Not On My Patch: a Young Wizards Hallowe'en Story Read Free Page A

seconds later Dairine came into the dining room, and Ronan and Kit turned to look at her. “Whoa!” Kit said, and Ronan simply burst out laughing: for Dairine was turned out in the long brown overrobe and crosswrapped beige gi -like undertunic of a young Jedi. Every detail had been handled— the breeches, the boots, and even the narrow apprentice braid hanging down on one side, with her red hair otherwise tied into a short ponytail behind. Behind her came Spot, who for the occasion had applied a virtual-shapechange field to himself and now looked like the kind of little low-running droid that when it sees you coming, hurriedly does a K-turn and runs away squeaking in fear.
    Nita knew Dairine had been working on getting her costume right for days, and therefore she wasn’t above teasing her a little. “Still looks like a bathrobe,” she said.
    Dairine turned a faintly scornful look on Nita. “People who carry these are not wearing bathrobes,” she said, twitching aside the overrobe to reveal, hanging from the bathrobe’s inner belt, a foot-long cylindrical object. This she unhitched, flipped in the air, and caught while hitting its actuator stud. The lightsaber’s actinic blade instantly sprang out and sang softly in the air.
    Ronan nodded, impressed. “Now that’s a nice wizardry,” Kit said.
    Dairine gave Kit the same look. “You kidding? Who needs wizardry for this? I bought it from one of Carmela’s weapons suppliers. Light-based weapons are real popular with species that have tight-channel plasma technologies. And once you’ve got one, modding a new hilt onto the thing’s no big deal.” She flicked her wrist from side to side, and the blade sizzled and hummed in the air: she looked at it with an expression of satisfaction tinged with annoyance. “Though you won’t believe the crap I went through to get it to make that noise. Any decent lightsword’s completely silent. What kind of lamebrain builds weapons that let the bad guys hear you coming?”
    Nita sucked in a breath and was glad that there were none of the more rabid sort of Star Wars fans around to take issue with such heresy. “Ooookay,” she said. “Just don’t let anybody else play with that thing…”
    “Are you insane?” Dairine said, collapsing the blade and hanging the lightsaber hilt at her belt again. “It’s DNA-locked— all the basic models come with that now.” She glanced at the table and the neat rows of candy bags, now not quite so neat. “This is getting kind of messed up…”
    “Yes it is,” Nita said, glaring at Ronan and Kit. “You guys are going to get plenty of stuff once we’re out; will you lay off this?”
    Kit and Ronan both smiled at her angelically, but showed no signs of stopping. Got to get them out of here before they eat it all… Nita thought. “Okay,” she said, “we’re done here.” She wrapped up the seeds and pulp from the pumpkin in the top few layers of newspaper on which she’d been working, took them into the kitchen and put them in the bag with the composting waste.
    “So where are you going to put it?” Kit said. “Front step?”
    “Probably…” Nita said. But as she came back into the dining room, she looked at the pumpkin and realized that it was looking back at her: and despite the carven smile, it looked a little sad.
    “…No,” she said. “I’m taking him with. Dad can’t keep an eye on the front door every minute, and I don’t want him getting smashed while we’re out.”
    Kit looked at her quizzically. “You’re going to carry a real pumpkin around with us?”
    Nita studied the pumpkin briefly. “It’s not like he’s overripe,” she said. “Or too heavy. I can get some rope, pierce through the sides and make a handle. I’ll take a separate bag for the candy.”
    “He?” Dairine said, bemused.
    Ronan shook his head in genial disbelief. “I’ve seen a lot of wizards do a lot of weird things,” he said, “but I’ve never seen one bond with a