“Someone out there had better untie me!” she yelled. She did not want to spend eternity like this. Going down to the center of the earth was bad enough. She would not go down tied to a stupid train!

Sure enough, someone climbed up to her—but it wasn’t one of the invaders. It was Jix, his nose and fledgling whiskers twitching.

“So are you going to free me this time?” she asked. “Or are you just here to chat?”

He immediately began to pull at the bonds that held her there, but they were too tight to undo. He paused, but only for a moment. “You’re a skinjacker,” Jix said. “So skinjack. That’s how you can get out of this.”

“There aren’t any living people here,” Allie reminded him. “We’re in the middle of nowhere.”

“I don’t mean people.”

It took her a moment, but Allie finally got it. Still it made no difference. “Oh, so do you think a longhorn or an antelope will come bounding out of the bush on cue, and stand where I can skinjack it?”

“I see your point,” said Jix, and then he leaped from the engine, leaving Allie to struggle with her bonds on her own. Around her the shouts of the invaders and the cries of Mary’s kids filled the night. Allie could see them now when she turned her head. It was horrible. Kids wrapped in flypaper and dragged off by the marauders; kids tangled in nets sinking into the ground. And then she saw the caboose. It lay on its side, and around it a mob of Mary’s kids struggled to keep it above ground, but their efforts were failing. If nothing else, Allie would have the satisfaction of knowing that Mary was going down too.

In a few moments Allie could see the dry brush around her, which meant that the train had sunk all the way down and was only a foot or so above the earth.

Just then, in the living world, something came bursting out of the chaparral. A coyote ran toward Allie and stopped only a few inches from her . . . as if on cue. Allie couldn’t believe her luck, but it wasn’t luck at all. Jix peeled out of the coyote. He had furjacked it and brought it right to her!

“Hurry! Before it runs away,” Jix said. The coyote, perhaps confused at having been possessed by a human spirit, howled and took off—but Allie bent her hand up from her bonds, reaching toward it, and her fingertips touched the creature’s leg as it passed.

There came a familiar rush and sudden dizziness. She felt the unmistakable heaviness of flesh, and—

—run run run, food food food, scratch scratch scratch—

Suddenly she was no longer tied to the train—she was no longer in Everlost at all! Her spirit had been drawn into the body of the coyote!