I sigh. “Don’t tell me I’m going to have to send my friends after you again. They’re not very pleasant.”
He takes a step toward me, shadows clouding his eyes. “Something’s happening here.” His breath whispers across my lips. It tastes of black tea and cinnamon, mixed with the campfire smell that clings to his shirt. “The wood is changing. You must feel it. The darkness that creeps in during the day. The eyes watching when no one is there.”
His physical presence is so big, so strong, it makes me want to step back. But that’s not how I roll. Not here. Not in my wood. I lean my head forward instead, so that our brows are almost touching. “I don’t feel anything.”
“Liar.”
The wind kicks up harder and the smell of the wood—bark and raw earth and autumn leaves—slinks up my nostrils.
I exhale. “Okay, maybe there’s something … off,” I say, thinking of the French traveler—it was dark, so dark—and Dad’s voice, welcoming me home as the path pulled me under. I point at the leaf turning black. “And that’s not exactly normal.”
“It’s worsening,” he says, “whatever it is.”
“How do you know so much about this place?”
“My family is connected to it, like yours.”
“You mean … you’re a guardian?” It makes sense—I don’t know why I didn’t think of it before. But why would a past guardian be using the wood for his own personal use? It goes against everything we are, our entire purpose for being.
“I wish,” he says, blowing my theory to hell. “My parents are cartographers, record keepers, members of—”
“The council?”
“Precisely.”
This makes even less sense than the guardian theory. I’ve never met an Old One who looked so … young. “So”—a million questions swirl through my mind; I grab one at random—“that means you can walk through the wood without getting lost?”
“Unfortunately, I cannot. My parents adopted me when I was very young. I do not share their gifts.”
“You’re human?”
He nods.
“Then how—?”
He holds up his arms. His sleeves fall to his elbows, revealing dark maps inked on his skin. If it weren’t for the smudging near the wrists, I would swear they were tattoos, they look so perfect. Pathways shoot out from his threshold, marking other portals along the way and alternate routes to take to reach my own.
“I copied these from their library,” he says.
I nod at the sign he was reading. “And the glyphs?”
“My parents taught me how to read them.”
“Well. Isn’t that convenient.” I shake my head. “Look, I can’t help you if you don’t tell me why you’re here.”
He studies me a moment, his gaze drifting down my face. He lingers on the mole on my collarbone before returning to my eyes. He takes a step back, and though the tips of our shoes are still nearly touching, it feels like an ocean of space opens up between us and I can breathe again.
“My parents are Augustus and Celia,” he says, watching me carefully.
“The council members who disappeared?”
He swallows. “Yes.”
“Oh. I’m … I’m sorry.”
He doesn’t say anything for a moment, and neither do I. My voice is quiet when I speak again. “The other council members seem to think they’ll turn up soon. That they just lost track of time or something.”
He stares at the ground. “I do not think so.”
“Not to be insensitive, but I still don’t see what that has to do with you running around this wood like you’re Lara Croft.”
His forehead scrunches up. “Pardon me?”
“Never mind,” I say, waving off his confusion. “I need you to tell me exactly why you’re here.”
He catches his bottom lip between his teeth. “I’ve already taken a great risk by telling you as much as I have.”
I cross my arms over my chest.
He sighs and glances at the wood around us. We’re the only ones here, but he lowers his voice. “I think their disappearance has something to do with what’s happening in the wood now, in your time, and I cannot just sit at home and act as though everything is all right. Yet, I…”
“You what?”
He stands rigidly straight, his hands behind his back. “I do not think I can do it without your help.”
I frown. “What exactly are you asking me?”
“I need you to let me through,” he says. “Into your time.”
XIII
Brightonshire watches me, hope and uncertainty rolling across his face in equal measure.
“You’re asking me to break the most important rule of the wood,” I say. “The rule that isn’t even spoken because it should be known, without question. The rule that encapsulates my entire purpose as a guardian.” No traveler can ever pass through a threshold into a time that is not their own.
“Yes, I am asking that of you, but I am also telling you, if you do not let me through into your time and work with me to discover the truth of what is happening here, there may no longer be a wood for you to protect.” His Adam’s apple rolls down his throat. “There may no longer be a world for you to protect.”
I rub my palms into my eyes, where a dull ache has sprouted behind my corneas. “This is insane. If what you’re saying is true, why didn’t you tell me this from the beginning? Why run?”
“I had not planned on involving anyone.” He glances at the trees, his voice dropping lower as he says, “I don’t—” He takes a deep breath. “I’m not sure who can be trusted.”
“But you trust me? That’s funny—you didn’t seem to trust me yesterday. What’s changed?”
“You have not given me much choice in the matter.” He runs his hand through his hair. “And I believe the disappearance of my parents may have something to do with the disappearance of your father. I believe you are the only one who can help me.”
Whatever I was expecting him to say, it wasn’t this. “What?”
“I will say no more of it here. It isn’t safe. I can explain properly in a more private setting.”
“Yeah, well, that isn’t going to happen. If you have something to say, say it now.”
“Please,” he whispers. “I cannot risk someone overhearing.”
“There is no one else,” I say. “Just you and me.”
He shakes his head.
“What are you afraid of?”
“I’d rather not say. Not here.”
“You’re not giving me a lot to go on, Brightonshire.” I roll my eyes. I can’t believe I’m even humoring this lunatic. “Why should I trust you?”
His hand reaches tentatively toward me, his fingers stretching until they lace through mine. Heat sparks along my knuckles, up my arm, and down my spine. My stomach tugs as I stare at his hand. A hand that, for all intents and purposes, was laid in a coffin with the rest of his body over two hundred years ago and should not be here, intersected with mine.
He holds my gaze. “Trust is not simple. It is not something that can be bought or earned within moments of meeting each other. But I promise you, if you let me through to your time, I will do everything you ask of me. I will follow your orders and be where you want me to be and say what you want me to say. If I ever once step out of line or give you any reason to doubt my intentions, you need simply order me back into the wood, and I will go.”
“Just like that?”