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“We failed them,” I said, focusing on him or trying to, even as my mind reeled.“It doesn’t mean we have to keep on failing them.”

“Meaning what?”he stared at me with wide, desperate eyes as if I were the oracle my position made me out to be.When I was just a person, like him, trying to find a path through this and failing as often as not.

And possibly going mad in the bargain!

The vendor was back, and I handed him the brown coat.“Add that to the others.How much do I owe you?”

I pulled out some gold coins that Pritkin had given me before we started this little equipment trip, which I guessed Mircea had supplied because we sure hadn’t brought any with us.But the man shook his head.“On the house,” he told me from around his blunt.

I blinked at him.“Seriously?”

“You’re Pythia.Aren’t you.”

I didn’t say anything because his tone didn’t make it a question.And because I didn’t want to end up with the crap beaten out of me like Æsubrand if angry types in the crowd overheard.But the man didn’t seem to need confirmation.

“It’s all over town,” he told me.“You can’t keep secrets around here.Too many like him,” he nodded at Æsubrand and tapped the side of his head.

“I do not have that ability,” Æsubrand said, frowning, while I wondered just how many people were tiptoeing through my head.

“I had a shop once, a dispensary,” the man said abruptly, returning my attention to him.“One of the real ones, not those trash fake things on the Strip, you know?”

I nodded.

“Like to have it back.Like to have my family back, too.”He looked at me steadily for a minute out of a lined and dirty face.“Give ‘em hell, Pythia.”

He pressed something into my hand and went back inside, and I looked down to see a little pot containing something off-white and sticky.And while obviously homemade, it did sort of look like glue.It came with a small brush that I used to dab some of the contents on the ripped-up card and mush it back together.

It wasn’t the greatest job in the world, with the two halves slightly off-kilter from each other, but it held.Enough that the enchantment took hold again, the one my old governess had paid a witch to cast on it years ago, and that had somehow persisted through every adventure I’d had.The voice that came from the card was wrong; instead of deep and resonant, it was high and breathy, as if it was having a day, too.

But it was clear enough.

“—indicating that the road is nearing an end, and your efforts are about to bear fruit.But it speaks of endings that may not always be what we want.The fruit could be sour or sweet, depending on what you now do.This card says to use its insight to your advantage to change the outcome of your situation.Good or bad, it is telling you that this isyourWorld,youractions, yourchoice.”

I looked at Æsubrand to find him staring at the card, a look of mingled pain and wonder on his features.“You haven’t failed your people yet, prince.”

“I no longer deserve that title,” he whispered, still gazing at the mutilated little thing in my palm.

“Then win itback.”

He looked up, and something like fire kindled in those strange eyes.“When?”

“Tonight.Tell the others.

“We’ve rested long enough.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

It was hard to see ghosts in daylight, even for me.The sun made the almost transparent bodies so pale that they were barely an outline on the scene, even when looking straight at them. Like an image painted on glass and then erased so that only the memory of the lines remained.

That was why I waited until twilight sent long fingers of shadow flooding over the desert and darkness had almost fallen before venturing out to the edge of town.And then beyond it, into the wide-open spaces that were all that existed for miles, now blooming in dark reds and mauves, deep, burnt umber, and that peculiar sunset yellow that makes everything look slightly sepia-toned.Everyone thought I was resting before dinner, which wasn’t remotely possible.I couldn’t rest until I knew...

Whatever there was to know.

But for a while, there was nothing but wind and the faint memory of the day still staining the horizon.It was a ruddy sunset, with only a little yellow flickering at the edges, like the flames of a fire.I watched it as I finally rolled to a stop and sat there in the gathering gloom, and thought I’d gotten that wrong.

Not a fire, but a bonfire, only not like the one in Stratford.Just the regular sort, blowing in the wind of an English coastal night and scattering sparks like stars across the sky.While clouds scattered the moonlight, the tide lapped the beach.

It looked like the bonfire that lived in my dreams.