Amber groaned, and turned her face away from the blinding light before she fully opened her eyes. Talking in the dream world usually let her wake up feeling so energetic, but this morning her head felt like it was stuffed with cotton. One thing she was aware of right away was Alex's spirit in the back of her mind, connected through the world of the dreams. Alex had the talent of always finding what she was looking for, so there was no question that if she started asking the right questions, she'd find out all the things Amber had been too embarrassed to say from her recent memories. Or the secrets she'd kept in the hope of protecting Ammadrine until she could find out what was really going on.

"So," Alex asked, "You can tell me about this dream while we're on the way, right? I don't want to forget anything."

"I... umm... " Amber mumbled, trying to work out what was the best thing to say. She couldn't tell Alex that they'd been searching for the janitor without her. She couldn't mention the image of Ammadrine with a knife, or anything about being tainted. She didn't want them to be fighting, and she knew that if she said those things, there would be no chance left for them to talk.

"Amber!" Mom's voice cut into her thoughts, and Amber managed to recognise the shape silhouetted against the setting sun. This wasn't where she normally woke up, or when. A little moving around, and she realised that she was sitting in the car, her head resting against the window. She must have dozed off, fallen into a memory from her past lives, and then Violet had pulled her into the dream without even checking where she was. And for a moment she panicked, thinking about what Mom might tell Alex, not even knowing she was there. "You were asleep, I didn't want to disturb you. Hope your neck isn't stiff."

"I think I was dead," Amber giggled at the thought that could be better than just falling asleep. The first few times she'd thought about it, it had seemed so serious. But now, maybe, she'd had enough time to get used to it and there wasn't such a big difference between life and death any more. Half her friends were dead, anyway. "I had a dream about some things I don't really remember, and then a meeting in the Crystal Throne Room."

"Those are the dreams where you meet your friend Violet, right? Where you seem to be dead? I didn't even notice." Mom was making a lot of effort not to freak out, that much was obvious.

"Yeah, kind of. And I've got one of the Rainbow Knights in the back of my head, like riding along watching me. So I can use her powers too. Mom, I should introduce you, this is Alex. And before you say anything Alex, I know you'd be happier if I keep it secret. But Mom knows a lot of this stuff anyway. And with Jack and Violet, I never figured out how to talk to them without talking out loud, so I couldn't tell you much without Mom asking why I'm talking to myself."

"Don't mind me," Mom muttered, keeping her hands on the steering wheel even though they were stopped right now. She was gripping it tighter, her knuckles turning white, but it was better than the lack of hope she'd shown when there was nothing she could do. That was a revelation in itself: as long as she could remember, Amber had thought Mom wanted to be as boring and normal as possible, but somewhere inside there was still the rebel who needed to make a difference. And she'd do whatever she could to help Amber, no matter how hard it was.

"Sorry. I should tell you both about this dream anyway. But the Knights are doing something, something big I think, and Alex wants to talk on the way. Can you take us there?"

Amber tried to relax, to let Alex take over her lips so she could tell Mom where they were supposed to be meeting the others. And at the same time, she tried to lock down all the inner voices that might be talking inside her mind. She really needed Alex not to know that they'd been on the way to see Ammadrine already, or at least driving to the house where one of the new janitors lived. If they knew she was keeping secrets from them, they'd never trust her again.

"There's a village somewhere around here called Addlevale," Alex's words came out, but they were a bit garbled as she tried to get used to a body that wasn't her own. "Damn it, I can't talk clearly. All the times I rebuked my children for slovenly diction, were they having to contend with their own bodies being so ill-calibrated?"

Mom's fingers gripped the wheel even more tightly. Amber could tell that Alex's voice was different; she had just a trace of the lisp that Amber had been trying so hard to get rid of. It was enough that Amber found it hard not to burst out laughing, but at the same time she could tell that the voice coming out of her mouth didn't sound anything like her own accent, especially with the long words and long sentences.

"Your... children?" Mom finally managed to get words out through her anxiety.

"Alex is a teacher," Amber answered. "Well, she was, I think. When she was alive. She always uses long words, I think it's cool, even if she's hard to understand sometimes. I think she was an English teacher?"

"I guess that's a reason to trust her," Mom shrugged after a pause, but it still looked like she was putting a lot of effort into the gesture. "It's a bit weird, hearing your little girl say 'my children' so casually."

"My mother said the same," Alex answered, after a brief pause to be sure Amber didn't mind. "I was twenty-one years old when I decided to teach, and she still found it hard to treat me as an adult. Of course, that was in the middle of the nineteenth century, so teaching was one of very few jobs available to a respectable woman."

"Okay. So, you need to go to Addlevale?"

"I don't know the exact location, but we should be able to sense the Enemy when we draw close enough. I only hope that she isn't able to sense us with the same ease."

"She?"

Mom put the car back into gear, and pulled out of the car park she was in. Amber could see a couple of tower blocks beside them, that she'd been dreading visiting before she fell asleep. One of them housed a new janitor, recently employed by her school. Mom had somehow managed to get the PTA to agree to them visiting some of the non-teachers at home. To give them a bunch of flowers, with thanks from the PTA for sticking with the school through such a tough time. They weren't entirely sure what the plan would have been after that; if it would be better for Mom to go up, present the gift from the grateful parents, and describe the guy to Amber; or if she'd be able to sense an ancestral spirit from outside the building. But now, they were on a completely different plan.

As they drove away, Alex didn't say anything about where they'd just been, or why. She thought about Mom's query though, and just when Amber was thinking they'd make the whole drive in silence, she came up with an acceptable answer.

"The Enemy is a former member of the Council of the Rainbow. She was formerly a knight, but is now identifying as female, even though her host appears to be a man. Some of us have suggested that it's the host rather than her who is our real enemy, but I believe that her excommunication from our ranks in a previous generation speaks volumes by itself. The man cannot be held responsible for that, so it seems logical to take his statements at face value. And although I am not sure in which direction current trends point, I feel it is appropriate to regard a discorporate spirit as the gender which she chooses to assume, in the absence of a body which could be used to make a more direct assessment. It seems likely that Ammadrine is still female, in any sensible system of labelling we might adopt."

Amber couldn't bring herself to say anything more after that. She wanted to argue, but she knew that she couldn't. She had no idea how easy it would be for Alex to see her thoughts, and to discover all the things she hadn't mentioned.

"And while we're on the subject of memories," Alex continued, "I would like to ask Amber what she experienced in her most recent recollection of a past life. By linking all of these memories together, we can only gain a better understanding of the events of the past, and how they led to the present. Would you object if I ask your daughter some questions while we travel? It would likely be easier if I keep my own statements inside her mind, because exerting control of a physical body requires a great deal of presence. But at the same time, I feel it might be considered impolite to subject you to one half of a conversation."