The day had gone soft and silver over Mosslight Fen, and Juniper Jell was trying very hard to be where the plan was. Mara Mudbuckle and Wick Willowcap had gone ahead across the moss, talking in low voices beside the cattails. Juniper could only catch bits and pieces: "lanterns," "the ring post," and "tonight."
That last word made Juniper’s chest tighten. Tonight meant a plan. A real one. And if she did not keep up, it might become one of those plans that happened with her name left out in the mud.
She sprang from a reed to a hummock, then another, her tiny orange scarf fluttering behind her. But the soft ground dipped wrong under her feet. Ahead, Mara had stopped at the leaning wooden post by the deepest channel. Wick held up his seed lantern, the little glowing shell bright as a moth.
Between them, tied to the rusted ring, was a rope stretched across the black water. It was old rope, frayed and wet, and it led off into the reeds where something gave a slow, hidden tug.
Mara turned her round nose toward Juniper. "Good. You're here," she said, but her voice was not quite the same as usual.
Wick blinked his bright eyes at the water. "We think something is holding the line," he whispered. "And I may have already said I would help it."
The rope twitched again. Juniper could step back and let the bigger creatures handle it. She could leap straight to the post and grab the rope before it pulled away. Or she could move into the reeds and follow where the line disappeared, even though nothing there had shown its face yet.
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