She landed on a floor covered with something she supposed to be the Dark Country’s equivalent of straw, even if it didn’t feel much like straw and didn’t smell much like straw and was the very last thing she’d want to dangle out of her mouth when she was wearing a farmer hat on a warm summer day. It was not a big cage. She’d hoped for a reunion with Pearlie here, but it looked like this cage was meant for her and her alone. Just in case, she called out, “Pearlie?”
“Over here,” said Pearlie through a slot in the wall separating Fernie’s cage from the one on her immediate right. Any tears she’d shed since leaving Shadow’s Inn could no longer be heard in her voice, and she seemed to be taking the same attitude Fernie had taken: sheer impatience for the next bit. She asked, “What took you so long?”
“I was busy feeding Nebuchadnezzar to the gnarfle.”
Pearlie was silent for a moment. “You know, I am so deeply sorry I missed that.”
“I’m sorry you missed it, too. It was everything I hoped for. Where’s Gustav?”
“I’m over here,” said Gustav Gloom from the cell on the other side.
A more distant voice, coming from a cage a farther distance away, complained, “I’m here. Thanks for asking.” This was Not-Roger, who was understandably in a bad mood after having his barn torn down, his pet gnarfle set free, his inn destroyed, and his freedom taken away from him.
“I’m here, too,” said Caliban, and now his voice sounded nothing at all like the cold, empty thing it had been when first they’d met him.
“Me, too,” said Not-Roger’s shadow.
“And me,” came Anemone’s voice from somewhere else nearby. After a pause, she added a careful, “Dear.” Fernie couldn’t help noticing what she was meant to notice, that this last word was not delivered in the vibrant tone the shadow had used as Anemone, but the rather richer and sweeter notes she had used as an older woman named Great-Aunt Mellifluous. It was a subtle difference, and only when the two voices were used one right after the other was it impossible to avoid noticing how alike they were, and how clearly they were now revealed as the voice of the same person at different ages.
Fernie wished she understood everything that was happening, but for now she shuffled over to the thin slit in the wall that separated her cage from Gustav’s and asked him, “What about you? Are you okay?”
“F-fine.”
Nothing that had happened in the last couple of hours worried Fernie more than the tremble in Gustav’s voice. If Gustav Gloom broke down, that meant Gustav Gloom could stand no more . . . and if Gustav Gloom could stand no more, then the faith in him that kept her own courage up now dangled by a very thin thread.
Suddenly afraid, she tilted her head to peer at him through the slit and saw him sitting quietly in a dark corner of his cage, his pale face as hard to see as a thin cirrus cloud drifting across the sky on a cold moonless night. Something on his cheeks glistened.
“Gustav!” she cried. “Are you all right?”
“What?” To her surprise, Gustav was genuinely puzzled by the question. “Why wouldn’t I be all right? I thought I told you, we needed to get captured. We wouldn’t have ever gotten anywhere if we weren’t captured. This”—he waved to indicate the cage and gave a little extra wobble of his fingers to include the zippalin and all the vile enemies who surrounded them—“all of this, is okay. I’ve been in worse places.”
Fernie wondered if he was just pretending to be braver than he was in order to make her feel better. “You’re not worried?”
“Of course I am. We have so much left to do. But I don’t think it’s anything we can’t handle. We’ll be okay.”
She decided he wasn’t trying to fool her. He might have been wrong about their ability to survive it, because he’d been in danger so many times in his short life that it was almost impossible for him to accept that any dangers could possibly be too much for him. But at least he was not faking his confidence. That he felt, and because he felt it, Fernie could feel it with him.
Still, there was that one nagging question. “Why are you crying, then?”
He tilted his head, then raised a finger to his cheek and brushed at the glistening wetness there. “Oh this.” He didn’t speak again for several seconds, and when he did, his voice was unusually soft and quivery. “It’s nothing. It’s just that . . . since being caught, I’ve had time to think about where we’re going and what we’re going to find there, and . . . well, it’s not a bad thing, really, but I’ve been sitting here, and . . . you know, it feels real to me for the very first time.”
“What?”
He moved closer so she could see him. His eyes were red and his cheeks moist, but for the very first time since she’d met him he wore a smile that had nothing to do with defeating an enemy or tasting a chocolate chip cookie.
She realized what he was about to say just before he said it, and understood that the tears welling in his eyes had nothing to do with fear or grief.
He said, “I think I’m going to get to meet my father today.”
Fernie understood now, but understanding made her have similar thoughts about her own father, and how good a man he was, and how great it would be to see him again, even in a place as robbed of hope as the Dark Country. She wiped her tears with the back of one hand and slipped the other as far as it would go through the wall slot until Gustav found her fingertips with his own.
Together, in silence, they waited to find their fathers.
Acknowledgments
You would not now be seeing this book without the persistence of agents extraordinaire Joshua Bilmes and Eddie Schneider of the Jabberwocky Literary Agency. You would not now be enjoying the same experience free of verbal land mines and other clutter without the ace red pens of copy editor Kate Hurley and editor Jordan Hamessley. You would not now be oohing and aahing over the illustrations without the genius of artist Kristen Margiotta. You would not now be holding the divine artifact in your hands without designer Christina Quintero. You might have no idea the book exists without the fine work of publicist Tara Shanahan. You would not now be seeing any books from me at all without the patience, love, and constant encouragement of my beautiful wife, Judi B. Castro. You would not now be seeing a human being with my name and my face were it not for my parents, Saby and Joy Castro.
I must give an extra shout-out to a man who died long before I was born, who for various reasons I probably wouldn’t have liked very much: Howard Philips Lovecraft, the extraordinarily influential writer who is the distant inspiration for the villainous Howard Philip October, and whose Cthulhu Mythos stories left a large footprint that can be felt various places in the lands that Gustav and Fernie visit.
Adam-Troy Castro has said in interviews that he likes to jump genres and styles and has therefore refused to ever stay in place long enough to permit the unwanted existence of a creature that could be called a “typical” Adam-Troy Castro story. As a result, his short works range from the wild farce of his Vossoff and Nimmitz tales to the grim Nebula nominee “Of a Sweet Slow Dance in the Wake of Temporary Dogs.” His twenty prior books include a nonfiction analysis of the Harry Potter phenomenon, four Spider-Man adventures, and three novels about his interstellar murder investigator, Andrea Cort (including a winner of the Philip K. Dick Award, Emissaries from the Dead). Adam’s other award nominations include eight Nebulas, two Hugos, and three Stokers. Adam lives in Miami with his wife, Judi, and three insane cats named Uma Furman, Meow Farrow, and Harley Quinn.
Kristen Margiotta has been creating spooky, creepy images since her early childhood. Now as an adult, she explores similar themes with more depth and further enjoyment. Since her graduation from the University of Delaware in 2005, she has been working as an artist, illustrator, and art instructor within the Delaware art community. Kristen finds that her different roles as a visual artist and instructor influence and strengthen each other, and she enjoys the chal
lenges and rewards that come from these endeavors. Kristen is the illustrator of the picture book Better Haunted Homes and Gardens, and her work can be found in the homes of collectors throughout the country. She has exhibited her paintings and merchandise regionally and in the Southwest through galleries, museums, and local events. Learn more at www.kristenmargiotta.com.
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