Somber, but empowered by their victory over the Draconis, Orion led his sisters over the brick wall, back out onto the street. They were all quite exhausted. Sister hoisted Bonnie onto her back. The smallest hatchling was still rather gloomy about having to give up the monkey, but she held her "Friend" tightly to her chin for comfort as they scaled the wall and landed on the street on the other side.
"Can we find Alex now?" Lyra whined.
"Umm…I guess so," Sister replied with weak confidence, triggering a skeptical look from her brother.
"Exactly how are we going to do that?" Orion demanded.
"Well, I found the address of his office on the internet," she explained, "We could go there and wait. In the morning, when he goes in to work, you three could be there to greet him."
Orion looked somewhat impressed by this simple, sensible plan, as well as a little sheepish that he hadn't come up with the idea of finding Alexander's workplace himself.
Bonnie grinned mischievously.
"I'll hide under his desk and when he sits down, I'll grab him by the leg!"
Lyra rolled her eyes.
"He'll probably drop his morning coffee on your head," she replied critically and Bonnie gave her a scowl.
"Come on!" Orion scolded them, "The sooner we get there, the sooner we can find a place to hide until morning."
"But-" Sister interrupted, looking heavily conflicted and Orion gave her a suspicious look.
"What now?" he asked anxiously and Sister told them about her encounter with the strange soothsayer and his message that what they were looking for was at the end of the "emerald necklace".
"Emerald necklace?" Lyra repeated, "What do you suppose that is?"
"Like for a princess?" Bonnie interjected excitedly, "Or an evil witch?"
"Probably not, Bonnie," Sister told her, "I suspect it isn't a real necklace at all, but it has to mean something…and he was right about basically everything else he said to me."
"Do you think it was the same 'Siren' we talked to?" Lyra asked hesitantly after a moment's silence.
"He's gotta be!" Orion concluded, "How many blind fortune tellers named Siren could be working the same night in the same city?"
"But he told us to look for the red beacon!" Lyra reminded him clutching at the medal hanging from her neck, "Remember?"
"So, now what?" Sister replied in a frustrated tone, "Do we search for the red light or the green jewelry?"
Orion shrugged.
"Personally, I liked the first plan, where we followed Google," he replied, then he added suddenly, "Hey! Where is your phone?"
"My…phone?" Sister repeated in surprise.
"Yeah! Your cell phone! That creep Ragazzi took mine off me when we got here, not that it had any battery left. But what about yours? You still have it, don't you?"
"Yeah," she admitted reluctantly, "But…"
"But what?!" Orion cried incredulously, "Get it out and call Alexander!"
Lyra and Bonnie bounced with excitement, certain they were finally going to get off these strange streets and meet a familiar face.
"I… can't," Sister said softly.
"Huh?" Orion asked in disbelief, "Why not? Is it broken or something?"
"I turned it off so Lexington couldn't track me," she explained.
Orion looked at her as if her nose had suddenly turned into a cuckoo clock.
"Well, turn it back on!" he commanded incredulously.
"I can't!" she insisted again, confounding them all as tears gathered at the rims of her eyes.
"But you've got to!" Lyra cried out, frustration rising in her tone, "All we have to do is call Alexander and he'll come get us and take us back to his place!"
"And Adelpha's there!" Bonnie added with a sniff, climbing down from Sister's back and pulling at her tunic, "Please, call him, Sister! I wanna see Adelpha real bad!"
A tear streamed down Sister's cheek as she heard her younger sisters' pleas and her claw went to her bag where the phone was hidden. Sister swallowed and pulled the phone from within the bag, offering it to Orion.
"Here," she said softly, "You guys call them."
Orion took the phone from her suspiciously, and examined it in his claw.
"What's going on?" he demanded, but Sister didn't answer. Instead, she turned away from them and began to scale the tall wall that encircled the zoo.
"Hey!" Orion cried, "What are you doing?"
"I have to go," Sister replied cryptically, "I love you guys!"
"Where are you going?" the girls cried in unison, while Orion shouted, "Hey! Get back here!" But Sister didn't listen, and though she was clearly heartbroken, she didn't even look back at them as she took to the air.
"Where is she going, Ori?" Lyra asked apprehensively.
Orion shook his head and growled in frustration.
"Go climb into that tree!" He commanded the two younger hatchlings, "Stay out of sight and don't move until we come back!"
"But what if…" Lyra argued.
"Then try something else, for crying out loud! I don't know!" Orion cried and he took to the air after Sister, leaving the two young hatchlings to fend for themselves.
She had gotten a good head start on him, gliding across the park's canopy toward the great, illuminated towers.
"Sister!" Orion roared above the wind, "Come back!"
"Don't try to follow me," she called back over her shoulder, her pain evident in her strained voice, "Just call Alex and take Lyra and Bonnie back to the clan!"
"What about you?" he pleaded, but she sped ahead of him.
Orion tailed her apprehensively, completely perplexed by her strangely dramatic behavior. It was hard to keep track of her shadow as it flickered in and out among the illuminated maze of elevated bridges, awnings, billboards, and fire escapes, but he finally caught up with her on the elaborately gilded roof of a mid-level bank building.
"Sister, stop!" he begged frantically as he approached her. Before she could rush off again, he grabbed her into a hold and they struggled for some time before Sister finally relented. With a despairing cry, she fell to her knees on the roof of the building, angrily slamming her fist into it's surface. The infuriated growl of the frustrated young gargoyle echoed across the rooftop, past the silent faces of her chiseled-stone kindred. Slowly, Orion crouched beside her, still poised to leap, should she try to take off again.
"What is it?" he asked her softly, "Tell me what's going on."
"I can't go home yet!" she declared to her astounded brother in a voice that sounded as though it was wrestling with a sob, "It was all my fault that Coldsteel escaped! I have to find a way to stop him and make this right or Brooklyn might not even have me back in the clan! Ever!"
For just a moment, Orion looked startled and even scandalized at this confession. But then he scoffed.
"Don't be ridiculous! No matter how bad you messed up, Brooklyn would never banish you from the clan! He knows you didn't mean to do this."
"Are you so sure?" Sister retorted miserably, "This isn't exactly the same thing as trashing the bathroom or being late to a clan meeting. I let a dangerous enemy of the clan out of his prison. That's basically a betrayal, and he's not gonna just-
"No!" Orion interrupted firmly, "No. I promise. He would never banish you! You have to know how crazy you're being!"
Sister shook her head, clearly unconvinced of her madness.
"Even if you're right, it would never be the same again. Not unless I can make it right! That's why I came here. To get Alex's help. But…"
Sister looked down at her feet, ashamed and heartbroken.
"I never meant for you guys to come after me and get involved!" she continued, "You have to get Lyra and Bonnie home! Use my phone to call Alex. When they find you, don't tell him or Brooklyn that you saw me. Just, tell them that you found my phone in the castle. I'll figure this out on my own, and then I'll come home. I just need more time!"
Orion gave her an incredulous look.
"Sister," he replied gravely, "There is no way in hell I'm leaving you alone here!"
He took the phone and pressed it into her claws.
"Ori?" she pleaded.
"I don't like this idea one bit," he told her coldly, "But you and I are a package deal, remember?"
"Yeah, but," she replied with a sniff, "The hatchlings?"
"We'll do what we planned before," Orion declared, "We'll find Alexander's office and meet him there. You can tell him what you did with Coldsteel and see what he says."
Sister nodded slowly, wiping tears from her eyes.
"But if he says we need to go home and let the grownups handle it," Orion continued sternly
"We go home and let the grownups handle it," Sister conceded.
Orion nodded decisively.
"Alright," he urged, rising and pulling her to her feet, "I left our little sisters hanging in a tree, unsupervised, which was probably not the most responsible choice ever. So, we should really get going!"
Now it was Sister's turn to grab him and hold him in a tight embrace.
"I'm glad you're my brother, Ori," she whispered.
As they hurried back to where they had left the hatchlings, they glided around the corner, only to nearly collide with Vernita, who stood defiantly, brandishing a rifle, with Marco at her side.
"How's it going, Ruthless?" she asked snidely as the two gargoyles nearly crashed to a halt in front of her.
Sister groaned.
"How did you find us here?" she demanded.
"It wasn't that hard," Vernita retorted, while sending Marco a contemptuous glance, "With this genius over here, posting photos of panda hats on social media!"
Marco looked down self-consciously, ashamed at having revealed their location in such an un-gangster-like manner, but then his face hardened while Vernita raised the rifle threateningly.
"What do you want?" Sister asked in a grumble.
"What did you do with Occhi!?" Vernita demanded.
"What is Occhi?" Orion asked, raising a brow at Sister who cringed a little.
"My little sister!" Marco cried in outrage, "Who you stole! You better not have eaten her!"
"I most certainly did not eat her!" Sister insisted in horror, "I left her in the truck."
"Truck?" Marco repeated in confusion, "What truck?"
"Your dad's truck, of course!" Sister replied, "The one you guys came up here in and parked by the marina. I left her there, safe and sound!"
"Safe and sound and probably frozen to death!" Vernita accused.
"She had a blanket," Sister retorted, a little less confidently. It had gotten rather cold and she hoped the little girl was okay.
"You expect us to believe that?" Vernita accused, aiming the gun straight at Sister.
"You put that gun down!" Orion demanded in a steady voice, "I don't know what's going on but Sister would never hurt a kid!"
Vernita laughed bitterly.
"I don't think so, freak!" she retorted, "If you don't want your heads blown off, you better give her back!"
"I told you, she's not here with us!" Sister replied again, "She's probably still waiting at the marina!"
Vernita gave them a cold, calculating look, then smiled a little.
"We'll just see about that," she retorted, then she turned to her comrade and ordered, "Text Nico!"
In half a moment, Marco's finger was tapping away at his phone, while the others waited awkwardly at the tip of Vernita's rifle. As they waited in tense silence, Sister caught a glance of Orion, who she noticed was focused on a mature tree with branches that extended over the middle of the road. Sister followed his gaze and noticed a slender, shadowy form emerging from behind the trunk and creeping out onto the bare branches. Orion shook his head slightly and the shadow paused and disappeared into the darkness. Vernita sneered at them suspiciously as Marco's phone chirped.
"She's not there!" he informed them angrily and Vernita lifted the rifle and aimed it at Sister's face.
"I'm a ask you one more time!" she threatened in a rageful voice, but she didn't get the chance to elaborate on what would happen next, as the slender shadow above her pounced and landed on her shoulders, knocking her on her face. Sister raced forward and grabbed the rifle that had been brandished at her, breaking it into pieces, while Orion grabbed hold of Vernita and yanked her to her feet, checking her for other weapons as Brooklyn had trained him to do.
He pulled the enormous knife from her pocket, and satisfied that she was no longer a threat, tossed her unceremoniously to the ground.
"Get out of here, girl!" he ordered contemptuously, "Go look for your sister yourself! We don't have her and we've got more important problems to deal with!"
Vernita quickly scrambled to her feet, but curiously, did not flee into the darkness as most lowlifes did when the clan roughed them up. She glared at Orion in a bitter, almost defiant way, then sauntered to the side, to stand next to Marco, whose confused countenance vacillated from anger, to anxiety, to just wanting to go home and go to bed.
"Good job, Lyra!" Sister cheered proudly, "Where's Bonnie?"
"Bonnie?" Orion called up into the trees, scanning the branches for a flash of red hair or blue skirt. But Lyra pulled on his wing frantically.
"She's gone!" Lyra cried hysterically, "They took her!"
"Who took her?" Orion replied in a confused, fretful voice.
"They did!" Lyra accused through furious tears, pointing at Marco and Vernita, "I told her not to go down to them, but she wouldn't listen. They grabbed her and another boy drove off with her in the jeep! I tried to follow them, but I couldn't glide that far!"
Lyra looked devastated as she tried to hold back from crying.
"I'm sorry!" she whispered miserably.
Sister gave the younger hatchling's shoulders a squeeze while Orion turned to Vernita, who was glaring at them smugly.
"Looking for something, Ruthless?" she asked Sister in a snide tone.
"Where is she?" Orion demanded, rage rising in his voice.
"Where's Oochi?" Vernita replied, "You give back your hostage and we'll return ours."
"We already told you twice!" Sister shouted.
"You said she was in the truck," Vernita reminded her, "But she ain't in the truck now is she? Nico said so."
"She probably went to look for someplace warmer," Sister reasoned, "Or maybe she got bored and went home?"
"Maybe you'd better find out or we take your little friend and turn her over to the Boss!" Marco threatened, though the pesky break in his voice betrayed his uncertainty with the entire situation.
Sister lunged forward, ready to tear the wretched boy's head off, but Orion grabbed her shoulder and said in a low voice, only meant for her.
"Is Nico the one who took off with Bonnie? If he just checked the truck, that means he's at the truck now. Do you remember where it is?"
"Yeah," Sister replied apprehensively, "But it's further south, where we were before! We'd be going the wrong way!"
"But if Nico's there, that's where Bonnie is too!" Orion replied, glancing at Vernita, who was still giving them a suspicious, cold glare, despite her confidence that she had them over a barrel. Sister sighed and nodded.
"We've got no choice," Orion told her and to Vernita's anger, the two older gargoyles wordlessly scooped up Lyra and took to the wind, heading south again, away from Alexander, Adelpha, safety, and rest.