“We have the ability to help you,” I said breathlessly. “We have healing magic. Oodles of it. I hotwired a whole other Power to fix you up. Come on over.”

  “What if I don’t want to?” Mandy demanded through the Radio.

  I scoffed. “Oh, you’re gonna.”

  “Or what? I’ve spent a lot of effort here, Owen. You don’t just…do this. What happens if I say no?”

  I folded my arms; this stratagem had been foreseen. “I’m going to be very disappointed in you.”

  “So what?” But her voice held notes of uncertainty.

  “Me too, very disappointed,” Schmendrick said from her nest. Her snout poked out just enough for her to speak and access the straw.

  Mandy was silent.

  “Already you disappoint ME for some time,” said Gary from the window where he’d been hovering. “I offer a chance for redemption.”

  “Schmendrick would be disappointed?” Mandy said quietly.

  “And me,” I said indignantly. “Cassie too.”

  Cassie shrugged. She’d developed a taste for Cazador Cola and was trading sips with Schmendrick, poking the straw into the end of the little alien’s visible snout. “I don’t know exactly what this is all about,” she said. “But everyone here is pretty mad at you, Mandy.”

  A sigh came through the Radio. “I don’t want Schmendrick mad at me.”

  “Or me,” I added. “Especially me.”

  Cassie grinned around her straw. “He went through a lot of trouble, Mandy. I mean, you have no idea what kind of crazy happened here.”

  The Aegis, a giant floating stone ring, was now hovering over the Observatory like the crown of an unkempt king. Gary had raged that it blocked the sun, and the sun was the whole ball game for him. We were working on it. The Gardeners hovered around the Aegis, doing things to the plants on its upper levels. I suspected they weren’t going to remove them, and were going to actually make them more vibrant.

  The Radio, being a very specific sort of jerk, switched songs: You made me love you,

  I didn't wanna do it, I didn’t wanna do it…”

  Cassie laughed, a crazy whooping haaaw haw haw!

  I whispered furiously at the Radio: “Shut up, dude, that’s not helping!”

  “Owen was on fire,” Schmendrick’s snout said. “He has new marks. He yelled. And had to jump in the water to put it out.”

  “WHAT?” Mandy shouted. “I didn’t ask you to do that! God dammit Owen I told you–”

  The Radio, drowning her out: “Gimme gimme gimme gimme what I cry for

  You know ya got the brand o' kisses that I'd die for!”

  Cassie was rocking back and forth on the floor next to Schmendrick, enjoying this immensely. “You should see the new marks,” she said. “Red and green now. So he’s not Surfin’ Shrek anymore.”

  “Oh my god,” Mandy said furiously. Her voice became a hateful whisper: “Owen I’m gonna kill you right in the face–”

  “You’ll have to come here to do it,” Cassie said.

  “Oh, I’m gonna!”

  “The Undine had ended the conversation,” the Radio said. “You know you made me love you…!”

  I found myself suppressing a smile. “Hope I don’t die.”

  Cassie plugged the straw into Schmendrick’s snout. “You won’t, dummy. Ya did good.”

  I waited nervously on the beach. I’d never had Mandy mad at me before, exactly. I didn’t know what to expect. Tidal waves? A hurricane? I didn’t think she’d just drown the whole island, that seemed like overkill.

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  I knew she was strong enough to grab me by the scruff of the neck and throw me out to sea; maybe I’d skip like a stone for a few miles before sinking. Or she could wad me up like a gum wrapper. Or drop-kick me into orbit, right through the ring of the Aegis up there.

  The sun was going down, and the Observatory had a new hat. The Aegis floated serenely over the whole place, the root systems reaching down to the soil of the Observatory.

  Gardeners orbited it, their glowbeans making them into gently lit moons. I knew they liked it; who doesn’t want a new toy now and then? They’d been inside, reporting on its contents. I still hadn’t been up in there. The voice of the Aegis itself seemed content; it had apparently been wanting to be fussed over for thousands of years, and knew a good thing.

  She must have arrived without my noticing. “Mad at you,” she said from the Mandy Tent. It shook a little as she dressed. “What gives you the right to go get barbecued?”

  “Schmendrick’s idea, she was drunk on that new Cola.”

  “It was NOT her idea! Don’t you get jokey with me, Owen. I’m … I’m mad. I’m mad at you. Officially.” To demonstrate, she emerged from the Mandy tent and stomped her foot in anger.

  My Human readers will understand the following: ripples. Not in the water. I am afraid I broke out into a lecherous grin, and also nearly teared up. I don’t know why, but tears were on the table, suddenly. Beautiful, noble Mandy.

  “I really am mad at you,” she said, stomping on the sand towards me. “Are you laughing at me?” And she shoved me, right in the chest, and by George I did catch some air and hit the sand, hard.

  I’d been ready for it, though, and was able to roll a bit. I couldn’t stop smiling, and I sniffed and wiped away a tear. I know, I know…I don’t get it either. Human neurochemistry. I couldn’t just appreciate a jiggle? Lame.

  She stood over me, legs wide, arms folded. I did not actually try to ogle her, but that dress had been hastily assembled and was holding on for dear life.

  Baring skin on her belly, exposing more than she had before, one end of the skirt was showing that coffee-with-lots-of-cream thigh all the way up to her hip…The beauty of it was leaving me speechless.

  She seemed less angry. The shove had helped, maybe? “Nothing to say for yourself?”

  I shrugged, down there on the sand. “You should have thought it through.”

  Eyes wide, mouth an O of outrage. She cocked a foot like she was going to kick sand in my face. That sand would be traveling with a lot of force. “Thought WHAT through?”

  “Trying to get me out of the cage,” I said.

  “Oh come ON,” she shouted. “That’s different and you know it!”

  “How exactly?”

  She grimaced. Her arms went wide, and flapped down at her sides. “Can you believe this guy,” She shouted up at the Observatory windows.

  “He planned the whole thing for days,” called Cassie from up there, past the trees. “Had Schmendrick as Bad Cop. Set up security measures. Researched the whole thing, planned on getting burned up again, it was amazing!”

  Mandy was muttering: “Schmendrick’s idea, he says. Don’t need you to rescue me! Can’t be killed, can’t be hurt.”

  “But you DO hurt,” I said. My voice was thick. I had to clear my throat. I couldn’t talk, my eyes were hot and itchy. “Not gonna fly. You don’t get a say.”

  Her anger again, boiling up. “What do you MEAN I don’t get a say? Who are you, anyway? I can … I can… any old time! Anytime, Owen!”

  “You won’t, though.”

  She collapsed, her shoulders slumped. She actually fell to her knees in the sand (another jiggle). “No, I won’t.” She looked up at the windows again. “Disappointing them.”

  I laughed. “What about disappointing me?”

  She smirked. “Doesn’t seem like that’s a thing.”

  I grinned. And she grinned back.

  “Will you let us help you?” I said. I thought about grabbing her hand. I didn’t. Then…then I did. Tried, anyway.

  She flapped it away from me, making a fist at her side. Looking away from me, not meeting my eyes. “I’d…if you … I’d owe-ski.”

  I yelled up at the window, to the rest of them. “She doesn’t want to owe-ski!”

  “Booooo,” shouted Cassie. “Owen already owes YOU, dumbass! We ALL do!” Schmendrick contributed by yapping, and all her pack started howling from all over the forest nearby.

  Mandy sighed. She looked at me, her face going from stubborn anger to misery. “I let you down, though. You… were stuck in there. You had to get yourself out.” She wiped at her eyes. “I think about it all the time. I let you down.”

  I grabbed at her hand again. This time I got it. Cold. She didn’t pull away. Our eyes met. Holy mackerel, this girl, oh my GOD so gorgeous, so sad…I struggled to remember what I’d been about to say, it had been pretty good.

  Oh yeah: “The only way you’d let me down is if you didn’t accept our help.”

  That’s the stuff. Well-worded. The Hunt was still yapping and howling. I felt their eyes, Cassie’s eyes, even Gary and his criminals watching us.

  She looked at my hand, my arm. “Burns,” she said miserably. “New burns.” Grimaced, glared. “Because of me.” A snarl. For a moment she looked terribly dangerous, because she was. I remembered her easily thrashing Taylor. His pleading.

  Mandy looked at me, up at the Aegis. Back at me. Kapow, went those eyes, into my heart. “Let me think about it,” she said, and splashed into nothingness. The empty dress drifted to the sand.

  “Booooo,” Cassie called again. “Kiss her next time, you dork!”