my snail’s pace, I didn’t come nose-to-moss with the ground.
As the steep wall of gray rock loomed closer, metal clanked and then a thunderous, human growl rent the air.
“Remo?” I yelled, hoping the sound had emanated from him and not some beast come to slurp me down.
My name was snarled, which all at once reassured me—not a wild creature since animals neither knew my name nor spoke—and spurred my legs to travel quicker—proud Remo was obviously in a heap of trouble if he was begging me for assistance.
As though some god had blown out a deep breath, the mist cloaking the prison cell dissipated. And not just a little but completely, giving me an unhindered view of Remo’s predicament. His hands were wrapped around the golden bars of what looked like an oversized birdcage, his knuckles white from the strain. Please let this not be a cupola.
“Amara, behind you!”
My heart detonated as I twisted around. Since I was running, the momentum disrupted my precarious equilibrium. I tumbled, but at least I smacked down on my ass.
“It’s coming for you! Get up!”
I jolted to my feet even though I hadn’t seen anything coming for me, then backed up hesitantly, scanning the ground and air faster. When nothing moved, I called out, “What did you see, Remo?”
Metal clanked again. “The lupa. They’re right in front of you! Skies dammit, run!”
I pivoted slowly toward him.
“Amara!” His face was as colorless as my sling. “NO!” he wailed.
Had the lupa torn me limb to limb in his mind’s eye?
My doubt that the cage was infused with dark magic puffed away.
“It’s not real,” I said, keeping my voice calm because screaming at someone in the midst of a panic attack was surely not wise. “You’re inside a cupola. Just open the door and get out.” When it jounced off the ground, I sped up.
He blinked, but then he screamed again, at the wolves this time, his eyes glittering with fury, and I realized he hadn’t heard me, or if he had, his mind was telling him I was dead or dying or had become a wolf myself.
The cage rose higher thanks to a pulley system tied to the top of the cliff. Had Remo thought this was an elevator? Didn’t he know about cupolas? Maybe he hadn’t understood what he was stepping into because the mist had hidden it.
Soon the cage would be too high to reach, so I ran, yelling at him to get the door open, hoping my words registered in his tormented mind. His gaze flicked to the sky. Whatever he saw made him jerk away from the bars and cower. I accelerated, reaching the cupola just as its floor leveled with my chin. I extended my arm and latched on to the door, giving it a firm yank.
It didn’t open.
I yanked again.
The hinges didn’t even creak.
Crap. Crap. Crap.
“Remo!”
He startled, his gaze whipping to mine.
“The door!”
He didn’t move. Just stared.
The cage rose another inch. I fashioned a pair of heavy-duty snips from my dust and snagged the sharp blades around a bar. And then I heaved the handles together, sweat beading along my hairline. My sharp tool didn’t even nick the metal. If only I had use of both my hands.
The cage drifted farther up. I tried again, failed again. What other tool could I make? An axe. As my dust morphed into one, the cage grazed the top of my head. I swung the axe, but it just pinged off the metal the same way it had pinged off the alarm box back in the last world.
Remo growled, upsetting my concentration. He punched the air, eyes slitted, muscles twisting underneath his tunic. “I will end you.”
I wasn’t sure whom he was going to end. I sort of hoped it wasn’t fake-me, but then I remembered fake-me was dead, so it must’ve been someone else. I hoped it wasn’t my mother.
He rammed one side of the cage like a bull, and it swung, its base clocking me square in the forehead. Stars brightened the edges of my vision, and I dropped my axe on my foot. The blade didn’t go through my boot, but the weight made my breath catch and my toes curl in pain.
Remo rammed his cage again.
“It isn’t real!” I screamed, trying to get through to him.
His eyes stayed glazed and unseeing. I grabbed my fallen weapon and limped to the thick cord pulleying the cage up the steep wall, then batted it over and over. The heavy blade bounced