It was the strangest thing—one minute Ryan was hanging off the edge of the cliff, clinging for dear life, and the next he was back on solid ground, in the seat of his horse. His left hand was holding the reins and his right was clutching a soggy length of rope with a noose at one end, which he was swinging above his head. He became even more confused when he saw Little Dipper standing in front of him, no more than fifteen yards away. She was stomping the ground and tossing her head, ready to run at any moment. The whole scene gave him an acute sense of déjà vu. It all felt so very familiar. But the weirdest part was that Ryan didn’t seem to have any control. He had his senses but no power over his muscles. Everything was happening independently of him. He couldn’t turn his head or shift around, couldn’t even move his eyes. All he could do was watch, a mere spectator inside his own body.

Certain this must be some kind of dream, he quickly figured out what was going on—he was witnessing a replay of what took place two nights ago. It was the night Little Dipper bolted, the night he’d chased her out to these cliffs. He recognized the scene he’d been dropped into—it was when he’d finally found her, the moment he’d tried to lasso her and bring her in to safety. He had needed three attempts to get the rope around her neck, and that’s exactly how the scene unfolded—he watched his first throw fall short, the second bounce off her stomach, and the third hit its mark—precisely as he remembered. Next, he pulled hard on the rope, tightening the noose around Little Dipper’s neck, and then he looped the other end of the rope securely around his wrist.

But then his flashback unraveled differently from how he remembered. The moment the knot snapped around Little Dipper’s neck, she thrashed her head and threw her weight in the opposite direction.

“Ease up, girl! Stop fighting!”

Every lunge for freedom put more and more tension on the rope, stretching Ryan’s arm and burning his skin. “Don’t do this, Little Dipper. . . . Work with me.”

It was strange hearing his own voice, hearing himself say words he never recalled saying. Stranger still was how fast his heart was racing. All these new sensations, these emotions, these memories . . .

This wasn’t how it happened at all. Or was it . . . ?

The rope coiled around his wrist was beginning to twist and tighten against his flesh. His voice sounded more and more desperate. “Come on, Lil’ Dip! Please! ”