Read Five: Out of the Dark for Free Online

crib when we peeked over the side of the roof. Johnathan and I pulled out our channeling rods and hit her with a double whammy.
    “
Bind
!” Johnathan yelled.
    “
Bindicus
!” I yelled.
    We’d discovered the words we said weren’t as important as visualizing in our minds what we wanted to happen. In fact, the words weren’t even one hundred percent necessary. They just helped us to focus. Johnathan was pretty straightforward in his use of words. I preferred to make up my own words to sound more hocus-pocussy. Usually I did so by adding a Latin-sounding ending to a normal word. Johnathan laughed at my made-up words, but I didn’t care. I thought it made them sound more mysterious and magic-y. Sometimes I even used real Latin words and they seemed to make my spells stronger.
    Both spells hit her at the same time. Her face froze—eyes huge and mouth open—when her wings, arms, and legs snapped together as though we’d wrapped her up in an invisible tortilla. Gravity took over and she fell like a brick to the sidewalk below. Halli, bleeding heart that she was, cushioned her fall with a pillow of air.
    “Crap!” grumbled Johnathan, whipping his head to move a strand of dark curly hair from his eyes.
    “What? That was awesome! A double blast of binding—she doesn’t know what hit her!” I did a celebratory fist pump in the air.
    “Yeah, it was cool.” He smiled at me, his dimples appearing all too briefly. “But, she dropped the changeling inside the window right before we hit her.”
    “Oh. I really hate when there’s a ‘but’.”
    That too-brief smile tugged at the corners of his mouth again, leaving me aching for more. “We have to go get it. Any ideas how?”
    “Hmm. I don’t suppose knocking on the door and asking the mom if we can just go get something we dropped in her baby’s room will work?”
    Johnathan rolled his eyes and shook his head.
    I sighed. “I guess you’re going to have to lower me down to the window so I can reach in and grab the little imp, then.” I’d never much liked heights. Not that I was necessarily
scared
of heights, I just preferred to stay closer to the ground whenever possible.
    None of us had yet perfected levitation, so Johnathan pulled a thin rope out of his backpack and fashioned it into a makeshift harness. He must have been a Boy Scout in his former life. I stuck my legs through the loops and tested the strength of his knots.
    “Don’t you trust me?” His eyes widened, eyebrows raised.
    I smacked him on the shoulder. “Of course I trust you, or I wouldn’t be about to put my life in your hands.”
    “Don’t be so dramatic. A fall from this height wouldn’t necessarily
kill
you. Just don’t land on your head.”
    “You aren’t exactly helping my jitters.”
    Just then, either the baby—or the changeling—let out a wail. Johnathan and I looked at each other, alarmed. He tied the end of the rope off on a pillar, then held tight to it right next to where the knot was tied at my waist. I concentrated on his broad shoulders and muscular arms as he helped me over the ledge. His momentary touch on my arm sent chills racing down it as he lowered me to the baby’s window. I reached in and grabbed the bundle the Faerie had dropped, took a quick peek to make sure it was indeed the changeling, and signaled for Johnathan to pull me back up just as the door to the baby’s room started to open.
    Whew,
I thought.
That was close.
    The blanket covering the changeling dropped open during the pull back to the roof. I peered down at the wiggling creature in my arms and shuddered as I wrapped it tight again, doing my best to avoid having my fingers bitten off by the hideous creature. Its face was that of a hairless dog, with a long muzzle and razor-sharp teeth. Slathering drool dripped from its pronounced overbite. Small, squinty eyes the color of a white T-shirt after it’s been washed with a new, black towel, focused on my face. Its wrinkled skin had dark areas of