"You'll see." He cocked an eye at Jonah." 'McClung,' huh?"

Jonah shrugged. "Like I said, we've been branching out."

"That wasn't what I meant," Fierenzo said. "I was thinking about your habit of clinging to walls.

Cling—clung—McClung?"

Jonah frowned. "No," he said firmly. "My grandfather wouldn't have lowered himself to a joke that bad." He paused. "At least, I don't think so."

They caught an uptown subway at Canal and Lafayette, changed lines at Grand Central and Times Square, and were soon back on 102nd Street where Fierenzo had parked his car the previous evening.

To his mild surprise, it hadn't been towed.

"Get in," he told the others, unlocking it with the remote and getting stiffly into the driver's seat.

Jonah climbed in beside him, Jordan taking the back. "So where are we going?" Jonah asked.

"We'll start by losing the tails I'm sure Bergan and Ingvar put on us," Fierenzo said, starting the car and fastening his seat belt. "Get my spare gun out of the glove box, will you?"

"What are you going to tell your lieutenant?" Jonah asked, popping the glove box door and gingerly pulling out Fierenzo's spare Glock.

"I'm working on that," Fierenzo said, looking in the mirror. "Hang on a sec," he added as Jonah started to hand him the gun. A car-sized hole had opened up in the traffic flow; twisting the wheel, he cut into it, shifted over a lane, and made the turn north at the next block on the tail end of the yellow light. "Okay," he said, holding out his hand. Jonah gave him the gun, and he slid it into his shoulder holster. The familiar weight felt reassuring, somehow. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," Jonah said. "And after we lose them?"

"We'll go to Meeting One, of course," Fierenzo told him. "I want to meet the rest of your conspiracy."

Behind him, Jordan inhaled sharply. "What conspiracy?" Jonah asked, his voice suddenly tight.

"You talked about having meetings there," Fierenzo reminded him. "That implies more than just the two of you, or even just the two of you and a set of parents. And I don't believe for a minute you and Jordan pulled this whole thing off alone. It's time I found out whose side you're actually on."

"But we can't," Jordan protested. "Jonah, tell him—"

Jonah silenced him with a gesture. "All right," he said. "But only if you can lose Halfdan's people."

"Trust me," Fierenzo assured him. "A couple of parking garages, a cab or two, maybe some new coats for you and your brother, and we'll shake them."

Jonah took a deep breath and settled back into his seat. "Okay," he said. "I just hope you know what you're doing."

Fierenzo nodded. "Yeah. Me, too."

The afternoon was starting to fade away, and Caroline had restoked the fire twice, when they finally had a visitor.

"Good afternoon," Nikolos greeted them as he stepped into the cabin between a pair of Warriors. "I wish I could say I was pleased to see you."

Caroline glanced at her husband, caught the quick twitch of his lip. Clearly, he wasn't any more surprised to see Nikolos than she was. "Likewise," Roger told the Command-Tactician. "Cozy setup you have here."

"We like it," Nikolos said, gesturing them to the couch as he eased himself into one of the two rickety cabriolet chairs. The wicker protested under his weight, but held. "Let me guess," he went on.

"It was that comment I made about pulling back to upstate New York."

"Basically," Roger confirmed as he and Caroline also sat down.

Nikolos nodded heavily. "I knew it was a mistake the minute I said it, but all I could do was hope you hadn't noticed. Dare I ask how you found this place so quickly?"

"Dare we ask where Melantha is?" Roger countered.

"I wish I knew," Nikolos said ruefully. "I certainly don't have her."

"Of course not," Roger said. "And this is just your summer retreat, right?"

"No, this is precisely what I'm sure you've already surmised," Nikolos said calmly. "Our last fallback position, prepared in the event that the Grays succeed in pushing us out of the city."

"Where you can continue the fight on your own terms?"

Nikolos shook his head. "If we're pushed back here, the war will already have been lost," he said.

"This will become little more than our final resting place, a land where our remaining people can fade back into the shadows of the hills and woods."

"Or a place where you can relax in comfort while Melantha destroys New York and the Grays?"

Caroline suggested, her throat tight.

There was a smoldering fire in Nikolos's eyes as he turned to her. "Look, Humans, it's my job to protect my people from our enemies," he bit out. "If dropping a few buildings is what it takes to accomplish that, then yes, that's exactly what I'll do."

"But only if you can persuade Melantha to cooperate," Roger said.

"I don't need Melantha," Nikolos shot back, leaning forward in his emotion, his hands gripping the armrests of his chair. "Damian can—"

He broke off abruptly. "I'm afraid you're going to have to be our guests for awhile," he said, his voice suddenly stiff and formal as he stood up. "Accommodations are being prepared for you at the main house. The Group Commander will send for you in about an hour."

Turning his back on them, he headed for the door. "Just remember one thing," Roger called after him. "If you want to kill Grays, you're right, we probably can't stop you. But if you start wrecking buildings and killing our people, this retreat of yours won't hide you for long."

"We hid from the Others for generations," Nikolos countered, half turning to look over his shoulder at them. "And they at least knew who and what they were looking for. You really think we can't hide from a people who don't even know we exist?"

He strode out into the gathering dusk. The two Warriors followed, closing the door behind them.

"Yeah, but there you had a whole valley to hide in," Roger muttered at the door. He took a deep breath, let it out in a ragged sigh, and turned to Caroline. "Was it my imagination, or did Nikolos actually lose control there for a minute?"

"It certainly looked that way," Caroline agreed, thinking back to that suddenly cut off sentence. "Has anyone mentioned Damian before?"

"Not to me," Roger said. "I'm still trying to figure out whether or not he has Melantha. One minute he'll say something that sounds like he does, the next minute he'll say something just the opposite."

Caroline shivered. "Roger, we've got to get out of here," she said. "Get back to the city and warn someone."

"I'm open to suggestions."

She looked around the room, trying to think. The cabin was late forties or early fifties, she'd already decided. A lot of such summer hideaways had sprung up about that time throughout the Catskills, many of them of rather hasty construction. The windows would be single-paned, the walls minimally insulated if at all, the floor—

The floor.

She looked down at the floor. Standard overlay flooring, the boards with that rough and rustic look.

Getting down on her knees, she held her palm just over the floorboards. With the fire drawing air from the rest of the cabin... "Do you feel air coming through the floor?" she asked.

Roger got down beside her, licking a finger and holding it over one of the larger cracks between boards. "I think so," he said after a moment. "But that fire's drawing in a lot of air. It could be a leak from somewhere else."

"I don't think there's any subflooring here, Roger," she said. "Just these boards nailed to the joists, with a crawl space underneath."

"No slab?"

"Wasn't required back then for this type of building," she told him. "And I remember seeing skirting boards on the outside at ground level as we were coming in. It's a crawl space, all right."

Roger tapped the board thoughtfully. "And if we can get through, then we can get out."