Big Dan looked over to where his men were lounging against the trees while they waited. He was suddenly tired of all of this. What had started as a kind of game to relieve boredom and perhaps raise his standing among the fairy clans was turning more sour than he’d ever admit to anyone but himself. The truth was he didn’t care for either Odawa or Grey’s problems. He didn’t care about this girl. And he was sick and tired of feeling like no more than an errand boy for the blind piece of shite who’d gotten him into all of this.

Happily, Odawa kept his own counsel while they waited for Rabedy and his companions to return. As soon as they did, Big Dan walked over to get their report.

“Well?” he asked. “I see you don’t have the girl. Do you at least have any news?”

“She’s gone,” Luren said, picking his nose as he spoke. “Both of them—like they never were. Rabedy tracked them to a beach on some grey sea, but they were already gone when we got there. The pony’s tracks started nowhere, then ended the same, but we couldn’t find a way through to wherever it was that they went.”

Rabedy nodded. “We hunted up and down the beach, but it was all grey sand, and then a fog came rolling in from the water and we couldn’t see anything anymore anyway, so we came back.”

“Where was this beach?” Odawa asked.

Rabedy shrugged. “Somewhere in the otherworld.”

“Could you see the sun? The moon or stars? Was the water east or west of the land?”

Rabedy and the other two bogans took a step back under the blind green-bree’s sudden barrage of questions. Luren shot Big Dan a questioning look, but Odawa spoke before Big Dan could.

“Answer me, you stupid little men,” he demanded, his voice booming between the trees. “Surely your tiny brains will let you do that much.”

“Hold on there,” Big Dan said.

The green-bree turned, his blind gaze fixing on the bogans’ chief.

“This is my business,” he began.

His voice had gone soft, dangerous, and low now.

“And these are my men,” Big Dan said before he could go on. “So you’ll be respectful to them, or you won’t speak at all.”

“This from the one who constantly berates them himself.”

“What I do or don’t is none of your pluiking business. While you’re working for me, you’ll do as I say, or you’ll take a hike up your own arse.”

“Working for you?”

Big Dan gave him a dangerous smile. “Well, I’m sure as shite not working for you.”

“Why you—”