Penny had reacted faster to Diana’s warning. She was already moving to hide behind Diana when the light split the night. Half of Penny’s hair frizzled and burned, leaving a terrible smell.

A roar from the dark behind them and Drake was rushing forward, his terrible whip at the ready, searching for a target. Light sliced deep into his side. He spun and fell. But even as he fell the burn was healing.

Diana saw Sam rush from the darkness. He yelled, “Diana, get down!” and fired at the spot where Drake had been a split second earlier.

Suddenly, revealed by the flash of light from Sam’s palms: Caine.

It had been four months since she had seen him. Just a little longer since together they had made Gaia.

Their eyes met. Caine froze. He stared at Diana. A look of pain creased his brow.

That moment’s hesitation was too long.

Caine reeled back, slapping at his body with hands weirdly encrusted on their backs. Slapping and yelling, and then Sam was yelling, “It’s Penny, it’s just Penny, Caine!”

Caine seemed to get control of himself, though barely, and for only a moment as he raised his hands and, with a wild sweep of both hands, flung Penny into the dark.

It was a mistake. An invisible Penny was even more dangerous.

Sam saw it and swept his killing beam around in a semicircle, searching for her. A flash of Penny, running. But when the beam pursued her, burning up the shrubbery, turning sand to bubbling glass, she wasn’t there.

Penny was not there. Astrid was.

Astrid in flames. Running, screaming toward Sam. Her skin was crisping. There was a smell of burned meat. Her blond hair was like a single flame and the edges of that fire ate at her forehead and cheeks.

“Astrid!” Sam cried, and ran to her. He was already whipping off his shirt to smother the flames when she suddenly ballooned, like a marshmallow dropped into a fire. She swelled and her skin turned charcoal and her eyes were just smears and…

The vision was gone.

Sam was in the dark. Panting. Staring.

He turned and saw the glow of the child in Diana’s arms. They were marching calmly toward Quinn.

Caine? Where was he?

Sam heard the sound of a whip. He ran toward that sound, but now the darkness had closed in and he had to toss Sammy suns profligately in order to see.

“Quinn! Run! Get out of there!” Sam yelled.

He watched as Quinn started to make a brave show of it, then he realized it wasn’t so much brave as stupid.

It was several minutes before Sam found Caine. He was breathing, but just now returning to consciousness. There was a livid red mark around Caine’s throat.

He sat up, then accepted Sam’s extended hand.

“Drake?”

Caine nodded and rubbed his neck. “But it was Penny who distracted me. You?”

“Penny,” Sam confirmed.

“Okay, next time we have to take Penny out before we do anything else,” Caine said.

The little procession—Drake, Penny, and Diana, with a baby in her arms—kept walking on down the road.

“So she had the baby,” Sam said. “Congratulations?”

“We lost the element of surprise,” Caine said. “They’ll be ready.”

As if to make the point, Drake, now even with the next Sammy sun, turned to look back at them, laughed, and snapped his whip. The laugh carried. So did the crack.

“Why didn’t they finish us?” Sam wondered.

“If I tell you something crazy, will you just accept it?” Caine said.

“It’s the FAYZ.”

“It was the baby. The baby stopped Drake. I was choking and he was behind me so I couldn’t get at him. Anyway, as good a hold as he had on me, if I’d thrown him or pushed him I’d have ripped my own head off. I saw the baby. Looked right at me. And Drake let me go.”

Sam wasn’t sure if he believed it or not. But the days of doubting a story just because it sounded crazy were over.

“They’re heading for the barrier.”

“Maybe it really will open?”

“Maybe,” Sam said. “But they’re going through town. Tearing up your people, King Caine.”

A scream reached their ears.

“Well, I guess we’d better give Quinn a good story,” Caine said dryly. “My legacy and all.”

“Penny first,” Sam said, and started running.

THIRTY-SEVEN

3 MINUTES

GAIA LAUGHED AND Diana couldn’t help laughing, too. They’d passed a burning house with kids lurking as near as they could get to the light without burning.

Penny had done something to make them run into the burning house.

Diana was horrified until Gaia laughed. And then Diana couldn’t help but laugh, too. It was funny, in a way.

Gaia had a sense of humor. How amazing to see it in an infant. Diana credited herself, her genes. Gaia had gotten that from her mommy.

Down the street, and the light that shone from Gaia was enough to draw people like moths to the flame. They would come creeping or cavorting, needing that light, needing it after so long in the hopeless pitch-black.

They came, and when they did Drake would whip them until they ran away again, or danced just out of his range.

Gaia laughed and clapped her hands. Amazing how fast she learned.

The barrier would be broken and Diana and her baby girl would be free. They could go to the zoo. Or what was that place kids went for pizza and games? Chuck E. Cheese’s! Yes, they could play the games and eat pizza. And watch TV in… They would find a house. Who could stop them, really? With Drake and Penny as their servants. Hah! Servants.