You see, we're both lonely guys," Todd said from the back. ""There aren't any girls our age aroundhere,
so we're lonely. And then when we comeacross three nice girls like you-well, we just natu rally want to
get to know you better. Understand?"
"So if you girls play along, we can all have fun," Vic put in.
"Fun-oh, no," Rowan said, dismayed. Jade knew she had caught part of Vic's thought and was
tryingvery hard not to pry further. "Kestrel and Jade are much too young for anything like that. I'm sorry,
butwe have to say no."
"I won't do it even whenI amold enough," Jade said. "But that isn't what these guys mean anyway
they mean this." She projected some of the images she was getting from Vic into Rowan's mind.
"Oh, dear," Rowan said flatly. "Jade, you know we agreed not to spy on people like that."
Yeah, but look what they're thinking, Jade said soundlessly, figuring that if she had broken one rule, she
might as well break them all.
"Now, look," Vic said in a tone that showed he knew he was losing control of the situation. He
reached out and grabbed Jade's other arm, forcingher to face him. "We're not here to talk. See?" He
gave her a little shake. Jade studied his features a moment, then turned her head to look inquiringly into
the backseat.
Rowan's face was creamy-pale against her brownhair. Jade could feel that she was sad and disap
pointed. Kestrel's hair was dim gold and she was frowning.
Well?Kestrel said silently to Rowan.
Well?Jade said the same way. She wriggled as Victried to pull her loser. Come on, Rowan, he's
pinching me.
I guess we don't have any choice,Rowan said.
Immediately Jade turned back to Vic. He was still trying to pull her, looking surprised that she didn't
seem to be coming. Jade stopped resisting and lethim drag her in close-and then smoothly detached one
arm from his grip and slammed her hand upward. The heel of her hand made contact just under his chin.
His teeth clicked and his head was knocked backward, exposing his throat.
Jade darted in and bit.
She was feeling guilty and excited. She wasn't used to doing it like this, to taking down prey that was
awake and struggling instead of hypnotized and docile. But she knew her instincts were as good as any
hunter who'd grown up stalking humans in alleys. It was part of her genetic programming to evaluate
anything she saw in terms of "Is it food? Can I get it? What are its weaknesses?"
The only problem was that she shouldn't been joying this feeding, because it was exactly the opposite of
what she and Rowan and Kestrel had come to Briar Creek to do.
She was tangentially aware of activity in the backseat. Rowan had lifted the arm Todd had been using to
restrain her. On the other side Kestrel had done the same.
Todd was fighting, his voice thunderstruck. "Heyhey what are you-"
Rowan bit.
"What are you doing?"
Kestrel bit.
"What the freak are you doing? Who are you? What the freak are you?"
He thrashed wildly for a minute or so, and then subsided as Rowan and Kestrel mentally urged him into a trance.
It was only another minute or so before Rowan said, "That's enough."
Jade said, Aw, Rowan ...
"That'senough.Tell him not to remember anything about this-and find out if he knows where
Burdock Farm is."
Still feeding, Jade reached out with her mind,touching lightly with a tentacle of thought. Then she pulled
back, her mouth closing as if in a kiss as it leftVic's skin. Vic was just a big rag doll at this point,
and he flopped bonelessly against the steering wheeland the car door when she let him go.
"The farm's back that way-we have to go back tothe fork in the road," she said. "It's weird," she
added, puzzled. "He was thinking that he wouldn't get in trouble for attacking us because-because of
something about Aunt Opal. I couldn't get what."
"Probably that she was crazy," Kestrel said unemotionally. "Todd was thinking that he wouldn't
get in trouble because his dad's an Elder."
"They don't have Elders," Jade said, vaguely smug."You mean a governor or a police officer or
something ?
Rowan was frowning, not looking at them. "All right," she said. "This was an emergency; we had to do it.
But now we're going back to what we agreed."
"Until the next emergency," Kestrel said, smiling out the car window into the night.
To forestall Rowan, Jade said, "You think we should just leave them here?"
"Why not?" Kestrel said carelessly. "They'll wake up in a few hours."
Jade looked at Vic's neck. The two little wounds where her teeth had pierced him were already almost
closed. By tomorrow they would be faint red marks like old bee stings.
Five minutes later they were on the road againwith their suitcases. This time, though, Jade was cheerful.
The difference was food-she felt as full of blood as a tick, charged with energy and ready to skip up
mountains. She swung the cat carrier and her suitcase alternately, and Tiggy growled.
It was wonderful being out like this, walking alonein the warm night air, with nobody to frown in
disapproval. Wonderful to listen to the deer and rabbits and rats feeding in the meadows around her.
Happiness bubbled up inside Jade. She'd never felt so free.
"It is nice, isn't it?" Rowan said softly, lookingaround as they reached the fork in the road. "It's
the real world. And we have as much right to it as anybody else."
"I think it's the blood," Kestrel said. "Free-range humans are so much better than the kept ones.
Whydidn't our dear brother ever mention that?"
Ash, Jade thought, and felt a cold wind. She glanced behind her, not looking for a car but forsomething
much more silent and deadly. She realized suddenly how fragile her bubble of happiness was.
"Are we going to get caught?" she asked Rowan. Reverting, in the space of one second, to a
six-yearold turning to her big sister for help.
And Rowan, the best big sister in the world, said immediately and positively,"No. "
"But if Ash figures it out-he's the only one whomight realize-"
"We are not going to get caught," Rowan said. "Nobody will figure out that we're here."
Jade felt better. She put down her suitcase and held out a hand to Rowan, who took it. "Together
forever," she said.
Kestrel, who'd been a few steps ahead, glanced over her shoulder. Then she came back and put her
hand on theirs.
"Together forever."
Rowan said it solemnly; Kestrel said it with a quicknarrowing of her yellow eyes. Jade said it with utter
determination.
As they walked on, Jade felt buoyant and cheerfulagain, enjoying the velvet-dark night.
The road was just dirt here, not paved. They passed meadows and stands of Douglas fir. A farmhouse
on the left, set back on a long driveway. And finally, dead ahead at the end of the road, another house.
"That's it," Rowan said. Jade recognized it, too, from the pictures Aunt opal had sent them. It had
two stories, a wraparound porch, and a steeplypitched roof with lots of gables. A cupola sprouted out of
the rooftop, and there was a weather vane on
the barn.