Bombo sat across from Windston. Frem sat beside him. They both ordered and then Bombo looked up at him between fingers. “My head,” he said. “It no longer likes the beers from these nights.”

  “I feel the same,” Windston said. “But this helps,” he said, sipping more.

  Bombo grabbed his cup and took a sip. Frem clapped his hands until a waitress showed up, one they hadn't seen before; he ordered beer and ribs.

  “The same for me,” Bombo said.

  She left and he looked at Windston, who was staring back over his cup. “Don't give me that look,” he said.

  “What look?”

  “That you don't want me to go after all.”

  Windston shrugged. “I don't.”

  Bombo rolled his eyes. “Yes, I know. I don't want to go either. But who is going to find this man called Boulder for me if I stay on this hunt with you?” He looked at Frem, who flicked him the bird and smiled.

  “I think,” Frem said, “you're scared you're gonna find Boulder without us.”

  Bombo laughed. “Really? You think I hunt this man only for you to shoot him?”

  Frem nodded, shrugged, smiling.

  “And what about you?” he asked Windston. “Are you going to chop this Boulder with your sword?”

  Windston nodded. “If I see him I will.”

  “Even instead of letting me get my revenge?”

  Windston nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “If I see him I'm gonna kill him. I’ll suck up his energy and get even stronger.” He shrugged. “Sorry.”

  “You do this for me?” Bombo asked.

  Windston nodded. “For you and for everyone else. Because he's just that bad and I can’t risk him killing anyone else.”

  “He is bad,” Bombo agreed. He shrugged. “Maybe this is why we cannot go our separate ways. I cannot be sure you won't kill this giant without me.” He laughed. “No, but serious; I do go today. I do.” He was nodding. “Although I don't leave some easy way. It is hard to do. I have grown fond of you. Both of you. Even the mean colorful boy,” he said, reaching over and ruffling Frem's green hair for the half second he could before Frem backed away. “Maybe especially this mean one.”

  “You can go right now,” Frem said. “Just make sure and leave us some of your money first.”

  “I do this,” Bombo said, nodding. “It was part of the deal.”

  Frem's eyes widened and he let his tongue drop out like a dog as he stared at Windston, who did his best to ignore him.

  “Money,” Frem said. “Beer!” he said louder. He stood on the bench, leaned his head back and closed his eyes. “And dragon eggs!” he yelled to several “yips!” and a few “yeehaws!”

  He sat back down, leaned up against Windston – who leaned away – gripped his shoulder and said, “We're about to be rich.”

  “To you,” Bombo said to Frem as he reached into his pocket for a small purse. He tossed it Frem's way. “And for you,” he said to Windston, doing the same for him.

  Frem looked inside but Windston didn't, only nodded thanks. “Three golds,” Frem said, “Fifteen silvers,” he said, still counting, “and a bunch of… copper?”

  “Copper and brass,” Bombo said. “It's a small fortune. Spend it wisely. Brass first. Then cash copper for brass. After that, cash silver for copper. Don't cash the gold. Keep it for emergency. This might fund your trip if you spend wisely. If not, maybe not.” He shrugged at them just as the food arrived.

  They ate in silence at first but then they got to reminiscing. One would think they'd talk about their feats but they mostly brought up silly things that had happened, mostly to Frem. Frem was always trying to portray some cool persona but he was comically clumsy. And Windston had worn a look of confusion more often than not, at least before he'd stabbed that swirl guy. And Bombo… Bombo sang the funniest songs sometimes. Just last night, as they were getting into town, when all the town was going nuts over his dark skin and massive size, a few of the children ran up to him to marvel and he scolded them nicely with a song that Frem had taken upon himself to remember to sing back.

  “We don't talk to strangers if we don't know them,

  We wouldn't call them strangers if they were our friend,

  We wait for our mommies and our daddies to say,

  We can talk to strangers and tell them our name.”

  Bombo laughed, shrugged. “It's true,” he said. “These boys and girls do not know me. I could be bad! Like this giant man, Boulder!” he laughed. “Squash them! Rip them! Burn them and kill them!” he said, angry more than happy by the time he was finished; he slammed his mug, which spilled a bit, and then hurried up and guzzled it down before wiping his lips with his massive forearm.

  Frem was almost in tears laughing. He stopped, stared deadpan at Bombo and said, “We were strangers.”

  Bombo shook his head. “You are not little boys and girls,” he said. “You boys are killers. I can spot a killer,” he said.

  Windston nodded, though he didn't have anything to add. He was more of staring at Bombo whenever Bombo wasn't looking to try and measure whether his sadness outweighed his desire to get out and hunt Boulder. It looked like maybe it did but it was hard to say.

  When they had finished eating Bombo went back upstairs and Windston followed him. He started packing up and was muttering as he did, mostly to himself, about where he might go first and which paths he might take.

  “I go to Venton first. This is sure,” he said. “It is a wonderful town. Many Winky restaurants. Many wonders compared to the towns here in wild Gorrals. Roads. Baths. Toilets. Showers.” He paused. “Towers,” he said. “This place is not like here. You see.”

  “Are we going there?” Windston asked.

  Bombo shrugged. “I imagine you do one day.”

  Windston shrugged too. “Probably. We won't know until the next key does something. This blue one is going crazy. Frem showed me last night. It's moving twice as fast as before, east more than north now, toward Ice Mountain.”

  “So, you boys were right to think it goes to the mountain.”

  Windston shrugged again. “Maybe. What if it's past that? Or before?”

  “I hope you find out soon. I am happy for you boys with your dragons. I hope you find big dragons to fly on like in the death dream.”

  Windston didn't say anything, though he was pretty sure dragons wouldn't be involved.

  Bombo finished packing and Windston followed him downstairs. Outside, he kept following him up the street south a ways before heading north and then west, facing the ravine between the Twins, Bombo's road to the Steels and then the drop.

  His pack was huge, mostly because the boys weren't going to be there to shoulder some of the burden.

  He stopped and sighed; and then he turned, nodding, and patted Windston's head. “You be a good boy,” he said. “Don't you go and follow what Frem does. He's bad.”

  “I know,” Windston said. “I always try to be good. Or now I will; for a while there I was kind of bad, like Frem.”

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  “You be good and maybe he will see you be good and want to be good too. You be the leader, not him. He's a bad leader.”

  “Okay,” Windston said.

  There was a silence Bombo filled with a heavy sigh. He smiled and looked over his shoulder. “I have a long walk now.”

  Windston nodded. The ravine was so long that the end was a sliver of light so narrow, it looked like Bombo wouldn't even fit. “I hope I never have to walk this way,” he blurted.

  Bombo laughed. “It is three day's walk. I'm sure you run it in one.”

  “I would,” Windston said.

  “Maybe I do too. I don't know. My pack is heavy this time.”

  There was a brief pause. Bombo broke it. He said, “Well, goodbye, my friend.”

  “Goodbye,” Windston said, reaching up and grabbing Bombo's extended hand so he could shake his finger.

  Bombo laughed, turned, and then laughed some more as he walked.

  Windston watched him go. He started singing at some point and seemed to like the echo. He sang and sang and sang, about walking, about singing and walking, about singing and walking and liking it. He did that until he was a little dot, and then Windston, who really didn't know what to do next, decided it was time he went and found Frem to find out.

  Frem was at the market arguing with a blonde guy about towels.

  “You throw in the towels because of how much I spent on the tents,” he was saying.

  “You spend only what I ask, not more,” the guy said, “so you don't get more.”

  “Yes,” Frem said, “but you asked a lot. And so, I thought, hey, I need towels too.”

  “So, buy.”

  It went like this at every vendor. Frem didn't like the prices of anything and so he always tried to get something extra. Only once did it work, and not with the towels.

  Regardless of how, he had bought everything they needed. All he needed now was for Windston to give him half the money back and then they’d pack it all up in the two bags he'd picked out.

  “We're not going to bring as much stuff as Bombo liked. But we are going to bring plenty of stuff. I have a pan; you have a pot. I have a spatula; you have a knife. See what I mean? We each have one thing the other doesn't. That way we're not carrying around a bunch of useless doubles.”

  Windston nodded but he kind of preferred Bombo’s way.

  They got one more round at the bar with Frem's waitress friend before heading off. She was all tears and pleas so they took her with them. That didn't last; halfway through the first mile she remembered that she would be needed the next night at the restaurant so had to go back.

  “Oh, sweet Abbey, why oh why do you go away and leave me all alone?” Frem asked as he watched her go. He pulled out a harmonica and started playing nothing on it badly as a sort of call and response.

  The first several miles were like that. They just walked, not ran, because they were both still a bit tired from all the drinking. And Frem sang. He sang and sang and sang, only he wasn't very good at it, like Bombo. He sang and he played and then he sang again. Each time he did one Windston wished for the other.

  The next day was much the same at first, only a bit faster – they jogged.

  The third day was even better as they had started running.

  By day four they were running and jumping and fighting one another and laughing. The countryside was hillier and chillier north. There were plenty of rock walls along hills to launch off for sword swipes, punches and kicks. Frem had these wooden sticks he'd found and bought meant specifically for walking. They used them for fighting. They bopped one another here and there, stabbed as well, and had gotten pretty good at dodging, blocking and parrying.

  When the sticks broke, they resorted to knife fighting with the broken ends.

  When those broke, it was all fists. Windston, as it turned out, hit hard – real hard. Frem, for whatever reason, was much worse at dodging him now and he learned rather quickly that Windston really was probably the strongest boy in the world, over maybe even Clement.

  “Maybe,” Frem was saying. “But I don't think he actually hit me in the face at all. So, I don't know.”

  “If I could get a hold of him,” Windston was saying. “Maybe I could swing him into the ground a couple times and then punch him.”

  “Even still,” Frem said, “I think he might just wiggle his way out. He's extremely fast. Very agile. Very quick.”

  “But so am I.”

  “Yes,” Frem said, dragging out the y in hesitation. “You are. But not that quick.”

  “But I am quick.” It was at that moment that Windston noticed something, a ping of something like a signal, though it was only mental; it drew his attention north and he stared in the direction at what was nothing more than a hill of grass ahead of them.

  “What?” Frem asked.

  “I just felt something strange,” Windston said. “My attention felt like it was pulled in that direction, hard, as if I heard a sound, only there wasn't one.”

  “Oh,” Frem said. “Anyway, like I was saying, Clement-”

  There was an explosion, a bright flash and then a rumbling like thunder.

  The boys looked at one another and then made for that hill as fast as they could. They climbed it, found that it was the actual edge of the world as all that was below was only misty clouds and water.

  The Great Northern Drop.

  They teetered and steadied themselves from what would have been, at least for Windston, a potentially scary fall; as far as the eye could see, left or right, there was nothing but a steep decline. The grass seemed to spill over it but ended in a roll; and there was only rock below that, straight down at almost a ninety-degree angle for more than a mile.

  Windston had heard the name before, the “drop” or the “fall.” He heard it in reference to why the merchants who passed through Gorrals were considered brave or adventurous (or insane), or why they were all safe from whatever might be going on elsewhere in the world, whatever that may be, as they were too high for anything down there to get to them. Gorrals, the ancient kingdom of the Gorralians, was a lonely island of a country propped up above the rest of the world on a one-and-a-half-mile high plateau spanning hundreds of millions of acres. The Gorralians hadn’t found it that way, but they left it that way all the same.

  Down below, very far below, was the northern sea – or, more particularly, the frozen swamp. Though, it wasn’t frozen. In fact, it couldn’t freeze – at least, not without a little help.

  “Wow,” Frem said, staring down.

  “Wow,” Windston repeated.

  “I don't know what to do,” Frem said, smiling at Windston. “I mean, I could just jump. But you…”

  “I could jump,” Windston said, his eyebrows down as he smiled. “What do you mean?” he said. “I could jump; I'd be fine.”

  “You wouldn't,” Frem said. “Not from that high.”

  “Yes, from that high,” Windston said. “From any height.”

  “Are you sure?” Frem asked.

  “Yes?” Windston asked more than said.

  Frem: “Why did you say it like that?”

  Windston: “Like what?”

  Frem: “Like a question?”

  Windston: “I don't know.”

  Frem: “Because you're not sure?”

  “I am,” Windston said, although he wasn't sure why. He turned, looked around, probably for something high. He was stroking his chin.

  “There's nothing,” Frem said. “I already thought of that.”

  Windston turned back. “Then there's only one thing to do.”

  “Jump?” Frem asked.

  Windston nodded. “Jump and roll,” he said, smiling.

  Frem laughed. “If you jump and land on your feet, and your face hits your knee, what then?”

  “I don't want to do that,” Windston said. “I'll…” He paused. “Shoot,” he said. “I don't know.”

  “I could probably carry you,” Frem said. “You could dangle from me.”

  “That might be better,” Windston said.

  “How about this? You jump, and, if it looks like it's gonna be bad-”

  “You grab me,” Windston interrupted. “Deal,” he said, holding out his hand.

  Frem grabbed it, and then he threw Windston out over the edge.

  Windston screamed. He screamed as loud as he could for as long as he could, and then he did it again. He did it again and again and again and again.

  And then.

  Plop!

  He fell flat onto what was an island of muck that exploded into a wide shower of algae mud. It was soft, though the fall did sting; and then there was just freezing cold water slowly rising all around him.

  His things were less lucky. By the time he surfaced, Frem was circling overhead, pointing out a pot, a set of tongs, scissors, a knife – and so on. Windston's pack had popped open, and one of the buckles on the belts that held it shut was torn off.

  After they collected their things, Frem tied the strap shut with itself and they headed on.

  They found themselves with their backs to an endless wall of rock and their fronts facing a spotted sea of teal blue watery stuff within which floated islands of yellowish-brownish algae like spicy mustard in dish water. It was cold and it was damp and there were frogs and snakes and other creepy things everywhere. They were all blue, a light blue like the water. Some were striped in green. And there were lots of these yellow fish with black sides that liked to flap onto the algae and slide across with their mouths gaped, open and ready to catch the unsuspecting snake, the frog it hunted, or the bug it hunted.

  Frem caught one. He caught one, they cut it up, cleaned it and cooked it, and it was good.

  “We can live on this,” Frem said. “These suckers are everywhere.”

  But never did they throw up more. They set up their tents on the edges of one island, which was so solid it had sprouted a tree, and threw up again and again and again. All night, they threw up.

  By morning, they were shaky but mostly fine.

  “I guess no more fish,” Frem said.

  Windston nodded, almost threw up again but didn't. “Maybe frog,” he said.

  They tried only a bit of frog next. It was very good and they didn't get sick.

  Frog it was.

  Day after day, night after night, Windston and Frem hopped slowly and steadily from island to island. They were close together, the islands. Never was one so far that they had to swim or Frem fly. And they caught a handful of frogs while they were at it. Annoying slippery teal blue frogs with black stripes above the eyes like eyebrows. At night, all night, they croaked. Hay-hum, hay-hum, hay-hum, hay-hum. They croaked and they cried and they wailed and they squealed. All night long.

  “That,” Frem said, just before they both dozed off under their little triangular tents, staring up at the stars, “is why I don't mind eating frog every night. One less frog to yell at me while I sleep.”

  “I think they really are yelling at us,” Windston laughed, “for eating their friends.”

  “I eat you,” Frem said in a monster voice. “I eat you you good.”

  “I eat you you yummy,” Windston said.

  They went back and forth like that until they fell asleep.

  The red star watched them. Or so it seemed to Windston as he dozed off. He slipped out of body that night, though he didn't remember in the morning. He was out and about in the bog, looking about for that ping from several nights before, before they jumped off the drop. It was a man, an old man, hunched over and angry in the face with bright blue eyes, gray hair and a beard to match. He sat lotus and his wand lay across his lap. His mind was awake as he slept, as it always was, and he thought of perilous things he would do and of perilous things he'd face.

  He was aware of Windston, who gazed upon him from above. He was aware of him but paid him no mind. He knew he would be there before he’d come; he was the ping from the night before; what Windston had felt, sharp and alarming, had been his sudden awareness of him.