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constellations and tell their stories.”
    I talked right over Opal’s squeaking protest. “And I could do a thing about rocks. My dad says there’s a special type of rock on a hillside near here. They sort of glow in the dark, so searching for them would be perfect for a nighttime hike.”
    Suddenly catching on, Opal stifled a giggle. Muskrat beamed. “Wonderful. We counselors were thinking of a nighttime hike, but we never knew about the rocks. Nothing’s scheduled for tomorrow night. How about holding it then?”
    â€œBut I can’t talk in front of people about constellations,” Opal whispered after Muskrat had gone.
    â€œOf course you can. You know your stuff, and this will make good our excuse to Melanie. Plus it will give us an army to look for Vraj’s eggs.”
    Nature Nuts spent the afternoon looking for animal tracks on the muddy edge of a swamp. Mostly that meant dodging mosquitoes andwater snakes. Beyond the reeds, we could hear the Sports Sprites having fun canoeing on Lake Takhamasak. I had to keep telling myself I was
not
at this camp to have fun. Still, canoeing appealed a bit more to me than tracking toads in a swamp.
    That night I convinced Opal to stay in her cabin so Melanie wouldn’t get all suspicious again. I sneaked out to the lone pine to tell Vraj our plans. The scaly alien guilt-tripped me into looking for eggs for a few hours, bringing our total number of eggs needed down to eighty-one. Hopefully reinforcements would help.
    At breakfast the next day, the nature counselors announced that our group would go on an overnight nature hike that evening. We spent much of that day planning for the excursion. After dinner, the Nature Nuts shouldered packs and sleeping bags and headed for the hill with the lone pine, the place that Opal and I had suggested. Not much of a trek from a hiking point of view, but it nicely fit the counselors’ idea of experiencing nature at night.
    Chelsea did her owl talk, and a real owl even answered her feeble imitations. A kid named Walt talked about nighttime animals like raccoons, possums, and skunks. There were lots of skunk jokes after that, but I was more worried about seeing dinosaurs at night. I had warned Vraj to stay out of sight, but she didn’t seem to take orders well from a near native.
    Next was Opal’s turn. Muskrat practically had to drag her from behind the pine tree to get her to stand in front of the group. Mechanically Opal began pointing out constellations and mumbling the names that are attached to each group of stars. But when someone asked her about the names, Opal started telling the Greek myths about each constellation. By the time she got to the story of Andromeda, she was really into it, and her shyness evaporated.
    â€œThis one’s got a really cool myth,” she said enthusiastically. “This queen, named Cassiopeia, brags that her daughter, Andromeda, is prettier than the sea god Neptune’s daughters. Neptunegets mad and sends Draco the Sea Monster to destroy the town. Well, Andromeda’s dad, King Cepheus, chains Andromeda to a rock so Draco will eat her instead. (Thanks, Dad.)” The kids laughed at that, and Opal beamed.
    â€œSo meanwhile,” she continued, “somewhere else in Greece, a hero named Perseus has just killed the Gorgon, a lady with snakes for hair who is so ugly that people turn to stone just looking at her. He flies by on his winged horse, Pegasus, turns Draco to stone with the Gorgon’s head, and then flies off with Andromeda to live happily ever after.”
    All those characters were supposed to be seen in the constellations. Those ancient Greeks must have had pretty good imaginations to connect a bunch of scattered stars into those pictures. I wondered suddenly if people on the planet I came from connected stars into different constellations. I had to drop that train of thought as Opal finished her talk. Everyone applauded, and she