"And somewhere at the top, a wish was waiting to be broken," I said, mostly to myself, though the words felt heavy enough to drop right through the porch floorboards.
"Ren, you're doing that thing again where you talk like you're reading the back of a book," Red said, leaning against the doorframe. She was still holding her mug of ale, but her eyes were fixed on the gold glitter slowly dissolving into the wood where the fox had stood. "Can we talk like normal people for five minutes? It's three in the morning. My brain is about eighty percent mush, and a bipedal fox just told us we're invited to a death-trap tower that grew out of the bay like a giant weed."
Kaelen didn't say a word. He just stood there, staring at the silver envelope in his hand. The moonlight—the real, crescent moonlight that we'd just fought so hard to restore—caught the edges of the paper, making it shimmer with a soft, inviting light. He looked like he wanted to drop it, but his fingers were locked tight.
