Dearest Zann,

After that, there was a long period of nothing. I wasn’t really conscious, but once it was over, I could tell that I had experienced some kind of time. Eventually I became aware of… a place, that seemed dark and looming, like Ambe’s lair beneath the palace. At first I remained still, dreaming. I didn’t feel ashy. I felt normal.

I looked up, and there she was: Jhusdhe, sitting there, scowling at me and kicking her legs.

“Jhus!” I said. “I mean, I’m sorry, Jhusdhe. Are you all right? Where’s Wande? Is she all right?”

“Be silent. It is the great failure of my mater that I cannot pretend not to know you. But I wish to hear no words from your savage maw.”

I straightened, and rose to an awkward sit. “I know you don’t like me. That’s not important. But what happened to you? I was looking all around–“

“I will have silence from you.” She was wearing a green playfrock I didn’t know, not ripped or dirty or anything. That was a good sign. It meant she and Wande were somewhere that their comforts were being seen to. And she seemed, well, not happy obviously, not Jhus, but lively. “You are an ill-bred puppy who has been bumbling through the snow, and now you are here.”

“Where are we? I can’t tell. I was in–“

“You are too stupid to understand. But you cannot stay here. There is a way out, there.” She pointed. “Go. And stop looking for us. You don’t deserve to find either of us, and my poor mother does much better without you.” And she looked away in that infuriating way she has, where the conversation is over and you don’t exist anymore.

I looked where she had pointed, and there was a long spoon, lying silver against the darkness. For a long time I didn’t dare go near it, with Jhusdhe there. What if she knew? She would never keep my secret, I knew that. But I had to do something. I leaned over, reached out. Touched it. But my fingers went in, it wasn’t a spoon, it was a spoon-shaped hole in the world and I was reaching through it. And then I was falling through it. I closed my eyes against the sudden brightness.

When I opened them, I could see that I was no better off.

Love,

Ybel