Under that formation was a beautifully crafted workbench, at least ten feet long and three wide; part wood, part stone, and part metal. It was so beautifully constructed that her jaw just dropped when she saw it. Cream stone, pale wood, gray metal.

Sitting on the workbench was the only spot of color in the room—a huge chunk of malachite.

It looked familiar.

So did the canvas roll on the workbench beside it.

Something moved slightly at the back of the room, in the shadows. She ventured past the workbench on tiptoes. There was a platform back there . . . a platform covered with what looked like a tumble of soft blankets and pillows in various creams and pale browns. And there was something—no, someone under those blankets.

“Josh!” She wasn’t aware she had spoken until the sound echoed in the room. She wasn’t aware she had run to him until she was sitting on the platform at his side.

He lay on his back, one arm thrown over his head. He still looked utterly exhausted, thin and drawn, and her breath caught as her heart ached. “Josh?” she repeated, leaning over him.

“Jolene . . .” he murmured. And her heart went from aching to breaking.

With tears streaming down her face, she got up, backed away, then turned and ran. Somehow, the little lizard with her light had gotten in front of her again, and she followed it, half-blinded by the tears that scorched her cheeks, too wracked with heartbreak to think of anything else to do.

How long she wandered, she couldn’t have said. She just followed the lizard, sobbing silently, eyes and heart burning together, throat closed, chest tight with grief. And when the lizard stopped, so did she, insensible to what was around her, until a polite cough made her raise her eyes. And her breath caught in her throat, despite her despair, because what lay before her was the most beautiful place she had ever seen in her life. Nothing even in her imagination came close to matching this.

Now she was in a “room” fit for a queen.

A sheet of that waterfall-like stone, three stories high and lit from behind, formed the backdrop for a platform of stone that had clearly been carved out of the native stone that had been there before. So had the throne that stood on it—or was the throne a part of it? In any event, the throne was marvelously carved, covered with sinuous, entwining representations of lizards, of the same sort that had brought her here. More of the lizards—live ones, this time—twined their metallic green bodies among the creamy stone of the carved ones. They were joined by a new set of lizards—and these were copper-colored. Green fer th’ malachite, red fer th’ copper hereabouts?

The throne was also illuminated, not from above, but from below and within. And sitting on that throne, glowing golden with her own power, was Jolene.