Perchance to Dream Read Free Page B

clothes.
    “Stop, drop, and roll!” Cobweb flung himself against the driver’s seat.
    The wolves scattered, retreating a few feet from the four screaming miniature balls of incandescent light bobbing about like demented fireflies.
    “I told you to be careful!” Ariel tried to catch hold of Mustardseed, but missed by several inches.
    “That’s not what ye meant t’ do, is it?” Nate queried.
    “No!” Bertie snagged Peaseblossom, bracing herself for searing pain that didn’t come. “Are you on fire or not?”
    Blue phosphorescent flames curled up the fairy’s neck and shoulders as she considered the question. “I think ‘not,’ but it does tickle.”
    The boys, once they stopped screaming, cut gleaming swaths of light against the sky that were noted with interest by the wolves. They crept back, pressing moist-looking noses to the wavering curtain of lantern light.
    “You scared me to death!” Snappish in her relief that they were not burning up like pixie-kebabs, Bertie remained tense, watching the predators lick their chops every time the boys swooped past them.
    “Sorry,” Mustardseed said. “Panic is sort of a reflex response when you’re on-fire-but-not.”
    “Not to be troublesome, but I do believe we’re on the dinner menu.” Ariel held up his hand. Gathering a wind in his palm, he used it to push the pack leader back to the edge of the lantern light.
    Bertie’s heartbeat thudded in counterpoint to the pad-pad-pad of paws in the grass as the wolves circled, looking for a weak side. “Get ahold of something.” The fairies obeyed with uncharacteristic haste, grabbing handfuls of her gown and hair. Nate stood beside her, but he wasn’t the one who could help them right now. “More wind, Ariel.”
    “As milady commands.” Every muscle strained under the silk of Ariel’s shirt as the wolves snarled and snapped, fighting to breach the veritable tornado that encircled the group. “A bit of help, if you please?”
    “I’ll turn them into a pile of fur coats.” Bertie braced the page against her knee, trying to pin it down long enough to write something, anything.
    “Bertie—” Ariel’s desperation generated a hurricane blast.
    The wind slammed into her like a shock wave, snatching The Book’s page from her grasp. Fluttering like a ballerina portraying a dying swan for a half second, the paper then dropped into a puddle of ghostwater. With a dismayed cry, she snatched it up and stared at the running ink in disbelief. “There’s barely room left to write my name, much less summon a horde of brigands armed to the teeth, or a legion of soldiers, or a cannon—”
    Uncharacteristic droplets of sweat had gathered upon Ariel’s forehead, and he spoke through his teeth. “Summon something small, then!”
    Inspiration struck, swift as blow. “More paper.” Bertie’s pen skidded, and the ink blotched as she scrawled,
The winds carry with them a
thick stack of enchanted pages.
    A blur landed in front of her with a fur-muffled thump, and the fairies disappeared under the caravan with coordinated yelps. Nate’s ghostly arms wrapped around Bertie’s waist, pulling her back a full two inches before his strength gave out. She thought the largest of the wolves had made it past Ariel’s barrier before realizing the wild creature before her walked on two legs, not four, and the glint in the lamplight was not the creamy yellow of jagged teeth but the obsidian-black of a stone-bladed knife.
    “Get away from her!” Ariel shouted, taking no risks with regards to the stranger’s allegiance. Concentration broken, his protective winds died, and the wolves were immediately upon them.
    “Off with you, curs!” The newcomer turned from Bertie and greeted their attackers, growling and slashing the knife. His movements were a blur of motion, the fight a dance by moonlight. He wore a ragged assortment of leather and fur stitched together in stripes, and his hair stuck out in spiky, black tufts, making him