His campsite was an interesting place. The people — twenty or so — slept in handmade huts that had been built out of branches and leaves and shrubs. Most were as dirty and smelly as R.V., but they were also cheerful and kind and generous.

"How did you stop the road from being built?" Sam asked.

"We dug tunnels under the land," R.V. said. "And we sabotaged the machines they sent in. And we alerted the media. Rich dudes hate having cameras pointed at them. One TV news crew is as good as twenty active warriors."

Evra asked R.V. if they ever fought hand to hand. R.V. said NOP didn't believe in violent confrontation, but we could see from the look on his face that he wasn't happy about that. "If I had my way," he said, "we'd give as good as we got. We're too nice sometimes. Man, if I was in charge, we'd give those turkeys a taste of hell!"

R.V. invited us to stay for lunch. It wasn't very good food — there was no meat, just a bunch of vegetables and rice and fruit — but we ate a lot to be polite.

They had lots of mushrooms as well — big and oddly colored — but R.V. wouldn't let us eat any of those.

"When you're older, man," he said with a laugh.

We left soon after lunch. The members of NOP had duties and jobs they had to do, and we didn't want to be in the way.

R.V. told us we could come back any time, but that they'd probably be moving on in a couple of days.

"We've almost won the fight here," he said. "Another few days and it'll be time to strike out for new pastures. Battles come and go, man, but the war is never-ending."

We waved good-bye and headed for home.

"That R.V.'s weird," Sam said after a while. "Can you imagine giving up everything to go off and fight for animals and the countryside?"

"He's doing what he believes in," Evra said.

"I know," Sam said. "I think it's cool that he's doing it. We need people like him. It's too bad there aren't more of them. Still, it's a weird way to live, don't you think? You'd have to be pretty dedicated. I don't think I could become an environmental warrior."

"Me neither," I agreed.

"I could," Evra said.

"You could not," I scoffed.

"Why not?" he asked. "I could take my snake and live with them and fight with them."

"You just couldn't," I insisted.

"Why not?"

"Because you're not smelly enough!" I laughed.

Evra made a face. "They were a little on the crunchy-granola side, weren't they?" he admitted.

"They smell worse than my feet when I haven't changed my socks for a week!" Sam exclaimed.

"Still," Evra said, "I can think of lots of worst-ways to spend my time when I grow up. I'd kind of like to be like R.V."

"Me, too," Sam said.

I shrugged. "I guess I could get used to it."

We were in a good mood and talked about NOP and R.V. the whole way back to camp. None of us had any idea of the trouble the nice ecowarrior would soon create… or the tragedy he would unintentionally cause.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The next few days went by lazily. Evra and me were kept busy with our chores and with feeding the Little People. I'd tried talking to a couple of the silent blue-hooded creatures, but none of them looked at me when I spoke.

It was impossible to tell them apart. One stood out because he — or she (or it) — was taller than the others, and one was shorter, and another limped on his left leg. But the rest looked exactly alike.

Sam was helping out more and more around the camp. We didn't take him with us when we went hunting, but we let him pitch in with most of our other jobs. He was a hard worker, determined to impress us and earn himself a full-time position with the Cirque.

I didn't see much of Mr. Crepsley. He knew I had to be up early to hunt for the Little People's food, so he left me alone most of the time. I was happy that way; I didn't want him bugging me about drinking human blood.

Then Cormac Limbs arrived early one morning, which caused great excitement.

"You've got to see this guy," Evra said, dragging me behind him. "He's the most amazing performer who ever lived."

There was already a large crowd around Cormac when we arrived at Mr. Tall's van (where he reported in to). People were slapping him on the back and asking what he'd been up to and where he'd been. He smiled at everybody, shook hands, and answered questions. He might have been a star, but he wasn't big-headed.

"Evra Von!" he shouted when he saw the snake-boy. He reached over and gave Evra a hug. "How's my favorite two-legged reptile?"

"Fine," Evra said.

"Have you shed your skin lately?" Cormac asked.

"Not recently," Evra said.

"Remember," Cormac said, "I want it when you do. It's valuable. Human snakeskin is worth more than gold in some countries."

"You can have as much of it as you like," Evra assured him. Then he pushed me forward. "Cormac, this is Darren Shan, a friend of mine. He's new at the Cirque and hasn't seen you before."

"Never seen Cormac Limbs?!" Cormac shouted, pretending to be upset. "How can this be? I thought everybody in the world had seen the magnificent Cormac Limbs in action."

"I've never even heard of you," I told him.

He clutched his chest as though suffering a heart attack.

"What do you do?" I asked.

Cormac looked around at the crowd. "Should I give a demonstration?"

"Yeah!" they shouted eagerly.

Cormac looked at Mr. Tall, standing at the back of the crowd. Mr. Tall sighed and nodded. "You may as well," he said. "They won't leave you alone until you do."

"All right then," Cormac said. "Stand back and give me room."

The crowd moved back immediately. I started to move with them, but Cormac laid a hand on my shoulder and told me to stay.

"Now," he said to the crowd, "I've been traveling for a long time and I'm too tired to go through my entire routine, so we'll keep this short and sweet."

He made his right hand into a fist, then stuck out his index finger. "Darren, will you put this finger in your mouth?" he asked.

I glanced at Evra, who signaled for me to do what Cormac asked.

"Now," Cormac said, "bite down on it, please."

I bit softly.

"Harder," Cormac said.

I bit slightly harder.

"Come on, boy," Cormac shouted. "Put some backbone into it. Work those jaws. Are you a shark or a mouse?"

Okay. He wanted me to bite hard? Then I would.

I opened my mouth and bit down quickly, meaning to give him a shock. Instead, I was the one who was shocked, because I bit clean through the finger and snapped it right off !

I fell back in terror and spat the dead finger from my mouth. My eyes shot up at Cormac Limbs. I expected him to scream, but he only laughed and held up his hand.

There was no blood where I'd bitten the finger off, only a white, jagged stump. As I watched, the most amazing thing happened: The finger began to grow back !

I thought I had to be imagining it, but as the seconds passed it kept growing, and pretty soon it was full-length again. Cormac held it rigidly in place a few seconds longer, then flexed it in and out to show it was as good as new.

The crowd cheered, and I felt my heart slow back down to normal.

I looked down at the ground, where I'd spat out the finger, and saw it beginning to rot. Within a minute it was nothing more than a grayish mound of mold.

"Sorry if I frightened you," Cormac said, giving my head a pat.

"That's okay," I told him. "I should have learned by now to expect the unexpected around here. Can I feel the new finger?" He nodded. It didn't feel different from any of the others. "How do you do it?" I asked, amazed. "It is an illusion?"

"No illusion," he said. "It's why they call me Cormac Limbs. I've been able to grow new limbs — fingers, toes, arms, legs — ever since I was a toddler. My parents discovered my talent when I had an accident with a kitchen knife and cut off part of my nose. I can grow back virtually any part of my body. Except my head. I haven't tried cutting that off. I guess it's best not to tempt fate."