ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴏɴɢ ꜱɪᴅᴇ

l i n h

When the girl jumped off the cliff, everyone went insane.

Okay, maybe insane is a bit of an extreme word, but I wasn't exaggerating by much. And the chaos didn't exactly improve when another one of the new group of five followed her. When the second girl from the group tried to go after them both, a stunned Coach finally snapped back to her senses and yanked the girl from the cliff's edge.

"What are they thinking?" Tam muttered to me, staring at the cliff in disbelief.

"I don't know," I stammered, just as bewildered.

The chaos really didn't improve when the two of them came back, one of them carrying—

"Is that a gnome?" I gasped, gaping at the boy who was carrying it.

"Are they out of their minds?" Tam asked, his voice almost amused.

"We need the physician," the girl shouted, running toward the tent, only to be stopped by the Ambi Coach.

"You're exposing us all," the Coach growled.

The girl frantically shook her head. "The plague only affects gnomes and plants!" she protested. "Please, this gnome needs help—it's not going to hurt anyone."

"Stay right there," the Exillium physician ordered as he pushed through the crowd of intrigued Waywards. He helped the boy set the gnome down, anxiously checking its pulse. "I'm not familiar with gnomish medicine," he admitted worriedly. "Even if I had a full apothecary, I wouldn't know where to begin."

Next to me, I could practically feel Tam's confusion and frustration. This definitely wasn't helping him figure out how much to trust the girl, and for someone who could usually read people right away, I knew he was on edge.

"Then we need to get him to Lumenaria," the girl said breathlessly. "Quickly."

"That's impossible," the red Coach cut in sharply. "All of us are banished from the Lost Cities."

"Who cares?" the girl shot back, and my mouth fell open a little. Was she brave, or stupid?

"Yeah," the boy added. "Do you seriously think the Council will arrest us for delivering a sick gnome?"

"Even if the Council would spare you, you're forgetting that none of us have crystals to leap you there," the blue Coach reminded them.

"We don't need a crystal," the girl answered, and before I could even try to figure out what she meant, the boy had scooped up the gnome, walking back to the cliff's edge.

"Lumenaria's on the other side of the world," the Ambi Coach said, echoing my exact thoughts. "You can't levitate there."

"No," the girl agreed. "But we can teleport."

Then she grabbed the boy's hand, and they jumped off the cliff for the second time.