When Kat woke, it was dark, and she lay on what felt like a pile of vines. Some of the plants had been wound around her wrists and ankles, binding her tightly enough to the mass that she didn't bother trying to move. At best, she could turn her head, but even that felt like too much effort for right then. She didn't want to do anything more than lie still.

For several minutes, that was all she did. Her eyes wouldn't open, and so she didn't bother to try. Instead, she drifted in and out of consciousness for some unknown time. Around her, she heard footsteps, and she thought she felt the vines shift once, but when she opened her eyes she couldn't see anything, so she gave up on trying to understand. It was easier to keep her eyes closed, easier to forget, and it hurt far less to simply rest her head on the plants beneath her and pretend the rest of the world didn't exist.

She couldn't stay asleep forever. Eventually her body reached a point where her eyes had to open, and once she hit that point, they wouldn't close again. She still couldn't escape from the vines, and she couldn't drift off into sleep, either. Just then, she was more trapped than ever.

But there was one thing she could do. She could scream.

"Annie!" she yelled, not caring who else heard her. "Annie! Where are you?"

"Shut up!" someone snapped, and a boot slammed into her side. Kat couldn't keep from crying out in pain, and she tried to pull away from whoever had attacked her.

"Where am I?" she asked, bracing herself for another kick. "Who are you? What's going on?" She wasn't shouting, but she did try to speak loudly enough to be heard, and she decided right then that she wouldn't fall silent. The worst that would happen was she would be kicked again, but he wouldn't kill her. Only one of them had been doomed to die, and that had been Reynardine, unless something else had happened in the forest.

She couldn't try to avoid learning that, she realized. If she was going to figure out what was going on, then she had to know everything she could. There was no time to protect herself from the truth.

"What happened to Reynardine?" she asked, her voice shaking. "And where's Annie? What did you do to her?"

"Kat."

If she hadn't heard Annie's voice first, the hand on Kat's shoulder would have made her jump, or at least flinch a little. With the vines wrapped around her, jumping was out of the question, but she could twitch around a little, and it was slightly better than nothing. "Annie!" she gasped, and tried to turn her head. That, at least, she could do, but she couldn't see anything. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Annie said, and then Kat felt a pair of arms wrap around her from behind. She was still trapped, but at least Annie was with her, and she supposed she could live with that. "Are you all right? They didn't hurt you, did they?"

"I think I'm okay," Kat said. "I was tied up, though." She tugged at the vines, but they didn't budge, and she hadn't expected them to. "And I'm still hungry." Sleeping had made her less tired, but she wasn't sure she would be able to travel very far even if she could escape the vines, and if all the spirits were still around them, then she wouldn't be able to do anything. She knew about the one that had kicked her, and there must have been others, since she remembered hearing them walking, but that could have been hours ago. "Where are we?"

"Keep quiet," Annie whispered. "I woke up before you, and they told me we can talk as long as we're not too loud and we don't try to escape." She wrapped her arms tighter around Kat, so tight her ribs almost hurt. "They called it the Shadow House," she went on after a moment. "I don't know where we are, but I think we're pretty deep in the forest."

"Are we going the right way?" Kat whispered.

"I don't know." Annie's voice shook, and Kat tried again to move her hands, this time to comfort her friend. She thought they moved a little more than the last time, but if so, the difference was barely enough to do any good, and Annie likely hadn't even noticed the attempt.

Kat hadn't heard any footsteps since the two of them had started talking, and that had to mean the spirit who had kicked her was still there. Even whispering as they were, she was nervous about mentioning the ring, and so it was only after a long pause that she dared to ask, "Do you still have it?"

"Yes," Annie whispered, and Kat relaxed a little more. There was some reason the spirits hadn't taken the ring, but whatever that reason was could wait. For now, the important thing was that they still had it, and that meant they still had a chance to destroy it. All they had to do was escape and get back on the right track somehow. The thought of doing that was daunting, but Kat wasn't about to give up now. She just had to think about things step by step, and that wasn't any harder than programming a robot.

Of course, most robots didn't have life-or-death consequences and managed to work within the bounds of science. This was something far beyond her, but event that didn't mean she couldn't try.

"Have you tried to use it?" she whispered, though she was sure she knew what the answer would be. If Annie had used the ring, it probably would have been noticeable. Either she would have escaped, or she would have burned this place down in an attempt to get them out.

"Yes," Annie said, and Kat tensed, wondering what she could still be doing there. "Just for a second. But it was… Kat, I'm not sure I should use the ring anymore. The spirits barely noticed I was gone, but I felt like I had the ring on for hours. I saw things… and – and heard things…" Her voice broke off, and Kat was about to say that she didn't have to tell her when she went on, "There were stars, and I could hear someone praying, and someone else cursing, but it was in a language I didn't understand. I don't know what was happening, and I don't want to know."

Kat wanted to know. She wanted to understand as much as she possibly could, but she was wary about asking on the chance that she might somehow hurt Annie and because knowing could lead her down that dark path again, and this time Estelle wouldn't be there to save her. Rather than asking anything more, she leaned her head back slightly and said, "It's okay."

A loud cry distracted her, and though it sounded familiar, Kat couldn't figure out who it was. She didn't know until she heard Annie gasp and whisper, "Zimmy?"

Kat heard another cry, and she realized that it had indeed come from Zimmy. If she hadn't still been afraid of making a single sound, she would have called out to the girl, but instead she kept her mouth shut and tried to peer through the darkness to catch a glimpse at what might be happening.

There was nothing to be seen, but the struggle Kat had heard earlier drew closer, and her heart pounded as she recognized Zimmy's voice cursing. There was no response from whoever she was fighting, but from time to time she would cry out in pain, and each time she did so, Annie flinched. The first time, Kat felt slightly justified in thinking she deserved it, but it happened again and again, and soon Kat just felt sick and wished it would stop. Closing her eyes did no good, but she did so anyway.

"Get your hands off me!" Zimmy screamed, and Kat closed her eyes even tighter, wishing there were some way she could go back and change what was happening here. If time travel had suddenly presented itself, she would have ignored every chance to go to the future just to keep one of them out of the clutches of the spirits.

But there was no sudden flash of light, no cheery sound of someone asking who had just been hoping for a time machine. There were only the harsh footsteps and Zimmy's screams drawing closer, and then suddenly the footsteps stopped, and something heavy landed on the vines beside Kat. She felt Annie's arms wrap around her even tighter, and whatever had landed drew in an angry, sobbing breath and didn't move.

"Zimmy?" Kat whispered, and Annie's arms wrapped around her still tighter, as though in warning, but Kat paid her no mind. It wasn't their fault that Zimmy was there, and they owed the girl nothing, but she felt sorry for her nevertheless. If the girl was still bound by the ring somehow, then Kat pitied her. It could just as easily have been her lying there, cursing and hissing.

The person on the vines fell silent for a moment, then said, "What're you doing here, Donlan? Were you stupid enough to get yourself caught?"

Again Annie's arms tightened around Kat, but this time it was in comfort rather than caution, and Kat glared in the direction Zimmy sounded like she was. Her eyes had opened, and though she could still see nothing, she felt more natural speaking to her that way. "We only got caught because you ran," she said, keeping her voice low, just in case someone shouted at her again. Zimmy hadn't bothered to whisper, but maybe she was hurt enough that the spirits didn't want to try to silence her. "If you'd stayed, we could have fought them off."

"Not a chance," Zimmy growled. "Do you know what those things are?"

Kat shook her head, even though she knew Zimmy couldn't see her. "Aren't they some kind of spirits?"

Zimmy growled again, but this time there were no words, only a guttural sound deep in her throat. "They're not just any spirits," she said. "They're…" But whatever she said next was completely incomprehensible to Kat. It might as well have been another language, and as far as she knew, it was.

Annie's arms tightened around her again, and Kat winced in pain. "Don't let her know I'm here," Annie whispered, her voice barely more than a breath. "Don't respond directly to my questions or anything I say. Do you understand?"

Kat couldn't help but be annoyed at being asked a question that she couldn't hide the answer to, but she nodded and hoped Annie would be able to feel the gesture, given how close she lay. "So, if you know so much about those… whatever they are… do you know where they've brought us?" she asked, speaking a little louder than she had before. No one kicked her, so she decided her courage might not have been completely in vain, and she felt a little proud of herself, or as proud as she could be while tied up by vines and stuck in some Shadow House. "I think it's called the Shadow House."

Either the darkness was easing or Kat's eyes were finally getting used to it, but she thought she could see Zimmy. She couldn't see much – just that the girl had bruises on her arms and looked like she was more reclining on the vines than lying on them – but it was enough to make Kat feel a bit more at ease. She wasn't sure how they would avoid Zimmy noticing Annie, but Kat wasn't entirely sure why Annie was so worried about that, except for that Zimmy might attack her for the ring.

"Shadow House," Zimmy murmured. "Of course they'd bring us there. Do you know how much danger you're in, Donlan?"

Zimmy sounded a little mocking, but even more than that, she sounded tense, and Kat's breath caught in her throat. If Zimmy thought they were in danger, then there was something more that Kat didn't know, something she probably ought to. "If I did, do you think I would have asked?" She tried to sound defiant, but her voice shook, and she was incredibly grateful for Annie's arms still around her.

Zimmy snorted and lowered herself onto the vines. "The Shadow House lives between two worlds, Donlan," she said. "It's between life and death, and the only way to pass between them unharmed is to go through here. If you're in the Shadow House, that means you're taking a trip to the world of the dead, and you might not get a chance to come back. I know I wouldn't bring you back from there." Kat thought she saw a flash of teeth in a grin, but it might only have been her imagination.

"Why did they bring us here?" Kat asked, and this time she didn't even bother to sound defiant.

"Dunno," Zimmy said. "Maybe they're going to ditch your bodies in the world of the dead, and you'll have to live out the rest of your lives there. It won't last too long, though, so don't worry about that." Zimmy's laugh – if it was a laugh – had no humor in it, and Kat closed her eyes again, hoping that Zimmy was lying.

"Maybe we'll get a chance to find Reynardine," Annie whispered, and Kat's heart sank. She'd thought Reynardine was dead, but hearing it from Annie made it sound all too real, and she knew now that he really was gone.

"What can we do?" she asked, and hoped Annie would realize the question was as much for her as it was for Zimmy, and possibly even more so.

"Apologize," Annie whispered, and Kat's heart sank again.

"Nothing," Zimmy said, and either there was nowhere further for Kat to sink or she simply didn't care what Zimmy had to say. She had sunk far enough that she didn't hope for one or the other. "You're tied up pretty good, Donlan, and you can't get past the…" Again that strange word, the one Kat was sure she couldn't have said even if she dared to try. "Even if you tried. You'll wind up tossed into the world of the dead, and you'll die there. I wonder what happens if someone dies when they're already dead. If they toss me in with you, I guess I'll find out."

Kat shuddered, and she didn't try to think of being stuck with Zimmy until they were both dead beyond death. She wanted to ask Annie if there was something the psychopomps could do, but then she remembered that she couldn't speak directly to her friend for some reason, even though the room had definitely gotten light enough for Zimmy to be able to see that there were two people there.

"If I were nice," Zimmy went on, "I'd kill you now. It'd be pretty easy. I could snap your neck, or bite out your throat, or strangle you with one of these things." She lifted one of the vines and twisted it around her hand as though testing how well it might fit around Kat's throat, and Kat pulled back, pressing herself against Annie as much as she could. "It'd be better than what you'll face in the world of the dead. Trust me."

"Don't worry," Annie whispered. "I won't let her hurt you. If she tries, I'll burn this whole place down."

Right then, Kat knew her friend would, and she found it both worrying and comforting that someone was willing to go to such lengths to protect her. If the Shadow House lay between life and death, though, then something terrible might happen if it burned down, so she shook her head.

"I will," Annie insisted, but then Zimmy was speaking again, and she fell silent.

"I'm not nice, though," Zimmy said as she released the vine and settled back against the wild growth. It had grown even lighter, and Kat thought she saw a hint of madness in Zimmy's eyes, so she couldn't trust that she would stay alive. "Besides, if we're fighting a war, I think I'd rather have you on my side than theirs. You might be helpless, but there's got to be something you can do."

"What war?" Kat asked.

"Living against dead," Zimmy said, and to Kat's relief, she didn't sound completely disdainful. "It won't be a real war, but it'll feel like one for us. The dead will all attack us, and we'll try to stay alive, but we won't manage. The best we can do is to last as long as we can."

It was light enough that Kat could see the dark green vines all around them, and she could see the spirits as well. There were many more than she had thought, and they stood in a circle, passing a bottle of something around. Each of them took a sip before passing it on, and it looked very much like a ritual, as though some sacred rite was being performed, and Kat tried to make herself even smaller, fearing it would turn out to be some kind of sacrifice.

"Where's Carver?" Zimmy asked. "I thought she'd be here to keep you alive. Or maybe she just doesn't care anymore."

Then Kat understood, but she knew it was too late for her to do anything about it, for sunlight poked through the roof of the Shadow House, and the spirit holding the bottle turned to set it aside. Whatever was going to happen couldn't be put off any longer, and when Kat glanced over her shoulder, even though she still felt Annie's arms around her, she saw nothing at all.