Andy and Hazel came back then and I realized that, while the memory-sharing had only seemed to take a few moments to me, it had actually gone on for much longer. Hazel was still riding on Andy’s shoulders, little legs kicking against his chest, her arms wrapped around his forehead. Andy carried a soup bowl from the restaurant filled with murky water. He put it on the floor and sediment began to settle.

Getting up from the bed, Galfreya sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the bowl. She moved her hand above the water and a ripple echoed the motion, back and forth—across the surface, following her hand. The sediment rose up again. When she moved her hand away, the water went still and she leaned forward to study something only she could see.

I could tell that Siobhan and Andy were dying to ask if it was working, but they seemed to know enough to not interrupt. I wanted to know, too, but I’d seen this many times before and had already resigned myself to being patient. When she knew something, Galfreya would tell us.

“How curious,” she murmured.

We all leaned forward, but the water didn’t look any different until Galfreya put her hand above it once more, setting new ripples in motion. She watched the movement until the water went still, then repeated the whole process a third time before she finally sat up straight and looked at us.

“You didn’t have any luck, did you?” I said.

I knew her well enough to notice the frustration that Siobhan and Andy wouldn’t spot.

“I can’t see them in this world or the other,” she said. “It’s as though they have simply vanished from existence.”

Siobhan blinked tears from her eyes.

“Do you mean . . . are they . . . are they dead?” she asked with a quiver in her voice.

“No. Even death leaves a trace.” She looked to me. “There are places, of course, hidden pocket worlds on the other side of the between that can’t be seen into, but by that token, you’d expect the bogans to be there as well.”

“They’re not?”

“No,” she said. “I found Big Dan and his gang easily enough. They’re camped in the bush on this side of the river—north of town—which might seem bold of them, trespassing in cousins’ territory, except we already know that they have a cousin in their company.”

I gave a slow nod. “Right. So we get the information from them, however we have to.”

Galfreya held up a hand before I could get up.

“That cousin I mentioned,” she said. “I had only a momentary glimpse of him, but it was enough to see that he is an old and powerful spirit. Not one of us here—not all of us together—could make him tell us anything he didn’t want to.”