Page 78 of Sky and the Grumpy Troll

Sky beamed at me, and I knew exactly what he was thinking: that he had a magical power. And I couldn’t very well argue it, because he’d bewitched me, too.

After a moment, Aeldryc returned and sat next to Pip, one hand on Pip’s bare knee.

“So,” Sky said, opening the big bag Dagmarra had pressed on us. “Lunch, courtesy of the sisters, and we’re going to figure out what the next step is. Oallian, why don’t you start?”

Oallian blinked. “Start? With what?”

“You’re the oldest one here. Have you heard of portals between worlds? The Liminal Order? Have you ever met someone who’d traveled here like Pip and me?”

Oallian’s eyes darted around. “Um.” He took a quick bite of his bread and chewed.

“Oallian, you’re, like, a thousand years old! Surely you’ve heard tales.”

The dragon went a little blurry around the edges, his fire leaking out of him, wisps of smoke curling up from his sleeves.

“Is my shirt on FIRE?” I asked, and Oallian batted at the flames, while Sky sighed and reached out, laying a soothing hand across the dragon’s forehead, and he went calm, closing his eyes.

“Is he not hot to the touch?” I asked.

Sky chuckled. “A little. Mostly only where he’s smoking.”

“Shit, Sky,” Pip said. “You have a magical power. Iconic.”

“I know, right?” Sky replied, beaming.

“Moving on,” Aeldryc said, back to being in full, intimidating Lord High Commander Mode. “The facts remain as we discussed them last night at dinner. It seems we need to send an envoy to Liminia to try to sort everything out. At the same time, we need to make sure no one else is dropping through this portal and being kidnapped by highwaymen. Or worse. And we need a way back through.”

Sky chewed on his thumbnail. “I’m worried my family is freaking out. I’ve been gone so long.”

I cleared my throat. “I worked out the arithmetic last night. Based on arrival times and departure times, my estimate is that for every two days that pass in Qoksmere, only about an hour passes in San Jose. This is only an approximation, but I believe it’s only been about a day in San Jose since Pip and Sky disappeared.”

Sky blinked at me. “Are you serious? I haven’t been missing for weeks?”

“Less than a day. Your mother has not called the police. She probably just thinks you’ve been busy with Club Vortex opening.” I watched him.

“So we have time,” Sky said, hushed. And then his eyes went bright and wet, and he kissed me on the cheek. He laughed, a short, cracked thing, and put his hand over his mouth. “I mean, they’ll find out soon. My older brother is my roommate. But Connor’s probably not even worried yet; he sleeps till noon, he won’t notice I’m not in the apartment till he runs out of clean mugs—and even if he does notice, he usually covers for me with Ma for a few days, in case I met the love of my life.” He giggled and cast me a shy glance. “Which I have.”

“Okay, so they will worry when a few days pass in San Jose,” I said. “But you have time, Sky. More than it feels like.”

“But we can’t—” He glanced at Oallian, who was trying very hard not to blur around the edges again, and interrupted himself to calm the dragon, reaching out and brushing Oallian’s hair out of his eyes. “Shh. It’s okay, sweetheart.”

“Are you leaving?” Oallian asked. “I just got myself back. And you’re talking about Liminia.”

“They’re the only ones with information,” Sky said gently. “Maybe you could fly by and visit.”

“Okay, but logistics.” Sky scrubbed his face and came back to himself, and he picked the plan up and started turning it over, fast, the way he did. “Liminia’s across the water, right? That’s a ship, that’s days at sea, that’s me feeling seasick while you soothe me and read me books, which, fine, sounds romantic actually, but what do we do if people are still coming through the portal? We don’t even know exactly where it is.”

“I will guard it.”

We all looked at Oallian.

He had gone still in his ruined shirt. “I fly,” he said, with the patience of a creature explaining water to fish. “Do you know where the portal is?”

Aeldryc glanced at Pip and sighed. “Not exactly, because Pip didn’t notice any landmarks.”

“In my defense, all trees look the same.”

“But we know the general area. It’s in Clovermere, about a half day’s ride from Feravael.”