Obscura unlocked Amos’s chain and led him onto the stage. As he passed Maren’s table, he lifted his eyebrows and mouthed, You okay? Maren shrugged. Of course she wasn’t. But she had to keep trying—there had to be another way to make this plan work.

Obscura stopped abruptly, and Amos almost walked into her, leaping back with a nervous yelp. The tall ballerina pulled the killer moth-bee off her shoulder and stood, muttering to herself and letting it crawl between her fingers.

“The whispering dust will work better if you put it inside the sachets instead of sprinkling it on top,” squeaked Maren. “Do you want me to add it to some of them?”

Obscura’s eyes were unfocused, almost like she’d forgotten Maren existed. Absently, she stuck the moth in her hair, then wiped her bleary eyes. “Tonight I’ll have a chat with the president of the Rockpool Banking Trust and the school superintendent. They’re about to have a budget surplus, and a sudden desire to build a new school—with a new headmistress.” Obscura flashed a wicked smile, but the circles under her eyes had taken on a bluish hue. She was getting tired after all. “Cyril has some notes to type up and deliver, and I’ll bring a little something over to Edna Frye, that bureaucratic cow. Then a quick stop at Cynthia O’Grady’s and, last but not least, your lovely parents.”

Maren’s body went rigid at the mention of her parents and Amos’s mother. She couldn’t bear to think of the things Obscura might tell them, the devious ways she could make them forget about her or never want her to come home again.

“That’s enough for one night.” Obscura snapped her fingers like she was summoning a waiter. “Add the dust to six nightmares.”

Maren made a show of considering all the piles of nightmares she’d made, then selected six at random and opened them up. “Can I have it, please?”

Obscura’s pointe shoes dragged as she crossed the stage. From the duffel bag, she pulled the tin of whispering dust and held it out to Maren, but as Maren reached for it, she snapped it back.

“I’m not giving you the whole thing.”

“Of…of course not,” said Maren. “We just need a few grains for each sachet. I’ve got tweezers right here. Do you want to do it?”

Obscura stifled a yawn. “You do it. I’ll watch to make sure you’re not wasting it.”

Maren eased the lid of the tin open and dipped her tweezers in. “This is just a suggestion,” she said, “but you could give me, Amos, and my grandmother some of this dust when we’re sleeping and make up a story about how we’re all friends.”