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"Que?" she blurted "You knoas only kidding about the crack, but seriously, are you high? You got any idea howfor him since he disappeared?"

"Yeah, I know Pretty onna do when you find hi I could adet into it, okay? Let&039;s just call it catching up on old tied more metal-probably skillets Star was a hell of a cook "So I&039;ll watch for you, then"

I sensed so she wanted to ask, so I waited She finally said, "Hey, you haven&039;t heard anything, have you? About et it"

"No, really? Fro hesitation It wasn&039;t like her Star was a do-it girl "I just get worried soe their uarded places I hurt for her "No, baby, that&039;s not gonna happen Everybody agreed, you deserve to hang on to what you have You know that Why would they change their h "Hey, no worries, I&039;m just freakin&039; paranoid-you know that I listen to the little voices in my head too much"

I would, too, if I were Star Which led down paths of speculation where I didn&039;t want to follow "Well, now I&039;m all jealous I wish I had little voices in my head Guess I&039;ll just have to settle for people really being out to get me"

"Bitch," she said cordially

"Bimbo"

Three or four uninspired insults later, we er seat Star would givefor o, Star had taken a tremendous hit, both physically and emotionally, and she&039;d been forced to leave the Wardens Usually, when people leave, they get blocked-a kind of ue It had been a close thing with Star, but they&039;d let her keep what little she had left Provisionally

And Star was absolutely right-that didn&039;t mean that somebody wouldn&039;t show up on her doorstep with official sympathy and orders to rip the essence of power out by the bloody roots They&039;d da with her, iththe De her into this, but there were only a few people in the world I could trust with my CD collection, much less with my life In fact, there were only three

Lewis and Star and Paul

It&039;ll be okay If I found Lewis, if he did as I asked, if everything worked out okayI wouldn&039;t need to put her at risk

If If, if, if

It was a s the rest of my future on Star&039;s, too

When I was fifteen, uy nauess it could have been worse He could have been naelbert, but at fifteen it was still a crushing horror to h that sounded like a rusty chain saw and a fashion sense second only to Paul Bunyan for addiction to flannel

Albert wanted us all to get closer to nature Even then, knowing next to nothing, I kneas a really bad idea, but Mo the moon but painted it, too, so we all packed our outdoorsy equip boots, and headed off into the Big Empty

Actually, it was Yellowstone National Park, but sa, even to a disaffected fifteen-year-old girl who didn&039;t want to be pulled away from the mall and her friends for the summer Beautiful and wild and powerful

But mostly I was bored, and I wished for TV and MTV and boys Awesootcha

We hiked And hiked And hiked I wasn&039;t much for that, and when my boots rubbed blisters on the first day, Albert the Bear wouldn&039;t let hen my feet I sulked and snapped at Mo so that a good-looking rescue party of tall, dark-haired men would coet eaten by a bear, but that was before I actually saw one; once I had, I didn&039;t wish anybody to get eaten by a bear

So to cli the downhill vieas looking up

"It&039;s going to rain," I said The sky was a perfect ocean-deep azure, the sun a hot gold coin glittering like sunken treasure I sat down on a rock and started to take my shoes off

"Don&039;t take &039;e bass voice "Feet&039;ll swell And I think you&039;re wrong, Jo It doesn&039;t look like rain"

I craned my neck, shadedover me Nice to be in the shade Not so nice to be in Albert&039;s shade

"See that?" I pointed to the thin, wispy clouds in perfect waves "Cirrus clouds, co, tree-hugging forest nut, Albert wasn&039;t very weather wise

I srabbed a stick and drew a circle in the dirt "The planet spins this way, right? East to west"

"Just figured that out, did you?"

I ignored him and drew an arrow the opposite direction "Wind ainst rotation So why is the wind co That was fine; I wasn&039;t listening anyway "It&039;s co-" My stick drew a spiral so the direction of the wind Rotation means a storured the silent conversation had so to do hat a freak I hat the hell were they going to do with me, and on and on and on Not like I hadn&039;t already said it and wondered it myself

I drew some wavy lines in the sand next to the spiral "Cirrus clouds for ahead of a pressure syste to rain Based on how fast they&039;re , it&039;ll probably be here before dark"

A freshening eastern breeze frayedface

Somewhere out there, beyond the trees, beyond the place where y fro water and energy, sucking ether to form mist, mist to form clouds, clouds to form rain

I closed ue, the taste of brass and ozone and cool, clear water God, it felt good Tingles all the way inside, deep down I&039;d never been out in the open before to a stor It had a raild power I&039;d never expected

"Bullshit," Albert said bluntly, and laughed "Pretty good try, Jo Hey, you&039;ve got quite the con artist there, Nancy"

MyShe looked at ravely, thumbs hooked in the straps of her backpack, and shifted fro, either, but she hadn&039;t co thirsty or being tired

"Are you quite the con artist, Jo?" she askedShe turned back to Albert "We&039;d better start back"

"Oh, come on, Nancy, you don&039;t buy this stuff, do you? She&039;s fifteen years old, she&039;s not some damn weatherman You can tell the weather around here for days around, anyway Clear as a bell, that&039;s what this is"

"There&039;s high pressure to the south," I said, lacing upover the horizon to the east It&039;ll be bad by nightfall-it&039;sfast Warm air always moves faster than cold"

"We should start back," Morue The first darkness edged over the eastern horizon, like early night, at just after three in the afternoon, and then it flowed like spilled ink, staining the sky Albert shut up about coddling ood tied carefully past crues People talk about nature as a mother, but to hter her children Every sheer drop we navigated was an open ed rock a naked tooth

I wasn&039;t attuned to the land, but even I could sense the power in it, the anger, the desire to s predators ere I felt it from the storm, too; the storms that made it into cities were less self-aware, more instinctual This one pulsed with pure h the trees, rattled branches, and fluttered leaves The breeze picked up and it carried the sharp scent of rain

"Faster," I panted as we hit easier terrain We ran for it as the storm clouds unfurled octopus tentacles overhead and the rain ca forked purple white, and without a city to frae and powerful, taller than the mountain it struck Thunder hit like a physical body blow It rattled through e, bones We&039;re mostly water, our bodies Sound travels in waves

Above us on the ridge, a tree went up like a torch