Pick shrugged. "The magic might be lost anyway, given the fact that no one knows what it is or how to use it. Maybe Ross is right."
Now it was Nest's turn to glare. "So you think I should just give up?"
"I didn't say that."
"All I should worry about is helping you in the park? The rest of the world can just be damned?"
He grimaced. "Don't swear. I don't like it."
"Well, I don't like the idea of you giving up! Or telling me to give up, either!"
"Will you calm down?"
"Not if you're telling me you won't even try to help!"
"Criminy!" Pick was back on his feet, shuffling this way and that on the narrow ledge of her shoulder. "All right, all right! What is it you want me to do?" He wheeled on her. "What, that is, that doesn't involve antidemon magic?"
She lifted her hands placatingly. "I'm not going to ask you to do anything I know you can't." She paused. "What I want you to create is a kind of early-warning system. I want you to spin out a net of magic and throw it over my house so that the demons can't come in again without my knowing it."
He studied her doubtfully. "You're not asking me to use magic to keep them out?"
"No. I'm asking you to use magic to let me know if they try to get in. I'm asking you to create a warning system."
"Well!" he huffed. "Well!" He threw up his hands again. "Why didn't you say so before? I can do that! Of course, I can!" He glanced at the sky. "Look at the time we've wasted talking about it when we could have been putting it in place. Criminy, Nest! You should have gotten to the point more quickly!"
"Well, I—"
"Come on!" he interrupted, jumping from her shoulder and scrambling back up the tree trunk toward Jonathan.
He flew the owl back across the park to her house while she followed on foot. Midday was approaching, but it was still misty and gray, the clouds low and threatening, the air sharp with cold. The wind had not returned and no new snow had begun to fall, but the return of both seemed altogether likely. Nest stared at the houses bordering the park, indistinct and closed away, their roofs snowcapped, their walls drifted, and their eaves iced. There were cars on the roads, but not many, and they moved with caution on the slick surface. It was Christmas Eve day, but she thought people would try to confine their celebrations to their homes this year.
When she reached the house, Pick was already at work. She had seen him do this before in the park, when warding a tree. The process he used was the same in each case. Here, he flew Jonathan from tree to house, to tree, back to house, and so on, forming a crisscross pattern that draped the threads of magic in an intricate webbing. At each tree he stopped long enough to conjure up a sort of locking device and receptor, invisible to the eye, but there to serve a dual purpose—to anchor the magic in that particular place and to feed its lines of power. No materials were used and nothing of the work was visible, but the result was to render the house as secure as if a fine steel mesh had been thrown over it. All passageways in or out were covered. All entrances were alarmed. Any attempts to pass through, whatever form they took, would be detected instantly.
It took him almost an hour to complete the task, working his way slowly and carefully from point to point, all around the house, spinning out his lines of magic, making certain that nothing was missed. She stayed out of his way as he worked, watching in silence. There would be no more surprises like last night's. If the demons tried to come back again, she would know.
"Now here's the thing to remember," Pick advised when he was done. He sat on her shoulder once more, Jonathan perched in a sycamore some distance off, awaiting his summons. "Any attempt by a demon to get past the net and into your house will trip your alarm. This alarm isn't something that rings or honks or whistles or what have you. It's a feeling, but you won't mistake it."
He lifted a ringer in warning. "A human entering the house won't trip the alarm. A human going out won't trip it either. But if you open up a window or door and leave it open, you invite the demon in and the system fails. So close everything up and keep it closed."
She frowned. "I didn't know that part."
"Well, it hardly has any bearing in the park, when we're warding the trees, because there isn't anything living inside the net that would open it up in any case. It's different here. Keep everything shut tight. If you do that, the demons can't get past the system without you knowing. Think you can remember that?"
"I can remember." She gave him a smile. "Thanks, Pick."
"Just remember what I told you. That'll be thanks enough."
He looked exceedingly proud of himself as he jumped from her shoulder and scurried across the yard to climb back aboard Jonathan. Together, they flew off into the haze. She watched them go, thinking that Pick, of all her friends, over all the years, was still the most reliable.
She looked at the house. There was nothing different about it; she felt nothing different inside. She was taking this entire warning system business on faith, but where Pick was concerned, faith was enough. Certainly the demons would detect the system's presence. Maybe that would be enough to keep them at bay for a day or so. Maybe that would be time enough for her to find out what it was that would unlock Little John's secret.
She found herself wondering suddenly how she had ever gotten to this point in her life. She was trapped in her home with a creature she did not understand and under attack from demons. She was struggling with her own magic and with the magics of other beings, the combination of which threatened to overwhelm her at any moment. She was hiding secrets that could destroy her. She was twenty-nine years old, adrift in both the purpose and direction of her life, her future uncertain.
What was her reason for being? Her gift of magic seemed pointless. Her life appeared to have led nowhere. She had been special since birth, but nothing of who she had been gave her insight into who she was meant to be. She was at an impasse, and the events of these past few days only pointed up how thoroughly lost she was.
If Gran were still here, would she be able to tell me what I ought to do? Would she understand the reason for all that has happened in my life? Or would she be as lost as I am ?
Likely, she would just tell me to get on with it.
There was no steadying influence in her life. No parents, grandparents, husband, or children. No family. There were friends, but that wasn't the same thing. She felt the lack of an anchor, of a touchstone that would give her a sense of belonging. The house had provided that once. And the park. All the places she had grown up in, the tapestry of her journey out of childhood. But somehow they weren't enough anymore. They served only to trigger memories that locked her in the past.
She stood thinking on the matter for a long time, staring off into space, traveling distances too far to be seen clearly.
Then the door opened, and John Ross stepped out onto the back steps. "Better come inside, Nest," he said quietly. "The sheriff's office is on the phone. They've found Bennett Scott."
CHAPTER 22
As she drove to Community General Hospital, nosing the Taurus between the dirt-and-cinder-encrusted snowbanks plowed up from the streets, Nest found herself reflecting on the cyclical nature of life. Her thinking wasn't so much about the fact of it—that was mundane and obvious— but about the ways in which it happened. Sometimes, in the course of living, you couldn't avoid ending up where you began. You might travel far distances and experience strange events, but when all was said and done, your journey brought you right back around to where everything started.
It was so in an unexpected way for Bennett Scott. She had almost died on the cliffs at Sinnissippi Park fifteen years ago, when she was only five. Nest had been there to save her then, but not this time. It made Nest wonder if the manner of Bennett's death was in some way predetermined, if saving her from the cliffs the first time had only forestalled the inevitable. It was strange and troubling that Bennett should die this way, after escaping once, after it seemed that whatever else might threaten, at least she was safe from this.