"Therefore, we must begin with meticulous observation," Lucifer continued, "followed by patient, careful execution. During this initial phase of our campaign, the candidate must perceive our presence no more than the hare perceives the circling hawk. We must test him, but do nothing major-nothing, you understand-until we have grown to know his fears and insecurities as well as what he doesn't fear; what he loves, and what he hates; his dreams and ambitions-especially his ambitions; his favorite and least favorite colors, foods, smells, sounds. Anything-anything-might tip the balance.

"That's why you're here, Williamson," Lucifer continued. "My attention is required in too many places to be watching the child eat and sleep and piss at all hours. That will be your job. Report everything to me. I want you to dust off every least skill acquired during that illustrious career in advertising, and research this boy like you never researched any market in your lamentably brief life. Got it?"

"Yes, Sir," Williamson replied. "When I'm finished, your biggest problem will be choosing which of the available buttons to push for the desired result, Sir."

"That may be your biggest problem," Lucifer replied. "I will have no problems at all. Is that understood?"

"Perfectly, Sir."

After an uncomfortable silence, the fat one, Lindwald, cleared his throat softly, and asked, "What about me, Sir?"

"I think that you, Lindwald, may finally be ready to enter the fourth grade."

"Quick, Sir Benjamin! Up the castle wall!" Joby raced to scramble up the live oak tree that spread its old arms over a quarter of their backyard. "The dragon can't get us up there. We'll make a new plan!"

"How come it won't get us?" Benjamin asked, racing after Joby. "Can't it fly?"

"It broke its wing!" Joby shouted without slowing.

"How'd it break its wing?" Benjamin pressed, waiting impatiently for Joby to climb above the first branch so he could follow.

"It tripped on my underwear!" Joby answered in exasperation. "Don't ask questions, Sir Benjamin! Just climb! You wanna get us both eaten?"

From inside the house, Miriam watched the elaborate play of little muscles across the small bare backs of her son and his new friend as they scrambled up into the tree's higher branches and fell into earnest conversation. She was still astonished at how quickly they had fallen head over heels into friendship. An after-school fight over some trivial violation of boyish honor had brought them together. Benjamin had bloodied Joby's nose, Joby had blackened Benjamin's eye. Two days later, Joby had knighted Benjamin on King Arthur's behalf, and they'd been inseparable ever since. Boys, she thought with a smile. Go figure.

Besides the boundless energy native to most children, they shared a natural athleticism, vivid imaginations, and a predilection to laugh at anything with the least potential for humorous interpretation. But, while Joby was a born leader, Benjamin was content to follow, constantly asking questions for which Joby happily invented answers. While Joby talked, laughed, and decreed incessantly, Benjamin tended toward thoughtful silences. Even their appearance was day and night. Deeply tanned, with large brown eyes and nearly white-blond hair, Benjamin seemed a golden noon beside the lunar radiance of Joby's pale skin, blue eyes, and midnight locks. Miriam always enjoyed seeing them together. They seemed two halves of some marvelous whole.

"Hey you," Frank said softly, coming up to give her a squeeze.

"Have a good nap?" she smiled, still watching the boys.

"Best nap I ever had-since the last one." His eyes followed hers. "Those two spend half their lives up there. Think we should build 'em a tree fort?"

"Let's not encourage them," she said. "Half the time, they don't even hold on to anything."

"Boys are climbers," Frank smiled, "and not half as fragile as us old folks. We don't want to make a wimp out of him." He squeezed her again. "Worst thing could happen to a boy. Lot worse than fallin' out of a tree."

"I'm sure you're right, dear," Miriam said, turning with a flirtatious smile to slide her arms around his waist. "Maybe we should find him a sister, so I'd have another wimpy girl to keep me company."

"Mmmm," he purred, leaning in to kiss her. "Wanna twist my arm?"

Going through Williamson's first report, Lucifer had to admit that a few of his observations might be useful, though he had no intention of saying so. One shred of acknowledgment was all it took to render such creatures utterly unmanageable.

He went to the transmission obelisk beside his office door, placed a hand on its glassy surface, closed his eyes, and focused on a name. Kallaystra . . . Kallays- "Bright One?"

Lucifer opened his eyes to find Kallaystra standing serenely at his side, looking, as always, like the wholesome ingenue she wasn't. Along with its fiery fantasies of Hell, the mortal world seemed to forget that demons were nothing more or less than angels swept to earth with Lucifer after their failed campaign against the Creator. Driven by rage or despair at their devalued state, some had fallen into madness, making themselves animal and ugly, or wandered off to become solitary rogues. But many, like Kallaystra, had remained as lovely as ever-on the surface at least. Kallaystra was one of very few, however, who still came readily when Lucifer called, one of even fewer he still dared rely upon. That, and the fact that she was an immortal being like himself, not some damned flake of once-human dryer lint like Williamson or Lindwald, earned her a very different degree of courtesy.

"Thank you for coming so swiftly, Kallaystra. I hope my summons didn't interrupt anything of import."

"Only boredom, Bright One. They are dull to watch."

"The boredom you endure magnifies my gratitude. What do you make of them?"

"The boy is certainly bright, but hardly so remarkable as many of his predecessors. The parents seem utterly mundane. Had bitter experience not taught us otherwise, I'd think all this caution wildly excessive."

"As it would be," Lucifer conceded, "had our Oppressor less power to complicate even the simplest endeavors. Someday I will catch Him meddling, and make Him pay." The idea made him smile. "This would be the very wager to force by default!"

"Would it?" Kallaystra asked. "You still haven't told me what the stakes are this time." She gazed at him inquisitively.

Caught off guard, Lucifer hesitated. He could hardly tell her that if he won she and all of Hell's other inmates would be eliminated with the rest of Creation.

"I . . . don't want this widely known, Kallaystra, for I'm testing loyalties; but as your faith is well proven, I'll trust you with a secret, just between the two of us. Agreed?"

"Of course, Bright One," she replied, eyes agleam with the delight conspiracy always brought her.

"You'll remember that little war some time ago, in Heaven. . . . The one we lost."

"What of it?" she said flatly. It was considered poor manners to mention it.

"Perhaps you'll forgive me for bringing it up when I tell you that, should I win this wager, the outcome of that contest will be reversed."

"What?" she gasped. "He agreed to this?"

"He did." Lucifer grinned. "He seems to have grown cocky in His old age."

"I can't believe He consented! What can He be thinking?"

"That is precisely what we must discover," Lucifer cautioned. "He's surely got an ace hidden somewhere. We need to find it before committing ourselves to anything of consequence."

"How can I be of service?" she asked, her enthusiasm clearly trebled.

"First, my trusted accomplice, by remembering that no one else must know what I have told you," Lucifer insisted. "When I am elevated to my rightful place in Heaven, proven loyalties will be rewarded; and proven disloyalty as well. Let the others reveal themselves without knowing what is at stake. Understand?"

"Rest assured, Bright One, your confidence in me is not misplaced."

"Had I doubted you in the least, Kallaystra, I would have said nothing at all."

"I am yours to command." She fairly bubbled.

"Good. I thought we might start by cultivating a small conundrum for Joby to navigate-just to see what boils up at higher temperatures." He went to his desk, glanced at Williamson's report, then smiled at Kallaystra. "Reconnaissance suggests that the boy's mother possesses a latent tendency toward anxiety, and the father attaches rather a lot of importance to his little boy's budding masculinity. I thought we might employ your extraordinary skill with dreams to whip these small flaws into a proper froth."

"Sounds fun." Kallaystra grinned. "What do you have in mind?"

"Briefly, I want his mother driven to strangle the boy in apron strings, while his father worries that Joby isn't 'man enough.' No matter what the child does, someone disapproves. Think you can manage it?"

"With ease, Bright One. Is that all?"

"Well, if you're left with time on your hands, you might help me locate a fifth-grade teacher more resonant with our point of view than the one they've got at that school of his. Someone with a love of conformity and a severe allergy to imagination."

"That will not be difficult, Bright One."

"I won't keep you then. Go with my profound appreciation."

"To the triumph so long denied us." She smiled, then vanished.

"Well . . . to my triumph, at any rate," Lucifer murmured.

He was sure, of course, that she'd leak their little "secret" all over the cosmos. All Hell would soon be scrambling to assist him as he could never have coerced them to do directly.

"Had I doubted you in the slightest, my dear," he said, chuckling softly.

"Ha! Yer out, Benjamin!"

"I am not! It didn't come near me!"

"Liar!" snarled the big, sweaty boy who'd thrown the large, red dodgeball. "I hit you clean enough to eat on, didn't I, Stives! Now you get out!" he hollered without waiting for Stives to answer. "It's my turn t'go in!"

"You didn't hit him," Joby said. "We all saw."

"You would lie for yer liar friend," Lindwald sneered. "Why should I believe you, you skinny prick!" Balling his meaty hands into fists, he looked menacingly around the dodgeball circle and asked, "Anybody else think I didn't see what I saw?"

No one answered. Lindwald had come to their school only a week and a half ago, and already everyone was scared stiff of him-even Tommy Stives, who had been the school's uncontested bully until Jamie Lindwald's family had moved here and enrolled their hulking, vicious, foul-mouthed, lying, smelly, sweaty kid in the fourth grade.

"Seeeee?" Lindwald jeered. "Nobody says I didn't hit yer wussy little friend but his wussy little friend. So both you wussies are lyin'. Get out, Benjamin."

"Lindwald," Benjamin persisted, "just 'cause nobody but Joby's got guts enough to say so, doesn't mean-"

"He's not worth it, Benjamin," Joby sighed. "He'll just use up the whole recess fighting about it. Let him go."

"But-"

"Benjamin!" Joby growled as meaningfully as he could. "Let him go in!"

"Yeah, Benjy!" Lindwald taunted. "Listen to yer chicken little boyfriend! Least he's got the sense t'be scared."

Benjamin was staring at Joby in confusion, but Joby gave him a tiny nod, hoping Lindwald wouldn't see, and pointedly squeezed the oversize red rubber dodgeball, which he'd been holding since Lindwald had missed Benjamin with it. Seeming to get it at last, Benjamin shrugged back into the dodgeball ring as Lindwald sauntered smugly to its center for his turn at being "it."

"You think yer gonna tag me," he grinned at Joby, "but ya better not throw too hard." He smiled nastily. "Wouldn' wanna hurt a innocent bystander, would ya."

Lindwald began to dance back and forth opposite Joby, hands slightly out from his sides. He was a lot lighter on his feet than his lardy appearance suggested, but Joby had no intention of trying to hit him-yet. He only raised the ball above his head, and threw it up and over to Benjamin, calling, "Just throw it back!"

Ever faithful, Benjamin did as Joby asked.

In possession of the ball again, Joby looked cheerfully through Lindwald at his friend, and said, "Since he just lies, and everybody lets him, what's the point in playing, right? Why don't you and me just keep the ball 'til recess ends, eh, Benjamin?"

Benjamin shrugged, deferring to Joby as always.

Joby tossed the ball up over Lindwald's head again, and Benjamin arced it easily back.

"What a pair a tutu girls!" Lindwald barked, ceasing his agile dodge dance and stepping toward Joby. "You can't just take our ball, and play with each other!"

Joby lobbed the ball back to Benjamin. Lindwald turned to rush him for it, but Benjamin threw it up and over to Joby who caught it just as Lindwald turned to charge back at him. That's when Joby swung his arms back and hurled the ball with all his pent-up fury straight at Lindwald-who dodged with unbelievable swiftness, so that Joby's killing shot passed him completely, and hit Laura Bayer right in the face. Her glasses flew away as she fell to the ground to lie stunned until the blood began to trickle from her nose. Then she clutched her face and began to cry, louder and louder.

"Nice work, butthead!" Lindwald jeered at Joby.

Pale and trembling, Joby stood immobilized between white-hot rage at Lindwald and horrified guilt over what he'd done to poor Laura Bayer. His guilt won out, and he rushed to stand helplessly over the wailing little girl, and blurt out apologies.

"Laura! I'm sorry! It was a accident! Are you okay? Stop crying! Please stop crying! I didn't mean to hurt you!"

"Didn' I tell ya not to hurt the innocent, Joby?" Lindwald laughed. Actually laughed-while Laura Bayer lay there screaming and bleeding on the ground!

Like an angry cat, Joby whirled and leapt at Lindwald, sending a fist into his face hard and fast, but what happened was so incomprehensible that Joby simply froze, mouth agape in shock. As his punch had landed on Lindwald's nose, Joby had felt it in his own face: the terrible ringing impact, the crunch of dislocated cartilage, the warm gush of blood in Lindwald's sinuses. Yet, reaching up to touch his own nose, Joby found it undamaged.

Lindwald's nose was already swelling as the blood appeared on his upper lip; but he just grinned hideously, and asked so softly that perhaps only Joby heard, "What's a matter, lady-killer? Hurt yerself on my nose?"

Almost involuntarily, Joby's arm swung back to launch another punch, but this time he could feel the terrible violence of it against Lindwald's already broken nose even before the punch had landed, and his swing veered wide almost of its own volition, missing Lindwald entirely.

Only then did Lindwald strike back, knocking Joby onto his back next to Laura Bayer and jumping down to slam him in the face, so that Joby's nose ran red as well now.

"Give up, dickhead?" Lindwald demanded from astride Joby's stomach.

"No!" Joby hollered.

Lindwald hit him in the face again. "Give up?"

"No," Joby said again, vaguely aware that his own pain seemed oddly dim and distant compared to the still resonant memory of Lindwald's.

Lindwald was pulling his fist back for another punch when someone yanked him away so fast that the huge boy seemed lifted by a sudden wind. Then Joby saw Benjamin on top of Lindwald, thrashing him with both fists, his arms swinging like the little wooden windmill duck in the garden next to Joby's house.

There was hardly time to feel grateful, though, before his teacher, Mrs. Nelson, and the sixth-grade teacher showed up and waded in to separate the boys. They were joined a moment later by the fifth-grade teacher, who brought wads of wet paper towel and said the principal was on his way. Everyone was picked up, dusted off, wiped clean, and dressed down by the time he arrived.

"I will see you, and you, and you in my office right now!" Mr. Leonard fired, pointing at Benjamin, Joby, and Jamie Lindwald.

As the three boys shuffled after him toward their doom, someone ran up behind Joby and touched his hand. He looked back to find Laura Bayer peering at him contritely through her somehow unbroken blue plastic-framed glasses.

"I'm sorry, Joby," she whispered. "I know you didn't mean to hit me."

She turned before he could reply and ran back to where the others stood, watching them go as crowds have always watched condemned criminals being marched to the gallows. As they walked, Joby hung his head and imagined kneeling before King Arthur to explain what had happened, but it was Merlin's voice he imagined. You must be perfect, Sir Joby, the wizard admonished, or the devil will win, and Arthur will lose, and Camelot . . . Camelot will burn.

Joby wondered miserably if he would get a second chance to be perfect. Arthur, help me! he thought, then remembered that Arthur couldn't help him anymore. It was in the rules. Arthur had said so.

"Joby Peterson, stop straggling!" Mr. Leonard scolded over his shoulder. "If you're man enough to punch people, you should be man enough to face the consequences. Now hurry up."

"Yeah, Joby," Lindwald whispered without turning around. Joby didn't need to see his face to hear the wicked grin in his voice. "If yer man enough."

Joby waited for Mr. Leonard to yell at Lindwald for talking, but the principal just walked before them as if he hadn't heard.

Trying to avoid her son, the school bus fishtailed, tires screaming on the asphalt, then slid full around, swatting Joby's bike like a bug onto the pavement. Rigid with terror, Miriam watched, unable even to cry out as the huge yellow juggernaut screeched sidelong over her son's doubled-over body, crumpling it savagely into the twisted blue wreckage of his bike. Only as the huge machine swiped two parked cars and shuddered to a halt did Miriam find her voice, and fill the sudden silence with her scream.