The Last Keeper E-Book

Kathryn Butler

• Herausgeber: Crossway
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: The Dream Keeper Saga
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 429

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

Book 5 Concludes the Dream Keeper Saga, an Adventure for Middle-Grade Readers Steeped in Magic, Mystery, and Glimmers of Hope After a worldwide quest to save the planet from Eymah and his nightmares, Lily is now racing to escape the dark caverns of the Realm. Joined by Keisha, Adam, and their magical friends, she fights Eymah's monsters in an unrelenting battle of ice and fire. When she meets an elder centaur along the way, Lily learns about an ancient scroll that foretells the last keeper—one who prepares the way for the arrival of the prince. Could it really be her? In her final fight to defend the earth and the Realm, Lily relies on her faith in Pax's promise: that he will return and make all things new. The thrilling conclusion to the Dream Keeper Saga takes middle-grade readers on an adventure filled with talking dragons, monsters, wizards, and more. Mixing fantasy with Christian themes, this novel invites families to reflect on and discuss God's story of redemption. - Ideal for Middle-Grade Readers and Families: Includes kids' favorite fantasy and adventure elements, with imaginative new characters and settings they'll love - Christian Themes: Invites readers into deep conversations about the gospel and theological issues, including faith, sacrifice, and salvation - Book 5 in the Dream Keeper Saga: This thrilling story concludes the adventure series by Kathryn Butler

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“Faith, purpose, friendship, and hope. These themes and more draw young readers into a world where dreams come to life. Butler brings creative imagination and spiritual depth together in a way that keeps children engaged and curious. The larger-than-life storyline of the Dream Keeper Saga is worth daydreaming about at your desk and discussing with your family around the table.”

Gloria Furman, author, Labor with Hope and A Tale of Two Kings

“Where have all the good books gone? The ones that celebrate the beauty of light, instead of romanticizing the darkness? The ones where words are strung together so beautifully that grown-ups and children alike are captivated by the story as it unfolds? The ones where heroes do what’s right and villains are put in their place? Far too few books like these take up space on my children’s bookshelves, but as a mom I refuse to believe that all the great children’s literature was written in days gone by. That’s why I adore the Dream Keeper Saga, written by the tremendously talented Kathryn Butler. My sons have devoured these books and learned important lessons as they read. These new classics remind us all that there are still great stories worth telling.”

Erin Davis, author; podcaster; mom of four

“Kathryn Butler’s writing effortlessly draws readers into an imaginative, action-packed world of fantasy that is marked with clear allegorical themes of the truest story ever told. You will laugh and cry with the characters, all while being beautifully pointed to the gospel.”

Korrie Johnson, children’s book reviewer; Founder, Good Book Mom

“I want to know Pax. With each book, he becomes more compelling, and with him, the whole saga. Some series begin with their best tale, then try to muster up sequels. The Dream Keeper Saga gets better with each book. Kathryn Butler wins our trust with her characters, engaging turns, and deeply Christian themes. I’m excited to add the Dream Keeper Saga to our family canon.”

David Mathis, Senior Teacher and Executive Editor, desiringGod.org; Pastor, Cities Church, Saint Paul, Minnesota; author, Habits of Grace

“Two of my favorite things about the Dream Keeper Saga are the character Pax and the almost Mad-Libs-esque imaginative flow, appropriate (even necessary) to a world redeemed from humanity’s collective dreams.”

James D. Witmer, author, A Year in the Big Old Garden; Beside the Pond; and The Strange New Dog

The Last Keeper

The Dream Keeper Saga

The Dragon and the Stone

The Prince and the Blight

Lost in the Caverns

The Quest for the Guardians

The Last Keeper

The Last Keeper

Kathryn Butler

The Last Keeper

© 2025 by Kathryn Butler

Published by Crossway1300 Crescent StreetWheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided for by USA copyright law. Crossway® is a registered trademark in the United States of America.

On page 241, Lily quotes Alfred Tennyson, Idylls of the King, “The Passing of Arthur” (1869), line 427, https://www.oxfordreference.com/.

Published in association with the literary agency of Wolgemuth & Associates.

Cover design: Studio Muti

Interior illustrations: Jordan Eskovitz

First printing 2025

Printed in the United States of America

Trade paperback ISBN: 978-1-4335-8786-3 ePub ISBN: 978-1-4335-8789-4 PDF ISBN: 978-1-4335-8787-0

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Butler, Kathryn, 1980– author. | Butler, Kathryn, 1980– Dream keeper saga ; bk. 5.

Title: The last keeper / Kathryn Butler.

Description: Wheaton, Illinois : Crossway, 2025. | Series: The dream keeper saga ; vol. 5 | Audience: Ages 9–12.

Identifiers: LCCN 2024007315 (print) | LCCN 2024007316 (ebook) | ISBN 9781433587863 (trade paperback) | ISBN 9781433587870 (pdf) | ISBN 9781433587894 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: Magic—Juvenile fiction. | Dreams—Juvenile fiction. | Adventure stories. | CYAC: Magic—Fiction. | Dreams—Fiction. | Adventure and adventurers—Fiction. | Fantasy. | LCGFT: Fantasy fiction. | Action and adventure fiction.

Classification: LCC PZ7.1.B8935 La 2025 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.B8935 (ebook) | DDC 813.6 [Fic]—dc23/eng/20240610

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024007315

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2024007316

Crossway is a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.

2025-03-05 03:41:45 PM

To Jack, Christie, and dream keepers everywhere.

Know he is making all things new.

Contents

  Map

1  Darkness Awakens

2  The Cry in the Shadows

3  Lost in the Caverns

4  Darkness Unleashed

5  The Blue Chamber

6  A Frozen World

7  Polaris

8  Vixenburg

9  Batten Down the Hatches

10  Kangaroos and Crustaceans

11  Fire in the Air

12  The Fall of the Sapphire

13  The Centaurs’ Prophecy

14  Castle Iridyll

15  The Tower

16  Ice and Fire

17  Camelot

18  Darkness Pursues

19  Tending Wounds

20  Fire and Daggers

21  The Sojourner in the Smoke

22  The Council

23  Maps and Firelight

24  The Compass

25  Across the Still Waters

26  The Lost King

27  Darkness Pillages

28  The Sunstone

29  The King Returns

30  The Vow in the Stars

31  Besieged

32  The Frontier

33  The Mountain

34  The King and the Dragon

35  Endings and Beginnings

  Acknowledgments

Chapter 1

Darkness Awakens

He awoke to darkness.

He lay on his back and stared into a void. Blinking several times cleared the grit from his eyes but didn’t sharpen his vision. In the silence and the dark, he struggled to remember where he was, how he’d arrived there—even his own name.

Oddly, he wasn’t afraid. The gloom felt like a worn, unwashed cloak dragging about his shoulders, its damp and musty scent repulsive, but the weave one he’d memorized. He knew the darkness even as he despised it.

His fingers searched the ground beneath him, and a carpet of dust gave way beneath his hands to reveal cold rock. As he hoisted himself upright, his limbs seized up with pain and sparks of color swam before his otherwise sightless eyes. He opened his mouth to moan, but no sound issued from his gummy lips. His throat felt like crumbling paper, as parched as if he’d drunk his fill from desert sands.

Desert. Hatred surged up from within him like a geyser, and he gripped the jagged rock. “Curse them!” he shouted into the emptiness. His voice, forced through stiff vocal cords, came out as a rasp. The growl that should have rumbled low in his throat instead wheezed out like a last gasp for breath, and as it petered away, cold determination pulsed within him like a heartbeat. A single thought etched across his mind: I will have vengeance.

He crawled to his feet, ignoring a second wave of pain that locked his joints, and he searched the shadows for some inkling of form, some pale whisper of light to hint at his whereabouts. Instead, all was lightless and shapeless and stifling. The longer he strained his vision, the more his head throbbed and the hotter his anger burned. He didn’t remember who had condemned him to this underworld, or why, but he knew he hated them.

He stretched one trembling arm in front of him, and his twitching fingers groped only empty air. He flailed to the side, and his palm knocked against damp rock. The wall of a cave? Or a tunnel? A tomb? Hatred for his nameless, faceless enemy propelled his legs forward, as a steam engine prods the sluggish gears of a locomotive. “I will find you,” he hissed. With one hand planted on the rock wall and the other extended with his fingers splayed wide, he plunged ahead into the darkness.

Minutes stretched into hours, hours stretched into days, and soon time itself seemed like a dream, a long-lost memory he couldn’t grasp. The clammy rock anchored him in space for a while, but eventually his palm slipped and he stumbled through the abyss without mooring. As he trudged and the blackness gathered around him like muck from a bog, he cursed the day of his birth and wailed as one lost. Still, on he wandered, his pale green eyes glowing in the darkness like ghostly moons.

Images haunted him. He remembered white spires gleaming like icicles against a cragged mountain. A court of nobles in white robes and silver circlets. A young girl with smoke-dark eyes and hair like drifting snow. He saw green fire, heard the clink of amulets as he walked. Every so often he would hear the sound of his own name, but before he could latch onto the word, it would vanish like a wisp of smoke.

On and on he trudged. His fingers, icy from the long days in the deep dark, toyed with a broken chain at his neck and picked at a tattered cloak at his shoulders, both vestiges of who he once was. His crumbling leather boots had split at the seams, and as he tromped over rock and through sand, every so often he’d drop into the dust to rub the blisters welling on his soles. Over time his stomach twisted with emptiness, and in a fog of starvation he swooned and collapsed to his knees. When he could stand his hunger no longer, he scooped handfuls of dust from the ground and feasted upon the earth, crunching sand grains between his teeth and filling his belly with dirt.

Still, his anger smoldered. “I will have vengeance. I must have vengeance!” he finally cried out, puffing out dust from his cracked lips. “Crush them. Ruin them. Curse them!”

As if in reply, a light flickered in the distance.

He squeezed his eyes shut, convinced they deceived him in the endless night. Yet when he opened them and peered into the darkness, the light still glowed. Faint. Icy blue. Wavering, like a candle flame clinging to life in a breeze.

At the sight of the glimmer, something turned over in his mind like an ancient, forgotten lock clicking open. He knew this light. And he knew that he desired it above all things—more than the sunlight, more than vengeance, even more than his own life.

He quickened his pace. I must have it.

His right boot tore away completely, and he hobbled across the rock floor. Still, he stumbled forward. The distant gleam burned in his pale eyes.

It’s mine.

The light shined just feet ahead. Too frantic to waste a moment, he leapt through the air and landed chest-first onto a pile of rocks. The impact stole his breath, but still he scrambled, clawing at stones, his eyes wild. Finally, he snatched up the source of the light from among the rocks and lifted it between two pale, trembling fingers. His eyes, steeped in shadows for so long, watered from the glare.

It was a fragment of a turquoise crystal, a pale fire glowing at its core.

The stone tingled in his hands, and its surface emitted a cool, life-giving balm. He clasped the crystal to his heart, then rolled onto his back and filled the cavern with wild laughter. “I have it!” he cried. “I have it! All will be mine!”

As the echo of his words died away, a burst of hot wind suddenly rushed down the tunnel, blasting his face and pelting him with gravel. His fist instinctively closed around the crystal, and he bolted upright as another gust struck him, whipping his grimy hair away from his face. The wind smelled rank, like the breath of a foul beast just stirred from slumber. “Who’s there?” he shouted.

The wind died down, as if his voice had frightened it away. He held his breath, listened, and waited.

Nothing.

He strained his eyes but saw no movement, light, or hint of life. Only the blue light of the stone shone through his closed fist, casting a haunting aura throughout the cavern like moonlight on black water. Its glow illuminated the sharp stalactites that hung from the cave ceiling like gleaming teeth. Otherwise, all was still and lonely and silent.

He snickered to himself, shrugged off his last shred of unease, and opened his palm to leer at his treasure.

The wind blasted again, this time with the howl of a banshee at its back. At the sound, ice coursed through his veins and he backed away, his fist still closed around the stone and his eyes frantically searching the inky shadows. By the cold light of the crystal he glimpsed something dark and amorphous, like a living, writhing storm cloud billowing down the passage toward him.

He turned to run, but in his fright he careened straight into the rock wall. When he spun around, the specter was upon him, enveloping him in the scent of decay. Another howl filled his ears, and he realized that the sound now gurgled from his own throat, his voice anguished and sharp with a malice he didn’t recognize.

He fell as if dead. Hours passed. Although his heartbeat still thudded and shallow breath occasionally seeped into his lungs, he neither stirred nor dreamed. Finally, he awoke, his chest burning and his fingers still closed around the crystal wedged in his palm. When he creaked to a stand, he opened eyes no longer pale green but red, as if plucked from the fiery depths of the earth.

We will make her pay, a raspy voice spoke into his mind. You will be her ruin. But first, you must serve me. You must open the way.

Suddenly, despite the darkness, he could see the cave floor strewn with sand and debris. The crystal shard’s glow intensified like a fallen star ablaze in his hand. As his black heart raced with anticipation, a terrible pain seared within his mind and coursed down his arms. In the next instant, an aura of blue flame erupted from the stone, struck the cave wall in front of him, and rent the rock asunder. A tunnel yawned open, blue veins of lightning crackling across its entrance. Then, a thousand moans sounded around him as shadows sped past, flew through the opening, and disappeared into the unknown.

He paid them no attention. His thoughts revolved around the one whom he sought, the one whose image he now remembered: the girl on the mesa, her hands uplifted, cords of light flying from her palms.

Chapter 2

The Cry in the Shadows

“I say, little fellow, not so quick now! We’re not quite as spry as you!”

Cedric chased after Flint, who’d darted into the cavern with Rigel flitting close behind. Lily cast a final glance over her shoulder at the wall of stone behind her. The rock face glowed slightly, its seams still warm from where she’d sealed the breach only moments before. The shrouds had screeched past her in a gray tide, and afterward the walls of rock had spiraled like water swirling down a drain, and the breach had clasped shut. As she searched the cave to orient herself, Lily half-expected a shroud to dart out from behind a tumble of rocks or to ooze like dripping tar from the stalactites up above. However, she saw only the glow of Flint skittering through the cave and heard only the occasional drip of water onto ancient rock.

It’s okay, she thought, her shoulders relaxing. It’s really okay. She replayed the events of the past hour in her mind: the hordes of shrouds charging toward them over the Egyptian desert. The breach yawning open like a ravenous mouth in the Sphinx’s headdress. The flaming pearl. Gabrielle and Yong fighting to reel in the shrouds. Dad. As the cool, damp air dappled her arms with goose bumps, she clung to the memory of her father holding up a bedraggled Sprock and encouraging her with tears in his eyes. “Go, Lily,” he’d urged her. “I love you. Go.”

Lily’s throat tightened. Dad was supposed to join her through the breach. She’d counted on him walking beside her for this next journey through the Realm, squeezing her shoulder every so often to reassure her that she wasn’t alone. She’d come to rely upon the comfort of his voice, his stories, and even his dopey jokes.

But he’s safe, Lily told herself. With the shrouds now expelled from the waking world, Dad was safe. So were Mom, Gran, Keisha’s and Adam’s families, and countless others who’d run screaming as the shrouds blackened the sky. After teetering on the brink of annihilation, the world was safe again. Pax had shown her the way. “Thank you,” she whispered.

“Hey, Lily, wait up!” Adam sloshed through a puddle and joined her. “You know, you were amazing back there. I mean, I’ve seen you do some awesome stuff before, but—well, you know. This was really awesome.”

He coaxed a smile from her. “Thanks, Adam. You were pretty awesome, too.”

“Nah, it was all Gabi. I couldn’t have made a dent against any of those shrouds if she hadn’t taught me how to use this.” He turned his boleadora in his hands, then swung his backpack to the front and stuffed the weapon into a zippered pouch.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” Keisha said, still panting from their flight into the cavern. She leaned on her staff to catch her breath. “That ghoul would have gotten Lily if you hadn’t bonked him.”

He shrugged. “I gotta say, part of me can’t believe we actually made it. It doesn’t seem real. I feel like I’ll wake up soon and find out I’m late for camp again.”

“Late again? I thought you got your alarm clock fixed,” Keisha said.

“I did fix it. I just hit the snooze button a lot.”

“Oh, Adam.”

“What? What’s the point of a snooze button if you’re not going to snooze?”

Keisha rolled her eyes. “So, what’s next, Lily?

“We go back to Castle Eerie-whatever, right?” Adam said. He shot Keisha a glance. “See, I pay attention!”

“Castle Iridyll,” Lily said. “Yeah, I think so. We need to warn Merlin about what’s happened.”

“Indeed, I believe we do, Miss Lily!” Cedric called back from within the tunnel up ahead. A dozen steps pattered toward them like rain against a rooftop, and in the next instant he appeared.

“We must return to Castle Iridyll, and with haste. After their jaunt in your world feeding off wakey-folk fears, the shrouds are more powerful than when they last slithered about the Realm. Your lassos weakened them, but they could still do dreadful damage if we don’t act quickly.”

With a shudder, Lily remembered Glower’s words when he taunted her on Sprock’s mountain: Once we’ve supped and regained our strength, our master will rise again.

“Cedric? Do you think the shrouds are strong enough to do what they threatened? You know—band together again and bring Eymah back?”

Cedric avoided her gaze, and for a moment his gait stiffened. “Well, now. You and the other guardians did shrivel them up a bit. Let’s not worry about hypotheticals until they become probabilities, shall we?”

“Hippo-whats and probba-billy-whose?” Adam asked.

“He means we shouldn’t worry when we have so little information,” Keisha said.

“Then why didn’t he just say that?”

Cedric clucked his tongue. “It’s always amusing to have you along on our adventures, Master Adam. I’m glad to have you here.”

“Speaking of ‘here,’” Keisha said, her gaze shifting warily about the cavern, “where are we?”

“Truthfully, I’d rather hoped you’d be able to tell us, Miss Keisha. I haven’t the foggiest idea. We scouts aren’t much for spelunking. There’s a reason our Creator blessed me with wings rather than with the digging claws of some of my brethren.”

Keisha turned in place and scrutinized the walls. “I don’t know where we are, but I don’t like it.”

“You said it. Caves give me the creeps,” Adam said.

“No, it’s more than that. There’s something off about this place. It almost feels like we’re walking through a haunted house or a murder scene. Like something terrible happened down here.”

The hair on the back of Lily’s neck prickled. Sprock said breaches eroded through the barrier in the “rotten” places of the Realm. What was so rotten about this place that it could punch a hole between worlds? Lily glanced at Adam and Keisha, their faces smudged with dirt and their hair disheveled after fighting against armies of nightmares. A pang of guilt twisted her gut.

“You know what?” she blurted, the words tumbling out. “You guys don’t have to come with me.”

“What are you talking about?” Keisha said. “Of course we’re coming with you.”

“No, I mean it. You were both incredible back there, and you’ve done enough. You should just go home.”

“No way,” Adam said. “I go where you go. No matter what.”

“But who knows what danger I’m dragging you into! The waking world is safe now. You should just go home and be with your families. This isn’t your fight.”

“Are you kidding? Yes, it is our fight!” Keisha said. “We’re part of the world, aren’t we? There’s no way I’m going to stand by and wait for those things to destroy the planet again!”

“But what about your parents?”

“My mom and dad would be proud to know I’m here with you.”

“Look, Lily,” Adam said, “there’s no way we’re heading back. Not until everything’s figured out. Not until we’re sure you can come home for good, too.”

As Adam patted her on the shoulder and Keisha squeezed her hand, Lily fought tears. “Thanks, you guys,” she eked out, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Come, come, friends!” Cedric called from within the tunnel ahead, the mingling silver and gold lights of Flint and Rigel silhouetting him. “We’d best stay together. There’s no telling where those devils may be hiding.”

Lily jogged to catch up with him. “How do you know which way to go?” she asked.

“Our shiny little friends here seem confident about the way,” Cedric said. “Every so often Rigel floats atop a current of air, and I can see a breeze making the fiery chap’s crown flicker. Where there’s wind, my dear, there’s bound to be a path to the surface. At least, that’s what I hope.”

Lily felt her muscles relax a bit more, like a spring uncoiling. “Thanks for being here, Cedric. I always feel better when you’re guiding me.”

Cedric straightened and puffed up his chest. “It is my honor, my dear. Always happy to serve. Although, I’ll admit that when this is all said and done, I’ll be glad to get back home to the canyon for a taste of mundane life. First thing on the agenda will be to help Tiggins finish that soufflé. Poor little tyke! I still feel dreadful that I abandoned him mid-mixing.”

“A soufflé? I thought you didn’t like stationary food. Except for my mom’s chili, that is.”

“Oh, this is no stationary dish, Miss Lily! This is caterpillar soufflé. One of the finest in the history of culinary arts, I might add.”

Lily broke into a smile. “I didn’t know you were into cooking.”

“Well, now, I daren’t presume to be a master chef, but I do appreciate tradition. This particular recipe I learned from my mother, who in turn learned it from my grandmother, and her from her mother, etcetera, etcetera. The secret, as she taught me, is to harvest the caterpillars when they’ve only just hatched. Everyone assumes they’ll be too small to be any good, but this is when they’re the most delicate! If you wait until they’re big and succulent, their flavor overpowers the dish.”

“Your mother sounds like she was a great teacher.”

“Indeed she was, Miss Lily.”

Lily fell back and walked alongside Keisha and Adam, and for a long time their chatter chased away the gloom. Between twirls of her staff, Keisha summarized the play she and her friend Nikau had written together over the summer, a thriller about a detective searching for a top-secret notebook. Adam related how he’d accidentally superglued his fingers together when he finally agreed to help his little sister make Christmas cards in July. Lily laughed and laughed, and for a while she forgot about all they’d just endured and the shadows into which they now plunged.

Then Lily recounted her adventures in the Realm since the Blight. She described how Pax rose from his tomb, and how she battled with Magnus. As she prattled on, the mood changed, with both friends lapsing into silence and interrupting only sparingly to gasp or to say, “Whoa.” Lily wondered if she’d done something wrong when their giggles petered away, but a pat on the shoulder from Keisha reassured her. She’d not flubbed; she’d just seen and heard things that even they couldn’t fathom.

As the hours wore on, the stories and conversation withered away. The damp chilled them, and the wet hair hanging about Lily’s face made her feel like she’d run through a rainstorm. She rubbed her hands to restore feeling to fingertips that had wrinkled into prunes, and onward they meandered, through dark passage after dark passage, weaving through a never-ending nothingness.

Suddenly a wail, inhuman and terrible like the cry of a hundred phantoms, echoed through the cavern. Lily backed against a wall only to find the rock face trembling beneath her palms. In the next instant, the entire cave buckled and shook.

“Look out!” Adam cried. He rushed to cover Lily as a shower of stones and debris rained down from above.

“The whole place is coming down!” Cedric shouted. “Run! Run now!”

Lily, Adam, and Keisha locked hands and raced forward as the cavern floor heaved beneath their feet. Cedric took flight and sailed ahead, and Rigel darted back and forth like a firefly to dodge the stalactites that wrenched loose from the ceiling and shot to the ground like spears. When Flint waved his arms and squeaked for help, Rigel swooped low and snatched him up; their mutual glows lit the way ahead like a lamp.

The wailing sounded again and, despite the danger, Lily froze. She had just faced hundreds of living nightmares, but none of them had frightened her as much as the unearthly evil she heard in these voices, dozens of them unified in a single cry. The howling reminded her of the dragon over the Great Wall, whose breath had leeched away all light and hope. Somehow, she knew that something similarly malicious lurked in these caverns, threatening to enshroud them all and steal away the light. In panic, she released her friends’ hands, stopped midstride, and scanned the tunnel.

“Lily, what are you doing?” Adam’s hand tightened around her own again. “Come on! We have to get out of here!”

Lily felt the pressure and warmth, his handhold like an anchor, and she willed herself to follow. Together they sped, muscles aching, breath condensing into clouds as they rushed through the cold darkness. Behind them, the clatter of stones escalated to a roar as the walls of the cave folded into a heap of ruins. Lily’s chest burned as she pushed herself farther and farther, fleeing not only the tumbling rocks that threatened to entomb them but especially the voices: a hundred voices merged together, anguished, like the last cry of a dying animal.

As abruptly as it had begun, the wailing stopped. The cavern also rested, its walls quitting their motion and the smashed ceiling settling into a pile of rubble. As if the cave had sighed with relief, a breeze brushed Lily’s soaked hair away from her face. Then there was a final clink of stones, and all was still.

In the new quiet, Lily leaned against the wall to calm her shivering, Keisha dropped onto the ground in shock and exhaustion, and Adam bent over with his hands on his knees to catch his breath. “What on earth,” he said between gasps, “was that?”

Cedric, shaking his wings and staring about the cavern in bewilderment, swatted at the dust cloud that swirled around them. “I can’t see a thing with all this flotsam in the air. Can you chaps see what’s happened?” he said, motioning for Rigel and Flint to investigate.

Flint and Rigel bobbed into the curtain of dust and disappeared. After a pause, a chorus of excited chirps and squeaks sounded from behind the cloud.

“Oh, dash it all!” Cedric said. “Here, let me clear out the place.” He spread his wings and with a few beats blew away the dust to reveal the tunnel behind them. At the sight of it, his wings went limp. “Oh dear,” he said. “Oh, dear me. That’s disheartening, isn’t it? I do hope we’re headed the right way. There’s certainly no going back now.”

Lily wiped dirt from her eyes, blinked a few times, and then saw what he meant. Fallen boulders had completely blocked the way they’d come. Whether it led toward fresh air or deepening shadows, the only way was forward.

Chapter 3

Lost in the Caverns

“Are you all right, Miss Lily?” Cedric asked, craning his neck to examine her face. “You look a trifle pale.”

Lily didn’t answer, and he repeated her name twice before she realized he was speaking to her. “Cedric,” she whispered, “that sound—”

“It gave me goose bumps too, my dear.”

“It was worse than goose bumps. I don’t know why, but I felt the same way I did when that gray dragon attacked us in China.”

Cedric gently took Lily’s hand in his paws. “That’s ominous, indeed. How awful for you, Miss Lily. I’m so, so sorry.”

“What was that, Cedric?” Keisha asked, holding her staff on guard as if she expected an unseen enemy to spring out at any moment.

“I don’t know, but I for one don’t want to encounter it again. Clearly, we’re not alone in these caverns. We’d best quicken our pace and be on our guard. The sooner we find our way out of this underground labyrinth, the better.”

“Are we sure that’s the right way to go?” Adam said, pointing to the tunnel ahead.

Cedric glanced behind them, where a wall of fallen rock blocked the passage. “No, but I don’t suppose we have much choice, do we?”

They wandered onward through an endless web of caves and tunnels. At times the corridors narrowed into crawl spaces, and the friends crept forward through the crevices on their hands and knees. During one such traverse that seemed to extend for miles, Lily worried they’d all suffocate in the stifling tunnel. She gasped for breath when they finally stumbled into an open cavern, and then, with a groan of dismay, she realized the way ahead shrank into yet another tiny passageway, its diameter no bigger than the width of her shoulders.

Eventually their rumbling stomachs and Adam’s pleas for lunch compelled them to pause in an open space for a food break. They dove into their bags eagerly, only to be disappointed by the state of their provisions. Adam had just a few smooshed s’mores bars in his knapsack, and when he turned out his pockets, he found only a bar of chocolate that had melted into a wad. Keisha’s search of her pack yielded some strips of fruit leather and a packet of dried soybeans. To his discouragement, Cedric had lost all his supplies during the fight at the Sphinx. “Not even a crumb or those pebbles from Master Sprock’s satchel,” he lamented, referring to the peanuts he’d presumed were rocks. “And Madam Aadila’s lovely fish! Oh, how I’d give my right wing for a morsel of that!”

Their meager rations reminded Lily of Philippe, and the thought of the rabbit plunging into his tattered hat to procure vegetables cooked in extravagant sauces enticed a smile from her. “Why don’t you call him here?” Adam suggested when she shared her thoughts.

“Oh no,” Lily said. “I’d never do that to him. He hates caves. I mean, really hates them.”

“Speaking of rabbits,” Adam said, crunching a soybean between his teeth and grimacing, “this stuff is about as close to rabbit food as you can get. I don’t know how we’re gonna survive when this is all we have. I’m so hungry I could eat a boot.”

“Fruit leather?” Keisha said, extending out a strip that flopped limply.

“Uh, no thanks.”

Suddenly, Lily slapped her forehead. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before!” She rummaged in her pocket. “Let me use the soothstone. I should have no problem getting us some real food.” She closed her eyes and held the stone aloft.

“No! No, Miss Lily!” Cedric shouted, and in the next instant he’d planted both paws on her forearm. “You can’t use the stone, my dear. Not here. Not now.”

Heat rose to Lily’s face. “Why not? I’m sure I could imagine us some food.”

“As am I, but Miss Lily, you’re not thinking! Use the soothstone and you’ll draw the shrouds, or—or whatever else is lurking down here—straight to us. We can’t risk it.”

“So, we just starve?” Adam said.

“I agree it’s not ideal, but would you rather deal with an empty belly or with whatever monsters screamed these caves into an avalanche?”

“Cedric’s right, Adam,” Lily said. “The soothstone draws shrouds like a moth to a lamp, remember?”

Adam scowled but finally shrugged in defeat. “All right,” he said. “Look, you guys can have some of my s’mores bars if you’d like. I’ll save the chocolate for later.”

“Same for my soybeans,” Keisha said. “Let’s ration them. We can eat half now and save the rest.”

“You can take my ration,” Adam said.

“That’s generous, but you just said you were hungry enough to eat a boot.”

“A boot would taste better than those things.”

“Hey!”

“What? It’s not my fault you pick weird snacks.”

“My snacks are weird? I’m not the one with chocolate gooshed in my pocket!”

“At least chocolate doesn’t break your teeth.”

“Oh really? How many cavities did you tell me you needed filled last month?”

“Three. What’s your point?”

“The chocolate is breaking your teeth, just at a slower pace.”

With a couple of snickers and a few eyerolls, they tucked into the measly food they had. While they ate, Cedric paced about warily, wringing his paws and starting at every plink of dripping water. “We really should get on, friends,” he said. “I’m hungry, too, but I don’t like Miss Lily’s experience with that voice. It’s best we not dawdle.” He waved for them to follow Rigel and Flint, who awaited them at the entrance to yet another narrow tunnel. Lily crunched a few soybeans, choked down a s’mores bar, and tried to convince her groaning stomach that these were enough. After a drink courtesy of water dripping from a stalactite—This must be what a playground slide tastes like, she thought with a grimace—she straightened, drew a breath, and again marched forward into endless shadows.

Hours stretched into days. Eventually, without the sun to guide them, they lost track of time entirely. When Keisha discovered her watch face had smashed during the cave-in, she pulled out her walkie-talkie, which featured a compass and a clock that glowed in the dark. “Perfect!” she said with a grin. As they trudged on, however, she lowered the device at her side, then finally returned it to her bag. “It’s real-world time,” she muttered when Lily asked her about it. “It’s pretty much useless. Right now, it says it’s October, and I’m pretty sure we haven’t spent months down here.”

“October? You’re saying three months have passed in the waking world?”

“According to this, yes. I’m pretty sure time isn’t passing the same way down here, so this clock doesn’t help us one bit.”

Three months, Lily thought. Three months since they’d disappeared into the portal at the Sphinx. Three months since she’d bid her family good-bye. What had happened in her absence? How was her family coping? Pax, please watch over them, she asked.

Without a gauge for the passage of day and night, they would stop to rest whenever poor, disheveled Rigel trilled, or when Flint pantomimed a need for sleep. During such reprieves the friends would crouch inside a cave, huddle close together, and fight to quiet their minds. With their nerves on edge, every shuffle, breath, and scuttling insect sounded threatening. Multiple times, Lily drifted off into a fitful sleep only to jolt awake at the sound of Adam turning over, or of Rigel clacking his beak in his sleep. Then she’d stare into the deep darkness and her eyes would play tricks on her, conjuring up shadows that oozed from hidden crevices in the rock and morphed into sinister shapes, only to disappear again. Lily’s aching joints warned her that she needed rest, and so in such moments she’d shut her eyes and focus on things that were safe and sure: the image of Dad at the Sphinx; the memory of her mother’s arms around her; Pax, brilliant as a jewel in the firelight when he brought the Catacombs down. She clung to these memories as if they prodded her very heart to keep beating, and eventually she’d sink into a restless, dreamless sleep . . . only to awaken, seemingly a moment later, to Cedric jostling her shoulder. “Time to go, Miss Lily,” he’d whisper. “We need to press on.”

The days languished on. Adam perseverated on food, recalling the tingle of pork chili verde on his tongue and longing for a juicy hamburger off the grill. After they finished the soybeans and the last morsels of chocolate, he talked nonstop about pork lo mein, buffalo chicken pizza, and tamales, until Lily found it so excruciating that she had to bite her tongue to keep from snapping at him. Eventually, he fell silent on his own. As hunger, weariness, and the endless melancholy of their surroundings wore him down, soon he pined only for sunlight and fresh water.

As the hours mounted, Lily fought against despair. Her days of familiarity and comfort with caves had vanished, and she longed for a breeze, for color, for the prickle of grass against her skin. As they plodded onward, she wondered if the monsters whose voices had paralyzed her with fright still stalked them. Most of all, she wondered if they’d ever see the sun again, if they’d ever find a way out.

After endless marching, with the kids’ shoulders stooped and their stomachs twisting with hunger, Flint suddenly paused and Rigel bobbed up and down, chittering in alarm.

The passage ahead—their only way forward—lay blocked with another wall of fallen boulders.

Flint slid off Rigel’s back and climbed amid the rubble to search for a way through. Rigel followed suit, flitting from one corner to the next like a hummingbird sampling nectar from irises, and Cedric squinted within their light to poke and prod the blockage for weaknesses. The longer they investigated, the more Lily’s hopes sank. Although the rocks likely arose from a cave-in, time had so settled them that they were sealed as tightly against one another as with mortar, with no obvious way through.

“Great. Just great.” Adam slumped to the ground and put his head in his hands.

“Now, now, Master Adam, best not lose heart,” Cedric said.

“I lost heart days ago.”

“Best not lose our senses, then.”

“Why don’t we turn back? Maybe there was another way back there that we missed.”

“I highly doubt it, young sir. These chaps have never led us astray before.”

“Well, they led us astray this time.”

“Master Adam, please don’t be dramatic.”

“I’m not being dramatic! Obviously, this isn’t the way.”

Cedric started tugging rocks away from the blockage. “Instead of all this sniveling,” he said with a grunt, “you could lend us that terrific arm of yours and help pull this apart.”

“Why? So we can deal with another cave-in and get crushed?”

“Adam, calm down,” Keisha said. “Yelling isn’t going to solve anything.”

“And digging through a wall of rock is? Who’s to say this isn’t a dead end? I’m tired of him telling us what to do. He’s the one who keeps pushing us, and he doesn’t even know where we’re going!”

“Well, do you know where we’re going?” Keisha said.

“Do you? Aren’t you supposed to know all these things about the Realm no one else does? Why won’t you use your superpower now?”

Even in the dim light, Keisha looked stricken. “That’s not fair! We’re in a bunch of caves without landmarks. How am I supposed to know where we’re headed?”

“Indeed, Master Adam, that’s truly uncalled for.”

The arguing made Lily’s head pound. “Can you all just knock it off?” she suddenly shouted. “All of you, just stop it! This whole mess is bad enough without your fighting!”

They avoided her eyes, and Cedric hung his head in shame. Adam raked his fingers through his hair. “Yikes. I’m sorry, Lily,” he said.

“Yeah, I’m sorry too,” Keisha said. “I’m just really tired, is all. Really, really tired.”

“And hungry,” Adam added.

“And—kind of scared,” Keisha said. “I feel like we’re trapped in a coffin that just goes on forever.” She raised her eyes to meet Lily’s. “How are we going to get out of this one?”

Lily straightened. “Cedric, I know it’s dangerous, but I need to use the soothstone,” she said. “Please. I need to do something to get us out of here.”

When Cedric answered, his voice was weak and thin, as if all the courage had left him like air escaping from a balloon. “I don’t know, Miss Lily. There’s the voices to worry about. And we still don’t know where all those shrouds disappeared to.”

“I’d rather battle a bunch of shrouds than deal with these stinkin’ caves,” Adam said. Keisha nodded so forcefully that she sent her beaded braids swinging back and forth.

Before Cedric could reply, a sudden commotion from Rigel and Flint drew their attention. Flint hopped from a rock onto Rigel’s back, and the glimmering pair squeaked and trilled together . . . then disappeared through the wall.

“They’ve found a way!” Cedric cried.

Lily rushed up to the pile of rocks, closed one eye, and squinted into the rent through which they’d passed, a hole no wider than a tennis ball. “I don’t see them,” she said at first, straining her eyes. Then Rigel darted past and flew a figure-of-eight on the other side.

“They’re through!” Lily cried. “Help me! We need to widen this opening!”

Cedric redoubled his efforts, and Adam and Keisha joined with renewed vigor. For several minutes the clunk of stones, the occasional grunt, and coughing from stirred dust were the only sounds as they hauled rocks from the wall and let them tumble to the ground behind them. While they worked, Rigel hovered on the opposite side and Flint flared to light their way.

“I believe we’re nearly there!” Cedric said, his paws working wildly. “You’d better go first, Miss Lily. I think it’s wide enough for you to get through.” Then a rock struck the tip of his tail and he stumbled backward, hopping from one foot to another and nursing the bruise.

Lily crawled into the opening, squinted in the light from Rigel and Flint, and then slid to the ground on the opposite side. The fresher air told her she’d stumbled into a larger chamber. “It’s another cave!” she called, her voice echoing.

Her hand brushed against something soft, and she glanced down at a round, gray lump at her feet. Lily bent over, cautiously reached out a hand to touch it, and found that it was plush, like a blanket. She swiped away a thick layer of dust, lifted the object into Rigel’s light, and gasped.

It was a stuffed raccoon, a torn but familiar green ribbon tied around its tail.

Chapter 4

Darkness Unleashed

He paced through the shadows and picked at his clothing, his long fingers flitting like the legs of a spider plucking its web. Vengeance. I must have vengeance! We’re wasting time. Enough of this waiting! With each lap around the cave his thoughts raced faster; soon they rushed like a flood from behind a dam. “It’s time you fulfilled your promise!” he finally said between clenched teeth.

The dark one replied, its voice rasping in his mind. Patience. First, my soldiers must return.

He balled his hands into fists. “But when? I opened the rock weeks ago and have languished since. Your army delays! Fulfill your promise now!” In his agitation, he didn’t notice that his own voice had taken on a mechanical edge, grating like metal scraping against metal.

The answer came swiftly. I decide when it’s time!

Pain seared like an iron brand between his eyes, then coursed down his neck and into each limb. As agony overwhelmed him, he dropped to his knees, clutched his head with his spindly hands, and trembled like a dried leaf.

“You promised me revenge!” he eked out in a whisper.

Another surge of pain, sharp and crackling as with electricity, shot down his spine. He arched his back and screamed, again in a voice not entirely his own.

You shall have your revenge, but only after you have served me! the dark one hissed.

He dug his nails into the earth and ground his teeth together. Although his head still throbbed and his limbs burned, he dragged himself to a stand. “I am not your servant!”

Another attack. As he crumpled to the ground, a low, venomous laugh echoed in his mind. Careful, pale one. I should have killed you years ago, when you concealed the true powers of that crystal from me. You live because I am generous. Betray me again, and you will find me otherwise.

“I’ve concealed nothing from you. I did as you asked!”

Another pulse of pain. I should have suspected your deceit when you guarded the jewel so jealously. Not even that insufferable, scribbling girl fully understood what she’d created, but you did, didn’t you? You knew its powers perfectly.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Don’t patronize me, twisted king! If you value your life, you will now wield the Ice according to my command.

Gritting his teeth, he snatched the crystal from within the tattered folds of his tunic. “I will destroy it!” he said, drowning the cave in blue light as he raised it into the air. “I’ll deny you its powers forever!”

Oh, pathetic, lost king, you forget that your mind and heart are rotten! No, you will not destroy it. You covet it too much to part with it. And while you covet, you belong to me.

“I belong to no one! I am—I am—”

You are nothing! You are a forgotten wretch in a forgotten place. A ghost who cannot even remember his own name.

His fist tightened around the gemstone until its vertices dug grooves into his palm. “I have served you,” he whispered, pleading this time. “I did what you asked. I opened the passage in the rock, as you demanded!”

I have not finished with you. Until my army returns, you will continue to uphold my will.

As the dark one’s words died away, a great clamor echoed from deep within the caverns. The lost king spun around and searched the darkness with his wide, pale eyes as a mob of shadowy figures spewed into the cave, and the air thickened with the stench of char and decay. He backed toward a wall and held up the blue crystal. Its pale glow revealed his new visitors: hundreds of shrouds, some robust and sharp in profile, others flickering in and out of substance. All of them filled the room with their shrieking.

His larynx tightened, as if the dark one clenched a fist around it. No, leave me my words! he pleaded, but his strength had shriveled like paper soaked in a rainstorm. The specter subsumed him again, and his eyes burned red. “What is this?” he demanded of the shrouds in a voice and with a mind no longer his own, cloaked in shadow. “Why have you returned in such a state? I directed you to assemble an army, and instead you crawl back as a moth-eaten rabble!”

The shrouds huddled on the ground and shook like dried grass in a gale. The strongest and most substantial, still rejuvenated after indulging in the fears of humankind, took their places at the front, although they dared not lift their eyes. The weakest—those who drifted like transparent ghosts and who couldn’t force themselves into forms sharper than vague clouds of ash—cowered in the background, whimpering and sniveling.

“Why have you thus returned?” he bellowed again.

A ghoul and a goblin in the front row whispered to each other; a minotaur grunted and dropped to one knee. All the others slunk back and huddled together.

He raised the blue stone, and its light intensified to a blaze. “Let me teach you the penalty for disobedience!” he cried. With a whip of his arm, a bright blue bolt surged from the stone and struck the ghoul square in the chest. The creature bared its yellowed teeth, but before it could growl, a sleeve of ice sprawled from the point of impact and covered his every boil and dripping fang. Then the ghoul fell to the ground, silent and motionless in a prison of enchanted ice that neither blow nor blade could break.

“Master, please! It warn’t our fault!” the goblin cried, his hands clasped and his arms outstretched as he begged. “Please, spare us!”

Another whip of the crystal, another bolt of blue lightning, and the goblin lay toppled on the ground, sheathed in ice with his fingers still entwined.

The remaining shrouds huddled together and sniveled for mercy. Another swing of the crystal; another dozen fell, breathless and frozen. Then another. And another. “Back to the breach, all of you!” he shouted. “Back to the breach or perish!”

“Lord of terrors, I beg you to hear me!” The minotaur approached and dropped to all fours, his massive snout inches from the ground. “I am unworthy, but I beg you, for our cause and your honor, hear me!”

He paused and scraped a facet of the stone with a grimy fingernail. “Speak,” he said.

“My lord, forgive me. We cannot go back.”

He raised the crystal.

“The way is shut, my lord! The breach is closed! There is no way into the waking world!”

His expression darkened. “What do you mean it is shut?”

“The girl, sire. The dream keeper who conspires with—with my lord’s enemy. She drove us back and shut the breach.”

“You lie. That girl is a steward and an artisan, not a guardian.”

“So we thought, but—forgive me, sire—she can lasso.”

“No guardian could lasso so many shrouds at once!”

“There were four guardians, sire! The girl and three old outcasts!”

“You talk nonsense! Not even four guardians could vanquish the horde I sent!”

“They had something to help them, master! A great orb!”

“Lies! You try my patience!” He raised the crystal above his head again, and it flared bright white. The minotaur flattened himself to the ground and laced his fingers over the back of his thick neck in anticipation of a blow from a flashing blue blade.

“Please, lord!” the minotaur cried, “I speak the truth! It looked like a pearl, but brighter than the stars and too large for any oyster.”

He froze, his eyes trained on the minotaur like lasers. The corner of his mouth twitched slightly. “A pearl, did you say?”

The minotaur nodded. “As great as a small moon. The guardians each placed a hand on it, and their lassos strengthened a hundredfold.”

The twisted king smirked and resumed his pacing while the minotaur clutched his neck tighter and pressed his forehead to the floor. For a moment, all the shrouds in the cavern paused in their weeping, cast timid glances at their master, and held their breath.

Finally, he tilted his head backward and erupted in laughter. “A flaming pearl! The little flea has found a flaming pearl!”