would kick somebody’s ass until it was fixed.

He stepped forward slowly. He’d never purposefully attempted to approach a ghost before. Not even when he thought they were his friends. He’d been shyer then, he supposed. Did they spook? Run away? Get aggressive? He didn’t know.

He realized he was thinking of them as human, as alive. And that’s because they looked so alive. So much like a human that it was nearly impossible to remember they were just so much energy after all. All right, then it wouldn’t matter how he approached it.

He strode forward, until he was nearly within reach. The air around the figure crackled and hummed in a barely audible tune. It was bright enough that his eyes strained and watered.

The ghost reached out, but not for Kyre. It leaned down as if plucking something from the ground.

Kyre dropped to his knees in the mud and muck and lowered his head, but not his gaze. It seemed important to be able to see, even though the bright made the corners of his eyes ping with pain. “Mishda paal,” he said. He wished he’d thought to ask Quenn what it meant. Too late now. Hopefully it wasn’t something mean or aggressive.

Two lines of energy – definitely arms, definitely hands, definitely a ring on the middle finger – reached for Kyre.

The swamp disappeared. Reappeared. In front of him a man. Not a ghost, but an actual man, with brown eyes and a dark beard. A dark ring settled on his finger. Kyre was still in the Stere, but also not, he thought, although he couldn’t place his finger on why.

“Who…” he wanted to ask, but the air was still in his chest when he found himself back in front of the ghost. A moment later, the ghost disappeared.

“You went somewhere!” Aviend was clearly trying not to shout, but her whispers were so loud she was a little hoarse. “Did you go somewhere? Where did you go? What was it like?”

“I think,” he said, trying to find the words for what had just happened. “I think I went to another here.”

She came over and helped him come up out of the mud and muck. His pants were stuck to his knees, sopped with brown.

“A better here.”