Page 24 of Search for the Lost

“You weren’t supposed to go after her. Now… it’s all your fault. What’s coming next. What they do to her. It’s all your hoofing fault. I’m so sorry, Crispin. I liked you. I really did.” He stood and kicked back the chair with one of his hooves. Then he pulled out a device that looked like a giant acorn, but Crispin knew exactly what it was.

“You stole the Great Acorn!” he bellowed, so outraged that his bones shook. Now he understood what Treebark had meant.

Cypher ignored him. “Take me to Anthor.” And a portal opened next to him, its mirror surface shimmering like mercury.

“Cypher, no!” Crispin leapt toward the faun, but his wobbly legs betrayed him and he ended up crashing to the ground.

“Goodbye, Crispin.” With one last regretful glance at his former boss, Cypher stepped through the portal and was gone.

Crispin lay there for a long time, staring at the space where Cypher had been and wondering what in the seven Dicharthian hells had just happened and how Cypher had managed to get his hooves on the Great Acorn. Crispin had heard about it but had thought it was a legend. It was a sort of universal key for the connected worlds, allowing the Oracle to travel to any world at any time—an incredibly dangerous power to be on the loose.

Leo found him and helped him get up off the ground and into a chair.

Minkis chittered at him, sounding alarmed at his confused state. “Acorn man all right?”

Leo was staring down at him too. “Yeah, Crispy, you okay?”

Crispin shuddered. “I don’t know.” Somehow the nickname didn’t bother him this time. “It’s Cypher. He’s gone.” And he has the Acorn.

“Oh, I’m sure he’s around here somewhere.” He peered over Crispin’s shoulder, and then around the room.

“No, Leo, he’s gone. He said… he said I wasn’t supposed to help Aspin. That I wasn’t supposed to come looking for my mother.”

Leo sank down into the chair opposite his. “He said that? The little bastard⁠—”

“Who said what?” Aspin shifted under the table. There was a loud thunk and then muffled cursing. After another moment, he slid out from under the table and grabbed the edge of Crispin’s chair, standing up much more steadily than Crispin had. Somehow Aspin managed to still look noble and handsome.

Crispin tried to hate him, but he didn’t have the energy for it.

Leo filled him in. “Cypher’s gone. Crispy says he betrayed us.”

Aspin growled. “I knew I didn’t trust that two-legged rat.”

“Actually, Fauns are in the deer family….” Crispin stopped himself. “It doesn’t matter. Leo, can you wake our host here? I think he has some explaining to do.”

“On it.” He reached over and shook his highness’s limp body.

Sourman sat up like a shot. “It’s Dorothy’s fault!” He blinked and reached up to touch his balding pate. Feeling around the tabletop, his hand encountered the pointy green hat. He picked it up and stuck it on top of his head, its dignity only slightly marred by a streak of brown gravy dripping down one side. “Oh, hello, gentlemen. I assume your hunger and thirst have been adequately sated? Wait, there’s one of you missing⁠—”

Aspin took the wizard by his green lapels and lifted him up off the chair. “You said our mother told you to expect us. Tell us why. Now.”

Green sparks danced around the wizard’s fingers, and he spread them as if trying to send them in Aspin’s direction, but they fizzled out instead and his shoulders drooped. “Very well. Set me down, you hulking ogre, and I’ll tell you everything you want to know.”

Aspin eased him back down to the chair, shaking him once more before letting him go. “Don’t mess with me, little man.”

Sourman sighed. “You want to know the truth?” He looked over at Crispin and then back at Aspin. “The truth is that you’ve always had⁠—”

“Wait, I know this one.” Leo grinned, and Crispin felt just a little bit better seeing Leo happy. “‘You’ve always had the power. You’ve had it all along.’ Is it in my shoes?” He tapped the heels together three times, then looked up, a frown on his face.

“I was going to say ‘You’ve always had enough to eat, haven’t you?’” The wizard prodded Leo’s stomach playfully, making Crispin, the stomach’s current owner, groan.

“Hey!”

“But it’s true, you did bring what you need with you. Do you have the chunk of oppositium your mother left for you?” He looked hopefully at Crispin.

“Oppositium? Oh, the Thing stuff. Aspin?” Crispin pointed at the backpack Leopold had been using as a pillow.

“Yes. Of course.” Aspin knelt, opened the pack, and pulled out the box. “This?” He opened it, showing the wizard the bit of round squareness that was definitely hard as a rock/soft as cotton.