He clenched his eyes shut, like he was in pain. “Oh, screw it,” he muttered to himself.

So here’s where the strings come in. And, more importantly, the kiss. It wasn’t a kiss from a movie. It was just a kiss: sloppy and grateful and a little awkward, as we found our footing and tried to figure out exactly how we were supposed to fit together and then settled into something that was both new and familiar at the same time.

When it was over, the credits didn’t roll. There definitely was no happily ever after. But I felt happy anyway.

We both stood there looking at each other like, what was that?, neither of us with any idea what we were supposed to say.

Then every question I had came spilling out in one breath. “How’d you get here?” I asked. “Do you know where Glamora is? Are you okay? Did you take that stupid boat, too?”

Nox tried to speak over me, answering my questions and asking his own, but I didn’t leave him any room. It was too much of a relief just to get to talk to him. After all this time. I would shut up when I was ready.

“What about the fog?” I asked. “What did you see in there?”

Nox shook his head blankly. He didn’t know what I was talking about. “Fog?”

“Didn’t you come through the Fog of Doubt?” I asked. “To get here, I mean.”

“I don’t actually know how I got here. I just kind of, uh, showed up,” he said. “One minute Mombi was teleporting us out of the Emerald City, the next minute things got all screwed up. And then I was here. Guess I got lost.”

“It sort of makes sense,” I said, rolling it over in my head. “I mean, kinda. How long have you been here?”

“No idea. Days at least. Weeks? Who knows. Time’s even screwier than normal here, I think.”

“What have you been doing?”

“Nothing, really. Just sifting through all this stuff, hoping I’d find something useful. Mostly I was just trying not to go crazy. I probably would have, if I hadn’t known you would show up eventually.”

“Wait. How did you know I was coming? Even I didn’t know I was coming.”

“I just had a feeling telling me I should sit tight. That you were on the way.” He wiggled his fingers and made a spooky warbling sound. “I’m psychic, I guess.”

“Ha,” I said, giving him a funny look.

He gave me the exact same look right back. “No, really. I am a little psychic. You knew that, right?”

“Somehow I missed it.”

He raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“You’re serious?” I said.

“Oh. It’s really no big thing. The sixth sense comes in handy in fights, so I can figure out my opponent’s next move. Basically when my gut talks, I listen. It’s just that my gut has a lot to say. Been that way since I was a little kid. Since before I even learned magic. What, you think Mombi rescued me out of the kindness of her heart?”

“Kinda, yeah,” I said. “I guess that is what I thought.”

“Nah. I mean, she probably would have rescued me anyway, but I doubt she would have taken me under her wing the way she did. Mombi only does that when she thinks someone might be useful. Anyway, I’m half-kidding. I mean, I am a little psychic, sometimes, but I don’t think that’s how I knew you were coming. I think I just . . .” He paused. “I mean, I guess it was less like I knew you were coming and more like, I had to hope for something. Otherwise I really would have lost my mind. I’m serious.”

“Oh,” I said, taken aback. I was flattered, yes, but this was way more sincerity than I was used to from him. It was more talking than I was used to from him too. The Nox I knew wasn’t exactly what you would call an open book. He was more like a tightly locked safe.

“Sorry,” he said. “Forget it. And forget the questions, too. I don’t have any of the answers. I’ve been stuck on this island. You’re the one who’s been out in the world. Tell me what I’ve been missing.”

So I took a deep breath and then started at the beginning. Nox listened in rapt fascination.

Then he went in a direction I hadn’t expected. “You met a Magril, huh?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Why?”

“No reason,” he said. “It’s just that I’ve never heard of anyone actually seeing one before. The Magril’s more like a legend or something. I didn’t even know they were real.”

I let out a little laugh. “Come on. This is Oz. Witches are real. Fairies are real. Everything’s real here.”

“Yeah,” he said. “Everything except the Magril. That’s why it’s kind of strange that you saw one. That you talked to it. Especially since . . .”

He trailed off, but I knew what he was talking about, and I pulled my knife down from the air and held it in my open palm so that we could both look at it. On the hilt, just as Nox had carved it, was the very same bird I had encountered.

“What do you think it means?” I asked.

He shook his head. “Means something,” he said. “But anyway. What happened next?”

“Oh,” I said, realizing that there were some parts of the story I wanted to keep to myself. “You know. Fog. Doubt. A really dumb boat. Then I was here.”

Nox raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t press any further. “So here we are,” he said. “I guess it would have been too easy for you to show up and tell me that Dorothy was dead, the kingdom was restored, and all wrongs had been reversed, huh?”