The creature laughed at this out loud.

"You're not from Hell, are you?" she asked. "No, I'm not."

"Are you an angel then?"

"No, not that either."

"What then?"

"I told you: Better you not know." The trumpets were sounding again. ceremony's about to begin. I have to go. I wish I could do more for you, child, but I cannot" He laid his fingers tightly upon her eyelids.

"Eyes closed until I'm gone."

"Yes

"You promise me?"

"I promise." His fingers were removed, and he began to whistle some pretty little tune, breaking it only to say: "Say nothing of this, to anyone," then picking up the melody again to mask his departure.

A promise made with fingers crossed was no promise at all; Maeve had known this from the age of five. Uncrossing her fingers now, she waited until the sound of whistling retreated just a little, then opened her eyes. Their flight had apparently taken them some considerable way up the mountain, because the ground around the rock on which he'd set her was steeply sloped. Far fewer ums grew here; and there was consequently far more light. She could see the sky overhead snow had stopped, the parting clouds tinged a delicate pink by the setting sun-and when she cast her eyes up the Mountainside in pursuit of the whistler she found him readily enough. At this distance, she could make out almost no detail of his appearance, but she was determined not to be denied it long. Climbing down off the boulder, she started after him.

It was hard going. The dirt and rotted needles slid away beneath her feet and hands as she climbed, and several times she had to scrabble for a root or a stone to keep herself from sliding back down the slope. The distance between herself and the beast grew steadily wider, and just as she began to fear losing sight of him altogether the same roseate light that had tinged the clouds overhead came between the trees, and with it a balmy air the like of which she'd not felt on her face in a month or more. The trees were more widely spread than ever, and between them she could see something of the slope beyond. It rose in a snowy sweep up to the top of the mountain, where the clouds had cleared completely, so that the peak stood against a sky pricked with the first of the stars. Their glimmer, however, could not compete with the lights shed on the snow field below, the source of which Maeve did not discover until she was a few yards from the edge of the trees.

Several forms of misty light hovered over the slope, shedding their gentle luminescence on a scene of such beauty she stood among the trees rooted with wonder. Though her rescuer had denied he was an angel, surely heaven was here. From what other place could the creatures that inhabited this place have come? Though few of them had wings, all were in some way miraculous. A dozen or more that better resembled birds than men-beaked and shiny-eyed-stood communing beneath one of the spheres of light. Another clan, this at first glance dressed in scarlet silks, descended the slope with much ostentation, only to suddenly draw their brilliance into their bodies and hang in the air like skinned snakes.

Yet another group had torsos like fans that opened lavishly, exposing vast, pulsing hearts. Not every member of this assembly was so strange. Some were near enough men and women but for a color that passed through their skin, or a tail they trailed behind. Others were so tenuous that they were nearly phantoms, their passage leaving no mark upon the snow, while others still-these surely the cousins of her savior-seemed almost too solid in this place of spirit, brooding in the shadows of their wings, reluctant, it seemed, to even keep company with their fellows.

As to the creature that had unwittingly led her here, he was limping his way through the congregation towards a place at the top of the slope where a tent the color of the darkening sky had been pitched. She was of course instantly curious as to what wonder it contained. Did she dare leave the cover of the trees and follow him to find out? Why not? she reasoned. She had nothing to lose. Even if she were able to find her way back down the mountain to the wagons, Whitney would be there, with his rifle and his righteousness. Better to go where the creature and her curiosity led.

And now, another astonishment. Though she took her way out from the trees and up through the hundred or so gathered here, none made a move to question her or block her way. A few heads were turned in her direction, it was true, a few whispers exchanged of which she was surely the subject. But that was all. Among such strangenesses, her size and sickliness were apparently taken to be a glamor of their own.

As she climbed the thought occurred to her that perhaps this was a dream: that she had swooned on her father's chest, and would wake soon with his body cold beneath her. There were simple proofs against such doubts, however. First she pinched her arm, then she poked her tongue in the bad tooth at the back of her mouth. Both hurt, more than a little. She wasn't dreaming. Had she maybe lost her mind then, and was inventing these wonders the way travelers in the desert invented wells and fruit trees? No, that made no sense either. If these were comforts she'd created, where were her mother and her father; where were the tables laden with cake and milk?

Extraordinary as all these visions were, they were real. The lights, the families, the shimmering tent; all as real as Whitney and the wagons and the dead in their graves.

Thinking of what she'd left behind, she paused for a moment and looked back down the mountain. Night was drawing on swiftly, and the forest had receded into a misty darkness. She could see no sign of the wagons, nor were there any fires burning below. Either the snow had buried them all, or-more likely@ey had moved on towards the mountain while the blizzard's fury subsided, assuming she was lost.

So she was. Orphaned and wandering among strangers, countless miles from the place where she was born, she was as lost as any soul could be. But she felt no sadness at that thought (a prick, perhaps, knowing her father lay in the dark below, but no more). Instead she felt a kind of joy. She was of a tribe of one here; and if she was ever asked what manner of magic she carried to this sacred place, she would sit these miraculous folk down and tell them about Everville, street by street, square by square, and they would be astonished. Nor would she be lost, when she'd told her tale, because Everville was her true home, and she was as safe in its heart as it was in hers.

It wasn't difficult for Whitney to convince those waiting back at the wagons that they should give up the O'Connell girl as lost and move on. Darkness was falling and Sturgis had already returned from the forest with babbled tales of a terror that had brutally dispatched Pottruck. It was still here, Whitney warned, and though its conjurer was dead, the creature's appetite for blood and souls would only become stronger as the night deepened. Besides, the storm had abated a little. This was God's way of thanking them for their part in O'Connell's dispatch; they should not scorn it.

Nobody-not even Marsha Winthrop-put up any argument against their departure. Whitney had graphically described the girl's abduction. It was unlikely she had survived.

Even though the snowfall had given way to mist, and the moon when it rose was round and bright, progress was exhausting, and after an hour of travel-with the fringes of forest a safe distance behind them-they made camp for the remainder of the night.

Whitney sang hymns as he lit the fire, raising his unmelodious voice to the glory of God, praising Him for leading them from Hell's dominion.

"The Lord has us in his hands," Whitney told the company between verses.