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about it now, but not so mad that he wanted to face an entire village of trolls and demand that Rex take the mirror back. That was a meeting that probably wouldn’t go well for Hudson.
    He kept pacing. “So the best thing to do is to give the mirror to Logos royalty?”
    â€œLogosian,” Charlotte corrected.
    â€œHow do I find one?”
    She sent him another pointed look. “Haven’t you ever paid attention to my father’s stories? Only two members of the royal family are left. King Vaygran, who’s a tyrant, and Princess Nomira, who’s missing.”
    â€œMissing how?”
    Charlotte huffed in exasperation. “It’s a good thing you only ran into trolls while you were in Logos. If King Vaygran’s wizards saw the compass, they would have hauled you off to a dungeon. They know it belongs to my father.”
    Hudson tilted his head at her. “I thought you said the compass was yours.”
    Charlotte flushed, turning the lotion on her cheeks light purple. Instead of commenting on who actually owned the compass, she summarized what Hudson should have already known. “A year ago, when King Arawn died, his brother, Prince Vaygran, left his estate in the country and came to the castle. He said Princess Nomira was too young to rule and made himself regent king. Then, when she wasn’t expecting it, he had his top wizard kidnap her and lock her up somewhere magical.
    â€œVaygran told the people he’d just hidden her in order to protect her until she was old enough to reign, but he won’t ever let her out. My father knows. He was King Arawn’s wizard and refused to work for Vaygran. That’s why we had to come here.” Charlotte looked down at her hands sadly. “To the awful Land of Banishment.”
    Hudson felt a twinge of guilt, which was quickly joined by several others, twinging guiltily around in his chest. No one at school had been understanding of Charlotte. But in their defense, how could they have known she’d told them the truth about Logos?
    Hudson wanted to apologize, to show her there were lots of nice things about Texas. But he needed to get rid of the curse first. “Is there any way I can give the mirror to King Vaygran?”
    She let out a scoff. “He wouldn’t care about helping you. More likely, he’d think you were a spy sent by my father.”
    Hudson went back to pacing, a pointless walk that was getting him nowhere. “Is there some way I could convince the trolls to take the mirror back? Is there some way to trick them?”
    She shook her head. “It’s almost impossible to trick a troll. They can tell the things you’re trying to hide. Besides, the trolls know you’ll be desperate to get rid of the mirror, and they know you’ve got a powerful magic object—one that’s not only a portal from this world, but one that also warns people about trolls. They’ll only accept the compass or something just as important. I can’t give you anything like that.”
    Hudson let out a groan. It was easy for Charlotte to shoot down his ideas. She wasn’t the cursed one. “Then the only thing I can do is go back to the troll village and give them the compass.”
    Charlotte’s head jerked up. “No, the only thing you can do is become a recluse, because you can’t give away the compass.”
    He stopped pacing. “Why do you need it? You don’t live around trolls anymore. What’s the point of having a compass that warns about them?”
    She stood and walked over to him, hands on her hips. “I’m going back someday—whether my father wants me to or not. Sooner or later, someone will stand up to King Vaygran and rescue the princess. Once Logos is safe, I’ll need the compass to take me home.” Charlotte held out her hand to Hudson. “So give it back.”
    He felt sorry for her. He really did. He promised himself that after