 
Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author's imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

This book was originally published in the United States of America in 2013 by Aero Studios.

Nikolas & Company: When Boats Breathe And Cities Speak. Copyright © 2014 by Kevin McGill. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced. Any other form of reproduction may not be performed whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information, please email _theaerostudios@gmail.com_.

2nd U.S. Edition

Designed and illustrated by C. Carlyle McCullough and Aero Studios.

ISBN 9780983415688

Contents

Dedication

Previously on Nikolas and Company

Chapter One: Mullen

Chapter Two: Merrows Among Us

Chapter Three: The Misery of Mr. Waters

Chapter Four: Face-to-Face

Chapter Five: Tom Turvey

Chapter Six: Hall of Pickings

Chapter Seven: Huron City Council

Chapter Eight: Tongue-of-Galley-Trot

Chapter Nine: A Father, A Good Father

Chapter Ten: Manor Minor Mayhem

Chapter Eleven: Faith

Chapter Twelve: Captain Bluecheeks

Chapter Thirteen: Huron Schoolhouse

Chapter Fourteen: Invitation to Trouble

Chapter Fifteen: Over Fern

Chapter Sixteen: The Deep Council

DEDICATION

In the near future, fourteen-year-old Nick wants to go home, to the moon. So when a mysterious voice calls him steward and beckons him to a magical moon set in the past, Nick's dreams seem to come true. All he has to do is follow his grandfather back to Huron, report to the city council what the voice told him, and take his place as steward.

Easy.

Unwilling to leave his friends on Earth to die in the refugee camps, Nick brings them along, including Xanthus Kobayashi (dragon nerd), Daniel Kobayashi (evil genius), Haley Wendell (hates boys), Caroline Wendell (good cook), and Brandy Wendell (loves boys and shoes).

Oh, and Nick's fraternal twin, Tim, came too, not that he really had any say in the matter.

En route to Huron, Nick discovers the mysterious voice believes that the Merrows (merfolk) bring an evil to the city and must be stopped. There is only one problem: the Merrows are one of the most respected and revered creatures between the brother worlds.

Nick's new life may not be so easy after all.

Senior stagecoach driver, Yeri Willrow, leads a group of mysterious passengers through one of the most fog-ridden nights of his prestigious career. What he thought would be a simple drive-and-drop quickly becomes an attack by foul-breathing, red-eyed creatures. Yeri learns that his mysterious passengers, Lir and Nia, are a family of automaton-legged merfolk and that he is their only hope against these creatures most foul. Having been made to take an oath with a pearl-of-devotion, Yeri is sent on a quest to call for aid from the city of Huron. What he doesn't know is that Nick is on a mission to stop the Merrows.

.

CHAPTER ONE

The World of Möon. A merway off the coast of the Eynclaene province.

  eri was cold. Damp. Wet. Fish enjoy being cold. Damp. Wet. It is likely that Merrows also enjoy being cold. Damp. Wet. Unfortunately, Lir the merman didn't understand that humlings absolutely do _not_ like being cold. Damp. Wet. If he had, he wouldn't have sent Yeri hundreds of miles through this watery merway. A merway, mind you, that had become too shallow after six days, forcing him to abandon the boat and trudge through silty water for the remainder of the trip.

Sleeping in it was a nightmare.

Yeri raised the lantern, its sour yellow light flickering off the limestone walls. The kerosene wick had all but charred into a clump, threatening him with a lightless journey. He winced into the darkness for what seemed like the one thousandth time, and for the one thousandth time, he could only see more darkness. Actually, that wasn't entirely true. Mum's warm hearth would appear from time to time like some evil mirage. Even now, he could smell her lemon beer and cold salami. Why was he even here in this loathsome merway? He could be home, safely fulfilling his stagecoach driver duties. Frankly, he considered all this to be a bit unfair. A simple drive-and-drop had turned into an encounter with Lir, the merman who used automaton legs to walk on land, not to mention a foggy chase by several one-hundred-eyed, foul-smelling creatures all the way to the Merrows' fortress. Oh, and what those monsters did to Lir's brother and sister-in-law and to all those mermen sailors! Looked as if their insides had been sucked out, leaving only a shell behind. Maybe he could turn around and go home? Start his own stagecoach business, marry Agatha, and—

Yeri remembered why he had agreed to this quest. He squeezed the tuft of fat pushing over his belt. It had been in retreat over the last few weeks, but was he gaining his hero's physique? Would Agatha approve? She would not marry him because of the generous fat around his midsection. Heroes do not have bulbous midsections; it is a fact.

"I will press on, Agatha. I will deliver this message to Steward Nikolas Lyons. All for you."

The merway ended abruptly. Yeri reached out and touched the cold stone. He pressed the stone wall to his left, his right, and above.

"Wait a garpup minute," Yeri mumbled to himself. The ceiling didn't feel like stone. It felt like wood, actual _wood_. Yeri's heart skipped as he felt the outer edges. It was a wooden hatch. This had to be the home of ironsmith Mullen. He was overcome with anticipation. She would have supper and a hearth and a real bed for him. Not only that, she could send him on his way to Huron with horse and food.

Yeri knocked. He knocked again. Then he remembered the secret code. "Squall?" He listened for a response. He heard someone unsheathe an iron sword.

The hatch flung open.

Yeri gasped, "Please, ma'am. Those were Lir's instructions to me. The Merrows seek the aid of Huron. For pity's sake, I beg of you. We must save the Merro—!"

CHAPTER TWO

  errows, Huron. Not Rones, Merrows," Nick said to the sky. " _Merrows_ lie about their true intent."

"Who are you speaking to?" Caroline said, closing her purse. She handed antacid pills to a very anxious Daniel.

"Oh," Nick said. "Just talking to myself."

"Hmm," Caroline said. "Your grandfather does that."

Nick frowned. "Yeah . . . yeah. I guess so."

At the moment, they were being lifted by the willy-kirk plant along the cliff face. To their left was the large winged ship suspended on the side of the cliff. Grand had called it an aero, which was supposed to take them from Earth to Möon by way of the tether, and eventually the city of Huron—home.

"The mermen are bad, Nick?" Brandy said, leaning over the willy-kirk. Two Merrows were being carried by the second willy-kirk below them. "Are you sure? They look so cool. . . . They're a little chubby though. Actually, they're really fat. Ew. Fat mermen."

"Yeah." Nick watched the Merrows adjust themselves. One was straightening his powdered wig while the other rubbed two pudgy fingers together. "I always imagined Rones as an evil sorcerer type of people. Not—you know, chubby mermen. A little hard to buy."

Tim shrugged. "Then again, can you believe we're riding a plant to a flying ship?"

"Or that we have traveled thousands of years into the past?" Daniel said, scrubbing his bald cranium. "Or that a city speaks inside Nick's head? Or that we are about to take a flying ship across a massive tether to some fantastic planet that was the moon? Or is the moon? Or will be the moon."

"He's gone into shock," Xanthus said. "Thought he could be all Mr. Scientific about this. It's caught up with hi—uh, yeah." His jaw dropped. "The aero boat thingy? It's breathing."

Daniel spun around and nearly leapt out of the willy-kirk. Sure enough, the ship's hull swelled and collapsed, releasing a deep rumble of air.

"It breathes," Daniel shook his head in disbelief. "How can boats breathe and cities speak?"

Nick reached out to the wooden planks. "It's kind of bony."

"Exoskeleton, more likely." Daniel swallowed. "A very large crustacean, or a winged theropod in the shape of a boat, perhaps."

"Nice." Nick let his hands glide over the aero's shell. Along the side were a series of holes that may have been cannon ports, just like in those old pirate movies, except these ports pulsed open and closed. Nick put both hands on the creature, and enormous membrane wings fluttered in response.

"This doesn't make sense," Daniel said, reaching out to touch a large knot on the ship's side.

The knot blinked.

Daniel jumped again. A pupil collapsed inside an iris, tracking the worried boy as the willy-kirk raised him.

"This doesn't make sense. . . ."

Xanthus pointed between the ship and cliffside, claiming that he knew how the aero hung sideways. Nick could make out two massive claws anchored into the rock face like some mythic bat.

After a few other conjectures about the aero's anatomy between Xanthus and Nick, the willy-kirk stopped and folded its cup sideways to a plankway.

"Grimmelwald!" Grand stepped out.

Between the willy-kirk and the ship stood a man with walnut skin, greasy flops of hair, and a three-pointed hat.

"Thought it was the dungeons for ya?" Grand said.

"Lyons!" Grimmelwald laughed, showing a checkered row of teeth. "A little tornado chasing couldn't keep me from my Mottle Craw." He smacked the aero, and her sails fluttered in acknowledgment. "No one can captain her like ol' Grimmelwald. She threw a fit and began dumping passengers off until they ordered my release. Now, let's get you on. Them Merrows were right behind you, and you can't have Merrows waiting."

Grimmelwald stepped off the plankway to the aero's deck. The kids gasped, expecting him to tumble off the ship and over the cliff face. In fact, he, standing sideways, had both feet comfortably placed on the deck.

"Mind your step now." Grimmelwald held out a row of dirt-rimmed fingernails. "She won't let you fall. An aero treats her passengers like they were her own flesh and blood. Just touch your feet to the deck, and she'll put ya right. Very good, very good."

Nick didn't think twice. He walked quickly across the plankway and stepped to the aero deck.

His world went sideways.

"Sweet." Nick shook his head, grinning.

With unsteady hands, Haley stepped across the threshold and also flipped sideways. Grimmelwald looked at her blue skin suspiciously.

"She's got jynn'us, Captain," Grand called out.

"Do you? Bless my gums. You'll never be the same." Grimmelwald smiled.

Haley looked up to the admiring ship captain.

And threw up.

Wet, chalky balls fell over the cliffside.

"Aye now." Grimmelwald nodded. "Got ourselves a puker. Better than the biters, I reckon."

Caroline followed and reached for Haley. "Ooh," Haley cried at her touch. The blue sheen had now traveled to her neck and hands. Caroline informed Grand that she was going to take Haley below deck to rest.

Everyone scurried across, leaving Daniel last. He stepped cautiously across the plankway, leaning heavily on his cane. He looked at the sideways passengers and then reached out with his right foot. At the last moment, he stepped back.

"There's an artificial gravity field generator onboard, correct?" Daniel asked.

"A gravi-ta-what?" Grimmelwald tilted his head. "That a soup?"

"No, no. You'd know it if you saw it. I'm not exactly sure which machine you're employing, but one would need a superconducting disc spinning around two different axes at the same time." Daniel's finger scribbled the air.

"Hmm . . ." Grimmelwald scratched a stubbly mole. "Pretty sure it's a soup. White bean, by the sound of it. Maybe cod. Bumgardners could tell ya. Fine soup makers."

"No. It's—ah, forget it." Daniel waved him away.

Grimmelwald shook his head. "Wild imagination that one, Mr. Lyons. They'll love him in Huron. It's the crazies that make the best citizens, I hear. Now, give me your hand, boy."

Daniel looked at the cliff, at the ship anchored into the cliff, and all the way down to the bottom. According to what he understood about the universe, ships shouldn't breathe, and they definitely shouldn't hang off cliff faces by large talons. Beyond all that, why would anyone voluntarily step onto a ship when it's suspended sideways eight hundred feet into the air, even if it could magically keep him on the deck?

"Mmmm," Daniel moaned as he slowly lifted his leg off the plankway. That was a sight Nick had never seen before: Daniel scared.

"You'll have to forget that cane of yours and lean in," Grimmelwald said, holding out his weedy hand. "Come on, boy. Lean in. Mottle Craw's gotta feel your touch before she'll let you onboard."

"What's the big deal?" Nick asked under his breath. "Is he afraid of heights?"

"No," Xanthus said, "just mythological flying boats."

Nick shook his head. "Come on, bro. Not a big deal."

"Don't be a jerk, Nick," Brandy chided. "It's hard for him."

"Don't think about it." Nick raised his hands. "Close your eyes and step out."

Daniel nodded to Nick, closed his eyes, stiffened his right leg, and tilted. But at the very last moment, he changed his mind and tried to step back on the plankway.

Daniel's screams followed him down the cliffside.

"Daniel!" Nick reached out.

Torso and legs and cane tumbled down. Suddenly, a pinkish tentacle whipped from the Mottle Craw's underbelly and pulled him under.

"Grimmelwald!" Grand yelled.

"Don't you eat him!" Grimmelwald dropped to his knees, banging the deck. "Don't you eat the gimp, you winged moll-sack! He's not food! He's a paying passenger!"

"AUUGHH!!" Daniel screamed from somewhere under the living ship.

Nick's blood turned ice cold. He could only listen to Daniel shriek while a carnivorous flying ship ate him alive.

"Mottle Craw!" Grimmelwald bellowed. "You old swagger! Bring him back this instant!"

Daniel's screams turned to whimpers as two tentacles hoisted him and his cane back to the deck. He was completely covered in pea-colored saliva.

"Here you go." Grimmelwald reached out to Daniel's shaking limbs. "That's a good lad. She didn't mean anything by it. Mottle Craw doesn't know crew from snack until your foot touches her deck. It's all right now."

"Mr. Grimmelwald, sir." Xanthus pointed to the tentacles snaking the air. "Can I go next?"

"Dude." Nick shouldered his way in and grabbed Daniel. "Seriously. I'm sorry, man. I didn't mean it. Are you all right?"

"It—it—" Daniel gripped his cane, wiping a glop of aero spit from his forehead.

"Yes?" Nick said.

"It licked me." Daniel shuddered.

Nick dropped his head in relief.

"It licked me. It licked me. It licked me. I've never seen a tongue so big. It was so . . . licky. Where's my cane? Where's my cane? Where's my cane?"

"It's in your hand, poor Daniel," Brandy said.

"I'm really sorry," Nick said.

"Stop laughing at your brother." Brandy punched Xanthus's arm, who was guffawing and slamming his foot.

"Sorry." Xanthus choked on his laugh. "It was so licky! I can't help myself. Licky! Ha! Ha! Ha!"

Without warning, Xanthus's guffaws became muddy and distant. Nick stared as the scene before him rippled away. Was he about to black out?

_The Merrows lie about their true intent! They enter into the city of Huron at the peril of us all,_ Huron cried.

Nick spun around just as a Merrow announced himself.

"Sir!" A merman bellowed from the willy-kirk. The two portly mermen had finally made it to the plankway. Both sat in something similar to a brass wheelchair fitted with towering wheels, bringing them eye level.

"Merrows," Nick said. He felt as if one hundred ticks were crawling over the tips of his ears, agitating him. He reached for his grandfather. "We can't let them on, Grand."

"Captain? Do you have little use for paying passengers?" said the plumper Merrow. His hair was whipped to a point, and he wore a vest exploding with scarves and buttons.

"Um, Mr. Waters—I—I—" Grimmelwald stuttered.

"Prime Minister Shale and I are quite displeased with our last trip aboard your Mottle Craw. You, Captain, are intolerable!"

The ticks marched down Nick's shoulders, between fingers, under nails. He wanted to scream.

"Forgive me?" Grimmelwald said.

"Then already late for a very lucrative banking deal, I had not the time to give you a piece of my mind. Now I do," Mr. Waters scowled. "We paid for an Earthbound flight upon the Mottle Craw, a supposed top-rate aero service according to your advertisements. Wouldn't you know we were treated like cargo? Your incompetence will be reported at our first opportunity. Even now, I've half a mind to transfer my ticket to the Blue Stramash."

"Please, sir," Grimmelwald said. "The tornado came from nowhere! Honest, sir! Do not send me to the dungeons."

"What are you mumbling about, you can of moldy snails? I am speaking about the food. Never has there been such an utter misuse of nesse tail. Tasted like boiled rubbish! And those scraps of witch hair you called blankets had nose fleas. Nose fleas!"

Nick breathed quickly. He knew bugs weren't on him, but his back swam with them—every one of them humming Huron's words: _The Merrows lie about their true intent. They enter into the city of Huron at the peril of us all._

"Is there something you desire?" Grimmelwald asked. "I've got a nice necklace from my deceased aunt. It's been checked over for dead magic. Honest it has, Mr. Waters."

The merman kept his eyes on Grimmelwald. "You think I can be bought off, you gumnut? Because I am a Merrow, that you can easily persuade me with trinkets and jewelry?"

"Please, sir . . ." Grimmelwald croaked in defeat.

Mr. Waters kept his eyes set on Grimmelwald. "Very well, then. Have you any crème? Our scales are a bit dry and could use attending."

"Oh, right! Boris's Crème. Got just the stuff. Use it for me eye bags. This brand comes with morphiseleus. Four hundred years of piloting turns your cheeks to sandbags, you know."

"Quit fussing and get the crème, you gout!"

Either Nick was going to yell at the smug Merrow or tear his own skin off.

Grimmelwald crab-legged around Nick toward his cabin. "Of course, sir. Yes, sir. It's right over here, in me personal belongings. Excuse me! Matter of strict importance. Pardon me. Pardon!"

"Sad creature, Prime Minister," Mr. Waters said smugly. "If he'd only known that we just wanted a little of that crème. But I like to have fun with these Dujinnin. Like old times, really. You can take the Dujinnin out of the slave ship, but you can't take the slave ship out of the Dujinnin."

Prime Minister Shale nodded.

"Right here. Boris's Crème. There you go."

"Quit your blathering," said Mr. Waters. He snatched the entire bottle of Boris's Crème and shoved it in his purse. "Now, how much do you intend to rob from me this time?"

"One way is three lizlin."

"I expect you take sulmare," said Mr. Waters.

"Yes," Grimmelwald said. "That I do."

"You'd sell my grandmother at the first opportunity," Mr. Waters said while raising his right hand. He began rubbing his thumb and fingers together, showing the universal sign for money. The merman's fingertips shimmered, and three translucent coins dropped into Grimmelwald's cupped hands.

"They can make their own money?" Xanthus said. "You'd be the richest person in the world."

"So they are," Grand said.

"Now let me help you on," Grimmelwald said, slipping the sulmare into his vest. "For years, I've told Huron Aeroways that these plankways are negligible at best. Can't manage a velle on them to save me life."

The moment Grimmelwald placed a hand on Prime Minister Shale's velle, the words boiled out of Nick, "Stay off this ship!"

Everyone snapped to attention. A dozen eyes locked onto Nick.

"You're not allowed in Huron! Stay off this ship," Nick yelled again. He felt possessed, not by some dark force, but by adrenaline.

"Nikolas." Grand's hand rested on his shoulder.

"What is the meaning of this?" Mr. Waters asked.

"Nikolas." Grand leaned in. "Now is not the time."

"I can't help it. Huron is making me angry."

"You'll need to learn how to control the voice, lad."

"Is this Merrow discrimination, Captain?" Mr. Waters craned his flabby neck to Grimmelwald. "Do you allow Merrow prejudice on your ship?"

Nick raised a finger to the Merrows.

"No. No." Grimmelwald spun around the velle. "He's a Lyons boy. His grandfather is Mr. Nikolas Lyons the 11th. He's being taken to Huron and instated as the new stew—"

"You lie about your true intent," Nick yelled above Grimmelwald. "You enter the city of Huron at the peril of us all."

Grand grabbed Nick's shoulder and turned him around. "Look ahead, lad."

"Best muzzle that boy of yours," Mr. Waters shouted after them. "If my memory of the Lyons' accounts serves me well, you have profited quite nicely by way of the Merrows."

Grand's boots ground the deck, and he took two large steps toward Mr. Waters. "Let it be heard here and now, Merrow. The city of Huron has spoken to Nikolas, and she says your kind is not to be trusted. Nikolas and I have been charged to find out why."

Mr. Waters's eyes fell on Nick. "I think Sheriff Silas will have something to say about that and the future stewardship of Huron, if there be any."

"Silas Gorringe? As the sheriff? Impossible," Grand said. "The city has no such role."

"You've abandoned your post, bringing the stewardship to its knees. Huron has a new administration."

"Make no mistake! The stewardship will remain as long as she speaks." Grand raised his chest. "And if you oppose Huron, I will personally snatch that tail fin of yours, drag you to Constance Cove, and throw you back in myself!"

Grandfather and grandson resumed their walk. Nick expected some kind of smug response from the merman but heard only the wind beating against the cliffside.

Finally Grimmelwald sniffed. "Merry reunions, merry reunions. Boy Pinkerton, see to it that our Merrow guests are given the best treatment."

A fully grown, redheaded man, wearing boy knickers and a red-striped shirt so small that it exposed his midriff, stood to his feet and answered, "Aye, aye."

Then Grimmelwald bellowed, "The rest of ya, prepare for the plummet!"

CHAPTER THREE

  rimmelwald turned toward the topmast. "Helmsman Billy? Mr. Billy?" A mongoose corkscrewed down the bone mast. The animal wore large boots, a white shirt, and goggles. He held himself upside down, his furry chin pointing to the captain. "The plankway is drawn. Hoist the mainsail, if you please. Quartersman Whipple, see to your men. Ms. Minkum, cast the line!" With that, Grimmelwald headed for the front of the ship.

Mr. Billy looked back to see if Grimmelwald was paying attention and then sniffed at the kids. "By the by, do you have a bit of mealworm or maybe some cobra jerky? Grimmelwald starves us creachlings near to nothing."

"Did that squirrel just employ human speech?" Daniel said.

"Mr. Billy," Grimmelwald called. "Waiting for roasted mealworms served on a lizlin platter? Have a little self-respect. The mainsail, now!"

"Aye, aye, Captain." Mr. Billy nodded, showing his teeth to Daniel. "Call me a nut-headed squirrel again, boy, and it'll be your eyes."

With that, the mongoose spiraled back up the bone pole. He undid several knots and released the mainsail. Mottle Craw stretched her sails, the membranous skin casting a mustard hue across the deck. Grimmelwald barked orders over the side. Ropes and tentacles leapt through the air. Two man-sized wolverines grabbed the ropes and threaded them through the mainsail's ringlets.

"That's a gargantuate," Xanthus muttered, gazing at one of the aeromen taking orders from Grimmelwald. "Can't believe it. A real gargantuate. Blind giants, but their hearing makes up for it."

Nick found the creature Xanthus was talking about. There stood a man three times the height of a human with massive ears but with no eyes whatsoever. He reeled in three cliff anchors.

"Hold on to something," Grimmelwald barked. "Insurance doesn't cover slip-offs." He snapped on goggles, plunked down in an ornate chair, and belted himself. His hand went to a steering wheel roped to what looked to be the aero's tusks. The captain gripped an iron lever and pulled. Two wingsails spread taut.

"You youth best take a step back, now. Grab on to anything firm," Grimmelwald cupped his hands and yelled, "Prepare for the plummet! All hands on deck!"

"Prepare for the plummet?" Daniel said, wrapping himself around the bone pole. "What does he mean, 'Prepare for the plummet'?"

With several more complicated gestures and a last call to the aeromen, Grimmelwald squeezed a thick tentacle. Mottle Craw shuddered.

Stone scraped from somewhere underneath, and a cloud of rock dust kicked up. Nick guessed that the aero was removing her talons from the crevices along the cliff face. Mottle Craw pitched back and forth, forcing unsecured passengers to grab onto anything firm. Then she pushed off.

They fell like a rock.

Brandy gripped Nick's forearm. "I really hope we're not going to crash. Daniel said this aero-thingy isn't aerodynamically sound. He gave us a ten percent chance of survival!" She nodded to the extremely frightened boy-genius choking the bone pole. Even with the wind battering his face, there was no mistaking that expression. Daniel was afraid for his life.

Nick saw the ground fast approaching and thought, _What if Daniel is right? . . . Heck. When was Daniel ever wrong?_

Wings whipped like paper. The massive ship was barreling down and toward a wild vineyard. Nick saw a small rodent scurry between two grapevines. A few more seconds at this rate and he'd be tasting those grapes, unless he was dead, which was very, very likely.

Grimmelwald reached a shaky hand to a brass rod and yanked. Everyone's stomach staggered as the Mottle Craw pitched horizontally, thrashing the top of a sycamore tree. Leaves rip-curled all around them, and the ship broke into a glide.

"This thing shouldn't be able to fly." Daniel gripped the bone pole tighter. "How could the wings provide the necessary lift? They're not even beating."

"Well done, Craw." Grimmelwald patted the aero's wheel and leaned to Nick. "The crew knows how to handle my Mottle Craw. But that ain't true for every aero." He pointed to a valley floor mixed with aero carcasses and the skeletal remains of a dozen different mythical creatures.

"Oh," Nick said.

"This is crazy," Daniel muttered again.

Nick's gaze moved from the aero graveyard past the Keranu Wall toward the tether clouds.

He experienced a rush unmanageable.

The tether was wrapped in a tornado the width of a mountain and the length of a small planet, which made the Mottle Craw suddenly feel like a gnat . . . flying toward a tornado the width of a mountain and the length of a small planet. The tether's wind tugged at the aero like a hungry predator wanting to swallow them whole. Bits of broken trees, rocks, and building structures floated by, proving the tether's appetite. And how it roared! It felt like his skin was vibrating at its seams.

He loved it.

Nick let his head fall back, allowing the tether's wind to pass over. For the first time in months, maybe even years, he could . . . breathe. Even the Merrow drama seemed trivial. All that mattered was the sound of his breath. His plan to invent a machine and win a cash prize, so that he could pay for a ticket to the lunar colonies, seemed like the lamest idea in the world now. A real freshman idea. _This_ was home.

He let his eyes slowly open. Mottle Craw pulled vertically, and its sails were dragged skyward by the updraft. It felt like the ship was tempted to follow the tether's crosswind, but it held steady and Möonward.

Those strange groungers, which had attacked their shuttle on its descent, leapt between the tether's blue lightning bolts. Mottle Craw shot out a tentacle with an attached bone-harpoon and speared one of the groungers. The poor creature thrashed about as the Mottle Craw retrieved it into her belly, followed by a cavernous _slurp_.

_BREEEGGHH._ A sound rolled from the rear of the ship.

"Um," Brandy said. "If that was what I think it was, then gross. This is _so_ not a girl ship."

Grimmelwald smiled. "Hungry are ya, Craw? That takeoff really worked up an appetite."

"Aeros don't usually eat—people?" Daniel said.

"Not the honorable ones." Grimmelwald shook his head. "Now a pirate's aero? That's a whole other bucket of boulder crabs. Pirates make a habit of feeding 'em gumnut babies. Keeps 'em nastier than a troglodyte on its lizlin treasure."

"Does it have a digestive system?" Daniel said. "Of course, it has a digestive system—I experienced it first-hand—but does it have one in the traditional sense? And what about the wings? How could such undersized wings carry a large ship? It would need a wingspan twice its current size . . . although I do not know the true weight of this animal."

Nick closed his eyes again. He wasn't going to let Daniel's panic attack ruin this for him. He was _truly_ living the life.

"Does it have all its nibbly parts like a liver and kidney?" Grimmelwald responded to Daniel. "No. And as for the wings, well, there's a little magic in everything, now, isn't there?"

Daniel's tone dropped. "Magic is simply advanced technology seen through the primitive eye."

"Really, Daniel." Nick kept his eyes closed. "It flies. That's all that matters."

Daniel's voice shifted toward him. "Surely, Nick, you cannot accept a flying ship at face value?"

"Why not?" Nick opened his eyes. "It works—you move on."

"You're always pushing the boundaries, questioning everything. How can you believe all this?"

"I questioned everything 'cause Earth sucked. But we've arrived!" Nick flew his arms out, laughing. "We're flying a half animal, half ship to Huron. You guys don't have to live in a refugee camp. And I'm having fun! We don't have to make it all complicated."

"Life is complicated," Daniel said.

"Doesn't have to be," Nick said. "You don't have to go looking for problems."

"Did you not just yell at two mermen to deboard the ship when they gave no reason for alarm?"

"Whatever." Nick waved Daniel off. "I'm not going to make a big deal out of that Merrow stuff. We'll go talk to the Huron City Council and tell them that the Merrows are bad. They'll kick them out. Done."

"Done. Just like that?" Daniel asked.

"Yeah." Nick shrugged. "Just like that."

Daniel breathed deeply, clopping his cane as he shifted around. "I'll be below deck investigating its intestinal tract . . . _simpleton_."

Grimmelwald called after him, "Whatever you do, son, keep clear of the red door to your left. Received a shipment of skainsmates the other day, and they're not housebroken yet . . . or was it the red door to your right?"

Nick scanned the odd crowd, trying to push off Daniel's negativity. He hadn't come to Huron to find _more_ drama. It took a second, but he found Xanthus, practically drooling over the myriad of fantastical creatures and sidled up to him.

"I can't believe they're all here." Xanthus looked around the deck, gawking.

Nick wasn't sure what Xanthus meant by "all," but there were certainly a lot of weird passengers on the Mottle Craw. It looked like a psychologically disturbed seamstress had been given free rein to play dress-up with giant woodland animals, mythological beasts, and a group of middle-aged adults. Among the passengers were several squat black-eyed babies running between feet while playing odd wind instruments that blew out petunias, chrysanthemums, ambrosias, and an assortment of other flowers.

"They're gumnut babies." Xanthus smiled. "If you were wondering. And the big hairy guy holding the scythe in the hobo-looking clothes? A Finoderre, I think. Want to see something really cool? Watch that guy's robe as he walks. See the goat legs peeking through? Satyr. And that hunched over thing there? The one with a monocle on steroids?"

"Yeah," Nick said. "The troll-looking guy. What is he?"

"A troll." Xanthus nodded. "That one's called a Trow. Lives in . . ."

Nick hated to admit this, but he really didn't understand a word of Xanthus's mythological tutoring. He'd already forgotten the difference between a Finnoderre and a Satyr and wasn't sure if the baby fairies were called gumguts or gumbuts. It took another ten minutes of Xanthus's chatter before Nick could offer anything to the conversation. He found a creature that resembled a rabbit, aside from its wiry hair, serrated teeth, and overall uncuddly nature.

"Xanthus," Nick said slowly.

"Yeah," Xanthus said.

"Remember that thing you were telling me about a year ago? At that fantasy convention you dragged me to. Cousin to the Manoboza or something."

"Blodaboza?" Xanthus's brow rose expectantly.

"Your twelve o'clock."

Xanthus saw the strange rabbit creature and made a sound like a cry giving birth to a cough.

"Let's go introduce ourselves," Nick said.

"Absolutely." Xanthus nodded.

"And Xanthus," Nick said.

"Yeah?"

"You're fun. How are you and Daniel even related?"

"Heh," Xanthus said. " _No_ clue _whatsoever._ "

After several hours of exploring the ship, Nick and Xanthus rejoined Brandy and Tim, who were gazing over the aero's bow. By that time, a thick cloud cover had left them in a whiteout, except for the pin-sized lights poking through with the promise of outer space.

Within a few minutes, the pin lights delivered. Mottle Craw breached the outer cloud line, and a star field arching between the brother planets appeared. The great planets stood like sentinels between the stars, cautioning the passengers to stay on the aero.

Nick found himself taking deep breaths. His brain said he was in outer space where no oxygen should exist. But the air here was as thick as Earth's, and there was even a slight breeze. Nick supposed the blue hue of magic that danced across the aero kept them safe. He thank-you patted the Mottle Craw.

Nick was glad that Daniel hadn't returned from investigating the aero's bowels because he would have ruined it by babbling on about the impossibility of breathing in a low-oxygenated atmosphere or something like that. Daniel couldn't appreciate the awesomeness of flying through space on the deck of a living boat.

Nick dared to peer over the bow. Up close, the tether was even more terrifying and wonderful. The clouds roared by like a freight train, whipping his blond hair up into a frenzy. Lightning bolts exploded, burning negative images of the tether's massive organic tendrils in his mind's eye. Nick thought about taking out an old wad of gum from his pocket and throwing it to the tether, just to see what would happen. But then he wondered if the gum would set off a chain reaction that would blow up the tether, thereby separating the brother worlds forever. Maybe he should ask Grimmelwald for permission first.

Brandy smiled at the sight and quietly slipped her hands around Tim's and Xanthus's arms. She chattered on about all the different outfits and how she was going to love this place because "these people _totally_ know what hats are for."

After another hour of Brandy's philosophies on fashion, her head bobbled sleepily against Xanthus's shoulder, but drowsiness couldn't stop her. She mumbled on about how girls needed to understand the trifecta of clothes, makeup, and friends if they're to ever achieve true popularity.

"We'll be Möonside by morning," Grand called out. "Off to bed with ya."

Half-closed eyelids tried to guide stumbling feet through a passageway that smelled like unwashed hair. Soon they were in their own cabin. Caroline and Haley were already bundled up and asleep under wool blankets. A tin bowl sat right next to Haley's head in case her jynn'us fever got really bad again. Other bodies squeezed onto beds or canvas cots.

"It's way easy," Xanthus said, trying to explain to Nick how the different races worked. "Just replace the end of the word with a ling. Human. _Humling._ Faery. _Faerling._ Elf. _Elfling._ Creature. _Creachling._ Those are the animals by the way. You know—beavers, cats, tigers, fish, whatever. Actually, some of the categories can get tricky. All the giants are called biglings _._ All midget creatures are midglings. Well, not _all_ midget creatures. Just the stout ones. A good deal of faeries are small too, but they're obviously _not_ midgets."

"Obviously," Brandy mouthed to Nick, who had to stifle a laugh.

"Monster-like creatures are called _un_ lings. . . . Oh wow. I totally get it." Xanthus smiled at Grand. "Monsters. Möon-sters. People from Earth called Möon's creatures Mon-sters, didn't they, Grand?"

"Yes." Grand took off his trench coat and rolled it into a pillow. He found a spot of open rug and sat down. "When those from Moon first went Earthside across the tether, they called themselves Möons. Horrified by their appearance, Earthians called them Mon-sters."

Brandy waved to Grand sleepily. "How come some people are dressed all American Revolution-y and others look like Sherlock Holmes? You know, Victorian? I thought we were thousands of years in the past? The ancient past?"

"The styles span the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries by the look of it," Daniel said. He was trying to decide between a malformed cot or sharing a bunk with Xanthus. "Late American colonial to the Edwardian period if I'm not mistaken." Daniel sighed as he plopped onto the cot. His rear thunked on the floor, shoving his feet up in the air like a crab in a showdown. The boy genius heaved three times to stand up, but finally resigned himself to the cot.

"Astute observations, Daniel," Grand said. "But they do not dress nineteenth century. Nineteenth century dressed like them. For nearly ten thousand years, our kind used the chronostones to migrate to your age, typically in times of war or great distress. We populated future Earth, bringing our knowledge and magic. Whatever culture we had developed by that time, we infused into your history. Consider the sudden rise of your civilizations. Egypt. Babylon. Syria. Greece. Rome. Great Britain. The United States—all moments in history when we settled _your_ lands. But when the World Council of Möon learned of the abuses to their kind in the mid-nineteenth century, they put an end to the migrat—"

"Wait." Xanthus raised himself up on his elbow. "We abused your kind?"

"You wouldn't know it by looking at them, but a good deal of Prams came during the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Some landed in the southern United States and were immediately enslaved by the local plantation owners."

Xanthus twisted his face. "You mean—the African slaves?"

"They were mistaken _for_ African slaves," Grand said. "Assumed they were runaways. It was the classic 'being in the wrong place at the wrong time.' Instead, very few . . ."

Nick fell asleep.

Nick dreamed, but it wasn't a dream of sight; it was a dream of touch, smell, and sound. Something clammy brushed his skin. There was a horrible smell and the sound of a thousand children hissing. From somewhere in the distance came the moans of . . . Mr. Waters?

"It sees me. It sees me," cried the merman. "Don't breathe on me. No, no. Help me—aahhh! Get it away from me!"

_Go to the deck,_ commanded Huron.

Nick's eyes fluttered open to a dark blue cabin and . . . snoring. Xanthus sawed wood; Grand was thinning a forest.

_Go to the deck,_ commanded Huron a second time.

Nick was tempted to ignore her. They had been running from the trackers for nearly a week, and he was exhausted. Besides, when Huron spoke, something bad always happened.

Go to the deck.

Nick flung off the wool blanket. Sweat met cold air. He almost pulled the blankets back over but instead got up and forced himself through the cabin door. The deck was covered in a thick frost. His bare feet burned from the ice, and his teeth chattered until he felt like they would explode. Open sea and faded stars told him that they must have crossed over to Möon sometime in the night. He looked to the bow of the aero and found Mr. Billy clutching the ship wheel, whistling a tune about some saucy she-mongoose with red fur. He continued the cold trek toward the rear deck. Finding the banister, he stepped cautiously up the stairs.

"Oww!" Nick cried. His foot had hit a Merrow's velle. It was laid out on its side, undisturbed, save for a couple of claw marks. Light flared all around. Nick turned to find Grand holding his battle-axe and Grimmelwald a lamp.

"Did you hear that?" Grand pivoted.

A green shadow skittled across the aero and leapt overboard, followed by a faint splash of ocean water.

"Mr. Billy," Grimmelwald called out. "Take us upward. Cloud level. We've had ourselves a stowaway."

Mr. Billy turned and sniffed the air. "Aye, aye."

Angry tears brought Nick's focus back to the velle. Grimmelwald's lamp revealed a silvery Merrow tail lying across the frosty deck.

"Mr. Waters?" Grand said.

They crept forward. It wasn't Mr. Waters at all, but Prime Minister Shale grabbing at something. The lamp's light marched past the prime minister's arm, over someone's frock coat, and onto a face, Mr. Waters's face.

"What horror is this?" Grand said.

Mr. Waters's frock coat was wet and wrinkled, and where one would expect a face and hands, there was only skin. It's as if he'd been hollowed out.

"He is a shell, Mr. Lyons," Grimmelwald said. "His innards . . . they're all gone."

Prime Minister Shale fumbled at Mr. Waters's earlobe, trying to remove his earring. He shoved it in his pockets and started on the necklace, crying all the while.

_Merrows are greedy,_ Nick thought as he stepped forward. "Prime Minister?"

"Don't touch him!" Prime Minister Shale shouted. "Don't touch him, boy! You'll ruin him."

"Prime Minister." Grand stepped ahead of Nick.

"I said don't touch him!" The merman tried to get up, but his fin kicked out. He moaned and began petting Mr. Waters's frock coat. "He needs bandages, humlings. Quickly now! Needs his whole body covered in bandages for the transmutation to be complete. Mr. Waters must join his brethren on King's Highway. . . . Oh, keep them away. Keep them away. They'll destroy us all. Protect us. Protect us."

"What is the meaning of this?" Grand asked. "How did this happen?"

"Poor, poor Mr. Waters." Tears rolled down Prime Minister Shale's cheek. "He—he—is turning into stone."

"Stone? Dear me, Mr. Lyons," Grimmelwald said. "We need to contact port authority. This ship is under Huronite jurisdiction. They'll be wanting to conduct a full investigation."

"Not yet, Grimmelwald." Grand raised his hand. "I'd like to conduct my own investigation."

Prime Minister Shale could only shake his head. "Keep them away. Keep them out of Huron. They will destroy us all."

CHAPTER FOUR

  rand asked Nick a few questions and sent him to bed, but there was no way he was going to sleep now. The only thing he could do was watch the roof rise and sink from the aero's deep breaths.

Nick was trying to understand what he'd just seen. Gross? Yes, it was gross. But there was something else. What was the word Huron kept using?

Evil.

He had seen many things in Colorado City but never something like _that_ , something evil. Nick pictured in his mind Mr. Waters's hollowed skin, like jellied fat from one of Caroline's Thanksgiving turkeys, and he could hear Prime Minister Shale say, "Keep them out. Keep them out. They'll destroy us all."

_A Merrow slowly turning into stone,_ Nick thought. _Prime Minister Shale crying like a baby? What if there were other monsters? What would stop them from sneaking into our cabin?_

Panic overcame Nick. What if the creature had gotten into their cabin? He turned over and pushed up on one arm to look around the cabin. His eyes bore into all the bed lumps, trying to detect some kind of movement. Xanthus was _definitely_ alive, if his snoring was any indication. Everyone else seemed to be breathing. Nick dropped back to his side. His friends were OK.

A second emotion began to creep in after the first. Truly, it had been around for awhile. Nick felt it when Grand was knocked out, and he'd had to fly the space shuttle. And he'd definitely felt it when Daniel nearly slipped to his death.

Responsibility.

Grand had warned Nick that his friend's lives were on him.

How did I suddenly become responsible for everyone? Oh, right. I felt bad for zooming off to a magical world while my friends were left to die at the refugee camp. But I couldn't have taken off without them?

Oh, and not to mention I'm now the steward of some ancient magical city. If I don't get the message to the council, the death of millions will be on my head. What if the city council doesn't believe me? What if it won't be as simple as delivering Huron's message?

_I'm worrying! Just like Tim! Maybe it's the twin thing. Maybe I'm becoming more like him._ Nick groaned at that thought. _Please, no._

Nick rolled over and faced the stars through his port window. He was not used to all of this. What was the word for it? Doubt?

He sighed. This was all getting a little too serious.

Nick dreamed that he was, in fact, Tim. In the dream, Haley used one of the aero's tentacles to bungee jump in and out of the Mottle Craw's mouth like some human popsicle. The Tim-Nick yelled at her, "Quit having fun. The Mottle Craw eats fun for breakfast! It's her favorite meal of the day!"

Nick awoke the next morning thickheaded and disoriented. He couldn't have slept for more than three hours, and most of that time was filled with crazy dreams. He leaned up, looked around, and remembered last night.

"Mr. Waters turned to stone!" Nick shot out of bed.

"Bro?" Xanthus said, wiping the crease lines on his face.

"There was an attack on the ship," Nick said. "That merman guy—Mr. Waters. He turned into a boulder or something."

Nick briefed everyone on the creature's attack from last night. Xanthus was ticked that Nick hadn't thought to wake him. Daniel wanted to see the place of the attack. After what seemed like an eternity of Brandy fussing over her hair, they all headed up to the aero's deck. Nick opened the door and immediately fell back down the stairwell.

Magic.

Everyone emerged slowly. Nick could only describe the sky as dazzling, which made everything else so. Blue was bluer, and sparkles sparkled.

"A-mazing." Caroline breathed deeply. "You can even smell it."

Nick breathed deeply. The magic actually smelled tart, like sap from an old pine tree.

"Uhh." Haley crossed an arm over her face, which was still covered in the blue sheen from her jynn'us. She pointed to the sky. "It's killing me. Command it to go away, will you, Xanthus?"

"The sun?" Xanthus said.

Caroline pulled out her bag and rummaged around.

"Yes. The sun." Haley wrung her hair. "Need an aspirin like you wouldn't belie—"

Caroline held out a handful of aspirins.

Haley snatched the pills out of her hand. "Caroline, I shall build a temple in your name."

Caroline pulled out a bottle of orange juice, but before she could hand it off, Haley swallowed the aspirins dry. She returned the bottle to her purse.

No need to waste good orange juice.

"Right there, at the netting." Nick pointed to the rear deck. "Mr. Waters turned to stone right there. And that's where the creature jumped."

"It could be a cockatrix." Xanthus shrugged. "A bunch of magical instruments can do it too. A wand or—I don't know. It's in my bestiary," he sighed. "You know, the one that blew up with the shuttle."

Nick turned his attention to the passengers. Most of them chattered on while munching biscuits being passed around by a small wrinkly-faced creature riding a self-propelled, smoke-belching cart. None of them seemed to know that just a few hours ago a Merrow had turned to stone.

Nick found Grand on the far end of the aero, gliding his finger over its bony banister. Trailing Grand like a two-month-old puppy was Prime Minister Shale. He slowly petted Mr. Waters's necklace while mumbling to himself.

"Been up all night with the prime minister trying to draw out more information," Grand yelled to Nick as he walked across the deck. "He just drivels on about the 'fouls' and 'red eyes.' You!" Grand suddenly pointed to Xanthus. "You have an abnormal love for magical creatures."

"Well . . ." Xanthus straightened up. "I like to think of it as an obsession."

"Fair enough. Here." Grand shoved a stone bowl into Xanthus's chest. "Collect samples of all of the creatures onboard. I'll compare your findings with the ship's manifest. If you discover a sample that is not found in the manifest, we have our creature."

"How—what, do what?" Xanthus looked at the stone bowl, bewildered.

Grand grabbed it back. "A bestiary bowl allows one to record any and all of Möon's creatures. Let's say you want to learn about the nature of a creature. A Mimi, for example." Grand held the bowl to his lips and said, "Mimi." A sickly manlike creature stood at the bottom of the bowl. Silver letters began to appear.

Mimi - Humling

Thin, brittle man. Due to their lack of stature, they can be killed in a fierce storm. Therefore, they live in the southern hemisphere where the winds abate.

Grand spoke again. "Treenid."

The Mimi disappeared and was replaced with a tree. It had a discolored trunk with translucent, prickly branches.

Treenid - Plantling/Creachling

A giant spider in the shape of an oak tree. The spider's eyes are at the end of each branch, which passersby might mistake for a juicy fruit and grab to their own detriment. When the passerby reaches for the treenid's eye, it will stand up on its roots to attack. However, its range of attack is limited, since all legs are rooted to the ground.

"You have got to be kidding me! This is awesome!" Xanthus looked as if he'd found a long lost love.

"It can also identify a creature." Grand plucked out a strand of hair from Xanthus, who yelped in pain. He dropped the hair into the bowl.

"Monkey trout? Odd," Grand said. "What's in that hair of yours?"

Xanthus blushed. "Hair gel. _Roadblock_ . . . asphalt strength."

Snickers came from all around.

Grand shook the bestiary bowl. "That's better. Sometimes it doesn't quite work. Especially if the sampling has been contaminated. Said you were a monkey trout. That's a fish with monkey arms that swings from tree to tree so that it can visit different ponds. Ah, that's more like it."

Letters began to appear at the bottom of the bestiary bowl by some unseen hand: _Humling._

"It can misread a creature. Important to check your samples twice, by the way. Said I was a beloved once. Ha!" Grand laughed and shoved the bestiary bowl back to Xanthus. "Specimens now."

Xanthus nodded and slipped away with the bowl. Grand looked back to Nick and started to open his mouth when a houndish voice rang across the Mottle Craw.

"Gallstones! Lyons? Is that you?"

Grand spun around, smiled, and took a step forward. "Cornish Portlorn."

The men reached out for a hug. They looked like two mountains being thrown together. Baron Portlorn's face was red with fiery red bushes for eyebrows and thick red hair. He looked to be a mature twenty-year-old, but Nick couldn't tell ages in this world since people lived to be one thousand. From nowhere, a dozen animals scurried out around the man's legs. They were pig-faced, but completely covered in long bunches of brown hair.

"It looks like a sheep ate a pig!" Nick said.

"Oh, the swaggers?" Baron Portlorn looked down to the strange creatures. "These are my breeders. Bought 'em off a swagherder Earthside. They might be of Möon origin, but Earth knows how to breed 'em."

Grand raised his fists to his hips. "Look at you, man. Done well for yourself."

Portlorn tilted a shepherd's staff armored in sapphire and bowed. "Last you saw me I was nothin' but a poor swagherder. Now, a baron of all things! Married and widowed since you left. Got the family inheritance through my deceased wife. How about you? Seems you've brought back a real herd, Ly—" Portlorn's bellowing voice was silenced with one glance.

Haley.

The baron adjusted a ring on his finger. "So um, er, these are your—"

"Not quite," Grand said. "These two, Nikolas and Tim, are my grandsons, and the others are my soon-to-be wards."

"So . . . they're dusties then?" Baron Portlorn said. "Earthside?"

They looked at each other apprehensively and nodded.

"And your name being—um—" Baron Portlorn directed his question to Haley.

Haley lifted her head up. Sunken, jynn'us blue eyes studied the strange baron. Finally, she moaned, "Haley."

"Haley?" Baron Portlorn said. "What a name. Well, I can see you haven't been to the Hall of Pickings. Not married, I suppose?"

"She's not married," Grand answered. "Haley is only sixteen, and in her culture, that is a little young."

"Yes. Well, in Huron, sixteen is _the_ marrying age, although we could have an extended engagement if you wish. Forgive me, but you would be a crown jewel to my flock. I have many wives, but none such as you."

"How many do you have?" Nick said.

"More than one hundred but less than one thousand. Be not troubled, Haley. They pale in comparison to your beauty."

"Beauty! Bro." Nick waved at Portlorn. "Unless self-esteem isn't your thing, don't ever tell Hal—"

"Yes, Haley. You are divine. A diadem in any man's crown."

"Are you kidding me?" Brandy protested. " _This_ is beautiful. She's all pukey."

"Yes. Very much so."

Haley's head bobbed in time with the Mottle Craw. She opened her mouth to say something. Last night's fish and biscuits came back up.

"Ooh." Nick winced at Portlorn's ruby shoes.

"I've upset you. This is all a bit much," Baron Portlorn said, shaking little white nuggets off his shoes. "To be offered so much coming from such humble means. And you don't even know me. Persimmons? Persimmons? Got Mr. Persimmons with the land. Fine butler when you need your beard dabbed, but can't play a game of hagnag to save his life. Egads, Persimmons! Where are you?"

In one blink, Persimmons appeared.

"Stop doing that!" Baron Portlorn nearly fell off his cane.

The man was little more than a wisp of hair crowning a three-piece suit.

"Now, please, Persimmons. An introduction is in order."

"Very good, sir," Persimmons cleared his throat, raised his nose to the air, and proclaimed, "Announcing Baron Portlorn of Portlorn Estates. Keeper of sows, swine, and swaggers."

The baron bowed like a folded mattress and turned to Haley again. "I—"

"Thank you for all of this, Portlorn," Grand interrupted. "Trust me when I say it's good to see you, but I'm in the middle of a very serious incident and really must continue."

"Oh. Of course, Lyons." Baron Portlorn bowed slowly, keeping his eyes locked on Haley.

Caroline escorted Haley back downstairs to avoid Baron Portlorn at all costs while Grand delegated tasks. Daniel was to help Grimmelwald question the passengers about the attack. Brandy was to stick close to Grand for small errands while he conducted his investigation. And Nick and Tim were to guard Prime Minister Shale.

Nick would've rather taken a ball-peen hammer to the head.

Guarding Prime Minister Shale was just about the most boring job ever. For nearly three hours, the merman just sat in his velle, petting Mr. Waters's earrings. His bottom lip shook as he moaned, "Fouls, fouls, fouls. Poor Mr. Waters. Poor Mr. Waters. Poor Mr. Waters."

The only entertainment was watching Xanthus collect samples from the Mottle Craw passengers. He stalked the ship, asking for tufts of hair, flecks of scale, and snatches of feathers. A grizzly bear believed him to be a ship inspector. Boy Pinkerton thought he was a harbinger of death who had come to read people's souls. Both conversations ended with the threat to remove Xanthus's body parts and hand them back to him. But nothing could deter Xanthus, so he worked his way to the back of the ship and out of Nick's sight.

After another hour of Prime Minister Shale's mumblings, a crow called from its nest. "City, ho! City, ho! We land in Huron within the hour."

If the crow had repeated itself a third time, Nick would have missed the scream of a plump, thirteen-year-old, fantasy-loving boy.

"AAAAAAGGGHHHH!!"

"Xanthus?" Nick said.

Tim looked at his brother. "He's ticked off a passenger."

Nick's blood turned to ice. "No, that's not it . . ." He knew exactly what had just happened. The monster was still onboard, and it was going for his friends. "It's happening!" Nick yelled as he bolted from his post.

CHAPTER FIVE

  ick!" Tim yelled. "What about Prime Minister Shale?"

Nick didn't hear Tim. He could only imagine Xanthus turning into stone. He jumped up the steps and nearly bowled over a gathering crowd at the back of the deck.

"Out of the way!" Nick barked.

Xanthus was laid out on a wooden deck chair looking up into the sky, his eyes dilated, and his fauxhawk matted down. Grimmelwald was already there holding a small scabbard and looking wildly around.

"Xanthus." Nick stumbled to his knees.

Xanthus kept his wide-eyed expression on the sky. He didn't blink; he didn't even breathe.

"Xanthus!" Nick yelled.

"Freaky," Xanthus whispered.

"You're not stone!" Nick laughed.

"No." Xanthus's twitchy brow roamed over to Nick. "Totally thought I was!"

"Man, I thought the monster got you," Nick said. "If that monster had gotten you—I mean, I made Grand bring you guys here to protect you. If you had—I mean—I—" Nick stopped before he consoled Xanthus like a lost pet. "You freaked me out, dude."

"What happened?" Grimmelwald said.

Xanthus bolted up. "Getting samples like Grand told me. Boy Pinkerton wasn't paying attention and knocked off my earring. You know. The one Mom gave to me." Xanthus held up an earring in the shape of a woman. "It fell between the cracks of the deck. I had my eyes between the boards like this." Xanthus contorted his face, his right eye twitching as if he was trying to see in between imaginary deck boards. "This really green arm tore through the deck and grabbed at me. Then I smelled its breath. Dead nasty. I yelled for my life, and then, well, the—what are you again?" Xanthus pointed.

Nick saw two strange men flanking Xanthus at both sides. They were tall with Asian features and had long hair the color of autumn leaves. Their arms were muscular, like sculpted stone shafts with hands stuck on the end. But their pointy ears caught Nick's attention. Elves?

"We are Harynne," the elfish-looking man answered. "Of the elfling kind and guardians of Huron. I am Captain Shaw. We were patrolling the skies and saw the skirmish."

"Yeah. These Harynne guys showed up," Xanthus said.

"Thanks," Nick said to Captain Shaw. "Big thanks."

"What did it look like?" Grimmelwald said.

"I don't know. But I know it's not a gorgon."

"Why?" Nick said.

"I looked right at it. I saw this really big eye. I didn't change or anything. That's how it works with gorgons. They give you the evil eye, and you're dead. Also, it smelled really gross. Bad breath. Gorgons aren't known for their breath, according to _Perlock's_."

"Assume nothing, boy," a voice said. Prime Minister Shale moved his velle through the crowd. "What did it smell like?"

"Smell?"

"Its breath. What did it smell like, lad?" the merman repeated.

"Gross. Like something had died."

The prime minister pulled out a silver handkerchief and covered his mouth. His other hand tightened around the purple satchel. Captain Shaw's silver eyes looked hard at the merman. Suddenly, the air shriveled, cracked, and began to smell like burning oil. A man appeared from the smoke column.

"Thank you for alerting me to the attack, Captain Shaw," said the man. He had a black beard and thick coarse hair. He wore a thick gray coat and under it a breastplate with the emblem of an iron gate. Next to him was a creature that looked damaged from birth. It had a five-year-old's body with deformed wings and a row of teeth that spread from ear to ear.

"Beronn? Toad knuckles," Grimmelwald growled under his breath. "Mr. Lyons will have my head for this."

"That?" Nick pointed to the weird creature. "That's a beronn?"

"No," Grimmelwald said. "Beronn's a man. To the point, Beronn Gorringe is the port master and son of the sheriff, Silas Gorringe. _That_ creature is a valkyrie." He pointed to the strange creature at Beronn's side. "Used as retrievers on the battlefield. You only have one if you need to retrieve something. I've never seen the vile thing in Huron Valley since they usually keep to necromancers and such."

"The assailant?" Beronn said to Xanthus. "Describe him."

Xanthus, less excited this time by the brutish man towering over him, retold the stories with "aahs" and "umms." Once he was done, Captain Shaw whispered to Beronn, who immediately scanned the crowd until his gaze fell on Nick.

"Do I know you?" Beronn said.

"Umm. Doubt it," Nick said.

"You are self-righteous, immobile, and an idiot, if the sheriff is correct," Beronn said.

"What?" Nick stood up.

"On Sheriff Gorringe's orders, my agents have kept me informed regarding your journey on the Mottle Craw. You're a Lyons, the grandson of Nikolas Lyons the 11th. His youngest, by the look of it. The sheriff has been expecting you and all your kin's ill fortune."

"Look, _sir_. I don't know you from Adam, but you can stop bad-mouthing my family."

Beronn's raised brow and scowling lip told Nick that he'd said the wrong thing.

"Captain Shaw." Beronn slid off leather gloves. "I will need the skullduggery for our Xanthus Kobayashi here. One can never trust the account of a dusty."

"Port Master?" Captain Shaw gripped his own belt. "He is only a child, and this is hardly an interrogation. We could damage his mind."

"Captain Shaw. The skullduggery, now!" Beronn commanded the Harynne.

Shaking his head, Captain Shaw pulled out an oval tin container with the word "skullduggery" etched on it. He slowly unscrewed the lid. Something like a grayish-orange jellyfish swelled over the sides. Nick felt his heart lurch as Captain Shaw reached into the center and pulled it up by a black tail. The skullduggery let out a _thump-pop_ , leaving a trail of gray slime. Now that it was free from the can, thousands of needle bones flexed from its belly, looking for a brain to interrogate.

Xanthus stiffened. "Hey. Hey. That's all I know. Geez. Come on."

Nick glanced over his shoulder and thought, _Seriously, Grand. Xanthus is about to get his brain scrambled, and you're nowhere to be seen?_

"Help!" Xanthus's pleading eyes searched the onlookers. "Nick?"

Nick didn't know what to do. No one else looked gutsy enough to stand up to Beronn, even the Harynne with all of their weird weapo—

A smile slid over Nick's face.

"You think this amusing?" Beronn grimaced at Nick. "Enjoy seeing your friends hurt?"

Nick took a couple of steps toward the port master, his smile unchanged.

Beronn's expression became suspicious. "What are you smiling at, boy?"

One of the Harynne had almost moved out of Nick's periphery when he reached for the guard's belt, grabbed a small orbish object, and raised it to the crowd.

"Back off!"

"The boy's got a Tom Turvey! Drop to the deck, now!" Captain Shaw yelled. On hearing the word "Tom Turvey," cries of terror swept around the aero. Bonnets and top hats and powdered wigs fell off. Passengers sobbed into the aero's deck. "Demon child!" "Possessed boy!"

Nick glanced at the weapon. It looked like an old, spinning top with a small crank.

"Back away from Xanthus, or I'll turn this—this crank thing." Nick warned.

"On second thought, Nick." Xanthus raised his hands to object. "I don't really need your help. Just gonna just take my chances with the skullduggery, if it's all the same to you."

"Nikolas!" His grandfather roared. The crowd parted, and there stood Grand and Brandy. "Put that down now."

Nick's ears rang with adrenaline as he lowered his hand.

Captain Shaw lunged for the weapon. "This is a Tom Turvey. It would have incinerated the entire ship."

"Oh," Nick said. "S—sorry." He looked at Grand sheepishly and then at Beronn, who was clutching his chest.

"Will someone kindly explain to me what is going on?" demanded Grand.

"Mr. Lyons." Beronn tried to find his footing. "The sheriff told me to keep a close eye on all ships entering and leaving Huron. The Harynne alerted me to an attack."

"Another attack?" Grand said. "Impossible. We witnessed the creature jump from the ship last night."

"It never left," Prime Minister Shale announced in a faltering voice. He peered around the crowd with a wild, lost smile. "It's a ghost, haunting the Mottle Craw."

"Beronn got all creepy," Nick said. "He was about to use a skullduggery on Xanthus."

"Skullduggery?" Grand's bottom lip and brow squeezed to a point. "What authority allows you to use such a dangerous creature, especially on youth?"

"My father." Beronn swallowed but tried to maintain his composure. "He has broadened my—my interrogation tactics, if you must know."

"Has he broadened your stupidity?" Grand said. "A skullduggery, sir!"

"Sheriff Gorringe has been given full authority by the Huron City Council," Beronn said. "It's his duty to protect Huron. He has passed that on to me."

"Your father hasn't the power he thinks he has. Provisional at best. Especially now that the steward has returned." Grand pointed to Nick. "Nikolas Lyons the 12th."

Nick felt dozens of eyes suddenly turn toward him. Surprises and murmurs came. "It is true?" "Steward of Huron?" "Your honor?"

"You'll find the sheriff's authority isn't so provisional, as deemed by the city council," Beronn said.

An impatient growl came from Grand. "There are other councils, _deeper_ councils. They have the final word."

"Sheriff says the Council of Teine is a myth. A story passed around by old nursemaids and rat-tailed schoolboys."

"Your inspection is done, sir." Grand's hands squeezed as if they could already feel Beronn's neck. "This would be a fine time for you to _shove_ along. I will deal with your father on my return to Huron." Grand about-faced and headed for the stairs.

"Nearly forgot," Beronn continued, "Sheriff Silas says _that_ boy's stewardship is also a myth. It is a story passed around by old nursemaids and rat-tailed schoolboys."

Grand didn't even pause. He spun on his heel, and in four long steps, stood nose to brow with Beronn.

"Speak about me in whatever manner pleases you, but never speak about my kin unless it be congratulations and commendations."

Beronn smiled. "The House of Lyons is nothing more than a mess of feral cats who need to be round up, stone-tied, and cast into the depths of Loch Huron."

Grand's hands and eyes flared jynn'us blue. "Tell your father something for me?"

"What is that?" Beronn sneered.

He grabbed Beronn's belt buckle. The port master's eyes widened like saucers. "Fetch." With the flick of his arm, a mass of gray cape and the screams of Beronn slipped into the clouds. He couldn't have flown higher if he'd had a ground-to-air missile strapped to his backside.

"Anyone else wish to share their opinions of the House of Lyons?"

Nick saw a Harynne guard slowly slip out a katana, but Captain Shaw waved him down.

"Grand!" Brandy protested, with arms pointing to the sky.

"Yes?" Grand said as he grabbed the valkyrie from its hiding place under the deck chair.

"You'll kill him," Brandy said.

"Ms. Wendell, I wouldn't kill a man over a few ill-chosen words even if they were directed toward my kin." Grand raised the howling valkyrie to eye level and said, "He'll be nearing Faerborough going about two hundred miles an hour, depending on how the winds fare. Flap _very_ fast."

The valkyrie cried into the horizon.

Grand nodded to the air, smirking. "Valkyrie can fly very fast, especially with a good tossing." But on seeing Brandy's disgusted expression, his blue jynn'us and brute upper lip quickly fizzled away. "And—and he'll be able to carry Beronn for a good while too, Ms. Wendell. They retrieve dead men's bodies from the battlefield all the time, so they're used to carrying a good deal of body weight."

"Um. _How_ are we supposed to make a good impression if you're throwing people off ships?!" Brandy clenched her fists. "Is Huron a bunch of barbarians?"

Grand shook his head. "No. Afraid not. Quite the opposite, really."

Brandy turned to Nick. "Well. You and Grand will get along just fine. But if you think—" Before she could finish her sentence, someone cried, "Oh, Steward!"

Suddenly, handlebar whiskers and muttonchops and cigar smoke and white gloves and badger paws and elfling hands and women in dresses with stuffed backsides descended upon Nick. There was a chortle, "Welcome home, me boy," and a squeal, "It's about time we had some decent leadership around here!"

A girl twice Nick's height and resembling a goat, was shoved at him. The girl's mother declared, "Trying to marry off me daughter here. Know any good stewards looking for a wife? Pretty in the face if you never mind the cup-sized earlobes. Be sure to keep her away from anything mint, if you don't want a weregoat on your hands." The girl smiled and said, "Hi," but it sounded more like a "baa-hiii." Then came the onslaught of cards. Inscribed on every one of them were their names, addresses, and their personal jynn'us. The space around him got smaller and smaller.

Nick couldn't breathe.

After another twenty minutes of being the eye of the social storm, he broke away from the crowd, claiming that Grand needed him. He headed directly toward the bow of the ship, hoping he actually could find Grand.

That's when Nick saw her _._

"Huron?" Nick slowly walked toward the banister. " _That's_ the city? That's Huron?"

"Yes, lad." Grand put an arm around him. "That's m' lady."

They had just crested over a mountain pass and into a great valley where the city of Huron filled the entire eastern side.

"It's been a fine trip, Steward," Grimmelwald said. Nick looked to Grand for a response. Grand only looked back at Nick.

"Oh." Nick realized Grimmelwald was talking to him. He tried to come up with a response. "Yeah. A good trip."

Grimmelwald nodded, pulling a tentacle down. With an even more sickening drop than their plummet at the Keranu Wall, the Mottle Craw careened over the mountainside. Grimmelwald stood to his feet, grabbed two floorboard levers, and leaned back with his entire body until the Mottle Craw righted itself with the horizon line and the great city of Huron.

"Amazing." Nick smiled. "Hello, Huron."

Hello.

CHAPTER SIX

  uron's city line was a crown of serrated spires, only to be outdone by giant redwood trees so tall they gouged the passing clouds. Between the spires and trees were many structures including copper-domed buildings, ark-shaped glass buildings, and one massive Ferris wheel.

They hadn't even passed the city walls when Nick started to choke on the magic. Its thick, piney smell and indigo hue netted the city. Blue flares crackled from the city streets, signaling the use of a hex or someone's jynn'us. Grimmelwald explained that Aeroways had to install a jynn-shield on the aero's belly because citizens took cheap shots at the flying creatures, usually to the detriment of the citizens. An aero doesn't take lightly to unprovoked attacks.

The airspace directly above the fog of magic swarmed with flying objects. Unlike Colorado City's electromagnetic flying cars, the city sky here was filled with stagecoaches drawn by pegasi, dragons, giant falcons, gaggles of geese, and a few smoke-churning machines.

As they passed over Huron's stone walls, Grimmelwald pointed to several gates that were adorned with spindly iron watchtowers manned by the Heimdall, elfling watchmen. Evidently, their eyesight was so sharp that they were able to watch a bird pluck its worm from ten leagues away.

Within Huron's city gates, they could hear the buzz of industry. Strange creatures covered half-built edifices, launching beams and carved stones back and forth. Commands were being thrown around by workers in languages seemingly impossible for a throat to utter.

Smaller stone walls chopped up the city into varying quarters, each with their strange and wonderful beings. It was obvious the quarters also separated the wealthy from the poor. One quarter was filled with beautiful plazas, fountains, and dwellings while another was marred with the squalor of poverty.

Nick was supposed to be in charge of all this?

He took a very deep breath.

The Mottle Craw dropped again until she was under the line of airborne stagecoaches and in the direction of the city center. After a moment, an enormous lake appeared, the sun strobe-lighting off its surface. Grimmelwald called out a few commands, and the Mottle Craw leaned a hard left just as another aero skidded to the water below. Grimmelwald pulled a lever. The Mottle Craw responded with a bellow and dropped into a nosedive. Nick could see the shadow of a large monster winding through the murky depths. Grimmelwald pulled the ship's wheel, and Mottle Craw shifted, turning her topsails upright. Lake water crashed over the bow and showered everyone. The foam settled, and in its place water-children giggled, chasing after the aero. Grimmelwald mumbled happily under his breath, "Water nymphs." He thumped the Mottle Craw. "Saw a big fat nesse just near the surface. I'll take ya out fishing once we get our passengers off-board. Deckhands. Prepare for docking!"

After a few minutes of hustling and barking out orders, passengers were topside, waiting for the plankway. Two aeromen pushed the wooden plank out while Grimmelwald placed himself at the exit. Mr. Billy raised up a small fiddle, grabbed the bow with his small mongoose fingers, and began playing a happy tune.

Nick found that being a steward had some advantages. The passengers insisted that he and his friends exit first. They even shoved a few more cards in his cargo pants while he stepped up to the plankway. After a few parting waves from Brandy, who seemed to treat the plankway as her own catwalk, they finally made it to the dock.

Grand was right. Huron was a melting pot of magical civilization.

Nick and company pressed their way between every creature imaginable. A limp-legged fawn cut them off with an apology. Two passing falcons flapped at each other like a cockfight in a back alley, their masters pulling back at their reins. A toad-like man dressed in a patchwork coat and fingerless gloves asked if they could "spare a spot of harjuice or harpickles." Another man with similar features cut in between them, claiming that this was his territory and only he could beg for har. As the two toad men got into a shoving match, a small gang of dark-robed creatures, who identified themselves as harbingers, pulled Daniel away. He came back pale-faced, claiming that the harbingers had seen his death and had offered a great deal on a catacomb plot.

Eventually, they found a clearing under a row of almond trees. Caroline brought up the rear as she guided a feeble Xanthus and, popping open a bottle of aspirin, handed two more to Haley. At the moment that she snapped her purse shut, thunder rumbled, and water drops tapped the leaves above them.

Grand looked up to the sky, sighed, and pressed his lips. "Forgive me, youth, but unless you are about to pass out, I must make one more stop."

"Xanthus?" Caroline said in her whispery tone. "He's been sick for an hour now. We should really get him home."

"He may be in shock," Grand said, "but that will wear off."

"No," Caroline said. "You don't understand. Xanthus is getting his jynn'us too."

"Pardon me?" Grand looked at Caroline and then Xanthus.

Xanthus was leaning against a caste iron column, sweating and heaving.

"He's been getting worse since the Mottle Craw," Caroline said. "I could tell."

"The two of you are getting your jynn'us. I have never seen such sensitivity to Möon air," Grand shook his head.

"Wait," Xanthus looked up quickly. His face was a sheet of sweat. "I'm getting my jynn'us too? Awesome! Oh man. I hope so."

Caroline pressed her point, flicking her hair back past her glasses for emphasis. "We all need to get out of this rain and get some baths and a change of clothes."

Grand looked as if he were trying to make up his mind about something. He turned around and inspected the bluish sheen on Haley's face. "Can you stand it a little longer, lassie?"

"Yeah." Haley rubbed her neck. "Actually, I'm starting to feel better."

"Don't worry about me," Xanthus said. "I'm fine."

"Then we must press on, Ms. Wendell," Grand said, resuming his march through the crowd. He tightened his trench coat as raindrops began tracing the edges of his shoulder. "That trip left me very concerned about Huron's state of affairs. I fear that foul creature aboard Mottle Craw, Sheriff Silas, and the Merrows are knotted together by some devious scheme. Must see Algernon the Collirian who serves on the deep council. He resides at the Hall of Pickings. It will be a good time to get your name change anyway."

"Name change?" Tim said.

"Yes, Tim. Some of us were misnamed at birth. You cannot become a citizen of Huron unless you are correctly named. For instance, my brot—"

"Hhhmm-mhhmm," called out Persimmons. "Announcing Baron Portlorn."

"Ooh," Haley groaned.

They slowly turned around. Persimmons stood straight as a pole while Baron Portlorn leaned on his staff, appearing to be recovering from a marathon.

"Whoo. Air's mighty thin at sea level." Baron Portlorn's red whiskers flapped with every breath. "Well. This is—ah—what a great surprise. Always been a man—oooh—of favorable coincidence."

"You've been chasing after them since the docks," Persimmons mumbled under his breath.

"Portlorn," Grand warned. "I need to get them to the Hall of Pickings and then home."

"This will only take a second, Lyons." Baron Portlorn said, walking toward Haley with his swaggers squealing along.

Persimmons rounded the flock and stepped up to Haley with an outstretched hand. "For Ms. Haley Wendell." A soft blue light came from his white gloves. Sparks swirled, giving off the smell of burning hair, and a long cigar-shaped object appeared. He held out a flute.

"Your most favored object among the brother worlds, I do believe," Persimmons said.

Haley, more impressed with the object than Persimmons's jynn'us, took the flute. "How did you know this was my favorite?" Her eyes began to redden.

"My jynn'us, Ms. Wendell. I read your heart." Persimmons smiled. "Actually, forgive me, but this was your second most favored object in the brother worlds. Granting your most favorite object might be a bit cumbersome and awkward for all parties involved."

"Thanks" was all Haley could manage.

"It's a flute. Just like Mom's," Brandy whispered to Caroline.

"Yeah," Caroline nodded.

"Just something to remember me by," Baron Portlorn expressed triumphantly.

"Very kind of you." Grand wrapped an escorting hand around Haley. "I'm sure she will cherish it forever, but I have some pressing matters to address now."

"Of course, Mr. Lyons. Best of luck."

The stained glass windows cast a rainy pattern across the Hall of Pickings. Six iron bowls filled with blazing fire were stationed at the points of the hexagonal room, providing the only light source. Rows and rows of books covered the high marble walls. They stood as a secondary defense for the room.

Set in the middle of the room were five velvet couches on which Nick and company sat comfortably. Well, almost everyone. The couch didn't take to Daniel; it kept forming and pushing itself around him, as if it just couldn't get comfortable with him. Being shimmied off his seat for the third time, he pulled himself up by his cane and found a lone column to lean against.

The only other objects in the room were thousands of small mason jars hooked to the ceiling by long metal wires, each one labeled according to their name type. The nearest one to Nick read, "Villainous Names—Their Master Plans." It looked to be filled with small scrolls. Another was labeled, "Miserly Names—Prized Possessions." It was filled with various coins of different shapes and sizes. _Was that how names were chosen?_ Nick thought. _Did you collect possessions of people and name them accordingly?_

_More importantly,_ Nick wondered, _why was that weird dude sniffing Grand like a dog on the hunt for its bone?_

For the last minute, a man had been sniffing Grand. Oddly enough, Grand was completely comfortable with it.

"Nnnnef!" The man breathed out. "Well, I can't see what all of the fuss is about! You're obviously Mr. Lyons. Never has a spirit shown with such goldness." The man's ears came to a twiggy end, and his second chin sported a healthy wart.

"It is the deep council that concerns me." Grand's gravelly voice reverberated through the hall. "Who could have let things get so far?"

"You were its power," the twiggy-eared man said. "Without you, we lost all influence."

"That couldn't be avoided, Algernon. I wish otherwise, but the trackers were hard after my family. I've shaken them though. Left them in future Earth without a chronostone."

"In the meantime," Algernon said, locking his hands behind his back, "Sheriff Gorringe has all but ruined us. He tightens his control over Huron, making it nearly impossible to become a citizen. And for those who've already gained their citizenship, it is now mandatory to apply for a passport before entering the boroughs. I have to apply for a passport to all five boroughs? At my age? And the trials are nearly impossible now. Before, all one needed to do for a creachling passport was to quote a line or two out of _Mystic Lemur on Love_ and whip up a few cat whisker elixirs. Now I'm to fight a gang of grizzlies? Grizzly snakes, grizzly bats, grizzly squirrels, even a grizzly koala, I hear!" By this time, Algernon had unbuttoned his burgundy robe, showing a checkered nightgown and a belly sneaking a peek at its guests. "They've stationed clims at every hearth, spying on us like common criminals and accusing us of just about every dirty magic. You, Lyons, of all people, know that I won't have anything to do with dirty magic, much less dead magic! But it's everywhere, I tell you. Just this morning I had some lavender tea laced with toe flame. Took a gallon of ice water before me toes stopped torching. Not sure how dirty magic got mixed up with the tea. A careless shopkeeper, I suppose. But what if I were caught in the act? It'd be Backroff Dungeon for me!"

"Sheriff Silas. He is in cahoots with the Merrows?" Grand said.

"Cahoots? I think not, Lyons. He hates the Merrows, hates their presence in the city. He thinks them the dirtiest of all Möon's creatures. Sheriff Silas is a Dujinnin sympathizer, after all. Not that I mind a Dujinnin sympathizer, tether knows they deserve a bit of grace, but it's more than that, Lyons. Devilish plots in our city. Devilish plots."

Grand nodded. "Well, it seems we couldn't have returned at a better time."

"That would depend." Algernon looked at Nick.

"They mean to end the stewardship," Grand said. "I'm sure of it. If they find any reason to doubt Nikolas's steward—"

"Well, is there?" Algernon's gaze remained on Nick.

"Is there what?" Grand said.

"Is there reason for doubt? Is he the Steward of Huron? Word is he's got a bit of the violent in him. Not too concerned about the welfare of others. That's the first quality of a steward, you know."

"Yeah, dude." Nick crossed his arms. "I'm the steward."

Algernon raised his brow, amused. "Oh, yes? And why do you think _you are the steward?_ "

"Because . . ." Nick swallowed. "She talks to me. The city talks to me in my head. And—and because Grand said so."

Algernon smirked. "In your head? Well, that's a first, ol' boy. The fair city no longer needs the horn now? She's chosen to speak inside the head of a hormonally-charged fourteen-year-old?"

"I need to meet with the Council of Teine tonight if possible," Grand said. "We need to sort this out. Something must be done, Algernon."

"Of course, Lyons. I'll arrange it all. Just wait for my signal. Now," Algernon said, suddenly remembering the six kids in the room. "Let's get on with it. Months behind on my publishing. Work is slow and depressing. Dark names I've been giving of late."

"Forgive me, youth." Grand looked down at them. "This is Algernon. He is Collirian of elfling kind. Collirians have a strong sense of your inner person. They're able to smell your spirit and help you find your true name."

Algernon was already wheezing the air around Brandy. "Sthhhhhnnnnnn." Her eyes grew as his nose rattled.

"Ghahhh!" He exhaled. "What is your favorite fruit, Brandy?"

"Who told you my name?"

"What is your favorite fruit, _Brandy Wendell_?" Algernon repeated.

"Um," Brandy said. "Kiwi. Why?"

"Why? Why? You tell me. Why is kiwi your favorite fruit?"

"Because it's pretty, but pretty in its own way."

"If you had to choose between death by drowning in a tub of pink clothes' dye or living in a colorless world, which would it be?"

"Um, I don't know?"

"What's your favorite color?"

"Oh, I get it. This is one of those fashion tests. Well, first, it depends on what I'm wearing. But if I had to choose, pink, of course. It's such a cliché, but it's not a cliché, you know what I mean?"

Algernon grunted, and his garlic-shaped head swiveled to Daniel. He walked over to him and stood nose to nose. "I don't trust you, Daniel Kobayashi. I do trust your bald head. I do trust your limp. I do trust your cane, but I do not trust you." He sniffed at Daniel with his left nostril. "You wouldn't believe in your name if I gave it to you."

Daniel's hairless eyebrows stayed on Algernon. "I can live with that."

Algernon looked back to the couches. "You, Caroline Wendell."

Caroline adjusted her glasses.

"Content Caroline. Content with your cooking and cannery and butterfly kisses." Algernon straightened, his chin doubling judgmentally at the chubby, fantasy nerd. "And Xanthus Kobayashi. Xanthus is not your name."

Xanthus dropped his eyes. "It's always been my name."

"Yes. Your mother let you name yourself. You chose the most unrelated mythic name you could find. She was a silly woman."

"I—I have to get a new name?"

"No. What for? You are fantastically misnamed. And that tells me so much about you." Algernon's eyes sharpened, as if he were peering through Xanthus's very soul and out the other side.

He waddled to Haley and turned down his inspecting nose.

"Haley. So worried about love. How? Why? What for? Who? Who? Who? Who?" Algernon mimed a heartbeat with his hand. "Why can you not tell him whom you love?"

" _What_ are you talking about?" Haley said, looking back to Algernon with sick eyes. "That creepy Portlorn guy?"

"Sure." Algernon smirked. "That creepy Portlorn guy." He sucked in his breath and held it while staring intensely at Haley before snapping his finger. He shuffled off to a wall ladder and climbed to the very top shelf. Humming what sounded like a lullaby, he grabbed a tattered black book and walked back to Haley.

"Here you go. This is one of my early editions."

"And do what with it?" Haley curled her hands back.

"Take the book and walk through those brass doors over there, of course. Find your name and return promptly."

"Haley's fine," she said. "I'm pretty secure with who I am as a person."

"Secure!" Algernon guffawed. "On what brother world?"

Her expression darkened. "Haley will do."

"Haley? I am sorry. You are no Haley! But if you want to keep it, fine with me. I have ten books to finish by week's end and don't have time to waste flim-flamming with young women who are unwilling to receive their true name. Good night! Only one other child during my tenure as Name-Giver ever walked through those doors and refused their new name. And we saw how your brother turned out, didn't we, Lyons?"

Haley blew loudly, stood to her feet, and grabbed the book with a limp wrist. "You don't have to get all clouds-of-black-death on me. It's just a name." She started to walk to the brass doors, but she swung her arms back and forth, declaring that she'd rather be doing anything else than this. She grabbed the knob and flung the doors open. As they closed, Nick heard an older woman's voice, "Your name is not a prophecy, but a path of your life if. . . ."

Nothing happened at first, but then a light under the doors shifted. There was an "uhhh" followed by pages flipping. Moments later, she walked back out.

"I am no longer Haley. My name is now . . . Helen," she said. "Haley is gone from existence. Helen has come to be."

Tim grinned. "Like that chic who was so beautiful she sunk a thousand ships?"

Helen's eyes switched from bewilderment to disgust.

"Seriously, _Helen,_ " Brandy said. "Sinking a thousand ships isn't good enough for you?"

"You don't _even_ know what I saw in th—"

"Now, before you utter another word, Helen, for it seems you have many to utter." Algernon lifted his nose to everyone. "I would highly discourage sharing what the Lady of Hypsus Lake shows you in the sandfall. Even the closest of friends may draw you off your journey."

"Don't worry about it," Tim said to Helen in a hushed tone. "We can tell each other."

"Now. To you, Nick," Algernon passed Tim.

"Hey!" Tim stood to his feet.

"Yes," Algernon said.

"Me. What about me?"

"I smelled your name the moment you walk through those doors, _Tim Lyons._ Your parents named you well. Not much else to say."

"I don't want 'well.' I want another name. Tim is boring."

"Tim is you, and you are Tim. It is best for you and everyone that you keep it." Algernon's tone dropped. "Do not fear, son. They love you just as much."

Tim's face blushed. He raised his shoulders, preparing to say something else, but nothing came.

"Now, Nick." Algernon shuffled over. He glared at his forehead for what seemed an eternity. Finally, he sniffed, clicked his tongue, and scrubbed Nick's forehead with his palm.

"What's your shoe size, Steward?"

"Uhm." Nick looked down to his muddy tennis shoes. "Well, where I'm from, ten in men's, but these are getting tight."

"Yes. You could have many names, son. Many names," Algernon said to himself. He looked quickly to Grand but said nothing. After a moment, the Collirian reached deep into his pocket, pulled out a silver key, and opened a cabinet stationed next to the brass doors. He took one more glance at Nick, unlocked a silver chest, and pulled out a thin blue book.

Algernon was a few paces away from Nick when Tim leapt from his seat, grabbed the blue book from his hand, and raced into the room of naming. The brass doors slammed after him.

"Come out of there this instant, young man!" Algernon commanded.

"Tim." Grand stood up.

The sound of a door locking came from the other side.

"I—I just want a new name," Tim called back.

"Your name is not a prophecy, but a path of your life if. . . ."

Grand's and Algernon's eyes met. Some understanding passed between the two, and they left Tim alone.

It was another twenty minutes before a disappointed Tim emerged from the room. "Stupid book." He threw the blue book to the ground and plopped back down on the couch. "That woman just sat there staring at me. Your book doesn't work."

"Impossible!" Algernon gently brushed dust from the rejected book. "I have never written a wrong book in my life."

"Yeah, but every page just says 'Tim'."

Algernon opened the book, revealing pages filled with the name "Tim" in sparkling gold letters. He looked at Tim with a twinkle in his eye. "Once again, I have never written a wrong book in my life."

At that, Algernon wiped the dust one more time and handed the blue book to Nick. He looked at the book for a moment, rose to his feet, and walked over to the brass doors.

The room was dark except for a silver podium in the middle. The air was dusty and hard to breathe. Immediately, sand fell from the ceiling like a waterfall. The brass doors closed, and the shadow of a woman appeared in the sandfall.

"Your name is not a prophecy, but a path of your life if you so choose. These names reflect your spirit as read by the Collirian. There are safe names, names of merchants and farmers, and there are dangerous names, names of heroes, leaders, and even villains. Every name has a meaning.

"You have a choice, grandson of the once steward." The woman's shadow spoke from the sandfall. "To fulfill your name and accept your future, or to turn from that, and be content with the simple life of a merchant, shopkeeper, or farmer. It comes to your name."

Nick plopped the book down on the podium and flipped it open. He began skimming.

Name ~ Meaning of Name

Derin: Precious, present . . .

Dwight: White, fair . . .

Leif: Beloved descendant . . .

Morgan: Lives by the sea . . .

Then he saw _that_ name:

Nikolas: Victory of the people.

Not Nick, like on his birth certificate, but Nikolas, Grand's name for him. The name that every steward has carried for, well, at least eleven generations. Nick's eyes dropped down a few more names. Nike . . . Niles . . . Norman. He could choose one of those? A non-steward name, a non-steward life. But how could he disappoint Grand and break the eleven generation tradition?

When Grand told him about his stewardship two nights ago in Colorado City, it had sounded fun—like being some magical rock star or something. Now it was all starting to get really complicated. He had spent most of his time worrying about his friends and the city of Huron. If he didn't choose Nikolas, the drama could be left for someone else. Maybe Tim? But why did Nick come to Huron? It was the life for him, right? A magical, wonderful life filled with boats that breathe and cities that speak. Nick felt a smile creep across his face.

He wanted this.

Nick breathed, letting the words tumble out. "Nikolas. I choose Nikolas."

"Nikolas," the woman said. "A name from the Weilmin race, the north men of Fareiss, before the settling of the Huron Valley and the cooling of the great fires. It means "Victory of the People." You have chosen a brave and _dangerous_ name."

A mirage rolled across the sand revealing several enigmatic images.

A dark hand reached for Xanthus. . . . A cage covered in burlap growled. . . . A man held a knife while a shadow looked on. . . . Nikolas lost in a desert. . . . A massive battle between the brother worlds and across the great tether.

"You will see joy and pain and all that comes with the stewardship over the great city of Huron. You will give freedom to races but cause the betrayal of brothers. I, Lady of the Hypsus Lake, have seen it. You must understand. Your life will be spent, not on your own pursuits, but on the protection of your city, its valley, and someday, the brother worlds."

The Lady of Hypsus Lake's eyes focused and locked with his. Nikolas suspected she didn't usually do that.

"This is irrevocable. The fate of everyone you know and love shall rest upon you. Are you sure, my dear Nick?"

"Yes," Nick said with finality.

"So be it," she said quietly. Then her voice rose, and she raised her hands. "Nick is no longer! Nikolas has come to be! And now, go bear the responsibility of your name, _Steward_."

The Lady suddenly moved her gaze away from Nikolas and to the door as if she expected something.

Crash!

"Xanthus!" Caroline screamed from the other side of the door.

Nikolas jumped. He heard Caroline and Brandy scream again. He ran through the brass doors just in time to see Xanthus crumpled on the ground. He started to shake and foam spilled out of the edge of his mouth.

"Is jynn'us supposed to do that?" Daniel said, rising to his feet.

"He looks really bad, Grand," Nikolas said.

Their grandfather's words began to tumble out. "This—This is no jynn'us. Algernon. Call the doctor, now!"

"Right away," Algernon said.

"I won't!" Xanthus yelled. "Shut up. I won't."

"What's wrong? Who are you talking to?" Grand said.

"A voice. A voice is telling me—It's saying—aagh!" Xanthus's eyes rolled toward the back of his head.

"You said he had jynn'us?" Daniel said to Grand. "That's why he was sick."

"Jynn'us has many adverse reactions, but nothing so violent, I'm afraid," Grand said. "This is quite sinister."

CHAPTER SEVEN

  aniel studied his half-brother. "Will Xanthus be all right?"

"I do not know," Grand said. "Where is that doctor—ah, quickly now, Dr. Bagnull!"

"I'm coming!" A squat old man had just opened the front door and was removing a wide-brimmed hat. "No need to tear up the rafters. A masseuse would do you wonders, Mr. Lyons."

Dr. Bagnull was dressed in all black. A leather chest with talons for feet sprinted after the quick-footed man. He snapped his fingers. The lid opened its mouth and showed an accordion of shelves stocked with hundreds of shaking, boiling, and murmuring bottles. He grabbed a jar labeled 'Anatoleech,' plucked out a black leech-looking creature, and shoved it over Xanthus's ear. The doctor put a second anatoleech on his own ear.

"So it's not his jynn'us?" Daniel asked.

"No, I'm afraid not," Dr. Bagnull took a deep breath. "He's a dusty, right?"

They all returned a blank expression.

"The boy is Earthside?"

"Yeah," Nikolas answered.

"Was he bitten by a tooth-footed mantis or fall into a morf's pit, perhaps?"

They all shook their heads.

"He was attacked," Nikolas said. "A creature attacked him on the Mottle Craw."

Xanthus pulled out a wrinkled piece of paper from his suit coat and handed it to Dr. Bagnull, who raised it to his own rounded spectacles. Xanthus had sketched a creature's eye stuck between two aero boards and a hand sticking out.

"Well, is this it?" Dr. Bagnull held up Xanthus's drawing. "I can't make anything of that."

"Can you help him, Dr. Bagnull?" asked Grand.

"This is no good, sir." Dr. Bagnull pulled the leech from his ear with a _thwu-pop_. "His insides are being mucked up something fierce, being changed all around. He needs serious medical attention. I do believe this creature you speak of has affected him in some terrible way, but what, I do not know. Did it attack any others?"

"Yeah," Nikolas said. "It killed them. They were just a pile of goo before turning to stone. . . . Grand?" His eyes got big. "Is that going to happen to Xanthus?"

"It—" Grand caught his words. "It is no use speculating right now, lad."

"But it is," Nikolas said, looking back at Xanthus. "He's turning to stone!"

"Afraid I can do nothing else for the boy." Dr. Bagnull shook his head.

"You're a man of science," Daniel said, his brow squeezing together. "What do you mean you can do nothing? That is unacceptable."

"Laddie." Dr. Bagnull glanced sidelong at Daniel. "I can snap a broken bone back into place, dismember bad appendages, or remove a wankapuk from yer bowels, but this here be out of me league. You need a jynn'geon."

"Excuse me?" Daniel said.

"Jynn'geon. A doctor with jynn'us, of course. You know, inner magic."

"This is absolutely unacceptable," Daniel rubbed his bald scalp, groaning. "Even the doctor is a superstitious charlatan."

"Then a jynn'geon is what we'll get," Grand declared. His eyes and hands lit with jynn'us, and he lifted Xanthus like a puppy. "Algernon, do you have any kind of transportation? I do not trust the cabbies in this part of town late at night. No offense, friend."

"I wouldn't blame you. I'll have my footman draw up Gibbur. One of my best crows. Knows his way about the city."

Grand had a last exchange with Algernon and slipped him a few sulmare coins. Within moments, they were standing in the mud-racked streets, waiting for Algernon's footman to draw the carriage.

After a few minutes, a very large beak peaked out between the Hall of Pickings and Pete's Treats store. The footman appeared with reigns in his hands. He gave them a tug, and a crow twice the size of the man took two steps, gave him a questioning caw, and walked out with a stagecoach in tow.

It stepped toward Nikolas. Tree trunk-sized talons kicked and kneaded the mud until it stood proudly before him. Most birds' eyes looked small and indiscernible, but Gibbur's eyes were great dark orbs that darted between the kids and the footman.

Nikolas had never felt so small.

Soon they were crammed into Gibbur's stagecoach. With a lurch, the stagecoach was airborne. They flew over the city through Wainscot Pass and toward Manor Major.

Nikolas looked around the coach. Helen was shaking from another bout of jynn'us, Xanthus clutched the silk lining as if begging for relief, and Daniel studied his sick brother with a dreadful expression.

Nikolas sighed.

Everyone was falling apart.

The lady at the Hall of Pickings said this would all be on him. She sure wasn't kidding. Looking at Xanthus, he was reminded of stories about an overly particular mother who paid some geneatric doctor a fortune to have her unborn child genetically modified. She requested that her daughter's hair color be changed from curly red to platinum blond. The doctor happily performed the surgery and began injecting the embryo with gene therapy, trying to reprogram the genetic code. Instead of giving birth to a blondheaded girl, the mother gave birth to six redheaded boys. Nikolas felt like the father of six teenagers.

And one of them was about to turn into stone and _die_.

Tim tightened his grip on the pressers in his hands. The magical instruments looked like fireplace blowers; one could magically shrink and suck up large objects into its small space. At the moment, both contained their mime parents from Earth, which Grand had had Tim and Xanthus store away. He had told them to do it because the mimes had been poisoned by scuccas. He needed to slow down its effect so that he could find a cure.

"Are they comfortable in these, Grand?" Tim said. "They won't die if they stay squeezed in here, will they?"

"No," Grand said. "Tuckland giants have been known to stay asleep in a presser for one hundred years at a time."

"And our parents?" Tim said. "Our real ones. What will happen to them?"

"Well," Grand said. "They were nearly dead when I found them, so I put them in stope."

"Stope?" Tim said.

"It is a kind of magical substance that keeps them suspended until I can find a cure. I'll do the same thing to these mimes once I de-press them and secure them down in the vault underneath Manor Major."

Tim looked down to the handle of one presser. Its wooden handle had lost its varnish and was starting to chip. He pulled off one of the exposed splinters.

"I don't even know them," Tim said, flicking the piece of wood away. His voice dropped to a whisper. "My real parents. Were they nice? Do you—do you think they'll like me?"

"Of course they will!" Grand said. "My son was a good man. A bit quiet, but he loved you both. And your mother was a strong, temperamental woman. She loved you with every bit of that strength. Both of them will love you just fine."

Their grandfather sat up and pulled back the curtain. He growled to himself, "Manor Major looks unkempt."

At the moment that the great crow landed the carriage on Manor Major's ragged lawn, Grand scooped Xanthus up and launched out of the carriage. They scrambled out, trying to keep up with Grand as he sprinted up the wet stone steps. It seemed that nothing could slow him down even when carrying Xanthus's two hundred and thirty pound body weight through a torrent of rain and mud.

Between the darkened sky and never-ending rain, it was hard to take in Manor Major. Nikolas could only make out the spires and towers that guarded a six-story mansion. The house was made of great hewn stones. In various places were semicircular windows with wooden awnings.

"It's the biggest house I've ever seen, Nikolas. I bet it has a parlor," Caroline said, as she guided a sick Helen slowly up the steps. She groaned with every step. "Right there, Helen, put your foot right there. And maybe a formal dining room, Brandy? Just like all those houses I used to read about in the digichives."

"This isn't a house," Brandy said clapping. "It's a castle, and I'm its social coordinator! I will plan all the balls and banquets and everything."

"Nice," Nikolas said. "Can you imagine the stairs in this place? It'll be like climbing a mountain."

Three flights of stone steps ended at a golden door stamped with the crest of a winged lion. Grand marched through a portico to a door and banged his boot against the lion's jaw three times, paused, and banged three more times. Nikolas heard the kicks reverberate through a large hall but no other sound.

Finally, the sound of slippers shuffled across a stone floor, and a rusty plate slid to the revelation of two trembling eyes. "Who's there?"

"Dangus," Grand said. "It's your lord, Mr. Lyons. I've a very ill lad in my clutches."

"Who's _there_?" repeated the voice, even more confused.

"Dangus," Grand said. "Have you lost your wits? Mr. Lyons, Lord of Manor Major. Open this door!"

"Mr. Lyons is dead. It's in the city records, sir."

"The city records are wrong, Dangus. I stand before you as living flesh! Now open this door. It's a matter of life and death."

"The city records are not wrong. Beg your pardon, strange fellow, but the city records are never wrong." Dangus rasped through the metal plate. "Well, except for me hair color. Obviously not a redhead. Never been one, that's for sure. More of a chestnut. Now, me great uncle on my mother's side, Mr. Willeforge, there's a redhead for ya, unless you stand him next to his brother, the finest redhead—"

"Stand back," Grand ordered the kids.

With Xanthus still in his arms, he raised his heel and rammed. The door blew apart, sending a shower of chips and splinters into the foyer.

There stood Dangus in a sleeping gown with eyes clenched, holding a snuffed-out candle. The force of the kick had flung his orange-white hair back into a mullet.

"Master?" Dangus's old blue eyes blinked in surprise.

Grand stepped around him and gently laid Xanthus onto the stone floor.

"Call a jynn'geon immediately, Dangus," Grand ordered.

"It's—it's—oh, Mr. Lyons! It's you, sir!" Dangus ran to Grand with outstretched arms. "You've come back. You're not dead. Aauuhh! You're back, sir. You're back, you're back! Oh, you're back."

Nikolas walked carefully over the wood chips and across the stone floor etched with a winged lion. Two staircases were on each side of the room, and a large corridor cut through the middle leading to a blazing fire pit. The corridor was decorated in tapestries embroidered with strange creatures or at least strange to six kids who had just come from the space-age future.

Nikolas took a deep breath and smiled. Manor Major smelled sweet, like someone had been cooking all day.

Like _home_.

Dangus was still leaping up and down. "Malmedy! Malmedy! She will be pleased to see you, sir. It's been so long. You're here for good, right? Please say you're staying. Oh, we thought you dead! It's in the city records, you know." He cried into their grandfather's chest.

"I've heard." Grand's anger ebbed away as the elderly servant deposited teary snot all over his coat.

Dangus started to quiver, and Nikolas heard the sound of a balloon shrinking.

"Ahh!" Caroline screamed. "What's happening to him?" On the floor was a redheaded baby in some type of pink dress and bib, crying with its arms outstretched.

"Dangus," Grand commanded.

There was another sound of a balloon stretching, and Dangus was back to his old self. "Sorry, master. The jynn'us has been so hard to control. You've been gone, and I'm getting up in years. Just had me seven hundred and fifty-second birthday last Tuesday."

"We will celebrate another time," Grand said. "But first, fetch a jynn'geon. Also—" Grand grabbed the pressers from Tim. "Take these two pressers down to be de-pressed. Store them next to Nikolas and Tim's parents down in the vault."

"Mom and Dad?" Tim perked up.

"What have we got in here?" Dangus held the pressers up.

"They're the mimes I brewed just before I left. Copies of Nikolas and Tim's true parents. Make sure to use the correct amount of stope."

"Right you are," Dangus said. "Jynn'geon. De-press, then stope. Jynn'geon. De-press, then . . . " Dangus mumbled as he scampered out of the room.

"Lawdy, Mr. Lyons, that you?" A plump, black woman stood at the front of the hallway. She was wearing a polka dot dress and an apron smothered in flour. Nikolas remembered Grand's words, "You wouldn't know it by looking at them, but a good deal of Prams came to Earth in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. They landed in the southern United States and were immediately enslaved by the local plantation owners."

"Malmedy." Grand nodded.

"Oh, I's can't believe it. You's com' back!" Bubbly tears began to erupt, and Malmedy bounded over to Grand with powdered fingers. Grand prepared himself for the second wave of tears. She flung her face into his chest, mumbling on about "desperate times" and "we was goin' to dies without you!"

Malmedy finally looked up. "I'm so sorry! Bet ya'll starving." Her nose lit jynn'us blue, and a breeze swept through the room. A large tray appeared with ceramic mugs, one frothy pitcher, and dark fudge piled high atop a pewter plate. Nikolas's stomach growled instantly. Caroline took the first ceramic mug and began pouring while the rest went straight for the fudge.

"Ya'll _were_ hungry!" Malmedy giggled.

"This is wonderful," Caroline said, froth slipping down her chin. "It's making my fingers tingle. And it tastes like chocolate but not quite. May I have the recipe?"

"That's harjuice," Malmedy said. "And we have our own harberry farm right here at Oxbar Estates. Finest producer of harberry in all a' Huron. Well, not no more. Our crops are gone t' seed, and we have to ship our harberries from Lichvale. That sheriff's run off all the work hands, lawdy. And Manor Major's gone to ruin!" Malmedy began the tearful mumbling again.

"Caroline," Brandy groaned. "Put that back. We're not poor little refugee kids anymore. We're royalty now."

Caroline was holding pieces of fudge over the gaping hole of her purse, looking guiltily at Malmedy.

"You from the orphanage, honey chil'?" Malmedy wiped a tear with her floury thumb. "They done starve you over there, I 'spects. You don't need to be sneakin' food away."

Caroline shook her head. "No. It's not like that. I like to have food on hand when we're out, you know."

Nikolas knew that wasn't the whole truth. If you didn't hoard food at the refugee camps, you might not eat for a couple of days.

"Ooh, I like that, Mr. Lyons," Malmedy said. "She's thrifty _and_ always looking out for others. Well, go on ahead, honey chil'. I'll get you a bag, and if that ain' enough for—" Malmedy saw Xanthus for the first time. "Oh my! What's wrong with that boy's face?"

Grand lifted Xanthus up. "Come, all of you. I'll show you to your rooms."

"Tim will need to—" Grand swung around. "Where's Tim? What has happened to your brother, Nikolas!?"

"Tim told Dangus he wanted to see his _real_ mom and dad," Caroline said, "in the vault. Dangus thought it'd be all right."

Grand closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and growled, "Like herding cats." He turned to Malmedy. "Can you prepare a room for Xanthus while I see to Tim down in the vault?"

CHAPTER EIGHT

  t had taken at least a five minute ride in a rickety steel carriage lowered down by a large bicycle chain before Nikolas and Grand arrived at the vault. They found Dangus sorting out their mime parents while Tim looked on. The vault itself felt solemn, contemplative. Grand explained that it was hewn from one massive rock, which explained the granite walls. Evidently, Grand's great-great-great-grandfather had dragged it all the way from an ancient quarry in County Keif, the western edge of Huron. The stone was absolutely impenetrable due to its ancient magical properties. Like many other things in Möon, magic grew stronger with age.

A green hue emanating from four glass cases framed in iron served as the only light source. Dangus had just de-pressed and sealed the mimes inside their own cases. He was now raising a small tin box with a rubber tube running from it into their mime-mom's case. The device reminded Nikolas of an old jack-in-the-box, complete with a spindly crank.

"Who pressed the mimes?" Dangus said.

"I did," Tim said distantly. "Xanthus and I pressed them. Back on Earth."

That felt like ages ago now. Nikolas remembered Tim's disgusted look while trying to get their mime-mom's finger into the presser and how Xanthus had almost popped their mime-dad when he had pressed too hard. After all they had experienced, sucking another person inside a fireplace blower seemed like nothing now.

"They were pressed just fine, Mr. Tim Lyons," Dangus said. "We'll have them swaddled and preserved before long." The elderly servant bobbed his head back and forth as he turned the crank. A green smoke slithered out of the rubber tube and around their mime-mom, swaddling her in some foggy shell.

It took a second for Nikolas's vision to adjust, but he saw his real parents lying in their own glass cases just on the other side of Dangus. He could feel Tim's nervous energy and his desire to run over there. Sensing his grandson's intent, Grand led him to their parents.

Nikolas stayed put.

"There has been no decay." Grand laid both hands on their real mom's case. "Good, good. I swabbed them in stope—the green substance."

"They're not dead?" Tim said, green reflecting off his face.

"No, Tim. Near death. If it hadn't been for the stope, they would be. The scuccas used a poison unfamiliar to me. I dare not take them out until I can find a counterhex."

"I'll find one," Tim said, wiping his eyes. "I'll make them better."

Grand looked to Tim and smiled. "Yes, yes. I believe you will, Tim." He slipped an arm over his grandson, who pressed his lips together in a vain attempt to stop his tears.

_Why would Tim cry about this?_ Nikolas thought as he began to walk over to them. _It's not like we even knew them._ He looked down to his real dad.

He couldn't look away.

"They—um, they look, you know, they look the same," Nikolas said, suddenly finding himself stumbling over words. For no apparent reason, a lump swelled in his own throat.

But he still couldn't look away.

_What the heck? Why am I getting all blubbery about this?_ Nikolas thought. His real dad looked _just_ like mime-dad. There was nothing to get shocked over. He looked at the mime-dad to compare. Sure enough, mime-dad was an exact duplicate. He had the same cleft chin, blond hair, and high brows. He dared to glance back over to his real dad. He didn't understand it, but something really was different. His real dad looked like, well, a good dad.

As that lump in his throat swelled again, he understood a little more why Tim had responded the way he had. Nikolas had always believed that if he could just find his place, his home, life would be better. But his brother had always believed that if he could just find his _family_ , his real parents, life would be better. If Tim had a good dad, maybe he would win a few fights against the bullies, maybe he would take charge more, maybe he would even ask Helen out. What if that's what Nikolas had really needed all along too?

A good dad.

Without warning, the metal carriage opened, and the vault filled with Harynne guards.

"What is the meaning of this?" Grand bunched his fists.

"Mr. Lyons," one Harynne said. Nikolas recognized him from their trip on the Mottle Craw earlier. It was Captain Shaw. "The city council wishes an audience with you."

"Captain Shaw?" Grand was caught off guard but quickly collected himself. "I wish to have an audience with them as well _,_ but I am burdened with a host of youth long overdue for shelter and bedding."

"It was not a request, sir." Captain Shaw leaned in. "My deepest apologies, Mr. Lyons, but you must come at once. The prime minister has turned to stone."

"What?" Grand squared with the Harynne. "Prime Minister Shale? The Merrow? We saw him but two hours ago, if that!"

"It is true." Captain Shaw nodded. "And now the city council has put all of Huron on alert. We, the Harynne guard, have been sent on a citywide roundup. An inquiry is being made. We are collecting all evidence regarding this creature that attacked the prime minister and your companion, Xanthus. We've even intercepted a Yeri Willrow, who claims to be able to shed light on these attacks, but he will only speak to the steward of Huron."

"I do not know this Yeri Willrow," Grand said.

"He claims to have a message from the Merrows," Captain Shaw said. "He had an altercation two weeks ago when the Merrows were attacked off the coast of Eynclaene. You must come now."

"I'm afraid it will have to wait," Grand said. "Mr. Kobayashi is ill, gravely so. Even now we are searching for a doctor to attend his illness."

"This is not a request, sir."

"Be reasonable, elf!" Grand said. "I cannot drag him and all his company back to Huron for some ridiculous inquiry. Not at this time of night."

"I am sorry, Mr. Lyons," Captain Shaw said. "But Sheriff Silas and the council said no exceptions unless dead. Even then we have permission to revive."

"I care not what Sheriff Silas thi—"

"Huron takes and takes, does she not?" A broken voice came from the metal carriage.

Grand squinted into the shadow. "Silas? Silas Gorringe?"

The sheriff stepped around Captain Shaw and two feet from Nikolas. On seeing Silas, he tried not to flinch. The man was wrapped completely from head to toe in a thin rubber suit with iron cuffs at the ankles and wrists. A black velvet cowl covered his head and velvet gloves his hands. He wore goggle-shaped glasses. The only exposed parts of his body were two black eyes and lips as shriveled as dried mushrooms. Everywhere he traveled, a gray-blue mist poured from his hands. Sheriff Silas was followed by his son, Beronn Gorringe, who had a bandaged shoulder and a scowl directed at Grand.

"I believe you two met earlier on the Mottle Craw." Silas held his hand out to Grand and Beronn. "My lawyer will be in contact soon for tossing my son clear across Huron and causing bodily harm against his person. Are we barbarians, Lyons?"

Something stirred from behind the sheriff. It turned out to be a sad-looking girl. She was either twelve or severely malnourished. Her hair was stringy, her eyes sallow and unblinking. Her face looked downcast, but when she caught site of Nikolas, she locked eyes. That sad, dead expression stayed on him as if she were in a trance.

"Hold this, Polythana, while I put the room in order." Silas slipped out a red notebook. She clutched the book but didn't move her eyes from Nikolas.

"This vault is quite filthy." He moved both hands to the ground. The gray-blue mist fell from his fingertips. It spread around Nikolas's tennis shoes, making them sizzle. It continued to move over the floor of the room and climb up the walls. Soon the entire room was covered with the strange mist, and it crackled like a vat of hot oil. The mist quickly dissipated, leaving behind pale stone walls.

"Much better," Silas let out a sigh. "Now, the reason for our visit. As Captain Shaw informed you, the council requests your presence immediately."

"How the devil did you become the sheriff?" Grand said. "I left Mr. Bromley as acting steward."

"He was incompetent," Silas said. "Had a nervous breakdown from what I hear. Or brainworms. I'm not sure. Either way, the council appointed me and generously changed my title from steward to sheriff to allow more leeway."

"What happened to your face, man?" Grand squinted. "Why are you covered in that suit? Last I saw you, you were courting every woman from here to Plymont Village."

"I am not the one on trial," Silas said. "You are, Mr. Lyons. As always, your kind seems to leave behind a wake of chaos, and the council would like to know the connection between your party and this beastly attack on the Mottle Craw."

"I do not have time for your games." Grand's voice rose. "In my absence, you snaked your way into authority."

"I agree," Silas said. "I tire of games, also. Too many lives are played with, too many hearts treated like so much trash. But you will attend the council. Let me speak plainly, Mr. Lyons. You have already been stripped of the title of steward due to your extended absence. You are now a common citizen held to the common civil authorities. If you and your company do not report to the council immediately, the Harynne are to escort you by force. And, Lyons, I hope it has not been so long that you have forgotten how effective the Harynne's method of subduing can be, jynn'us or not."

Without another word, Sheriff Silas walked to the metal carriage. Polythana, however, stood unmoved. During the entire encounter with Grand and Silas, she had fixated on Nikolas while tightening her grip around that red notebook. It was uncertain whether she thought Nikolas was an oddity or if she was about to ask him to save her from the sheriff.

"Polythana!" Silas yelled. "Come now, you worthless dung scrap!"

Polythana snapped out of her trance and scurried to the carriage. She hopped in quickly and, with eyes on Nikolas, slid the iron doors shut.

"I'll see you momentarily, Mr. Lyons," Sheriff Silas said. "Captain Shaw will escort you himself."

Grand stood frozen. His eyes bore into the sheriff as they stepped into the carriage. The pistons whistled, and they began moving upward. For a moment, there was no other noise except the clanking metal of the carriage rising to ground level and then back down. Nikolas could see his grandfather's jynn'us swell between his fingertips as his anger grew. But after a long breath, the blue glow dissipated, and he began a slow quiet walk to the carriage.

CHAPTER NINE

  he stagecoach lurched and leapt through the air with every beat of Gibbur's wings, causing Xanthus's head to loll about and his legs to flop over, which pushed Helen's knee into Daniel's thigh, whose cane pressed Tim's foot into Caroline's ankle. It was a maelstrom of elbows and knees.

"Where are we going _now_?" Nikolas yelled over the pounding rain.

"Roggen Tree," Grand said. "We are to give testimony to the Mottle Craw attacks."

"I was personally asked to escort you," Captain Shaw said, "and for that I am glad. The Harynne have always respected your leadership, Steward Lyons." He looked around the cabin as if someone was listening. "We need it now more than ever."

"Huron doesn't speak to me anymore," Grand said. "I am no longer the steward."

Questioning and sadness filled Captain Shaw's expression.

"He is." Grand nodded to Nikolas.

Captain Shaw visually inspected the insolent teenage boy, but Nikolas couldn't return his gaze.

"Ah, yes," Captain Shaw said. "The lad who almost incinerated the Mottle Craw. I remember. And so does port master Beronn."

Nikolas found the courage to look at Captain Shaw after all. "That's because your crazy boss was about to use a skullduggery on Xanthus's brain."

"A very young steward too," Captain Shaw said, ignoring Nikolas's outburst. "May I assume the voice no longer speaks to you, Mr. Lyons?"

"Yes," Grand said. "She now speaks to him. Isn't that right, Nikolas?"

"Yeah," Nikolas said, turning back to the window. "That's right."

A wall of rain punched the flying stagecoach. Hands went out; stomachs went up.

"A real northerly," Captain Shaw said. "Fall is on our doorstep. Ah. The Roggen Tree."

Gibbur leveled out the stagecoach, allowing Nikolas to catch a glimpse of the Roggen Tree. A small mountain twisted from Loch Huron's eastern shore. Houses and manors dressed its slopes with a great oak tree as the crown. It was such a large tree that passing clouds sifted between its leaves and branches. It created a sort of canopy over Mt. Lycenius, and its enormous roots swirled in and out of the grassy knoll, elbowing the earth over and over.

Gibbur made a couple of passes around the great tree before landing softly at an obsidian gate.

Just as Grand was about to light up his jynn'us and carry Xanthus, Nikolas wedged himself between them. He slipped an arm around Xanthus's suit jacket. "I've got him, Grand."

Xanthus leaned with all of his two hundred and thirty crushing pounds.

"See . . . Not . . . heavy . . . at . . . all," Nikolas lied. Air was hard to come by, and he thought his back would break. Daniel hobbled over and slipped his free arm under Xanthus.

"Are you sure?" Nikolas said to Daniel.

Daniel winced as Xanthus's weight pushed him back onto his bad leg. "He is my half-brother."

Grand nodded and turned.

They followed Captain Shaw from the stagecoach past the gate and through wooden doors carved into the tree trunk. He led them down a corkscrew stairwell into a domed chamber.

The room wasn't made of building material, rather a cyclone of roots. In a time before, someone had taken the unique root growth and formed it into a hall.

"Why does a city council meet under a tree?" Nikolas questioned.

"Wisdom thrives well at the roots," Grand answered without slowing his pace. "Pray that hasn't changed."

They made their way down another stairwell so narrow that it was nearly impossible to manage Xanthus. Nikolas heard Daniel's gasps and grunts as his own lower back started to ache. After ten minutes of slow, awkward steps, they came to a passageway where Nikolas could hear the murmur of voices.

Someone called out from the passageway, "Captain Shaw, they must be cleansed first." A very young Harynne guard stepped into the light of the kerosene.

"Guard," Captain Shaw said, "this is Mr. Lyons and his grandson, Nikolas, who happens to also be the Steward of Huron. Do they really need to be cleansed?"

"Sheriff's orders. He cannot stand for any impurities. Sorry, sir. It will only burn for a second."

Gears clacked from the ceiling, and copper hoses wormed out.

"Does it hurt?" Tim said.

"Depends on how dirty you are," the guard said.

"Hey, Mr. Elfling, dude," Brandy said, "can we get some shampoo? My hair is beyond disgus—owww!"

Amber liquid sprayed them, sizzling every hair and freckle, and felt like the cold vaporous touch of gasoline. Nikolas almost dropped a squirming Xanthus.

"Does it clean the skin off you?" Nikolas ground his teeth.

Grand was the only one who didn't flinch. He stood like a totem pole.

A mad totem pole.

Eventually, the brass hoses retreated, leaving everyone's skin feeling stretched and cracked.

"You are ready to see the counc—" The guard started to speak, but stopped when he saw Xanthus. "What is wrong with that boy? The sheriff will not allow any diseased person in his presence."

"If the sheriff will not permit him inside, then he is free to visit me at Oxbar Estates. I am in no mood for fastidious milksops!"

The Harynne guard nodded. Iron doors opened with a dull groan, and they stepped into the chamber. The Roggen Tree roots were thinner in this chamber room.

Several strange creatures sat on wooden thrones, each with their own podium. A violet rug in the middle of the room suggested a place for the visitors to stand. At that moment, a Harynne guard stood at a podium, looking back at them as if he'd been interrupted.

"Mr. Lyons." A grizzly bear, wearing a golden robe and wiry spectacles, stood to his feet.

"Japateurga." Grand nodded to the bear. "I have a gravely ill boy and a lassie in the throes of jynn'us, so let's make this quick."

"We summoned you here regarding the Mottle Craw incident. But first, Lieutenant Quillens was in the middle of a report regarding Prime Minister Shale." Japa sat down and nodded to the Harynne at the podium.

"As I said," Lieutenant Quillens continued. "After Mr. Lyons turned the merman, Prime Minister Shale, over to us, we escorted him from the ship. Within minutes of deboarding, he had to relieve himself. We were forced to stop at Ms. Havisham's Wedding Cakes and Dresses."

Xanthus's lean had turned into a slump, making it even more difficult for Nikolas to keep his own head up. Still, he managed to take note of the council members.

Bigling Representative ~ Charnock

_It looks like a trollish boulder sporting Benjamin Franklin's clothes,_ Nikolas thought.

Creachling Representative ~ Japa

A grizzly bear that looks like he enjoys reading and long walks on the riverbank.

Faerling Representative ~ Tulus

Jane Austen with pointy ears.

Midgling Representative ~ Ludwig

Empty chair.

Humling Representative ~ Silas

_What's she doing in the sheriff's chair?_ Nikolas thought. The sad-looking girl, Polythana, whom he had just seen in the vault, sat with dangling feet on the dark oak chair. She kept her face down until she caught site of Nikolas and locked eyes with him again.

Creepy.

Nikolas shook his head and forced himself to look away. He caught the last part of Lieutenant Quillens's report.

"After twenty minutes had passed in the lavatory, we knew something had gone ill with Prime Minister Shale, but it was too late. The merman had already begun the transmutation into stone. I did hear something scramble from the bathroom window and am led to believe he was attacked by the same creature from the Mottle Craw."

"First, Mr. Waters, now, the prime minister," said the trollish boulder whose nameplate read "Charnock." "This is a travesty, a travesty, indeed. What did you do with the body?"

"The Merrow delegate, Mrs. Parcel, suddenly appeared and insisted on taking it. The body is in her care now for further examination and proper stratification, as the Merrows call it. In plain language, to make sure it turns to stone properly."

While Lieutenant Quillens finished his sentence, steps echoed from the stairs, followed by the sound of the copper cleaners. The door opened, and Sheriff Silas walked to his chair.

"Polythana," Silas said, ordering the sallow-eyed girl out of his seat. He cautiously removed a red book and gave it to her, followed by his cloak. "Be sure to keep it from the ground if you can manage even that."

She nodded quickly, like an old dog that had been beaten repeatedly.

"Let us continue our inquiries. Guards!" Silas called across the room. "Bring in Mr. Yeri Willrow now.

"As I told you, two weeks ago, my Harynne officers found a Yeri Willrow wandering near the Mottle Craw, asking for the Steward of Huron. He told Officer Taperwick that he hailed all the way from Gromwell village. Claims to have a message from Lir, Duke of Eynclaene. It is to be delivered to the Steward of Huron."

Several footsteps and a cockney accent echoed on the other side of the door. "What are those tubes for? A cleansing? Thank the tether . . . Haven't had a shower in weeks . . . how dirty am I? Why would that—mataaaagghhh!" The voice squealed. "Turn those vile things off! Ghaaahh! It burns."

The Harynne guards escorted a man who looked as frail and limp as the scroll he was clutching.

"I am—I am Yeri Willrow. Senior stagecoach driver of Fungma—"

"Yes, we know," Japa said. "You are here as part of an investigation of the highest order. Speak, Mr. Willrow."

Yeri looked from Sheriff Silas to Japa. "I have this message from the mermaid—uh, er—mer—merman, uh, Lir, Duke of Eynclaene! See his seal! And . . . and he requires, requests, relishes, ah, your help—the steward's help! Under great distress by foul, nasty-breathed creatures, really wicked, nasty ones you wouldn't be introducing to your mother, if you gather. And at least a dozen Dujinnin fleets off the coast. Waterdragons. And snakes . . . actually serpents. Leviathan, I believe. I came as quickly as I could but was detained by the blacksmith Mullen. She couldn't believe the duke would entrust a man like myself with such an important task. She pegged me for a liar."

"You claimed you could help us with these attacks on Mr. Shale and the prime minister?" Japa said.

"Yes," Yeri said. "In this call for help, they reveal a dark secret that will aid you in preventing the foul's attacks. I would have shared this earlier if I had not been detained for several days by your guards!"

The council members exchanged a few whispers and then Japa commanded, "Bring it here, Mr. Willrow."

Yeri took a step forward but halted. "I can do no such thing, Mr. Bear. Uh, Your Honor Bear. I was sworn to secrecy on my life, sir! This is sensitive information regarding the fouls. I've been instructed to give the message only to the Steward of Huron and no other. It's hexed and will destroy the hand of anyone else."

Sheriff Silas held a velvet hand out. "That would be me. As Steward—"

"Steward!" Grand bellowed.

"Yes, _steward_. I have already explained this to you, Mr. Lyons. My duties as sheriff have subsumed the steward's responsibilities."

"You are no steward, Silas. You dare claim the voice speaks to you?"

"Forgive me, Lyons. Do you?" Silas said.

"I do!" Nikolas said, trying to stand as straight as possible under Xanthus's weight. "I'll read the scroll. I hear her voice."

"Forgive me?" Japa said. "No one has ever received the steward's voice under the age of one hundred."

"Nikolas is different," Grand said.

"No matter how special he might be," Japa said, pinching his furry brow together. "It is impossible, Lyons. The voice of Huron speaking to a mere boy? Besides, there is no reason to believe that Huron's voice has not passed to Silas."

"Pardon me," Yeri said. "I'm more confused than a bat in a bottle. Who _is_ the steward?"

Grand grabbed Xanthus's shoulder, switching places with Nikolas. With his free hand, he directed Nikolas toward Yeri. Nikolas looked back to his grandfather who nodded reassuringly.

He crossed the room toward the strange little man holding the limp scroll. But before he even touched the scroll, Huron cried.

The Merrows lie about their true intent. They enter the city of Huron at the peril of us all.

The closer Nikolas edged to the scroll, the louder she spoke.

The Merrows lie about their true intent. They enter the city of Huron at the peril of us all.

Nikolas's index finger shook as it reached for the scroll.

The Merrows lie about their true intent. They enter the city of Huron at the peril of us all.

Nikolas tried to grip the ragged paper.

THE MERROWS LIE ABOUT THEIR TRUE INTENT. THEY ENTER THE CITY OF HURON AT THE PERIL OF US ALL!

"Tear it up!" Nikolas yelled. "Destroy it. Huron can't save them!"

"Destroy it!" Yeri looked mortified. "What the devil for? They need our help."

"Why don't you at least open it before destroying it, _Steward_?" Silas said.

"I can't," Nikolas said.

"You're right, Mr. Willrow," Silas said. "The hex can tell a false steward from a true one."

"That's not it. Huron won't let me open it. She doesn't want the Merrows here."

"Oh, of course she doesn't." Silas smirked. "How gullible do you think we are to listen to the babbling of a teenage boy?"

"Just cause you're too dumb to understand doesn't mean she's not talking to me," Nikolas shot back.

"Excuse me?" Yeri said. "I have given up employment and security to deliver this message, not to mention a good bath."

"Yes." The Harynne guard sniffed. "He speaks the truth."

"Tell me, stagecoach driver," Silas said. "Can you summarize the Merrows' need without compromising its message?"

"Summarize?" Yeri patted his stomach nervously. "I suppose. But there _are_ certain details I can share only with the steward, whomever that might be. The Merrows are in danger. The Dujinnin mean to take their treasure and—" For no apparent reason, Yeri grabbed his stomach, gasping. "Among other things, they are looking for refuge in Huron and military protection of the treasure."

"We are to grant this to them?" Silas said.

"Yes, in summary."

"They are afraid for their lives?"

"It is a concern."

"I'm sure it is more than a concern," Silas said, placing his gloved hand on his red notebook as if swearing an oath by it. He kept his eyes on it for a moment. His lips stretched into what Nikolas supposed to be a smile. "Of course, we will give the Merrows the finest protection Huron has to offer. Lieutenant Quillens, call six of your most suited Harynne battalions. Dispatch them to collect the duke and his kind. Employ a movir. Best have them enter through King's Highway. They can join their fellow Merrows in Creachborough. Be sure to have them all here by morning."

"No." Nikolas's voice trembled. "You have to keep them out of Huron! Don't let them—"

Grand silenced Nikolas with a squeeze of his collarbone.

"We will continue this line of questioning later, Mr. Willrow," Japa said. "Now, please, Mr. Lyons. To the reason we summoned you—you have a boy by the name of Xanthus who also encountered the devilish creature."

Grand stared at Japa for a moment. His disgust of the scene was evident, and Nikolas wondered if he would march out of the chamber without another word. Finally, he looked down to Xanthus. "Are you all right? Can you speak?"

His bottom lip fell open, and he groaned pitifully.

"You do not have to do this, Xanthus," Grand looked back at Japa. "The creature has effected him. He may need to rest."

"I'm good, I'm good. I want to help." Xanthus slipped from Grand's arm and moved toward the podium. His feet scrubbed the stone as he gave Nikolas a reassuring smile. "See. I'm—"

It looked like someone suddenly turned Xanthus off. He collapsed to the ground.

"Lad!" Grand bellowed. He looked at Sheriff Silas just as he ran over to Xanthus. "I told you he was in no capacity to come tonight!"

Xanthus writhed on the floor. Grand got to one knee, put a steady hand on him, but hesitated when he saw something. Xanthus squeezed his head, showing blistered hands.

Their grandfather jumped to his feet, "Guards, a jynn'geon, now! We need a jynn'geon of the highest order. I should have not brought you here, Xanthus. This was a mistake."

Xanthus looked at his blistered hand and then at Nikolas. His eyes were the color of mud. "What's happening to me, Nikolas?"

"Guards. Fetch Dr. Mendesmuss," Sheriff Silas said. "Quickly!"

After ten long minutes, the Harynne showed up with a somber-looking elf and a short, plump woman. Unlike the Harynne, this elfling didn't look Asian; rather, he had Malmedy's dark skin and almond eyes. He bowed slightly, introduced himself as Dr. Mendesmuss, and pointed an open palm to the woman he introduced as Ms. Butterhead. On seeing Xanthus, the jynn'geon rolled back his sleeves and slid off two black gloves. He asked for the patient's name. Grand replied, "Xanthus Kobayashi."

"Ms. Butterhead," Dr. Mendesmuss said, "root of crooked tree and two pinches of venushcrete, if you please."

Without a word, she opened a wicker basket. It was filled with bottles and satchels that twitched and rattled just like Dr. Bagnull's. With knowing hands, she pulled out a small wooden box and a vial and handed them to the elfling doctor.

"Lie flat on your stomach," Dr. Mendesmuss said. "Good. Now try to breathe slowly, Mr. Kobayashi."

Xanthus's breathing slowed down although his hands squeezed into little hooks. The doctor ripped open his suit coat and shirt. On seeing his back, whispers moved through the room. It looked like someone had injected swamp water under his skin. He sprinkled bits of root of crooked tree over the exposed skin and lathered his hands with the venuschrete.

"Now this might hurt a little," Dr. Mendesmuss said quietly. He closed his eyes and held his hand three inches above Xanthus's back. One blue spark leapt from his thumb followed by several more blue sparks, creating a small lightning storm. Xanthus's fists uncurled, and he stifled a cry.

"Fascinating . . . now, for the arm . . . hmm, quite fascinating . . . maybe . . . shh. I know it hurts. We're almost done." Dr. Mendesmuss moved to Xanthus's head. The blue sparks shone off his curly brown hair. "No, no, I'm mistaken," he said as he got to his feet. "He's been infected. This is a virus."

"Virus?" Nikolas looked to the elfling doctor.

"Yes," he said warily. "Is there something I should know?"

"Umm." Nikolas looked at Tim and bit his bottom lip. "Not really."

"Did he eat anything strange?" The elf doctor asked, wiping the creme from his hand with a handkerchief. "Encounter an unknown animal?"

"Dr. Bagnull asked the very same question," Grand said, peering around the room. "Who has the drawing?"

Xanthus slowly pulled the drawing of the Mottle Craw monster out of his pocket and handed it to Grand. He raised it up to Dr. Mendesmuss.

"Oh my!" Yeri yipped from behind the group. He shouldered his way through the crowd and grabbed the paper.

"Mr. Willrow?" Grand said.

"Forgive me, Mr. Lyons. I've seen this eye before, several of them, in fact. The day I drove the Merrows to their fortress. That is a foul, sir."

"A foul?" Dr. Mendesmuss said. "What is its nature?"

Yeri observed the almond-eyed doctor for a moment and shook his head. "I do not know. I've only seen its red eyes and smelled its breath. They chased us down the Eynclaene cliffside, breached the Merrow fortress, and attacked the mermen on the bridge."

"I have never seen this creature," Dr. Mendesmuss said. "But my zoology is limited. Could be it was carrying a disease—the unlings usually do."

"That thing was turning people to stone," Nikolas said.

"Stone?"

"Yeah. Prime Minister Shale said it turned people into stone."

"That's quite odd." He slipped the gloves back on. "I've never known a virus to turn people to stone. Could be though. Hmm . . . It is suspicious that—"

"Shut up! Shut up!" Xanthus yelled, thrashing his head back and forth.

"Forgive me. I—" Dr. Mendesmuss said.

"No. It's not you. It's the voice again," Xanthus said.

"What's it saying?"

"It's telling me—it's telling me to fall asleep and join the other children."

Dr. Mendesmuss nodded to himself. "Ms. Butterhead, please record."

The woman slipped out a small tablet and pencil.

"The patient, Xanthus Kobayashi, is fighting an unknown infection. This will make identifying the antiserum all the more difficult. Recommended medication at present to combat the infection—" Dr. Mendesmuss paused to look Xanthus over one more time. "Yes, yes. Tongue-of-galley trot, I'm certain. The elixir is to be administered until the cure is found or condition final."

Dr. Mendesmuss closed his basket of elixirs and handed it back to Ms. Butterhead. "Frankly, I cannot say for certain if he is actually turning into stone. Our first course of action is to understand what ails him. Then we'll be able to find the proper cure. All we do know is that he is changing, hence, the tongue-of-galley trot. It will abate that change but not forever. If a cure is not found by the Ferret Festival, he will be dead."

A quiet dread filled the room.

"Xanthus . . ." Nikolas said.

"What about us?" Tim's eyes rounded. "If it's a virus, could we catch what he has?"

"I do not know," Dr. Mendesmuss said. "Until we understand the nature of this creature, it is anyone's guess. Ms. Butterhead, the tongue-of-galley trot."

She slipped him a large molasses-colored vial. Dr. Mendesmuss held up the vial. "This will last him a week, Mr. Lyons. You will need to brew a new batch within seven days. Most importantly, he needs to rest. This is no place for a patient in his condition."

"I heartily agree," Grand nodded, picked up Xanthus, and began to walk to the exit.

"The investigation is not over, Mr. Lyons!" Sheriff Silas said. "We must question all parties involved. Where are you going?"

"Manor Major," Grand called out. "My home!"

"Not until we're done with our inquiry," Sheriff Silas said. "And besides, it is entirely impossible for you to return to Manor Major."

"Excuse me," Grand stopped.

"We as a council have decided that you are not fit to occupy Manor Major."

"What are you on about?" Grand said. "Manor Major is my home. This boy needs proper bedding and rest. I will not leave him, or the rest of Nikolas's company, out in the cold. We will return to Manor Major if I say we will return to Manor Major!"

"And you will be in violation of the city of Huron!" Silas yelled. He slipped out a starch white envelope, broke the seal, and flicked the paper open. "The council has already decided. Allow me to review the highlights. 'By decree of the council, Nikolas Lyons the 11th and companions are permitted neither to enter nor dwell in Manor Major. If he shows any sign of aggression, the Harynne guards are ordered to remove him by force.'"

"The council would never order this!" Grand looked between the sheriff and the rest of the council members.

Silas continued, "Mr. Lyons. You are no longer the steward since she has stopped speaking to you. And we cannot believe your fourteen-year-old, unruly grandson here has received the great and powerful voice of Huron. Manor Major is not only a home, but it is also a place of government for the steward. And it is uncertain whether you or your house shall retain that title. But please, I am not one to leave you destitute. You may stay in Manor Minor for the time being."

"You should dropkick him, Grand," Nikolas said.

The sheriff found Nikolas and let out a derisive chuckle. "Oh, little steward. Now it's your turn, Nikolas Lyons the 12th. It is your turn to have it all taken away. So many friends, so many responsibilities. How can one boy keep an eye on every single person? Huron would love to slip her tendrils through the seams of your company and pull you apart, one by one. Everything you have will be sucked out by her until all that remains is a husk. She's greedy like that. Are you ready, _Steward_?"

Grand turned around silently and walked out of the chamber.

The walk past Manor Major and toward Manor Minor was a muddy, miserable affair for Nikolas's designer tennis shoes. As he tried to find some semblance of dry ground, thoughts battered around his head. _Sheriff Silas won again, like Grand was a wuss or something. Why didn't Grand just chuck him out of the council room?_

"I done told you that Sheriff Silas was a bogworm." Malmedy's bottom lip curled as she readjusted the red and white polka dot handkerchief over her hair. "All sneaky and schemin' like that. I's not surprised, no I ain't!"

Dangus reassured them that Manor Minor was a splendid home, though it was not nearly as large as Manor Major. From their vantage point and in the middle of night, it seemed good enough. It was a simple two-story brick house, but trees enshrouded most of it.

After a few more minutes of breaths and steps, Dangus sped up with a cackle. "There ya go. A few repairs and she'll be like new."

On seeing the entire house, it became clear that Dangus had been a little too optimistic. Manor Minor looked to be losing a one hundred year battle with the forest. Two trees hung over the house, pushing their branches into windows and doors. Large cracks scarred the brick, and the roof quivered with thousands of what Malmedy called "good for nothin' moss bugs." Weeds and tree roots bullied the walkway, making it dangerous to walk over.

_This was home?_ Nikolas thought. He stopped and looked at Grand. "This is stupid. The sheriff's jerking you around. Do something."

But Grand just walked by silently.

"Those Harynne are supposed to have our backs. Traitors." Nikolas considered another idea. "What's the most powerful weapon on Möon? You know, like an explosive device."

His grandfather halted and moved his attention to Nikolas. "How much power should one creature possess?"

"Just—you know—just what it takes to beat the other guy," Nikolas said. "Like you. Beronn made you mad, so you dropkicked him off the Mottle Craw."

Foggy breath rose from Grand's mouth like a chimney as he stared at his grandson. He turned slowly around and continued walking. "Life is not always so simple, Nikolas."

_It should be,_ Nikolas thought to himself.

No other words were exchanged while they navigated the fragmented walkway to a front door that had been covered by vines. When they got to the door, Grand gently laid Xanthus down, unsheathed his axe, and cut away the vines.

"Stay far behind," Grand warned as he used the axe head to push the door open. A gust of brown leaves rolled past, beckoning them into the dark house.

CHAPTER TEN

  retty dark in there, Mr. Grand, sir," Brandy called out from behind. "Creepy."

"It is the dark," Grand said, "that turns shadows into monsters. Let us have a little more light." He mumbled something, and his axe head glowed yellow, lighting up the inside of Manor Minor.

It looked like an overgrown greenhouse.

The ceiling was a bed of vines while other plants twisted around end tables and chandeliers. One small tree grew from a couch covered in mildew.

"Nope," Brandy said. "Still creepy."

Everyone stepped through the door slowly. The front room was sizable with a large fireplace and high ceilings. Nikolas could make out a dining room just past the foyer. Choked by vines and shrubbery, a staircase led up to a dank hallway which meant more rooms. It looked haunted by the ghost of Emily Dickinson.

"From mansion to dump," Brandy groaned. "It'll take forever before I could even host a decent dinner party."

Helen flattened her head against the doorframe, trying not to pass out from her jynn'us fever. "For crying out loud, Brandy, it's a place to sleep. It's better than the refugee camp."

"Barely," Brandy mumbled. "Smells like feet."

Daniel started to drift from the party; his attention was drawn away by a yellow flower with a purple tongue bobbing up and down. It was attached to one of the vines.

"Oh, don't say that, Brandy. It's a fixer-upper." Caroline's fingers lightly traced the air, remaking the room in her mind. "I like fixer-uppers. It could be quite nice. It needs new wallpaper. The wood floors could do with a new coat of varnish."

Daniel touched the wrinkled edge of the flower petal. The flower closed and opened.

Grand slackened his grip on the axe head. "For good or for ill, youth, this is home."

Daniel's thumb grazed the flower's tongue. It shrunk back.

Grand shook his head. "Best we—"

The flower snapped shut around Daniel's hand.

"Aaahh!" he howled. He tried to beat it off with his cane, but a second vine snatched the cane away.

Sedentary vines sprang to life. A large one slithered down the stairwell and pinned Daniel's thigh to the wooden post, his hands to the banister. Within seconds, he was smothered in pulsing flowers. Nikolas bolted across the room and grabbed the flower squeezing his cheek.

"Stop!" Daniel cried. "The stingers—there are stingers in the flowers."

"Lynneyellow!" Grand reached for his axe. "We have but a minute before the venom takes effect. Find its root. Don't disturb the flowers!"

Grand and Dangus sprang to their mission; everyone else stood petrified. As they began running from room to room, Nikolas noticed one thick vine leading to the back of Manor Minor. He followed it and found himself in a kitchen looking at nearly a dozen vines writhing through the back door like too many pythons caught in a hole. Grand kicked a door down from the opposite end of the kitchen.

"Grand," Nikolas said in a hushed voice, "I think I found the root."

"Keep back." Wild-eyed, Grand lifted his axe with both hands. "Axe, reveal your foe!"

Yellow light blasted from the axe head and out the back door. Something like the guttural warning of a cat came from the high grass. It took Nikolas a few seconds for his eyes to adjust before he could make out the lynneyellow. The plantling was a fibrous yellow mass with ripples of stubbly skin. Enormous roots grew from the skin and toward the house. It stared back at them with a pair of gray misaligned eyes. Grand twirled the axe around his fist and slammed it into the thick vine.

"Wreeigh!" cried the lynneyellow. Its roots shuttered throughout the house.

"Owww!" Daniel yelled from the living room. "It hurts."

"Be brave, lad!" Grand bellowed. "Had to find her main artery. It'll remove its barbs soon."

Again Grand swung, and again Daniel and the lynneyellow cried.

After minutes of Grand's hacking and blackish blood spraying everywhere, the house began to shake from foundation to weathervane. Vines whipped through doorways, shredding their frames. They slapped and unsnapped, yanked and unwound from trellises and chandeliers, cupboards and bedposts. The floorboards rumbled like misplayed piano keys while vines escaped out the back door, leaving dead branches and skeletons of unfortunate creatures in their wake. The very last vine made sure to slap Nikolas's cheek on its way out.

"Hissss!" The lynneyellow gave a disapproving cry. Four thick vines hoisted it up while smaller ones reached out to low-hanging branches, swinging the terrified plantling deep into the forest. It hissed the entire way there.

"Vile thing," Grand muttered.

One could almost hear Manor Minor agree with Grand as wood creaked back into place.

"Ooh," Daniel groaned from the other room.

"Coming, lad." Grand bolted to the living room. "How do you feel?"

"Like I've been attacked by a gang of porcupines." Daniel reached for a welt on his cheek.

"Feel any frothing of the nose? A sudden desire to sleep?" Grand had a steady hand on Daniel's back.

"Sleep?" Daniel said. "That is the last thing I want to do. And my nasal passages are fine."

"Good. Good. It did not send its venom. Younger ones take longer."

"Venom?" Daniel's eyes enlarged as Grand moved him to a stool.

"It's like a battle zone," Nikolas mumbled to himself while surveying the scene. Xanthus lay sprawled out on the couch. Helen's head was between her knees, and Daniel was curled over Grand's arm.

"All so simple?" Tim said. "Right, _Nick_?"

Grand stood to his feet. "This lynneyellow was planted here recently by the help of some dirty magic to be sure. Lynneyellow would never root itself near a humling dwelling. We can thank our sheriff for that."

"Come on now, honey chil'." Malmedy wrapped her chubby hands around Daniel to lead him upstairs. "Let's get you some bandages first, then it's on up to your room. Goin' to be mighty interesting settling in, Mr. Lyons. Yes, 'em. Mighty interesting. Who knows what's gotten all up in this place. Ya'll be on yo' guard now."

The room fell quiet. Every one of Manor Minor's creaks and moans could be a monster creeping toward them. Even now lone lynneyellow flowers pulsed open and closed, looking for victims to snare.

"Dangus." Grand stomped one of the lynneyellow flowers into a bloody mess. "See about proper bedding for Xanthus and Helen. I'll need to secure the place." He tightened his grip around the axe head and walked outside.

A beat of silence.

_Zcrazz!_ A burst of light flashed. _Aigghhh!_ An unidentified monster cried.

"Get 'em, Mr. Lyons," Dangus said under his breath as he shuffled over to Xanthus. "We ain' gonna let that Silas take us over!"

"Well!" Caroline clapped her hands, smiling. "I might as well start tidying up."

Brandy contended on that point, explaining how sleep and beauty were synonymous, but Caroline was already pushing cleaning materials into open hands. After an hour, Malmedy returned to a room full of kids cleaning. She praised Caroline for her "mighty fine industriousness!"

Malmedy then declared they must be famished and began to make a late meal. After rolling out and unfolding a small table from under the stairs, she passed out silverware and plates. She stood at the head of the table and tilted her head in a strange way. A breeze flittered through the room, and the table suddenly filled with steaming bread rolls, cuts of cold ham, piles of turkey, and two blocks of cheese. A bowlful of kiwi and ripe apples buttressed by condiments for sandwich-making appeared. Pitchers frothed over with harjuice. Hungry teenagers quickly stormed the table, elbowing each other for a plate and utensils. While Tim and Nikolas were threatening to stab each other with their forks, Malmedy sliced the bread. It warped then sliced under her sure cuts, every slice releasing the tangy smell of sourdough.

Everyone grabbed a chair and circled around the table. Grand had one hand on a pewter mug and dug into his chest pocket for something. He removed a pipe. It had been snapped in two.

"Blasted," Grand said. "Third one in a year."

"Not that you'd be smoking in my house anyway." Malmedy wagged her finger as she waddled to the kitchen.

"Just checking the state of my pipe," Grand grumbled to himself. "Woman would send me to the nursery if I gave her the chance."

"You know I would," Malmedy called from the other room.

Everyone started to snicker but suppressed themselves when they saw the flash in Grand's eyes. After a moment, his flash turned into a twinkle, and they all let out a laugh.

"Lad." Grand pointed his mug to Nikolas. "There's only one steward of Huron, and her name's Malmedy Migglesnee. Don't you ever forget it if you know what's good for you."

At first, Nikolas didn't hear the faint knock on the door. But after the fourth knock, the door creaked open, and there stood a man.

Yeri Willrow was squeezing his hands together nervously.

"Mr. Willrow?" Grand stood to his feet.

"Mr. Lyons." Yeri walked in slowly. He slipped off his three-horned hat and looked slowly around. "I—is Xanthus?" He swallowed. "Where is he? Has he succumbed?"

"No," Grand said. "No, nothing like it. Dr. Mendesmuss's tongue-of-galley-trot has done its work for now. He's resting."

"Oh good." Yeri took a step inside the living room.

"Would you like some food?" Caroline said.

"I am famished." Yeri looked quickly at the food and then Grand.

"Of course. Forgive my manners. Get yerself a plate, lad."

Yeri scampered over and immediately wedged himself between Brandy and Tim as he grabbed a knife. He began cutting chunks out of the cheddar cheese and cold pork. As if he needed to explain his excitement, he announced, "I would never recommend the hospitality of the Harynne. For a fortnight, I was made to eat their elvish lily mash. Flower pedals and fruit seeds. Didn't know if they took me for a man or an insect."

After covering every inch of his plate with cheeses, breads, and meats, not bothering himself with organizing it into anything that resembled a sandwich, he grabbed a stool and pulled it between his legs.

The stagecoach driver loudly munched away as all eyes stayed on him. A piece of fat from the pork hung out of the corner of his mouth. He used a heel slice of sourdough bread to push the fat back in. When he eyed the harjuice, he let out a giggle, quickly poured it into a small goblet, slurped it down, and returned to pushing as much food down his throat as possible.

"Why are you here?" Nikolas said.

"Geez, Nikolas," Brandy said. "Be nice."

"What?" Nikolas said. "We're all thinking it."

"Ignore Nikolas," Brandy said. "His mouth is a mental condition."

"I—I suppose an explanation is in order." Yeri looked around the table.

"It did come to mind." Grand raised an amused eyebrow.

"Well—" He squeezed down a dry piece of bread. "It is about Xanthus. I saw the state of his condition at the city council. Do not think me inappropriate, but I was wondering if I could stay on at Manor Minor to look after the lad?"

Grand sat up straight. "We have a housekeeper. And she's a fine nanny when the situation calls for it."

"Oh, oh, I know." Yeri waved his hands. "I thought I could offer a more unique service to you. It's just, well, I've had experience with the foul that attacked him."

"Yes. You mentioned that," Grand said.

"Yes," Yeri repeated. He looked around the table. It was clear everyone was waiting for a fuller explanation. "My part in this adventure was all a matter of luck, really. Whether that luck was good or bad remains to be seen. I am a senior stagecoach driver for Fungman, Zedock, and Josiah. Our other driver came down with squatters, so I was tasked with driving the Merrows to their sea fortress docked at Constance Cove. Well. We were chased by fouls as the Merrows refer to them."

"What is a foul?" Grand said. "I have heard of no such creature."

"Maybe it's a tracker, Grand." Nikolas said. "One of those scuccas."

"No," Yeri said. "I am familiar with that creature, and it is certainly not a scucca. We had a scoundrel who used to breed scuccas behind Farmer Tom's barn, illegally of course. Those creatures do not have hundreds of small eyes and foul breath. Both are quite nefarious but altogether different.

Now, these fouls chased us clear to the fortress. We went into lock down but not before one breathed on a Merrow. Lir's brother to be exact. I then accompanied the duke to the bridge. It was there I learned the true enemy. The Dujinnin had led the attack, releasing the fouls on the Merrows, but they were not finished with us. We went to submersion depth, and the horror ensued." His eyes bugged out. "We were attacked by not one but two waterdragons and later a leviathan."

"Leviathan!" Malmedy shook her head as she made her way to the fireplace. "That ain't no joke."

"All three beasts were ridden by Dujinnin. By the wits of the duke, our enemies were vanquished, but our luck soured. Several fouls broke through the glass and onto the bridge. Began to attack the mermen—"

"Turned them to stone?" Nikolas said.

Yeri paused and nodded. "Yes. It would seem so. Anyway. After the incident, Duke Lir and his wife Nia convinced me to play the hero. And what an adventure that's been. But I think Agatha will find my hero's physique to her liking." He patted his stomach. "Proved my worth as a suitable marriage candidate. Anyway, they asked me to deliver a request for salvation to the steward of Huron. Nikolas Lyons. Which I did at the city council. And now I am here."

"That is a story I'd be proud of," Grand said, "but you've finished your quest. You've proven your worth to Agatha." He leaned in with squinted eyes. Yeri's face slowly wilted. "I smell a lie among your bold truths. There's nothing in it for you now, driver. So why are you here? And what exactly can you offer Xanthus?"

"Well . . . I, you see . . . " Yeri had a strawberry in one hand and its leaf in the other. Its red liquid began meandering down his thin index finger.

"Well?" Grand said.

"He looked quite ill, the boy. And yes, I know very little about the creature that attacked him aside from my first encounter at the Merrow fortress. But I believe I could be of assistance."

Grand scratched the underside of his chin, his eyes never moving from the stagecoach driver. He leaned back in his chair and folded his hands behind his head. Without warning, he reached into the back of his neck, pulled out his battle-axe, and sent it flying. It whipped past Yeri's hair and smashed a small creature to the wall. Its head stayed propped on the axe's blade while the body fell to the ground.

Yeri let out a small yelp and dropped the strawberry onto his lap. Grand stood up and walked to the severed creature. It had eight tentacles like an octopus, although the blade had clipped two of them off. A black liquid was oozing from its pulsing beak mouth.

"It's a meekle," Grand said. "Probably been feeding off the other creatures that have invaded the house. That black ink would burn right through your body and leave you with gaping holes."

As he removed the axe, he looked at Yeri, "I will not suffer spies, Mr. Willrow. If I find your desire to aid Xanthus is anything but altruistic, know that my aim can shave the hair off a nose-snail."

Yeri unconsciously stroked his left nostril.

"Understand?"

He nodded. "Yes, Mr. Lyons. I just want to look after the boy. I saw many harmed by these fouls. I have a duty to anyone else facing the same fate."

"Very we—"

"Aiih!" came the distinct cry of Daniel Kobayashi.

"Oh, boy," Nikolas said.

"It never stops around here!" Tim said.

"Help me!" Daniel screamed from upstairs.

"Daniel!" Malmedy yelled. She lifted her skirt and bolted through the hallway covered in faded lavender wallpaper and turned at the last door to her right. They showed up just in time to see Daniel's legs spin from under him. He clawed to his feet, aiming for the door.

Krack!

His chin bounced on the rug.

"Something's trying to kill me." Daniel did a push-up on his good leg.

"We need to help him." Nikolas shouldered his way between Brandy and Caroline.

"Grab my hand!" Nikolas yelled.

At the moment Daniel held his hand out, he was pulled away by some unseen power. The rug bunched up around him, leaving little room for escape.

Brandy's eyes grew. "Uhm. Do you see that?"

The folds of the rug smoothed out to its full length and rose into the air.

"Awesome," Nikolas said. They were looking at a large tattered rug patterned in burgundy and brown and fringed with tassels, and it was currently floating inches from the ceiling.

"It's a—a flying rug." Brandy looked amazed.

"How do I get down?!" Daniel said.

"Go on, Rug," Malmedy said. "Keep it up. See if I don't make rag rugs out of you."

Daniel leapt to the side, but Rug predicted his movement and rolled the boy genius into itself. He looked like a floating pig-in-the-blanket, screaming unintelligible Japanese, "Koko kara watashi o eru ni wa, orokana shikimono!"

"You done heard me, Rug," Malmedy said. "I'll make a dozen welcome mats and sell you to the witches."

Rug sagged at the sides, mimicking a large frown.

"Ima watashi o oriru!!" Daniel pounded his fists.

Rug spit him out. Daniel leapt to his good foot and cried, "Ima watashi o oriru!" He scrambled down the hallway without his cane.

"Poor, poor Daniel," Caroline stifled a laugh.

"Magic doesn't like him at all," Nikolas said, watching him hop downstairs. "Shouldn't be left alone. He needs to get a magic world buddy."

Caroline nodded.

"Drama, drama, drama," Malmedy said, shaking her head. "I ain' never seen so many kids make such a ruckus. Now I _know_ you ain't gonna keep this up!"

For the next hour, seamstresses were called; magic mirrors were discovered; debates about attending school were had. The house quickly became a tornado of voices, and Nikolas was caught in its eye.

He was starting to wonder how crazy life in Huron would really be. For years, he had pined to live in a place where good was good, and evil was evil, instead of fake smiles while the death rate of refugee children climbed. He assumed Möon would be that world, but it was shaping up to be far different. Shoppers might not step around hemorrhaging teenagers here, but that didn't mean everything was black and white. He could hear Malmedy.

Drama. Drama. Drama.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

  eri Willrow," said the rotund mermaid. She stood tall with the help of her automaton legs, wore a powdered wig, and dressed similarly to Lir's mother-in-law, Hydan.

"Yes," Yeri said.

"Do you know why I summoned you?" the mermaid said.

"No," Yeri said. "I really do not."

Yeri was telling the truth. Mr. Lyons had permitted him to stay at Manor Minor, so he had slipped into one of the empty rooms to tuck in early for the night. After the commotion between the Daniel boy and magical rug had settled down, he fell asleep. Sometime later, his insides churned and pulled him to his feet. The pearl-of-devotion forced him from the room, through the sleeping Manor, and out the back door. It finally stopped tugging when he was half a mile into the forest looking at a mermaid with an outstretched hand. Evidently, she had the other end of the pearl-of-devotion's leash.

"I am Mrs. Parcels. The city council has informed me of your encounter with the boy, Nikolas Lyons, this very evening."

"Yes," Yeri said. "One of his companions, Mr. Xanthus Kobayashi, was attacked by a foul."

"I am aware," Mrs. Parcels said, her automalegs shifting around a clump of moldy leaves.

"I plan to tell Nikolas everything regarding the fouls when we get a moment to ourselves. We might be able to save Xanthus before it is too late."

"Yes," Mrs. Parcels said slowly. "I was afraid you'd say that. That is why I've summoned you. Under no circumstance are you to reveal the Merrows' involvement with the fouls to Nikolas. It is abundantly clear that this boy steward is not on our side and could ruin everything."

"But—but he is the steward of Huron, ma'am," Yeri said, slightly shocked. "We must tell him."

"No, you must not," Mrs. Parcels said. "Nothing can compromise our efforts now with so much at stake."

"Xanthus," Yeri said. "He has been hexed. It could spread to the others!"

"That is the risk we must take," Mrs. Parcels said. "If they know the truth of the fouls, then we will not be allowed sanctuary within Huron. That cannot be."

"Forgive me," Yeri said. "But you cannot stop me. I _will_ tell him everything. The pearl-of-devotion does allow me to inform the steward regarding the fouls."

"Not any longer," Mrs. Parcels said.

"Don't threaten me," Yeri said. "I will speak to the boy. I must tell him what those foul creatures really are, _who_ they really are. You ca—"

Suddenly, Yeri's stomach flipped, and his skin flushed green.

He fell to his knees and grabbed at Mrs. Parcels's automalegs. Slowly, he looked up at her. The mermaid's hand twisted around some invisible chord. "Not any longer."

"But I must tell him, if nothing else, for the sake of the boy. Please. If I don't, Huron is in peril. Xanthus is in dang—arggh!" Yeri cried. Mrs. Parcels's hand twisted tighter.

She reached into Yeri's breast pocket and pulled out the ragged scroll that Lir had written to Nikolas weeks ago. "The conditions of the pearl-of-devotion have changed. You can no longer speak of this to anyone; your very life depends upon it. Silence now, Yeri Willrow. Silence."

Nikolas was under a swagger blanket, his head sunken into a soured goose feather pillow. The sound of Xanthus retching and Malmedy cooing came from the other room. "There, there, now, honey chil'. You's gonna be fine. You's gonna be fine."

Xanthus had been attacked by some strange creature and would be dead by Ferret Festival, at least according to Dr. Mendesmuss.

Images of Xanthus's stone corpse flashed across his mind.

Dead.

For the first time in Nikolas's life, that word felt real. His best friend would be gone, and he couldn't do anything about it. What _was_ he supposed to do? He was just a fourteen-year-old boy. Nikolas shook that thought away. He had signed up for this, right? He had told the lady at the Hall of Pickings that he wanted this. Chose the name Nikolas. Told Grand he wanted this. He had to find a cure for Xanthus.

Eventually, Nikolas fell asleep. Images of crow eyes, Harynne spears, and the sheriff's velvet-gloved fingers gliding over one another flashed all around him. There were no stories to his dreams, just impressions and images.

For no apparent reason, his visions began to quake, followed by the warm press of a hand. Grand was shaking him awake.

"Nikolas," Grand said in his familiar Scottish accent. "Come."

"Grand?" Nikolas teetered from the bed confused. He tried to search for his shoes in the dark but, after a moment, gave up and followed him to the front porch. It was night and a bluish-white light crested over the northern mountain range.

"What is that?" Nikolas said.

Grand pulled out a wooden rod from his inner cloak. His eyes and hands flared jynn'us blue, and he dug his thumbnail into the wood, shaving off the corners like butter. "It's the Earth's reflection of the sun as it tilts over our horizon. We call it Earthlight. The dwarves call it 'yomlayala,' meaning night-day." Grand was silent for a moment while he began to round one edge of the rod. "Forgive me for waking you, but I have just come from a meeting with Algernon and the Council of Teine . . . I'm leaving."

"Wh—what? You're what?" Nikolas snapped awake.

Grand continued to work the wooden piece with his thumb. It now had a round ball with a stem. "You are the authority now, Nikolas. Both for Huron and your company."

"Grand?" Nikolas took a step closer.

"I need advice." Grand's eyes stayed on the rod. He dug deep into the bowl with his thumb and hollowed it out. He removed a thin iron rod from his coat pocket and, with what looked like two hundred pounds of pressure, drove it through the stem. Nikolas realized he was making a pipe with his bare hands. "Afraid the Council of Teine has fewer answers than I."

"You don't need to seek advice. You're—you're Grand!"

"I have doubts." Grand's jynn'us blue eyes moved to Nikolas. "Many doubts. Like I've never had before. It was always Huron that guided the way. I grew used to her voice, her call for help, her words of comfort. Now, I am lost. You will find, as many stewards before you, that Huron's voice becomes one with your own. And if the time comes that she stops speaking, that she stops calling on you to protect her, well, it's as if your heart has gone deaf entirely."

Grand whistled to Gibbur. The giant crow walked out of the stables, preened one last feather, and bounded within five feet of Grand. With the pipe secured between his teeth, he swung a leg over the bird's saddle.

"You're still her protector." Nikolas took a step closer to Grand.

"Thank you for that, but I am not. You are, Nikolas." Something like envy flashed across Grand's expression. "Huron . . . has chosen you."

"I'm—I'm just a boy."

"Are you or are you not the steward of Huron?" Grand asked.

"Yeah . . ." Nikolas searched for words.

Grand leaned over. "Do you want to be the steward?"

"Sure, I do. But it's—it's starting to get really crazy. This jynn'us stuff and Xanthus getting sick and the sheriff and man-eating vines and flying rugs and . . . I don't know. I just didn't think—"

"I've seen you step up to the challenge and take charge. You showed true quality when you flew the shuttle."

"Not that hard to take on some psychotic port master or try to fly a shuttle, but—but this? All of this on _me_?" Nikolas pointed back to the soft glow of Huron in the distance. "This is more than a challenge. It's—I don't know—insane. I don't even know where to start. And what about Xanthus? He's dying, _dying!_ He needs a cure. What do I know about magical diseases? I thought this was all supposed to be some fairytale world with three little pigs and Billy Goat Gruff. Just some magical moon land, you know." Nikolas's eyes dropped to the ground. "Simple."

His grandfather lifted a match to the pipe.

"Grand." His voice rose. "I can't do this without you."

"Don't hide your faith in me, boy!"

Nikolas flinched. Grand had unleashed his fury on many people, but he'd never been on the receiving end.

His grandfather sighed as his jynn'us blue eyes faded. "It is my hunch the Merrows' greed has gotten the best of them, and they have now brought an evil to Huron. It attacked the mermen, Prime Minister Shale, and Mr. Waters, and I believe it now has Xanthus. If you—"

"Do you know something?" Nikolas interrupted Grand. "Are the Merrows connected to Xanthus somehow?"

"I cannot be certain," Grand said. "What I can be certain of is that you are the steward and the only one who can stop the evil advanced by the Merrows. But this darkness cannot be overcome until you attend to your own faith.

"Your greatest virtue is the quality of your faith, lad. You had little doubt that we'd manage to leave Earth and make it home. You were the first to believe me when I revealed the truth of Möon. Yet your weakness is my own. You do not have room for chaos. Your faith is so sure that it does not leave room for complexities. If something is confusing, if it goes against what you believe, you become scared and hide your faith. In this case, you've hidden that faith in me, like I am some kind of vault. But you cannot hide faith, for that will only diminish it. In order for faith to thrive, it must be risked."

"Risked?" Nikolas said. "On what?"

Grand directed Gibbur closer. "Risk it on your company. Have you not considered, even for a moment, why Huron drew not only you, Nikolas, but your company?"

"Huron called my friends, too? She spoke to them?"

Grand didn't answer his question. Instead, he turned the crow around and gave one final glance. "Forgive me, lad. I did not mean to yell. We all face the same crisis of faith. We all want to hide."

He tightened Gibbur's reins, readjusted himself in the saddle, and kicked.

"Farewell. Always remember. You must arise, Nikolas, and take your place among the clouds."

The grass rolled under the crow's wings, and within a few beats, Grand slipped into the night. Nikolas's shoulders rose and slumped.

Everything _really_ was on him now.

He didn't even make it up the stairs. He collapsed on the sofa, the one that didn't have a small tree growing out of it. Sleeping was much harder now. Each time he closed his eyes, everything flashed in front of him: his real mom and dad in those caskets, Dangus turning into a baby, a flying rug, Xanthus collapsing, getting a new name, man-eating ships, gateway to Möon, Tim's eternally withered expression, and Grand leaving . . . again. Nikolas squeezed his head.

There were just too many voices.

He dared to hope. It would be great if everything was a little less crazy tomorrow.

CHAPTER TWELVE

"Ow!"

Nikolas yelled and scrambled to his feet. It felt like a bee had stung his brow. He looked around. It was morning. The sun filled the living room, and Malmedy was singing in the kitchen. But there were no stinging bugs.

He touched his forehead and looked at his fingertip. He saw a dot of blood. "What?"

Someone cleared his throat. Nikolas slowly looked down to his feet and groaned.

Crazy had gotten an early start.

A fleet of mini aeros manned by tiny pirates, the color of blue marble, surrounded him. There on the stern of the front most ship stood a pirate, with one foot raised, holding up the source of the sting: a pin-sized sword.

"I be Captain Bluecheeks, Scourge of the South Seas," Captain Bluecheeks cried. "What be yer name, boy? Looking loaded to the gunwales, ya do. Had to wake ye up if I'm to deliver me message."

"Just 'cuz he's asleep don' mean he's drunk." Malmedy stood in the living room, holding a basket of eggs. "Now what are you doing in my living room?"

"Be mindin' that tongue there, wench." Captain Bluecheeks moved his pin-sword to Malmedy. "Or 'tis Triton's spear for ye!"

"Wench?" Her nostrils matched her buggy eyes. "I will lay you out!"

"Prepare the big guns, scurvy dogs! It be the great leviathan of the deep! Come to feast upon decent pirates, filling the world with widows and sonless mothers!"

"Wait—wait. Stop with all the crazy." Nikolas crumbled back to the couch, pinching his nose. "You came to talk to me, right? Focus. On. Me."

"All hands ahoy. Get yerself movin', or it be the keelhaul for ye!" Captain Bluecheeks yelled at the men. "Cast the mainsail!" The little pirates pulled and tugged at the ropes. The aero's mainsail unfurled, revealing a note written in black ink. The handwriting was sloppy and frantic.

D + F - C, and no greater than 15 and 18 over Fern = Xanthus's creature and the terror of Huron.

"Who wrote this?" Nikolas pulled the piece of paper from the sail.

"Aye now, lassie." Nikolas was pretty sure the captain had just called him a girl. "I may be the infamous pirate, John Bluecheeks, but I be no traitor to me employer."

Nikolas snatched Captain Bluecheeks and flipped him upside down.

"Unhand me, you cur!"

"Ludwig" was carved on his rump. _Wasn't that Grand's friend, the toymaker?_ Nikolas thought. _He left all those clues for Grand back on Earth?_

He grinned.

Was the toymaker helping him make sense of everything, leading him to Xanthus's cure?

"Sweet. Hey, Grand—" He stopped himself.

Grand was gone.

He shook it off and curled up the scroll. "I got this." Nikolas's job was to figure out what this clue meant and find a cure for Xanthus. It was on him now, and that was that.

"You've done yo' deed, now get on out." Malmedy had the door open.

Captain Bluecheeks led the pirate fleet out the front door but not before he cursed Malmedy by the bottom end of every sea monster. Meanwhile, Nikolas set his sights on the kitchen to hunt down some food.

"Now where're you going?" Malmedy said, roadblocking him.

"I got some stuff to do." Nikolas held up the pirate clue. "Thought I'd grab some food and go to Huron. Meet this Ludwig guy."

"Oh no, you ain't. You's going to school."

Nikolas straightened his neck and squared his shoulders the way he assumed Grand would. "I—I'm the steward, and I'm going to Huron."

Malmedy squared her own shoulders. "And I's the Malmedy! And as long as I's the housekeeper under your roof, you goin' to school."

"But, Malmedy, I—"

"Malmedy?!" She squeezed her brow so tightly it could've crushed a man. "Don't go Malmedy-ing me! _You's_ going to get your learning. I will not stand for any unlearned stewards—not on my watch!" She waddled into the kitchen, shaking her head. " _Malmedy_ —boy, you done lost your mind— _Malmedy_."

"We've got clothes!" Brandy bounced down the stairs in a purple silk dress.

"Dat's right," Malmedy called around the corner. "Lovar's Seamstress delivered an emergency order this morning. I laid some clothes out on yo' bed, Nikolas."

"What's this?" Dangus held up a sheet of paper. He announced, "'To my grandsons and wards.'"

"Probably from Grand," Nikolas said. "He left last night."

Tim stumbled down the stairwell. "Grand left?"

"Mmmh, mmmhh," Malmedy declared. "Now didn't I tell ya, Dangus? Saw it in them green eyes o' his. I knew Mr. Lyons was up and leaving. That man gits all fidgety like."

Dangus started to read the letter out loud. "'Nikolas. So there is no confusion, you are the lord of the house until I return. I seek the answers to our mystery here and am off to visit the Lady of Hypsus Lake. As I told you before, a dark enigma brews over Huron, and I believe it is related to Xanthus's illness. If you find out any other information regarding his illness, be sure to address it immediately. Captain Shaw the Harynne is on our side. In fact, when that snake of a sheriff was not looking, he slipped a nuncio to me. It is a moment by moment log of all the Harynne's activity.'"

Nikolas looked down to the end table and found a leather gray book with the word "NUNCIO" written on it.

"'There is a warrant out for the arrest of your friends.'"

"What??" Brandy said.

"'The sheriff means to block us at every turn. Because I am not their legal guardians, Huronite law says they are to be submitted to the nearest orphanage or workhouse. Captain Shaw does not want that to happen. Avoid all Harynne guards. If they do come to arrest your friends, the nuncio will alert you in plenty of time, allowing you to make a hasty departure. It will help you avoid their ever watchful eye and hopefully keep your friends out of the orphanage.'"

"Orphanage?" Caroline walked in, wearing a very plain yellow dress with her hair tossed up in a bun. The horn-rimmed glasses were a complete mismatch to the Victorian style.

Dangus continued. "'Consider Rug for all your means of transportation. I have also given you one hundred sulmare coins. If you need more, Dangus knows where the treasure is located. Lastly, to Helen, I have included the song of the lionsbran. I've reason to believe you will find it helpful with your newfound jynn'us. Be strong in my absence. I may be gone more than a month. Your Grand and Warden, Nikolas Lyons the 11th.'"

"At least we've got ourselves a proper steward to look after the estates." Dangus nodded to Nikolas. "Sure you'll do a better job than I."

"Grand left you in charge, Nick?" Tim said perplexed. "You're just a kid."

"What's wrong with that?" Dangus said.

Malmedy leaned out of the kitchen, clutching a massive skillet. "I don't care what ya call him. Just so he knows who's da' steward and who's da' Malmedy."

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Xanthus said, bounding down the stairs. "Does Grand know about the burning of the trees? They cry for the sap of the one called Nikolas the Fire Devil!"

"Dude." Nikolas twisted around. Xanthus's skin and eyes had returned to their normal shape as if nothing had happened. "You're all better!"

"Yeah. That stuff Dr. Mendesmuss gave me is awesome. I'm definitely going to start my own elixiary now."

Nikolas breathed a huge sigh of relief. The day was getting better already.

"Did you see our new clothes?" Brandy hopped in front of Nikolas. "Go. Try yours on. I want to see!"

Malmedy leaned out of the kitchen again and said, "Go on, Nikolas, and get in 'em, and get down to breakfast. You too, Xanthus."

They sat around an oak table in the dining room. The table was filled with large slices of piping-hot cranberry bread, breakfast pudding, and a heap of ricky-tweet eggs. Caroline was flitting back and forth from the kitchen with a broad smile as Malmedy barked out orders. Brandy chattered excitedly about their new clothes, while Tim stared down at his scrambled ricky-tweet eggs that called back to him, "Ricky, ricky, tweet. Ricky, ricky, tweet, tweet."

"I'm not saying I don't like eggs, Malmedy," Tim said, "but I sure don't like my eggs singing back to me. It's just wrong."

"Well, it's all we got's," Malmedy said. "My food's up in Manor Major. Got them ricky-tweet eggs wild and didn't have no time to soak 'em in pickle juice. Hushes 'em up when you soak 'em in pickle juice."

"And _that's_ why I'm not a carnivore," Brandy said.

"Eating eggs does not make one a carnivore, Brandy," Caroline corrected.

"Do you hear that, Brandy?" Xanthus shoveled a pile of ricky-tweet eggs into his mouth and down his throat. "Ricky, ricky, tweet, tweet. Ricky, ricky, tweet" could be heard moving down into his stomach. He pointed to his round belly. "Do you hear that, huh, Brandy? It is the call of the wild from the recesses of my carnivorous bell-ay!"

"Ugh." Brandy rolled her eyes. "You are so gross."

Xanthus pounded his fists on the table, laughing, "Oh, dude. The look on—" Suddenly, he leapt to his feet and clutched his stomach. "Woah. I—I . . ." He ran through the kitchen's gaping hole left by the lynneyellow and to the backyard. Sounds of retching followed.

"Ha!" Brandy yelled. "That's what you get for grossing me out."

"Now didn't I tell you to eat slowly?" Malmedy shook her head, following Xanthus out. "Dr. Mendesmuss said tongue-of-galley trot's got side effects. Nikolas! Take your hat off at the table."

"Oh. Uh, right." Nikolas begrudgingly removed his bowler hat and put it on his lap. He didn't care about the leather boots, double button vest, and frock coat, and he could have definitely done without the the frilly burgundy scarf. But the bowler hat?

Awesome.

A bleary and cautious Daniel stumbled down the stairs. He had obviously found Malmedy's clothes: a black trench coat with black gloves, black vest, and black boots.

"Daniel!" Brandy called out. "You look so handsome!"

A blank stare was Daniel's only response. Bloodshot eyes undergirded by dark crescents proved that he'd stayed up all night, probably fearful that some magical object would attack him. He slowly sat down but not before inspecting the plate and fork. They could be hexed to attack highly intelligent nineteen-year-old boys.

A few minutes later, Helen glided quietly into the kitchen holding Portlorn's glass flute to her chest. She sat next to Nikolas and called to Tim in a sing-songy tone, "The rolls, please." She began to hum loudly.

"Everything all right?" Nikolas said cautiously to Helen.

"Yeah. Why?" Helen said.

"That?" Brandy said. "She's been doing that _all_ morning."

Caroline leaned into Nikolas. "Mom used to hum all the time."

Helen glared at Caroline. "I'm just humming. Get over it."

"No complaints here, Helen." Tim's eyelids hung dreamily, and he had a big smile. "Hey, I bet your jynn'us gives you the power to sing like an angel."

"You mean the angel of death?" Helen grabbed her knife and stabbed the yellow lump of butter repeatedly. "Cause I've always wanted that job."

Tim's grin turned uncertain.

Brandy steered the conversation back to what she deemed more interesting, which at that moment was how she would teach all the different sorts of ties to the boys. No gentleman would ever manage to make it into fantasy society without knowing how to tie a Windsor knot after all.

Nikolas felt a smile spread across his face. The breakfast table, in the warm morning sunlight, made all the problems with Huron and the Merrows seem like ancient history. Xanthus was his old self again. Daniel had survived the night unscathed, and even Helen hummed like she'd been chugging happy pills. Life was already clearing up.

Nikolas squeezed the stem of his spoon thinking, _I got this._

He didn't really have much to do if one thought about it. All he had to do was solve the pirate clue tucked in his frock coat, which would lead him to a cure for Xanthus, and everything else would just figure itself out. What would he do after all that? Join a sports team, maybe? He wondered if football was a thing in Huron. He could get a girlfriend or learn a musical instrument. He'd always wanted to learn the drums.

Distracted by his daydreams, Nikolas hadn't seen Helen's right hand creep over to Portlorn's flute and raise it to her lips.

She began to play.

Spoons stopped. Chairs creaked. Bodies shifted in the direction of the music. It sounded enticing, like a voice summoning one from the edge of a cliff—the wrong way.

"Helen?" Tim started to look uncomfortable. "When did you learn how to play the flute?"

She didn't answer Tim; she couldn't answer Tim. Her lips were locked onto the flute. All she could do was play.

"It's getting a little weird, Helen," Nikolas said. "Helen, I sai—"

Snap.

"Woah!" Nikolas jumped out of his chair. A strand of blue smoke hung over the kitchen table.

_Snap. Snap. Snap._ Smoke chained around the room.

_SNAP._ _SNAP._ _SNAP._ _SNAP._ A light flashed from the smoke, and an oval object dropped into the milk jar.

Helen slammed the flute down. "What. Was. That?"

"You tell us," Nikolas said, reaching into the cold jar of milk and pulling out some kind of iron handcuff. Recognition then spread over his face. "Helen."

"What?" Helen said.

"That—" Nikolas pointed to the flute. "That's your jynn'us."

"My what?" Helen said.

_CRASSHH_ came the sound of dishes breaking.

Everyone looked to the kitchen. Malmedy's hands had just released a stack of dirty dishes, and she was staring wide-eyed at Helen. She scrambled up the stairs and back down with Dangus. "Never gonna believe . . . my own eyes . . . seiren's call!"

"What's this, miss?" Dangus said.

"I don't know. I just—I started humming." Helen pulled the flute closer to her. "Then I played Portlorn's flute. I don't know how to play a flute. And that appeared."

"The seiren's call," Dangus said.

"What's a seiren?" Helen said.

Dangus let his bottom lip fall open. He studied Nikolas's friends as if seeing them for the first time. The house servant scratched a lock of orange-white hair and mumbled to himself before speaking. "A seiren uses her voice or musical instruments to conjure up weapons, people, creatures, and such. When a seiren calls for help, none may resist her."

"Helen? Ask for help?" Brandy laughed. "Literally, what-ever."

"And this?" Nikolas asked, holding up the milk-soaked band.

"That's a strappet," Dangus said. "A very powerful weapon. It binds enemies so that they cannot escape. No one can break its bonds."

Malmedy broke up the revelatory scene by grabbing unfinished plates and forks out of mouths. "It's best you keep that jynn'us to yo' self, honey chil'. It's all Sheriff Silas needs to lock us up. We'll get it sorted out when you come back home. Drama, drama, drama." Malmedy shook her head while handing out coats and opening the front door. "Huron Schoolhouse is the only thing any of you's need to worry about. I sho' hope that school done let you in. It's Octoberist an' everything. Now, go on and take Rug, and don't get yourselves into any more trouble!"

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  ug zipped through Wainscot Pass and into Huron, retracing Gibbur the crow's journey from last night. Being used to hovercars with walls, the kids clung to every fray and tassel, but at least they hadn't needed to steer the magical carpet. Malmedy reassured them that Rug knew his way since he'd been weaved from the mane of one thousand pegasi, the same pegasi who'd pulled Huron's city coaches for hundreds of years.

It also explained why Rug sweated like a horse.

They swept around a tower on Mt. Lycenius. Suddenly Rug tumbled over, flipping everyone off, but he quickly caught them before they plunged to their deaths.

"Are you nuts, Rug!" Nikolas shouted as he scrambled back onto the flying carpet. But after sorting himself, he saw why Rug had stopped suddenly. Thousands of fliers had log-jammed the sky. Directly in front of them floated a sled harnessed to a brown-spotted dragon and filled with three dwarf children in matching derby hats. The smallest one chugged away at a corn pipe.

"What's the deal?" Tim said.

The sound of crashing metal came from behind them. An aircarriage had just rear-ended another aircarriage. The two drivers—a dwarvish man with tattoos covering every inch of his face and a thin old woman—started screaming at each other. Nikolas expected the tattooed dwarf to be the threat, but it was the woman who started unleashing curse words and blasting magic from her wand. She whipped the wand around as it shot out bits of gray, sparkly clouds. The magic banged the dwarf's aircarriage, zapping parts of it out of existence.

"Magical road rage," Xanthus said. "That can't end well."

The pair was only one set in a sky full of dueling drivers.

"Can't we just go down to the ground?" Helen said.

"I tried already." Nikolas yanked at the tassels. "Rug won't let me. I think there are traffic laws. You can't just drop out of the sky."

"Then what's the hold up?"

Suddenly, Nikolas heard the voice. _The Merrows have come, and death is their name!_

His vision was drawn north to a highway running across the city.

"Oh, no," he said quietly.

Thousands of Merrows were pouring through some kind of portal into Huron. Her voice grew in volume and number. She became her own chorus, sending out a warning for every single Merrow.

Merrows . . . Death . . . Name . . . Come . . . Have . . . Death . . . Merrows.

"They're here," Nikolas said.

"Who? What?" Xanthus said.

"The Merrows. They're in . . ." Nikolas's voice drifted off. He turned to Xanthus and back to the Merrows. "Huron."

Xanthus followed Nikolas's gaze and said, "Wow. They're using movirs and everything."

"Movirs?" Nikolas said.

"Yeah. See those two guys holding the copper staffs. When connected, the movirs create a gateway."

Two men were holding rods at the eastern end with gray electric currents passing between them. Thousands of Merrows were pouring through the electric currents and into the heart of the city, Nikolas's city.

Accompanying the Merrows' train was a sulmare horde. It bathed the onlookers in dazzling white. Elephant-sized crabs and mermen holding triton spears guarded the train while giant headless turtles and sixteen-legged octopi carried the sulmare. The octopi used eight legs to hold up the iron vaults while they walked on their other eight.

Merrows about Nikolas's age were in large individual silicon tanks. Xanthus explained they couldn't be outside salt water until their seventeenth birthday and even that was a tough period of adaptation.

"They got here fast." Nikolas let out a deep breath.

"Not good," Xanthus said. "Right, dude?"

"No," Nikolas said. "Not good at all. Huron is angry."

"Where're they coming from?" Xanthus said.

"Has to be Eynclaene," Nikolas said. "Or Eynborough? I can't remember. It's off the seacoast anyway. That Yeri guy would know."

The traffic continued to move but sluggishly. With the delay, Nikolas had plenty of time to take in the surroundings. He could see Huron Schoolhouse. It was, in fact, not a house. It didn't really look like a school either. The white building was a plain six-story square wooden structure surrounded by tall iron gates. He saw hundreds of fantastic creatures bustling and squeezing into its front doors.

As traffic eased, Rug drifted below the tree line, obscuring the Merrows' march into Huron and whatever evil followed them.

Restlessness came over Nikolas. It felt like bits of electricity were creeping under his skin.

"All these Merrows are entering the city." Nikolas said. "The voice of Huron is freaking out, and we're going to spend the day taking entrance exams? Doesn't make sense."

Every part of him fought to keep his mouth shut, but he couldn't help it. With a long sigh, he looked at all of them and said, "You know school is the last place we should be, right? Some weird creature attacks Xanthus; the Merrows are in on it, and we're taking entrance exams?"

"I'm actually looking forward to school," Tim said.

"I know, right?" Brandy said.

A smile hinted at the corner of Nikolas's mouth, and he reached into his inner coat pocket. "I have an idea." He pulled out the pirate's clue.

"Oh, boy," Tim sighed. "Here we go."

"What's that?" Xanthus said.

"Our last will and testament," Tim groaned.

"It's a clue," Nikolas said.

"For what?" Xanthus said.

"To your cure. And probably more," Nikolas said. "Someone out there knows what attacked the mermen and you on the Mottle Craw. They probably have the cure."

"Really?" Xanthus perked up. He grabbed the scroll.

"Where did you get that?" Tim said.

"Some blue toy pirate gave it to me right after Grand left."

"A blue toy pirate?" Tim said. "So now we're taking cues from toy pirates?"

"Seriously, Tim," Nikolas said. "I will knock you off Rug right now. I will smash my fist in your face and knock you off Rug."

"Boys!" Caroline put her hands up.

Nikolas kept his furrowed brow on Tim, but after a few breaths, his chest deflated. "Anyway, I meant to show you guys the clue, but the morning's been a little crazy with Helen summoning iron cuffs and learning how to fly a magical rug."

"Xanthus's creature?" Xanthus pulled the piece of sail closer. "What does it mean, my creature? Oh, it's a riddle."

"How about it?" Nikolas said. "We ditch school, figure out that clue, and get a cure for Xanthus."

"Hey. I got an idea," Tim said. "How about we go to school, and none of our friends get dragged to an orphanage to never be heard from again."

"You don't have to come, Tim." Nikolas felt his adrenaline pumping again. "I'm really OK without the whining."

"We're all going with you, Nikolas," Helen said matter-of-factly. "But we should go to school first like Malmedy told us to. I don't care about those Harynne guys, but I won't lie. She scares me."

"Fine." Nikolas relented.

Nikolas held a sheet of paper that read,

_F ~ This note is to verify that you are indeed an idiot, Nikolas Lyons the 12_ th _._

He flipped the paper over to see the title, "Class Assignment: Remedial Program" and the school secretary's signature, Maggie Moloch. Maggie was a creature completely covered in fur like the hair dredged from the drain of a bathtub. Xanthus said she was a brownie of the faerling kind.

Nikolas looked back at the big fat "F" again and shrugged. _So what?_ , he thought. He had never aspired to be a world-renowned dork. There were more important things to worry about, like preventing Xanthus from dying and stopping the Merrows' evil plan. He started fishing around his pockets for the clue when a passing horned elbow nearly sliced his stomach open.

"Watch it!" Nikolas yelled at the bone-plated student.

First to finish the test, he was told to wait in the hallway. The unending stream of Huronite students had left him pinned against the wall ever since.

Nikolas could still hear Brandy's squeals that morning as they walked through the school gates. She threw out words like "fabulous" and "lovely!" Most of the girls wore dresses that could double as a one-man tent. Top hats were common among the boys as were frock coats and scarves. But a few held to their own fashion sense, such as the girl with a necklace of mice skulls and bone bits stitched into the seams of her black velvet dress.

Aside from the students' strange clothes and mythological nature, the hierarchal structures looked familiar. Nikolas could still distinguish jocks from loners, nerds, geeks, and preps. The jocks did here what they did back at Weaver High School. They made sure the loners, nerds, geeks, and preps didn't stray from their designated caste system. The only difference was that Weaver jocks weren't allowed to drag around three-foot clubs. Bludgeoning a person with medieval weaponry was frowned upon at Weaver High.

Everyone except for Xanthus piled out of a door labeled, "Administration." Brandy held a piece of paper to her face. "What does 'remedial class' mean?"

"Another term for special needs students," Daniel said in a quivering tone.

"What?" Brandy was thoroughly mortified. "No, no, no! I cannot start this low on the social food chain. _You're_ the gimp. Why do the rest of us have to go?"

"It's not a class for the _physically_ disabled," Daniel's voice edging on anger. "Remedial refers to our intelligence. They think we are . . ." He swallowed. "Mentally challenged."

"Well, I thought that entrance exam was absolutely insane," Nikolas said. "I didn't know Minotaurs have split hooves or that a dragon stores up fire in its craw."

Daniel searched the ground for some sense of reality before locking eyes with Nikolas. "I've never failed a test, Nikolas. Never."

Nikolas unfolded his arms. "Wait. They put _you_ in stupid class?"

"We all are." Helen held up her paper. "I'm in the same class with Brandy. Yeah. An eighth grader."

The administration door blasted open and out came Xanthus executing a perfect ballerina leap. He hunched over and kicked up his legs like two doughy pistons.

"And there it is." Helen tilted her head.

Nikolas smirked. "Xanthus's forbidden fire dance."

"Woo-hoo!" Xanthus shouted. "I. Got. A. Hundred!"

Daniel almost fell off his cane. "You passed?"

"Igotahundred. Igotahundred. Igotahundred. Igotahundred!" Xanthus stumbled for a moment, waiting for his lungs to deliver another round of oxygen. "I got every question right. They said no one has ever gotten a hundred percent on the entrance exam. Maggie Moloch called me a boy genius! Me! Xanthus Kobayashi! What did you get, Daniel? Bet you got like a hundred too. We'll be the brilliant Kobayashi boy genius brothers."

Daniel jammed himself over his cane. Words tried desperately to escape. "He gg—gg—ggot a hundred?"

"Daniel got a four," Brandy said. "He did the worst of all."

"I'm sure you got a bunch of easy questions," Nikolas said.

"Not even." Xanthus grabbed his chest offended.

"OK." Nikolas raised his test and read it out loud, "'Which flower spits out spores, planting itself into the skin of its victim? The squatter or the sheila?'"

"Uh, the squatter, of _course_ ," Xanthus said. "The sheilas plantus can tell you if you are in love with a person by flapping its petals when said person is near. Pshh. Come on. Hit me harder, bro. Next thing you're going to say is that you don't know where dragons store their fire. How about the craw! Which is pretty obvious, if you think about it. The dragon drinks up the volcanic magma, ingesting the liquid while collecting the fire up in the cr—"

"You knew where drag—!" Daniel grabbed the stone wall. The cane couldn't keep him upright anymore. "He knew where the fire was stored. He knew! Xanthus is the genius now. Which, in this world, means I'm—I'm the idiot. . . . Doesn't matter." Daniel shook his head. "It doesn't matter. None of this is real. It can't be real."

_Clink, clink. Clink. Clink, clink, clink_ came the sound of rattling bottles.

"You're new here." A voice called out from behind Nikolas.

There, in a stovepipe hat and drab coat, stood a boy whose grin overtook his chin. He put out an expectant hand; Nikolas raised his own. The boy shook it like a kitten in a cage match.

"Jack's the name. You're _thee_ Nikolas Lyons. Oh, happy days. And these are your friends? Well, that'll get ya up the social ladder, being the steward of Huron and all. So where's your first class?"

"Just finished taking the entrance exam." Nikolas retrieved his numbed appendage. "We're all in remedial class except Xanthus. He's a boy genius now, you know."

"I gotta go actually." Xanthus waved at them. "Don't want to be late. First class. AP Epic Heroism!"

"Well!" Jack pointed ahead of the crowd and started walking "We're in the same class then. A bit of good news there, I suspect. I'll take you there myself. Remedial class, huh? Hope you've got some good elixir insurance! Ha ha. Ha ha."

The joke produced confused looks.

"You're dusties, I forgot. Well, it means if you enjoy being chased by a giant unitoad or letting brain-damaged mages transform your limbs into celery stalks, then you'll love remedial class. Here we are."

Jack reached for a formidable iron door and put his entire weight into it. The door moaned open.

Nikolas saw a troll-boy study the chair that he was sitting on before he pulled it from between his legs and shoved it into his mouth. The chair legs were rammed against his cheeks like four tent poles. On seeing his audience, the troll-boy smiled sheepishly, squeezing out a liter of drool.

Daniel groaned, "What Jack means to say is for the rest of the school year, we've been confined to a roomful of mentally disturbed mythological creatures."

"Seriously, I cannot do this right now." Brandy shook her head. "None of these students even know how to tie a tie. Aw geez. That one's _eating_ his tie. I'm literally going to have a breakdown here, _people_."

"At least you'll graduate top of your class," Jack said.

"If we survive the class." Nikolas smacked at a small squirrel biting his shoe. It scampered off mumbling, "Nuts. Nuts. Nuts. Need walnuts for the winter. For the winter. For the winter. Nuts. Nuts. Nuts. Aah! Splendid." It trapped the leg of a coat rack in its vicious woodland teeth.

Bamm!

The door slammed behind them and three iron rods slid into place.

"That would be lockdown," Jack said. "They'll release us at the end of school. Seats, shall we?"

Clink, clink. Clink. Clink, clink, clink.

"Am I going crazy?" Nikolas leaned to Brandy. "Sounds like someone's carrying a dozen wine bottles in their pants."

"I hear it too." Brandy nodded.

Seating arrangements were difficult. Should they sit next to the elfling who was hacking at the troll-boy with his imaginary sword, or the dwarf girl who kept her collection of moldy heels of bread in a tin box? Brandy led the way to a creature holding a toy tarantula. He must have been nine feet tall with a thick brow and completely covered in bear-like fur. On closer inspection, it didn't look like a man, it looked like . . .

"Big Foot?" Brandy hissed, "Is that—"

"It's a sasquatch," Jack answered.

"Petting its stuffed animal," Brandy said. She put her hand out to touch the toy tarantula's leg.

The leg twitched.

"Aghh!" she yelled, leaping completely over a desk. "That thing is alive! In here! This is crazy, Nikolas Lyons." Brandy threw herself into a desk on the opposite side of the room. "You have to get us out of here, now!"

"What do you expect me to do?" Nikolas said.

"I don't know," Brandy said. "Aren't you the Steward of Huron or something? Pull some strings. Just get us out of here. This place is a social time bomb!"

"Uh, did you forget that Silas basically put an end to my stew—"

Iron rods released, and the door gears quaked. In walked a very short woman with a penguin-like nose, monocle, and fingers pressed together as if they'd been fused from birth. Her black dress crept past wrists and neck, covering anything that might suggest skin or blood circulation.

The woman opened her mouth and yelled, "P—LEASE TAKE A SEAT. MY name is Mrs. Weekeses, your assistant prin—CI—pal. HE—LOO my mentally underdeveloped stu—DENTS."

Daniel gave Nikolas a mixed expression of disdain and "Get me out of here, right now!"

"But since you cannot discern the difference between ME and the sharp end of a PEN—CIL, I suppose it does not MAT—TER my precious little I—DI—OTS."

Daniel's nails raked the desk.

"It seems, my mentally UNDER—developed students, that you have forced Mr. Moolworth into early re—TI—RE—ment." Mrs. Weekeses moved her attention to a giant boy who curled his head into his torso to avoid the chandelier. Even though the giant boy was at least twenty feet tall, she bent down and whispered. "You see, Horace, Mr. Moolworth suffers from a severe case of claustrophobia, so stuffing him into your boot and trying to put it back on, well, it did him in. That and the toe muck. But Mr. Moolworth DID last more than a month, so that's an improvement."

The giant boy gave a toothy smile. He was very pleased with himself.

"This—this isn't real." Daniel's voice trembled. "This can't be real."

Mrs. Weekeses brought her attention back to the students. "In the meantime, my mentally UNDER—developed students, we are assigning you a substitute teacher until a new one can be BLACKMAILED into taking the position."

"Please, no," Jack mumbled.

"Substitute?" Brandy said. "Is that bad?"

"The last substitute had to be restrained by an entire Harynne unit for transporting us to the netherworld."

The door whined open, and a snowstorm swept into the classroom. A decrepit man, dressed in a white robe completely covered in swirling snow, entered.

"Father Frost," Jack said with recognition. "It's going to be a cold one."

"Ah. Father Frost," Mrs. Weekeses said. "Just in time. I was just telling my UNDER—developed students about you."

"Hello, youth." When Father Frost opened his mouth, a flurry of snow rushed out. He moved to the front of the classroom and began the typical teacher's speech about rules and detention, releasing more snow flurries. Since he thought they were all mentally disabled, he talked slowly and concisely which meant even _more_ snow flurries. By the time the speech was done, an inch of snow had accumulated, and Nikolas predicted another two in the forecast.

Jack glanced back to find arms crossed and teeth jack-hammering. "Lucky you guys know a good junior alchemist." He flared out his coat to reveal rows and rows of bottles. The bottles in the cloak rattled _clink, clink, clink, clink._ "Got something to nip the nip."

"Dude. That's what made all the clinking noise." Nikolas gawked at Jack's coat. "You're a walking pharmacy."

"My coat-of-elixirs? I'm an alchemist's apprentice. Now something to warm us." Jack's eyes scanned the various bottles. "Ah, bluebottles with ground vixen lashes." He opened the bottle. A drop drizzled out and splashed on the floor. The snow dissolved, but so did the wood floor below it, and the wood floor below it, and the wood floor below it.

"Right then, a little too potent for our needs." Jack quickly screwed the lid back on and tucked it away. Brandy gave Nikolas a strained smile.

"Ah, that should be good. One of my mentor's recipes. He's a Bumgardner, you know." Jack's expression waited for some kind of congratulations. "You really are dusties. Bumgardners are midgling kind. Master mixers. Whether elixing or cooking, you can't beat 'em for anything."

He took a small sip. Surprisingly, he didn't transform into some evil creature or grow broccoli out of his throat. He passed it on to Brandy. "Just a drop will do ya."

Brandy sniffed it. "Mmm. Smells like soda. I've been jonesing for a soda all morning!" She threw her head back and guzzled.

"No, Brandy!" Jack yelled. It was too late. Brandy had downed half the elixir before he could snatch it away. "That bottle would've warmed an army of drakebats."

Brandy's eyes got big, and they shifted between Jack and everyone else. Her face went from pink to crimson red, and the snow underneath her feet melted off into steaming puddles.

"Is she OK?" Nikolas said.

"It won't kill her." Jack snickered, placing the bottle back in his coat. "She'll actually be a fine source of heat."

Nikolas held up his palms to Brandy. The icy numbness in his fingers started to go away. "You're right, Jack. That's _nice_."

"You're a jerk, Nikolas Lyons." Brandy swung at him.

He threw his head back to laugh but was stopped by a wall of fur. Sasquatch was leaning into the only source of heat.

"Woah, woah." Nikolas twisted around.

A circle of moans, coos, and cackles closed around them as all the mentally challenged students moved toward the warmth.

Brandy swatted at a mangy claw. "Don't you touch me!"

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  gh." Brandy stormed out of the classroom and through the mass of Huron students. "I can feel their nasty breath all over my face."

"They're following us." Helen looked back.

"We have to lose them," Brandy said, sprinting through the main entrance. "This is a social disaster. Four hours, Nikolas. You hear me, four hours!"

"Four hours what?" Helen said.

Brandy stopped at the front steps, chin up to her oldest sister. "Four hours of social integration. It is a scientific fact, as documented by _You Go Girl!_ magazine, that your place within a social environment is defined within the first forty-eight hours. I have burned through four. If the last forty-four hours are not redeemed, I will be forever known as the mentally underdeveloped, sweats-like-a-pig girl!"

"Who cares?" Helen said.

"Who cares?" Brandy slapped her forehead. "Who _cares?_ I didn't travel thousands of years into the past, fly across two planets in the belly of a man-eating ship, and sleep in an abandoned house with monsters sniffing at my feet, to become a nobody! Seriously. Why did any of us come?"

"Um," Helen said. "How about eighteen years being the average life expectancy of a refugee kid?"

Brandy was about to respond, but her eyes wandered past Helen and to the school lawn. She raised a finger. "What is that?"

Hundreds of booths manned by students were scattered across Huron Schoolhouse's lawn.

"It's the club and society recruitment fair," Jack said. He took off his stovepipe hat and flicked back a lop of auburn hair. "Really, just a bunch of shallow girls talking clothes, boys, makeup, and on the rare occasion, the fate of orphan children and how someday, somebody should do _something_. All self-serving, really. Not anything you would be—"

"Eeeeh!" Brandy already had Caroline by her sleeve and hustling toward a booth with the words stitched on its cotton banner:

Society for the Exceptionally Beautiful

Both Inwardly and Outwardly, But Most Particularly Outwardly

"Don't go too far!" Nikolas yelled after her. "We still have Xanthus's clue to figure out."

"Do they have groups for boys?" Tim said scanning the fair. "Like a cool boys' club?"

Jack pointed to several booths down the field. Tim nodded and walked toward the Hightower Boys booth. Daniel spotted the Automaton Club and limped his way over. Jack agreed to join him.

"Nothing strikes your fancy?" Helen said in a cheesy Huronite accent.

"Naw." Nikolas shrugged.

Wait? Was Nikolas alone with _thee Helen Wendell_? This had never happened before. It was just the two of them walking across the lawn like old buddies. Not that he was into her or anything, but they had never shared more than a sentence between them, at least not that he could remember. For some strange reason, he began to feel awkward.

Tim-awkward.

"Yeah, uh, nothing strikes my fancy," Nikolas said in a deeper voice, which only worsened the awkwardness, so he stopped. "I'm not good with club kinds of things."

Another awkward pause. He took a second stab at it.

"Tried one last summer. Train wreck. My pup scout leader and I didn't see eye-to-eye about our recreational activities. He thought the litter should earn the mountain climbing badge by going to one of those stupid indoor clubs, the rock climbing ones. I told the litter if we were going to earn a mountain climbing badge, we should _actually_ climb a mountain. Right? The more dangerous the situation, the more we're worthy of the badge. Pup scout leader said I needed to be a team member and then felt the need to spell the word 'team.' Anyway, I convinced the other litter members to spike his diet soda with four aspirin PMs and take all the gear up to Mt. Jebu—"

"The active volcano? The one that just erupted?" Helen said.

"Yeah. Over in Yellowstone. Pretty sweet, huh? Anyway, it was only twenty minutes by interstate hyperrail. So we climbed it."

"You didn't actually _go_ inside?"

"No! It was frustrating. We made it past the guards and everything. But Andrew had forgotten to pack his camel bag with cherry soda, and after an hour of hiking, nearly passed out. You see, he's addicted to cherry soda and apparently underwent severe sugar withdrawals. Everyone gave him their sodas to level out his glucose. After sucking up a gallon of our drinks, he informed us that it wouldn't do. Informed us this specific sugar spike was triggered by a chemical reaction between fructose syrup and the cherry flavor found only in cherry sodas. I was literally this close to punching him in the face."

Helen's expression teetered between amusement and apprehension. "You're all kinds of mental, Nikolas Lyons."

"What? You haven't done anything crazy? Come on."

"Oh, I don't know. How about traveling back in time to an Earth tethered to a magical Moon—hey, what?" A girl from the Feather for Skin Club shoved feathery hands into Helen's face. "No, I don't care if it's all the rage. I don't want feather-skin. Seriously, if you don't get that chicken wing out of my face in two seconds, I'll roundhouse you. . . . What was I—yeah. Anyway. I'm too busy playing bodyguard for my sisters. Promised Mom I'd keep them safe."

Nikolas searched for a response. Again, he still didn't know what to say to _thee_ Helen Wendell. "Uh, um. The housing situation at Manor Minor is lame. But Grand'll take care of it."

"Yeah. I have my own bedroom now, and we all get to stay together, so that's nice."

Nikolas was floored. _We all get to stay together, so that's nice?_ Never had such nice words been uttered by Helen Wendell, ever. Maybe Portlorn's flute was doing something to her. Or maybe it was that jynn'us of hers. Still, Nikolas couldn't forget Helen had just threatened to roundhouse that feather girl for her aggressive recruiting techniques.

They let the crunch of the autumn leaves under their feet and chatter from the booths fill the silence until they made it to Brandy and Caroline.

"Jazz, tap, ballroom," Brandy announced in her high voice to a redheaded girl. "I have also acquired over twenty-three hundred friends on my friendbook account, averaging thirty a day."

"Well, aren't you a funny little creature," the redheaded girl said. But her drooping expression proved that she was not impressed. "My name is Anne Hightower. Forgive me for asking, but are you an athlete? What with all your sweating."

"Oh this," Brandy said. "It's a—I'm doing a detox. See, the most effective detox uses a form of poison . . ."

"Did you hear that?" Nikolas said.

"Hear what?" Helen said.

"Aiigh!" The voice came from the Hightower Boys booth. "Let me out!"

Helen and Nikolas spun around and yelled, "Tim!"

Jack ran past them muttering something about the "Hightower Boys."

There, at the Hightower Boys booth, a boy stood squeezing goo out of a rubber egg sac with Tim trapped inside. Another boy raised a massive paddle and smacked the egg sac into the air.

"Aaah!" Tim screamed.

"That's my brother!" Nikolas yelled. "Knock it off."

"Well, well, well," said a teenage boy holding the paddle. He was shirtless, with suspenders, wool pants, and black-striped socks. His hair was oiled flat and parted down the middle. He couldn't have been more proud of that part, a straight edge more jealous. "I see your big brother has come to the rescue."

Tim shot Nikolas a look. The one that said, _"Don't tell him I'm the big brother."_

"Rosenthal. Come now," Jack pleaded. "He's new here. Just arrived yesterday."

"I gathered that," Rosenthal said. "Kept asking if we might 'hang sometime.' I said sure. We can 'hang' now." Rosenthal took another satisfying swing, sending Tim past the fifth floor.

Nikolas sized Rosenthal up and knew he had this. The boy wasn't much older than he, despite that healthy handlebar mustache.

Nikolas flicked his bowler hat to the grass and rolled up his sleeves. "Consider this your warning."

"Don't—help—Nick!" Tim cried all the way down.

"Would you like him back?" Rosenthal dropped his shoulders and sliced the air. Tim's screams followed him skyward.

"Yes. Now."

"Well. You'll just need to fetch this paddle from my hands, and he'll be all yours."

Nikolas was already cuffing up his sleeves. "No proble—" Without warning, blond hair and an "Aye-yaah!" flashed. Rosenthal flew up and rip-curled over until mouth smashed dirt.

Helen landed on both feet from her flying kick. Her right leg ready for a roundhouse.

"Back off!" she said, pushing hair from her face.

"Girlie?" Rosenthal hopped to his feet.

"Aaah!" Tim splatted into a gooey mess.

"Girlie, girlie, girlie," Rosenthal said bowing. "I say, Huronite hens aren't ones for bold introductions. Giggles and winks for the most part. Rosenthal Hightower likes." He turned around to his booth. "What say you, Hightower Boys? A candidate?"

The boys hooted "Yes!" and "Get that one to the livery!" Rosenthal faced her, hung one hand on his suspender, and raised the other one up. An apple launched from the Hightower Boys and landed perfectly into his palm. He shoved an impossible amount of the apple into his gaping mouth, juice dribbling out like little horns.

Helen dropped her shoulders and turned the other way. She knew what he wanted.

"Girlie! Hold one moment." Rosenthal held the apple out. "Who are you, exactly? I at least need to know where to send the invitation."

"Her name is Helen." Jack raised his hands, trying to get between them. "She's a ward of the House of Lyons."

" _Thee_ Helen?" Rosenthal said, pushing Jack out of his way. "Word around town is you've inherited the seiren's jynn'us. Probably already used it on me. Well, I accept. And why shouldn't I? Being the ward of the House of Lyons and all. A good stock, for sure."

Helen spun on her foot. "Jynn'us? How do you know about my jynn'us?"

"Never mind all that. It's settled then. I've found my date. On the sixteenth of Decemberist, you will attend the Festival of Lights with me. Your invitation will be in the mail. Sign it and send it back. All procedural, of course."

"Excuse me?" Her arms locked. " _We_ are not happening."

"Of course we are," Rosenthal said, angling his head. "You are of the highest pedigree in the land. My family owns ten percent of all dirty hexes in Huron. Every girl wants to go with me to the Festival of Lights."

"Oh, I see." Helen flicked her hair up. Most would have thought she was trying to look cute, but Nikolas knew better. " _Now_ I get it. I am connected to a good family and have a pretty face."

"Right you are." Rosenthal spit out a wad of seeds. "Beauty _and_ brains."

"And since you, being one of the tram drivers of Disneyworld here, need to find your long lost maiden, we'd make a perfect match?"

"Well. Not so fast, girlie." Rosenthal chucked away the half-eaten apple. "There are a few obligatory requirements on your part. We'll need to test you for curses, inherited or otherwise, physical abnormalities, hidden creachling attributes such as Werewolf, Satyr hooves, and what not. So you'll need to restrain yourself from any overly romantic sentiments until then, but yes, we are a match _._ "

Helen squinched her nose, giggled, and shoved her hands into Jack's coat-of-elixirs.

"Steady on!" Jack stumbled back.

Helen didn't bother to look at what was in her hand. She threw the vial at Rosenthal, and it broke into hundreds of glittering lights. He stumbled back, more out of shock by Helen's attack than anything. The glittering lights floated around until they found Rosenthal and imploded. His whole body flashed green.

"What did she throw at him?" Nikolas said.

"Freedman and Frolick's elixir," answered Jack. "Just a simple vanity elixir. It's supposed to help with hair—"

Rosenthal held up the backs of his hands and screamed. Coarse black hair grew from every inch of skin. His eyebrow hair cascaded below his nose, and his plumy mane completely overtook his straight edge part.

"—growth." Jack finished his sentence. "It's supposed to help with hair growth."

"What have you done to me," screamed Rosenthal. "You cursed sow!"

Helen shrugged. "What? Suffering from some strange physical abnormalities, are we? I am so sorry, Rosenthal. But it will never work between us because, you see, you're a carpet. I don't date carpets."

"Ahhh!" Rosenthal screamed.

"Helen!" Brandy said. "Are you crazy? That's Rosenthal! You know. Anne Hightower's _brother_." Brandy pointed back to a red-haired girl fuming, the same redheaded girl Brandy had been trying to win over a few minutes ago.

"I don't want to hear it." Helen marched past Brandy.

"This isn't Weaver High," Brandy said. "You can't just beat up every guy who looks at you the wrong way."

"I said I don't want to hear it."

"We're so not doing this, Helen," Brandy yelled. "I will not have my junior high career shot down because my sister is a psychopath!"

Helen kept walking.

"You're a relational terrorist, Helen Wendell!" Brandy stomped the grass. "Uhh!"

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  hey agreed to put some distance between them and the excited schoolyard. Brandy stayed to try and console Anne Hightower while Tim hobbled off to the bathroom.

Crossing two lanes of traffic, they found an open plaza full of statues, creating a stone forest. Nikolas noticed several groups of Merrows admiring the various statues. He tried to ignore them for fear of setting the voice of Huron off again.

"So this Bumgardner guy that trained you," Caroline looked at Jack earnestly. "Does he do potions or food?"

"Both." Jack slipped his thumbs into his pants' pockets and walked with an explanatory gait. "Food and hexes are a bit of the same, don't you think?"

"I do not know," Caroline stopped to squint up at Jack. "Brandy calls my quiche magical, but, you know, she doesn't mean it."

Jack cleared his throat and declared, "Only when an ingredient dies to itself can magic be born, can magic be tasted. That's what Mr. Lozano Squires says anyway."

"So is he talking about food or magic?" Caroline said.

"Yes. But he usually means magic. However, it's not really that easy. The most important ingredient is magic's cooperation. It's got to like what you're making, and it's got to like you. Or you could find yourself trying to amputate an unsightly dog tail from your backside. Oh, and Caroline. Your quiche? It very well may be magical. I'd like to taste it myself."

"Really?" Caroline giggled, clasping her hands together and bobbing on her feet. "I could whip up a—"

"Hey!" Xanthus weaved between statues. "Just saw Tim covered in crud. Said we're supposed to meet at the plaza with all the statues or something?"

"Damage control," Caroline said. "Helen met a boy."

"Ah." Xanthus nodded knowingly.

Helen rolled her eyes.

"This is not math," Daniel declared as he kept his gaze on the pirate clue. He'd been studying it since Huron Schoolhouse. "D plus F minus C? This is not math. Not really."

"I don't think we need to worry about that cure, bro," Xanthus said, grinning. "I feel awesome! That tongue-of-galley trot is great. Dr. Mendesmuss really knows his elixirs."

"How was AP epic heroism?" Caroline said. "Did you make any friends?"

"Beyond the expectations of mortal men." Xanthus pulled out Grand's bestiary bowl. "And I got some sweet samples for my bowl. Need to find another way to acquire the samples though. Leprechauns don't care to have their leg hairs plucked. That reminds me, Daniel. Our family is cursed to the seventh generation or something. Sorr—" Xanthus saw Jack for the first time. "Um. Who are you?"

"Oh, you two have not met." Caroline held a hand to each boy as if she was a relational coordinator. "Jack, _Xanthus._ Xanthus, _Jack_."

"I get the hat," Xanthus said. "Explain the clinking."

"It's all the elixir bottles in his coat," Caroline said. "Jack's a magician."

"I am not." Jack laid his hand on his chest. "I'm an elixirist."

"But . . . your top hat?" Caroline wrinkled her brow and pushed her glasses up.

"Stovepipe hats are common in the city. A Huronite design, after all."

"But you know," insisted Caroline, "all those bottles. Pull a rabbit out of your hat kinda stuff."

"Magician. Elixirist. Neither pulls rabbits out of hats. But I can do that if you'd like."

"Please," Caroline smiled.

"Very well." Jack flipped his stovepipe hat off and shoved his arm down the gullet.

Even Daniel stopped reading the clue.

"Always wondered where the other side went," Xanthus said.

"Orvell's Incidentals and Keepings. Fifth and Greenwich," Jack said.

"Oh," Xanthus said, slightly deflated.

"An elixirist cannot keep all of their equipment on them, so we're assigned closets. I can only afford the smaller one. They're quite expensive, and I haven't yet profited by my elixir. . . . Ah, gotcha." Jack kept his hand in the hat and announced, "Ladies and gentlemen, would you like to see me pull a rabbit out of my hat?"

"Yes." Caroline stood straight and serious. "We would."

Jack raised his arm skyward.

Xanthus screamed long and loud.

"Oh . . . my." Caroline's eyes grew big.

"Um, dude," Nikolas said. "That rabbit is dead."

"What's _wrong_ with you?" Xanthus cried.

Jack looked back at the stiff rabbit with its withered fur and leathery gums. One milky eye stared north, the other southwest. "Do you expect me to keep a live one in my locker? That'd be cruel and unusual."

Xanthus trembled. "Put that away!"

"Forgive me. I didn't mean anythi—"

"Don't be too down on yourself," Brandy said to a moping Tim as they walked from the schoolhouse. "Stick close to me, and we'll get you into high society." She lifted a lavender booklet. "Look, there are so many to choose from. 'Society for the Rosy Cheeks,' 'Society for Smooth Skin,' 'Society for Thin Ankles, Small Toes.' Hey. That's nice, Caroline. They have a 'Society for the Plucky but Average-Looking Friends of Exceptionally Beautiful Girls.' Oh. Sisters don't count. Sorry."

"Um. Thank you, I guess," Caroline said.

Brandy jumped in front of Daniel and started to walk backward. "I even found some societies for you to join. What with your disability and all."

"Not interested," Daniel said, keeping his eyes on the clue.

"Sure you are. They didn't have much though. The closest ones they had were a 'Society for the Peg Leg,' 'Society for the One-Eyed Peg Leg,' 'Society for the Non-Eyed Peg Leg,' 'Society _Against_ Cruelty to Non-Eyed Peg Legs Being Used for Earwax Removal of Giants and Other Creatures of Large Proportion.' Told me they could form a society for gimps if you wanted. There is a high demand among the servant popula—Ow!" Brandy smacked her head into a statue. It reeled backward.

"Brandy!" Nikolas jumped around her and rammed himself into its base. After a moment of spitting through teeth, while knees threatened to snap in two, he managed to push the statue back into place. He kept fingers spread over the stone legs just in case.

"Like herding cats with you gu—," Nikolas stopped himself. "Wait . . . Those aren't legs. Those are—"

Huron seethed, _The Merrows have come, and death is their name!_

"—fins?" Nikolas quickly pulled his hands off and stepped away. It wasn't the statue of a Huronite lady looking proudly to the horizon, but a mermaid covering her face. "The statue. It's a Merrow turned to stone."

Everyone moved their gaze to the plaza. They were completely surrounded by mermen, maids, and children frozen in horror.

"It's a Merrow graveyard," Nikolas said.

"Isn't that—?" Xanthus said, pointing to a stone Merrow in the distance.

"The Prime Minister Shale." Nikolas nodded.

Twenty paces from Duckett Street lay a transmutated Mr. Waters with horrified eyes and Prime Minister Shale crawling from some unseen monster. Nikolas recalled the prime minister's words, "Keep them out. Keep them out. They will destroy us all."

Around the statues of Waters and Shale were mourners holding several parasols. A child in a wheeled water tank played her accordion while a mermaid on automalegs cried bitterly into the shoulder of an elderly merman. Nikolas looked to all the other Merrow huddles throughout the plaza. He'd thought they were admiring fine works of art, but he'd been wrong. They were mourning their loved ones.

"Why would anyone put petrified Merrows out here?" Nikolas shook his head. "Kinda creepy."

Jack shrugged. "They're all over the city, you know, especially King's Highway. Many would like to take them down, but the Merrows insist on keeping them."

"They want their graveyard on every city corner?" Nikolas said.

"No," Jack said. "Think of them more as a tribute to the fallen. I suppose one can make such demands when they own half the city."

"Sad," Caroline said. "Is that going to happen to you, Xanthus?"

She looked at Xanthus, who was studying the statue Brandy had nearly knocked over. He had a frightened expression. "That thing, Nikolas, whatever it was, it breathed on me too."

"Yeah." Nikolas nodded.

"We're going figure out that clue, right?" Xanthus said, looking back to the statue.

"Totally." Nikolas tried for confidence. "We got this, right, Daniel?"

"Maybe." Daniel uncurled the clue again. "I understand the letters. D plus F minus C. But over Fern? It is meaningless."

"Mr. Fern?" Jack said. "He's a scribe."

"Pardon me?" Daniel said.

"A scribe." Jack nodded. "Mr. Fern tends to the Hall of Keepings for the Third Epoch, and his study is on the bottom floor."

"Over Fern, of course." Daniel pressed his lips. "The clue must be in a record 'over Fern.' The answer is probably in the Hall of Keepings. I expect those letters then correspond to some form of filing system."

Nikolas whistled for Rug. Within moments, the magical carpet vaulted above the schoolhouse crowd.

"The Hall of Keepings is in Humborough," Jack said. "As humlings, you'll be given unlimited access."

"We can't walk into the other boroughs?" Nikolas said.

"No," Jack said. "One cannot enter the boroughs without a passport, ever since Sheriff Silas began his administration anyway."

"You're very useful, Jack." Nikolas smacked him on the shoulder as Rug swept in front of them.

Jack tilted his hat. "Thank you."

"Got any plans this afternoon?" Nikolas grabbed one of Rug's longer tassels.

"I do now." Jack flipped his stovepipe hat back on and started to work the buttons of his coat-of-elixirs.

Tim legged himself onto Rug and looked back to Jack. "Sure you want to sign up for crazy?"

Rug tried to hold steady against a strong northerly wind. Pegasi were the only animals able to fly their stagecoaches in such conditions, but even a few of them had pitched over to be rescued by the Heimdall watchmen.

It took about twenty minutes before they landed at Humborough Gate.

After a pensive nod from two Harynne guards, Nikolas and company followed Jack through the gate, down several cramped streets, and up a long flight of switchback steps until they came to the Hall of Keepings. Due to a city ordinance, Rug had to wait in one of the city stables with all of the other non-licensed vehicles. Begrudgingly, he obeyed.

The Hall of Keepings was a tall, crooked brick tower squeezed between Huron's northern wall and two stone buildings. Nikolas wondered if the hall could've stood without the support of the surrounding structures.

They were greeted at the door by a man-sized rat, which sent Caroline screaming down the steps. Its hooked buckteeth and twitchy whiskers were more than she could handle. After Nikolas chased her down the steps and brought her back shaking, the rat asked if they were interested in a loan or contribution. Jack quickly explained their need, and the rat led them through two mismatched doors into the Hall of Keepings. Attic was the only way Nikolas could describe its smell and for good reason. The hall was stacked from floor to ceiling with boxes of discarded toys, mismatched shoes, clothes cast away for some new fashion, and moldy books well on their way to decomposition. If one removed an object, the whole place would implode.

In the middle of the hall sat a dark cherry wood desk filled with rows of books opened, bookmarked, or stacked for research. Several rats were flipping through books, while another rat, much older and slower, kept his eyes fixed on the top right of a page. The twitching of whiskers was his only movement.

Jack leaned to Nikolas. "Mr. Fern is from the line of Pack Rats. They all are." Then he waved his hands. "Mr. Fern! It's Jack!"

Mr. Fern's spectacled eyes rose slowly, considered them for a moment, and dropped back down. "Good to see you, Jack."

"I've brought my friends. They want to check the records. See about a wicked creature and all," Jack said.

"You know your way about. Spent half your wee years in here, didn't you?"

"I still have an account, right?" Jack said.

"Of course, Jack. You are a citizen, after all."

"All right. Now what?" Jack said.

"Suppose we should select a door." Daniel said, looking at several curtains, each with a title:

Clothes, Shoes, and Hats: Being of the 3rd Epoch

Musical Instruments: Being of the 3rd Epoch

Stories, Tales, and Records of Huron: Being of the 3rd Epoch

"I cannot imagine Xanthus's creature has a taste for clothing," Jack said. "And unless you heard the beast plucking a sitar, Stories and Tales is our door."

They shuffled across the hall and walked up to the paisley curtain titled, "Stories, Tales, and Records of Huron." Beside it hung a wooden board with the names of the floors carved on it, but instead of numbers, they were lettered according to their filing: A, B, C, and so forth.

"I guess this is where our clue fits in." Daniel pulled the paper from his cloak. "Now, D plus F minus C are obvious. This is an alphanumeric code." He looked to everyone for recognition. Dull silence was their response. "Alphanumeric. It is a common coding system and not very sophisticated, I might add. It is to be expected of this world."

Nikolas smirked. "That is, of course, if this world is even real."

"It is not, I assure you, Nikolas." Daniel's eyes stayed on the paper. "Your sardonic humor is noted by the way. We are merely part of a construct. A very sophisticated construct, no doubt. Must have been entered into a government program through the refugee camps."

"But I'm not from the refugee camp," Tim said.

"You and Nikolas most likely do not exist."

"I do too!"

"You're programmed to say that," Daniel said.

"I'm not!"

"Then why go along with it?" Nikolas said.

"It is not advised to ignore the environment of a construct. Your brain still believes it to be real. I will find a way out though."

Jack scratched the back of his neck. "Are you proposing that all of Huron is a product of your mind?"

"Don't worry, Jack," Nikolas said. "Daniel's power of disbelief would put Santa on suicide watch."

"As I said, this is an alphanumeric code." Daniel returned to the clue. "Letters corresponding to numbers in the alphabet. First, every floor is over Fern, so we have that part of the clue figured out. Now, we're in the Hall of Keepings, which probably uses some form of cataloguing system. I would guess the catalogue system is also alphabetical. Jack. How many letters are in your alphabet?"

"Twenty-six," Jack answered.

"The same as ours." Daniel pulled out a pencil and paper from the inside of his cloak. He jotted down the numbers, his expression steely and engaged. "All right now, D is four, and F is six. By adding them together, they equal ten. Now subtract C which is the number three.

A few grunted, but Daniel couldn't conjure up an intelligent response from them.

"Look. D + F - C, or 4 + 6 - 3 equals—"

"Seven?" Jack offered.

"And seven is alphanumerical code for . . ." Daniel coaxed them with his hand.

"G." Nikolas nodded.

"Very good," Daniel said.

"The Gs? Follow me!" Jack's coat-of-potions clanked loudly as he spun around and flung open the paisley curtain. They followed him up a corkscrew stairwell, past several unmarked doors, and to a yellow door with a glass knob and the letter "G." He shouldered the door several times, finally pressing it open.

"OK." Nikolas gawked at the room. "We're going to be here awhile."

They found themselves in a room covered from wall to ceiling in bookshelves. Shorter stacks of books were lined in front of them like foothills before their mountain range.

"We've established the G. Now, for the rest of the clue," Daniel said, biting his thumbnail. "No greater than fifteen and eighteen. Fifteen plus eighteen adds up to thirty-three. Jack, are you sure there are only twenty-six letters in your alphabet?"

"Yes. Only twenty-six," Jack said.

"Hmm," Daniel said. "What if you do not add fifteen and eighteen, rather, they represent their own characters. Fifteen is O, and eighteen is R. No greater than—"

"G, O, R . . ." Nikolas said. "What's a Gor?"

"Gorgon," Xanthus said matter-of-factly.

"That was easy!" Caroline grinned. "This is fun!"

Xanthus shook his head. "But I don't get it. Gorgons don't breathe on you; they look at you. That's how you turn to stone. Didn't it look at Mr. Shale?"

"I don't know," Nikolas said. "But Yeri said he looked into its eyes when they chased him to the Merrow fortress."

"OK." Xanthus shrugged "Mystery solved. It's a gorgon."

"Are you OK?" Caroline said.

"Gorgon," Xanthus said slowly. "That's straight Greek mythology. You know, Medusa. Her sisters. They were all gorgons. But there's no cure, guys. You turn to stone, and that's that."

"There's a cure in these books." Nikolas pointed up the ladders. "That's why we're here.

"No," Daniel said. "Xanthus is right. The clue only led us to Xanthus's creature. It never indicated a cure. How do we reverse the transmutation? That's the key here, correct? How do we keep Xanthus from turning to stone?"

"It's impossible," Xanthus said, rubbing his earring. "You can't argue with mythology."

Nikolas shot Daniel an evil look and hopped onto the ladder. "Forget Daniel. He's got the soul of a Bunsen burner. There has to be a cure in one of these books. What's the point of leaving the note if there isn't a cure?"

"Yeah." Caroline grabbed Xanthus by the arm. "You'll be OK."

"Thought it was just some weird magical cold." Xanthus leaned his head against a ladder. "You know, because we came to a fantastic moon. But it's not that at all."

"Stop saying that, Xanthus," Nikolas said. "We'll find a cure and get you fixed by dinner."

"OK." Xanthus said, but all hope was drained from his voice.

Nikolas wanted to kick that stupid cane out from under Daniel. _Way to bum out your brother._

He climbed the ladder confidently, if only to prove that they would figure out the clue. It took about ten rungs before he found "GOR." He pressed his hat down while scanning the embossed letters. All the books were strays from several different encyclopedia series.

_Gil-Gos_ _~ Muskingum's Monsters: A Complete Account of the Unfortunate Late Muskingum Graves' Traverses across Huron Valley and Beyond. As told by his cook, Lester Ungfried_

"Got one," Nikolas announced as he grabbed for _Muskingum's Monsters_. Its pages were curled like potato chips, and layers of dust left him gasping and coughing. He passed it down before rummaging for another one.

_Gol-Gul_ _~ Phantasmagoria and the Monstrogoria: Life and Times of all Unlings across the Brother Worlds_

He pulled the book out and threw it down to Jack, leaving a dusty trail.

After nearly pillaging the Stories and Tales section for an hour, they carried thirty-two books to Mr. Fern, but the scribe informed them that Jack had an outstanding fine and was limited to only ten books. They would have to return most of them. After doing so, they scrambled down the steps and toward the stables. They found a nervous Rug. He didn't like the way Chesterton dragon was eyeing him.

Nikolas had just found a secure place at the front of the magical carpet when he felt Xanthus's prod. "Your coat's gone all radioactive, Nikolas."

Nikolas gave Xanthus a confused look and followed his line of vision to his coat pocket. "Oh, that? Grand gave it to me. It's the Harynne's nuncio. Supposed to send out an alert if they come after us." Nikolas slipped out the gray book and opened it to the glowing page.

"Hey!" Tim twisted his head. "In the middle there. They kinda look like . . . us?"

An invisible hand was sketching a mass of bodies on top of a large floating rug.

Xanthus leaned in. "Who are all the other people? See. The ones surrounding us?" Five other figures with katanas had just been sketched.

"Harynne." Nikolas looked up. There stood five real Harynne guards holding katanas.

He scrambled to his feet. To do what? He didn't know.

The Harynne raised reeds to their lips followed by a chorus of _thissff._

The sound of skin smacking stone came from all around. Nikolas heard Jack drop the books.

Everything went black.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

 _he Merrows have come, and death is their name._

Nikolas awoke with a gasp.

"Ughh," he moaned and tried to raise both hands to his temples, but they were tied behind a wooden chair.

"Am I dead?"

"No." Tim's bitter voice reverberated from somewhere in the dark.

Nikolas squeezed his eyelids closed, open, and closed again. He didn't know what those Harynne had shot him with, but black cotton balls danced around his vision. A few things were obvious. Everyone had been tied to a chair, and the room smelled like wet rock.

"Are you insane?" Nikolas called into the darkness. "I don't know who you are, but you'd better let us go! Grand wi—"

"Please don't, Nikolas." Caroline nodded to Helen, whose mouth had been clamped shut with a metal guard. "They've already been through it with her."

Nikolas heard growls and murmurs from somewhere in front of them. Finally, the darkness disappeared, and he could make out copper plaques floating in front of stone chairs.

Lady of the Lake

Japateurga

Dr. Mendesmuss

Mr. Algernon

Baron Portlorn

Mrs. Parcels

When Nikolas saw the very last plaque, _Duke Lir Anu Palis_ , Huron's voice seethed, _The Merrows have come, and death is their name!_

The merman, Lir, held a handkerchief over his nose, staring wide-eyed at Xanthus whose head fell into his chest.

"Nikolas . . ." Xanthus's head rolled over. A brown milky substance covered his eyes, and his skin was covered in black blisters again.

"Please," Caroline said. "Xanthus is turning to stone. He needs his medicine every four to six hours."

Dr. Mendesmuss looked to Japa who nodded. He slipped out a silver envelope and spoon-fed the tongue-of-galley trot to Xanthus. His breathing slowed after a few minutes.

"What's going on?" Nikolas said, glancing at Baron Portlorn, Algernon, and Dr. Mendesmuss. "Thought you guys were on Grand's side."

"We are the Council of Teine, the deep council," Japa said. "We are on the side of Huron."

Nikolas recognized the grizzly bear from the first city council of Huron. "Pulling a double, Japa? Didn't pay enough to stab Grand in the back the first time?"

Japa said nothing, but the way he dug his claws into the stone throne told Nikolas everything.

"This is the chamber of the deep council." Jack peered around. "We're under the City Council of Huron, quite literally." Chandeliers, frosted with centuries of candle wax, lit up the ceiling of a massive cave with follicles of tree roots edging out. "You're the deep council, the Council of Teine?"

"Yes," Dr. Mendesmuss answered.

"I thought you were a myth," Jack said.

"As you should," Japa said. "Audience with _this_ council is to be avoided at all costs. The city council deals in civil matters. The Council of Teine deals in shadows and whispers."

Lir slowly lowered his handkerchief to address Nikolas. "Yeri. How does he fare?"

"Excuse me?" Nikolas said. _They kidnap him, and this merman wants an update on the stagecoach driver?_

"My wife, Nia, and I sent him with a message requesting Huron's aid. I've been told he resides with you to care for Xanthus?"

"He's fine." Nikolas leaned from the chair. "You've got bigger stuff to worry about, merman. Like kidnapping me. Grand is going to beat the stuffing out of you when he finds out what you did."

"He is only a steward," Japa growled. "And not even that now. We do not need his permission."

"We'll see about that when you're sucking down teeth."

Japa bared his teeth. They looked like little daggers.

"Yeah. Those ones," Nikolas sneered.

The grizzly bear roared and leapt from the throne. Suddenly, hot breath and black eyes were inches away from Nikolas.

"Japa!" Dr. Mendesmuss stood to his feet.

Japa gnashed at Nikolas.

"This is unacceptable, Japa. Creachlings have risen above their incivility."

Japa gnashed again but retreated back to his seat.

"We mean you no ill will by this summons, Nikolas." Lir raised his hands, signaling everyone to lay down their verbal arms. "But you can no longer pursue the quest you've begun."

"What?" Nikolas said. "Check out a few books from the Hall of Keepings?"

"You know it is a bit more than that." A woman spoke for the first time. Her plaque read _Mrs. Parcels_. She was a hefty mermaid strapped into spider leg-shaped automalegs, and her voice sounded like a box of broken metals. She rose to her automa-spiderlegs, holding the pirate clue in her hand. "The clue delivered to you by the toy pirates?"

Nikolas's eyes shrunk suspiciously. "How do _you_ know about that?"

"We _are_ the Council of Teine," Lir restated. "There is very little we do not know. It is why we exist, to know and protect Huron."

"Then you know what Huron thinks about all of you Merrows coming here?"

"Tell us, O' Wise Steward," Mrs. Parcels said. "What does Huron think since you two are so intimate?"

Nikolas hesitated. He turned to Xanthus who was shuddering from the pain.

"Leave," Nikolas said. "All of the Merrows need to leave Huron now. That's what she keeps telling me."

Surprise moved through the chamber.

Lir lowered his handkerchief completely. "And be left to the devices of our enem—"

"Do not let him draw you into his madness," Mrs. Parcels interrupted their exchange. "Huron has never spoken directly to a steward at any point of our city's illustrious history, especially to a fourteen-year-old boy. She has always used the horn so that everyone may hear her voice. Otherwise, how could one distinguish Huron's voice from unmerited prejudice?" Mrs. Parcels stretched out her hand to Nikolas. "And this question of you as the steward? A steward has never taken the seat before the age of one hundred. Temperance and self-control must be attained. A fourteen-year-old, flax-headed boy guardian of a city—the great city of Huron, no less? Hasn't even found his jynn'us? Steward of Huron, I think not."

Nikolas actually agreed. He was responsible for hundreds of thousands of biglings, midglings, faerlings, humlings, and creachlings? The thought of it made him sick, but Grand had given him an order.

"I don't know what you're talking about, and I don't care," Nikolas said. "Right now, all I care about is doing what Grand told me to do. He told me to protect Huron and my friends, and I'm gonna do it. Look at him. Look at Xanthus."

Heads stayed still, but eyes slipped over to Xanthus. Sweat poured down his cheeks as he fought for every breath.

"He needs a cure now! If that clue helps me find a cure, then you can't stop me."

"We understand the predicament thrust upon you," Lir said. "But you are quite naïve. There is more to this clue than you realize. We fear the sheriff is using you. And the more you heed this clue, the more Sheriff Gorringe has you in his grip. Do you think it a coincidence that his son befriended you the moment you received the note?"

"Son? That Beronn guy?" Nikolas laughed. "Grand tossed him off the Mottle Craw. We're not friends."

"His _other_ son," Lir said, his eyes moving away from Nikolas. "Jack Gorringe."

Nikolas stiffened. "He's not—"

"I hate my father," Jack said. "I want nothing to do with him."

"He's your dad?" Nikolas said.

"I haven't talked to him in over two years," Jack said. "He is a vile and contemptuous man."

"Why didn't you tell us?" Nikolas said.

"Everyone hates me because of my father," Jack said. "No one will speak to me at school. The teachers have me pegged for a criminal. That is why they put me in remedial class. You were all new. I—I thought if you got to know me, you wouldn't care about my lineage. Please, Nikolas. I don't have anything to do with all these troubles. I just wanted to be your friend."

"So?" Nikolas tried to pretend he didn't care about this revelation. "So what if he's the son of the sheriff? Jack's been helping us with the clue. You know what, I don't answer to you. I answer to Grand. I'm going to find a cure for Xanthus." Nikolas leaned in, the rope cutting into his wrists. "And I'm going to figure out what you Merrows are up to."

"You will?" Mrs. Parcels stood to her feet and folded her hands. "The sheriff has ordered all Harynne to arrest your friends on sight and take them to the nearest orphanage."

Daniel and the Wendell sisters straightened up in their seats.

"Yeah. So?" Nikolas shrugged.

"Have you wondered why the Harynne haven't arrested your friends already? Do you think they couldn't have come to the Huron Schoolhouse or Manor Minor and dragged them away? The Council of Teine, as a favor to Mr. Lyons, has allowed your orphan friends to indulge themselves, although they should have been submitted to the nearest orphanage for processing." She stepped toward Nikolas. "I'm not sure about the state of your orphanages Earthside, but I promise you, Huronite orphanages are legendary for their strict diet of gruel and twelve-hour, character-forming work days in the troglodyte mines."

"They're wards of the House of Lyons," Nikolas said. "Grand made them wards."

"He has submitted the papers," Mrs. Parcels said, "but they have not been approved. Not yet." She grabbed the clue and began ripping it apart. "If you so much as think about clues or cures, the Harynne will have your friends swept away and admitted to the nearest workhouse. And any attempt by your grandfather to adopt them will be thwarted. Do I make myself clear?"

Nikolas kept his eyes fixed on the ground while Mrs. Parcels sprinkled the clue at his boots.

"I said, do I make myself clear, Nikolas Lyons the 12th?"

Nikolas kept his eyes down and his mouth shut. This council meant business. They would send his friends to a nightmare comparable to the refugee camps. He wasn't going to make promises he couldn't keep, but he wasn't going to let Xanthus turn to stone either.

"You're a very bad lady," Caroline said.

"Nikolas!" Mrs. Parcels shouted. "Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, ma'am." Tim nodded quickly. "Totally clear, Mrs. Parcels. We'll forget about that stupid clue."

Nikolas shot him an angry look.

Tim ignored him. "I'm the oldest. I'll keep Nikolas in line."

The Harynne guards escorted them to Manor Minor and a very worried Malmedy. Once they told her the Council of Teine had abducted them, however, her worry turned to rage.

And that's when she started swinging.

The Harynne guards had to duck and dodge Malmedy's fists while Dangus and Nikolas did their best to drag her back into the house.

"After all Mr. Lyons done for that city!" Malmedy yelled at the door, accompanied by her ceiling-pointing and head-shaking. "If I wasn' a respectabl' citizen, I'd let that council have a piece a' my fist! Now what are we'se gonna to do when some creature's turning poor littl' youngin's like Xanthus to stone. And Yeri's gettin' it too!"

"Yeri?" Nikolas noticed a lump on the couch for the first time.

The stagecoach driver rolled over and was met with gasps. His face had swelled up with brown and green spindly pockmarks all over his skin.

"I'm one to catch every bug and bother," Yeri said. "Be a good steward and find us that cure. Hoped to see Mum by winter's end." He rolled back over.

Nikolas slid down the wall. Defeat hung heavily in the room. Helen massaged her bruised jaw; Caroline and Brandy guided a shivering Xanthus to the couch. Tim stared at his shoes. Nikolas could see Daniel taking quick glances at him, probably wondering what he was going to do now. Would he watch Xanthus slowly turn to stone or find a cure and pretty much sentence all his friends to an orphanage for the rest of their teenage life? He knew what he really wanted to do.

Run away.

But that wouldn't actually make him feel better, so he had to choose. There was no way he could ever standby and let Xanthus die if he could help it.

"We'll find that cure, Xanthus," Nikolas said.

"What do you mean, 'We'll find the cure?'" Tim rubbed his wrists. "Didn't you hear the council?"

"Yeah, I did," Nikolas said. "We're supposed to sit around and do nothing? Just let everyone turn to stone?"

"No one is turning to stone," Tim said. "I've got a ton of galley-trot left, and Dr. Mendesmuss is working on a cure, remember? Look, since we arrived here, Daniel has been taste-tested by a living boat and stung by a man-eating vine, and we were all abducted by the Harynne. Now we're going to look for trouble? A drone won't be there to bail you out, Nick. Let's just keep our heads down, and go with it for once in our lives. You know, go to school. Let the _adults_ save the world."

Nikolas said, "If Yeri's gotten it, then it's probably airborne. Won't be long before we're all turned to stone. And the rest of Huron, too. We have to save them."

"Man, your Messiah complex has a life of its own. Give it a rest. Seriously, Nick, not everyone needs you to save the day."

"Do you think I want this? Do you think I want to worry about Merrows and Harynne and all this junk? But Grand and Ludwig and Huron and everyone else is telling me that I have to do something. I can't ignore all of that."

"I've never actually seen this Ludwig guy and who knows the true source of the 'voice' in your head. The deep council doesn't believe you, and I sure—" Tim stopped with a finger to Nikolas's chest.

"Sure what?" Nikolas said.

"I'm sorry, dude. Grand doesn't know you like I do. You always have these big ideas, trying to drag everyone along. By the end of it all, you're dead wrong, trees are on fire, and someone gets hurt. I—I'm just not buying it anymore."

"I hate to admit it, Nikolas, but Tim is right." Helen stepped between them. "I promised my mom I'd protect my sisters. The refugee camp was bad enough. If they take us to the orphanage, I just can't deal with that."

"Really?" Nikolas turned to his friends. No one would look him in the eye. "You're serious? We're gonna just let Xanthus turn to stone? You're crazy if you think I'm—"

"Stop it!" Xanthus cried out.

Nikolas's mouth hung open, prepared to launch a tirade.

"It's up to me, right?" Xanthus said. "Well, I can't drag you all down with me. I'm sick, but I'm not dead. I can take care of myself. I want to wait on Dr. Mendesmuss for a cure. He knows a ton more about this than any of us. Thanks, Nikolas, but there's no reason to send everyone to the orphanage over something I doubt you can fix anyway. Sorry, dude, but it's true."

I doubt . . .

Nikolas felt that. It was like a punch to the sternum. Confusion rolled over him. He _had_ to save Xanthus; there wasn't another option. But no one wanted him to, even Xanthus.

"I'm responsible for you, Xanthus," Nikolas said. "If anything happens to you, it's on me."

"Why?" Tim said. "Why are you in charge all of a sudden?"

"I—I changed my name." Nikolas looked at his brother. "I changed it to Nikolas and told the lady at the Hall of Pickings that I wanted to be the steward, to be responsible for everyone. I can't go back."

Tim snorted, "Please. A name doesn't make you the steward. You'll _always_ be Nick."

Nikolas dropped to the wicker chair and stared at the fibers on the arm rest.

He suddenly jumped to his feet. "Fine! Who cares what happens to other people? Let's just sit around and wait until the whole city turns to stone!" His nose burned, and he tried to hold back the tears. "You know what? Grand was wrong about you guys. He said that I was supposed to have faith in you, that Huron needed you, that she called you here or something. Guess what? She doesn't need you. I don't need you. You're just messing everything up. I wish I'd left you behind at that refugee camp!" He grabbed his bowler hat.

Tim crossed his arms. "Poor, poor brother. Life on a magical moon isn't so simple after al—"

Nikolas slammed the front door.

