THE TRAIN THAT JACK AND LEANDER BOARDED was red as rusted metal and sporting bullet scars. It was blessedly free of any sinister Fatas. As Jack and Leander settled into a car furnished in Old West decor, Leander said, with desperate anger, "Why did you bring her?"

Jack gazed out of the window. "You know Finn. Do you think I could keep her away?"

Leander was silent for a moment. Then: "I didn't betray Lily Rose to Seth Lot-if that's what you think."

"Lily Rose is in the house of the Wolf and you're his Jack."

"Not anymore." Leander drew back his white blazer and Jack saw a holster and a brass flintlock pistol engraved with sea serpents, a weapon made to kill Fatas. "I traded for this at the Ban Gorm's-"

"The Blue Lady? You were there? How curious. Her left hand is now missing a body."

"Jack. Lot knew the Blue Lady traded in mortal things, like the elixir. Why did you go there?"

Jack rested his head back against the seat. "Our original plans were sidetracked. What are you going to do with that gun?"

"Find the Wolf's house and get Lily. The bullets are coated with a special poison. My friend-"

"Finn told you the ultimatum Lot gave her?"

Leander whispered, "Yes."

"Why were you in Fair Hollow?"

"To meet a friend who would bring me into the Ghostlands. She gave me the poison for the bullets."

"Phouka had all the Ways shut, except for the one at Lulu's."

"There's another."

As dusk began to streak the sky, signaling a new day, the train halted at a crossroads where old row houses and cottages the colors of Easter eggs were tangled with prehistoric yew trees. A tower with a clock face overlooked a pond blazing red in the twilight-the place resembled a resort town gone to seed. Jack and Leander exited the train and strode quickly to a purple Victorian, where a weathered sign above the door read ORSINI'S BOOKS.

Inside the shop, books had overrun the interior, tumbling from tables, towering in piles, stuffed in crates and on shelves crammed with unusual objects collected from the true world . . . an old typewriter, a stone Celtic cross, a stuffed owl. The wooden floor creaked beneath their boots as they searched. Leander murmured, "Jack, the chances of her being here . . ."

"When I want your opinion, I'll be sure and ask for it."

Leander halted and Jack followed his gaze to the back door, which was open and half off its hinges.

"Orsini." Jack ran out the door.

In the courtyard, he fell to his knees beside a pile of black fur and earth . . . it was all that remained of his old friend. With one shaking hand, he tenderly touched a bear-shaped brooch in the fur. When he swallowed a howl of anguish, it was as if he'd inhaled a ball of thorns. "Tell me, Cyrus"-he didn't look at Leander-"what terrible things have you done for the Wolf?"

Leander crouched beside Jack. The Celtic knot and wolf tattoo on the side of his neck was visible as his golden hair fell back. He said, carefully, "Not as many as you have, with Reiko."

"I'm not the one who caused an innocent girl to be taken from her family."

"Not yet."

Jack thought of Finn out there, alone-or, worse, with Caliban-and wanted to rip someone apart.

Leander bowed his head. "I never should have spoken to Lily when I saw her. All of this . . . it's my fault."

Jack relented. "Reiko has had her claws in that family since Finn was a child. But you might have prevented her sister's fate."

Leander shouted, "I've tried everything to free Lily! I will do anything for her!"

"What do you mean, exactly?"

Leander's expression was desolate. "I will die for her." He hesitated. "Jack . . . Caliban and Lot are tracking you by your blood-because of what happened to you on Halloween. The elixir won't work on you. You've been marked from the beginning."

"Atheno betrayed us."

"Well, he was a kelpie. Are you really surprised? You need to disguise your mortality if you're going to move through the 'lands. You need to be what you once were."

"And how do you propose I do that?"

"I know a witch."

"Do you now?" Jack felt a glittering darkness stir within him.

"She can help you."

"And what about Finn?"

"You'll have to risk the witch scrying for her-and that might alert Lot's spies. I've led them on for a bit . . ." Leander rose, digging into his blazer pocket. He took out an amulet and held it toward Jack. "Take it. You need this more than I do."

Jack gazed at the amulet, a dragonfly made of brass and crimson glass. "Where did you get this?"

"I stole it from the Wolf. It's something I was supposed to return to its owner, in exchange for information. But I've since learned what I need to."

"Why is it shaped like a dragonfly?"

"Because the witch is called the Dragonfly. She lives near the Green Mill."

Jack accepted the amulet and met Leander's gaze. "You know where the Wolf's house is, don't you?"

Leander backed out the door. "Lily can't be taken out of the Ghostlands, Jack. I'll save her before the seven days are up. I'll kill Lot."

Then he was gone.

"Leander!" Jack felt the brass and glass dragonfly move in his hand. He unfolded his fingers and the amulet, now a mechanical insect, rose, twitching and clicking, from his palm to hover before him.

Jack said, hoarsely, "When I'm done burying my friend, take me to your witch."

AFTERWARD, BEFORE HE LEFT, Jack took the phoenix pendant Finn had given him from around his neck and reluctantly slid it into a cup of tea, leaving only the leather thong exposed.

"Clever girl. If you find your way here . . ."

CHAPTER 11.

And Christabel awoke and spied The same who lay down by her side- O rather say, the same whom she Raised up beneath the old oak tree.

-THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER, SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE Finn fled into the forest, away from the swarming lights. When she glanced back, she saw the branches twist like wooden snakes to form a barrier behind her. The orbs broke into a glowing wall at the forest border and didn't follow.

She turned to face the forest. Mist crept across the ground. The trees were black oaks and firs, coiled together, mammoth, like towers. Toadstools as big as her hands and as richly colored as jewels-emerald, crimson, jet black-spilled over roots and slabs of rock. Only the whisper of wind-brushed leaves broke the silence.

Shivering and fighting a desire to collapse, Finn pushed forward, shoving at branches draped with moss, swatting aside creepers as thick as her wrists. When she accidentally snapped a branch, sap as warm as blood spattered her and she cried out, remembering how Reiko Fata had once turned Sylvie into a tree.

What sounded like a woman laughing in the darkness made her halt as a mind-wrenching terror shook her.

The laughter descended into a sobbing shriek and a death rattle groan. Finn pulled herself up into a tree and huddled there, felt the old enchantment, the desire to sleep, creeping up. But she couldn't sleep, not here, and despairingly fought it as her eyelids grew heavy. She was so cold, her body kept convulsing, but the tree was warm, its bulk sheltering her from whatever prowled the forest.

As she touched a sticky clot of blood where she'd scraped her forehead on a branch, she saw electric lights glowing through the leaves.

She stood up in the tree and nearly yelled with joy when she saw the neon sign of a Shell gas station beyond the forest. There was a busy highway in front of the gas station-the true world. Warmth, shelter, and safety.

After only a moment, Finn slid back down into the crook of the tree. If she walked out of this forest to that gas station, she would never get back to the Ghostlands. She would lose Lily.

She curled beneath the canopy of leaves, with the dark murk beneath her. Somewhere in this nightmare place, her sister walked the halls of the Wolf's house. Lily. Are you really here? She thought she might cry herself to sleep, but exhaustion hit her like a train.

A crack of wood shot through the silence, echoing. Sucking in a breath, Finn lifted her head and watched a massive shadow step out of the trees.

It was a prehistoric stag, as big as a car, its antlers hung with objects-a tiny china-doll head; a baby spoon; keys and jewelry. The stag glided majestically past her tree, into the dark, and, as it did, its form seemed to curl upright-until it walked as an antlered man, away from her. Her stunned gaze followed it.

Quelling an instinctive fear of the uncanny, something now familiar to her, she climbed down from the tree and prowled after the antlered shadow as it became a stag again.

Something brushed against her lips.

A large luna moth appeared from the dark. Dismay and joy tangled through her when she recognized the silvery death's head markings on its white wings. "Moth!"

She couldn't see the sky, but starlight permeated the forest as she and the moth followed the stag. The leaves rustled like ghost voices. The moth was a comforting luminary. As the stag led her through a blueberry thicket in a meadow frosted by starlight, she began to notice, in the trunks of some trees, knots that resembled twisted faces. She spotted the corroding hulk of a jeep near the stump of an oak.

She stepped on something that cracked and, startled, looked down to see a metal helmet like something out of World War I. As she continued on, she saw more helmets in tufts of moss and leaves, an old rifle disintegrating in the roots of a tree, a gas mask circled by red toadstools like little worshippers around an idol.

When the stag passed through a giant briar arch and vanished into the shadows, Finn hitched up her backpack. Arches here, she was beginning to realize, signified doors. So she stepped through.

Beyond a cluster of elms was a chain-link fence surrounding a black house that resembled an Italianate villa. In the front courtyard, ebony statues glistened, wreathed with blackberry briars. A red Cadillac rusted in the drive. It wasn't a scary house, but, rather, one that seemed to hold its secrets close.

The doors opened and something moved onto the porch.

A young woman emerged into the light. She was wearing a white dress and button-up boots. Her hair was short and scarlet. She clutched a plush toy-a black rabbit. A young man stepped to her side, his face wreathed with crimson curls. He was dressed in an old-fashioned suit and held a walking stick. The pair was as pale as bloodless things and, for a stomach-wrenching moment, Finn thought they didn't have eyes, until starlight glinted across them.

"Is it her?" The young woman nodded as if deciding something. "Yes. It must be her."

Finn began to back away. Remembering Jack's warning, she didn't reach for her silver dagger. Instead, she fumbled in her backpack for the Leica camera.

"We were sleeping." The young man had a deep voice. "I'm Roland. This is Ellen. We won't speak your name-there are eyes and ears in this forest, and although most are friendly, one must be cautious."

Finn pulled the Leica camera from her backpack and pressed the button. The young man flinched at the flash and said, "Stop that."

"Come in for tea." Ellen held open the door, revealing a cozy parlor with a fireplace and lamps. It didn't look like a bad fairy's house, but, then, none of them ever did, did they? "And shelter. The forest told us you were coming."

Still armed with the Leica, Finn moved cautiously toward the house. She trudged up the creaking stairs and the moth followed. Neither of the strangers said anything about the moth.

Ellen and Roland led her into a salon scattered with claw-footed furniture, old books, and toys that looked as if they'd come from the Edwardian era. As Ellen sat on a green velvet sofa, Roland clattered around in an antique kitchen Finn could see through glass doors smeared with lichen. She gingerly settled into an armchair that reeked of cigar smoke and kept the camera in her lap.

"You're bleeding." Ellen gently set aside the rabbit toy. "You can't do that here."

Finn touched the cut on her brow. She whispered, "What are you?"

Ellen sat primly, hands folded in her lap. "What a rude question."

"Sorry." Finn's fear ebbed. "I need to find . . . a place. Can you help me?"

The young woman's eyes were burgundy brown. Her skin breathed cold, but Finn had learned to not recoil from anything that looked human but wasn't. "Look, I need to get to Orsini's Books, at Crossroads."

"That's very far." Roland returned with a tarnished pewter tray full of tea things and some unsavory-looking muffins. As he set the tray down, he said, "Worldly food. It's old, but it's all we've got."

The tea looked fine, but the muffins had mold on them. As Finn held the teacup just to warm her numb hands, the moth settled on the cup's rim. "Do you know how I can get there?"

"The train." Roland sat beside Ellen and hunched forward, studying Finn. He took up the walking stick and twisted the handle shaped into the head of a horse. As the handle snapped off, he tilted down the staff and a tiny vial slipped into his hand. He lifted it to the light, revealing a liquid so purple it was almost black. He tossed the vial to Finn, who caught it and frowned down at the bottle swirled into an artwork of skeletons and fruiting vines with a brass skull for a lid. She whispered, "It's the elixir, isn't it? To conceal my blood."

"We bought it from the Blue Lady a long time ago. When we were different. One drop will make you as the Fatas are. It will mask your mortal scent." Ellen folded her hands in her lap. "If you take more, it'll change you, poison you."

Holding the vial as if it was a grenade-she wasn't about to drink anything given to her by strangers-Finn whispered, "How do I get to the train?"

"You'll have to go through Maraville to reach the train station."

The moth suddenly swirled up from the tea and flew across Finn's mouth.

"Look away," Roland said quietly, "from the moth."

Finn skewed her glance to a taxidermy wolverine on a nearby table.

The air cracked. Out of the corner of one eye, she saw a burst of light and shadow. A second later, she heard a British baritone shivering with breath. "Finn."

She turned her head to find Moth standing there, his eyes wide in the firelight, his dark hoodie and jeans making his skin seem paler. She moved to her feet and almost hugged him, but settled for a smile. "What happened?"

"A kiss. The girl selling soup at the fair asked for a kiss, and I changed the instant I did it. Twice now, I've brushed against your lips and become myself again."

"A kiss? So, in the forest, when you kept sweeping against me-but it didn't work."