I took the offered bar with a short nod. “Yeah. I’m fine.”
“You sure? You haven’t said much since we left Leanansidhe’s, and you’ve got that broody I hate everything frown going on. Are you—”
“I said I’m fine,” I snapped, making her jump. Razor hissed at me and vanished down her shirt, and Kenzie’s eyes flashed.
“All right, tough guy, point taken.” She stepped away, not quite able to mask the hurt and anger on her face. “I’ll leave you alone.”
I sighed. “Kenzie, wait.” She turned back warily, and I raked a hand through my hair. “I’m sorry,” I offered, dropping my arm. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’m just...tired, I guess.”
She blinked, watching me in concern. “You gonna be okay?”
“Honestly? I don’t know.” I looked down at my hands, fiddling with the wrapper of the bar, feeling her gaze on me. “It’s just...everyone is counting on us, you know? And there’s a lot that could go wrong. We have to find Annwyl, who could be anywhere right now, convince her to come back with us, and somehow make it to Keirran, who is probably on the other side of a freaking army. And if we do manage all that, if we somehow make it to Keirran without dying, we have to convince him to destroy the one thing that’s been keeping Annwyl alive. So that she can die. So that he can get his damn soul back.” I scrubbed a hand across my eyes, shaking my head. Kenzie continued to watch me, saying nothing, though her eyes were sympathetic now.
“I haven’t seen my parents in months,” I muttered. “I don’t know what they’re doing, what’s going on in the mortal world or how much time will pass before we’re finally done here. Everything is so screwed up. My sister is going to war with my nephew, my best friend killed me so the Lady could rise to power and the only way to stop all of this is to let another of our friends die. And I...” Have somehow become the champion of Faery itself. No pressure there, right?
Leaning my head back, I stared up at the canopy of the wyldwood, feeling the ugly truth steal over me. I was exhausted, I was sore and my head ached, but truthfully, I was just scared. So much rested on us finding that amulet and destroying it, but what if we couldn’t? What would happen to my family if I couldn’t bring Keirran back? If the First Queen actually won?
I heard Kenzie take off her backpack, set it on the ground and pick her way over the roots to stand beside me. Putting her hands behind her, she leaned back against the wood, gazing into the forest. Razor climbed out of her shirt, muttered, “Grumpy boy” in my direction and scampered up the trunk, disappearing into the branches.
“I’m scared, too,” Kenzie said after a moment. Surprised, I glanced down at her, but she was staring into the trees, her gaze distant. “I know I’m not as close to this world as you are, but I do know what’s at stake. I’m worried for you, my parents, Alex, Razor and...and I can’t even think about Annwyl right now. I keep hoping there’s another way, that we’ll find another solution, so Annwyl doesn’t have to...” Her voice shook a bit on that last part, before she took a quick breath and turned back to me.
“It sucks,” she admitted, her eyes going dark. “Sometimes the world is like that. Sometimes we just have to play with the hand we’re dealt. But let me ask you this—would you trust this to anyone else? You said the Nevernever itself chose you, a human with no special powers, no magic or glamour or anything. There has to be a reason for that, and I think it’s because no one else can do it. It has to be you, tough guy.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in fate or destiny.”
“I don’t.” Kenzie shrugged. “There’s always a choice, Ethan, even if between running away and facing the thing that scares us head-on. Even if all paths lead to the same place.” She paused a moment, staring up into the canopy, her voice going soft. “How we get there, and what we do on the way, that’s always up to us.”
“Humans.” Grimalkin appeared on a moss-covered stump. He didn’t saunter around the tree; I hadn’t seen him hop onto the log. He was just there. “I am going on ahead,” he stated, blinking at us languidly. “Our thin friend should be able to take you the rest of the way.”
“What?” I scowled at him. “You’re leaving? Now? Why?”
“I must meet with our contact and make the necessary arrangements for your crossing into the Deep Wyld, since it appears I must do everything around here,” the cat said in a weary tone of voice. “Worry not, human. We will meet again soon.”
Leaping to the ground, he stuck his tail in the air and trotted toward the brush. “I trust you will be able to go on without getting into too much trouble,” he said as he slipped beneath a clump of ferns and disappeared. “The River of Dreams is not far. If you could refrain from tedious human chatter and the tendency to fall all over each other, you might reach it before nightfall.”
* * *
Night did fall before we reached the River of Dreams, and it fell quite suddenly. As in, one second we were walking through the hazy gray twilight of the wyldwood, the next, it was dark. Like someone had flipped a switch. Kenzie startled, and I immediately went for my swords, certain that whatever had killed the lights was waiting in ambush, and we were seconds away from an attack.
“Don’t panic, Ethan Chase,” the Thin Man said as I turned in a wary circle, scanning the darkness and shadows. “This is perfectly normal. Do you hear that?” He tilted his head, and at that moment, I heard it, too. A dull murmur filtering through the trees, the sound of moving water in the distance. The Thin Man smiled. “We are very nearly there.”