“I was speaking of your—” His gaze shot upward. “Would you be calling that a hat, lass?”

I closed my eyes and groaned. I’d gotten so used to the weight of it on my head that I’d forgotten I was wearing my MacHalo. I unstrapped it, snatched it from my head, scraped off strands of dripping moss, and inspected it for damage. Two of the brackets were broken at the base, and several of the lights had been turned on in our roll down sand dunes, wasting precious batteries. I clicked them off and put the helmet on the rocks near my clothes.

I nodded at the piece of Unseelie lying on the ground between us. “Are you going to eat that?”

“Not for love or money,” he said vehemently.

“Well, pick it up and put it in your pocket. You might need it again. Like it or not, it saved your life.” No matter how badly I wanted it, I didn’t dare impair my sidhe-seer abilities. If we encountered anything Fae, my Nulling talents were all I had. We’d have to freeze them and run. Or use the stones again.

“It did something to me. Something … wrong.” He studied it with distaste, picked it up, drew back his arm, and flung it into the quarry. I heard a splash, a second much larger splash, and a snapping sound, followed by a third splash. Since my back was to the water, I had to interpret what happened from the look on his face. “Something awful-looking ate it?”

Looking mildly shocked, he nodded. “Tell me everything you know about what you just fed me and the effects it has. And as for the loch, lass, I wouldn’t recommend swimming in it.”

Christian’s clothes were soaked, and after a scan of the snow-covered peaks around us, he concluded there was a high probability of a sharp evening drop to frigid temperatures, which meant we needed our clothes dry, fast. As there was no convenient dryer nearby, toasting them in the sun was our only option, so a short time later we were both stretched out, me mostly naked, him completely. He was unself-conscious nude. I had to admit, he had reason to be.

After a quick glance, I’d sought privacy on the other side of the tumble of rocks our clothes were drying on and savored the warmth on my skin. All that was missing was my iPod.

And my parents. And my sister. And any feeling of normalcy or safety. In a nutshell, everything was missing.

I was terrified for Mom and Dad. Since the Silver I’d entered didn’t show the tunnel from the outside, what assurance did I have that the destination it did show wasn’t also an illusion? What if the LM wasn’t holding my parents captive in my own living room but someplace else and I’d sent Barrons on a wild-goose chase with the photo I’d texted?

A wave of frantic helplessness was building inside me, threatening to turn tidal. I didn’t dare give in to panic. I had to stay calm and focused and work on moving forward however I could, even if it meant taking baby steps. Right now that meant getting my clothes dry and resting while I had the chance. Who knew what dangers the night—or even the next few hours—might hold?

Christian and I talked while we sunned, our voices carrying easily over the rocks between us. I told him about the effects of eating Unseelie. He questioned me extensively, wanting to know who else had eaten it, exactly what it had done to them, and how long it had lasted. He seemed especially interested in the increased “skill in the dark arts.”

“Speaking of dark arts,” I said, “what did you guys do the night of the ritual? What happened? What went wrong?”

He groaned. “I take it that means the walls came down anyway. I’ve been trying to convince myself that my uncles managed a miracle. Tell me everything, Mac. What’s happened in the world while I’ve been stuck here?”

I told him that the walls had crashed completely at midnight, that I’d watched the Unseelie come through, and that the Lord Master and his princes had captured me at dawn. I omitted the rape, being turned Pri-ya, and my subsequent … er, recovery (no way I was talking to the lie detector about those events), and told him merely that I was rescued by Dani and the sidhe-seers. I brought him up to speed on Jayne’s efforts, filled him in on what we’d learned about iron, and told him that his family was okay and searching for him. I told him the Book was still loose but withheld the gruesome details of my recent encounter with it.

“How did you come to be in the Hall of All Days?”

I told him about the Lord Master abducting my parents, luring me into the Silver, and insisting that I show him the stones.

“Bloody idiot! Even we know better than to do that, and he was once Fae. It’s no wonder the queen appointed us Keltar keepers of the lore. We know more about their history than they do.”

“Because they keep drinking from the cauldron and forgetting?”

“Aye.”

“Well, at least we have them. Even though the ride’s rocky, they help in a pinch.”

“Are you daft, Mac?” he said sharply.

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you know what’s happening every time you take them out of that pouch?”

“Duh, that’s what I was saying. It makes us shift worlds … or dimensions, or whatever they are.”

“Because the realm we’re in is trying to spit us out,” he said flatly. “The stones are anathema to the Silvers. Once you remove them from your pouch, the realm detects them and, like an infected splinter, endeavors to expel them. The only reason you go with them is because you’re holding on to them.”

“Why are they anathema to the Silvers?”