When we stopped we were in the foothills of a mountain range. For a moment I thought that we had gone back to Emilia’s, but then I noticed that these mountains were far more imposing than the ones we had left that morning. They jutted into the sky with ragged edges and pointed tops, looking like gigantic pieces of broken glass covered in snow.

  This time Donavan sank into a crouch as Emilia popped into being.

  “Let’s get under cover,” she said.

  Donavan struggled to stand, but was having difficulty. Keegan helped him to his feet.

  As Keegan pulled Donavan’s arm over his shoulder, I noticed that the two of them were almost exactly the same height. They walked up the hill in front of Emilia and me. When we reached the trees, Keegan gently lowered Donavan onto a boulder. Donavan leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees, his head hanging down.

  “Are you okay?” I asked him, for the second time that day.

  “Yes,” Donavan answered, without raising his head. “Just exhausted. Doing anything with powers in this world takes away all my energy.” I could feel that he was frustrated and disappointed with himself. He struck me in that moment as someone who was used to being quite good at whatever he did.

  “Maria, you should practice swapping emotions between Donavan and Keegan again,” Emilia said.

  At that, Donavan’s head snapped up, and I could tell he was uncomfortable with the thought of Keegan invading his feelings at the moment.

  I nodded to Emilia, but instead of attempting to switch their emotions, I closed my eyes and thought of the way I felt when me and Keegan went flying through the stars and swimming under the sea. Just remembering made me ecstatic. Carefully, I separated all of the energy I could from the emotions and sent it to Donavan. The rest, the happiness of remembering, I sent to Keegan.

  The exhaustion that flooded into me from Donavan was so overwhelming that I barely felt the emotions from Keegan.

  “I am ready to go. Thank you, Maria,” Donavan said. “And Keegan,” he added quickly, glancing at Emilia to be sure that he had not betrayed me. He reached out to both of us.

  The world went flying by us once more. When it stopped, we were on top of a snow-covered mountain. Donavan bent over, hands on his knees, bracing himself. Keegan grabbed him before he fell over. As Emilia appeared, I looked around us, shivering with the cold. We were high above the tree-line, and the sun glared off the snow, making it necessary to squint against the brightness.

  I turned away from the sun and gasped. The view was utterly spectacular. Snowy mountains stretched out to the west as far as I could see, jutting up into the sky, towering over the world below. We were at the top of one of the highest, and I was sure that I was seeing for miles and miles.

  “It’s beautiful,” I said, teeth chattering. My breath rose in great clouds.

  “It is, but we cannot stay here long. It is too cold,” said Emilia. “Can you help Donavan?”

  “I’ll try,” I replied. It was difficult with the cold pressed in on me to summon any kind of energy. Besides, I had already taken Donavan’s complete store of exhaustion on the last stop, although Emilia didn’t know it.

  “Use me,” Keegan whispered, low enough that Emilia couldn’t hear him. He was projecting a determination that was strong, vital, full of energy. I pulled it from him, and he staggered as my exhaustion filled him. I grabbed his hand to steady him.

  I reveled in Keegan’s energy for a moment, reluctant to exchange it for Donavan’s exhaustion. It even seemed to alleviate the cold somewhat. Summoning up all of my will-power, I pushed the feeling to Donavan and felt his exhaustion come pouring into me. I dropped Keegan’s hand, unable to muster the strength even to hold onto it. Donavan’s exhaustion was hitting harder each time he moved us.

  Donavan grasped both of us by the shoulders. The mountain rushed by us as we descended. We came to a stop just within the bottom of the tree line. All three of us sank to the ground, unable to stay on our feet.

  “We will stop here for today,” said Emilia, seeing the exhaustion in all of us.

  Donavan began to protest, but Emilia cut him off. “Even if Maria could exchange your feelings once more, your body is exhausted, and so are hers and Keegan’s. If you press on, you will only be hurting yourselves. I want them to be healthy when they get to Cyrus. Besides, after this we will be going through much more populated areas, and I want Keegan, at the very least, to be able to defend you or get you out of here.”

  None of us had the strength to argue with her. We sat quietly as she went to work gathering wood and building a fire, laying out rolls of blankets around it. She opened one of our packs and brought out bread, cheese and some jerky. We accepted the food from her and sat chewing it in silence.

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  As we finished eating, Emilia told us all to get some sleep. “We will be starting long before the sun comes up tomorrow morning,” Emilia explained. “I do not think that anyone will find you here, but I will keep watch on the pathway below, just in case.” She started down the hill. Before disappearing she turned around and looked at me. “Tomorrow, you will work on swapping the emotions of Donavan and Keegan, no matter what they are feeling.”

  I looked away, not wanting to meet her gaze. She knew that I had not followed her directions. Emilia disappeared down the pathway.

  The three of us lay down on our blanket rolls. I could feel rocks underneath, pushing into my body and wondered if I would be able to sleep. Exhaustion had taken its toll on me, however, and I fell asleep almost immediately.

  When I woke up, the sun had set, although the sky was still light. Donavan was adding more wood to the fire, and Keegan was pulling food out of one of the packs. When he saw that I was awake, he handed me a piece of bread.

  “Thanks,” I said, my voice husky. “Is there any water?”

  Keegan nodded and handed me a tin canteen. I drank greedily, letting the water wash the sleep from my throat.

  As I sat munching on my bread, Keegan and Donavan resumed the conversation they had been having before I woke up.

  “I have been Dreaming for three True World years,” he explained.

  “I’ve never heard it called that,” I murmured, “the True World.”

  Donavan nodded. “It is from another world, called Mareeja, where I spend most of my time. I can’t Shift like Keegan, but I do have influence over where I usually go.”

  “What made you come here on this night?” Keegan asked.

  “Probably Soren. I was actually sleeping in Mareeja, and I dreamt that I was here, and here I was. I am sure Soren pulled me into this world. He must have known that Emilia would be wanting to move you around this time.”

  “But wouldn’t that take you to him?” I asked.

  Donavan shook his head as Keegan explained, “You always go to wherever you left the dream, no matter what.”

  Donavan agreed. “Yes, and Soren and Emilia had made sure that I left the dream from her cabin, so that I would go there whenever he pulled me back into Wendellia.”

  “Are you okay with this whole thing? With how dangerous it is? With the possibility of getting trapped here?” Keegan asked him.

  Donavan shrugged. “I agreed to help a long time ago. One of my cousins is trapped here. I hope that if we can somehow defeat Cyrus, she will be free.”

  As soon as Donavan mentioned his cousin, I felt a spike of apprehensive guilt in Keegan. He saw me watching him and turned to stare at the mountains behind us.

  Donavan saw Keegan’s unease and said, “It was not you.”

  Relief swept through Keegan. I wanted to ask what Donavan meant, but he was already continuing, “Emilia may think differently, but I am going with you all the way to rescue Soren. She will just have to accept that fact.”

  “How long has your cousin been here?” I asked.

  “In the True World, only one month, but it has been nearly four years here. I have been hiding her in my apartment. Her parents think she is on a medical trip in a remote village.”

  “Where are you from?” I asked.

  “South Africa,” Donavan answered. “Could you not tell by the accent?”

  I shook my head. “I knew it was different, I just didn’t know from where.”

  “I understand,” said Donavan. “So you are both from the same town?”

  “Yeah,” answered Keegan. “We’ve known each other for a long time.”

  “It is nice,” said Donavan, “to know someone both in the dreams and the True World.”

  Keegan and I both nodded in agreement.

  “How long have you been Dreaming? Keegan told me he has been for a year.”

  “Umm,” I said, thinking hard. Keeping the times of the two worlds separate was getting harder and harder. “What has it been? A couple of weeks?” I asked Keegan.

  “A couple of months,” he said.

  Donavan looked surprised. “Your power is well-developed for such a short amount of time.”

  “You should see Keegan’s,” I replied.

  “What is your power?” Donavan turned to Keegan and asked.

  Keegan looked at Donavan for a moment before making the fire snake out across the ground and circle around Donavan’s blankets. Donavan’s eyes widened as Keegan released the fire and it resumed its normal shape.

  “A fire-weaver,” Donavan said, thoughtfully.

  Keegan shrugged. A feeling pulsed out of him towards me, and I allowed it in. Keegan was feeling secretive, so I said nothing about his other abilities.

  Soon we grew sleepy once again, and lay down. As the sky darkened, the temperature dropped, and even with the fire, I felt cold. I began to shiver, and Keegan noticed.

  “Here,” he said. A sheet of flame snaked out of the fire and circled around me. Within seconds my blankets were warm and I was no longer cold.

  “Thank you,” I said, sleepiness making my words blur together.

  “No problem,” Keegan replied. “How are you, Donavan?”

  There was no reply. Donavan was already fast asleep.

  “I guess he’s good,” said Keegan.

  I giggled. “Let’s get some sleep.”

  I closed my eyes and was soon fast asleep. And as I slept, I had my first dream in Wendellia. At first all I saw was myself, the real me, asleep in my bed at home. The sky outside of my window was dark, but there were lights on in the house. I could faintly hear my mother reading a story to Zach.

  After watching myself there in bed for several minutes, a picture flashed into my mind of a towering mountain made of red rock far in the distance. I could just make out the mouth of a cave high on the side of the mountain, and I felt something pulling me there.

  A moment later, I was in the cave. A woman who looked vaguely like Emilia crouched on the ground stirring a small pool of clear water. As the water swirled around, pictures seemed to appear on its surface. I saw all of this in a glimpse, and then it was gone, and once more, I watched myself sleep.