Page 11

This time he came awake fully when Fromlith halted.

“Is the monster here again?” Leopold asked sleepily, looking around.

They were in a small valley with a steep slope ahead of them.

The hillside was covered in pebbles and small rocks, all the same dull gray as old concrete.

The valley floor was also mostly gray stone, although it was scattered with short scraggly plants in shades of pale periwinkle.

“No monsters here.” Fromlith stooped so that Leopold and Crispin could slide off his shoulders. Crispin landed gracefully, as if executing a dance move, but Leopold stumbled and fell, scraping a hoof loudly against a sharp rock and tweaking his ankle.

He scrambled back to his feet. “How do you know there aren’t any monsters?”

“No self-respecting monster would come anywhere near here. It’s… uninspiring. And nothing you find in these parts tastes good anyway.” Fromlith’s stomach rumbled as if in agreement, shaking the ground.

“Thus the name,” said Crispin, looking pleased with himself for figuring it out. “The Pond of Disappointment.”

Fromlith nodded sadly. “Some of my ancestors tried to build a vacation resort here, on account of the waterfront. They came with high hopes, but nothing worked out. The buildings were poorly constructed. The food was bland. The weather was always too hot or too cold. There was nothing to do except swim, but the pond—which started out as a lake, I guess—shrank until it was too cramped for giants. So everyone left.”

Leopold didn’t say so, but he could relate.

On the few occasions when he’d had enough spare cash to go on vacation, he hadn’t had fun.

The Grand Canyon had been so foggy he could barely see beyond the end of his nose, let alone into the storied depths.

His campsite in the Sierras was evacuated due to a forest fire.

When he visited a quaint little coastal town, all the shops and restaurants were closed due to a power outage, signs on the beach warned of sewage contamination, and his motel room was infested with bedbugs.

“But where’s the pond?” Crispin peered at the sad little valley.

He had a point. There was not a drop of water in sight.

“Over that hill.” Fromlith pointed. “But if it’s all the same to you, I’m going to say good-bye here. The pond is a real downer.”

Although Leopold didn’t relish climbing that slope, especially with his sore ankle, he couldn’t really ask Fromlith for more. The guy had been more than generous.

Apparently concluding the same thing, Crispin gave Fromlith a courtly bow. “Of course. Thank you for your assistance.”

“And you’ll tell the Mother of Fae that I didn’t harm a hair on your head?”

“I’ll tell her that you were a perfect gentleman, and provided… enormous assistance.”

This must have pleased Fromlith, for he beamed, bent, and clapped Crispin hard enough on the back to send the desk fae flying into Leopold.

This time they both fell down, legs and antlers tangled.

It took them a while to recover—and on Leopold’s part, a fair bit of swearing—and by the time they did, Fromlith was already stomping off into the distance, heading eagerly back to his enormous tiny house.

Crispin brushed himself off. “Let’s do this, shall we? My perfecality score?—”

“Is dropping by the minute. I know. Fine.” He was ready to get this nightmare over with. Sore ankle notwithstanding, he started up the hill.

It was hard going. There was a path of sorts, but sometimes it disappeared and they had to find it again.

At times the slope was so steep that they both had to proceed on all fours, which at least turned out to be easier as deer-things than in their usual forms, but even then the scree tended to shift beneath them.

Leopold thought he’d be relieved when they reached the top, but he wasn’t—not when he saw the equally steep downward path to a patch of water with all the charm of a sewage treatment pond.

“Ugh,” said Crispin, gazing down at it.

“Agreed.”

“There’s a lovely little pool near my home, you know.

Crystal-clear water surrounded by soft fragrant grasses and tiny flowers.

Sometimes Minkis and I go for a dip after I get home from OotL, before I fix dinner.

” His gaze was unfocused, and a slow smile spread across his face, making him more handsome.

Leopold frowned. “Who’s Minkis?”

Crispin shot him a look. “My pet squirrel, of course. He’s wonderful. I can show you some photos….” He stuck a hand in his trousers pocket but brought it out empty. “Oh. I may have lost them when we, um, transitioned.”

“Bummer,” said Leopold, who was relieved. He was in no mood to be subjected to cute pet pictures. He turned away and started his skidding, sliding way down to the water. It was a harrowing journey, but they both made it to the bottom without losing their precarious balance.

For a few moments, they both stood on the shore and looked at the pond. “Well. I suppose it is reflective.” Crispin looked doubtful.

“Is this gonna do the trick? You know, I have to work in the morning. Cleaning busses, not sitting in an office and filing reports about doodads I’ve collected.

And it’ll probably be raining again. And I’ll probably do something soon that’ll get me fired, and—” He stopped and emitted a sigh as impressive as Crispin’s. “Just do the thing already.”

Frowning, Crispin pulled out his phone and stared at the cracked screen. “Thea?”

There was no response.

“Thea? We’ve found the pond. Now if you could— Oh, damn the black eye of Pothos!”

Leopold glanced over to see what Crispin was staring at and wasn’t even a little surprised to see an oily gray cloud making its way toward them.

It was hard to judge the cloud’s dimensions.

One moment it looked roughly human-sized and the next it seemed bigger than the hill they’d just climbed.

Its edges shifted and its interior swirled, and there was something both sinister and purposeful in the way it slunk forward.

“I thought Fromlith said no monsters,” Leopold said tightly.

“It appears our giant friend was mistaken.” Crispin looked as displeased as if he’d eaten a mouthful of skunk-sprayed porcupine.

“What does it want? Why is it chasing us?” Leopold’s heart raced, a feat it was unused to on any regular basis.

Crispin shook his head frantically. “I don’t know! Thea! Help!”

The phone made a series of noises like an old-fashioned modem, played a bar or two of “We Are Family,” and spat a volley of greenish sparks that made Crispin yelp. He managed to keep hold of it, though, which was a minor miracle.

There was nowhere to run and no place to hide, and there were no roaring giants in the vicinity.

Leopold didn’t even have a weapon—not that he knew how to fight a cloud anyway.

And Crispin, who held his ground despite looking terrified, didn’t seem to know what to do either.

Probably desk fae didn’t often face death.

The cloud slithered closer. It had a sound, Leopold realized.

Or more accurately, sounds. Static like a radio not quite getting a signal.

Glass shattering. The wind battering a house.

Engines idling and then revving. All of them at once, making Leopold’s heart race and his skin feel goose-pimply.

And it tugged at him, the way your foster mom tugs at your shirt collar when you refuse to leave the candy store of your own volition.

“Leave us alone!” Crispin shouted. “I am a curator with the Office of the Lost and I order you to stop interfering in my collection duties!”

The cloud didn’t seem impressed. Maybe Crispin needed a badge to flash.

It came even closer. Leopold couldn’t smell it—maybe only giants could—but he could feel it, alternately cold and hot, and with an electrical charge that made his hairs stand on end.

Crispin was holding his phone up like a weapon. “Go away!”

It didn’t.

And the weird thing—well, hell, everything was weird, wasn’t it?— one weird thing was that although Leopold was scared, he also felt an urge to walk toward the cloud, to meet up with it, to touch it. It must be the same way moths felt about flames.

“Go away!” Crispin bellowed even louder. Apparently he felt no similar draw.

Leopold took a step forward.

Crispin grabbed Leopold’s arm, tight.

And the cloud spoke, its voice filling the air so thoroughly that Leopold could barely breathe. “Giiiiive himmmm to usssss.” Foggy teeth gleamed in its depths, gnashing like breaking glass.

Oh, shit. Leopold knew to a certainty that he was the him in question. And for a brief time he was afraid that Crispin would simply shove him into the cloud and make his own safe escape. Leopold could hardly blame him if he did.

Instead, Crispin tightened his grip on Leopold’s arm and screamed, “Thea! Take us back to OotL!”

And then he dragged Leopold into the pond.