John Ross jogs quickly along the walkway bordering the Chicago River, moving south from the breach in the fortress walls. He carries his staff before him, but he has temporarily lost the use of its magic, the"consequence of another of those times in the past when he was forced to call upon it - before the Armageddon, before the fall. Thus he must flee and hide as common men. Already, his enemies look for him. They have tracked him here, as they track him everywhere, and they know that somewhere in the conflagration he will be found. A Knight of the Word is a great prize, and those who find him will be well rewarded. But they know, too, that he will not be taken easily, and their caution gives him an edge.

He has come late to the city's fall. The attack has been in progress for months, the once-men and their demon masters laying siege to the makeshift walls and reinforced gates that keep the people within protected. Chicago is one of the strongest bastions remaining, a military camp run with discipline and skill, its people armed and trained. But no bastion is impregnable, and the attackers have finally found a way in. He is told they gain entry through the sewers, that there is no longer any way of keeping them out. Now the end is at hand, and there is nothing anyone can do but flee or die.

Bodies line the streets, flung casually aside by those who leave them lifeless. Men, women, and children - no exceptions are made. Slaves are plentiful and food is scarce. Besides, a lesson is needed. Feeders slink through the shadows, working their way'from corpse to corpse, seeking a shred of fading life, of pain, of horror, of helpless rage, of shock and anguish on which to feed. But the battle moves on to other places, and so the feeders follow after. Ross works his way along a brick wall fronting the postage-stamp yards of a line of abandoned brick homes, searching for a way out, listening to the screams and cries of those who have failed to do so. The attack shifts to a point ahead of him, and he recognizes the danger. He must turn back. He must find another way. But his options are running out, and without the magic to protect him he is less certain of what he should do.

Finally he begins to retrace his steps, angling west toward the outskirts of the city, away from Lake Michigan and the downtown. It will be nightfall soon, and the hunters will not find him so easily. If he can reach the freeways, he can follow them into the suburbs and be gone before they realize he has escaped. His throat is dry, and his muscles ache, for he has not slept in days. His coming to the city was in response to a dream that foretold of its destruction. But he is mistrusted everywhere, a Ca.s.sandra crying out in the wilderness of a crumbling Troy, and his warnings are ignored. Some would imprison him as a spy. Some would throw him from the walls. If they did not fear his magic, he would already be dead. It is a pointless, debilitating life he leads, but it is all he has left.

He comes up against a firefight at an intersection in the streets and spins quickly back into a shadowed niche to hide from the combatants. Automatic weapons riddle wooden doors and pock brick walls and take the lives of everyone caught in their field of fire. The feeders frolic through the carnage, leaping and twisting with unrestrained glee, feeding on the rage and fear of the combatants. Killing is the most powerful form of madness and therefore the feeders'strongest source of food, and they are drawn to it as flies to blood. No sounds come from them, nor is any form of recognition accorded them, for they are a silent, invisible presence. But in their lantern eyes Ross sees the pleasure they derive from the dark emotions the killing releases, and he is reminded of the Furies in the old Greek myths, driving insane those who had committed unconscionable crimes. If there were Furies in real life, he thinks, they would be mothers to these feeders.

When the fighting dies away, he moves on, running swiftly toward the confluence of freeways that lead into the city from the west, anxious to find his way clear. Night slips down about him like window shades drawn against the smoky, fiery light of the city's destruction. The smells that a.s.sail his nostrils are acrid and rank-charred flesh and blackened blood. Disease will follow, and many of those who do not die in the fighting will die in the aftermath. Thousands are driven from this city into the wilderness. How many will survive to take refuge somewhere else?

He reaches the arterials winding into the main east/west freeway, but the attackers throng from all quarters before him, lining the four-lane, gathering for an unknown reason. He edges back cautiously and works his way down the backyards of houses and the shattered gla.s.s fronts of businesses to where those who celebrate do not ma.s.s so thickly. He finds a rise on which an abandoned housing development is settled, and he enters a house that gives him a clear view of the freeway leading in. From an upstairs window, he looks out on a grand procession approaching from the west. He uses his binoculars to get a clearer look, a cold suspicion beginning to surface.

There, on the buckled, cracked ribbon of concrete that spreads like a length of worn pewter into the horizon, he sees the first lines of captured humans, shackled and bent as they shuffle forward in long trains, their lives spared so that they may serve as slaves. Cages on wheels contain those who will be accorded a special death. Heads strung on ropes and mounted on poles attest to the number who have found death already.

Then he sees her. She rides on a flatbed wagon pulled by several dozen of those she has subjugated. She sits amid the demons who are her favorites, tall, regal, and as cold as death, queen of the destruction she surveys. Her history is legend. She was a world-cla.s.s athlete who medaled twice in the Olympics. She became an activist, first for reform, later for revolution, gifted with charismatic speaking powers. She was revered and trusted by everyone, and she betrayed them all. Along the freeway, the once-men who serve her go quiet and bow their heads in obeisance. John Ross feels his stomach knot. Even from where he hides he can see the emptiness in her eyes. She is devoid of emotion, as dead inside as the creatures she has crushed in her pa.s.sing. She is a pivotal figure in the Void's implacable war against the Word. She is John Ross's greatest failure.

He knew her when she was different, many years ago, when there was still time to save her.

He knew her as Nest Freemark.

Monday, JULY 4

Chapter Twenty-Six.

Nest Freemark woke to the sound of voices, hushed and cautious outside her bedroom door. The big floor fan had been turned off and shoved to one side and the door closed, so she could not see who was there. She tried to pick up on what was being said, but the words were indistinct. She lay facing the door, staring at its familiar paneled frame, the bed-sheet pulled up to her chin, her fists clenched about the wrinkled border. She did not know when she had finally fallen asleep or how long she had slept. The room's light was gray and muted, and the temperature cool, so she thought it might only be dawn. But when she looked at her bedside clock, she saw it was almost noon.

She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, then turned over to look out the window. A small section of the sky was visible through the curtains. Clouds drifted slowly across the blue expanse, and the sun cast their shadows on the earth and marked their pa.s.sing with changes in the light. The breeze that wafted through her open window smelled damp and fetid.

Had it rained during the night? Her thoughts drifted. Gran had always loved the sound of falling rain.

Her eyes teared, and she brushed at them quickly. She would not cry again - not right away. She had cried enough. She felt something scratchy against her bare elbow, and she reached beneath the covers to extract Gran's crumpled note. She had found it beneath her pillow when her grandfather had finally gotten her to bed - after they had taken Gran away, after all the policemen, medics, firemen, and neighbors had gone, after she had refused over and over again to go somewhere else for the night. Alone in the darkness of her room, trapped in the downward spiral of her sadness and rage, she had curled into a ball atop her sheets, the fan blowing cool air over her heated skin, her eyes scrunched tight against her horror and misery, and clutched her pillow to her face. That was when her fingers had come upon the note. She had pulled it out, opened it, and stared at it in disbelief. The note was from Gran. She had read it so many times since that she knew the words by heart.

When he comes for you, use your magic. Trust Wraith.

Love you, Gran She looked at the writing again now, trying to gain some new insight, to find hidden meaning behind the words. But the note was straightforward and the warning it contained unmistakable. Gran had written the note in the moments before she died. She had written it, in all probability, knowing she was going to die. Nest had thought it all through carefully, looking it over from every conceivable viewpoint, and argued the possibilities with herself until she was certain. The police and the firemen and the medics and the neighbors might agree among themselves that Gran was an old drunk who saw things that weren't there and finally drank so much she took out a shotgun to blow away her phantoms and brought on the heart attack that killed her. They might dismiss her with a shrug, a few words of sympathy, and an unspoken conviction that anyone crazy enough to go around shooting holes in trees and fences was just asking for trouble. They might sleep a whole lot better living with that explanation than with the truth. But the fact remained that the truth was something else entirely. Gran wasn't dead because she drank or she was crazy. She was dead because the demon had killed her.

I have enemies to eliminate.

Nest could still hear his words, spoken to her in the blackness of the caves, disembodied and remote and rife with malice. The demon had gone about the business of eliminating Gran quite deliberately. He had taken great pains to sidetrack everyone who might protect her, and then he had come for her. Nest knew it was so. She had never been so certain of anything in her life.

Now Gran was warning her, in the crumpled note she held in her hands, that the demon was coming for her as well.

Why?

Nest had pondered the question all night and she still didn't have an answer. She had a.s.sumed all along that the demon's interest in her was strictly secondary to his interest in Gran or John Ross, that he was using her to get to them. But Gran's note suggested that his intentions were more personal. Gran obviously believed the demon was after Nest as well. Use your magic. Trust Wraith. Use your magic. Trust Wraith. Gran could have written anything in those last few moments, but she had chosen to write this. Gran could have written anything in those last few moments, but she had chosen to write this.

Why?

Because Gran had thought it more important than anything else. Because she knew what was going to happen.

Which was more than Nest could say.

What did the demon want with her?

She rolled onto her back and stared at the flat surface of the ceiling. Use your magic. Trust Wraith. Use your magic. Trust Wraith. As if the magic had done Gran any good. And where was Wraith last night when she was fighting to keep her sanity as the feeders crawled all over her? Why should she believe either one would be of any use against the demon? Questions buzzed in her mind like gnats, and she closed her eyes against their persistent whine. The answers that would silence them were nowhere to be found. G.o.d, she was going to miss Gran. Her eyes filled with tears immediately. She still couldn't believe her grandmother was gone, that she wasn't sitting there at the kitchen table with her orange juice and vodka and her cigarette and ashtray, that she wouldn't be asking Nest what time she planned to be home from the fireworks that night, that she wouldn't be there to talk about the feeders and the forest creatures and the magic in the park. As if the magic had done Gran any good. And where was Wraith last night when she was fighting to keep her sanity as the feeders crawled all over her? Why should she believe either one would be of any use against the demon? Questions buzzed in her mind like gnats, and she closed her eyes against their persistent whine. The answers that would silence them were nowhere to be found. G.o.d, she was going to miss Gran. Her eyes filled with tears immediately. She still couldn't believe her grandmother was gone, that she wasn't sitting there at the kitchen table with her orange juice and vodka and her cigarette and ashtray, that she wouldn't be asking Nest what time she planned to be home from the fireworks that night, that she wouldn't be there to talk about the feeders and the forest creatures and the magic in the park.

Nest sobbed quietly. She could still see the look on Gran's face as she lay lifeless on the porch, the shotgun clutched in her hands. She would always see that look, a cold haunting at the fringes of her warmer memories. She had known the truth about how Gran died the instant she had seen her face. The note only confirmed it.

She turned on her side again, staring at the curtained window and the clouded sky beyond. The back of her throat ached with what she was feeling. She would never get over this, she thought. She would never be the same again.

Footsteps approached along the hallway beyond her room and stopped outside her door. A moment later the door opened, and someone stepped inside. She lay without moving, listening to the silence. She hoped that whoever was there would go away.

"Nest?" her grandfather called softly.

She did not respond, but he crossed to the bed anyway and sat down next to her.

"Did you sleep at all?" he asked.

She closed her eyes against the sound of his voice. "Yes."

"That's good. I know it wasn't easy. But you needed to get some rest." He was quiet for a few moments, and she could feel his eyes on her. She remained motionless beneath the sheet, curled into herself. "Are you hungry?"

"No."

"There's a lot of food out there. People have been stopping by all morning, bringing ca.s.seroles and tins filled with everything you can imagine." He chuckled softly. "Looks like some of them emptied out their entire kitchens. We've got enough food to feed an army. I don't know what we're going to do with all of it."

His hand rested on her shoulder. "Why don't you get up and come out and keep me company?"

She was silent a moment, thinking it over. "I heard voices."

"Friends. Neighbors. Everyone's gone now. It's just you and me." He shifted on the bed, and she could hear him sigh. "They say she didn't suffer, Nest. She was gone almost right away. Ma.s.sive heart attack. I spoke with the doctor a little while ago. He was very kind. I've got to go down to the funeral home and pick out a casket this afternoon. A notice has already been sent to the paper. Reverend Emery helped prepare it. He's agreed to speak at the funeral on Thursday."

He trailed off, as if he didn't quite know where to go next. In the silence, Nest could hear the old clock ticking down the hall.

After a moment, her grandfather said quietly, his voice filled with sadness, "I just don't understand"

She nodded without offering a reply, thinking that she understood better than he did, but didn't know how to explain it to him.

His hand tightened on her shoulder. "You might have heard some comments last night, loose talk about your grandmother. You'll probably hear more. I don't want you to pay any attention to it. Your grandmother was a special person. A lot of people didn't understand that. They thought she was peculiar. I guess she was, but she was good-hearted and caring and she knew how to look after people. You know that. And I don't care what anyone says, she wasn't out there shooting that shotgun at nothing. Your grandmother wasn't like that."

"I know," Nest said quickly, hearing the despair build in his voice.

She twisted about so that she could see his face. It looked careworn and tired, the age lines more deeply etched, the thick white hair mussed and badly combed. When she looked into his eyes she could tell he had been crying.

His voice shook. "She was fine when I left her, Nest. She was worried about you, of course, but she was fine. I just don't know what happened. I don't think she would have brought out the shotgun if she wasn't in danger. She hasn't even looked at it in years."

He paused, his eyes searching her face. He was waiting for her to speak, to respond to his comments. When she stayed silent, he cleared his throat, and his voice steadied again.

"Your young friends said something strange when they came by the house to ask me to help look for you last night. They said you were chasing after someone who was poisoning trees in the park, someone I'd told you about. But I don't know anything about this." He looked away a moment. "The thing of it is, Nest, I get the feeling I don't know anything about a lot of what's going on. It wasn't so important before." His eyes shifted back to her. "But after what happened last night, I guess now it is."

His eyes stayed locked on hers. Nest felt like a deer caught in the headlights. She didn't know what to say. She didn't even know where to begin.

"Can we talk about this a little later, Grandpa?" she said finally. "I just can't do it right now."

He considered her request a moment, and then nodded. "All right, Nest. That seems fair." He rose, his eyes traveling about the room as if seeking something. "Will you come out and eat?"

She raised herself to a sitting position and forced a smile. "Sure. Just give me a minute, okay?"

He went back through the door and closed it softly behind him. Nest sat in the bed without moving, staring into s.p.a.ce. What could she say to him? She got up finally and went into the bathroom and took a shower. She let the water wash over her for a long time, her eyes closed, her thoughts wandering off to other times and places, then returning to focus on what lay ahead. She dried off and began to dress. She had just finished pulling on shorts and a T-shirt and was bending down to tie her tennis shoes when she heard a scrabbling sound at the window.

"Nest!" Pick called urgently.

"Pick!" she exclaimed hi relief, and rushed over to push aside the curtains.

The sylvan was standing on the sill looking disheveled and grimy, as if he had been rolled in dirt. His leafy head was soiled and his twiggy feet were caked with mud. "I'm sorry to be late, girl. I've had a dreadful night! If I don't get some help, I don't know what I'm going to do! The balance of things is upset in a way I've never seen! The feeders are all over the place!" He caught his breath, and his face softened. "I heard from Daniel about your grandmother. I'm sorry, Nest. I can't believe it happened."

"Was it the demon?" she asked quickly.

"Of course it was the demon!" He was so matter-of-fact about it, so unshakably certain, so Pick Pick, that she smiled in spite of herself. Pick scowled. "The stink of his magic is all over your front yard! He must have come right up to the front door! How did he do that? Where were you and your grandfather?"

Quickly she filled him in on what had happened - how she had been lured away from the dance by the demon, how Danny Abbott and his friends had stuffed her in a burlap bag and hauled her down to the caves, how the demon had come to her there and taunted her, how her grandfather had been summoned by her friends to find her, and how Gran had ended up being left alone.

"Oh, that's a nasty piece of work!" Pick spit indignantly. "Your grandmother would have been a match for him once. More than a match for him, fact of the matter is. I told you as much. Would have split him up the middle if he'd tried something like this!"

Nest knelt at the windowsill, her face even with his. "So why didn't she, Pick?" she asked. "She always said she had magic, that we both did. Why didn't she use it?"

Pick scrunched up his seamed face, his sharp blue eyes narrowing, his mouth disappearing into his beard. "I don't know. She wouldn't have needed a shotgun if she'd had the magic. She was powerful, Nest - strong-minded and able. She'd studied on her magic; she'd learned how to use it. She might not have been as strong as he was, but he would have come out of a fight with her with a whole lot less skin! And there wasn't a sign of her magic amid the leavings of his!" He rubbed his beard. "Truth is, I haven't seen her use it in a long time - not in a very long time, girl. Not since your mother..."

He trailed off, staring at her as if seeing her in a new light.

"What?" she asked quickly.

"Well, I don't know," he answered vaguely. "I was just wondering."

She let the matter drop, choosing instead to tell him about the note. She took it out of her pocket and unfolded it so that he could see that it was Gran's writing, and then she read it to him. When he heard the words, his face underwent a strange transformation. "Criminy," he whispered.

"What is it?" she demanded. "Stop making me guess what you're thinking, Pick!"

"Well, it's just that..." He shook his head slowly, his lips still moving, but no sound coming out.

"Why would the demon be coming after me?" she pressed, poking at him insistently with her finger.

Then the bedroom door opened, and her grandfather looked' in. Pick disappeared instantly. Nest stood up, smoothing down the front of her T-shirt, composing her face.

"Your friends are at the back door," her grandfather said. "I think you ought to see them."

Reluctantly Nest came out of the bedroom and followed him down the hall. The old grandfather clock marked the cadence of their steps. As they pa.s.sed the living room, she glanced in at the pictures of her mother and Gran resting on the fireplace mantel. Gran's cross-st.i.tch project rested on the arm of the old easy chair, unfinished. Her crosswords sat in a pile on the floor beside the chair. There were small pieces of her everywhere. Dull slants of gray light wedged their way through the drawn curtains and window shades, but the room felt musty and empty of life.

In the kitchen, dozens of containers of food sat unattended on the table and counters like forgotten guests. Her grandfather slowed and looked vaguely at the array of dishes. "I better see to this. You go on outside. It might be more private for you in the backyard."

She went the rest of the way down the hall to the screen door and opened it. Robert, Ca.s.s, and Brianna stood waiting for her. Ca.s.s held a bouquet of daisies, mums, and marigolds.

"Hey," she said by way of greeting.

"Hey," they replied in jumbled unison.

Ca.s.s pa.s.sed her the flowers, dark eyes bright with tears. "Sorry about Gran, Nest. We'll all miss her."

"She was the best," Brianna agreed, wiping at her nose.

Robert shoved his hands into his pockets and looked at his shoes in a way that suggested he had never seen them before.

"Thanks for coming by." Nest sniffed at the flowers automatically. "These are really pretty."

"Well, daisies were always her favorite," Ca.s.s said.

"You remember when she laid into me for cutting down that stand out back?" Robert asked suddenly. He seemed surprised he had said something and gave Nest a quick, hopeful look. "Man, she was upset. But when you told her I was taking them home to my mom, she said right away that it was all right, and she took us inside and gave us milk and cookies. Remember?"

"I remember when she helped me make that Cinderella costume for Halloween when I was six," Brianna said, smiling. "She did most of the work, but she told my mom we did it together."

"I still can't believe she's gone," Ca.s.s said.

They were silent a moment, and then Robert said, "What happened to her anyway, Nest? There's all kinds of stories floating around."

Nest crossed her arms defensively. "She had a heart attack." She tried to think what else she could say. Her gaze shifted away from Robert and back again. "I suppose you heard about the shotgun."

Robert shrugged. "Everybody's talking about that part, and you can guess what some of them are saying. But my dad says people will talk no matter who you are or what you do, so you might as well get used to it."

"People are mean," Brianna said to no one in particular.

No one spoke, eyes shifting uneasily in the silence.

"Thanks for not leaving me last night." Nest tried to change the subject. "You know, for getting Grandpa to come back over and find me."

She told them what had happened to her, only leaving out the part about the demon, then adding at the end that she was all right, no harm had been done, and they should all forget about it.

"What about the man who's poisoning the trees?" Brianna said, her brow knit anxiously.