Page 116 of The Queen's Box

The squirrel scolded Cole in chitters and clicks, then flicked its tail, leaped onto the trunk of the tree, and scurried to a higher branch.

Cole chuckled. To Willow, he said, “We’re known for white squirrels in these parts. White squirrels and waterfalls. Didn’t you know?”

Willow shook her head. “Severine—she’s the queen of Eryth—said something about white squirrels.”

“Oh yeah?”

“She said they were good omens.”

Cole shrugged. “Okay, sure. Why not?”

Willow leaned close and nudged him with her shoulder. It was thrilling, nudging him with her shoulder. “‘Okay, sure. Why not?’” she parroted. “You could say that about anything.”

Cole set down his bottle of Cheerwine. He propped his feet on the bench of the picnic table and put his elbows on his knees, folding his forearms on top. “My mom said they were. AndMicah—he loved that. You know how kids are. ‘Mama, look! A white squirrel!’”

He dropped his head and let it hang. Then he looked sideways at Willow from under a flop of hair. “The white squirrels weren’t good omens for him.”

Willow felt sadness descend.I saw a girl get beheaded,she almost said. But no. Not yet. The tightness in her throat was too painful.

“It’s funny that there were white squirrels in Eryth,” Cole commented. “Western North Carolina’s the only place I thought they lived.”

“I never actually saw one,” Willow said. “Not in Eryth.”

“Huh.”

“But Ididsee...” She hesitated, biting her lip. “Okay, this is going to sound weird.”

Cole gave her his full attention.

“You know about the Fade, right?” she said.

“Not much. Just that you have it or can tap into it.” He smiled wryly. “It lets you slip between worlds.”

She nodded. That was close enough. “Well, I have something else, too.”

“Another type of magic?”

“I guess,” Willow said uncomfortably. “Sometimes when I touch things, I have visions.”

Cole whistled. “Visions, huh? Could be good, could be bad—a magic like that.”

“It’s what let me see Eryth in the first place. It’s how I knew Eryth existed. And with the duskwyrm—well, I kind of had a vision when I touched him. In Eryth.”

“Okay,” Cole said.

Willow took a moment to gather her thoughts. Then she explained, haltingly, about Aesra and the Secret Sisters, theall-female guard that seemed to hold more power than anyone in Eryth, save for Queen Severine.

“And it was Aesra I saw in the vision,” she said. “The vision the duskwyrm gave me. She was brought into a room—she was just a kid—and made to stick her arm into a cage that held the wyrm. Aesra didn’t want to. They made her.”

“They sound great,” Cole said flatly.

“She cried afterward. One of the Sisters slapped her across the face.” She looked out over the mountains. “She kept getting bitten, year after year. But she didn’t...” She lifted her shoulders. “She looked normal. It wasn’t like what happened to Amira.”

“This Aesra—they were building up her immunity,” Cole said.

“Do you think so? That’s what I’ve been wondering. I wonder if they all go through it. The Sisters.”

“If these ‘Secret Sisters’ need yearly inoculations, the wyrm you saw in a cage wouldn’t have been the only one. They’d have to keep a farm of them. A hatchery.”

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