Orson Card - Magic Street

"I didn't know you wasn't inside," said Mack.

"So you were saving my life."

"Take that girl inside, Yo Yo."

But Sherita didn't go. She turned to face Mack. Now that the crowd was dispersed, she didn't feel so ashamed. "Officer that saved me said it was Ceese Tucker told him to come save me. And Ceese told me it was you saw what I was getting into," she said.

"I know you didn't choose to do it," said Mack.

"Thank you, Mack," she said. "And for what it's worth, I never thought you was crazy."

Behind her, Yo Yo waggled her eyebrows. But Mack didn't laugh. "Thank you, Sherita. Now you go on inside with Yolanda."

It was near three A.M. before Yo Yo got Sherita back to her folks and extricated herself from tears and hugs and thanks. And not long after that, Mack joined her, along with Ceese and Grand Harrison down Cloverdale, between the Snipe and Chandress houses.

"What's he doing here?" asked Ceese. Yolanda was just as suspicious.

Mack smiled. "He was my ride?"

"You walk everywhere, Mack," said Ceese.

"He helped me dig out Miz Ophelia," said Mack. "He knows what he saw. He knows you got powers, but he believes you're not a witch. There's no reason to leave him out now. And we need all the friends we can get."

"If I can," said Mack. "I'll hold on to him and Ceese and get them inside."

"And what about me?" asked Yo Yo.

"You don't need my help."

"You ever seen me inside there?" she asked.

"No."

"Then how do you know I don't need your help?"

"Puck—Mr. Christmas—he gets in and out just fine."

"That's cause it suits my husband's purposes to let him. But me? I don't think so."

"If he's watching everything you do," said Ceese, "then how can you expect to fight him and win?"

"He's not watching," said Yo Yo. "He just made this place so it locks down hard if I come up."

"So what makes you think Mack can get you in?"

"Cause he's such a lucky boy," said Yo Yo.

"That's why I'm so rich," said Mack. "Come on, let's see if we can all go at once, holding on to each other. If we can't, I'll take you one at a time."

COUNCIL OF WAR Puck was waiting for them inside the house. The living room was furnished exactly like Yo Yo's living room. In fact, it was her furniture, right down to having Sherita's blanket tossed on the couch.

"Puck," said Yo Yo, "just keep your hands off my stuff."

"I never know what's going to show up here," said Puck. "The boy comes in bringing you—so your stuff appears. Bingo! Presto! Abracadabra!"

"Bite me," said Yo Yo.

"You always offer, but you're all talk."

"I know what he does to his servants who, uh, bite you."

"We got a situation," said Ceese, "and we got to figure out what to do."

"You?" said Puck. "You don't have a situation, my lady and I have a situation."

"This shit tonight didn't happen to you, it happened to people in our neighborhood, and we're going to do something about it," said Ceese.

"Ceese, he knows that," said Mack.

Puck grinned cheesily.

"Asshole," muttered Ceese.

"Bad language exacerbates the situation," said Puck. "I know they taught you that in cop nursery.

Always stay calm."

"What in the world is going on with you people?" said Grand Harrison. "Tonight I was just minding my own business, and then I get my tools and my SUV borrowed, I dig up a grave, open a coffin, and take my next-door neighbor out. Then I get brought down here into a house that doesn't exist and listen to a bunch of fools argue about nothing. You know what I want? I want to know how you all going to keep this stuff from happening again."

"What stuff?" asked Puck.

"Wishes," said Mack.

"Mack's dreams," said Ceese.

"He's cut loose a big one tonight, Pudding," said Yo Yo.

"That means he's got himself a pony to ride," said Puck—again talking as if Yo Yo were the only person in the room.

"Yes," said Yo Yo.

"A pony?" asked Ceese.

"Some human he can work through. Kind of like the way my lady and I using these two bodies."

Grand didn't like hearing that. "You telling me that you—that these bodies are possessed?"

"Leased," said Puck. "With option."

"This old coot," said Puck, "be eating out of dumpsters and licking sweet roll wrappers and walking around talking to his dead dog named God, cause he figured as long as he knew it wasn't really God, just a dog with God's name, he wasn't actually schizo."

"We don't take bodies somebody actually using," said Yo Yo. "And that's the truth, Mr.

Harrison."

"What did you mean," said Mack, "when you said 'leased with option'?"

"Didn't mean a thing," said Puck.

"You always mean something. Usually about six things."

"He means," said Yo Yo, "that if something happens to these bodies while we using them, then our option's up."

"You die?" asked Mack.

"Not the part of us in those glass jugs," said Yo Yo. "Just the part of us that can move around on its own. Be like living in a wheelchair after that."

"Worse," said Puck. "Be like living as a human."

"So you're not completely immortal," said Mack. "Just partly immortal."

"And that's why Puck couldn't tell you the truth," said Yo Yo. "He's under strict orders. He can never tell a mortal the truth unless he's sure he won't be believed."

"That's not true," said Puck. He grinned.

"Shut up, Puckster," said Yo Yo.

"We got a situation," said Ceese, "and you got a situation. Not the same situation, but they got the same cause. Your husband, your master, the king of the fairies, whatever he is, he's got himself a pony, right? And doing that made all those wishes come true tonight. So to solve your problem, and our problem, what can we do?"

"Nothing," said Puck. "We are absolutely helpless. Go home. Cry into your pillows until your dreams come true."

"He's so funny," said Mack to Grand. "Always joking. You know how Puck is."

"Mack," said Yo Yo. "The thing is, it's a fight you can't fight. You already did all you could. For years you did it, deflecting his power so they never finished their dreams. That was good work, but now it's done. He's got his power out in the world."

"Oberon's pony isn't doing this stuff," said Yo Yo. "In your neighborhood, I mean."

"Who is, then?"

"Puck," said Yo Yo.

Puck elaborately curled himself into a fetal position as if he feared being struck by stones.

"This isn't funny, Puck," said Mack. "You did this?"

"It's in my nature," said Puck.

"That's true enough," said Yo Yo. "He can't help being a trickster. But also he has Oberon's direct command to find these twists. The thing is, Puck can't tell you because it would be the truth, but he's also deflecting them. He can't stop it from happening, but... well, for instance, Ophelia and her husband could have been entwined in a love embrace under the HOLLYWOOD sign. Or halfway to Catalina. And Sherita—it didn't have to be a boy her family knew about, it could have been some rich boy in Beverly Hills or Palos Verdes, and how would you have found her then?"

"So he was helping," said Mack skeptically.

"As best he could," said Yo Yo.

Puck ducked his head in a show of modesty.

"He does what he can," said Yo Yo. "Here's the thing. What he can do, what I can do, it isn't much. The part of us he locked up, it includes most of our powers except persuasion and... pony riding. And the way it works is, we can't get that part out. Because this part of us, the wandering part, the curious part, is walking around free. It makes it so we aren't hungry enough to force anything.

"But him," she went on, "we pushed him all the way under. Didn't divide him. So to do anything he has to squeeze it out of his captivity. Get some part of him to the surface of the earth. But that part is never completely separated from him. He's not divided like we are." She sighed. "Took him a long time, but the force of his wandering part was so great that it worked its way through a channel to the surface of the earth."