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

closest to the house. “Hey, Rhiow! What’s shakin’?”
    The little black cat put her whiskers forward at them all. “Things around here, I’d say! But you haven’t met my partner, have you, cousins? Hwaith, this is Hrronan— Khit and Hnita— Dhairine—”
    Introductions were made all around. “What brings you two out this way?” Kit said.
    “Well, you know how people get about black cats this time of year,” Rhiow said, and sat down and yawned. “Either you have to stay sidled for a few days to keep from attracting attention to black cats in general and giving some ehhif bad ideas…”
    “Or you have to stay in,” Hwaith said, stretching fore and aft and sitting down next to her. “So boring. So we got out of town. Urruah and the twins are handling the Grand Central gates for the evening…”
    “And when Tom and Carl told us what they were up to this year, we said, ‘Sure, we’ll come by and add some atmosphere,’” Rhiow said. “Controlled circumstances, after all. We go where we’re needed…”
    “You guys don’t fool me,” Kit said. “You just have fun being someplace where wizards are doing magic out in the open for one night in the year.”
    “Well, who wouldn’t?” Hwaith said. “Bad enough that so much of this planet has to be sevarfrith. When one of the cultures has a night when you can come out and sing on the rooftops a little, interventionally speaking… who’d miss that?” He chuckled. “Anyway, they’ve really knocked themselves out— you ought to go take the tour.” He looked over his shoulder toward the front windows, which were all curtained with something that let an eerie blue light shine through.
    “Will do,” Kit said as the two cats vanished back toward the house. The four wizards made their way back up to the walk again and headed for the door and the steps up to the porch.
    “Do my ears deceive me?” said a voice from inside the door, which had what appeared to be some kind of alien skeleton nailed up spread-eagled on it. Out of the door came lurching someone in classic Frankenstein’s Monster makeup of the Boris Karloff vintage, every detail complete right down to the giant heavy shoes, the jacket with the too-short sleeves, and the bolts in the neck. But the face under the makeup was Tom Swale’s, and Nita couldn’t stop herself from laughing at the sight of one of their Advisory Wizards in something so different from his usual jeans and polos. “It is you guys! Didn’t know if we were going to see you tonight.”
    “How could we miss this!” Kit said.
    “Well, just glad you could take time out of your busy schedules,” said another voice from behind Tom: and there was the normally very buttoned-down Carl Romeo in a frayed and apparently bloodstained business suit that had seen far better days, and some of the most realistic ghoul makeup that Nita had ever seen. Carl leaned out the door and peered at the sagging candy bags. “You folks have plainly been making out like bandits. Come on in, release your burdens for a while and have a look around.”
    They all filed in, pausing at a table by the front door, where visitors were exchanging admission tickets and getting their hands stamped. Behind the table sat a gorgeously witchy-looking woman wearing a slinky glittering deep-purple dress with black lace appliqued over it in a spiderweb pattern, and a matching long veil or mantilla in the same spiderweb lace.
    “You haven’t met this lady,” Tom said. “This is a cousin of ours from out west. Helen Walks Softly: Kit Rodriguez, Nita Callahan. And from a little further out of town, Ronan Nolan…”
    Hands were shaken and everyone quietly said dai stihó, for there were nonwizards wandering around the ground floor, looking at static displays of scary stuff. “Your eyes are seriously cool,” Kit said in complete admiration. They were those of some big cat, a lion maybe, large and golden. “Contacts?”
    Rhiow and Hwaith burst out laughing.