Again, Yehuda Leib squeezed his eye shut, fighting to calm himself and focus on his goal:

The tower.

The tower.

Only the tower.

Soon enough he’d managed to hone his intention, but the damage had been done: when Yehuda Leib opened his eye once more, the illusion of direction he’d carried with him into the Far Country had been wiped away.

They were everywhere, on every side: the demons and the dead, the War Cats and the cavalrymen, each of them bounding forward toward the rest, scratching and biting, slashing and firing.

They were everywhere.

He was surrounded.

Again, terror began to take hold of Yehuda Leib’s heart, but still his pony dodged and pranced, cantering, galloping, leaping forward without impediment.

The two armies were holding one another back.

And as long as he did not lose sight of his goal…

With a deep breath, Yehuda Leib fixed his gaze on the huge tower before him, letting the nightmares all around him fade into the darkness.

Death. He was coming for Death.

And no one could be allowed to stop him.

—

From a distance, the Tower of Death seemed simple, geometric, one flat face of stone pivoting to lead into the next and the next and the next until eternity.

But from feet away, it seemed as if each face were endless.

Yehuda Leib slid from the saddle, and his pony, in a panicked lather, pulled and bucked, fleeing hard back into the battle across the valley.

He was alone, but not for long: on every side, the battle raged. Only the combat of others held his pursuers back.

The tower’s stone was mottled, splotchy, and as he drew near, the reason became clear: the tower itself was made of grave markers—slabs and tablets, plaques and plinths—that met edge to edge, rising high up to heaven.

Yehuda Leib cursed quietly to himself. He saw the letters on the gravestones, understood what they were, but he had never learned to read them. Surely one of these graves would proclaim ENTRANCE or I OPEN HERE or something else useful, but if it did, Yehuda Leib had no way of knowing.

Slowly, he began to work his way along the stone wall, tracing the engraved names of the dead with his fingers, looking for something, anything, familiar.

“Yehuda Leib.”

Yehuda Leib nearly jumped out of his skin. There, not five grave widths distant, was a girl, staring at him.

“Oh no,” she said sadly. “What happened to your eye?”

Yehuda Leib lifted his fingers to his eye patch. “I traded it,” he said.

The Nameless, Faceless Girl frowned. “For what?”

Yehuda Leib looked over his shoulder at the battle unfolding all around them.

“Time,” he said. “A little more time.”

“Well,” said the Nameless Girl, “let’s make sure we don’t waste it, then,” and she turned swiftly to the wall of graven names.

But Yehuda Leib was confused. “Do I know you?” he said.