They lay there, breathing hard.

He thought she was going to cry, but she didn’t.

Ned lifted his head after a moment, cautiously, looking to his right, where the torches were. Twenty or thirty of them, he guessed. Some were inside the lower city now, others following. Coming in the way he and Kate had come themselves moments ago—in the sunlight of a springtime afternoon.

It was dark now. It was undeniably, impossibly, night.

He couldn’t clearly make out the figures carrying those flames. Beltaine, he thought. The Celts used to light sacred fires tonight. He was looking at fires.

Kate lay beside him in the grass, up close, hip and thigh against his. He had to give her credit, she wasn’t trembling or whimpering or anything like that. In the midst of everything, with the nearness, he was aware of her perfume again.

“This,” she whispered suddenly, turning her mouth to his ear, “is kind of cozy.”

Ned’s jaw actually dropped again. So much for whimpering, or tears. “Are you insane?” he hissed.

“Hope not. But really…I never in my life expected to see anything like this. Did you never have dreams about magic?”

And what did that have to do with anything?

“Kate, get it together! I met some of these guys two nights ago I think. We could get killed here.”

“Then stay close,” she murmured, “and let’s be real quiet.” She shifted a bit so one arm was right against him.

“Quiet won’t do it,” he whispered. “They can sense things. If I can do it, they sure can. We need to get away.”

He fished in his pocket for his phone. “Turn yours off,” he rasped. “Last thing we need is a ringtone right now.”

She moved to open her pack and do it. Ned flipped his phone open. Thank God, he thought: it was working here. He went to dial Greg and then stopped and swore savagely under his breath. Melanie’s stupid, stupid joke. Greg had that idiotic, multi-digit auto-dial, and Ned didn’t know his actual cell number. He punched “3” savagely. Heard two rings.

“Ned, what’s up?”

He kept his voice very low. “Melanie, listen, I’m in a bit of trouble. I’ll tell you later, but please get Greg to bring the van to the road below a place called Entremont. Quick as he can. I’ll meet him there. You know where it is? You can tell him how to get here?”

She was brisk, unruffled. Had to give her that. “I do know. Just north of town? Ned, you okay?”

“I will be when he gets here. It’s, ah, something like what happened at the mountain.”

“Poor baby. Okay. I’ll have him bring Advil. Hang in. He’ll be on his way.”

Ned flipped the phone shut and turned off his ringer. Put it back in his pocket. Lifeline to the real world, from wherever this one was.

He glanced at Kate, still right up next to him. “Is there another way back to the highway?”

She wasn’t totally out of her mind. She whispered, “They had a stairway up the cliff, at the other end, but it’s crumbled away mostly. It would go south down the valley, I guess.”

“We may have to try it. This isn’t close to safe.”

He lifted his head again. More torches, at least twenty of them. Some had been planted along the path now: from the entrance to the site, lining the road all the way to—of course, he thought grimly—the sanctuary space where the one tall column stood.

It was directly in front of them, to the left of the main street. He couldn’t make out the column from here, but he could see the flames clearly. The moon, he realized belatedly, was above them now. Full moon night.

“Well, I still have to say I like snuggling here,” Kate Wenger said. Ned heard—amazingly—a huskiness in her voice.

Even more amazingly, amid his terror, he was starting to find this aspect of things, her scent, how close she was in the dark grass, unnervingly distracting.

“You gonna kiss me, or what?” he heard her say.

Oh, God, he thought. It made no sense at all. None.

“Forget that now!” he whispered fiercely. “Let’s just go. We have to get down to the road. We’ll try that other stairway, and hope. I figure it’ll take Greg twenty minutes.”

“No. Stay where you are.”

Just behind them. A voice they knew.

Ned froze again, his neck hairs prickling. He felt Kate stiffen beside him.

“I have us shielded here,” they heard. “If you go from me they’ll sense you and they will kill you tonight. For violating this.”

Well, that would change Kate’s idiotic mood, Ned thought.

He heard a rustling sound. A figure crawled up beside him, to lie prone in the grass, as they were, by the tree.

“You followed us?” Ned whispered.

“I saw you arrive. I’ve been waiting for them.” The man from the cloister and café looked at him. Same leather jacket, same cold, intense expression. “I did tell you not to come here today.”

“I know,” Ned said.

“He didn’t want to,” whispered Kate from his other side. “I thought it would be cool. I like your jacket, by the way.” She smiled.

So much for changing Kate’s mood.

The man ignored her, his attention fixed on the torches. Some were planted, others were being carried. Ned still couldn’t clearly make out who was holding them.

“Why can’t I see anyone?”

“They aren’t entirely here yet,” the man said quietly.

The matter-of-factness made Ned swallow hard again.

“They will be when he comes,” he heard.

“When who comes?” Kate asked.

“Softly!” the man hissed.

“When who comes?” she repeated, more quietly. There was silence for a moment.

“The man I have to kill.”

Ned looked at him. There were too many questions. He said,

“I think…I may have seen him two nights ago.”

The figure on his left said nothing, waiting. Ned doggedly went on, “I was at this tower, above our place, and…Does he have stag horns? Sometimes?”

“He can. Golden hair? A big man?”

Ned nodded.

The wind blew. In the moonlight Ned saw smoke streaming south from the torches. The man beside him shook his head. He said, “Ned Marriner, I have no idea who you are, but you do seem to have yourself entangled here.”

“Not me?” Kate said, much too perkily.

“Perhaps,” the man said, gravely. “You did bring me here with what you said. I used your words as a sign, lacking any other. You named this place, among all the possibilities. I am grateful beyond words. I’d have likely been elsewhere when she arrived and, as the gods are always witnesses, she would have made me suffer for it.”

“She?” Kate said. “You said a man was coming.”

Another silence. “She will be here. We are where we are. The barriers are down.”

“Holy cow,” Kate breathed. “Is he…is this guy, like, a druid?”

A sudden, involuntary movement on Ned’s other side. “I hope not, or I am lost.”

Way too many questions.

Ned asked the first one he thought of. “Why is it night?”

He heard a sound, almost amusement. “Why would you imagine time should follow a known course tonight? Here? I told you not to come.”

“It shouldn’t be dark for hours. We were going to be gone before—”

“You’d have been dead when the spirits came if I weren’t here.”

Blunt, not a voice to argue with.

“What’s his name?” Kate asked. “This other guy…with the horns?”

An impatient voice from Ned’s other side. “I have no idea yet.”

“You aren’t being very nice,” Kate said, with a sniff. “Neither of you.”

Ned still didn’t get it: what was with her? But he saw the man on his left shift to look across him at Kate. He seemed about to say something, but he shook his head, as if rejecting a thought.

To Ned, he murmured, “I will go up when he comes. They will not be expecting me. He believes he has led me astray. All of them will be intent upon me. Go back along this field to where you came in, then run down the path. You will find your afternoon light again, beyond the gate.”

Ned looked at him. “What will you do?”