They made good ground. The fliers mostly remained close to the walls to avoid any possible currents. Ten minutes later, the tunnel expanded into a cavern so vast that even Henry's echolocation couldn't make out an opposing wall.

After about an hour, he spotted the first volcano. It stood quiet, save for the plumes of smoke drifting from its summit. They soon came across more, leading Henry to surmise that this must be one of the most volcanically active areas in the Firelands. Some grumbled ominously, and one leaked a few steady yet quickly cooling streams of lava.

Although none erupted, the air quickly grew hot and foul. Thoughts of Kismet and the volcano that had destroyed her home involuntarily crept into Henry's mind. For the first time since leaving her in the deserted nibbler colony, he began to wonder if she had made it back to the citadel unharmed. But she must have had. Henry shook his head to push away his worries. Kismet was resilient. She could fend for herself, and he had more immediate concerns to deal with—individuals in much more need of his help than Kismet. You must be fine, he thought, and almost smiled. Just be fine for a little longer.

They pressed on for another two hours. Occasionally, the currents would pick up, and they would quickly dive into nearby caves until they abated enough for safe flying. It slowed them down considerably, but at least the air was usually somewhat more breathable after a windstorm.

About the fifth time they headed in for a landing, Henry thought the fliers were overreacting. These currents were barely more than a breeze. Just as he was about to heed them to fly on, his echolocation picked up the true reason they had landed. Barely off Aurora's back, he froze in place.

"Flatten out on the floor," commanded Ripred before he remembered that he had forfeited command earlier. "My bad," he grinned, looking back and forth between Henry and Howard with a figuratively raised eyebrow. "Old habit."

"Do as he says." Luxa was already on the floor, peering out from behind a small pile of rocks. Henry and Howard exchanged glances, then followed her example, as did the others. Gregor lay on his stomach beside Luxa, while Thanatos crouched next to Henry with Thalia and Nike by his sides. Aurora and Ares squeezed behind a rock to his right, with Temp and Boots between them. Howard and Ripred dragged the unconscious nibblers off the bats to hide them as well.

Henry kneeled between Luxa and Thanatos and peered out, searching with his eye for what his echolocation had picked up earlier—movement—but couldn't see any source. There was a volcano with a golden glow issuing from the top. That had not been the movement, though.

Henry meant to open his mouth and ask whether anyone else saw something when Cartesian's voice behind him whispered, ". . . The others."

Only as Henry squinted into the ashy gray light and directed all his senses ahead did he finally make out the nibblers. Two gnawers directed them in single file along a lengthy, curved pathway that began at the mouth of a tunnel, high up in the rocks, and led to a pit at the base of the volcano. The edge of a cliff bordered one side of the pathway, while a stone wall ran along the other, obstructing their view of the pit. About midway, the pathway disappeared into the wall, and it wasn't until the nibblers emerged directly into the pit that they understood where the gnawers were leading them.

As the first ones were shoved out of the tunnel, they began to cry out warnings to those following. Henry squinted, and his heart skipped a beat when he believed he recognized the voices.

He reached into his backpack, fetched the binocular device that Gregor had given him earlier, and turned ahead, peering through. His eye swept across the hectic pile of nibblers, and . . . there! He hadn't misheard—first in line had been Lovelace. She implored the others to turn around, even shoving a few of her kin back up into the tunnel.

A large number of them heeded her call and turned, attempting to push their way back up, with some even crawling over the backs of others. A handful managed to succeed, only to be driven back by the gnawers.

The shrieks grew louder as the gnawers rolled a large boulder into place, sealing the tunnel shut. The nibblers desperately tried to push it aside, but it refused to budge, leaving them trapped.

Henry lowered the binoculars to call his party into action, but Luxa beat him to it, leaping to her feet first. "Let us go!"

"And do what?" asked Ripred, pulling her back down. "You, all of you, you've got to stop running into dangerous situations without using your heads! There's no faster way to get killed!"

Luxa shot Ripred a glare, breaking free from his grip. Standing up, Henry joined her and exclaimed, "What are you saying? This is our purpose for being here! We've found them, Ripred. They are Teslas' colony. It is why he brought us here. We cannot just sit idle, and . . . Let us lift them out of the pit to safety!"

Every fiber of his being itched to spring into action, so much so that he almost dropped Gregor's binoculars. Remaining passive went against his very essence. What was the use of sitting around, waiting for . . .

And what if we could have saved them? What would we have gotten out of that? His own words, uttered by a version of himself he had long ceased being, pierced his mind like blades. Back then, sitting idle had not been against his nature. On the contrary, he had judged Thanatos for the very thing he prided himself on now: protecting the weak at the risk of his life. Was it not what he prided himself on now?

For the first time since he had declared that he would be a hero, the realization slammed into Henry . . . and he smiled. What would his two-year-younger self, bitter and obsessed with invulnerability, say if he could see him now—him, who had long since embraced these habits that he had once judged so harshly?

He had been scared, thought Henry suddenly. Of not obtaining enough power and respect. Of trusting and relying on others. Of losing his life needlessly. Henry tightened his hand into a fist and looked up. He was no longer scared. "Let us fly."

Yet Ripred shook his head. "We could carry a handful. But there are hundreds trapped there." There was a kind of bitterness in his voice that Henry had not heard since the Vineyard and the story about the Garden of the Hesperides. "Don't you think the rats might notice an airlift? And then what? We lose the one element we've got in our favor—surprise."

"Then what do you want us to do? Wait for the volcano to smother them in lava?" Henry was less surprised than he thought to find tears shining in Luxa's eyes after . . . how many years?

"No! No, oh, for goodness sake! I just want you to think about it for a moment!" snapped Ripred.

"V is for volcano," Boots reminded everyone. "And valentine." She poked Ripred on the haunch with her scepter. "Valentine!"

Ripred slowly turned to look down at her. "Why are you here?"

Henry inevitably asked himself the same. She wasn't supposed to be here, and neither was Hazard, who now tugged at Luxa's sleeve. "We help them, right?"

Before she could reply, a gust of wind swept by, drawing everyone's attention. It wasn't strong enough to indicate that the currents were starting up, yet one overriding gust seemed to be blowing out of a nearby cave, sweeping the ashy haze toward the nibblers and giving Henry his first breath of clean air in hours.

"Hey, look, you need not argue," called Howard, pointing toward the nibblers. "They are taking action themselves!"

Henry raised the binoculars back to his face to see what Howard had meant, and he immediately discerned that the nibblers had overcome their initial panic and organized themselves to carry out an escape plan. Lovelace orchestrated it—she and . . . yes, that figure next to her, with the pearly white fur, was Curie.

Under their supervision, the rest had begun to build a triangular formation by bracing themselves along the far wall of the pit. A single row of nibblers formed the base while others swarmed onto their backs, and so the triangle rose quickly before their eyes.

"That's smart. A pyramid!" Gregor remarked, and to everyone's surprise, it was Cartesian who responded.

"It's the Isosceles maneuver," he said. When Henry lowered the binoculars, he observed that, for the first time since they had rescued him, Cartesian was awake and thinking clearly.

"What's that?" asked Gregor.

Another unexpected voice replied: "It is not a true pyramid, for it has three, not four points. Rather, they aspire to mimic a two-dimensional triangle." Teslas sounded weak, but he sat up, staring at his colony with them all. "I knew you could . . . do it, Lovelace." Henry understood his whisper only through his heightened hearing.

"See, they have a plan. Let's work with it." Ripred leaped back to his feet. "What they need is someone to hold that path if the rats come through."

"Then we will do it," declared Luxa, and Henry nodded, tightening his hand on the handle of his sword.

"Lad, fliers, you keep your senses peeked for the gnawers," commanded Ripred, and just this once, Henry did not complain about being ordered around. After all, he was already doing exactly that. "Good," said Ripred when he saw that they complied, apparently no longer concerned with appearing humble or asking who the leader was. "Temp, watch the pups. The rest mount up."

Henry had already taken a first step toward Thanatos when Luxa suddenly had his arm. "Hold on! We should wait until the boulder begins to move. That will give us time to reach the path, but not alert the gnawers to our presence beforehand."

"Good. Very good. Now you are thinking," snarled Ripred. "Everyone, wait as she says."

With a reluctant sigh, Henry kneeled back down. He hated waiting, but Luxa had a point. Alongside the others, he kept his watch on the boulder, with the advantage of the binoculars.

These were the nibblers he had been chasing after all this time . . . and they were so close, almost in reach. Henry once again thought that it went against his nature to sit here and leave them in peril. Only feeling Thanatos by his side eased him a little.

A minute went by, and then the nibblers' Isosceles formation was almost at the top of the pit. Henry ceased biting his lip before he would have drawn blood. Where on earth were the gnawers?

"If there were to be lava, would we have some warning?" asked Howard into the loaded silence.

"Generally, I believe there's a rumbling, some sort of sound," replied Ripred. "Although I am no expert."

"There is," said Henry, remembering the volcano by Kismet's cave. "We would long be hearing sounds if it were erupting." He sat straighter when he spotted that the first nibbler had reached the edge of the pit. He held on to the ledge, stabilizing the formation. The escape plan was working.

"Maybe the rats won't come back . . . ?" Gregor sounded as uncertain as Henry felt. "Maybe they didn't figure that the mice could get out?"

"You really think they are such fools?" Henry couldn't tear his gaze away from the nibblers. He may pride himself on his optimism, but even he did not trust in so much luck.

"I agree. Something is wrong," said Luxa. "Why would the gnawers allow this?"

"They wouldn't." The grim tone had returned to Ripred's voice. "Unless they were expecting something else to do their work."

A terrible premonition swept over Henry about what was truly happening here, about the gnawers' true plan for this colony's fate. It couldn't be any more pleasant than that of the colony they had chased down a cliff, but . . . "There is no lava," he urged. "No eruption."

"Not lava, it be, not lava." All heads turned toward Temp; his antennas waved, and his feet nervously stepped. "Not lava," he mumbled over and over. "Not lava, not lava." He broke off and began erratically clicking.

"What's he saying, Hazard?" asked Gregor, and a discussion broke out, but Henry kept his eye through the binoculars fixed on the nibblers. He lifted one leg to get to his feet and fly, to lift at least a few out before the dreadful sense in the pit of his stomach materialized into reality . . . and it would be too late.

Yet before he could move, Ripred pressed him back down to the floor. Henry groaned, wriggling up just enough to raise his binoculars again, and observed that the nibblers in formation had sent the pups up now. Five little ones made their way to the top, and Henry's throat tightened as he recognized them—they were Curie's and Cevian's. Henry made out Kepler's dark gray fur and noticed that he was having trouble climbing. Eventually, the cause of his difficulty slipped from his paw and hit the bottom of the pit with a clear crack. Henry would have bet Mys it was the other half of his figurine.

Kepler wailed, meaning to climb back down, but Curie, who had followed behind, shoved him back up. Slowly turning and reaching up to climb on, he suddenly . . . lost his grip. Henry watched him fall, knocking down two others who had been following.

What . . . what was happening? Henry tightened his grip on the binoculars, unable to avert his eye from the living formation.

"The nibblers . . . something is happening to them!" Howard confirmed that the others were seeing it too, and despite the sting in his head and Ripred's grunt of protest, Henry sprung to his feet. Disregarding the ache in his head, he leaned on the rock where they had taken cover.

Henry watched the pups urgently as they climbed. They had almost reached the top. But then, one by one, they . . . lost their grip, just as Kepler had. And one by one . . . they fell.

It did not take long for the first adult nibbler to follow. The one at the top of the triangle faltered first, then another, and another . . . until the entire formation disintegrated.

Soon, every last nibbler had collapsed in a heap. But they were not dead. Henry could feel the sharp edge of the binoculars on his skin as he pressed them firmly against his eye and stared at the scene—at the bodies . . . flailing, as if in agony. Yet, he found no source.

As soon as the others processed what was happening, chaos broke out. "What's going on?" called Gregor.

"We must go!" shouted Luxa.

Beside Henry, Thanatos had spread his wings. "I will go."

"Not go, you do, not go!" begged Temp.

Henry's head spun, and he jumped when Ripred called toward him, "Lad! What is happening?!"

Henry pressed the binoculars to his face yet again . . . only for his jaw to drop in horror. "I know not, I—" he stammered, unable to find words for the nightmare unfolding before his eye. The nibblers writhed at the bottom of the pit, clawing at the air and their own necks.

Henry instinctively scanned the heap for familiar faces, spotting Curie's white coat—her body convulsing with violent spasms. There were her mother and her young . . . Two of them already lay still; the others still fought, gasped, twined, like . . . "They cannot breathe!" he finally burst out. "They're suffocating!"

"It must be poison gas leaking from the volcano!" yelled Ripred. "No one fly! Not one of you fly there!"

Luxa let out a maniacal scream, and the sick feeling that had been brewing in his gut washed over Henry as he processed the meaning of Ripred's words . . . along with a wave of unbearable helplessness.

Then Thanatos beside him jerked around, nearly mowing him off his feet. "No!"

Henry barely managed to drop the binoculars in time to grab hold of his saddle gear, forcing him back to the ground. "You cannot help them!" he yelled, to convince himself as well as his flier. "We cannot help them!"

Thanatos writhed and screamed, seemingly deaf to Henry's cries. His wings extended in violent jolts, and if Ripred hadn't leaped to hold the large flier down with his own weight, Henry would have lost him. Thanatos let out a terrible, high-pitched howl, unlike anything Henry had heard from him in a long time. They were names . . . He cried out names. Their names. Curie, over and over.

"Take flight, Aurora!" yelled Luxa, as though she had heard nothing, and another jolt of fear for her shot through Henry. It only abated when Howard restrained her before she could mount up.

He fought against her resistance vehemently, while Ares tackled Aurora before she could lift off. "You cannot help!" he screamed. "Not help now!"

Aurora howled and twined, but Ares held her firmly. On her other side, Nike cradled Hazard and Thalia, though her gaze was on the still-struggling Thanatos, who was much harder to restrain. "Release me!" he screamed as Ripred and Henry held onto him firmly.

"Death!" yelled Henry. "Death! Cease! Please! Please!"

Only when one of Thanatos' extending wings collided with Henry's stomach and he was flung backward, crying out in pain, did Thanatos cease his struggle. "I am—" He heaved. "I—"

Henry gasped for the air that the blow had pressed out of his lungs, clutching his aching stomach. He attempted to rise to his feet when something startled him as it dashed past—Cartesian, who had managed to limp forward as if attempting to fling himself in the air. Whether he meant to catch a current toward the others or simply kill himself, Henry didn't know.

The first airstream he met catapulted him upward, and Nike had to release the children in order to catch him. Teslas sat still as stone, his face an agonized, frozen mask.

"No one take flight!" repeated Ripred urgently.

Henry heaved, pulling to all fours, then falling forward and into Thanatos. "Do not fly," he repeated Ripred's words. "Do not . . . not . . ." He pressed his face into the fur of his flier as if, in this manner, he could escape the horrific image that unfolded . . . before his ears once he was no longer looking with his eye.

There was no blocking out the hundreds of agonized screams that echoed and wormed their way into his ears like slithering, vile worms, eating into his flesh and nestling in his brain. The shrill, unstatic image they forced him to see burned itself into his inner eye—a mass of hundreds convulsing, their energies jerking together with their limbs, their haunting screams painting their bodies in the colors of agony.

And then, all of them stilling . . . dying, one by one.

Henry's already pulsing head flooded and drowned in all the details that he hadn't asked for. No matter how firmly he pushed his palms into his ears, no matter how hard he fought with his mind, he couldn't switch it off. It wouldn't stop. It wouldn't . . .

Only when Thanatos rammed his head into his side did Henry realize that he had been screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Lad, you okay?"

Henry heaved, finally managing to give Ripred a nod. The questers all stared at him with wide eyes . . . He attempted to focus on the fragments of words he eventually made out being exchanged—Luxa, Boots, and Gregor, then Ripred's angry voice—but Henry felt less in control of his perception than he had in ages. All he could do was cower above Thanatos, clinging to him like a lifeline that saved him from being consumed by the screams of the dying.

As Henry fought desperately to regain control, his mind drifted into oblivion. He hadn't regretted having crossed the threshold in ages . . . He didn't want to recall the last time he had regretted it. Henry heaved, forcing himself to confront the images it forced him to see headfirst. If he confronted it . . . would he have less fear?

The first thing he registered was that Platonius and Curie had already stilled. Pollux ceased twining next. Lovelace clawed her own throat bloody before her body went rigid . . . and then it was over.

A wave of overwhelming relief flooded Henry when he took in the stillness . . . only for the realization to descend upon him that this silence was not peace; it was grave.

The thought sent a jolt of visceral panic through Henry's body. Another scream ripped out of his throat as he dragged himself to his feet, releasing Thanatos for the sake of yet again covering his ears with his hands. Why wouldn't the world just be still? Why couldn't he have silence?

Henry reeled forward without a goal, yet moments later, he found himself caught in Ripred's grasp. "Lad! Lad!"

Somewhere behind him, Thanatos howled. Someone sobbed. Something crashed to the ground.

"Lad, are you with us?" Ripred asked again. Yet Henry could do nothing but press his hands into his ears and scream. His vision blurred. He barely registered Thanatos behind him, wailing . . . something. "Lad?"

Were they still screaming? Henry looked up at Ripred for confirmation. "Why won't they cease screaming?" he pressed out of his throat. "They are dead. What do they still scream for?"

He forced air in and out of his lungs, watching Ripred's expression shift. "My lad, they ceased screaming long ago."

Henry stared at him incredulously, registering a twinge of concern before his vision sparked and fragmented, then faded into black oblivion.

***

"Catch the nibblers in a trap / Watch the nibblers spin and snap."

Was he dreaming? Had that song—that ridiculous, nonsensical children's song, sung in Boots' cheerful little voice—followed him into his dreams?

"Oh, he's waking! Doesn't being so powerful in your senses have downsides?"

No. No, he wasn't dreaming. Henry flung his eye open and jerked up, groaning in pain. His hand felt the back of his head and sensed a fresh bandage. "I . . . ah . . . what happened?" He blinked and took in the sorry pile that had gathered around him. All there, and on his left . . . "You live!"

Henry wrapped his arms around the neck of his bond, heaving. "I live," he mumbled. "I am . . . I am well. I am . . ."

"Lad, you attempted to tell us that the screams persisted after they had long ceased," said Ripred. "You are not well."

"I couldn't stop hearing them," mumbled Henry, his gaze flicking toward the pit. "I heard . . . saw . . ." He couldn't speak on. He could only bury his face in Thanatos' fur and battle the urge to sob.

"We all saw," said Luxa on his other side. Her eyes held a weighty sorrow, yet also a tinge of compassion.

"Not like he did, Your Highness," said Ripred.

Henry forced himself to take a deep breath, battling the relentless images that flooded him again . . . The images he hadn't asked for yet had been unable to lock out. "I saw . . . I mean, I heard," he whispered.

"Because you hear better than other humans?" asked Gregor in a stale voice.

Henry nodded. He had no idea how long he sat there with his bond, with his questers, huddling and hurting together. Minutes must have passed . . . All throughout, the innocent voice of Boots continued her little song: "Catch the nibblers in a trap! Watch the nibblers spin and snap! Quiet while they take a nap!"

"Stop it!" called Gregor suddenly, and Henry couldn't really blame him. But how was Boots to know that this wasn't the time to sing? She didn't, and so she neared a tantrum, no matter how many times the Overlander apologized.

"Mouses do dance!" she insisted. "I just do dance like mouses!"

"I know," said Gregor. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"I want to dance like the mouses do dance," said Boots, sniffling.

"It's okay. Don't cry," insisted Gregor, stroking her curls, although Henry could tell that the Overlander himself was moments from breaking into tears.

A dance . . . Henry recalled the images of twining bodies; it must've looked like a dance to her innocent eyes. It was . . . not so implausible, thought Henry, clinging to Thanatos and feeling his tremble. The song described a dance. Boots . . . hadn't known what was happening, so she had seen only what she had known. What she had sung.

"She's right," Gregor said suddenly, his voice breaking.

"How so?" asked Ares.

"That song. That part about the nibblers," said Gregor, shifting where he sat. "We just watched it happen."

Only then did Henry jerk up, despite the sting in his head. He stared at Gregor, mouth agape. "Catch the nibblers in a trap," he whispered. "But—"

"That!" called Gregor. "That's not a song. That's a prophecy! Don't you see?"

Henry's mouth opened, then closed again. All around him, the faces of the others showed the same mix of emotions that he felt . . . although, for some reason, Henry found it hard to be as disbelieving as some of them looked.

"Sandwich wrote it, right?" the Overlander continued, beginning to pace. "He carved it in the nursery."

"Yes, he carved it in the nursery, not the room of prophecies," said Luxa. "And we do not know who wrote it, it is so old."

"That song stems from the old nursery," interjected Henry. "It is carved on the right wall, just across from the Death Rider mural. All of the murals there are at least inspired by Sandwich's work, so it has to be."

"See?" exclaimed Gregor.

"See what?" asked Boots.

Henry extended a hand, pulling her onto his lap. "We speak of that favorite song of yours," he said. "Father, mother, sister, brother / Off they go."

"I do not know / If we will see another!" Boots finished, clapping.

"Sandwich wrote it, and it's happening now!" insisted Gregor. "We just watched the nibblers get caught in a trap and dance all around and take a nap—only it isn't a nap, not the kind you wake up from!" He reeled. "Like, "Father, mother, sister, brother, off they go"! To die! Don't you see?!"

The others were still skeptical, as Henry saw, but all of a sudden it clicked in his own head, and he stilled to stone.

"Off they go . . . to die," mumbled Thanatos.

"I felt that there was something more to it," said Henry. "It has never sat right with me that Sandwich had supposedly written an innocent children's song." This was why he had loved it so much—so much that he had taught it to the nibblers and sang it to the pups—the very same pups who had died here today, it suddenly hit him.

"You get it!" exclaimed Gregor.

"Yes, yes, the lad's wise. And so may you be, it seems." Ripred planted himself in front of Gregor, then began to pace too. "What is it? That nonsense in the first verse. How does it go? Someone sing it!"

Hazard's high voice piped up: "Dancing in the firelight / See the queen who conquers night / Gold flows from her, hot and bright."

"That's enough," Ripred cut in. "Dancing in the firelight . . ." He stared at the glowing volcano. "We've got firelight, anyway."

"See the queen who conquers night." Nike scooted back and forth before her gaze fixated on Luxa. "You could be the queen."

Luxa shook her head. "I am not dancing. Nor have I been."

"Maybe it's not the queen who dances," Howard finally mumbled. He looked the most skeptical of them all, but even in his eyes, Henry saw that he acknowledged Gregor's point. "Things may be said to dance in the light. When it flickers. Someone's eyes, water, anything, really."

"The nibblers danced in the firelight," Aurora whispered.

"Dancing aside, we still need a queen," grumbled Ripred.

"Gold flows from her, hot and bright," repeated Ares. "Luxa has no gold."

"I have nothing but rags," Luxa mumbled. "I cannot be the queen."

Before anyone could reply, the ground beneath them trembled with a low but foreboding rumble. Henry instantly released Thanatos and glanced up at the volcano. A thin stream of lava bubbled out of the top and ran down the side toward the pit. As . . . gold as gold could be.

"Gold flows from her, hot and bright," mumbled Nike. "You don't think . . ."

"I think the Overlander's right," Ripred cut her off and scrambled up, pointing at the volcano. "There's your gold."

Gregor followed his gaze, adding, "And there's your queen."

As if on cue, a second, more powerful rumble jolted the ground beneath them. "Get out of here!" Ripred's voice competed with the now-deafening volcano. Yet, as they attempted to mount the fliers, everything descended into chaos. With so many seat changes, no one knew where they were supposed to go.

Henry's mouth opened, yet the only thing on his mind was that song . . . prophecy, thought Henry. It was a prophecy. Dancing in the firelight. See the queen . . . He stared up at her, dazed. The queen . . . His cracked lips formed the words silently.

Only Ares' cry from behind jolted him back into reality: "Luxa, Death Rider, Teslas—on Aurora. Howard, Hazard, Cartesian—on Thanatos. Gregor, Boots, Temp—on Nike. Ripred—with me. Thalia, fly under me in case you tire!"

Henry blindly staggered over to Aurora, infinitely glad that Ares had the mind for this right now. Everyone else did the same, and so, they all manage to get a seat.

Henry ended up wedged between Luxa and Teslas, who dug his talons into his backpack, fervently trembling. As soon as the fliers took off, they were swept up in a strong current coming from a cave overhead—what timing!

They were heading directly for the volcano, and initially, Henry was concerned about the eruption and any potential remaining gas, but then he understood that their only way forward was to ride the winds. It had to blow somewhere, and they had no choice but to hope that it would be a better place . . . If only it didn't grow stronger.

The longer Henry stared at Thanatos, flying directly ahead, the more he felt himself losing consciousness again. His head pulsed, and he sank against Luxa, fighting to keep his eye open. The rumbling from the queen tore his eardrums, yet at that moment, it almost sounded . . . soothing.

Dancing in the firelight / See the queen who conquers night. Boots' singing registered with him, as it had before. But no, that didn't seem possible. Boots was on Nike . . . or Ares? Was she here with them? Suddenly, Henry couldn't recall. All he could hear was the voice, echoing the song repeatedly—a lullaby. It was a lullaby . . . it was a . . . No, it was a prophecy. Was it not a lullaby anymore if it was a prophecy?

Out of nowhere, Aurora plummeted a few feet, and Luxa yelped. Teslas' grip behind him tightened, jolting Henry back to reality. The golden bat wavered and panted, struggling to maintain height. The thought that they all might be too heavy for her filled Henry with fear.

Luxa cried out, then soothed. She leaned forward over her bond's neck, pressing her face into her golden fur. Desperately, Aurora moved her wings until she regained control, and Henry's head slumped forward yet again, catching a glimpse of the lava slowly leaking from the volcano and seeping into the pit with the nibblers.

At the sight, a spear pierced his heart. Henry longed to say something, perhaps "rest in peace" or "you will never be forgotten," but he couldn't even bring himself to weep. Once again, he leaned forward and rested his head on Luxa's back, unable to do anything but stare, not actively trying to make out familiar shapes but unable to resist doing so.

They were dead . . . Were they dead? They looked so peaceful. Perhaps Boots had been right, and they were only taking a nap. Sleeping . . .

And just like that, Henry's own eye fell shut. One final moment he battled, then he yielded to the all-encompassing silence that he had craved so much after his last view of the pit below and the pearly white coat of Curie . . . sleeping.