Then she pushed open the doors and motioned for him to follow her inside.

Based on Viola’s descriptions of the Guild, Barclay had imagined it to look more like an office. Instead, it looked like a pub. The inside, much like the outside, was falling apart. Wobbly barstools were missing legs. The uneven wooden floor was sloshed with beer. The green paint was peeling off the walls like skin after a sunburn.

It was cozy, at least. A brown coat of arms hung over the fireplace mantel, and the walls around it were decorated with plaques of stuffed Beast heads and maps of places Barclay had never heard of before. The thick tree that sprouted up and grew from the room’s center was covered from top to bottom with nailed flyers. Beasts of all sorts perched in the rafters or crawled across the floor, growling and hooting and munching on fallen scraps.

“Like I said before,” Viola told him, “there are six Guild locations around the world, one in each Wilderland. The headquarters is in the Mountains, where the Grand Keeper is. Everywhere else just has a High Keeper who runs the place. The High Keeper here is Kasimir Erhart.”

She pointed to a man on a couch by the fireplace. He had a long, matted gray beard that covered most of his embellished tunic. His head hung back, his mouth open. He was fast asleep. It was no wonder he didn’t care about rules if he’d rather nap all day than do his job.

The young woman beside him didn’t seem to mind that he slept. She wore a long braid of dull blond hair tucked beneath a slouchy oversized coat that reminded him of a Dullshire sentry uniform, very soldierlike, with lots of chainmail. Barclay couldn’t see her face, but from here, it looked as though she was staring intently into the flames.

Viola searched around the room, and she pointed at a group of people sitting at a high-top table. “I recognize them! They’ve done work for my father.”

She strutted over to them, leaving Barclay no choice but to follow.

There were three people at the table. The first was a man with brown skin and copper glasses shaped like hexagons. The second, a woman, had red hair knotted with twigs and leaves, and fair skin covered in dirt, as though she’d been unearthed only minutes before, like a fresh mushroom. Last was another woman, also light-skinned, but much smaller and older—so small and old, in fact, that Barclay was shocked to see the five empty mugs of beer in front of her.

“Viola Dumont,” the man said with surprise. “What are you doing in the Woods? I thought you were apprenticed to Cyril Harlow.”

Viola flushed. “I am. I’ve just been traveling alone, for the time being.”

The man said nothing, only raised his eyebrows and swept his gaze over the two of them.

“This is my friend, Barclay Thorne.” She shoved Barclay forward. “Barclay, this is Mandeep.” She nodded at the man. “And this is Floriane. And Athna.” She pointed at the dirt-covered woman and the elderly one. “Barclay needs some advice, if you don’t mind us asking.”