He frowned. “The Unseelie lands have been drowned as long as I can remember, Lara. Having spent so much time in your world, I’d say it was probably just a result of climate change.”

Unexpected burrs ran through his words, pulling their truth out of tune. Hairs stood up on Lara’s arms, reinforcing the feeling of wrongness, and she blurted, “No,” without meaning to. “Whatever it was, it wasn’t climate change. My power’s getting stronger, Dafydd. I’m starting to hear it now when people are wrong even if they believe it’s the truth.”

Delight lit his face briefly, pushing his weariness away. “Truthseeker indeed.” Then a touch of dismay creased his features and he relaxed into the seats again. “But I’m wrong?”

“I need you to try and remember any legends or stories Oisín might have told you. Did he ever mention someone named Brendan?”

“There’s a mortal name,” Dafydd said absently. “Brendan, ah, Brendan the sailor. They were friends from before he came to the Barrow-lands, I think.”

Lara, under her breath, said, “No,” as the words soured in her mind, but Dafydd continued undisturbed. “I remember, just barely.” His eyes closed and he sank further down, voice rising and falling in a soft murmur. “He was blind with age already, Oisín was. I never knew him as a sighted man. But he used to carry a stick, a walking staff. Carved bone, I think. A gift from my mother, I think. I only remember him having it after she died. I asked once if I could have it, because I barely remembered her and I hoped it would remind me. But he said we had to give it to Brendan, to take across the sea.”

Hope surged in Lara’s stomach, making a knot as nauseating as fear. “Did he say where across the sea?”

“I supposed he meant to Tir na nÓg, the lands to the west. I never asked.”

“But Brendan was Irish,” Lara whispered. “Across the sea to the west was America, for him.”

“So it is here,” Kelly said triumphantly, then made a face. “Or it was at some time.”

“No.” Music had turned to a crescendo with Kelly’s first statement. Lara turned to grab the dashboard with both hands, as if she could direct the car through will alone. “No, it is here. Still is. It felt true when you said that, Kelly. Pull over, can you pull over?”

“Uh, yeah.” Kelly pulled off, tires scrabbling over gravel as she went too near the ditch. “What are you going to do?”

“It’s here. It’s here somewhere. I found a path through the Seelie forest back to the palace, maybe I can find one here. It’s got to have some kind of similar feeling, doesn’t it? They’re both magical constructions.”

Dafydd climbed out of the car as she spoke, leaning heavily on it as he pulled Lara’s door open as well. He offered her a hand, and a faint smile as she looked up at him in concern. “We can share a little of thought and emotion with those we’re close to,” he reminded her. “And I hold the image of the staff in my mind. But I can’t do it within the confines of that vehicle.”

“You can’t at all! You don’t have very much power left!” Lara got out, more to herd him back into the car than to accept his help, but he caught her hand.

“If there’s an item of Seelie, or even Unseelie, power here, Lara, it’s more likely to lend me strength than anything else in your world. It may mean my survival.”

“Even if you burn out looking for it?”

“I believe the risk worth taking.”

“Either way,” Kelly said from within the car, “make a decision. We’re not exactly in suburbia, but I don’t like you standing around outside the car when there’s an APB out on us.”

Dafydd tipped his head toward the vehicle. “Kelly makes a compelling argument.”

Lara raised a palm in defeat. “All right. If you can give me the image, I think that’ll help me build a path. How do you do this, like with a …” She trailed off, but lifted her free hand to Dafydd’s face, approximating a gesture she’d seen in film trailers.

Dafydd laughed out loud. “A Vulcan mind meld? Would that make it easier?”

Color rushed Lara’s face. “Actually, yes, I think so. It’s sort of familiar.”

Kelly leaned over the passenger seat, peering up at Dafydd as he confidently settled his fingers against Lara’s cheek and temple. “Today has been one hundred percent full of suck, and yet at this exact second I gotta say I love my life, because I’m watching somebody perform a mind meld for real.”

Enough truth ran through that to make Lara smile. Dafydd, looking into her eyes, smiled as well, then gently tugged her forward to put his forehead against hers. “Proximity eases the sharing. Close your eyes. Think of sandy beaches, cloudy skies.”

The clear white path truthseeking had created when she’d searched for her way out of the Seelie forest filled her mind, as neutral an image as she could come up with. It had song to it, distant tolling like water against a shore. Oisín appeared on the path, less frail than he’d been when she’d met him, though he was by no means a young man. He still wore fine Seelie raiment, but now he carried a staff taller than he was.

If it was bone, it came from the largest animal Lara had ever imagined. Even an ivory tusk seemed inadequate for its height, and it had no curve to it at all, standing slim and ramrod straight. Intricate carvings along its length showed that it was hollow, and though the carvings were delicate in design, the staff itself warned of strength and power. In Oisín’s hands it had no bent toward either destruction or creation, but the sense of it said it could be used for both.

And it was here, in her world. Choir music filled her, a host of soprano notes striking a triumphant path forward. Lara staggered as power splashed through, and out of, her. It leaped forward, racing across the countryside to briefly illuminate the image of a roaring waterfall pouring from a narrow point in a broad river. Surprised laughter broke from her throat, and Lara opened her eyes to flash an exultant smile at Dafydd.

He whispered, “Lara,” and her clarity of vision faded in a rush as he collapsed in her arms.

“Dafydd? Oh my God, Dafydd!” His weight was inconsequential, even though Lara didn’t think of herself as physically strong. Kelly sprinted out of the car and around to the passenger side, helping Lara to pour him into the backseat.

“Buckle him in,” Kelly snapped. “We’re leaving. Now.”

Lara, mute, did as she was told, then took her own seat, barely able to pull the seat belt on as Kelly pulled away from the curb. It took two tries to clip the belt in place, and she buried her face in shaking hands when she’d managed it. “I don’t think our world is really meant for using magic. Closing the breach in the garage wiped me out, and this was worse,” she said into her palms. “And I think I just ripped away most of what Dafydd had left to power my own search. Kelly, if he dies—”

“It won’t be your fault,” Kelly said shortly. “Where do we need to go?”

“West.” Lara parted her fingers to stare at the road in front of them as she tried to bring the clarity of vision back. “It’s hidden in a waterfall west of here, a big one. It’s got to be on the Connecticut River.”

“West and what? North? South? It’s a big river, Lara.”

“Almost due.” A hint of music returned, merely a thin bell tone compared to the earlier song. “It’s almost due west of Peabody. There can’t be that many waterfalls on that parallel.”

“We’ll get a map.” Anything else Kelly intended to say was interrupted by Dafydd’s sharp intake of breath. Lara twisted to find him pressing both hands against his temples.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured after a moment. “I seem to have fallen asleep.”

“Lara put a whammy on you,” Kelly said over Lara’s apology. “When was the last time you ate?”

“This morning, I suppose,” Dafydd murmured, then continued in a hazy voice: “Some unpleasant second cousin to oatmeal, a last meal by the standards of the Massachusetts penal system.”