"Listen to me," she said. Her lean, smooth face was so close to his own, he could feel her breath on his face. "By the end of this day, we will be outside the Forbidding and back in the Four Lands. I will make Tesla Dart promise this. There won't be another day inside this world. Then maybe you can start putting what you're feeling right now behind you."

He nodded without looking at her. "I can't do anything before then, I can tell you that much."

"Just concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other," she said. "Just stay with that for the rest of today. You'll be fine."

They set out again shortly afterward. They had finished the little food and water Oriantha had brought with her from the camp. Tesla Dart seemed to be able to go for long periods with no food or water at all, and she said nothing of the supplies situation, insisting they press on.

"I want us out of here by nightfall," Oriantha insisted.

"I want us out of here forever!" the Ulk Bog snapped in reply.

It was midafternoon when they reached the rim of a crater-shaped valley that dropped away in a huge, sweeping bowl, its slopes rock-strewn and chopped apart by twisting defiles. The valley floor stretched away for perhaps a mile, all of it riven with jagged cracks and littered with boulders and clumps of thick scrub. It was a stark, desolate landscape, an arena poorly carved by ancient cataclysms and the passing of time, rough-hewn but immediately reminiscent of the place where Redden had watched Khyber Elessedil do battle with Tael Riverine. When he made the connection, a deep shudder went all through him, and he wrenched his gaze away and concentrated on the ground in front of him.

"What is that?" Oriantha asked Tesla Dart.

The Ulk Bog glanced over and shook her head. "Kroat Abyss. Very bad. You don't go there. Dangerous things."

They kept walking, glancing over now and then to the valley. "Who was Kroat?" the shape-shifter pressed.

"Straken Lord, very early. One of first. Drilled down for place to keep the bad things collected."

"The bad things. What sort of bad things?"

"Elf magic, talismans and sorceries used against the Jarka Ruus in ancient wars. Locked away with us, these ones, when we were imprisoned. But no one knows their power, no one knows how to use, afraid to try." She gave them a sly look. "Weka touched them and no harm came to him, he told. But Straken Lords keep such for themselves, not let others come close. Weka not like others. Weka knows all the secrets of the lands, all the hiding places, all the treasure chambers and tombs and keeps. So he visits and looks."

She gestured at the valley. "Takes me there, once. Long ago. So long. I was still learning. Just a girl. Takes me down into darkness and shows me what is there. Things of the Old World. Of when Jarka Ruus were one with Faerie. Long since gone."

Redden, who had been only half listening before, suddenly realized what he was hearing. He stopped where he was. "What did you say?" he asked sharply. "Things of the Old World?"

The other two stopped and turned back to him. "No, Redden," Oriantha said in warning. She was already sensing what was coming.

"Were there pretty stones?" he asked, ignoring her. "Did Weka show you colored stones?"

"Some," said the Ulk Bog. "In a box, locked up. Pretty stones. Different colors."

"Were they in sets of three?" he pressed, moving over excitedly.

"Redden, stop it!" Oriantha snapped.

Tesla Dart glanced over at her, and then looked back at the boy. "Sets of three. Red. Green. Another two. Yellow, maybe?"

"Four sets, four colors? You saw these stones? They were down there?"

"Saw them like I see you. Took them out of case and held them in my hands. Pretty in the light. Glittered and shined. But they were only stones, not magic. Nothing happened. I put them back."

"Shades!" Redden breathed, turning to Oriantha. "Do you believe it? We've found the missing Elfstones!" He held up his hands as she started to object, giddy with excitement. "No, listen to me. This is a miracle. We had the chance to find them all along; we just didn't know it. Tesla Dart knew where they were. She knew! But she didn't know we were looking for them because we didn't say anything about it. We just told her we were trying to find friends that had been carried off by a dragon. We didn't tell her why we were inside the Forbidding in the first place. We didn't say what we had really come looking for!"

"Redden, what difference does it make now? That search is ended!"

"Only because, until this moment, we had no place to look. We didn't know where to go. Only Khyber knew anything, and she took that knowledge with her when she died. But think about it! Tesla Dart knows this information, too. She can take us down there into that pit. We can still find the Elfstones and bring them back out again!"

Oriantha stared at him. "Listen to yourself. How many are dead already because they thought they could find the missing Stones? How many, Redden? Now you want to risk our lives, as well? You want to forget about getting out of here, about finding a way back to your brother? You want to go hunting for the Elfstones, too? You must be out of your mind!"

Redden stepped forward so that he was right in front of her.

"I need to do this. Do you understand me? I need to. I've watched everyone die-and most of them right in front of me. I watched Carrick die. I watched the Ard Rhys die at the hands of Tael Riverine. All of this happened because of the search for the Elfstones-I understand that. But if we now have a chance to find the Stones and bring them back into the Four Lands-to finally do what we set out to do-don't we have an obligation to try? It would provide some small vindication for what's been sacrificed. It would prove that those who are gone didn't die for nothing!"

Oriantha shook her head. "No. It was madness before, and it is madness now."

"But we've suffered so much! The Druids are mostly dead; the order is destroyed. Your mother is dead. My brother may be dead, too. The search was a disaster. If we could get possession of the Elfstones, at least we would have something to show for all that." He shook his head and stared at the ground. "I am not going back without trying. I can't. I won't ever be the same if I give up on this chance. I have to try to find a way back to who I was before all this began. Maybe I can do that if we recover the Stones."

Oriantha folded her arms. "The Elfstones have been the cause of everything bad that has happened. Why do you think it would be any different now? Insisting on this just gives you one more chance to kill yourself and take us with you. I risked my life to break you free of that cage. Was it all for this? To have you take up right where you left off and in the end die anyway?"

"But what if all that is behind us?" He wheeled on Tesla Dart. "Are you sure the Elfstones are still down there, in this underground storage chamber? Can we find a way down there like you did?"

She looked from him to Oriantha and back again, clearly uneasy. "Stairs take you down-a long way down. But the stones are there. No one touches Old World magic, not even Tael Riverine. We can do, can go, if you want."

"Does something guard the magic? Are there creatures watching over it? Is it dangerous down there?"

"Nothing guards. Nothing watches. It is a dead place with dead things from a dead world. Only the Straken Lord goes. And Weka, too, once upon a time. Now, you maybe."

"You see?" Redden turned back to Oriantha. "We can do this! If we bring back the Elfstones, it will mean we didn't fail entirely. You must see it. We can't let this chance pass! We have to take it. We have to at least have a look!"

She glared at him. "You were the one who claimed to be falling apart. You were the one who insisted we had to be out of the Forbidding by day's end. Remember?"

"But knowing the Elfstones are down there changes everything. Now we have a real purpose in being here, one that doesn't involve running and hiding and fighting to stay alive. We have a chance to bring back the most important magic in Elven lore."

"Bringing back the Elfstones won't bring back the Ard Rhys or my mother. It won't bring back any of them. The past is done. You understand that, don't you?"

Redden took a deep breath and exhaled sharply. He could feel this opportunity slipping away from him, and he couldn't stand the thought of it. Oriantha was determined not to go, and if she didn't she probably wouldn't let him go, either. She was too invested in saving him, had given up too much to bring him back to his family. He understood what that meant, and he knew he wouldn't fight her.

But if that happened, he would never recover from what he had gone through. He could sense it-and not just in an offhand way, but deep down inside where the pain never quite goes away. Doing this, giving it at least a chance, would help him heal. It would lend him the emotional strength that had been steadily eroding all during his imprisonment and systematic incapacitation.

He met Oriantha's hard stare squarely. "What if the Elfstones could be used to help us defend against the Straken Lord's invasion? What if one of those sets has the power to negate the size and numbers of his army-maybe even to destroy it? Would it be worth it then?"

"We don't know what the Stones can do, Redden."

"But if we had them in our possession, we might be able to find out. We would have four chances to find a magic that would make a difference. Isn't that worth the risk?"

She continued to stare at him, saying nothing.

"We just need someone with Elven blood to wield the Stones," he continued. "Even I would do! I'm more than half Elf. My mother's blood is Elven; my father had some small portion of Elven blood, as well. I could try to use them."

Oriantha sighed wearily. "You are determined, aren't you? Even given the probable danger. Even knowing that it might all come to nothing. Your stubbornness exceeds your fears and doubts and your need to escape this place." She shook her head. "Hard to believe."

He almost laughed. "No harder to believe than anything else that's happened. It's just another part of the madness we've been struggling with since we left Bakrabru. But this, maybe, will lead to something good. For me, it means finding a way to live what what's happened. It means putting an end to this whole business. I have to try."

She shook her head in despair. "You won't let go of this, will you?" She gave a deep sigh. "All right. Maybe there's something in what you say. We'll give it a try."