Perhaps the living world had finally connected coast-to-coast and around the world, but Everlost was a new frontier. It was just like the days when America was still the New World, and no one knew what breathtaking vistas and unforeseen dangers lay over the next ridge. Perhaps the unknown wouldn’t have been so daunting if they had an entire crew—but unlike Mary, Nick hadn’t been interested in collecting followers. His job was to get rid of them, which made it hard to maintain more than just the barest of skeleton crews—namely, himself, Charlie, and Johnnie-O. It was time to change all that.

“Come on, Charlie—let’s tame the Everwild! We’ll chart the rails, and mark the deadspots on the way!”

And although Charlie was reluctant to travel to places unknown, Nick knew he was tempted. There was a certain excitement in breaking away from the familiar, and shattering old routines.

“We’ll need to look for a finder who can trade us the paper we’ll need to make a new map,” said Charlie, “but until then I can scratch the map into the engine bulkhead.”

Nick slapped him on the back, leaving an accidental chocolate stain. “Let’s get started, then. We’ll get to the southern Afterlights before Mary can!”

With the furnace blazing on the memory of coal, the steam engine headed south into a vast unknowable wild.

CHAPTER 4
The Outcast

On a warm June afternoon, two finders came to a small-town diner that had burned down many years before. The living world had paved over the spot, and turned it into a parking lot for the bank next door, but in Everlost, the diner remained, its chrome siding shining in the afternoon sun. It was the only building in town that had crossed, and so had become a home to about a dozen Afterlights.

The finders, a boy and a girl, arrived riding a horse. This was unheard of. Well, not entirely unheard of. There were stories about one finder in particular who traveled on the only horse ever known to have crossed into Everlost—and it was said she did travel with a companion, although he never played into the stories much.

As the kids stepped out of the diner, they kept their distance, wanting to, but also afraid to believe that this could be the finder of legend. The cluster of Afterlights were young—and the oldest girl from the diner (who, not surprisingly called herself “Dinah”) was their leader. She was ten when she had died, and the thing she remembered about herself more than anything else was that she had long, luxurious hair—so now it trailed behind her like a smooth amber bridal train.