Free Joshua and the Lightning Road by Donna Galanti Page B

the wrong direction and off you go. Over The Edge. Into The Great Beyond. Do you know what happens next?”
    At the same time Sam nodded, I shook my head.
    “You fall through space until you die of hunger and thirst. Then you float around forever. If you’re lucky, you shoot through a wormhole and crash down onto another Nostos realm before you die. If not, all that’s left will be your bones rattling together in space.”
    It all sounded like some wild story to me, even on this place. Yet the purple sky, blue sun, and the mist that held flame-throwing beasts made anything a possibility.
    “How do you know about wormholes?” Sam said.
    “By the arrow of Artemis, I’ve seen one!” The man hurled a fist in Sam’s face. “And it’s not just The Edge you have to worry about.”
    Sam shrugged. “We’ve dealt with the cadmean beasts. We can deal with the rest.”
    The man’s expression tightened. “Perhaps. But what about the hydriads? They roam the Acheron creeks seeking prey to suck the water from their body.”
    A memory of Sam’s fear of the creek, a snout rising above the water, and that feeling of being watched popped in my head, and my skin prickled. Danger lurked everywhere in this place. If I ever got home again I would cherish every minute being bored. Bored was better than dead.
    “So, we’ll find a way around and won’t cross anymore creeks,” I said with more confidence than I felt.
    “You have no choice. The Acheron creeks crisscross the entire Perimeter Lands.”
    A biting breeze rushed over me, and its roar blew by like the very creek we’d crossed. We needed a friend, and this man might be a Child Collector, but he was listening to us and hadn’t blasted us yet—and he may have a way home. I raised my hand. “Listen, whatever your name is—”
    “Call me Leandro.”
    “Leandro. Why share this?” The man’s eyes were like a dark green sea mixed with blue, one eye shining bluer than the other.
    “Because I can help you find your friend. And maybe get back to Earth.”
    “And why help us?” I needed to trust him completely.
    The man looked at me for a long while. His eyes shone intensely and held a yearning and power that scared me. He flung his hair back, and the scar on his face zig-zagged white across his skin. Finally, he answered. “Because I travel between realms searching for someone as well. Two someones. I want to get to Earth, too, but first must find my people. In helping you, perhaps I’ll find mine … and find a way to Earth.”
    “You don’t have the codes to get to Earth then,” Sam said. The man said nothing, just crossed his arms.
    “You’ve fallen away,” Sam said, more like a question this time. Still silence.
    Sam, Charlie, and I nodded in agreement. This man was our one choice.
    Leandro took our nods as approval and broke the silence. “I come from the Arrow Realm, ruled by the once-great hunter goddess, Artemis. And if you don’t quarrel with me, we won’t have a problem.”
    With that, we all relaxed a bit and introduced ourselves. Leandro’s gaze held mine as he shook my hand. His palm had ridges on it like it had fought often and worked hard. I was the one who finally looked away. There was nothing fallen about him. He seemed god-like to me.
    A horn trumpeted through the quiet woods. Three times. Its echo rang around us.
    “The alert,” Sam said. “They’ll be looking for us now.”
    “Even if they did catch us, with you being a prince and all, maybe they’ll go easy on us,” I said. It sounded good to me.
    Sam shook his head. “I’m a traitor now, an ignorant Barbaros like you. I helped Reekers escape. Anyway, I have no special privileges. King Apollo does not favor me.” He said no more on the subject.
    “That’s not all who’ll be looking for us. The cadmean beasts know we’re in here too,” Charlie reminded us. I glanced around us, expecting some new and unimagined horror to lunge at us, or a vine to grab my leg and drag me down