When my eyes crack open, I'm in a dark damp room made of weird material. The stone is cratered and grainy under my hand. When I raise my head, black metal bars slash the space in front of me like teeth. I look around. I'm alone, but I hear muttering in the darkness beyond.

Great.

My throat and mouth are dry. Hard to keep my eyes open. The last thing I remember is drinking from a canteen. A light comes through the darkness. To the left's a window with bars over it. I peek down and gawk.

The world outside looks like a white desert, except there are crags, and the surface looks hard. The worst of it is these . . .

Uh, giant things sluggishly squatting on the ground with sailors attending to them. They look like giant silver toads, with tiny heads—at least, I think they're heads where long, dark pink tentacles writhe. Someone feeds something to one. At first, I think it's a log the monster digests in its jelly skin, but when I realize what it really is, my heart falls in my stomach.

I vaguely remember something about this, but before I can understand what's going on, a small orange head pops up in front of me.

"Whoa." I stumble back and meet Caramel's starburst green eyes. Thank goodness she's here. I'm not really alone. For a split second, I thought we might've gotten separated for good.

I cough. "Wh-where are we?"

"Mrow," Caramel explains.

"The moon? Wait, really?" I don't remember that being on the map. "I think I remember that from the stories." My brain's still fuzzy from whatever was in the canteen. "I mean, I know there are thousands of moons, but . . ."

Caramel meows in the affirmative.

"Wait, are there cats here?" I ask Caramel. The cats of Ulthar are known to travel pretty far to protect their own.

"Mraw," Caramel says. Cats on the moon. Makes sense.

"And if we needed their help, they'd come?" I ask her.

"Mraw."

"Okay." Of course in a world of dream logic, cats live on the moon that isn't actually the moon-moon. I grasp one of the bars and say to my cat, "Caramel, can you go get help?"

"Mraw." I swear she nods.

I rub under her chin. "Be safe, please." I bump noses with her, and then she's gone. A lump forms in my throat. I wish I could follow her.

I can't stand feeling helpless, so I won't. My hand slides away from the bar. I can't wait for someone to get me out of some tower. I need to figure this out.

I go to the bars at the cell entrance and wriggle one the one to the farthest left. Doesn't budge. But if the material is grainy, leaving white, glittering moon-dust on my jacket, it must be soft. I wonder who'd have a prison made of this. Maybe the wardens don't keep the prisoners alive long enough to worry if they'll escape. Maybe there's nowhere to run.

I can't think like that. This place isn't like Earth. If all the monsters can bend logic, so can I. I try the next few bars, and when I get to the center one, it budges a little. There are soft grooves in the floor where it's been worn. Footsteps pad to my left, but no one approaches. I wait until the sound quiets, and I tug on the two weakest bars in front of me.

The first time I try, nothing happens. But I pull again, and one of the bars gives at the bottom, slanting toward me as I hold it.

Outside the cell, there's no light except for what's streaming through the barred windows. I look for Moggy, but all the cells around mine are empty. I hope he's okay.

I pause. In the corner sits someone with their head down. When I step closer, they look at me through long coils of hair.

A girl. Her skin is about my tone, a light brown, but her hair is silver and thick. She has white curved horns set against her curls. Her light purple dress reminds me of a Greek stola from old mythology illustrations I've seen.

She's one of the prettiest people I've ever seen. Her eyes are wide as she takes me in.

When she speaks, her voice is a soft rasp. "It's been so long since I've seen anyone. Are you an apparition."

I pinch myself. "Nope. Not yet."

"Good. I've missed company. Someone who doesn't serve those . . . things."

"How do you know I don't?" How could someone trust me, or anyone, so easily?

"I see it in your eyes."

"My village wanted to give me to one of the Great Ones, so I could be their wife and have their children."

"Great Ones? Aren't they all in the sunset city?"

"They still visit the plateau where I live. They can do whatever they want. We, most people in the Dreamlands still worship them."

"Worship them," I repeat, adding, "and your parents asked you to marry one?"

She shakes her head, and I think her smile is a little bitter. "They didn't ask."

I frown. "That's not fair." I always knew that some parents never really saw their kids as human like them—or whatever her people call themselves. Marrying your daughter to an eldritch being that only cares for itself seems extra cruel.

"That's the universe." The gods are all-powerful, and those who try to fight them will be driven mad, whatever that means. But the dreamwalker Randolph Carter fooled Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos who's also the Messenger of the Gods, one of the most influential Outer Gods, maybe more than the Mother of a Thousand Young and the Gate-and-the-Key.

My problems with chasing pumpkins feels small. I'm small. But I'm not. Randolph Carter was a scarred and sensitive veteran who figured things out after he got sad about the state of the world once he came home after the war.

"Why do your people worship the gods?" I ask her.

She blinks and pauses, giving it some thought. "Because they're powerful and deserving of worship."

"So, how did you get here?"

"I ran away, and I was captured on a ship. They feed us to the moon-beasts."

"The moon-beasts?" I look toward the barred window. "The big, gray frog things outside?"

The girl nods. "Yes. They worship Nyarlathotep, and it's been said giving them sacrifices appeases him and keeps the seas calm. He has the most control of this place over any other god, except perhaps for Azathoth."

"You ran away?" I ask her.

"Yes, and got dragged off the ship."

I rub my neck. The air smells stale, but I catch a hint of something coppery. "Oof. Same. I ran away, too. From my last foster parents." The last word falls heavy between us.

"What did they do to you?"

A sour taste fills my mouth. "Bad stuff. I don't really want to talk about it." One day, when one of my foster mothers came to get me at the bus stop, I refused to leave my seat and even peed on myself before the bus driver urged me out on the street. I still remember the whispers and uncomfortable laughs of the other kids.

She bows her head but keeps the eye contact. "All right, then. I understand."

A lump swells in my throat, and I scratch the side of my neck. Besides being imprisoned why giant white frog things that might eat us, I don't know why I'm so nervous. "What's your name?"

"Moongirl," she says.

"Is that what the kidnappers call you?"

Moongirl shakes her head. "No. I call myself that because I'm a girl on the moon. It's what I like to be called. It sounds like something from a dream or a storybook."

I try her cell bars, and so does she, our hands accidentally brushing against each other's. But no dice. They won't budge.

Plan B. I feel behind me. They didn't take my backpack. Maybe they didn't find anything of worth. The moon-wine bottle's still in there. Good.

As she kneels by the bars, looking sad and lost, I get on my knees. "Hey, I'll be back."

She chews on her bottom lip. "O-okay. But please don't forget me." Her tone makes me sad. Cece told me, back on Earth, some people are raised to be slaughtered. As a sacrifice to the gods. Moongirl wasn't born to be killed, but I don't see much of a difference between that and getting forced to marry one of the Great Ones. Seems like death might be easier.

But I don't like to think like that. I've heard things like that before. That death is better than some of the pain I've gone through, and I'd like to think life is worth more than that. That I'm worth more than that. Then again, that's why I'm here and not at home, right? To prove I'm worth something by being a hero. As if my value can be found outside myself. Maybe it can. Or can't. I don't know yet.

She wraps her hand around one of the bars, and as she straightens to her full height, I see her silver toes are cloven.

As I sneak around a corner, more footsteps come. One person. When I peek, I see a man-like shadow turned away from us.

I whisper to her, "I'll put this close to a guard, they drink it, and I take their keys. Trust me, this will totally work."

A lump forms in my throat. Time to act.

As the figure's back is turned, I inch forward and set the moon-wine out.

I wait as the shadowed figure bends to inspect the wine. When he fidgets his head, I sneak farther away, so he can't see me. But I can't see him either.

A pop, some gulps

passes out, I take his keys off his belt and carefully put the cork back in the bottle.

When I go back to the prison cell, Moongirl stands and watches me hopefully as I unlock the door to her prison. She heaves a long sigh of relief, but she shakes. It must be scary, trusting someone else to help you.

"Thank you," she says.

I shake my head. Why are my cheeks hot? It's freezing in here. Must be nervousness over getting out without being eaten. I'm pretty anti-getting digested. "Don't thank me yet."

"But I already said it."

She holds up a hand. I flinch before my mind works. She's asking me to stop. "Wait. I think there's someone else on this block."

"You saw them?" I ask, shifting and pretending I didn't have a weird reaction.

She looks to our left."Yes. They were just captured."

As I follow Moongirl, I tense, afraid it's a trap. That I can't trust her. Since when have I trusted anyone completely. Even Cece I've had reservations about. I dunno. Nell is okay, maybe Lavinia.

I slow. I smell something faintly like mildew, but earthier.

"There we go," she says, pointing to the cell closest to us. I inch forward and look inside. The shadows make it hard to see.

I look inside at a figure hunched into the corner. They're covered in dark brown fur with greenish clumps, and they raise their head.

A werewolf—no, a ghoul. On Earth, they often hang out in graveyards. In the Dreamlands, they live in mountains and the Underworld.

When they look up, their eyes are a soft brown. They whimper to themselves.

"Do you have a name?" I ask them.

With a gravelly voice, they say, "Roger."

I give a thumbs up. "Okay, Roger that."

They point to themselves. "Yes, Roger this."

I say, "Cool. Hey, we can get you out. Can you claw the floor by the cells?"

Unlike with Moongirl, with the effort of three of us plus their claws, we free them, and they join us.

I tell both of them, "My friend went to get help."

Moongirl says, "Your friend. Did they have some mode of transportation, like a zebra?"

I blink. "She's a cat. Can cats ride zebras?"

Underneath the window, Moggy scuttles about, worrying his claws together.

"Pst, Mogs."

"What are you doing?" he asks. Translation: Caramel told me to keep watch.

The architecture catches my eye, what we'll need to climb. It's not smooth; it's jagged, whorled. In theory, we could wind down if we're careful.

Moggy helpfully extends his tiny arms and skitters back and forth, to catch one of us if we fall.

Sweat prickles my neck and under my arms as I go first, and then Roger, and then Moongirl. The climb is slow and painful, but my feet hit the ground. Roger comes down the swiftest, scaling the moon-walls with ease. Moongirl is more cautious. Soon, we're all safe with Moggy. Safe. Yeah, right.

"What on the moon is that?" Moongirl says, pointing up. I follow her stare.

My mouth drops when I see hundreds of cats pour down the ice-blue mountain. They overwhelm the people serving the moon-beasts and leap far from the massive, tentacled globs.

The ripple of felines narrows down the valley and barrels toward us, but slows. Caramel approaches at the head, followed by cats. Orange, black, gray, white. Green, yellow, blue eyes. Old, young. Long-haired, short-haired.

"Good girl," I tell Caramel, scratching the back of her ear. A sting. I look. A cut on my hand, which bleeds freely. From the climb, I guess.

"Mrah," she says, turning around. An order, kind of sassy. I love my cat.

We ride the wave of furry backs into a celestial plane of stars and newborn planets.

***

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