Free Higher Mythology by Jody Lynn Nye Page B

oncoming car. They noticed that she was clutching something to her chest. It writhed, and she spoke to it, too low for them to hear her.
    “She’s got her baby brother or sister with her,” Williamson said. “Let’s just go up and make friends, and I’ll give her a buck or something to go back in the house.”
    Suddenly, the child sprang to her feet, and ran up the side of the hill.
    “There she goes!” Pilton exclaimed. The two men broke into a run, jumping over the shallow stream and charging up the slope.
    “Why are we chasing her?” Williamson asked suddenly, stopping on his heels.
    Pilton paused only for a heartbeat. “Well, we don’t want her to think we’re child molesters. She knows somethin’s wrong now. We gotta catch up with her.”
    “We don’t want her to get the sheriff out here,” Williamson agreed. The thought went through both their minds at once that it would be a bad idea to have anyone investigating their presence in the forest preserve at this time, for whatever reason. Williamson poured on the speed, and outdistanced his companion.
    With their long strides, they crested the hill in no time. The girl was just a few lengths ahead of them, the soft soles of her green-shod feet flashing down the hill. Pilton shouted, “Hey!”
    The running girl looked back at him over her shoulder. All at once, she dropped to her knees. Suddenly, for no really good reason Pilton could detect, she vanished from sight.
    “Where’d she go?” he yelled. Williamson dashed to where the girl had last been visible.
    So far as he could tell, Williamson was reaching for a handful of empty air, but he came up with the little girl’s upper arm clasped in his big fist. She reappeared as if a curtain was being drawn away from her, then Pilton could see there was a white scarf or something like it on the ground around her feet. The little girl wrenched her arm free to support the bundle in her other arm, and Williamson took hold of her long blond hair instead.
    “Right here, you idiot. Can’t you see her?”
    “I can now, but she was invisible before,” Pilton insisted. “How’d she do that?”
    “She wasn’t invisible,” Williamson said, his voice scornful. “She’s wearing green, and you’ve got the sun in your eyes.”
    “No, she’s magic,” Pilton said. “She disappeared, like in a trick.”
    “You’re just blind, that’s your problem.”
    “What do you want of me?” the girl demanded, clutching the baby protectively to her chest.
    Pilton and Williamson inspected their prisoners. The girl stood about three feet high, with long, silky blond hair that was now tangled and festooned with pieces of weed. She wasn’t as young as they’d first suspected. The summing look with which she fixed them wasn’t just that of a hyper-intelligent six-year-old. She had an old, old look in her eyes. If she hadn’t been so small of stature, Pilton would have thought she was just on the early side of teenage.
    “Why did you run away?” Jake asked her.
    “Well, you were chasing me,” she said, her chin stuck out. She looked as though she might cry, and Pilton felt sorry for her. “Let me go. I want to go home.”
    “What do you want to do, Jake?” he asked, staring at the child. She was a pretty little thing, and scared to pieces.
    “No names,” Williamson snapped back, looking alarmed.
    “Let her go, huh?”
    “Shut up! I got to think!” The harshness of his voice alarmed the girl, who tried to take a step away. Williamson tightened his hold on her hair, and she whimpered. The baby, catching her alarm, burst out crying.
    “My God, that kid has lungs!” Pilton said, taken aback by the sheer volume of noise the minute baby produced.
    “Quiet! Shut it up!” Williamson thundered over the shrieking.
    “I can’t!” she said, stamping her foot. Tears began to track down her cheeks. “You frightened her!”
    “Shut her up or I’ll wallop you! Dammit, I can’t think with all this screaming going