“This is…well, the easiest way to explain it is…this is an alternate dimension.”

“An alternate dimension? Like that fantasy role-playing gamer crap, with swords and magic elves?” Great. I’d been sucked into nerd hell. Shouldn’t there be a different one for people who’d never banished an evil magician or LOL’d in an RPG chatroom?

“Um… Less Lord of the Rings and more Alice in Wonderland. Only scary,” Luca said. “This world is a reflection of our world, only everything’s…different. Warped. Discolored. Disproportionate.”

“I’d say that sounds crazy, except that it actually looks even crazier than it sounds.” I pulled Luca to a stop to ask the question twisting my stomach into knots. There was only one real explanation for all this, and it had nothing to do with cake layers and fantasy role playing. “Am I insane?”

He must have heard the very real fear in my voice because he turned to look at me, in spite of the vines still snaking toward us like they were drawn to our scent or our sound, or maybe just the air we disturbed with every step.

“This is real, Sophie. And based on the fact that you haven’t freaked out yet, I’d say you’re astonishingly stable.”

“Or maybe I’m in shock.”

He shrugged. “Always a possibility.”

“So, how did we get to this dimension?” I asked, stepping over and around vines again.

“It’s called the Netherworld. Around here, anyway. They may call it something else in other regions of the world. Nether means—”

“Under. Beneath. I know. Like nether regions. If you’re telling me this place is the crotch of the world, I’m not gonna argue,” I said, and Luca laughed softly. “But how did we get here? Does this have something to do with that guy with no eyes? Is he from here? Did we get traded for him, like some kind of exchange program? One freaky eyeless Netherworld guy in exchange for two normal, tragically beautiful people from our world?”

Luca glanced back at me in surprise, and I rolled my eyes. “We’re about to be devoured by man-eating plants. Shouldn’t we at least acknowledge how attractive our respective bodies are before they’re digested from the inside out?”

“Is that your way of fishing for a compliment?”

“No.” I already knew I was pretty. Not that I would have hated hearing him say it. “My point is that this isn’t a fair trade no matter how the U.S. dollar stacks up against whatever the Netherworld currency is.”

Luca exhaled softly, and his hand tightened around mine. “Sophie, we are the Netherworld currency.”

My heart did a somersault in my chest. “What does that mean?”

“That means that we aren’t safe. I don’t know what you are, butI can’t actually control the dead, no matter what people think about necromancers, so we—”

“Whoa.” I pulled him to a stop again, frowning up at him. Maybe I wasn’t the crazy one at all. “I only understood part of that sentence, but it sounded like you said you don’t know what I am.”

Luca stared at me through narrowed eyes, like he was studying me. Just like he had when he’d pulled me off the floor at school. At my real school. “You don’t know either, do you?”

“I don’t know anything right now, except what I am. I’m a sophomore, and a dancer, and a student council member, and a dance committee member, and—”

Luca laughed. “Sophie, you’re much more than all of that.”

“Um, thanks.” I guess. “What does that mean, exactly?”

“I don’t know.” He frowned. “I’d hate to guess without more information, but I can tell from touching you that you’re not human.” He held up our joined hands. “Not entirely, anyway.”

I pulled my hand from his grip. “Okay, being hot will only get you so far, and you should know that telling a girl she’s not entirely human is not considered a compliment. At least, not in my world.” Though I was seriously starting to doubt he was a native of my world. Or even planet earth.

“Sophie, look around. Pay special attention to the man-eating vines and the fact that we’re no longer in your world. Think back to the man with no eyes. With all that in mind, does it really seem so crazy to think that you may not be entirely human?” He shrugged, and though his eyes sparkled, his grin looked almost shy. “I’m not.”

“You’re not…human?”

“Well, I am human. But I’m more.”

More? “What are you?” I wasn’t convinced that “more” was even possible, but the evidence slithering across the floor toward us was pretty damn convincing of…something. Maybe we were both crazy. Maybe we were really sharing a delusion in some real-world psych ward. Maybe my ex-boyfriend was in the room next door.

Maybe Kaylee was actually the sanest person I knew.

I squeezed my eyes shut and shook my head—that was the scariest thought I’d ever had.

“I’m a necromancer,” Luca said, and I opened my eyes to look at him. “But that doesn’t mean what most people think it means.”

“Well, I’m not most people. I have no idea what that means.”

Luca chuckled, and we started picking our way down the hall again, carefully avoiding vines. “Thanks to movies and popular fiction, most people think necromancers can control the dead. Of course, most people also think necromancy is fiction.”