It was hours before Orion and Lyra found each other again after they were separated in the gangsters' courtyard. Orion searched frantically but had no idea where to begin looking for her. He rightfully suspected from the sudden bustle of activity around the houses in the courtyard, all of which contained members of the Dragoni family, that they were not safe anywhere near that neighborhood, but he couldn't just leave his younger sister alone in a strange city. She was unsure on her wings, which were still developing and not strong enough to carry her more than a short distance off tether. She would most likely have found a place to take cover. Trying to remain hidden behind trees, church steeples, and taller buildings, he surveyed the surrounding area, looking for something that stood out as a place Lyra would hide, all the while becoming more and more distressed.
He was making larger and larger circles around the neighborhood, following the protocol that Brooklyn had taught him for hunting down an escaped suspect on the ground, when he caught sight of what looked like the remains of a brick church with a mostly collapsed roof. The front wall of the sanctuary protruded above the wreckage, and Orion noticed a bluish flashing light that he immediately recognized as a small beacon on a keychain that had been given to each of the hatchlings by the clan. It wasn't particularly bright or noticeable to human eyes, but it was enough to draw the attention of a patrolling gargoyle.
"Look, Ori!" Bonnie exclaimed from her perch on his shoulders.
"I see it!" he replied with relief, thankful that his sister was clever enough to have brought it. He and Bonnie landed and were thrilled to see Lyra burst out from behind a pile of rubble, looking quite distraught.
"I'm sorry!" she sobbed miserably as she ran to them and embraced them, "I tried to keep my human form as long as I could, but when that man came and took Bonnie away, I freaked out and…Then that girl saw me transforming and she started screaming."
"Oh, that was Angelo's kid, I heard screeching," Orion realized, "I had thought it was Bonnie."
Bonnie stomped her foot indignantly.
"A gargoyle does not screech," she informed him, "A gargoyle roars!"
"Bonnie tried to calm her down," Lyra continued, "But she wouldn't listen and then it was too late. All those grownups were coming with their guns and…"
Lyra looked down shamefully and sobbed again.
"I couldn't protect my sister! I tried to get Bonnie to safety but I couldn't carry her on my wings! I tried as hard as I could, but I wasn't strong enough!"
"Lyra, no!" Orion argued, "You were strong! Strong and smart too. You did everything right! You kept Bonnie calm and quiet and stayed with her until I was able to get there. And you used the beacon when you were lost, just like Angela taught us!"
Lyra wiped her eyes, not looking particularly consoled.
"Look. None of this was your fault!" Orion insisted, "I'm the one who got us into this mess. I should have never had you leave the castle with me. I'm the worst big brother ever."
A faint smile crept onto Lyra's lips.
"You beat up those gangsters pretty good though," she observed, "I saw you from the roof."
"There was a lot of luck involved in that," Orion replied doubtfully.
"Maybe, but you did it on your own," she argued.
"You were a good warrior, brother!" Bonnie agreed pridefully.
"And you!" Orion suddenly remembered, "Bonnie! You kept your human form longer than either of us could!"
"That's easy!" Bonnie replied, and with a deep breath and a slight shudder, she transformed into her human form again with a triumphant smile on her face.
"That's amazing!" Orion exclaimed.
"We can't do that!" Lyra added, perhaps a little enviously.
"Yep!" Bonnie replied, "But I'm too cold and I want to be a gargoyle again."
To her siblings' amazement, Bonnie drew another sharp breath and gargoyle hatchling form emerged once more.
"You mean you've been able to transform back and forth whenever you want and you didn't even say anything?" Lyra exclaimed incredulously.
"I can't do it whenever I want," Bonnie corrected her, "I have to be wearing my fairy shoes and my special pants and dress with the velcro holes for my wings and tail. Otherwise my butt will show."
Orion and Lyra looked at one another and laughed.
"I guess we did alright," Orion said thoughtfully, letting the magnitude of what they had accomplished sink in.
"Yeah. For our first gun fight," Lyra agreed.
"Without adult supervision," Bonnie added.
"Yeah!" Orion declared confidently.
"Now what do we do?" Lyra asked, and Orion's confidence deflated.
"I didn't get the chance to call Brooklyn," Orion remembered, "I'm not sure they were ever really going to let me anyway."
"Maybe we could find a phone somewhere?" Lyra suggested, "Do you have the number?"
"In my phone…" Orion realized sheepishly, "Which that Ragazzi jerk still has."
"We could go back to the train place!" Bonnie suggested excitedly, "Maybe we could find a train that's going back to New York!"
"Let's not," Orion said with an eyeroll.
"We have some money," Lyra pointed out, "Maybe we could try a passenger car this time."
"I don't know if Amtrak will let us ride alone, and I think it might take longer than we have in our human forms. Bonnie could make it, but I'm not sure I can."
"Me either," Lyra admitted gloomily, "Looks like we are stuck in Chicago. And no one even knows we're here."
The three of them sat in frustrated silence for several minutes, listening to the scuttering of the rats nearby and the melancholy howling of the elevated train in the distance.
"Alexander!" Orion suddenly exclaimed and the two girls looked up in surprise, "Alexander's in Chicago! We just have to find him and he can help us get home!"
Lyra's face brightened hopefully, then fell a bit.
"How do we find him?" she asked.
"Look by the lake?" Bonnie suggested.
"That's right, Bonnie!" Orion agreed, "He told us at Christmas that his new apartment is by the lake. Remember? He showed us a picture of him on the beach. That's where we should start!"
"So we have to find the lake?" Lyra asked.
"Lake Michigan!" Bonnie added excitedly, "That's where Alexander lives!"
"Lake Michigan looks really big on the map," Orion considered, "It should be easy to find. Let's do like we do at home and find a really tall building. Then we can look around and see if we can see it."
The children agreed and they stealthily climbed to the top of the church ruins and set off to glide to the nearest tall building. It was slow going. Lyra struggled against the heavy gusts of wind and seemed to crash with exhaustion at every shelter where they stopped.
"Maybe we could find a clothesline or something we could use as a tether?" Lyra suggested hopefully after about an hour of dodging humans from one lowrise building to the next.
"This wind is killing me too," Orion admitted, "I can't tether you and carry Bonnie at the same time!"
Lyra looked discouraged.
"You can do it!" Bonnie assured her, "Look! Those tall towers over there aren't so far away!"
Lyra and Orion glanced at the towers in the distance. They stood out against the glowing horizon and they were still several miles away.
"Keep trying," Orion encouraged her, "We're gonna get there!"
Glide by glide, they inched their way closer to the towers, which seemed to be obstinately moving further and further away from them as they approached. The wind roared past their ears now, tearing at their bodies with a chill that made even their gargoyle teeth chatter from the cold. Still, Orion urged them on, hoping that from the decks atop these towers they could find the location of the lake and direct themselves to where they could find the one friend they had in this immense, strange city.
At last, their talons crunched into the concrete face of the tallest tower in the cluster.
"Let's climb up!" Orion ordered triumphantly as he panted for breath. Slowly they made their way, the angry wind biting at their faces and trying to wrench them away from the tower. The children were so focused, that they barely got a chance to look around them until they reached the top. Peering over the railing, they beheld the familiar sight of an urban grid, stretching as far as they could see. A dark ribbon stretched before them. It was the boulevard with the green park space that connected to large rectangular parks. In the distance, they could make out the silhouette of the burned out church where Lyra had hidden. It seemed a lifetime away now.
"It looks like our city!" Bonnie noted, and she wasn't wrong. But their home was surrounded by a river that defined their territory. They knew their way around by the shape of the shoreline, the dark safety of Central Park, the lights of the harbor, the familiar towers that marked their waypoints for them and even peeked above the heavy clouds to greet them like familiar friends. This city seemed like an endless blanket of unknown in comparison.
"I don't see a lake from here," Lyra said disappointedly.
"Me neither," Orion agreed.
They made their way across the deck, past enormous, humming boxes that contained the building's HVAC systems and satellite dishes. Orion kept his eyes on the carpet of lights below them, scanning the horizon for a large black blotch that would indicate a body of water. But found nothing except the same straight black ribbon that ran from park to park, including a large park just below them.
"Oh, Ori!" Lyra gasped in sudden horror and Orion looked up. On the north side of the tower, the carpet of lights stopped abruptly at an endless blackness. Bedecked by twinkling harbor lights, the darkness of Lake Michigan extended to the horizon and went as far as the eye could see before it blended into the somehow deeper darkness of the night sky above it.
"Look! It's the ocean!" Bonnie exclaimed cheerfully.
"No," Orion replied despairingly, "But it might as well be."
"Ori!" Lyra exclaimed as her eyes ran up the shoreline to the great towers of the downtown area and the Gold Coast beyond, "How will we find him in all that?"
As Orion looked frantically up and down the endless lakeshore, he had no answer for her.