Wood Sprites

“A back door only stays secret if you don’t advertise it.” When the twins stared at him in surprise again, Crow Boy elaborated. “The oni do not play well with others, even other oni. I have not heard of there being a pathway near Pittsburgh, so it is possible that they have kept it for emergencies only. Plan B.”

That was good news at least: a way to Elfhome that wasn’t heavily guarded.

In a matter of minutes they had everything to be known about Laurel Caverns spread across the dozen monitors and their two tablets.

Nikola tilted his head back and forth. “Their website says that they host fieldtrips, caving tours, Girl Scout events, gemstone panning, and something called Kavernputt.” He tilted his head a couple more times in confusion. “Oh, it’s miniature golf in a cave, entirely handicap-accessible.”

For a secret back door, it sounded overrun with humans. Maybe Crow Boy was wrong. Maybe Ming had kept the caverns just because they made him money.

“Putt-putt?” Jillian obviously was trying to link miniature golf with plans of global conquest. “There’s something very twisted about a bad guy hiding out at a putt-putt course.”

“Oh!” Nikola cried. “Their website just posted that they will be closed to the public. It says they’re going to be renovating the gift shops and lighting systems.”

Louise breathed out in relief. “Yves just fell back to Plan B.”

43: Highjacking Plan B

“You didn’t say anything about ostriches,” Crow Boy said.

In the scramble to implement “Highjack Plan B,” Louise had left finding transportation to the babies. At first glance the box truck, painted fire-engine red, had seemed a bit flashy, but it did match the specifications she’d given them. She’d assumed that the tall, matching red, livestock box on the back was empty.

Crow Boy’s puzzled look after he’d climbed up into the high cab warned her that she was wrong.

“Ostriches?” Louise scrambled up beside him. To her dismay, the back window of the truck afforded a view of eight ostriches. They studied Louise back with large soft brown eyes and thick eyelashes. They were the most beautiful eyes Louise had ever seen. “Oh no!”

“Chuck!” Jillian cried. Louise wasn’t sure how Jillian decided it was Chuck’s fault.

Nikola cringed, but it was Chuck who defended the choice. “You said we needed a self-driven truck with combination locks on cargo pods, fully fueled.”

“Someone is going to notice it’s missing!” Jillian cried.

“They haven’t yet. And we wanted to see the ostriches. We’ve never seen one before! We haven’t seen any animals.”

Louise sighed. The babies didn’t have enough experience to understand cause and effect. It worried Louise, not just because of what they might do, but because of what she might miss. She might be smart as a rocket scientist, but she didn’t have twenty years of learning how the world really worked. She was gambling all their lives that she understood things enough to see a way to safety.

“What do we do?” Crow Boy asked.

Louise took a deep breath and swung the door closed. “We need to get moving; we’re running on a time table.”

Nikola pressed his nose to the window and stared in fascination at the ostriches. They stared back, seemingly equally fascinated.

Jillian eyed the ostriches with open suspicion. “What are we going to do with eight ostriches?”

“Play with them?” Nikola suggested.

Louise knew that was impossible, although a tiny part of her wished they could. “If we don’t need the cages, we’ll set the truck back on its original course with the pride.”

“Pride?” Jillian echoed in confusion.

“Groups of ostriches are called prides,” Louise said.

“Like lions?” Jillian said.

One of the Jawbreakers said, “Evidence has been found to show lions in Africa have been kicked in the head by ostriches and had their jaws broken and starved to death.”

Jillian gave Louise a dark look. “We’re in a truck filled with lion killers?”

It didn’t seem nearly as fun when Jillian put it that way.

“Hello!” Joy pressed against the glass to look up at the big birds. “Who’s there?” She tilted her head back and forth. “Oh, no one’s home.”

Jillian snorted.

“That’s not nice,” Louise said. “They’re just not as smart as you.”

* * *

The cavern’s entrance was marked with a low split-rail fence and a giant arrow sitting on a rough stone slab. There had been a barrier with a “closed” sign attached to it, but that had been run over. Louise wished they could have stopped and reconsidered, but they were already committed. Crow Boy had flown ahead, and their first attack was already underway. The truck’s auto-drive put on turn signals, slowed, and gracefully turned into the driveway. Their truck thumped over the fallen barrier. Her heart started to race. She wished she could take Jillian’s hand and hold it tight, but she didn’t want her twin to know how scared she was. Louise gripped her hands together.