"I have to lead story hour," Lilith said, "but let me think about this. Maybe there's something I'm missing."

She handed me the key to the archive, and I let myself into the long narrow room. Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined the walls, and each shelf was stocked two and three deep with newspapers, booklets, pamphlets, journals, photo alb.u.ms, all in eerily mint condition and all clearly labeled by date. A computer with high-speed Internet access rested on a side table near a bank of filing cabinets.

I zeroed in on the six-month period surrounding Chloe's birth and stacked up the material on the mahogany worktable. I found a roll of parchmentlike substance stowed behind some of the annual journals, and I unfurled it across the table. It looked like it might be from the side of an old canoe, decorated with drawings burned into the surface. An eagle. A brilliant star. Indians in full dress. Trees. A waterfall. At least I think it was a waterfall. A fierce catlike creature was positioned over it, and lines like the rays of the sun radiated out from the centerpoint.

Interesting but it got me nowhere.

"Focus," I told myself. There wasn't time for anything else.

I was halfway through a long account of damage caused by spring flooding when my cell vibrated.

"Dawn Eckhard, Vermont Country Daily Vermont Country Daily. What's the official explanation for the light show over Sugar Maple last night? I checked with NASA public relations and they said it was either Saturn orbiting closer to the earth or s.p.a.ce junk flaming when it hit the atmosphere. I'd like your take on it."

"Nothing much else to tell, Ms. Eckhard."

"d.a.m.n," she said. "I was hoping for a UFO. We haven't had a good UFO sighting in years."

"Sorry to disappoint you."

She had an easygoing laugh. "Hey, I would have settled for another Saturn story if it got me a few extra column inches."

Another Saturn story? On another day I would have asked what she meant by that, but she had already launched into giving me her phone number and e-mail address and the moment pa.s.sed.

I went back to searching the archive. Chloe's birth was heralded in the local paper. The town historian gave her arrival a full page, single-s.p.a.ced, in the ledger. Her human father didn't merit a mention.

I fielded another phone call about Isadora's light show, wishing I could come up with a better explanation than s.p.a.ce junk, but it was the best I could do.

Maybe that Saturn angle was our best excuse.

You've got to love Google. I typed in Saturn Saturn and the date, and the screen filled with hundreds of page options. I picked the first and scanned the contents. Apparently two things were happening today. Every thirty years or so, Saturn reached the point in its...o...b..t when it was closest to earth and easily visible to the naked eye. At the same time the planet was in direct opposition to the sun, making it glow noticeably brighter in the night sky. UFO sightings usually rose accordingly. and the date, and the screen filled with hundreds of page options. I picked the first and scanned the contents. Apparently two things were happening today. Every thirty years or so, Saturn reached the point in its...o...b..t when it was closest to earth and easily visible to the naked eye. At the same time the planet was in direct opposition to the sun, making it glow noticeably brighter in the night sky. UFO sightings usually rose accordingly.

Like any celestial event, it brought out the sky watchers, the crazies, and the hopeful.

I owed Dawn Eckhard a big thank-you. Now I could blame Saturn for everything, and science would back me up. The galaxy was filled with all sorts of events, random and regular. You could find an explanation for just about anything if you wanted to.

But as I looked at the chart, the numbers started to form a pattern. Saturn swung this close to earth approximately every thirty years. Chloe was almost thirty years old. The last time Isadora tried to pull Sugar Maple through the mist was within seven days of Chloe's birth.

I cross-referenced stats on Saturn's...o...b..t with a date one week before she was born. Not a match. I tried six days. No luck. Five was the lucky number.

I went back another thirty years. I cross-referenced Saturn with the same time period in Sugar Maple's history and found a small mention of earthquake activity near the center of town, followed by a spectacular thunderstorm.

I searched back sixty years, ninety, one hundred fifty, one hundred eighty, as far back as two hundred seventy years ago, and every single time I found references to unusual disturbances in and around Sugar Maple that tied in with the transit of Saturn, and they all spanned a narrow twenty-four-to thirty-six-hour period.

With the help of the archival records and the computer, I was able to roll it all the way back to the early eighteenth century when the Abenaki Indians were making room for the new settlers from Salem. You couldn't argue with the math.

Isadora had been working toward this since before Chloe was born. This wasn't an impulsive, emotional decision on her part. It was the well-thought-out, deliberate action of a powerful ent.i.ty with single-minded intent.

To take back what belonged to her, no matter the cost to herself or Sugar Maple.

Or to my daughter.

We had been working on the cla.s.sic witching hour deadline of midnight, but according to the charts, Saturn would reach the closest point in its transit at 10:42 P.M.

If Isadora was going to make a move, that was when it would happen.

Which meant we had less than seven hours to find Karen, save Sugar Maple, and free Steffie's soul.

25.

CHLOE.

At some point when I wasn't looking, knitting became trendy.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not complaining. Trendy Trendy meant lots of new knitters joining the fold, which meant a healthier bottom line for me. meant lots of new knitters joining the fold, which meant a healthier bottom line for me.

I think it was the New York Times New York Times that called knitting the new Zen not long after 9/11 happened. I'm not sure I'd go that far (trust me, there is nothing Zen-like about a knitter who just realized she has to frog three months of work on an Orkney Pi shawl), but when I need to think deeply about something, I reach for a plain old cuff-down sock and start knitting. that called knitting the new Zen not long after 9/11 happened. I'm not sure I'd go that far (trust me, there is nothing Zen-like about a knitter who just realized she has to frog three months of work on an Orkney Pi shawl), but when I need to think deeply about something, I reach for a plain old cuff-down sock and start knitting.

Which was what I did the second Luke went out the door.

Too bad the thinking part didn't kick in as fast as the knitting part.

My mother taught me to knit when I was four or five years old. I had wanted to learn how to spin the way she did, but I was too little to sit at the wheel so she taught me to knit and purl instead. She figured there would be plenty of time later to teach me her other art.

"Your grandmother taught me," she said, "and her mother taught her, all the way back to Aerynn, and one day you'll teach your own daughter."

I wondered if Karen had taught Steffie how to knit. I imagined them sitting together in the MacKenzie kitchen on a snowy winter afternoon, happily working on a scarf for Luke while a pot of soup bubbled on the stove.

Yeah, I know. Most of my domestic fantasies were lifted straight off the Hallmark Channel and Nick at Nite. But it made me happy to think at least one little girl lived the life I'd longed for.

Except she hadn't. Steffie had barely lived at all. Six years in this dimension were barely a running start at a life. Six years with your parents weren't close to enough.

Maybe I was approaching this from the wrong angle. Isadora knew exactly what she was doing when she imposed her arbitrary deadline. Humans reacted strongly to countdown clocks. Even half-blooded humans like me. Our adrenaline pumped hard and fast and made us act on instinct instead of intellect. It made us make mistakes.

"Slow down," I said to the empty shop. "Think it through."

I had known Isadora all my life. Her son Gunnar had been my best friend. Our lives had threaded in and out over the years, and I still didn't know one single thing about how they lived or where they lived. Even Janice, who had gone beyond the mist many times to visit clients, didn't have a clue. That was how good the Fae were at covering their tracks. For mil lennia it had been a matter of survival.

All I knew for sure was that their powers emanated from some source beyond the mist and dissipated the longer they were away from that source. Isadora's eye-catching display last night had taken its toll on her powers, weakening her visibly toward the end. She was beyond the mist right now, gathering up whatever it was that gave her those powers.

Which meant I didn't necessarily have to be stronger than Isadora to win; I had to be smarter. I had to figure out a way to wear her down and drain her energies. If I could outlast her, I could outsmart her and steal back Steffie's spirit so the child could complete her journey.

a.s.suming that I knew the first thing about stealing back spirits.

Pretty much everything I knew about spirits had been gleaned from repeated viewings of Ghost Ghost and and Grey's Anatomy Grey's Anatomy. Janice had tried on more than one occasion to bring me up to speed, but I had my hands full with vampires, werewolves, selkies, witches, trolls, sprites, brownies, and the rest of my neighbors. I found myself wishing I'd paid more attention.

One thing I knew for sure about Isadora was that she didn't delegate authority. She was your original hands-on bad guy, more than happy to do the dirty work herself. To be honest, I believed she liked it. Plucking a child's soul from the afterlife would be more fun than a week in the Bahamas in mid-February.

Holding the child's soul hostage? Priceless to someone like Isadora.

It was clear Isadora's powers had increased exponentially in the last few months. Even within the restrictions of banishment, she was able to reach into other dimensions and snag Steffie's spirit and hold it captive.

Each time she exploited another weak spot in the banishment, she came one step closer to breaking free without my help, and when that happened, we would be done for. That clock was ticking even more loudly than the one I had scaled a few hours ago.

I had no doubt that if Isadora were released from her own imprisonment, she would be able to pull Sugar Maple beyond the mist right now. She had the skills and the power necessary, and equally important, she had a score to settle and she didn't mind using a child's soul as the bargaining chip.

Which meant that wherever Isadora was right now, Steffie was close by.

But where?

I kept circling back to Snow Lake. Isadora showed a marked affinity for the place. Witness last night's command performance. Her sons, Gunnar and Dane, had also spent much of their time in our dimension out at Snow Lake. And come to think of it, the Weavers were always flitting about, either ice skating in the winter or boating in the summer.

It seemed as likely a spot as any.

Across the room, Penny the cat yawned, stretched, then hopped out of her basket and padded her way toward me, meowing loudly.

"You just ate," I chided her gently. "I thought we agreed to cut back on the Fancy Feast."

"When you cut back on Oreos and Ben & Jerry's," the cat shot back.

The last time Penny talked to me was just before the battle with Isadora and Gunnar back in December, and she hadn't mentioned my eating habits. Of course, Penelope hadn't really been talking; she was just providing a gateway for Sorcha to visit this realm one last time.

My heart started to pound, and I placed the cat down on top of the worktable, where she sprawled across the waterfall tapestry I'd forgotten to pin back up on the wall.

"Okay," I said, heart pounding. "Who's in there?"

"Now you're hurting my feelings," the cat said, pausing her vigorous grooming. "I've only been gone a few months and you've forgotten all about me."

I felt like my heart stopped beating. Please, please, Aerynn and all the other Hobbs women before me, let it be Gunnar. Please, please, Aerynn and all the other Hobbs women before me, let it be Gunnar. "Gunnar? Is that really you?" "Gunnar? Is that really you?"

Penny looked up at me and her eyes shifted from their familiar golden hue to brilliant blue, and I threw back my head and laughed out loud.

Penny was a gateway companion, an old soul who had provided Sorcha, my surrogate mother, entry into this dimension just a few months ago. I waited for the cat to shapeshift into my beloved friend, but we just stared at each other.

"I've been trying to get your attention for weeks, and you haven't picked up on it," he said. "What's up with that?"

I don't know about you, but I had trouble taking a talking cat seriously. "Shift over," I told him. "I can't stop thinking about litter boxes."

"This is the best I can do, kid. Let's enjoy it while it lasts."

It turned out he had been responsible for the odd occurrences around town recently. Flaming cat b.u.t.ts. The visible blue flame messages. Janice's verbal diarrhea the night of the seance. The bubble Karen suddenly found herself in. All Gunnar's handiwork.

"Please don't tell me you hurled that ball of flame at Luke and me."

"Give me some credit. I was trying to get your attention, not kill you."

"Oh G.o.d, Gunnar, I wish I could see you. Everything's changed. I don't know who my friends are anymore. Your mother has Luke's daughter's spirit trapped. His ex-wife has disappeared and I think someone's trying to erase her memory. The-"

"Don't worry," he said. "I know all about it. Karen's with me."

I felt my legs go out from under me, and I grabbed for the edge of the worktable.

"Put your head between your knees."

"Why don't you put your tail between your legs," I muttered as the room began to spin.

"She's not dead," he said, "if that's what you're worried about."

I sank to the floor in a pool of relief. "I wish you'd told me that first."

"You always did have an overactive imagination." I could almost see him smile. "Must be all those old movies you love."

I didn't want to cry but it was all too much. I was so filled with emotion it had no place to go but out through my tear ducts.

"d.a.m.n it," the cat who was Gunnar said. "You know I hate it when you do that."

"S-sorry," I sniffled. "It's just life has been so crazy. Down is up. Up is sideways. And I've been missing you so much."

"I thought you had the cop to take up the slack."

I cried even harder. "I don't think we're going to last."

"Then he's an a.s.shole."

I started to laugh. "Gunnar . . . "

"A major a.s.shole. If he doesn't have the b.a.l.l.s to live with magick, then screw him. You can do better."

"I can't do better."

"The h.e.l.l you can't.

"You saved his life. I thought you liked him."

"h.e.l.l, yeah, I like him, but not if he doesn't go the distance with you. I didn't cash in my chips so he could go back to Boston."

See what I mean? Gunnar always had my back. It was like he'd never left.

Except he had. He was dead. Or as close to dead as a Fae ever got, and he wasn't coming back to this dimension no matter how much I wished he could. Isadora could curse me to h.e.l.l and beyond but I wasn't the one who had created the instruments of destruction that took her sons from her. Isadora had called those weapons into being to use against me, and she would pay the price for that act of vengeance into eternity, separated from her sons' spirits in every dimension. There may not always be justice in the world of humans but it was good to know the Universe would not be denied.

But how I wished Gunnar could have been spared.

Penny stretched out full length on top of the tapestry and looked up at me. Gold flecks were starting to appear in the blazing blue eyes.