"It really won't open?" Sister cried, "What do we do now?"
The two youngsters glanced around the windowless room, trying to find a way to escape that didn't involve tearing the door off the frame and getting themselves caught in the process.
"The hinges are on the other side," Orion grumbled, "We're going to have to break the lock."
"That'll set off the alarm!" Sister realized in consternation, "And sick Xanatos' security team on us!"
"Sis," Orion said with an eye roll, "We ARE Xanatos' security team."
"The clan is. But there's also the XE guys. And what do you think Brooklyn's going to do to us if he finds us in here, breaking down Xanatos' door?"
"We should probably just call him," Orion realized, pulling out his cell phone. "We'll be caught, but at least we won't have destroyed anything and we won't get any of the humans in Xanatos Enterprises involved in our stupidity."
Orion had thought this a perfectly reasonable suggestion, but Sister looked at him as if a colony of tiny alien creatures were creeping around in his hair. Suddenly, her eyes brightened.
"Lyra!" she exclaimed, "We can call Lyra! She has a keycard and she can come let us out!"
Orion nodded and he clicked his screen to dial the rookery phone.
The phone rang for some time, but finally Orion heard a click and the sound of breathing.
"Hello?" he said and was met by a familiar childish cackling.
"Bonnie!" Orion cried, "Can you hear me?"
"Is this Ori?" she asked in a silly voice, "Where are you?"
"I'm in another room," Orion explained, "Can you get Lyra to come to the phone?"
"Ummmmm…" Bonnie stuttered, "Are you in the kitchen?"
"No, Bonnie," Orion replied with a sigh, "I'm not in the kitchen."
"Is there some pudding in the kitchen?"
"Umm…Probably, but-
"Fleet and Micah said that if I go away and be quiet for ten minutes, they will give me a pudding."
"Yeah, but listen, Bonnie. I need to talk to Lyra."
"I've been quiet for a hundred years and they still haven't given me the pudding!"
"Bonnie?"
"And if I go ask them where's my pudding, then I didn't leave them alone and they won't give me a pudding! What am I supposed to do?"
"Bonnie, listen," Orion said in exasperation, "Go get Lyra to come to the phone and I'll bring you a pudding."
Bonnie seemed to pause and consider this.
"Will you bring a pudding for Friend?"
"Yes!" Orion exclaimed urgently, "Just get Lyra!"
Bonnie laughed gleefully.
"Hooray! Friend likes chocolate, or chocolate swirl, or butterscotch. She also likes banana okay, but NO tapiocas or green!"
"Bonnie, if you will go get Lyra, I will bring you every pudding we have!"
Orion grimaced as his ear was blasted by a joyful shriek.
"Yes! A pudding for Friend and my brother and sisters and for Linnet and Angela and Lyra, Lark, and Lyndon! But NOT for Fleet or Micah because they're big jerks!"
And with that, the line went dead, as Bonnie in her excitement had hung up the receiver.
"Great," Orion groaned. He glanced over at Sister, but she had disappeared.
"Sister?"
"I'm up here!" she called and Orion followed the sound of her voice to the top of one of Xanatos' book shelves. Sister had found an air return vent and gently pried the bolts loose so she could remove the cover and place it on top of the shelf.
"I think we could fit in here!" she called down to him.
"Where does it lead?" Orion asked skeptically.
"I'm not sure," she admitted as she pulled out her own cell phone and began shining the flashlight into the dark tunnel, "But it has to lead somewhere."
Orion watched as she gingerly threaded her wings and shoulders through the very narrow opening, then squirmed her body the rest of the way through.
"What do you see?" Orion asked anxiously as he climbed the bookcase behind her and peeked into the opening.
"Nothing," she admitted, but there's another vent here on this side. I can feel the air moving through it. If I can get it open, we can climb out."
Orion cringed as loud bangs and clanks echoed through the tunnel.
"Someone will hear us!" he complained.
"I can't exactly break a metal cover quietly!" she retorted. A sharp, rattling crash on the other side of the wall indicated that she had succeeded in breaking open the air return cover.
"Come on!" she called back to him. Carefully, Orion climbed into the dusty shaft that felt as if it was made of flimsiest, paper-thin sheet metal ever produced.
"Are you through?" he asked in the darkness as the shaft creaked and groaned under their combined weight.
"Almost," she assured him as she wiggled through the opening at a strange angle. Suddenly, there came a loud Pop!, and with a sickening feeling, Orion realized that the air shaft was tearing away from the stone wall. He was lunged forward by gravity and slid uncontrollably through the broken shaft until he fell several feet to the floor of Xanatos' eloquent sitting room. A cloud of dust emerged with them and left them gasping and choking amid a huge chunk of bent and broken sheet metal.
"I somehow think…they're going to know…that we were messing…around in here," Orion told Sister sarcastically between bouts of coughing and Sister groaned in response.
Suddenly they both froze in fear as the large, echoing room was filled with a forceful, mechanical voice.
"This area of the castle is restricted. You are not permitted to enter here."
Orion looked up and gasped as two red, robotic eyes glared at them through the dust cloud.
"Run for it!" Sister cried out in surprise as the Steel Clan robot loomed menacingly over them.
Orion scrambled to his own feet and ducked beneath the robot's mechanical legs and swishing, articulated tail, just as the robot's robotic claw closed on Sister's wing joint.
"You must return to the rookery," the robot boomed as it lifted her off the floor, "Hatchlings are not permitted here without adult supervision."
"Let go of her!" Orion yelled angrily, leaping onto the machine's back and unleashing his talons on the steel tubing that he knew protected the robot's electrical system.
The robot's soulless face turned unnaturally toward Orion and he could hear the lens of its mechanical sensors moving within its head as it examined him.
"You are not complying with the rules of the household," it recited coldly as Orion felt its snakelike tail coil around his middle and yank him unceremoniously from its back.
"Put us down!" Sister shrieked indignantly as the robot gripped Orion by the tail and began to carry them both toward the corridor.
"You have been detained," the robot informed them unnecessarily.
"You're hurting me!" Orion complained, tears forming in his eyes. Being yanked by the tail was a common corporal punishment for young hatchlings, but was both humiliating and painful for a warrior of his size.
"You will be returned to your clan leader."
Brooklyn was not the least bit pleased to have his two young warriors returned to him by their tails, nor to hear that they had been creeping around the Xanatos' private residence without permission. Having dismissed the uncanny, but otherwise emotionless robot, the clan's temporary leader now stood before them with his claws on his hips, full of very real and completely justified anger. Orion silently wished to have the robot back.
"What did you two think you were doing?" Brooklyn demanded, visibly trying to keep his voice calm.
"It was my fault, Brooklyn," Sister began earnestly, "I was the one who wanted to see in Xanatos' library and I made Ori go with me."
Brooklyn glanced at Orion with a raised brow. He raised his claws questioningly.
"You made him go?" he asked incredulously, "Where are the chains?"
"There's no chains," Orion growled bitterly, his rear end still smarting from being held upside down by his tail for so long, "It was her idea, but I went along with her on my own free will."
"What would have happened if you had refused to go with her?" Brooklyn asked him.
"How should I know?" Orion asked a bit too snarkily. But he felt like he did know and that Brooklyn probably knew as well. This bothered him a lot more than his tail.
"What were you looking for in Xanatos' library?" Brooklyn asked them.
Sister glanced at Orion, as if wondering if it would be worth it to try to lie at this point. Orion returned a look that made it very clear that he had no intention of shaming himself any further that evening.
"We were looking for spell books," Sister admitted.
"Spell books?" Brooklyn repeated in surprise, "What for?"
"We were hoping there might be a healing spell," she explained, "For cancer."
Brooklyn sighed understandingly and gestured for them to follow him from the courtyard where the Steel Clan robot had dumped them, to the north tower common room.
"You two are hardly the first to be tempted by this route," Brooklyn began as he closed the door behind them, "Throughout the ages, there have been many, many people who have sought the power of sorcery to cure illnesses. Nearly all with disastrous results."
"What's wrong with using magic?" Sister asked, "If it can help make someone better, why wouldn't we use it?"
"Because sorcery is a promise that is rarely fulfilled," Brooklyn tried to explain.
"What does that mean?" Sister asked incredulously.
"I mean that it always takes more than it gives. And it has already cost our clan enormous pain and sorrow."
Sister hung her head forlornly and Brooklyn knelt beside her.
"I know your intentions are good, Sister," he told her gently, "But this is not the way to help Elisa. Terrible things happen to people who meddle with these powers, as well as those they are trying to help. Do you understand?"
Sister nodded her head sadly and Brooklyn gave her a gentle smile as he rose to his full height.
"This is hard stuff," he told them, "But you are good kids. Tough warriors, right?"
"Right," Orion agreed.
"Right," Brooklyn concluded, and then left them alone to think about what he said, as he was already late to an important phone call with the clan's unofficial liaison with the police department.
"But she could die!" Sister replied in almost a whisper, after Brooklyn had departed. Orion felt a sickness inside himself when she said this, but he found he didn't know what to say. Behind them, they heard the soft creak of the door, followed by a scurrying sound and light scratching on the sofa. Bonnie's bright eyes and red curls peeked cautiously over the back of the sofa, and she smiled warmly at them as they looked up at her from the floor.
As if slightly aware that she was interrupting something profound, she spoke in a hushed but determine tone.
"Did you guys bring me any pudding?"
Sister rolled her eyes, then giggled.
"Come here, Bonnie Boo," she replied, "No pudding is a problem I can actually fix!"
A short time later, all the hatchlings were assembled at an enormous, steel-topped prep table in the castle's industrial kitchen. Some of the smaller ones were not yet tall enough to peer over the edge of the table, so they crowded on two wooden benches while Sister scooped each of them a bowl of thick chocolate pudding. And since she was their big sister, she even ground up half a bag of Oreos and dressed each bowl so that it looked like a pile of mud with pretzel sticks and a couple brightly-colored gummy worms crawling across the top. The city-raised hatchlings cheered at this authentic culinary ode to nature and happily dug into their respective dishes.
As they were all enjoying this treat, they were suddenly interrupted by Broadway and Angela, who burst through the door with an air of both excitement and urgency.
"Come children, get cleaned up!" Angela ordered them in a happy tone, "Coldstone and Coldfire have returned home! You must hurry out to the courtyard and meet them!"