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“Mate?”

“What if we get lost? What if we don’t know where we’re going? One, we have to make sandwiches and tea. That’s a rule.”

“Is it?” He was learning so many things.

Cosmo nodded. “The last thing that you need in any given situation is to be hungry or thirsty if you’re lost. Also, we’re going to bring a piece of chalk so that we can mark our way. That way, we’re less likely to get lost.”

“You are an incredible explorer.”

Cosmo’s pink skin warmed. “Thank you, I try. These are the things that we have agreed—the three of us—when we go exploring without each other. It would be a terrible thing to have two in one universe and one in the other and not be able to find each other.”

“Oh, my sweet Rosie, that would never happen.”

“No?”

“No.” Hawk smiled for him. “The three of you are a force of nature. You’re meant to be on the same plane no matter what. It’s part of the magic of you.” He wasn’t blowing smoke up Cosmo’s ass, either. He meant it. No matter what, the three of them would be together.

“I hope that you’re right. Regardless, I think we’ll bring chalk.” Cosmo grinned at him and winked. “Which sort of sandwiches do you think we should bring?”

He gave that the serious contemplation that it deserved. “Well, we could have cream cheese and cucumber sandwiches.”

“I like those.” Cosmo pondered. “We could have tuna fish.”

“There could be stinky and enclosed places.”

Cosmo’s eyes lit up. “That’s a good point. Let’s make peanut butter and jelly. There’s blackberry jam.”

“Excellent.” They cut huge slabs of white bread, slathered them with peanut butter and blackberry for Cosmo, strawberry for him.

Then they wrapped them in paper, put them in a pack with a canister of water. Then they added some chalk that went in their pockets.

“All right, so now—let’s find a door.” Cosmo took his hand and squeezed. “How did you explore before? Did you just pick a room?”

Had he explored before? Hawk wasn’t sure. He didn’t particularly remember exploring.

He’d built this house, but he had to admit that even in his wing, some things were just different.

The magic seemed to have been confused when it was recreating the house. Maybe the physical building just didn’t fit in the space that the magic needed, and so things got shifted. Maybe he was just really, really old, and he couldn’t remember how the hell the place looked to begin with.

“How do you normally do it?”

Cosmo closed his eyes and went very still for a moment. Then he sucked in a quick breath and grinned. “Let’s go!”

Then they were off and running, barreling down the hallways like they were children. They made it right to a big door at the end of a hall that he didn’t remember having seen there before. “Did this hallway change?”

“Define change.”

Hawk fastened Cosmo with a stare. “The definition of change is when something isn’t the same as it was only moments before.”

“Oh. Then yes. This hallway did change. Let’s go. Rawr.” Cosmo grabbed the doorknob and yanked it open.

The room Cosmo chose was his library. Oh, glorious. It was still there. The shape of it was different. It had been partially a tower room, so one wall had been rounded, the one with the loft with the walkway and ladders. Now that wall was a straight line, and the balconies were longer and wider, the bookshelves rising a floor higher.

Fascinating.

“Ooh…look at the pretty books!” Cosmo headed for the stacks, eyes alight. “Are they all yours?”

“I think so?” He had no idea. “We should have a look, because who knows?” Hawk chuckled, because Cosmo was already digging in.