“You have come.” She rose from the chair as if she were on strings and raised a withered hand, beckoning us forward. I squared my shoulders and marched toward her, Ash and Puck close behind me. The Briars seemed to hold their breath, the dolls and other toys watching intently, until we stood just a few feet from the ancient hag, the now-familiar stench of grave dust and old newspapers clogging the back of my throat.

For a second, nobody moved.

I cleared my throat. “All right,” I announced, meeting that eerie stare head-on. Or, hoping I did, anyway. It was difficult to glare at an eyeless face—you didn’t really know if it was looking at you or not. “I’m here, Oracle. We came as fast as we could. Now, what is this offer you were speaking of at Elysium? What do you know about my child?”

“Your child,” the oracle mused, almost dreamily. “Your son. Yes, I know much about him,” she continued, smiling at my shock. “Many futures have I glimpsed, and in all, he is a remarkable creature, born of Summer, Winter and Iron, an anomaly among all his kind. Human and fey, with the magic of all three courts flowing through his veins, he will possess a power none have ever seen.” She paused then, her forehead creasing like wrinkled paper. “And here is where his future becomes cloudy. Something is out there, Iron Queen, something dark, and it has the power to turn your son from you. I cannot see what it is, perhaps it is not even in the world yet, but he is balanced on a very fine edge, able to fall either way. And what comes after…” She shook her shriveled head. “I have seen death and destruction on a grand scale, many lives lost, the courts destroyed, and in the center of it all is your son.”

I was having trouble breathing. My legs felt shaky, and I locked my knees to keep myself upright. Beside me, even Puck looked stunned, his face pale beneath his red hair. Ash didn’t say anything, but he stepped close and placed a steady hand on the small of my back, just to reassure me he was still there. I leaned into him and drew strength from his touch.

“You…still haven’t told me your offer,” I whispered, reeling from the flood of information the oracle had thrown at me. “You could have told me this at the Voodoo Museum, or anywhere in the Nevernever. Why did you call us here?”

The oracle’s thin lips curled in a grim smile. “Because, I have something to show you, Iron Queen,” she whispered back, and turned to gesture at the water behind her. “The Dreaming Pool can show anyone their future, or the future of another, if one knows where to look. Come…” She beckoned me with a talon. “Step forward, into the waters, and I will show you your son.”