"Wanna get punched?" Cal grinned.

"Wanna catch me?" Jupiter parried, flapping his arms like wings.

"But there aren't any owners!" Autumn protested.

"Which is what's got the Council worried," Sky said. "If someone doesn't show up with proof of ownership, Ferristaff might be allowed to buy the land himself."

"No one can buy the Garden Coast!" shrilled Sophie.

"We got demons on our butt," growled Nacho. "No way we should be diddlin' around with richards like Ferristaff."

"This must be the bad thing Swami always said was coming," Autumn sighed.

"Anybody hear where Swami's gone to yet?" asked Ander.

"Jake just says the same thing as always." Cal shrugged. "He got sent off on some 'secret mission' for the Council."

"Lucky bastard," said Nacho. "At least he gets to do something."

"Amen!" said Cal. "Me an' Cob are gonna pound 'im for not takin' us along."

"We shouldn't just be sitting here," mumbled Cob, who'd been uncharacteristically quiet ever since the night of the attack. "I'm sick of hiding."

"What else are we gonna do?" said Cal. "You know somethin' 'bout fightin' demons that the Council don't?"

"Even if we can't fight demons," Hawk said, frowning at his tennis shoes, "we should at least be getting rid of idiots like Ferristaff and Foster. Like Nacho said, we shouldn't have to suffer ticks like that with all this going on. Seems to me we could've gotten rid of that trash ages ago, and I think we should have."

The ensuing silence made Hawk look up to find everybody looking back.

"Not a half-bad idea, Hawk," said Cal.

"Yeah." Nacho grinned. "Got any ideas how?"

"Me?" Hawk said ruefully. "I suppose I could come up with a decent story about it. But that's pretty much all I'd be good for, as everybody knows."

"Well, that's one story that would do my heart some good," Tholomey said, grinning. "Make a nice change from all the other ones I'm hearing now."

"Yeah!" said Ander. "Tell us how the land was cleansed forever of Ferristaff and Hamilton, oh great bard!"

"And Greensong." Autumn smiled.

"And don't forget Foster," said Nacho.

Surprised to find himself suddenly the center of attention, Hawk took a moment to prepare himself, as Solomon had taught him, his mind quickly sketching out the form his tale would take. "Very well," he said, imitating Solomon's voice and manner, to the amusement of all, "a tale then." And he launched into a set of stories, each more wildly inventive than the last, about how a band of clever children managed to drive out the four greatest villains in the land in just a single night. By the time his story ended there was rapt silence in the cave, and delighted smiles on every face.

"We gotta do it!" Cob shouted, the light of mischief in his eyes again.

"Why not?" crowed Nacho.

"Because we're not supposed to use our gifts at all right now!" said Sophie, sounding scandalized. "You all know what the Council said. We're supposed to stay out of sight, not put on a circus for the demons!"

"We could put up wards!" said Jupiter. "Just like we're doing everywhere else! And have people on the watch until we're through."

"And when Hamilton or someone goes running through town telling everyone what happened, and the demons figure out who we are?" Sophie insisted.

"Weren't you listening?" Nacho scoffed. "We won' look anything like us! How would anybody know who'd done it? I think it's a great idea! You're a genius, Hawk!"

Hawk felt suddenly alight with pride. Solomon had always told him that bards were not just entertainers, but counselors to the mighty and leaders of men. Now, Hawk began to realize what he meant. He fiercely wished that Rose were here to see this, not off on the Garden Coast collecting seeds against the worst scenario with Ferristaff.

"It sounds very cool," said Ander, "but I'm not sure it's really such a good idea. The Council's been real clear about laying low. At least we ought to tell them what we want to do, and get permission first."

"Wuss!" Cob scoffed. "They'd just say no! They don't think we can do anything."

"Yes they do," Autumn protested. "They just care about our safety too."

"Autumn's right," Hawk said, recalling a conversation he'd had once with Solomon about the captive-hawk poem. "They respect us. But Solomon told me once that no one ever gets permission to grow up. If someone gives you your freedom, it's still theirs, not yours-like some kind of loan. See what I mean? To grow up, we have to take our freedom without permission. It's the only way it can be done."

"Wow!" said Nacho. "That's some pretty heavy dunkin', dude."

"So, what?" said Sophie. "You're saying we should all just defy our parents now, in the middle of a demon invasion?"

"I'm not trying to tell any of you what to do," Hawk said, a little scared himself of what he was proposing. "Like I said, that's got to be your choice, but I'll be graduating in the spring, and even now my mom cares way too much about my safety to ever give me permission to get in harm's way. She'll never really believe I can handle it until she finds out I already have." Hawk felt rather proud of all this sudden insight. "She may not know it consciously, but I think she's secretly waiting for the day I finally steal my freedom."

"Oh man!" Cob crowed. "Hawk, you are the uber-bard!"

Knowing she was overruled, Sophie threw up her hands as almost everyone there jumped on Hawk's bandwagon. Within minutes they had sorted themselves into four groups, one for each of the first four people they meant to drive out of town. Then all the groups fell into animated discussion about how to achieve their various missions.

Not five minutes later, Sky gave a deafening whistle that silenced everyone, and said, "This cave is too small and too noisy. I can't hear myself think in here. We should break up, and each team go find someplace to plan where they can hear each other talk."

"Foster group to my house!" Nacho grinned.

"Ferristaff team can go to my place," Hawk said. "My mom's gone all week."

There was an awkward hesitation while everyone, especially Hawk, avoided acknowledging the reason for her absence. Then Sky, already heading for the cave mouth, said, "Hamilton group to the sacred circle."

"Team Greensong can stay here then," Autumn said, smiling.

With that, Hawk led his team, which happened to be the largest, out of the cave, filled with pride. Rose had been right after all. His barding skills did have their uses.

As two birds, a raven and a blue jay, flew away from the circle of trees that four boys had entered half an hour earlier, Cassey lowered her binoculars in exaltation. She'd just known that continuing to spy on that ring of cypress would pay off eventually! Her binoculars had given her a very good look at the children as they'd entered this time, and to her delight, she'd recognized one of them. A boy named Jupiter. She'd met him at the market, where he worked, and been quite taken by his name. So astrological!

She turned around and half-sprinted back to town, knowing Molly would want to hear about this right away. Cassey felt certain she would call a special meeting tonight, now that they actually had a fairy's name!

He was out inspecting a work site in the woods. Fallen trees lay tumbled on the ground for as far as he could see into the darkness, an impressive harvest, but he wasn't pleased. Why had none of these been hauled away yet? Was he the only one who knew what work meant anymore? Where were all his men? As if in answer, he heard laughter from the edges of the clear-cut. Gleeful children's laughter. Suddenly, the uncut woods surrounding the site seemed too dark . . . too wild. He turned to run back toward his truck, but his legs would hardly move. He pushed them forward as if through sand while the laughter grew louder behind him. He strained to make his legs obey him, and- Ferristaff gasped awake.

The dream dissolved, but quiet laughter hung on the air just long enough to leave him certain there was someone in the house. He sat up and peered into the darkness.

"Who's there?" he called gruffly, but only silence answered him. Perhaps the dream had lingered longer than he thought. He glanced at the luminous clock face beside his bed: 3:30 A.M. Outside, tree trunks groaned, wind rushed sighing through the foliage, branches tapped and scrapped against a wall downstairs. Sounded like a storm was brewing. Ferristaff lay back and stared up at the ceiling. It had only been a dream.

But as he closed his eyes, it came again-a childish giggle from downstairs. He bolted up in bed, and pulled the top drawer of his nightstand open. The gun he kept there was gone. He began to fear. Hamilton's teenage vandals must be real after all. Well, children he could handle, gun or no. However fierce their masks might be, he knew that deep down children were scared of nearly everything. One just had to face them down. He got carefully out of bed and crept to the open doorway of his room where he could peer down the stairwell into the entryway and some of the dining room. All was dark.

"You'd better get out!" he called in an angry, no-nonsense voice. "Now!" He expected to hear scurrying escape, or frightened silence, but was surprised with more laughter. There were more than one of them, then, and too dumb, or stoned more likely, to know trouble when they heard it. "You think I'm funny?" he demanded. "When you took my pistol, you missed the shotgun in my closet. That makes me a lot more dangerous than you are. Now get out of here, or no one will blame me for what happens to intruders in my home!" It was a bluff, of course. He'd left his shotgun in the basement after cleaning it, but how could they know he hadn't two of them?

There was more hushed laughter, and a brief green glow of some sort through the living room door opposite the dining room. He knew where they were now, and that room had no exit but the one he was looking at. They'd hide when they heard him coming down, but he wouldn't go into the living room after them. Through the dining room, he could reach the basement and his shotgun. After that, there'd be no more bluffing. He'd faced much tougher customers in his time than a couple of rural delinquents with a pistol between them, assuming they even knew how to shoot it.

"I gave you a choice," he growled menacingly, "and you chose wrong. Now you're going to pay the price." He started loudly down the stairs, figuring the more noise he made, the more startled they would be. Before he'd gotten halfway down, however, the green glow kindled in the living room again, and grew until it lit the entire stairwell. Unable to imagine what might cast such a glow, Ferristaff had come to a complete halt, when something large flew through the doorway, glowing like a giant firefly! Before he had time to gasp, it wheeled to fly directly at him, talons outstretched, beak gaping wide, a piercing shriek preceding it, a huge, burning owl rushed to rake his face! Ferristaff turned to run, but went sprawling on the steps instead, banging his shins painfully as he lunged at the railing for support. When he looked up there was no owl, but a child standing at the top of the stairs-dressed in glowing bark and leaves-a child with wings, and coal black eyes devoid of pupils!

Ferristaff remained crouched, utterly dumb, staring wide-eyed at the apparition, which was not entirely opaque, he realized. "W-what-" he croaked, but there was another peal of laughter from below him, and he turned to find at least five other creatures like the one above, gazing up at him with glee.

"Is it a toad?" chortled one of them.

"It's not pretty like a toad," said a second. "It's just an ugly lump."

"A stump then?" laughed another.

"It cannot be a stump," smiled a fourth, pointing at Ferristaff's disheveled thatch of iron hair. "It still has leaves."

"It must be a tree then!" exclaimed the second child. "An ugly stunted tree! Trees don't belong in stairwells though. What are we to do with it?"

"Cut it down! Cut it down!" shouted all the childlike ghosts at once, swirling into the air like great, glowing, windblown leaves, slapping lightly at Ferristaff's face and back and hands and hair as they flew past him up the stairs to join their leader.

Ferristaff yowled in wordless fright as they gusted by. "Who-what-who are you?" he babbled hysterically when they had passed.

"We are spirits of the wood," said the creature who had been an owl, no longer grinning. No one smiled anymore. "The ghosts of all the trees you've murdered."

Ferristaff gaped in blank incomprehension, then he murmured, "I'm still dreaming. . . . You're a dream."

"Then wake up!" the spirit child screamed. "WAKE UP!" And they all flew around him once again, pinching, tugging, swatting, laughing cruelly. "Can't you wake up?" cried the leader of them. "Don't you know how to wake up from a nightmare?"

"Stop! Please stop!" cried Ferristaff. "What do you want from me?"

Immediately there was silence, and Ferristaff uncovered his head to find the "children" settled all around him on the steps again, fixing him with melancholy stares.

"Stop killing us," said their leader very quietly.

"Go away from here," said a second creature.

"Take your saws and trucks and cranes away," said a third.

"And all your men," said a fourth.

Ferristaff looked from face to impossible face and thought, This isn't happening. "You," he said, rising to his feet in sudden fury, "you aren't real! I don't believe in . . . in fairies!" shoving one of them aside he ran down the stairs toward his front door. Sometimes in dreams, he thought, getting out meant waking up. But as he reached the polished redwood door, its grain began to twist, the wood to bulge and groan, and all at once a giant wooden mouth yawned wide before him, screaming at a deafening volume, as if its owner were being flayed. Ferristaff crumpled to the floor in terror, covering his ears, and wailing like an infant. "Stop!" he screamed at last. "I'll do anything you want! Just let me go!"

The giant wooden mouth melted into the form of a small wooden boy, who walked out of the door itself to become another glowing spirit like the others. "We will let you go," it said, "if you're gone before tomorrow."

The other spirit children were drifting in the air above him now, settling to the floor around him like huge snowflakes. The leader of them stepped forward and bent down until his face was only inches from Ferristaff's own. "We want you to go," the creature said, its eyes suddenly slitted with malice, its mouth stretched impossibly wide, full of terrible needle teeth. It thrust this terrifying visage farther forward until their noses almost touched. "And don't come back," it growled. "For we are far more dangerous than you." His teeth grew longer before Ferristaff's eyes. His mouth stretched even wider.

"How . . . how can I be out that quickly?" Ferristaff stammered, numb with terror. "I have all these things to pack, my business to-"

"Let someone else do that!" the toothy creature shouted, and Ferristaff felt his bladder go, a wet warmth spreading from his crotch.

"I'll get out," Ferristaff sobbed. "I'll make it up to you. I'll be gone by morning, and I'll have one of my people-"

"Just go," hissed the apparition.

"And so you do not think us just a dream," said the fairy boy who'd stepped out of the door, "we leave you with a gift." He spread his arms, and, from nowhere Ferristaff could see, a flood of stones and bones and broken shells poured from between them to pile up on the floor. Ferristaff stared down at the jumble for a moment, then looked up again to find himself alone. Only their "gift" remained, and he knew with terrible certainty that it would still be there in the morning, though he, himself, would not.

29.

( Cold Servings ) The morning after their crusade, Hawk rose at dawn, drove into town, and stealthily returned to their sea cave lair to find several of his fellow crusaders already waiting. The news was good and getting better as he arrived. Ferristaff was definitely gone. Tholomey reported that his front door had been left wide open, their cryptic calling card still piled on the floor inside.

Looking like the cat who'd swallowed the canary shop, Nacho told them all that Foster's lime-green Mercedes had last been seen at 2:00 A.M.. racing south from town as if the hounds of hell were on its tail, "Which," Nacho said happily, spreading his arms in a sitting curtain call, "they were!" When the cheers subsided, Nacho went on to speculate that, at the speed Foster was driving, he'd now have at least a couple of the tickets that he'd been so excited about giving out to everybody else.

Half an hour later, smiling sweetly, Autumn crouched through the cavern's entrance and informed them that Greensong had experienced a much more "animated" encounter with several of the trees she'd always claimed to care so much about. "We told her that we didn't like having spikes driven in our sides," Autumn said primly. "Then we played a game of hide-and-seek with her. She hid, we seeked. She won. I don't think we'll ever find her now, though it wasn't very fair of her to use a car." Everyone giggled.

All their protective wards had held, and there'd been no sign at all of demons. As further anecdotes were shared, and bragging contests escalated, Hawk sat quietly, basking in the rosy glow of all they had achieved.

His mom had called the night before to say that she and Joby would be coming home today. She hadn't sounded happy, which was unsurprising given what they'd gone there to do. His mother's grief caused Hawk pain, of course, but he hadn't known Ben well enough to take his death as personally as she and Joby did, and besides, now he'd have some news to really cheer them up when they got back. Visions of their pride and amazement danced through his imagination; he saw grateful congratulations from the Council and ticker-tape parades down Main Street. He imagined Solomon giving him a regal nod as their awards were being bestowed, and saying, You are a true bard now, young Hawk. If only Rose had been here, Hawk's happiness would have been utterly complete.

It was half an hour more before they began to wonder where the Hamilton team was. Cob, Cal, Sky, and Jupiter were not known as early risers, and the group was still debating whether someone should go roust their lazy butts from bed when Blue arrived and told them he'd just seen Hamilton in town.

"She was in the coffee bar on Shea Street, asking if anyone knew where Foster went," Blue said anxiously. "She didn't seem upset at all, except she wanted Foster and couldn't find him. I was hoping Sky and those guys would be here."

"Something went wrong then." Nacho frowned. "I'm going to find Cob."

"I'll go back and look for Jup," said Blue.

Just as they turned to go, however, Ander crawled into the cave, and stood up looking pale and shaken. For a moment he just stared at them seeming to shiver, though it wasn't all that cold. Then, as the cave fell silent, Hawk realized that Ander was crying.

"What's wrong?" Hawk asked with dawning dread.

"Sky," Ander croaked. "And Jupiter," he said, crying harder now. "They're dead."

"What?" Nacho yelled.

"God!" Sophie shrieked. "Goddamn it!" she yelled again. "I told them! I told all of you!" She burst into tears, as did Autumn. Everyone else sat gaping, their faces drained of color.

Hawk could not move at first, couldn't even breathe. It was his fault. He'd talked everybody into this. Steal your freedom, he had told them, and now two of them were dead. Three, Hawk amended numbly. His life was over too. "How?" he heard himself ask, as if someone else had spoken.

"They're calling it an accidental fall," Ander said, "from climbing on the cliffs out by the Circle."

"That's bullshit!" Nacho shouted.