“How are we going to anchor it?” Jillian asked quietly.
Louise breathed out a curse. “I’ll deal with the gossamer.” Louise gestured to the rocks and trees around them. “You set up temporary anchors.”
As Louise watched the gossamer approach, she tried to determine what else she might have forgotten. She planned to take the gossamer to the tengu village — probably scaring the daylights out of them — so probably sending Crow Boy on ahead would be wise.
As its massive shadow started to eclipse her, Louise played “hover” on the whistle.
Suddenly she was scooped off her feet in a fury of black wings. She squeaked in surprise as Crow Boy leapt backwards with her in his arms.
“What?”
“Back off!” Crow Boy growled, warding off an adult tengu male with his spar-sheathed feet.
“Yamabushi?”
“She is under my protection.”
“A human?” The male cocked his head to study Louise. “Wait — Tinker domi?”
“That isn’t domi.” A woman came floating down out of the sun. Hidden by the brilliance, she was only a warm voice and shadow of a female figure with wings arching like an umbrella above her.
Crow Boy gasped as if struck and lowered Louise to the ground. “Wai Sze!”
Louise gasped with recognition. She had seen this before. “You’re Mary Poppins!”
The female landed silently before them, black-winged and almond-eyed. She didn’t look at all like a British nanny. And yet, there was something very much like Louise’s dream. The female laughed with surprise and delight, “I am?”
“I dreamed of you. You are — were Mary Poppins.”
The female knelt down in front of Louise. “I’m Gracie Wong. Gracie Wong Dufae.” She took Louise’s hands in hers and gazed at them with wonder. “And you’re one of my beloved Leo’s babies. They said that there was just one of you, but I kept dreaming that there was a whole nest of you, still so young, needing me.”
Something inside of Louise released. She crumbled into Gracie’s arms and felt completely safe for the first time in months. Grief long buried deep inside her — too dangerous to release until now — roared out of her. The sorrow tore through her, hot and huge. She felt as if she would choke on it as it burst out of her chest, her throat far too tight and small to release it all. She clung to the safety she had glimpsed again and again in her dreams, desperately wanting to believe it was real.
“You’re safe, my little one, you’re safe.”
“I don’t know what to do!” Louise cried. Between painful sobs that tore through her, she tried to explain the whole horrible mess. Of the babies in danger of being thrown out and magical nactka and the nestlings and how their siblings were now trapped within the protective spell on the polished stone.
“I would bear them if I could. I loved Leo so much. Nothing would bring me greater joy than to have his children.”
With a loud rustle of wings, another tengu female came flying in from the southwest. “There’s a major force of oni not far from here. They’ve spotted the gossamer and are coming to investigate. If they have human weapons, the ship is too big a target to miss.”
“Get the children onto the airship,” Crow Boy ordered. He scooped up Jillian and launched himself up into the air. Jillian’s yelp of surprise trailed after them as he flapped upwards.
There was a thunder of wings as the tengu adults swooped down, snatched up the children, and carried them upwards to the waiting ship.
“We need to move the babies!” Louise stepped back to avoid being carried off. “Joy! Joy!”
The baby dragon appeared on Gracie’s shoulder. “Hello, who’s there? Oh! Providence!”
“Be nice!” Louise carefully took Joy from Gracie’s shoulder, mindful of Joy’s claws. “She’s here to help us. We need to move the babies.”
“Move?” Joy said doubtfully.
“Oni are coming!” Louise pointed to the east where birds rose up, scattered by something moving unseen in the dense forest. “We have to leave. You need to move the babies.”
Joy eyed Louise for a long moment, as if totally confounded by the request.
“Please, Joy. The babies love you so much, and they’re totally helpless right now. You need to help them or the oni will find them and. .” The possibilities were too awful to say.
Joy sat back on her haunches, mane bristling out like it was filled with static electricity. She puffed up like a balloon and then howled. The sound rushed up the scale from a low rumble to a sonic shrill shriek. For a mile in all directions, startled birds flew up into the air. Overhead, the gossamer shied away.
Louise stuck her fingers into her ears, but she could still feel the sound in her bones. All the hairs on her arms raised up, and her hair felt like it was trying to stand on end. “Joy! What are you—?”
The rest of the sentence caught in Louise’s throat as the gleaming ghost of a dragon appeared in front of her. Its hide was a deep gold to Joy’s dusky rose color. Its mouth moved and Louise felt ripples of something move across her skin. But she heard nothing — only the wind rushing over the hilltop.
“Providence!” Gracie whispered with surprise.
Joy waved both paws at the ghost and launched into a tirade in some language that Louise had never heard before. The baby dragon threw in hand gestures she had obviously learned off the streets of New York and a butt wiggle.
There was loud rush of wind and a second dragon appeared, this one blood red and smaller. Smaller being relative — it looked nearly fifteen feet long from whiskered nose to crocodile-like spiked tail. Its eyebrows lifted with surprise at the sight of Joy and Louise. When it leaned in to press a paw to Louise’s chest (scaring her by its sheer size), Joy smacked its paw away.
“Mine!” Joy plastered herself to the side of Louise’s head.
“This is Impatience.” Gracie whispered an introduction. “He’s — he’s — helpful.”
Joy renewed her tirade. Louise guessed that the baby dragon had summoned the dragons to ask for their help. Louise wasn’t sure it would actually work; Joy was being extremely rude.
The conversation came to a sudden halt as all three dragons turned to eye Gracie.
The tengu woman looked surprised and then nodded, replying in their flowing language.
Crow Boy landed silently beside Louise and knelt down in respect to Providence. He listened for a moment and his eyes widened and he gave Gracie a worried look.
“What’s going on?” Louise whispered. “The oni are coming! We don’t have time to stand around and talk!”
Conversation stopped again as everyone focused on her.
Louise squeaked in surprise. “What?”
Providence pointed a long clawed finger at her and then flicked it up, toward the gossamer.
Crow Boy bowed his head low and rose, scooping up Louise.
“Hey!” Louise cried as Joy leapt to Gracie’s shoulder. “Wait! Are they going to move the babies?”
“Yes, they are.” Crow Boy vaulted upwards, unfurling his great black wings. “We must be ready to leave as soon as they do.”
Louise glanced back down at Gracie and gasped. The tengu woman blazed as if crafted from light. “What are they doing to her?”
“She agreed to be the babies’ surrogate mother.”
“She said she couldn’t.”
“They are making it so she can. Joy needed Providence’s permission to use his dream crow.”
A mote of light wafted from where the broken nactka sat to the gathering of dragons. It merged with Gracie.
Louise went limp in Crow Boy’s arms as he winged upwards. It was done. For better or worse, the babies were on their way to becoming real.