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backed even further away. Nathan froze, and then stayed completely motionless, both hands raised, scarcely even breathing, for over half a minute.
    Aarif said, ‘Do you want me to try, Professor? When I was a boy, I used to catch my uncle’s chickens for him.’
    Nathan didn’t answer, and still didn’t move. The phoenix let out yet another crrarrrk of alarm, but after a while its curiosity was beginning to get the better of it, and it came a few steps nearer, repeatedly twitching its head from side to side.
    Nathan waited until the phoenix had almost reached the near edge of the ventilator hood. It stared at him, making a thin warbling noise in its throat, and ruffling its feathers. Even when it was close enough for him to try snatching it, Nathan held off. He wanted to make sure that he got a good firm grip on it, first time. He didn’t know for sure if it was developed enough to fly yet, and he didn’t want it to fall off the top of the ventilator hood on to the floor and injure itself. It was only a fledgling, after all.
    â€˜Aarif,’ he said, ‘take off your lab coat and hold it out, just in case it loses its footing.’
    Aarif did as he was asked, and he and Kavita stood underneath the phoenix with his lab coat stretched out between them as a safety net.
    The phoenix came even closer. Nathan took a deep breath, and then lunged forward and caught hold of both of its scaly legs.
    Immediately, with a screech of rage and indignation, the phoenix attacked him. It jabbed at his face with its beak, narrowly missing his left eye, and its claws scrabbled at his wrists. It screeched again and again, its beak hacking at his forehead and his cheeks and splitting his lower lip, and its wings beat so frantically that it almost lifted him off the stepladder.
    He tried to take a step down, but the phoenix went for his face yet again, and when he instinctively jerked away from it, he lost his balance. He clattered backward down the stepladder, still holding the phoenix’s legs in both hands. Aarif managed to snatch the tail of his lab coat and partially break his fall, but he landed heavily on his right shoulder on the floor. Even as he lay there, winded, the phoenix kept up its furious attack, tearing at his left earlobe with its beak and clawing at his neck.
    â€˜ For Christ’s sake get this damned thing off me !’ Nathan shouted.
    Aarif tried to pin the bird’s wings against its body, the way he would have caught a frightened chicken, but the phoenix was like a blizzard of feathers and claws, and it was impossible for him to get his hands around it. He tried instead to seize its neck, but it screeched and twisted its head around and viciously pecked at his hand.
    It was Kavita who finally managed to subdue it. She threw Aarif’s discarded lab coat right over it, twisting one of the sleeves around its legs and tying it roughly into a knot. The phoenix screeched again and again, and fought with such determination to escape from its makeshift straitjacket that they could barely hold it. Eventually, Aarif managed to keep the struggling creature pressed against his chest long enough for Nathan to be able to climb to his feet. Between the two of them they carried it across to the parakeet cage, opened the door and forced it inside.
    Aarif untied the sleeve of his lab coat and dragged it out of the cage, while Nathan quickly fastened the catch. Instantly, the phoenix exploded with fury. It thrashed its wings and hurled itself from one side of the birdcage to the other, crashing against the bars so violently that some of its feathers burst out and floated in the air all around it.
    â€˜Aggressive little critter, isn’t it?’ said Nathan, dabbing the blood from his face with a paper napkin. ‘You remember what I told you about mythical creatures not being afraid of humans? I should have remembered it myself.’
    â€˜It won’t hurt itself, will it?’ asked