I sprint toward a cluster of trees, slipping behind a wide trunk and pressing my back against the bark. Trying to quiet my ragged breaths, I listen for Doug’s footsteps behind me.

“Fleur!” he roars. “You can’t run from me!” His feet slow, as if he knows he’s close. “There is no escape from this. Not if you want your friends to survive.”

Chill . . . I tip my head against the trunk, eyes squeezed shut against the cold rain that spatters my cheeks. Chill would want me to run if it meant saving Jack and Poppy.

A twig snaps. I reach my mind into the soil, searching for his soles against the wet ground.

“I can smell you,” he says, his voice low enough to send a shiver up my spine.

My thoughts surge into the branches of the sycamore at Doug’s back. With a loud groan, its huge limbs lash around him, dragging him off his feet and slamming him into its trunk. Doug screams at me as the tree forces him to his knees. I swing out from my hiding place, grabbing roots with my mind, coiling them around his wrists and jerking his arms out wide. A vine curls around his head, tipping it back, exposing his throat to me. Another slithers down from the tree, plucking the transmitter from his ear and slinging it into the grass. The red light pulses like a heartbeat between us.

Doug’s eye is wide, the rain carving rivers down his face. “What are you waiting for?” he shouts.

I summon a branch and aim it like a spear at his chest.

His breath hitches. All it would take to end his life is a single command from me.

And if he dies, then what? What happens to Time if that magic is lost? What happens to all of us? The transmitter blinks in the grass. If I send Doug back through the ley lines with the rest of his Guards, how long will he sleep? And what happens to the earth while he does?

My spear shrinks away from him. Doug watches me back away as if he has no idea who I am. I can’t end this alone. I need to think. I need a plan. I need Jack.

“Fleur, don’t do this!” Doug’s voice rises to a shout as I turn and break into a run.

City lights flicker through the trees ahead. I sprint toward them, keeping the wind at my back, no idea which direction I’m heading. I’ll find a pub or a tavern. Someplace with a phone or a computer I can use. Somehow, I’ll get through to Jack.