CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Then into Now

HORACE COULDN’T HELP BUT SHAKE HIS HEAD AS CHLOE RUBBED her now-empty hand theatrically across her thigh, like she was trying to wipe invisible cooties off her palm. The scene was just as the Fel’Daera had shown, but now he understood the context. The new arrival—Little Bo Peep, here at last—stared down at the daktan with wonder in her eyes, clearly having a moment. Just as clearly, though, Chloe had no interest in letting the moment be.

“I hate to tell you this,” Chloe told the girl, with a tone that suggested she didn’t hate it at all, “but you’ve got only a few minutes for your little reunion party. And then some stuff is going to happen that’s going to require you to be conscious.”

The girl looked up at last, meeting Chloe’s gaze with glassy but unflinching eyes. “I wish I could tell you I was ready for that,” she said.

Her voice was so earnest and honest that Horace’s heart went out to her at once. He still remembered the Find, even if Chloe didn’t—the sudden drop, the collapsing of the universe into a single point—and he was guessing the girl was going through something like that right now. Possibly some sadder, crueler version of it. He watched as the girl reached into her hair, as if trying to pin the little black flower to something there. He caught a glimpse of silver beneath the strands of her auburn hair, and knew it was Tan’ji. She was trying to fix her instrument, whatever it was. She fumbled with it stubbornly, but he could see the hopelessness on her face.

Mr. Meister stepped forward. “Not like that,” he said kindly. “Not yet.”

The girl looked up at him desperately, but then seemed to swallow her need. She nodded and wrapped her fist around the daktan. She glanced about, taking in the group. She even looked up into the sky, as if she could see Neptune overhead. But how could she possibly know Neptune was there? “I’m April,” she said. “I guess you were expecting me.”

Mr. Meister stuck out his hand, his great left eye riveted to the mysterious Tan’ji buried in the girl’s hair. “Indeed we were,” he said. “A pleasure to meet you at last. I am Mr. Meister. You are among friends here.” He shook the girl’s hand and then looked past her. “But it seems you have brought a friend of your own.”

The boy in the canoe, who as far as Horace could tell was not Tan’ji, had been watching silently, his fists pressed against his mouth. Now he dropped them and announced robotically, “I’m Joshua. I’m hurt.”

“And I’m terrible,” April said, wading into the water to help the boy. Mrs. Hapsteade was at her side in an instant, holding her skirt high. “He sprained his ankle,” April explained as they lifted the boy from the canoe. His ankle was wrapped in a colorful cloth.

“I fell,” the boy added. “I don’t always watch where I’m going.”

“Neither do I,” Mrs. Hapsteade said, which was about as far from the truth as anything Horace had ever heard. “Let’s get you over here with Gabriel—you’ll be safest with him.”

But as they helped the boy limp past Mr. Meister, the old man held out his hand. “Stop,” he commanded, the word like a hammer. They stopped, and Mr. Meister bent down to peer at the boy. The quick inspection he’d given April’s Tan’ji paled in comparison to the penetrating gaze he leveled at the boy now. It reminded Horace of his own first encounter with the old man, back at the House of Answers on that first fateful day.

“Your name is Joshua,” Mr. Meister said after several silent moments.

“Yes, sir.”

Another long pause. An interminable pause. Horace counted to ten.

Midnight—and Isabel—was now only three minutes away. What was the old man doing? At last Mr. Meister reached out and clasped the boy’s shoulder. “Joshua, I believe I know why you are here,” he said.

“You do?”

“Yes. But for now, I want you to stay close to Gabriel. Do whatever he tells you to. Can you do that?”

“Yes.”

“Excellent.” Mr. Meister straightened as Gabriel stepped forward. “Hold on to him. Keep him safe.”

Horace was bewildered, but not even a flicker of curiosity crossed Gabriel’s face. He led the boy away, talking to him softly.

Just then Neptune slipped down through the canopy of leaves. She caught a branch and hung in midair overhead, her cloak dangling. “The Riven are almost here,” she said, pointing. “There are three packs now, spread out wide through the woods and heading straight for us. They’re just a couple of minutes away.”

“They hope to pin us against the river,” Gabriel said.

Mr. Meister rounded on April. “Not to worry. Nothing we didn’t expect. But with the little time we have before they arrive, a question. I believe you had another companion. She carried an instrument—a harp.”

“What?” April asked vaguely, watching open-mouthed as Neptune pushed herself back into the sky. She seemed dazed, overwhelmed. “Oh yeah, of course. She got out of the canoe, a little ways upstream.”

“Why?”

“Because I . . . I told her you were here.”

“She did not wish to meet with us?”

April seemed to scan her memory. “She said she wasn’t ready yet.”

Horace wasn’t sure how to take that—uncertainty, or a threat.

“The Riven have been chasing us,” April said. “Those Mordin that are coming—they’re after me, I’m sure. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Mr. Meister said. “That is why we are here. We thought you might need help.”

“We escaped from them before. And an Auditor too—”

Mrs. Hapsteade sucked in a sharp breath. Mr. Meister grabbed April by the shoulders. “An Auditor? When? Where?” he insisted, his alarm apparent.

“A few hours ago. Up the river.”

“What’s an Auditor?” Chloe asked.

Mr. Meister released April and focused on Horace, his eyes slowly widening in realization. “Horace. Please describe to me the woman you saw in the Fel’Daera.”

Horace tried not to squirm. Had he screwed up somehow? “I don’t know—long blond hair? She was pale. She had a braid.”

Gabriel straightened in alarm, gripping the Staff of Obro like a weapon, but Mr. Meister barely reacted. “I see. And she will arrive at midnight?”

“I didn’t see the actual moment, but . . . yeah, very close to midnight.”

Mr. Meister ran a nervous hand through his white hair. He and Mrs. Hapsteade came together, bending their heads. Horace, standing nearby, could only just hear them. Mr. Meister began to mutter, as if taking inventory: “The Alvalaithen. The tourminda.”

“The staff,” Mrs. Hapsteade murmured back. “She won’t be blind in the humour.”

“And what of the Fel’Daera? She could play havoc with the breach, perhaps, but as long as Horace retains possession—”

“Isabel,” Mr. Meister whispered, barely audible.

“Is someone going to explain what’s going on?” said Chloe.

“A danger approaches,” Mr. Meister announced. “Chloe, you must try to get away. Mrs. Hapsteade will take you, and April too.”

Chloe crossed her arms. “Thanks, but no.”

“This is not a request. Gabriel, stay with me. Keep the boy under curtains as best you can, and may yours be light.”

“And yours,” Gabriel said with a solemn nod. A second later, he and Joshua vanished as the humour swallowed them—a tiny version of it, anyway. From the inside, the humour was a hopeless gray fog, but from the outside it became a fiendish trick of the light, a slippery spot the eyes refused to focus on. Horace had seen the humour through the Fel’Daera, of course, but the sight gave him no comfort now. Whatever an Auditor was, it clearly had them worried.

“Horace, as for you—” Mr. Meister hesitated, seeming unsure, and then said, “Go with Mrs. Hapsteade.”

Horace glanced at Chloe. She shook her head. “But I stay,” he protested, pleading with the old man. “I saw myself. So far, everything I saw has come true. I just didn’t know—”

“You are leaving. Now.”

Suddenly a bird called out furiously from a treetop a little ways upstream, raucous cries that cracked the night open wide. A crow? April spun toward the sound. She cocked her head. “The Auditor is coming,” she said.

A split second later, Neptune dropped heavily to the ground and stumbled toward them, breathless. She searched the sky behind and overhead, hands clutched against her chest. “The Mordin have us completely surrounded. There’s more of them now—eleven, altogether.” Eleven! One short of four full hunting packs. And Horace knew who the twelfth was. “Also?” Neptune said, her voice ragged. “There’s an Auditor out there. Very close. She’s already—” She swallowed, grimacing as though she’d bitten into something painfully sour.

Mr. Meister eyed her through the thick gleam of the oraculum. “So I see,” he said grimly. “Resist her if you can, Keeper. Are you still able to greet our new guests?”

Neptune nodded. She glanced quickly around, then bent and scooped a single hand beneath a half-buried stone the size of a melon. She lifted it as though it weighed nothing—which, of course, it didn’t. She tucked it under her arm and sprang into the darkness overhead.

Mr. Meister spun to Mrs. Hapsteade. “Try to get them away. Now.”

Chloe threw her arms up in frustration. “Would somebody please—” And then her face went blank with shock. She stumbled back a step. Horace saw with dismay that the wings of the Alvalaithen had begun to flutter madly. What was she doing?

“We are too late,” Mr. Meister breathed.

Chloe staggered back another step, holding her hands away from herself as if she were covered in something nasty. “I feel her. Where is she?” She stared around wildly, as if searching for someone. Her eyes were hollow, blazing sockets.

“What’s going on?” Horace cried out.

“The Auditor is inside,” Mr. Meister intoned gravely.

Horace’s skin began to prickle. “Inside—what do you mean?”

And then, like a warrior angel, a tall white figure dropped out of the sky down among them, landing silently in a crouch. It straightened to its full, noble height and looked haughtily around, quickly taking stock of them all.

Horace stared in awe. Here was the woman he had seen. But this was not a woman. This was not even human. It was a Riven, like none he had ever seen. A hair’s breadth away from being beautiful beyond measure, the creature had round, brown-black eyes and high white cheeks, a perfect, vicious mouth. Just below her platinum hair, a ruby-red stone seemed embedded in the smooth flesh of her forehead. This, clearly, was the Auditor.

Chloe stepped forward. She stood as tall as she could and glared up at the creature with burning malice. “Get out,” she hissed between gritted teeth.

The Auditor spread her arms wide, and her monstrous hands too—bone white and hypnotically graceful, mesmerizingly foul, an extra knuckle in each of her fingers. “That’s no way to treat a guest,” she said serenely, her voice like falling sand.

“You are not a guest, Quaasa,” Mr. Meister said. “You are a parasite.”

“My dear Taxonomer!” the Auditor said with a faint note of surprise, clearly recognizing him. “How funny that you—of all Tinkers—should accuse me of such a thing. Have you brought out your whole collection today? I can’t remember when I’ve encountered such a feast.”

“Hey,” Chloe said. “Bleachie. I told you to get out. Get out and stay out, or I swear to god, I—”

“You are not allowed to tell me what to do, Tinker,” the Auditor said. “Ruuk’ha fo ji Quaasa. All doors are open to me.”

“Not mine, you sick freak.” Chloe bent down and picked up a dead branch as long as a broom and as thick as a baseball bat. She sidestepped into a tree, vanishing, and emerged two seconds later from the other side of the trunk, already swinging the branch with every bit of weight she could muster. Horace had to leap back to avoid being struck, but it hit the Auditor dead on.

And passed right through her.

The unchecked momentum of her swing carried Chloe to the ground. The Auditor laughed, merry and cruel, and then rose slowly into the air. With a grim terror, Horace understood at last. Somehow, some way, the Auditor was inside the dragonfly now, imitating Chloe’s power. And apparently she was inside Neptune’s tourminda too, using it to defy gravity.

She was hijacking their Tan’ji, using their own powers against them.

Horace hunkered low to the ground and scrambled away, headed for the water, trying to distance himself from the Auditor. His first thought—his only thought—was for the Fel’Daera. Maintain possession, that’s what Mr. Meister had said. If the Auditor couldn’t actually see into the box, she couldn’t use it, right? And Horace, of course, would do whatever it took to never let the box go.

But most of the other Tan’ji here were far more susceptible. The Alvalaithen, of course, and Neptune’s tourminda. Horace had to believe Chloe could handle herself, and Neptune too. But what about the Staff of Obro? Would the Auditor be able to see in the humour just like Gabriel could? Would she be able to control it? He was afraid he knew the answer.

And then, from far behind—footsteps, rustling and snapping, approaching the river. A moment later, the biting stench of brimstone.

The Mordin were nearly here.

Horace reined in his panic and stopped, looking back. The Auditor was floating four feet above the ground, circling the scene. She reached out for a nearby tree and pulled herself clean through it, drifting like a ghost. Chloe was cursing at her. April was backing away, clearly at a loss—what was her power? Was the Auditor tapping into it too?

Beyond them, across the clearing, Horace could barely detect the slick wrinkle in his vision that indicated the unseen cloud of the humour, where Gabriel and Joshua were hiding. Off to the left, Mr. Meister and Mrs. Hapsteade were turning toward the forest, turning to face the looming shadows that now tilted forward down the dark lanes of the trees. Was he imagining it, or had the Mordin actually altered their skin to look more like trees?

But even as Horace looked, the humour was thrown wide, swallowing him with a roar. In his panic, he’d forgotten this was coming. He jumped as the sky and the ground and everything in between vanished into a featureless ocean, the entire clearing and riverbank gone into gray. Every sound became a cavernous murmur—cries of alarm and shouts of command that sounded as if they were deep underwater.

He crouched down again—cowering. He heard the unmistakable high-pitched growl of a Mordin. After that, two muted cracks like distant cannon fire. He’d heard that sound before, he thought, in the tunnels behind the House of Answers after they’d escaped the golem. Horace did his best to ignore the sound now, trusting each Keeper to hold his or her own. He had to trust. The Auditor had erased all their advantages.

Well, almost all. He caught his breath and reasoned it through, trying to calm his nerves, to ignore the senseless sea of chaos around him.

The Auditor was a terrible surprise, and he didn’t know who had control of the humour now—Gabriel or the Auditor. But the humour had gone up right on schedule. So far nothing had yet happened that directly contradicted the Fel’Daera’s sightings. Not one thing. Perhaps the willed path was still intact.

Horace realized he was counting. He’d been counting off the seconds since the humour had swallowed him—sixteen, seventeen, eighteen. It was now one minute past midnight. He’d witnessed this future, of course—fifty-nine minutes ago—and he knew what he had to do. What he was going to do. He stumbled as best he could through the horrid nothingness of the humour, assuming he was still headed toward the river. After several steps, he felt spongy ground beneath his feet. He must be near the water. He pulled the Fel’Daera from its pouch and cleared his head, pushing aside his fear and letting his logic come to the surface. If he’d seen truly, Dr. Jericho was due to appear on the opposite riverbank any moment now. The Mordin would hesitate there for a couple of minutes, for a very simple reason.

Fear. Fear of Horace. Dr. Jericho would be feeling the Fel’Daera from fifty-nine minutes ago. He would know that he was living through a future Horace had already witnessed, a stunning disadvantage. Realizing that Horace was a step ahead of him, and worried that whatever move he made might be the wrong one, the Mordin would be hobbled by his uncertainty.

And now, with the breach still set at two minutes and two seconds, Horace planned to add to that uncertainty. Swiftly and surely, he opened the box and pointed it in what he hoped was the direction of the river. He couldn’t see through the box in the humour, of course—he couldn’t see it at all—but that wasn’t the point. When Dr. Jericho arrived, he would be feeling two open Fel’Daeras from the past at once! It was a brain-ratttling thought. And when Horace was freed at last from the humour, he would be able to witness the near future unfolding, using his knowledge to do what he could to keep Dr. Jericho at bay, and help his friends.

“Gabriel,” Horace muttered quietly into the gray of the humour. He could barely feel the word leaving his mouth. He hoped beyond hope that the Warden could hear him, that the Auditor wouldn’t have the power to block his voice.

No response. Horace’s inner clock, meanwhile, told him that Dr. Jericho should just be arriving across the river.

“Gabriel,” he said again.

Another distant boom. And then, blessedly, Gabriel’s powerful voice, quiet but omnipresent. “I’m here,” he said, his voice reverberating remorsefully. “I’m sorry for your blindness—I can’t stop her. She’s blinding you all.”

“Can she hear us?” Horace asked. The utter blankness around him was starting to make him lightheaded, and he clenched the box harder, still holding it open.

“I can fend her off for a few moments. She is stretched to her limits, I think. She’s inside the staff, the tourminda, the dragonfly. It can’t be easy for her to wield them all at once.”

Horace’s inner clock told him Dr. Jericho had just arrived on the far bank of the river. The Mordin was no doubt standing there, aware that the Horace of an hour ago was watching him through the Fel’Daera, seeing the future unfold. “I have a plan,” Horace said. “Well, not so much a plan, but . . .”

“A path.”

“Yes. Do you think you can pull the humour away from me? On my mark?”

A pause. “She’ll fight me,” Gabriel said. “But I’ll try.”

“You’ll do it,” Horace said meaningfully. He’d seen it happen.

“Understood,” said Gabriel.

Suddenly another voice swept through the humour like fine sandpaper. “What’s this?” the Auditor sang. “Secrets? Please share. Whatever is yours is m—”

Her voice was cut off as abruptly as it had appeared—Gabriel’s doing, no doubt, wrestling her for control of the humour. Horace thanked him silently.

Horace had every reason to believe that Gabriel would come through. He’d witnessed it.

But there was a problem.

The breach. It wasn’t small enough. He’d tried his hardest, but he now understood that two minutes and two seconds was an eternity. The breach was nowhere near narrow enough to be useful. By his reckoning, barely a minute had passed since the Auditor’s arrival, and as he listened to the muffled sounds of the battle raging behind him—Gabriel shouting directions, the heavy footsteps of the Mordin, an occasional whale-sized thpack—he knew this whole thing might already be over two minutes and two seconds from now.

Horace reached out for the black heart of the silver sun. He caught hold of the breach and bore down on the stream of power that flowed there. At first he couldn’t budge it, but slowly the breach began to shrink. It crept below two minutes. Pain crackled between his eyes. He ignored it, thinking of Chloe, and Gabriel, and April, and all his companions—out there doing battle, out there resisting the Riven. He would do his part too. He gritted his teeth, and the breach approached ninety seconds. He wasn’t sure what the bottom limit was, but he needed to go farther than this.

No. Not farther.

Closer.

He squeezed harder. The breach plunged below a single minute, Horace’s head full of lightning. It was exhausting work, and even as he strained to close the breach, precious seconds ticked by.

And then suddenly—terribly, unforgettably—a presence crept into the Fel’Daera like a cloud of murky ink. An invader, a shadow, a poison. It reached out, fully aware and predatory, groping for control of the breach.

The Auditor. She was inside the box. Horace went numb with shock and then his shock turned to horror as cold lips brushed against his cheek, unseen in the humour. “What have we here, Tinker?” the Auditor whispered coarsely into his ear.

She was right beside him here in the gray. And of course she was—he’d witnessed it, thinking she was Isabel. How could he have been so stupid? Horace couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. He gripped the box so hard he thought it might shatter in his hands. “Can I play?” the Auditor crooned, and then she pried at the breach, trying to throw it open wide.

On the instant, Horace unfroze. An anger like he’d never felt before exploded in his chest. A roaring wave of will coursed through him, surging into the Fel’Daera. He clamped down on the breach harder than he thought possible, so hard that the creeping presence of the Auditor was blown back from the breach like smoke on the wind. The breach closed even tighter, becoming microscopically small. The flow of power through the silver sun waned to a trickle.

At the uppermost limits of his strength, Horace pinned the breach in place with all the authority he had, hammering it home. A massive thrum of energy tolled through the Fel’Daera, and in its wake, the Auditor’s presence evaporated, ejected forcibly from the box. She cried out in astonished rage, her shriek suddenly cut off—whether by Gabriel or by her violent eviction, Horace hardly cared. The Fel’Daera was his again. It would always be his.

Horace nearly fell to his knees, but managed to stay upright, still holding the open box in front of him, out in the gray void of the humour. He couldn’t see the silver sun, of course, but he didn’t need to. He knew where the breach sat now, though he could scarcely believe it. He’d been trying to get below a minute, and he’d managed that—spectacularly. He felt for it again, just to be sure.

Four seconds.

Too stunned for a moment to remember himself, he spoke with a voice that scarcely seemed like his own. “Now,” he said quietly, knowing that Gabriel would hear him, knowing that Gabriel would do as he had promised. The box had shown him as much.

And sure enough, a thin, piercing rumble cut through the air, shaking the earth. The humour vanished. The night returned, but Horace was nearly alone within it. He glanced back, and his eyes slid queasily across the entire clearing and the unseen patch of woods beyond. The battle was still going on, deep within the humour, silent and invisible from outside.

But of course, there was only one thing he wanted to see right now. Across the river, Dr. Jericho stood pale in the darkness, like a dead tree come to life, open astonishment plastered across his face. Horace stepped right up to the water’s edge, open box still in hand, knowing the Mordin was now sensing the Fel’Daera not only in the present, but twice—once from nearly an hour back, and once from a mere four seconds ago. Horace wondered if the Mordin had ever encountered such a thing before.

Dr. Jericho composed himself. “Ah, my dear Tinker, there you are,” he called out, his voice a purr. “And there you were,” he continued, pointing first at Horace directly and then at a spot farther up the bank, where Horace had been standing fifty-nine minutes ago. “And there you were again.” He shook his head as if in admiration. “Such a fast learner. In a little over a month, you’ve mastered the breach. The last Keeper of the Fel’Daera didn’t manage that for years. Impressive.”

Horace resisted the thin man’s taunts about the last Keeper of the Fel’Daera. He kept one eye on the Fel’Daera’s blue glass as he replied, channeling Chloe’s bravado. “Yes, I’m very talented. Get used to it.”

The thin man stroked his chin thoughtfully. “I wonder—what do I do in the next few minutes that is so . . . vital . . . that you feel the need to see it twice? You continue to watch me even now. Care to share why?”

The truth was, Horace hadn’t seen this future clearly at all. It had been choppy, and then he’d blacked out. But again—there was no reason Dr. Jericho needed to know that. “Not interested in sharing, thanks,” Horace said. “You said it yourself: Why would I tell you your own future?”

“Why indeed?” said Dr. Jericho with a menacing smile.

“Tell you what,” Horace said, trying to sound more confident than he actually felt. “How about you try something and see how it works out for you.”

“Do you know, I would rather not?” Dr. Jericho replied, but before the sentence was half out, the box revealed the movement Horace had been waiting for, the moment he’d so desperately tried to see beyond, fifty-nine minutes ago—the Mordin crouching, then leaping across the river straight for him, savage hands outstretched. Horace nearly flinched, but kept watching—Dr. Jericho, landing on all fours right where Horace now stood, his teeth flashing. And then the scene through the Fel’Daera went black, Horace’s view momentarily obscured because the Mordin’s body—four seconds in the future—was occupying the same space the Fel’Daera was in right now.

Four seconds. Horace would need to dodge at just the right moment. He held his ground, not revealing his hand, letting the future come to him. His automatic counting had begun the instant he saw the future Mordin leap—one . . . two . . . three.

On four, Horace threw himself to the side, tucking the box safely against his belly as he rolled. In the same instant, the Mordin—already airborne—thundered to the ground just as Horace had foreseen, missing him by only a foot or two.

Horace scrambled to his feet, box still in hand. The Mordin laughed with savage glee, measuring him up and preparing for another attack.

But Horace was already ahead of him. Four seconds ahead—Dr. Jericho, circling to the left; now swiping low with one mighty arm, trying to sweep Horace’s feet out from under him.

Horace crouched. One. Two. Three. Horace leapt high on four. The Mordin’s arm swept under him, fast as a snake. Horace barely cleared the blow, stumbling when he landed, but he kept his feet, kept the box open.

“Careful, careful,” Dr. Jericho scolded, still circling. “This is a dangerous game you’ve chosen to play tonight, Tinker.”

“I didn’t choose it,” Horace said, “but I know I win it.” That was a bluff, of course, but the thin man didn’t know that.

Horace held the box at arm’s length, circling with the Mordin and keeping his distance, struggling to watch both now and then at once. It was hard not to be distracted—in the present, the humour was merely an unseeable wrinkle where the forest seemed to buckle and bend. Through the box, though, Horace could see the battle that raged within. He wondered what Chloe was doing. The Auditor would be all but invincible now—flying, formless, and invisible in the humour.

But there was no time to worry. Motion flickered inside the box again—Dr. Jericho feinting to Horace’s left, then lunging to his right. Horace played into it casually, sliding to his right. One. Two. Three. Then he dove to the left, into the thin man’s bluff. Now it was the Mordin’s turn to stumble as he tried to reverse himself, groping awkwardly. Horace pinwheeled backward, out of his range.

A stab of nausea corkscrewed through Horace’s gut. However slightly, he’d just changed the future the Fel’Daera had revealed. He would have to be careful. But the action inside the box wouldn’t slow—the Mordin, reaching high overhead and grabbing hold of a tree branch like some ghoulish, spidery ape; lifting himself and swinging forward; now Horace himself, running not away from the attack, but into it, under it.

Horace was already counting, readying himself. One. Two. Dr. Jericho stretched upward for the branch. Horace braced himself. Three. But just as Horace was about to launch, just as the Mordin’s feet left the ground, the Fel’Daera revealed an unthinkable sight. Dr. Jericho, dropping out of his swing, reaching back with one long arm as Horace sprinted beneath him, catching Horace across the shoulders and slamming him to the ground.

No. It couldn’t happen. Yet Dr. Jericho was already swinging. Horace sprinted toward him just as he’d seen, unsure what else to do. As he ran he cried, “I need help!” He ducked beneath the Mordin’s legs, passing him by. He glanced up and saw the Mordin reaching back for him with one great hand, the other still clinging to the thick branch fifteen feet overhead. Dr. Jericho’s face was alight with predatory joy. He was going to catch Horace.

And then suddenly—miraculously—a shadow dropped out of the stars. It struck Dr. Jericho heavily in the neck and chest, riding him downward. The Mordin cried out, losing his grip. Even as he fell, he clawed at Horace, his sharp nails raking down Horace’s back. The Mordin slammed to the ground, his jaw plowing into the soft dirt.

As Dr. Jericho lay there stunned, Horace scampered away and collapsed against a tree. Another bolt of nausea wrenched him, bigger this time, and a pounding in his head. He’d changed the future yet again—but how?

And then a voice from the canopy. “I see what you’re doing, Keeper. Of course you know what’s best, but are you very sure this is it?”

Neptune. She’d been floating overhead, obviously, and had heard his cry for help. She’d dropped down onto the Mordin with all her weight and then gone light again, leaping away. Now she stood high in the tree above the Mordin.

“This is the only idea I have,” Horace told her.

Dr. Jericho stirred, lifting his head.

“I’m out too,” Neptune said. “I’m low on rocks, so I gave him the full Neptune. But that was a twenty-footer I just hit him with, about my limit. And he’s still getting up.”

Twenty feet! Horace reckoned that with a drop from that height, Neptune had hit the thin man with a force of five hundred pounds or so. But the Mordin staggered slowly to one knee now, shaking his head. He seemed merely dazed.

“It’s okay,” Horace said. “I can handle this. Help the others.”

“They’re holding their own. Two Mordin are down, temporarily. Chloe’s been calling for you. I came looking.”

So Chloe was okay. But of course she was. Horace glanced toward the woods—or rather, tried to. Still the humour rejected being seen. Meanwhile, through the blue glass, Dr. Jericho was nearly on his feet.

“Tell Chloe I’m fine. Tell her not to do anything stupid.”

“Considering what you’re doing right now, are you sure you’re qualified to make a demand like that?”

“Watch out!” Horace cried. Through the blue glass, a genuine scare—Dr. Jericho groggily regaining his feet one instant; the next, leaping alertly high into the air, swiping viciously at Neptune. The Mordin snagged Neptune’s cloak and yanked her to the ground. But no—this future couldn’t come true. Horace wouldn’t let it. He cried out, and the box seemed to flicker clumsily. Here in the present, Neptune sprang lightly off the branch, sailing out of sight into the tree. Dr. Jericho got to his feet, glancing up with a scowl, but he didn’t even attempt to go after her.

A miasma of queasy pain racked Horace, doubling him over. It was all he could do to keep the box steady as he fought off the effects of this latest—and greatest—refusal to follow the willed path.

“Talented, you say,” Dr. Jericho said, watching Horace intently and holding his ground for now—both inside and outside the box. “But not enlightened.” The Mordin rolled his neck, as if working out a soreness, and dusted himself off. “Have you not been taught properly?”

“I’ve been told what I need to know.”

“Need,” the thin man laughed. “You Tinkers are all alike. You claim not to need what you clearly desire. Don’t you wonder about this pain you’re feeling now—the pain of disobedience to the box?”

Horace didn’t know how to answer. He would refuse to answer. He stood up straight, trying to quell the cramps still roiling in his belly.

“It’s called thrall-blight,” said Dr. Jericho. “And it’s not just you it affects—oh, no. Thrall-blight spreads through the Medium. Even to the Mothergates themselves.” Dr. Jericho raised his foul eyebrows in innocent surprise. Inside the box, he had begun to advance on Horace slowly. Horace took a careful step back, his mind reeling with the Mordin’s words.

“Has no one ever told you?” Dr. Jericho continued. “Have you never heard the story of Sil’falo Teneves’s greatest mistake?”

Despite himself, hearing Dr. Jericho utter the name of the Fel’Daera’s maker made Horace’s heart skip a beat. “What mistake?”

“The mistake in your hand, of course. The Box of Promises.” He spat out the word promises as if it were something nasty he’d stepped in.

“Shut up,” Horace said. “You don’t know anything about it.” He kept inching backward. The Mordin kept coming, twenty feet away now, spreading his abhorrent hands.

“I merely repeat what Sil’falo herself has said—allegedly. I am not claiming I agree.”

“I know you don’t agree,” Horace replied. “If you really thought the box was a mistake, you wouldn’t want it so badly. You wouldn’t want me to join you.”

“True enough. And in that regard, am I really so different from your current master? Come with me. Join me. I can teach you things he never will.”

His master—Mr. Meister? Horace opened his mouth to object, but just then the future inside the box went wildly blurry, the ground and the trees and everything in between—including the Mordin—smudging and quaking unrecognizably. He’d never seen anything like this before. What was happening? In the present, Dr. Jericho cocked his head curiously, clearly catching Horace’s dismay.

In the next instant, as Horace continued to back away from the advancing Mordin, a sudden tidal wave of sound swept over him—shouts of surprise and roars of anger and a child’s plaintive voice calling out.

The humour was gone. But no sooner was it gone than the sounds released by its disappearance also began to fade. In the now-visible patch of woods, Horace saw a scene of chaos grinding to a halt. Mrs. Hapsteade stood exhausted inside the clear protective sphere of a dumin, looking spent, two Mordin lurking outside. Another Mordin, shockingly, had Mr. Meister pinned against a tree eight feet off the ground. The old man wriggled, trying to reach into his vest. Gabriel knelt next to Joshua, staff in hand, his face vacant. April stood behind with glassy eyes. Hardly anyone was moving.

One by one, every figure began to stare, following a peculiar sound—a soft, thin wail of pain. And now Horace saw. A white figure lying on the ground, writhing in pain, hands clutching her head. Her dark green eyes stared into the sky.

The Auditor.

The Mordin began to shout to one another, harsh cries of warning. What was happening? And now another voice, human and familiar: “Horace, look out!”

Chloe. Horace turned toward the sound, but in the same instant backed into something cold and hard—the tip of the canoe, catching him behind the knee. Immediately he was falling, tumbling clear over the canoe. As he fell he caught sight of a new figure, stalking boldly across the clearing. A human. Small, with fiery red hair. At her breast was a small brown sphere, sparkling from within like a night full of green stars.

Horace hit the ground hard, knocking the wind out of himself. The box slipped from his hand and slid away, just beyond his grasp, the lid still open. He strained to reach for it. But what about Dr. Jericho? Looking down along the length of his body, Horace saw that the Mordin had dropped to all fours, his black beady eyes still locked hungrily on Horace—so fixated that he hadn’t seen Isabel yet, apparently hadn’t noticed or felt what had happened to the Auditor.

But the other Mordin clearly had. They had already begun to scatter, fleeing from Isabel. Mr. Meister’s captor let the old man fall heavily to the ground. Another Mordin reached down and helped a fallen comrade to his feet, the two of them sprinting into the woods.

Isabel continued her calm approach. The wicker sphere pulsed and glowed. Without warning—without a sound—one of the fleeing Mordin clutched at its back as if shot. It toppled violently, plunging face-first into the ground. Horace knew without question it was dead.

Breathless, Horace finally grabbed hold of the box. He brought it to his chest and pointed it at Dr. Jericho. He was sure the thin man would run now too, but the box told a different story, promised a different future, horrible and inescapable.

Dr. Jericho, stalking swiftly across the clearing on all fours, stretching for Horace across an impossible distance; his mighty hand wrapping around Horace’s lower leg, swallowing it from the knee down. In the present, Horace struggled to scramble backward, counting down even as the events shown in the box began to unfold in the present.

One. Horace slid over a tree root, scraping his hand. He wasn’t going to make it. Two. The Mordin reached out, his hand opening like the maw of a shark. “No. No!” Horace cried, kicking. Three. The Mordin took hold, took hold in the present for real, his hand encasing Horace’s leg in a stonelike grip.

In the same moment, another Mordin, galloping away from the scene, crumpled like paper and plowed into a tree with a bone-crunching thump. Dr. Jericho, still clinging to Horace’s leg, turned swiftly. He saw the fallen Mordin, saw Isabel, saw the Auditor still squirming and keening in the dirt. “No,” he said. But he did not relinquish his grip on Horace.

Horace held the box out, staring into it, hoping beyond hope that his fate would be a good one. And then, through the glass, a miraculous sight. An unthinkable sight. Horace’s mouth went dry watching.

Dr. Jericho, seizing up as if struck by lightning, his head thrown back in anguish. Horace gripped the box hard, his breath caught in his throat. Time seemed to slow down as he watched—the Mordin releasing Horace, then throwing his arms out wide, his fingers as rigid as tent stakes; his many faces collapsing into a single ghoulish skull; and now—now—his long body going slack, collapsing like a rag doll, crumpling lifeless into the mud.

Horace gasped.

One.

Dr. Jericho was about to be cleaved. Tingling with shock, Horace slid his eyes from the box, down along his body to Dr. Jericho. The Mordin looked back at him, furrowing his brow.

Two.

Horace opened his mouth, the words slipping out before he could stop them. “You’re next,” he said.

Three.

Dr. Jericho’s tiny eyes went wide. Twenty feet away, Isabel turned, the wicker harp ablaze. Horace still hadn’t taken a breath.

And then, in one fluid movement, Dr. Jericho released Horace’s leg, grabbed the prow of the nearby canoe and reared back, heaving hard with a murderous grunt. The canoe left the ground as he hurled it sidearm across his body like an enormous silver spear, straight at Isabel. Horace threw his head to the side and the canoe streaked over his face, missing him by an inch, hissing audibly. Isabel cried out and dropped toward the ground. The canoe clipped her shoulder as it passed, then careened through the trees farther on, tumbling, then crashing to a halt broadside against a thick trunk thirty feet away.

Even as Horace turned to look, his heart pounding like a giant’s fist in his chest, the Mordin was airborne, on his feet and leaping back across the river in a single bound. He landed on the far side and scurried up the bank like a nightmare, melting into the shadowy trees. Just like that, he was gone. The woods went quiet again. All the Riven had vanished except for the two dead Mordin and the Auditor, writhing almost silently in the leaves.

Horace fell back, letting the lid of the box slide closed against his belly. He rolled over and vomited, the world spinning around him. So much disobedience, so many willful changes to the futures the box had revealed. And none of them more outrageous than the last one, the worst one. Had he just done what he thought he had?

Had he just saved Dr. Jericho’s life?

Chloe squatted down at his side. She didn’t touch him—not while he was still throwing up everything he’d ever eaten, plus maybe some things he hadn’t yet. But he thought he could feel her concern, warm and feisty. He waited for her to make a joke, but she didn’t.

At last his gut stopped heaving. The world began to right itself. He wiped his chin on his sleeve and sat up, slipping the Fel’Daera back into its pouch. He crawled away and propped himself against a nearby tree. He found Chloe’s eyes.

“What did I do?” he said.

“You survived. You did it.”

“But I—”

“No. No buts. You’re safe. Everyone is safe.”

Mr. Meister limped over, his eyes on the Fel’Daera. “It is true,” Mr. Meister said. “You did well. Everyone did well.”

But Horace wasn’t so sure. He’d broken just about every rule there was for the Fel’Daera. He’d used it in a way he now felt sure had never been intended. And worst of all, he’d uttered those two simple words—despite the Fel’Daera’s predictions—that had saved the life of his worst enemy. He felt miserable. A failure. And judging by the foul expression Mrs. Hapsteade wore at Mr. Meister’s side, she seemed to feel much the same.

“Chloe,” said a voice. “Chloe, is that you?”

Horace looked up. Isabel. No matter what anyone said, she was the one truly responsible for saving them all. But how did she know Chloe’s name?

She’d found her feet and was now approaching, almost drunkenly, clutching her shoulder. The older Wardens backed away silently, faces creased with concern, Mrs. Hapsteade clinging to Mr. Meister’s arm. Isabel reached out for Chloe with a trembling, hesitant hand.

Chloe rose to her feet, scowling. “What?” she spat.

The woman’s eyes fell on the dragonfly gleaming in the hollow of Chloe’s throat. “It is you. I found you. Chloe. Oh my god . . .” She was crying.

Chloe took a step back, studying the woman’s face. Her own face became a breaking dam, a wall of furious confusion beginning to crumble. She took another step back, then a half step forward. Her voice, when she spoke, was as fragile as a flower, full of wonder.

“Mom?”