"You're Constance's and Forbearance's oldest brother," Alexandra said.

The tall man nodded. "I am."

Able Pritchard had been the only missing family member during Alexandra's visit to the Ozarks the previous year. His wife Grace had been there, pregnant and unhappy, but Alexandra had never learned what had kept him away that summer.

"Wait a minute," she said. "You saw me when I was a baby? You're a member of the Thorn Circle?" He looked no older than Lucilla and Drucilla.

Able smiled. "No, Miss Quick. I din't meet your pappy 'til later. I reckon sayin' you was a bairn might be stretchin' the leather a bit. Truth is you wasn't actually born yet."

Alexandra did some quick reckoning of her own. "You met my mother, when she came to the Ozarks to find her grandmother."

"Ayup. She made me her guide through the Hollers. She was quite a witch, your momma. I was so impressionable, I would've followed her to the ends of the Earth. But she din't let me meet her granny."

"Probably for your own good."

"Prob'ly. She never told me what Granny Grimm said to her, but she was harrowed. Afterwards she told me 'bout the Confederation an' what your pa was about. It sounded very adventuresome to me, bein' barely more'n a tad. But I also apperhended what my kinfolk din't, that we'uns wouldn't stay hidden forever an' the Confederation sooner or later would come to our door. So… I pestered her as to what I could do."

Alexandra waited for Able to finish this story, but to her annoyance, he turned to David instead. "Connie's doin' well," he said. "She walks with only a li'l help. Bear follows her like a shadow."

David nodded. "She, uh, she say anything…?"

"You know she misses you terrible. She don't have to say so."

"Why are you here?" Alexandra asked. Evidently David and Able had already met, and there seemed to be a great deal she was missing. Able didn't look put out by her brusque question. He was calm and serious in a way that his brothers were not.

"A coupla reasons," he said. "First relates to all these elves." The elves had been completely silent during his introduction, but now they all turned their attention on the Ozarker.

"You'all know," Able said, addressing the elves, "my folk've never kept house-elves or been part of any Compact you'uns made with wizards. We'uns left that wickedness behind in the Old World. There's some in the Five Families who reckon elves are part o' the Old World we'uns oughter have no intercourse with."

"They ought to talk to some of the elves who've been here since before we all came to the New World," Alexandra said.

Able paused. When Alexandra didn't say anything else, he went on.

"They'uns debated Ms. Brandywine's idee," he said. "I reckon they'uns must've consulted the Grannies too. Those of us who want to leave this world behind is in favor. The Steadfasters hain't so sure."

"What idea is this?" Alexandra asked.

"We'uns reckon goin' to the World Away will take more'n you, Miss Quick. Constance an' Forbearance said what happened at Charmbridge. You can open the way, but we'uns can't all cross by our ownselves. We'uns need help, an' askin' for help from outsiders, an' 'specially from… Beins, is mighty hard for our folk."

David snorted.

"But we'uns reckon the World Away oughter be large enough to share," Able said.

Alexandra looked from Able Pritchard to the elves. David folded his arms glumly, while Ms. Brandywine seemed to be scrutinizing everyone at once.

"I never promised to do this," Alexandra protested. "I'm not even sure I can do it!"

"I heard what happened at the Unworking. And again at Mahomachi, an' Charmbridge."

"Glad you're so confident." Alexandra looked at Bran and Poe. "Is this really what you want? To leave this world behind, and go to the World Away? Forever?"

Bran and Poe looked at each other, and didn't answer. Another elf spoke up. "Maybe not all of us. But enough. If it is what we want, daughter of Thorn, will you help us?"

Alexandra put her hands over her face. It seemed like too much. They had all lost so much already, and even more of her friends wanted to leave.

A hand touched her shoulder. She dropped her hands. David wore an expression as anguished as her own.

"No one's gonna make you do anything," he said. "As if we could."

"Do you want this?" she asked. "Do Constance and Forbearance?"

David glanced at Able. "We haven't really had a chance to talk about it."

Alexandra fixed him with a look she imagined Anna might once have given her. "Then why don't we go to Furthest and talk to them? I told the Grannies already, I don't care who they think I am, and I don't owe them or the Five Families anything."

"Spoken like Troublesome," said Able.

"But I'll do it for my friends," Alexandra continued. "If that's what they really want. That includes you," she added, looking at Bran and Poe. "I mean, I'll try. I really am not sure how this would work. Like, there are logistics. Have you guys even thought of that?"

The last question was addressed to Able. He raised his eyebrows. "'Course we'uns've thought about that, Miss Quick. You already cracked open the dwarves' mountain. Reckon you'd have to do it again."

"There are elves already in that mountain," Alexandra said.

Able nodded. "Ayup. Reckon you'll have to free 'em, an' they'uns hain't domesticated like our friends here."

This caused a discontented rustling among the assembled elves, their voices hushed and chirping but clearly displeased. Alexandra wondered if only the most rebellious elves were here, or if the subservience that seemed to come so naturally was easily cast off because it had never been their true nature.

"Those elves are gonna have some feelins 'bout bein' trapped so long, I reckon," Able said.

"Wait, what? Elves trapped in a dwarven mountain?" David said.

"It's a long story," Alexandra said. "I only told you some of it last summer."

"I'd like to hear it," said Ms. Brandywine.

"Mebbe there'll be time, if'n you would care to 'ccompany us, Miz Brandywine?" Able said. "But that also depends on our small friends here. I din't bring a mule an' we'un's hain't much for brooms, so mostly I been travelin' the long way, 'cept when I can find a ley here or there. It's a fair piece to the Ozarks from here, but I've made the trip many a time an' it don't put me out none. But if'n you'all is gonna come to the Ozarks anyhow, you could do us a small favor…?"

Able was much more comfortable speaking to elves than Constance and Forbearance had ever been. He also seemed unbothered by asking for help from elf magic, something that repelled most Ozarkers. The elves nodded their heads and squeaked agreement. Bran and Poe hopped off the stack of books they were sitting on and stood next to Alexandra, blinking up at her.

"We would be happy to help David Washington and Alexandra Quick and their friends," said Bran.

"Cool, I finally get top billing," David said.

"Well," said Ms. Brandywine, "I've never seen the Ozarks, and without a law practice or a society to run anymore, I suppose I wouldn't mind a little travel. I would like to meet these elves of the dwarven mountain. Are we leaving right away? I would like some time to put my affairs in order."

"I hope your trip won't be as final as all that, Ma'am," Able said.

"You aren't expecting me to just open the World Away today, are you? Don't you all need time to… pack, and get ready?" Alexandra was overwhelmed by the enormity of what they were asking. They couldn't just leave this world behind! The Ozarkers, and hundreds of elves, so many of her friends!

"Not today, I don't reckon," Able said. "You're right o' course. Even if'n we'uns're finally talkin' 'bout makin' serious preparations, it'll take awhile."

"Okay," Alexandra said. "Fine. I'll come. I'll do… I'll do whatever you ask."

"There's just one more person I'm waitin' on," Able said.

"Who's that?"

"Already sent an elf to fetch her," Able said, "'summin' she's coming."

As if on cue, there was a pop in the hallway outside. Able stepped aside, and Sonja, looking less thin than a few weeks ago, stepped into the doorway, still holding the hand of the elf who had brought her.

After a round of hugs, Alexandra asked Sonja, "Why are you here?"

Sonja's faced dimpled. There was a shadow of her old self in her smile. "I had a long talk with Able, and we agreed I should have a long talk with Burton."

"You can't possibly be thinking of staying with him? Even… going with them, to the World Away?"

"You're always telling me what I should or shouldn't be thinking, Alexandra. Burton isn't a bad person, and he is the father of our child."

"He's a player and a jerk," Alexandra said. "What are you going to do, marry him? Become an Ozarker?"

"That's between me and him, I guess," Sonja said slowly.

Alexandra shook her head. "You—"

"Miss Quick," Able said. "I understand how you feel, an' believe me, hain't none of us too pleased with Burton's comportment. I went to find Miss Sonja after I found out what them two, uh, got up to, an' like she says, we'uns had a long talk. She an' Burton needs to decide twixt themselves what to do. We'un're all agreed it's their decision. Maybe Burton will leave the Hollers. Maybe Miss Sonja will stay with us. Maybe they'uns'll go their separate ways. But it hain't up to you or me."

Alexandra felt more arguments bubbling up, but realized it was her own feelings threatening to spill out. Not feelings about Burton, but feelings about losing more friends, and having no control over what happened to them.

Ms. Brandywine had conjured a traveling cloak and a tall witch's hat, and looked rather uncomfortable at the little drama before her, while the elves crowded around them seemed to regard the argument as some sort of play being enacted before them, which they watched silently.

Alexandra swallowed and looked away. "Fine. Let's go to the Ozarks, I guess." She didn't think Geming Chu or any of his generals needed to know where she was going.

"We go," said Bran.

"We go," said Poe.

And with a great burst of air rushing into the room, they all vanished.


Five humans and a dozen elves stood beneath the trees looking at the Pritchards' homestead. It seemed unchanged from the last time Alexandra had been here. Winged goats were penned in a great dome-like netted fence, and two large barns sat across a well-trodden dirt yard from the large, sprawling one-story house with its uneven roof.

"Where'd all the other elves go?" Alexandra asked. There had been dozens in the ASPEW office alone.

"They takes word to the others," said Bran.

"Word will come, and so will all free elves who wishes to go, if Alexandra Quick opens the World Away," said Poe.

"What about all the elves who aren't free yet?" Alexandra asked.

"They will be," David said. "By the time the war's over. That's our job."

"How am I supposed to do that?" Alexandra asked.

"You don't control everything, Miss Quick," Ms. Brandywine said. "I've been studying magical contracts for a reason. Those elves who haven't been freed by the actions of the Thorn Circle can be magically released from the Compact. I admit that's a little harder than simply opening cracks in the world, but perhaps if your father had consulted with me—"

"Like you'd have joined the Thorn Circle?" David said.

"No. You're right, Mr. Washington. And I know your father's objective was not primarily freeing the elves, Miss Quick."

"Whatever." Alexandra walked forward towards the Pritchards' house. She wanted to see Constance and Forbearance and know that they, at least, were okay. Behind her, Able, Sonja, David, and Ms. Brandywine followed. David looked as nervous as Sonja. Behind them, the elves trailed along looking around curiously.

Mr. Pritchard and Noah and Burton both came out onto the front porch to meet them. Mr. Pritchard's face tightened a little at the sight of the elves. Or maybe it was the sight of Alexandra, or Sonja. Or all of them. Mr. Pritchard was rarely happy about receiving visitors, Alexandra thought, and now he had even less reason to be.

"Mr. Pritchard," she said. She cleared her throat. "I'm… so sorry about Innocence." She wanted to say, I'm sorry I couldn't save her this time, but her feelings weren't important. "I gave my condolences to Constance and Forbearance, but not to your family. I am sorry about that, and I'm sorry I wasn't at the funeral. There are reasons, but no excuses. I'm sorry."

She waited for him to curse her or tell her to leave. He just nodded. "We'uns knowed you loved that girl too."

"We'uns was likewise very sorrowed to hear 'bout Miss Anna," said Noah.

Burton said, "We'uns know she was a dear friend to you, and to allus as well."

After an awkward silence, Able was the first to speak. "I said our piece to the elves. They'uns agreed to our proposal, 'least some of 'em has."

Mr. Pritchard nodded. "Noah, go fetch Granny Pritchard. She'll send word to the other Grannies, I reckon."

Noah tipped his hat to the guests and Apparated away.

"You'uns know Miss Quick and Mr. Washington and Miss Rackham," Able said. "This is Miz Brandywine. She's a Colonial lawyer or some such. She's gonna help with freein' the elves who hain't freed yet."

Mr. Pritchard nodded again. "Don't feature how that 'splains you comin' here, Miz Brandywine, but you're welcome with all the others." Both he and Burton seemed to avoid looking at Sonja, which made Alexandra a little angry, but before she could say anything, Mrs. Pritchard stepped out onto the porch.

"Dust," she said, "Constance tells me it's traditional to leave out gifts for visitin' elves—milk an' honey an' such."

Mr. Pritchard grunted.

"Actually, it's not only traditional, but highly recommended," Ms. Brandywine said. "Not that I think our friends will inflict any of the traditional calamities upon you, but there are ancient courtesies it would be better to observe."

"We'uns would not want to be seen discourteous to wizards or Beins," Mr. Pritchard said. "Do as you'uns think proper." He turned to Burton. "We'uns'll let you and Miss Sonja have some time alone so you can do the right thing, boy."

Burton looked uncomfortable, though not nearly uncomfortable enough, as far as Alexandra was concerned. She held her tongue, because Sonja had made it clear she could speak for herself, and because the Pritchards were all still in mourning.

Burton descended the steps and took Sonja's hands in his. "I reckon we oughter talk," he said.

Alexandra couldn't help interjecting, "You reckon?"

Sonja shook her head at her. "Tell Constance and Forbearance I'll join you all in a bit."

"Okay," Alexandra said. "Just shout if you need us."

Sonja smiled slightly at this. Burton rolled his eyes without amusement.

Able, Alexandra, David, and Ms. Brandywine went inside. They found Mrs. Pritchard and her youngest daughter Whimsy preparing dishes for the elves, while Forbearance was setting out plates on the table for their human guests. Constance sat in a rocking chair, watching her little brother, Done. Everyone paused. Then Forbearance rushed over and embraced Alexandra. She hesitated, and shook David's hand. Her eyes glistened. All of them walked over to Constance, who had risen from the chair with tears in her eyes. She was still pale, and one arm, hidden beneath her shawl, never moved from her side. Very gingerly, Alexandra embraced Constance too.

"We'un's missed you terrible," Constance said.

"We'uns been so feared," Forbearance said.

"You disappeared, Alex," said Constance reproachfully.

"Again," said Forbearance.

Alexandra looked down. "I'm sorry." She forced her voice to remain steady. "Sorry" covered so many things, and not nearly enough.

Mrs. Pritchard was chatting with Ms. Brandywine while Mr. Pritchard sat back down at the table and called Done over to him. There wasn't much privacy here, but the adults were giving the teenagers a little bit of space. Alexandra and David caught Constance and Forbearance up with the purpose of their visit, the elves outside, and of course, Sonja. Alexandra sensed their parents listening in even if they tried to appear they weren't.

"Will you really do it, Alexandra?" Forbearance asked. "Open the World Away?"

"Do you really want me to?" Alexandra asked.

Forbearance looked down. Alexandra read in the twins' faces what a struggle this question was.

"We'uns never called ourselves Steadfasters," Constance said. "But I reckon we'uns never featured actually leavin' neither. Now…" She took a breath, and winced slightly. David reached a hand towards her, before pulling it back. "No one calls themselves Steadfasters no more."

"The Confederation called on us to join them 'gainst the Dark Convention… and MACUSA," Forbearance said.

"No one answered their call," Constance said. "Their Regimental Officers got sent sideways outter the Hollers."

"We'uns know the Confederation won't let that stand."

"Everyone's feared they'uns won't let us remain a Culture apart no more."

"You can if the Confederation goes down," Alexandra said.

"So you say," said the deep voice of Mr. Pritchard. He had indeed been listening. "S'pposin' that happens. Will yore father be in charge then, Miss Quick? Or will it be this MACUSA? Or maybe the whole Confederation will fall apart an' it'll be wizards 'n Muggles left to deal with each other in ev'ry Territory 'n Holler, and a thousand fractions that will be."

It was about the longest thing Alexandra had ever heard Mr. Pritchard say. She didn't know how to answer his question. "I don't know," she said. "But I'm pretty sure it won't be my father in charge."

"So have you already decided you're going?" David asked. "You're gonna join the Exodans an' flee to the World Away, if Alex can make that happen?"

"We'uns'll stay with our kin," Mr. Pritchard said. "And a world away from this one looks better day by day."

David looked at Alexandra. She stared hollowly back at him, not knowing what else to say.

Then he took Constance's hand. Forbearance covered her mouth.

"What about you?" David asked. "Is this what you want?"

"David," said Constance.

"You don't have to go, you know," he said.

"Boy, guest or not, you are oversteppin' yoreself," Mr. Pritchard said. "This is family business, not yourn."

David's jaw clenched and Alexandra saw a vein throb in his temple.

"He calls his own sons that," Constance whispered. "It weren't meant the way you think."

"I know," David said, through clenched teeth. He let go of her hand and rose to his feet. "I'm gonna go take a walk."

"Watch out for hide-behinds," Alexandra said, as David stalked out of the house.

He mumbled something to Mrs. Pritchard who was returning from delivering refreshments to the elves.

Constance closed her eyes. Her cheeks were wet. Forbearance knelt next to her, and Whimsy, returning with her mother, came over and threw her arms around Constance's neck and rested her head on her good shoulder. Everyone sat there in awkward silence.


Sonja returned after a while, without Burton. No one questioned her as she walked over to sit down with Constance and Forbearance and Alexandra. The twins embraced her and fussed over her, and for a little while their conversation was light, as if they were trying to ignore the loss and grief hanging over their heads.

Alexandra supposed eventually the Grannies would turn up and ask her to open the World Away. She didn't know how the Ozarkers planned to do this. How long would it take everyone from the Five Hollers to assemble at the mountain where all their magic was kept? Could she draw again upon the centuries of Unworkings stored there, all the magic she'd once touched when she first opened a crack in the world and seen the World Away? She wasn't sure her father's tutelage had prepared her for this. And what about the elves? Would they just appear and walk hand-in-hand with the Ozarkers to the Other Side?

All this speculation was a distraction to keep her mind off of the things she really didn't want to think about. Anna gone, Innocence gone, Constance and Forbearance leaving. Her father dying. What of Sonja? And the Confederation might be bleeding and weak, but they still had many, many Aurors and Inquisitors and Regimental Officers, and all of them saw Alexandra and her sisters as the enemy now.

Nothing she'd done had actually made things better. The Deathly Regiment hadn't ended. The Confederation and the Dark Convention were both still terrorizing the Muggle and magical worlds. Had she ever saved anyone?

"Where's David?" Constance asked. Alexandra hadn't really been listening to the conversation for a while, so it took her a moment to register Constance's question. It was getting close to sunset. Alexandra's joke notwithstanding, the Ozarks could be dangerous if you just went out strolling unawares, as she well knew. David probably hadn't gone far, and the elves were out there too, so probably they knew where he was.

All this went through her mind more slowly than usual. Constance was in no shape to get up and go looking for him, Forbearance wouldn't want to leave her side, and Sonja… Sonja was looking at her with that insufferable, understanding expression again.

Alexandra stood up. "I'll find him. He's probably just walking around to blow off steam."

"Y'all are gonna stay the night, I reckon?" Mr. Pritchard said, with as little hospitality in his voice as he could possibly manage without sounding inhospitable.

"Tell Mr. Washington I'll be servin' dinner soon," Mrs. Pritchard said.

"We'uns might not hear from the Grannies or t'other Hollers 'til tomorrow," said Noah. "I reckon there'll be a conclave with Pa 'n t'others to decide if'n it's time."

"Reckon Miss Quick has a say in that," Able said.

Alexandra shrugged. "I don't have much to say, actually."

She walked out into humid air starting to cool. The voices inside had become like a low-grade cacophony, bothering her with words without meaning, even if it was her friends talking. Finding David gave her something else to focus on. The group of elves they'd arrived with were gathered around the plates and basket Mrs. Pritchard had put out for them, eating and chatting as if they were at a picnic. They immediately hopped to their feet when she approached them.

"Where did David go?" she asked.

"He was curious about the bad place," said one of the older-looking elves.

"Bad place?" Alexandra asked.

"Where dwarves once lived and elves is imprisoned," said another elf.

"Oh. That place." Alexandra frowned. "Did he go there by himself? It's not even in this Holler, how would he—"

The tallest elf held up his hands. "Mister Noah and Mister Burton took David, and Huzzkin goes with them. Miss Quick doesn't worry. We makes sure David is not taken by the Old Folk."

"Old Folk?"

"Other elveses… not our kind. They is tricksy."

Alexandra pondered this blankly for a few moments. Once she would have pressed them with more questions, but she knew all she needed to know. The elves trapped in the mountain had told her they were older than the Ozarkers. They'd wanted her to free them, and tried to manipulate her into killing a jimplicute, a fearsome beast that preyed on elves and dwarves and humans alike. She'd left them buried beneath the mountain after she brought it down around the dwarves. She was glad David hadn't gone to talk to them by himself.

They were tricksy, though. And then there were the dwarves, who were anything but friendly, even if they now were forced by circumstances (circumstances she had created) to make nice with the Ozarkers. Alexandra didn't think David, Burton, and Noah together would be in much danger, but still, why would they go all the way there?

Seized with a sudden irrational fear, and images of Archibald Mudd and Mrs. Wilborough lying bleeding, Innocence blowing away on the wind, and Anna—Anna—Alexandra squeezed her eyes shut, and then without even saying good-bye to the elves, took a seven-league step into the next Holler.

The mountain looked much as she had left it. It was more of a hill now; she had greatly reduced its height. Rocks remained piled up around its base and great cracks in its rocky sides still looked recent, evidence of the cataclysmic force she'd unleashed with all the power of the Ozarkers' Unworking at her command. But there was an orderliness to the stones around the mountain's base, and Alexandra saw paths in the scrub and stone and even along its slopes that her eye once would have missed. She'd been told the dwarves were hard at work excavating their former home, trying to make it habitable again so they didn't have to rely on the hospitality of the Ozarkers.

In the gathering twilight, the shattered mountain looked eerie and sinister. Considering all that had come out of it, this wasn't surprising. Alexandra looked with her Witch's Sight and saw the cracks in the world she'd first opened here, and deeper in the heart of the mountain, the great reservoir of magic accumulated over centuries. She had only tapped a small part of it that night that she'd unleashed on the dwarves.

Imagine what else you could do with it.

While she considered this, she heard footsteps crunching over a rough graveled trail and had her wand out and pointed at the intruders before she even registered them as people.

Noah, Burton, David, and an elf with stiff wiry hair standing straight up all over his head stopped in their tracks.

"Are you fixin' to hex us, Miss Quick?" asked Noah.

Alexandra lowered her wand. "Can't be too careful out here. I just came to check on you."

"'Zat a fact?" Noah sounded amused. Alexandra didn't like that, or Burton's smirk, but David wasn't smiling.

"We talked to the dwarves," David said.

"Yeah? I guess with four of you, they didn't try to ambush you and eat you."

"Really? You still going on about that?" David asked.

"You get bashed over the head, tied up and dragged across rocks, and told you're going to be boiled in a stew, it might be hard to forget."

David nodded slowly as he came closer. "Yeah. You know, you left a few things out of that story, like how you nearly wiped them out afterwards."

Alexandra scowled. "Is that what they're telling you now?"

"Did you blow up their home and drop a mountain on them?"

She hesitated. "Yeah, kind of."

Next to David, the wiry-haired elf's eyebrows rose like tiny bristle-brushes.

"How many people did you kind of kill?" David asked.

"I didn't—" Alexandra closed her mouth.

"What were you about to say?" David demanded. "That you didn't kill any people?"

"No," Alexandra said. "I was going to say that I didn't intend to kill anyone. I wasn't exactly in my right mind… I mean, you saw me appear at the Jubilee."

"You mighta been wired, but you weren't possessed."

"All that magic definitely made me do things I shouldn't have." Alexandra avoided looking at Burton.

"Like genocide?"

"Oh give me a break!" Alexandra snapped. "I made them stop ambushing people and forced them to make peace with the Ozarkers. I didn't genocide anyone! Did they tell you I risked my life by killing the jimplicute for them?"

"Actually, as I recall 'twas me who killed the jimplicute," Burton said.

"Using my plan, and me as bait!"

"I'm sure killing one monster made up for all those casualties, and creating a refugee crisis," David said. "You sure were angry about the Confederation wiping out wizarding communities, and the Dark Convention preying on Muggles, but I guess it don't matter if it's not people."

Alexandra stared at him. Her fingers curled and uncurled. Then she said, "Go to hell."

Burton and Noah had both stopped grinning. The elf, still silent, flinched and made some sort of gesture with his fingers.

Noah said, "Alright, everyone's tetchy and carryin' a stone or three in their throat. We'uns can talk 'bout Miss Quick's crimes back at the house if'n you like, but don't cleave yoreselves at a time like this."

"Crimes?" Alexandra repeated. "Are you going to try me before or after I open the World Away for you?"

"'Twas a figure o' speech, Miss Quick," Noah said. "We'uns hain't got no Aurors or wizangamots. You knows that."

"Yeah, too bad for the dwarves," David said. "If they want justice, it ain't gonna come from us. Kinda like elves."

"Justice," Alexandra said. "What would justice look like, for dwarves?"

"Why don't you ask 'em?" David said.

"Maybe I will," Alexandra said.

David snorted.

Noah repeated, "Alright, don't be like this. Why don't we'uns all head back?" He put a hand on David's shoulder, while the elf, who had not said a word throughout this exchange, gingerly took David's hand.

Alexandra stepped back when Burton reached for her. "I don't need your help. Seven-League Boots, remember?"

Burton put his hands up. "Fine, fine. See you back at Furthest." He and Noah and David and Huzzkin all Disapparated away with a series of pops.

Justice, Alexandra thought. What did that look like?

She didn't move for several moments, and then she walked towards one of the rocks that might have been thrown away from the mountain during her great fit of wrath. It lay in the ground with the look of having only recently landed there.

After looking around and casting Revealing Spells, she levitated the rock into the air and excavated a hole at the bottom of the depression where it had sat. Very carefully, she bundled up both her wands and tossed them into the hole. A moment after her wands left her hand, the rock dropped back to the ground with a heavy thud.

She ran her fingers over the tattoo on her shoulder, and the one on her wrist, thinking about whether she should release her familiars. But she had been through this before; Charlie would refuse to leave her, and she couldn't bear trying to explain to the raven what she was feeling. She didn't know if it was selfishness or mercy to let them share her fate.

She walked towards the mountain, along the faint path she'd seen before the sun went down. It was dark now, with only a quarter moon and the stars above casting light. She might not have seen the dwarves around her in daylight; she knew how readily they could blend in with their surroundings. But in the darkness, she was surrounded before she was even aware that she wasn't alone.

She stopped, and said nothing as shadows smaller than her closed in.

"It is her!" said one voice.

"The angry witch, the mad witch," said another.

"Friend of the Ozarkers and ally of the elfin kind, but no friend of ours," said a third.

Their voices were hostile, but none of them touched her. No spade hit her in the back of the head like last time, either.

"What want you here, mad angry witch?" asked the shadow directly in front of her. "Come you here to threaten and sunder us again?"

Alexandra held up her hands. "I'm wandless."

A silence fell over the dwarves as they absorbed this.

"Wandless was she last time, when she wreaked such wrath," one of them muttered.

"What do you here?" asked the first dwarf again, this time with an edge in his voice that was both quizzical and threatening.

"A trap," muttered a voice behind her.

"Aye, a wicked trap by a wicked witch, to tempt us to rash action. We know the ways of wizard kind," said another dwarf.

"No trap," Alexandra said. "No trick. I'm without a wand, and none of my kind know I'm here. I'm delivering myself to you for justice."