Struggling to wake up all the way and frightened now for Pan, she forced herself into a sitting position and cast about. Her grandmother was seated right where she had been sitting when Phryne had fallen asleep—hadn’t her grandmother done something to make that happen?—still holding the pouch with the Elfstones clasped in her hands. Time had passed—it must have passed—but there was no way Phryne could know how long she had been sleeping.

“Why is Pan here?” she demanded. “Why did you bring him?”

Her grandmother’s face had assumed a stronger look.

Watch and see.

Pancea’s shade had reappeared atop the triangular marker, all gnarled and bent, radiating its sickly green light, ghostly in the darkness of the cavern. She was turned away from them, looking back over the clusters of markers and tombs to where Panterra was walking toward her. It took a moment for Phryne to realize that the black staff he was carrying was the same one she had last seen in the hands of Sider Ament.

“Phryne!” he called out to her.

She started to reply, but Mistral quickly hushed her. Atop her perch, Pancea was shrieking as if scalded, her rage directed at the boy. In response, the dead who followed her were rising from their resting places and filling the empty spaces between markers and tombs with their ghostly forms, all white and transparent and ephemeral as mist. Their whispers were wild and excited as they drifted into view and formed clusters, all of them massing and then coming together about their leader.

Mistral Belloruus had gone into a crouch, fingers pressed to her lips.

Watch.

Pancea Rolt Gotrin’s hands swept up and wicked green fire flashed at her fingertips, driving into Panterra Qu. But his black staff responded more quickly still, blocking the attack and shattering its thrust. The boy held the staff before him, sweeping away shards of flame, but the attack had staggered him, and Phryne could see him falter.

“Phryne!” he called again, but his voice was weaker.

Now.

Her grandmother tossed the pouch with the Elfstones toward Phryne, but it landed short and lay halfway between them, unprotected. The Elven girl flung herself across the space that separated them, fingers closing on the little bag. She heard Pancea scream again, saw another flash of green fire that flared all around her and everywhere at once. Curling herself into a ball around the bag and its contents, she tore the leather bindings apart and dropped the blue Elfstones into her hand. A moment later, she was on her feet, the Stones clutched tightly in her hand as she turned to face the malevolent shade.

But Pancea was no longer atop the triangular marker. Instead, she was right in front of Phryne.

-Give them to me-