I didn’t know we had made it to Steamer’s Fall until Tike nearly ran off a small cliff. Klus tripped him just in time so that he tumbled to the edge of it, bruised and shocked but not plummeting to whatever waited below. He rolled over to scold the crocodile before he noticed the cliff edge a few inches from his side. From what I could tell Klus got a hug instead of a scolding.

The fog was thicker here, more humid. Not quite to the point where you couldn’t see past your own nose, but Tike and Klus were closer to silhouettes than anything else despite only being a handful of feet away and the cliff drop a suggestion of thicker fog and shadow until you got up close to it. I slipped up the edge but I couldn’t make out anything new. The daylight was diffused so thoroughly that it might as well have been evening for all I could tell, though I knew we hadn’t run that long. I couldn’t help but feel a smidgen of respect for whoever had to gather here everyday; no doubt the wet, blinding fog and cliff didn’t make it as easy as Deamar made it sound.

The roar of a waterfall didn’t sound too far off and it was accompanied by a loud hissing noise that I could only assume was from the waterfall hitting the lake of molten rock. Futilely trying to put out a fire it was no match for.

I turned back to the others, ready to ask if Tike or Deamar knew the way down so we wouldn’t be caught between fire dancers and a cliff edge, when something about our group struck me as odd.

Tike was still on the ground near me with Klus. Prevna and Jika a few steps away on the other side of him, also peering into the fog. Deamar was half covered in fog, keeping his distance from the rest of us while casting glances over his shoulder like the fire dancers might reach out and touch him at any moment.

“Kuma?” I asked.

But I didn’t see her tall form anywhere in the haze and she didn’t answer my call. I hadn’t heard her fall or stumble behind us, I was sure of that, but I had also been focused on keeping up with the others’ pace and thinking through every possibility.

This wasn’t one I had rated as very likely. She was an experienced Picker band member, someone who could keep up and adapt. She shouldn’t have been too proud to call for help or too slow to keep up. Though that didn’t change the fact that as far as I could tell we had all arrived without her and from the shocked looks on everyone else we didn’t have a clue on where she had disappeared.

Either we left her and hoped she’d be able to make it back to the village once this was all over or someone had to retrace our steps and hope we found her.

Prevna came to the same conclusion as me. “I’ll go find her. I’m the one who insisted she join us.”

Jika tensed up at that but she didn’t offer to join the search. Apparently, the threat of being burned to nothing was too much for her even though she had more connection to Kuma than Prevna or me.

I shook my head. “No, I’ll go.”

Prevna gave me a long look before she caught my hand and pulled me away from the others. “I’ll go.” I opened my mouth to protest but she squeezed my hand and I closed it again so she could say what she needed to. “You’re smart and observant and you’re always the first to throw yourself into dire situations because you can make decisions in a heartbeat while everyone is still thinking. But you’re not at your best. You’ve been awake for days and your reactions are slow.”

She dropped her head so our foreheads touched and she could stare into my eyes while I had to match her. “If you get caught by the fire dancers it’d be worse for you than rest of us. We don’t know how long their fire lasts and you wouldn’t have an escape from it if you can’t put it out. Keep everyone who stays here safe and trust me.”

I swallowed. Not quite able to give into her argument or protest against it when all she was doing was asking for what she always wanted. Just a little bit of trust. Acknowledgment that she could survive without me trying to control every little thing.

Prevna saw me waver, so she pressed her point. “We don’t have much time. Like I said, Kuma is my responsibility and you need to rest. Let me go and if we don’t find her quickly we can always meet back up at the village.”

“The fog…”

“We’ll be fine.”

Such a blatant lie, but I still found myself wanting to believe it. Wanted to give Prevna what she was asking for even if some part of me was insisting that if I wasn’t the one to go than something was bound to happen that I’d regret. Nor could I quite find my usual retorts to turn the conversation in my favor.

“If…” I cut off the doomsday hypothetical I wanted to ask and instead forced a conflicted smile on my face. “Don’t make me regret this.”

Prevna chuckled and straightened up. “You regret everything.” Then more serious, “If there is someone who can you back don’t wait for us. I’ll take Tike. He knows this whole valley like the back of his hand.”

We rejoined the others who cut off an anxious conversation of their own.

Prevna said, “I’m going after Kuma. Tike, join me. I’ll need your knowledge of the valley and the route we took to get here.”

Tike looked like he’d rather do anything but head back towards the fire dancers, but he nodded anyway. “Klus will come too. He can help carry her if we need to.”

Prevna eyed Jika and Deamar. “Listen to Gimley. She’s gotten through more dire situations than most.”

Neither of them seemed particularly pleased to be stuck with me and all I could say was that the sentiment was shared. Prevna and I shared one last look and before I could stop myself I stepped forward and changed the look into a glare.

“From one horror to another: don’t die.”

She grinned and then a handful of moments later the fog swallowed half of our group as they retraced our steps.

I turned my glare on Deamar. “Is there a path down?”

He blinked owlishly back at me. “I…think so.”

“Don’t you live here?” I gestured to take in the entire valley. Surely, he had to have a basic idea of the area around where he lived even if he hadn’t exactly proved it these past few days with Tike taking the lead. Even I had known what to expect around Gabbler’s Shore despite mostly being stuck in a tent.

He crossed his arms, defensive. “It’s been years since I’ve been here and I’m not sure exactly what side Tike took us to.”

“We can walk the edge.” Jika broke into the conversation to stop a brewing argument as she glanced anxiously between us. “We should see a path that way and we should get moving.”

She wasn’t wrong. Every moment was another chance for the fire dancers to change their course right for us.

“Do you at least remember if the path would have been close to the waterfall or away from it?”

Deamar frowned as he thought before he finally said, “Away from it. Near the edge where we would pull up the floater I think.”

I pointed. “This way then.”

I led them toward the lake and away from the rush of the waterfall. Even with the fog, my sense of direction wasn’t so bad that I couldn’t remember where the giant lake of molten rock should be. Tike hadn’t exactly led us in circles on the way here.

Everything in me wanted to turn around, march up to Prevna, and insist that I was joining her or going alone even as I wished I could curl up and fall asleep without feeling like everything was falling apart.

I glanced back at the unwelcome pair I had been stuck with more than I liked. If either one of them disappeared into the fog…well, I would make sure they regretted it.

Jika gasped. “Is that it?”

I followed the invisible path from her pointing finger to a spot in the cliff that jutted out further than the rest and then angled gradually downward. I glared at the thin, worn footpath. By rights it should have been well within my perception even with the thick fog obscuring everything but my gritty eyes had slid right past it.

I waved Deamar forward. “You first. You should have at least some familiarity with the path but if you do slip I don’t want you tumbling down onto us.”

He huffed at the insult but he was more than happy to take the lead. Deamar strode forward but his proud stride quickly transformed into a shuffling step as he did his best to keep his balance on the wet, pitted stone path. Jika took the middle again and I brought of the rear which had the benefit of being able to check that they hadn’t disappeared without the giveaway of looking over my shoulder.

Plants—green, purple, and orange—grew from the little clefts and ledges on the cliff wall to our left while to our right was a drop off of more fog. It was only about halfway down that I start to see little glowing pockets of golden orange lighting up the fog from below. The cliff really wasn’t that tall, but the fog had done a little too well at covering up how dangerous falling over its edge really was. There was only a strip of land between the cliff and where the lake of molten lake actually started. I had been leading us toward the main body of the lake but the more I saw of Steamer’s Fall the more I realized it was a cove full of lava. It wasn’t just where the waterfall reached.

We all had little slips and starts as we made our way down the treacherous little path but we had one nice bit of luck in that no nearly pitched over the side. Once we reached the strip of land hugging the cliff’s edge we only really had one direction we could take: back the way we had come toward the center of the cover. This time we would just be on the bottom of the cliff instead of the top.

Despite Deamar’s memories of the floating boxes being tied into place near the path there wasn’t a single one in sight. I could see where triangles of stone had been wedged into cracks in the ground, likely so they could tie ropes around them, but that only added to the idea that there wasn’t a convenient person here to rescue us. Deamar still pretended to be confident as we followed him along the cliff’s edge.

One interesting thing about the lava in this part of the lake was that most of it didn’t have the vibrant glow that the rest did. The lava here was dark gray and black with some bubbles of bright orange breaking through. Perhaps the waterfall deserved more credit than I initially thought.

The roar of the waterfall grew and grew as did the strength of the fog. In the end, we were forced to hold onto each other’s tunics so we wouldn’t accidentally bump into each other or stumble over someone’s foot into the lava. The pockets of bright lava close to the shore were still strong enough to create a glow through the fog and I was sure the effect would have been even stronger at night. So with one hand clutching Jika’s tunic and the other trailing through the plants on the cliff wall I made my way forward. I hoped none of the plants had contact poisons since I had the feeling if I took my hand of the wall I’d stray too far in the other direction.

Then I heard Deamar curse and we all jerked as he stumbled over something. Jika nearly fell on her face and I caught her only to slam my shoulder into the cliff for my trouble. I frowned when I heard him laugh, some mixture of surprised relief, since I never would have expected him to in my vicinity. Jika and I pressed closer to him and when I peered around her I saw what all the excitement was about.

A barrel, about thigh height on me, was sitting on the ground. All wood and wrong, but a clear sign that one of the villagers had been here, especially if the fog wasn’t deceiving me and there were a couple more on the other side of it.

“There has to be someone here!” Deamar said. “They’d never leave these here and waste a trip.”

I was about to reply when a new voice cut through all the noise from further up the path. “Who’s there?”

Rescue.

My lips pressed together as I glanced back in the direction I thought Prevna had gone.

I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted it.