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“All right, let’s find a way around this.” Granger starts down the path running parallel to the chasm.

Leo doesn’t move. “Wait.”

Granger stops and looks back.

Leo stares down the path, then at the chasm blocking our way. “This is a warning.”

“About what?” Toto asks.

“Going that way.” He nods toward Granger. “Something doesn’t want us to keep going straight.”

It takes me a second. “Shit.”

Toto’s gaze bounces between us. “What?”

“We need to keep going in the same direction,” Leo says. He points across the chasm. “That way.”

Toto peers over the edge. “Oh.”

Granger folds his arms. “Any bright ideas, gorgeous?”

“I’m thinking.” Toto plants her hands on her hips and studies the chasm. A moment later, she startles and swats at the air. Then her entire face lights up. “Anaviere!”

Granger, Leo, and I look at each other.

Toto turns toward absolutely nothing and starts talking. “Yes, it’s me! I know, it’s been forever.” She pauses, apparently listening to a response none of us can hear. “I missed you too.”

I stare at the empty space beside her.

Granger squints as though looking harder might make Toto’s invisible childhood friend magically appear.

Leo scans the trees, clearly wondering whether this is another trick.

Personally, I’m trying to decide how long we politely entertain Toto’s apparent descent into madness before one of us intervenes.

“We need to get across.” Toto points toward the other side of the chasm as she continues speaking to thin air. “Can you help?”

Another pause.

Toto beams as she turns to look at us. “She can help us!”

Of course she can.

“Thank you, friend.” Toto claps her hands, then immediately starts herding us backward. “Come on. Give her some space.”

I move because Toto is pushing me, not because I have any idea who I’m supposedly making room for.

Granger goes completely still, carefully lifting one foot before setting it down somewhere else.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“I don’t know where she is,” he mutters. “I don’t want to step on her.”

Despite everything, I almost laugh.

Leo stiffens when Toto grabs his arm and pulls him back another step.

I’m just deciding we’ve indulged this long enough when the enormous tree beside us creaks and the trunk bends.