Black Dawn by L.J. Smith

Author:L.J. Smith
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon Pulse

CHAPTER 13

I think,” Jeanne said, “that he’s here to get Delos to close the Dark Kingdom out. Shut up the castle and come join him Outside. And, incidentally, of course, kill all the slaves.”

Maggie stared. “Kill them all?”

“Well, it makes sense. Nobody would need them anymore.”

“And that’s why you were escaping now,” Maggie said slowly.

Jeanne gave her a quick, startled glance. “You’re really not as stupid as you seem at first sight, you know?”

“Gee, thanks.” Maggie shifted on her branch. A minute ago she’d been thinking how good it would feel to get away from the twigs poking her. Now she suddenly wanted to stay here forever, hiding. She had a very bad feeling.

“So why,” she said, forming her thoughts slowly, “does Hunter Redfern want to do this right now?”

“What do you think? Really, Maggie, what do you know about all this?”

Four Wild Powers, Maggie thought, hearing Delos’s old teacher’s voice in her mind. Who will be needed at the millennium, to save the world—or to destroy it.

“I know that something’s happening at the millennium, and that Delos is a Wild Power, and that the Wild Powers are supposed to do something—”

“Save the world,” Jeanne said in a clipped voice. “Except that that’s not what the Night People want. They figure there’s going to be some huge catastrophe that’ll wipe out most of the humans—and then they can take over. And that’s why Hunter Redfern’s here. He wants the Wild Powers on his side instead of on the humans’. He wants them to help destroy the human world instead of saving it. And it looks like he’s just about convinced Delos.”

Maggie let out a shaky breath and leaned her head against a branch. It was just like what Delos had told her—except that Jeanne was an uninterested party. She still wanted not to believe it, but she had a terrible sinking feeling. In fact, she had a strange feeling of weight, as if something awful were trying to settle on her shoulders.

“The millennium really means the end of the world,” she said.

“Yeah. Our world, anyway.”

Maggie glanced at P.J., who was swinging her thin legs over the edge of a branch. “You still okay?”

P.J. nodded. She looked frightened, but not unbearably so. She kept her eyes on Maggie’s face trustingly.

“And do you still want to go to the castle?” Jeanne said, watching Maggie just as closely. “Hunter Redfern is a very bad guy to mess with. And I hate to tell you, but your friend Prince Delos is out for our blood just like the rest of them.”

“No, I don’t still want to go,” Maggie said briefly. Her head went down and she gave Jeanne a brooding look under her eyelashes. “But I have to, anyway. I’ve got even more reasons now.”

“Such as?”

Maggie held up a finger. “One, I’ve got to get help for Cady.” She glanced at the motionless figure clinging trancelike to the fir’s trunk, then held up another finger. “Two, I have to find out what happened to my brother.

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