Quietly, Quiggly stepped into the darkness as he stealthily approached and steeled himself to hear the sound of his own voice in the stillness. His heart hammered in his chest as he fought the urge to flee, although his stomach knotted and felt like it was tying itself in a knot. But he pressed ahead, slowly and cautiously taking his first step, not wanting the sound of his footfalls to carry into the forest. At first he did not hear anything, but the silence was unsettling to him, and the fact that he felt nervous was something new to him. He walked across the small clearing that was bordered on either side by pines and listened intently, even sniffing the air as if that might give him some clue as to what might be going on. He breathed shallowly, not wanting to hear even the sound of his breath. He heard only the wind through the trees and was reassured by that. Quietly, very quietly, he drew a small knife from his pocket. Still moving slowly and keeping low, he moved slowly and carefully into the space between the trees. The leaves on the ground crunched and crackled with each step, the dry sound unnerving him. Just as he stepped into the circle of light from a small patch of light from the moon, he heard, very faintly and almost a whisper, Quiggly's voice. "There you are! Do you have the crystal ball?" The voice was low and raspy and seemed to float with the sound of a whisper, like the wind. Quiggly was certain he could hear the sound of his own breathing in it, but that was all he could be certain of. He realized that no matter how hard he tried, he could not control his breathing, and it sounded distinctly, even through the rustling of the leaves and the tree branches. He strained to hear anything else, but all he could hear was his own breathing, and then a muffled thud of sound. "I had it, and then I lost it!" a voice said to him, and it was Quiggly's own voice, although he couldn't remember saying that. Quiggly pressed the knife against the back of his left wrist, stilling the blood pumping down his arm. "I can't find it," the voice said, and Quiggly could tell by the sound that it wasn't his own voice anymore. "The trail we were following is gone, and we're following it to the edge of the forest," the voice said, and that, too, wasn't Quiggly's voice. "So I was telling him you had to go find it." The voice said something else, but the voice was not his own anymore. Quiggly shuddered, and then suddenly he realized he could hear nothing else. Everything was silence, silence and dark. "It must have been one of those pesky ghosts," the voice he thought he was hearing said, but Quiggly heard nothing. "But the thing I really don't understand," he continued, his voice muffled with the thought that he was speaking in an empty cave or something like that, "is how is it you're here, Quiggly, and there's two of you?" And then, in a rush, Quiggly remembered everything. He looked at the dagger in his hand and wondered what the heck he was going to do with it. "You better tell me the story again," the voice said to him, this time an utterly clear sound in the night. "What do you mean?" Quiggly asked, turning around. "What story?" he asked, but the voice didn't answer. "That part about this stupid ball being the key to the treasure I need, and you telling me that it is, and I need the treasure, but I don't have the crystal ball," the voice said, and for a moment Quiggly was confused. He knew he had the crystal ball, but he couldn't remember if he had it with him now. "The ball's in your bag!" the voice said. "And the trail leads through the forest! And I need the treasure. I need it bad!" The voice said that part again. Quiggly didn't have time to listen to the voice and remember where he had put his crystal ball, because in that moment he was seized by two large arms. It was hard and rough to the touch, and they squeezed his breath away. He was pushed to the ground and choked with the hand over his mouth, the other hand holding his arms. "Your bag?" the voice asked, and Quiggly was relieved, because it was his voice. But the sound of the man's voice made him feel uneasy. He didn't know what to do, and he didn't know if he could breathe in. "The trail will be back tomorrow," the voice said. "And then we'll find it and then everything will be OK!" The voice sounded frantic, and Quiggly heard things scuffling in the leaves all around him, as if he was lying on some sort of ground cover. "There's more than that," the voice said to him, and for a moment Quiggly thought he was going to be able to breathe. But he wasn't able to breathe. Instead, he heard another sound and he felt a needle prick into his arm. The voice in his mind began to fade. "Oh yes, a lot more, but I don't want to talk about that until we see what it's like in the morning." Then Quiggly heard the sound of steps running away, and it reminded him of the path through the woods. ## CHAPTER FIVE "Now that it's all got a beginning and an end," the voice said to Quiggly, "and as I said before, it doesn't matter what order you tell it in, it doesn't matter, in the end, because it all leads to the same place." "The treasure?" Quiggly asked. "That's right, the treasure," the voice said. "And I need that treasure, I really do need it, because I've got a thing for the occult. And so do you, it seems. So when you have the treasure, then we can be occult together." The voice had a strange sort of laugh, not quite like any Quiggly had ever heard, and for some reason it gave him the creeps. "So let's go find it. So come on, don't just sit there staring at me. Do something. Go find the treasure." Quiggly stared for a moment and then turned around and looked at the trees. The sound of a branch snapping somewhere above him made Quiggly spin around, but he saw nothing. "I can't go out there! There's nothing there!" Quiggly said. "But if there's something there, then you'll know about it, and I'll know you have the ball. Come on," the voice said, and Quiggly tried to control himself as he listened to the voice, the soft sound of breathing, the shuffling of the man's feet on the ground. "All right," Quiggly said. "All right. I'll look around and go get you some help. Just stay right there," he told the voice, and it made a noise of surrender. Quiggly listened for a few seconds and then walked slowly to where he had hidden the bag. "So?" the voice asked. Quiggly shrugged and gave the voice a worried look. "Don't know," he said. "There's nothing there, so you'll have to go farther into the forest to find it," the voice said, but Quiggly wasn't listening to him anymore, so the voice went quiet and waited, then the voice tried to get Quiggly's attention again. "So?" the voice asked. "Nothing there?" "Yeah," Quiggly answered, but the voice didn't seem to hear him. So Quiggly said, "I told you, I don't see nothing." "Maybe it got turned around in there. I don't see how else that could be the case. It's just that a bag with a piece of paper about the ball in the bottom of it shouldn't be doing that. And if it's in here, then why isn't it in here?" the voice said. "Maybe the bag itself is magic." Quiggly felt sure he should have left the bag back in the glade with the dead men, or at least left it in the bag and buried it. If he buried it, then there wouldn't be anything to worry about. The voice was starting to make him nervous. But for a moment he didn't know what to do, or where to go. "Maybe it fell out," Quiggly offered, and the voice responded with a loud burst of "Maybe it's a new spirit! That's it, it's a new spirit, and that's the next step for us! That's the next step! Oh, we're going to be a powerhouse!" And with that the voice grew quiet again. "Then why are you so quiet?" Quiggly asked. "Because you're mad, that's why." Quiggly turned around and saw nothing except the empty space around him and the trees, which began to move. They swayed, as if breathing heavily, as if he was hearing them