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suspected there was more to this church, however, than met the eye.
    The demon was still tied to the front of the train, and now he could tell that it was a she-demon, perhaps La Llorrona —the crying woman—although she didn’t appear to be crying. Not that Jix had actually ever met a she-demon, or knew for sure that such things existed, but he’d heard stories.
    The next thing he noticed was a caboose at the other end of the train, decorated with Christmas lights and shinybaubles that reflected the rising sun. He made a note to ask about it when he felt sure he’d get a truthful answer.
    And then there was the fourth passenger car. All of the other passenger cars seemed crowded with children, but the fourth car was crowded in a very different way. In the windows, Jix saw faces pressed up against the glass. It was quite literally crammed with Afterlights—there had to be a thousand souls stuck in that cramped space. Jix recalled one time when His Excellency had commanded a group of Afterlights to squeeze themselves into a large ceramic vase that had crossed into Everlost. In the living world it had been big enough to hold no more than two or three—but Afterlights, who are pure spirit, and have no true physical substance, can fit just about anywhere. They kept climbing in, and his Excellency got bored when the count reached fifty. There was no telling how many souls were shoved into this train car.
    “Wild, huh?” said Moose, looking at the crammed car. “Like clownsh in a car.” The faces in the window didn’t seem in distress, and Jix figured they had been in there quite a long time because they had gotten used to it. At most, it looked awkward and inconvenient, but they were still having conversations with one another as if this was just another normal day for them.
    “Why are they in there?” Jix asked. “For someone’s amusement?” That made Squirrel laugh, which was not a pleasant sound.
    “They were an enemy army,” Milos told him. “We defeated them a few months ago, and now we hold them in there for safekeeping.”
    “Yeah, yeah,” said Squirrel. “Prisoners of war.”
    “Bet you’ve never sheen sho many Afterlightsh,” said Moose.
    For a moment Jix wanted to brag about the great City of Souls, but decided to keep that to himself.
    The skinjackers brought their four slumbering spirits to an Afterlight who waited by a sleeping car.
    “Leave them with me,” the kid said, but Jix was reluctant.
    “It is all right,” said Milos. “Sandman will tag them, and mark them with the date they will awake.”
    Jix refused to give his sleeping girl to Sandman; instead he carried her into the sleeping car himself.
    “Hey,” said Sandman, “you can’t go in there.” Jix turned to him, bared his teeth and growled. Although his growl still sounded more like a boy than a wild cat, Sandman was intimidated enough to leave him alone.
    The sleeping car was already crowded. Each upper and lower berth had two, sometimes three sleeping kids, their chests rising and falling with the memory of breathing, but none of them snored or made the slightest sound. Jix found a comfortable place and left his sleeping girl there, making sure she looked comfortable, then kissed her forehead, because he knew she no longer had parents to do so, and because he knew no one was watching. Then he left the sleeping car and went straight to Milos.
    “I will meet Mary, the Eastern Witch, now.”
    “You will meet her,” said Milos, “when she is ready to be met.”
    “And when will that be?”
    Milos took a long look at him, perhaps trying to readsomething in his expression, but stealth also required a cool, unreadable face. Jix never gave anything away that he didn’t intend to.
    “Not today,” was all Milos said.
    “In the meantime,” suggested Jackin’ Jill, “why don’t you go lick yourself clean like a good kitty?”
    Jix suspected that he and Jill were never going to be friends.

CHAPTER 4
Green Goddess
     
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