The town of Eddystone, New Hampshire was suffering through a spell of freezing, miserably cold weather unheard of for over a century. The winter had been unusually mild right up until the first day of February, and then the snows and storms had begun, the daily highs refusing to budge above ten degrees. The deep cold had moved in and decided to camp out for a while, smothering the little seaside town like a thick, wet, icy tarpaulin.

Eddystone's citizens gamely went about their business bundled up like arctic explorers, faceless and impossible to distinguish from one another in their heavy gear. Neighbors stood right next to each other and didn't even know it, wrapped tightly in layers of down and wool. They laughed it off, making frostbite jokes and holding neighborhood bonfires. They were commendably stoic about it for the first week.

After the temperatures remained cutting and cruel for another week with no end in sight, people began to lose their sense of humor. It was no longer a joke, an adventure, or an excuse to make giant fires. It was brutal and horrible, and everyone hated it.

They stood grimly huddled, faces buried in scarves, hands thrust deep into pockets, eyes closed, keeping the lip balm handy. With silent, collective impatience they waited for it to end.

The swift waters of Kingston Creek, which was more river-sized than creekish, were frozen from shore to shore. Frost patterns glazed the corners of shop windows, inside and out. Pipes froze and burst. Road pavement shifted and heaved, causing accidents and arguments about how everyone's tax money was being used. Outside recess was perpetually canceled for all students.

Local photographers captured images of the snow-covered salt marshes and sugar-frosted trees at sunrise. The abandoned buildings out on the Fingerbone Islands looked even spookier than usual in the swirling sea smoke. The weather was good for pretty photos. Other than that, everyone agreed it was a dreadful nuisance, spring couldn't come fast enough, and that stupid Groundhog down in Pennsylvania was a big, fat liar for saying he didn't see his shadow.

Sharks died, frozen to death. Threshers washed up on the beach, eyes empty, mouths agape. Mist coiled around them as if the ocean was reaching out to haul their souls back into the deep. The gray waters of the Atlantic crawled up the beach and licked at their lifeless fins

"That might be the creepiest sight I've ever seen," said the Sheriff. Tall and weathered, he stood next to the young man from the Science Center who'd been sent out to examine the dead sharks. The Sheriff thought the poor creatures looked like they had just come from the icehouse, frost coating their skins. He was originally from the deep south, and still wasn't used to the weather in New England. "Does this happen a lot?" he asked.

"Nah, hardly ever," said the fellow. He poked the thresher again. "They're cold-shocked. Jeez, frozen solid. What a way to go."

"I know just how it feels," said Sheriff Protheroe, stamping his feet on the sand. He looked down at the dull black eyes of the beached shark, one of several that lay along the sand.

What a sight, he thought. He wasn't a superstitious man, but if he had been he might have thought this was some kind of a bad omen. The Sheriff shivered and crossed his arms, trying to turn his attention back to the Science Center Guy.

"I'm not sure what this is, though," said the young man. He poked at a jagged hole in the shark's belly with a pencil. "They definitely froze to death, but a few of these threshers have injuries just like this one. Looks almost like, I dunno, bites."

"So," said the Sheriff, "they bit each other before they died, or what?"

"Not shark bites," said the young man. "Something else bit them after they died. I think after they washed up on the beach." He picked up a chunk of gray and white flesh sitting nearby. "Then whatever it was spit the meat out." He casually threw the chunk in the air and caught it like it was a baseball. "Like, maybe it didn't enjoy the taste."

The Sheriff frowned. He didn't like the sound of that. He didn't like much of anything that was going on in Eddystone lately. The cold weather. A rash of missing pets. Enoch Wildwood found torn to pieces on his own back lawn.

He shivered again and hunched against the wind. Bad omens, indeed.

Over on Maple Street, Ellie Homing sat at the breakfast counter in the small cottage she shared with her mother. A small girl with red-blonde curls and hazel eyes, she poked at the watery eggs her mother had set in front of her. Usually she liked her mother's cooking, but lately the quality had been lacking. She knew it was probably because her mother missed Mister Enoch. Ellie missed him too. She sighed at her eggs.

Her mother glanced over at the television. The weatherman was dressed up in a yeti costume, pointing to another record low hovering right above their town. Ellie groaned and fed most of her eggs to Daisy the dachshund under the table when her mother wasn't looking.

Further inland, Ezra Harker prowled around in the thickets that grew along the edges of Kingston Creek. He was tall for eleven, thick hair long and unkempt, the dirtiness and general tangle disguising its dark red color, which he disliked. A heavy black leather motorcycle jacket was worn over a black wool sweater and black jeans, leading down to black steel-toed boots. He was lanky, wolfish, and coated in a carefully cultivated layer of dirt.

His sharp eyes, light gray and the color of newly minted dimes, swept the ground in a thorough, methodical way. He moved stealthily, checking his traps. He'd often set traps and snares for standard hunting purposes, but for the past few days he'd had a different goal. Catching something new. Something hungry, clever, and undeterred by the cold. A predator, not a prey animal. Something he'd seen signs of but had not seen. He was dying to find out what it was, or, he suspected, what they were.

His traps were not just empty. They had been tripped with no sign of what had taken the bait, and deliberately broken as if his intended prey had been angered, or possibly wanted revenge on the trap-setter. There was no blood, or hair, or any other organic trace of the trap evaders. Ezra scowled in frustration. He took pictures of the traps and the surrounding areas for later study and reference.

Ezra decided to go poke around in the salt marshes next. He'd seen some unusual tracks over there two days ago. He shoved the camera into his beaten-up black backpack and headed off to new prowling grounds.

Over at the Eddystone Public Library, Churchill McGee and Unwen Shaw were trying to cajole the librarian into letting them hang a flier on the bulletin board. The librarian looked at the two children, one a skinny boy with freckles and hair like sandy cotton candy, the other a girl with ebony skin and wide dark eyes, shiny curls pulled back in a big bunch. They looked familiar, but she couldn't recall their names. She wasn't very fond of children.

Raising an eyebrow over her cat's-eye glasses, she said, "I'm sorry, what is it again?"

"We're starting a club to play old school tabletop RPGs," said the boy, Church, again.

"What's that?" the librarian asked, again.

"Role-playing games," said Unwen, again.

"Computer games, do you mean?"

"No," said Unwen, trying to be patient and barely managing it. It figured they'd get the mean librarian, she thought. Just their luck. This librarian hadn't heard of anything unless it was invented before 1972. "You just, like, sit around a table and use your imagination and roll dice and stuff. Tell a story." She smiled winningly. "Have an adventure."

"Oh," said the librarian. She paused, looking at the children. She sighed. "I suppose that should be fine. Go ahead and post it." She waved a hand at them to make them go away as quickly as possible.

"Thank you," said Unwen.

They tacked their flier up between an ad for a cleaning service and a notice for a missing cat, one of several posted pleas to help find missing pets that peppered the notice board. The two children looked at their flier hopefully, willing it to get attention. Was it colorful enough? Enticing enough? Neither one of them had ever tried to start a club before.

"I sure hope we spelled everything right," Church said, "so we don't look like a couple of dumbasses."

"We checked it, it's good," said Unwen confidently. "It's as grammatical as we can get it."

They'd made tearaways at the bottom with Church's cell number for people to contact them. They'd specified that it was for kids only, preferably sixth graders like themselves. No weird adults or little kids, please.

Impulsively, Church reached out and pulled off one of the tabs. Unwen looked at him, puzzled.

"It makes it look like people are already interested," he explained, "if there's one taken already."

"Ah," she said. "Clever."

"Thanks for sounding so surprised," he said.

She laughed. "You have a good idea every once in a while," she conceded. "Not hardly ever, but, you know, sometimes."

He bumped her shoulder with his, and she bumped him back harder, making him stumble painfully into the water fountain. "Really?" he said, rubbing his ribs.

"Oops, sorry," she said, and ran for the stairs.

They chased each other down to the Children's Floor to hang out. The kid's section was getting a little babyish for them, but they weren't confident enough to go up to the teen floor yet. They weren't ready to go back to being the youngest in the room again, targets for bullying and being talked down to, though they're tolerance for little kids fussing and throwing picture books around was wearing thin.

On the way down they discussed their theories as to why there were so many missing pets all of a sudden. Cats, dogs, chickens, even one guinea pig.

"They probably all headed south, like the geese," offered Church. "I would too, if I could. This weather blows. My mom says if she wins the lottery we're going to Florida."

"Alien abduction," said Unwen. "I'll bet you. They got tired of cows and they wanna try something new on the menu."

"Mooooo," Church said.

They ran down the second flight of steps and down the hall to the friendly, crayon-colored, toasty-warm environment of the kid's room.

Two hundred and twenty-six miles away, coming over the bridge into Fishkill, New York, Danny Hallow was ensconced in the back-most seat of Miss Grace's old green Volvo station wagon. He'd been given the small third row all to himself for the trip to New Hampshire, and he'd been camped out there for hours already, surrounded by a litter of art supplies and candy wrappers. He was stretched out with his sneakered feet propped up on the window, Creature from the Black Lagoon action figure snuggled into the crook of his arm.

Danny had turned eleven the previous October. He had dark brown hair and eyes that were night-sky blue. He was small for his age, thin and pale as a bare bone. His teeth were sugar-white and unusually sharp, a trait he was told ran in his father's family.

Danny was a nickname for Danzellan, not Daniel as teachers and doctors usually assumed. Officially he was Danzellan Wildwood Hallow, three names that seemed to mean something important to the adults in his life but meant nothing to Danny.

He was stretched out across the seat with his headphones on, blocking out the conversations of the three adults in the car. Scissor Sisters sang into his ears, not in the mood for dancing, no dancing today. He tapped the toes of his Converse together, following the beat, as he doodled in his sketchbook with colored pencils.

Mr. Murray sat in the middle seat, books and maps spread out next to him. Silas Murray was a tall, slightly built gentleman with black hair that waved back from his face like the wings of a graying crow. He had kindly, tilted features and eyes as black as obsidian. He was the one who taught Danny about math, history, grammar, and table manners. He was the only reason Danny maintained passing grades in school because while Danny was far from stupid his attention span for academics was low.

Ali was up front in the passenger seat. Angel 'Ali' Ramirez was a solid man shaped like an iron barrel, all big guns and belly. He was the one who showed Danny how to cook, fish, and net blue crabs off of dock pilings. He liked to entertain Danny with wild tales about his childhood in Puerto Rico, his time in the Army as a demolition expert, urban legends, and fairy tales. He dressed as Green Lantern every Halloween, even when it was pointed out he didn't have the ideal physique for skintight spandex.

Gloria Jean Grace was driving. A tall woman with freckled, light brown skin and long braids she wore pulled back, she was a no-nonsense woman, firm in her ways, and highly intelligent. She was the one who made sure Danny ate balanced meals, got down from there when "there" was too high off the ground, and meted out sensible advice. She was the only one that Danny was afraid of, though he couldn't explain why.

She was the enforcer of rules and a tough taskmaster. She considered it her job to raise Danny properly, because she said the two men were too easy on him. She was a public defense lawyer, and liked to take Danny to protests, trials, and political rallies for entertainment.

"Educational and better than the circus," she'd say, though Danny would have liked to go to the actual circus at least once.

These three people were Danny's Keepers. He'd called them that from as far back as he could remember. They kept him safe, they kept him fed, they kept him happy when they could. They loved him, even though he wasn't their own. They ruffled his hair and said good job and had sung to him when he was small and had generally done all of the things parents were supposed to do.

Danny had been in their care since about the age of four or five. They were the only parents he could recall. His mother and father existed only in random snatches of memory, faded old Polaroids shelved at the back of his mind. That was the way it was, and he never questioned it.

Danny had been keeping himself busy and quiet in the back so he wouldn't bother them with his chronic hyperactivity. He was drawing pirate ships battling for supremacy on storm-tossed and unforgiving seas. They exchanged cannon fire, the smaller ship blowing the mast clean off the bigger one in a mass of jagged splinters. The guys on the captured ship were forced to walk the plank into shark-infested waters, mateys. Aaaaargh, no prisoners. He poked around for the reddest pencil to use for the spurting blood.

The captain of the defeated ship was begging for clemency for his men when Danny noticed that the steady rain, wiggling down the window like silvery minnows for the last four hours, had turned into soft snow.

Danny sat up, leaned forward and let his arms hang over the back of Mr. Murray's seat. "It's snowing," he announced.

"We noticed," said Ali.

"How much longer?" Danny asked.

"A good long while," said Miss Grace. "We're only about halfway there."

Oh, ye gods, Danny thought. Halfway?!

"Is there a Starbucks around here?" asked Danny. He flopped back into his seat and tried not to bounce or fidget. "Can we stop?"

"For heaven's sake, put your seatbelt on, Danny!" said Miss Grace. She sighed. "Are you bored already?"

"No," he said. "I mean, yes, sorry, yes. I just want some coffee." He slid down, down, disappearing from view. "Or I'll die." He held up one hand, flailing weakly. "Dying, dying from caffeine deficiency."

"All right," said Miss Grace. "I suppose we could all use a pick me up." She raised an accusing eyebrow at Ali. "Your fault," she said, wagging her finger at him. "You've been giving him coffee since he was seven years old. It's no wonder he's such an addict already. "

"He was nine," Ali said, "and I'll have you know that in my family we start drinking coffee at birth. It never hurt me any." He flexed a giant bicep.

"We need to make better time," injected Mr. Murray, perusing his maps. Ali had plotted their trip on his phone using Google, but Mr. Murray was doing a better job finding shortcuts with his maps, so Miss Grace was primarily trusting him for the directions.

"We can't stop at a hotel tonight, unfortunately," Mr. Murray said. "The reading of the will is tomorrow morning. We'll have to drive straight through, snow or no."

The Will, thought Danny. He capitalized important words in his mind. His Uncle Enoch's Will. The uncle he never knew existed until last week. Danny felt the prickle of excitement that idea gave him, like little bolts of electricity. His uncle had left him something. No one had ever left him anything in a will before.

He didn't even care if it was something small. Just the concept was exciting. It could be a box of paper clips and he'd still enjoy the experience.

Of course, a million dollars wouldn't be unwelcome. He'd voiced that idea to his Keepers, who had informed him that a million dollars was an unlikely option. The fortune his mother's family had once possessed had dwindled to nearly nothing, they'd said. It was yet another surprise to Danny that his family had ever had a fortune to lose. Figured they'd have to go and lose it before he came along.

Any money would be fine in Danny's opinion. Five hundred bucks would do. Then he could get the entire Classic Universal Monster Action Figure Set that his Keepers hadn't been able to afford last Christmas. They had gotten him the Creature from the Black Lagoon, which was his favorite, and he'd been happy with that. Better one than none at all, of course, but he wanted them all. Creature was lonely without his friends.

He didn't know much about his mother's family, the Wildwoods. Just that they were not ordinary people. He knew that from the stories his Keepers would tell about growing up with his mother. They had all been best friends throughout their younger years, his Keepers and his absent mother whom he could barely remember.

As offbeat as those stories could get, he knew they were leaving many, many details out. Danny could usually tell where the gaps were. Sometimes because it was just obvious they were keeping something from him, the way they'd stop the story, glance at each other, and resume somewhere further along. Other times his JK would kick in and he would Just Know something, a detail they'd left out.

Danny's JK was seldom useful or impressive. Nearly pointless information would come to him in random flashes. He had Just Known where Ali's keys were one time when they'd been lost. He'd warned them to move the grill because he Just Knew a tree was going to fall over in a storm. Those things were helpful, but more often the info was either too confusing to understand or was something along the lines of knowing the cashier at Target owned a red Toyota. Useless.

He and his Keepers called it the JK, for Just Know. That way, if he said he knew something they could quickly clarify if he meant he knew it, or if he Knew It, without coming right out and saying the word psychic in front of anyone. They'd told him this kind of thing was common in his mother's family, like his sharp, white teeth came from his father's side. Genetic. Inherited. Just weird enough to brand him a freak and an oddball, because when he'd started school, he'd been too young to realize that he shouldn't ask other kids about the spaghetti he knew they'd had for dinner or tell them that he hoped their Grandma wasn't mad about the ring, or otherwise let people know that he knew things he wasn't supposed to. Self-restraint kicked in by second grade but by then it was too late.

So, with the limited information Danny had been given of his family's weirdness, he dared to hope his uncle might have left him something truly bizarre and interesting. A magic monkey's paw. A trunk full of Atlantean coins. A map leading to pirate treasure. His imagination ran wild with all of the possibilities.

He was suspended from school for two weeks, so the timing was perfect for the trip. Not that he was happy that his uncle was dead. He just didn't feel bad, because he'd never met the guy. It was hard to feel sad about losing an uncle, your mother's twin brother for cripe's sake, when he'd never even written you a letter or anything.

Of course, the Keepers weren't thrilled about the suspension. Danny, on the other hand, was overjoyed to have an impromptu vacation and some time away. Especially following The Incident at school that had gotten him suspended. He might never live it down. It was probably the last nail in his coffin, guaranteeing he would never have one friend, not ever.

The Incident was the reason Max was in his backpack. Danny peered in at the lump of fur and leathery skin huddled in one of his sweaters. He was sleeping, as he usually did during the daytime.

"Does Max need anything?" asked Mr. Murray, looking up from his map.

"Bugs," said Danny.

"No bugs in here," said Mr. Murray. "Perhaps the coffee shop has bug-pops."

Danny smiled at Mr. Murray with tolerant affection. Mr. Murray winked in response.

Mr. Murray knew it was worrying Danny that he was having trouble finding enough to feed Max. Max was supposed to be hibernating this time of year and he was all off kilter.

Danny was technically the reason Max wasn't hibernating, because of The Incident. Therefore, he felt responsible for taking care of him and keeping him alive. He'd told his Keepers this was how he felt about it and they understood, though Miss Grace wasn't overly enthusiastic about having a bat in the house. She appreciated him trying to take responsibility, though.

There were four different versions of The Incident. There was the school's official version, which is what the other kids told the Principal and the Principal had told the parents. There was the version Danny had told his Keepers, which omitted a couple of details he wanted to avoid discussing. Then there was the version Miss Grace had come up with and told Danny to stick to like glue for anyone outside the four of them. The Danny's Defense Team version, they called it.

Then there was what actually happened. Only Danny really knew that version. Even Max didn't know the whole story.

All four versions ended with Danny being suspended from school for ten days and a live brown bat living out of his backpack. He hated school and had always wanted a pet, so this state of affairs was fine with him.

Then they'd received word that his mother's twin brother, Enoch Wildwood, was dead. An uncle that Danny had been told he'd met long ago but didn't remember. An uncle that no one had ever mentioned to him, not once.

Now he was taking a road trip to the reading of the actual will of a dead man to get some kind of inheritance. He was having a grand old time, though he was trying not to show it. Miss Grace would probably disapprove and lecture him about being disrespectful. He was excited but trying to play it cool.

This was nothing but a brief reprieve, though he tried not to think about that. When he got back to school everything would be even worse than it had been before. The bullying from the other kids, the disapproval of his teachers. To add to the fun, he was high up on the principal's crap-list now.

Funny how that worked, Danny thought. Years of being pushed, ostracized, kicked, spitballed, cyber-bullied, and laughed at had never once drawn the attention of the principal, oh, no, but disturb a bat colony in the school's attic just one time and suddenly you're on the man's radar. It really wasn't fair.

He sighed. What he needed to make everything better was a cafe mocha with an espresso shot and whipped cream on top and maybe chocolate sprinkles, too. And a sandwich with melted cheese.

And a bug-pop. He rubbed Max's sleepy head.

After another hour, they pulled off of the road to stop at Coffee Heaven so they could use the bathroom and Miss Grace could grumble about over-priced baked goods. Shortly thereafter, Danny was again settled in the back of the car with his coffee and a panini. It's the little things, he concluded, that keep the happy thoughts rolling along. He went back to his music, drawing, and wondering how much longer this drive was going to take.

"Are we even close?" he asked.

"Oh, hell, no," Ali answered. "Not even a little close."

"Please don't ask again until we're through Connecticut," Mr. Murray said.

It had been fun in the beginning, all four of them cheering enthusiastically every time they crossed another state line. By the time they reached Connecticut the fun was going out of it, and by Massachusetts the journey had taken on the tooth-grinding tone of a million-mile marathon, and everyone had gone very quiet.

Miss Grace gripped the wheel in grim determination to drive straight through with no more stops. She squinted grimly into the snow, whirling at the windshield like the Volvo was making the jump to lightspeed.

"Not even McDonald's?" Danny asked.

"Definitely not even for McDonald's," Miss Grace replied.

Ali bugged her to give him a turn but she kept putting him off, insisting that she didn't trust his driving since he went around on a motorcycle all the time and hadn't driven a car in years. Ali called her a control freak which led to a brief squabble, but it lost steam quickly. They didn't have the energy to fight.

Mr. Murray kept himself busy reading maps and quizzing Danny on geography. "Samoa," said Mr. Murray. "South Pacific or Oceania?"

"Oceania," said Danny.

"Excellent!"

"See," said Danny. "I remember things so much better when you teach me."

"You're not being home schooled," shot Miss Grace from the front seat. "I'll say it as many times as I have to."

"Why not?" Danny asked, though he was used to the answer. He'd been angling for home schooling for a while.

"Because you need to go to school to learn and get along with people better. Make friends," she said. "You know. Socialize. Learn how to socialize."

"Look at us," said Ali. "We've been friends since elementary school, since we were younger than you are now. Friends are important."

Danny had heard all of this many times and still considered it to be a huge crock of cow feces. Socialization, for crying out loud. At school? Did they know what school was like?

"But I don't make friends at school," he said. "The kids don't like me. The teachers don't like me." All I learn at school, he thought, is where all the best hiding places are.

"Well," said Miss Grace, "just try to be yourself."

"I'm already always myself," Danny said. "I think that may be the problem."

Ali laughed sympathetically.

"We understand," said Mr. Murray, "we really do." He turned to Miss Grace. "Perhaps we could send him to a small private school or something of that nature." Mr. Murray smiled dreamily. Danny assumed he was having happy thoughts of neatly pressed uniforms and poetry readings.

"We could talk about it, I suppose," she answered. The phrase 'talk about it' usually meant no, and likely did in this case. Danny knew they couldn't afford things like private school. Miss Grace worked for the state, Ali was a cook, and Mr. Murray was retired from whatever it was he used to do with a tiny pension. Danny's grades weren't going to get him any scholarships, plus now he had a suspension on his record.

"Reform school?" he asked, and they all laughed. "What?" he said. "I'm suspended. I am a total rebel, a real badass." He pulled his hair over his face and tried to look tough.

"Yeah, oooh, look out Crips and Bloods," said Ali, throwing up exaggerated fake gang signs. Danny laughed.

"We'll talk about it when we get home," said Miss Grace. "You have a week left to your suspension. We have plenty of time to figure something out."

"You're right," said Mr. Murray. "Let's just enjoy our visit to our hometown. None of us have been here in years and years." He turned to Danny. "Do you remember it at all?"

"I've been there?" Danny said, surprised.

"I'll take that as a no," said Mr. Murray. "We were all here for your father's funeral, but I guess you were very small when your father was, um, when he died."

When he was murdered, thought Danny. They never said it, that word. Murdered. "We weren't in New Hampshire when that happened though, right?" he asked. "We lived in Maryland."

"That's right," said Ali. "But you visited your mother's family home every summer, until you were three, and then we were there for the funeral."

"He was only a toddler," said Mr. Murray. "I'm not surprised he doesn't remember. Maybe it's for the best that he doesn't."

Eh? Danny thought. What does that mean?

"Hey," Ali said, "do you think the old movie theater is still there?"

This triggered a long conversation among the Keepers about people and places Danny didn't know anything about, so he let his mind wander. He decided to keep pushing for homeschool. After all, it wasn't learning that he hated. He liked knowing stuff. He hated school. Different thing altogether. He had a whole week left to wear them down.

Then they saw the highway sign.

"NEW HAMPSHIRE!" they all yelled in relief. Danny threw his hands in the air and whooped. Ali reached back clear across the middle seat to give Danny a vigorous high five.

"I've never been so happy to see a highway sign before," said Miss Grace, seventy percent of the stress clearing from her face.

Danny thought that meant they were there, but it was nearly another hour before they pulled off of the highway onto an exit ramp. All of the signs they were following said seacoast, which piqued Danny's interest.

"Seacoast?" he prompted alertly.

"Eddystone is a seaside town," said Mr. Murray. "It's right on the ocean, didn't you know?"

"Like Ocean City?" asked Danny, feeling his excitement building. He loved the ocean. He'd had no idea that they were going anywhere near the ocean. He'd been begging for years to move from their small house in Easton to Ocean City. Either that or Baltimore. Anywhere but Easton, really.

Miss Grace always said no. She maintained that she liked the small-town thing, though Danny observed that she didn't like the one they lived in very much.

"Like Ocean City, only much smaller and less crowded," said Mr. Murray. "There's a little boardwalk and some amusements along the beach." He looked out of the window at the falling snow, which had become very deep along the side of the road as they'd come into Northern New England. "Those things won't be much fun this time of year, of course," he sighed. "There's always sledding."

It was getting dusky out. Miss Grace flipped on the headlights. They passed a brightly lit farm store, a small gas station, and a darkened plant nursery, closed for the season according to the sign. Other than that, it was trees, snow, trees, snow, and more trees.

As they crested the top of a steep hill, Danny could see a town off in the distance, further down the road. The lights of homes and shops shone through the gathering darkness and snowfall. Even farther out he could see the beam of a lighthouse sweeping across the gray winter waters of the Atlantic, stormy and agitated, boats bobbing up and down like corks next to the docks they were tethered to.

Cool, Danny thought. A lot of the buildings were painted bright colors, in contrast to the bright white snow. Danny liked that.

The headlights illuminated a whitewashed sign with blue trim, standing on the side of the road.

Welcome to the Town of

Eddystone, New Hampshire

pop. 6,664

Founded in 1626 and 1636

Welcome/ Bienvenue!

"Why was it founded two times?" asked Danny

"Actually," said Mr. Murray, "it was founded three times. The first settlers abandoned it. Then the second settlers, well, disappeared, and then the third group had more sticking power I suppose."

"Disappeared?" said Danny, immediately keying in on the weirdest part.

"Vanished," said Ali, with much drama and lots of hand movements. "Without a trace."

"Very cool," said Danny, impressed.

"Yes, we thought you'd like that," said Miss Grace dryly. "So if there's the sign, the turn for Gnomewood should be right about- "

"There!" yelled Ali pointing left, hand directly in front of Miss Grace's face. She braked hard and skidded to a crooked halt on the icy road. She turned slowly to give Ali the Gloria Grace Look of Death. Ali shrugged, looking sheepish.

Throwing the car into reverse, she backed up a few feet, then turned left into a long, paved driveway that wound through a tunnel of trees. The way was dark, the trees growing together in a canopy that clung together so thickly overhead that the snow was barely reaching the ground.

They came to a fork in the road, split by a twisted old tree. The left fork had a cheerful sign that read, "Chatwin Farm, apples, blueberries, strawberries, pick your own! (in season)". On the right was a dilapidated post reading, "Gnomewood Home- private property, trespassers will be-" the last word worn away.

They turned right.

"Will be what?" asked Danny.

Ali swung around, eyes wide and voice deep. "Mur-derrrred," he intoned.

"Disemboweled," Mr. Murray said.

"Fed to trolls," Ali added.

"And you wonder where I get it from," said Danny to Miss Grace.

"I don't wonder anything," said Miss Grace, elbowing Ali.

"We're not trespassers," reassured Mr. Murray. "We're fine. Probably. No murder by trolls today if we're lucky."

Danny couldn't always tell if Mr. Murray was joking or not. He had a very dry wit.

The Volvo bumped along, sliding and jumping. Miss Grace grumbled and hung on to the wheel with determination. The trees were even closer together here, and it was dark and hard to see. Danny peered out the side window. If he looked at them the right way, the trees had faces.

Mean, nasty faces. The faces of people-eating trees. He quickly faced front again, just as what was left of the daylight filtered back into the car as they left the cover of the tree tunnel.

The car's tires crunched slowly around a large circular driveway. A gigantic oak tree grew in the center of the roundabout. A brick of granite was set in front of the tree like a gravestone.

Gnomewood Home, it read in deeply carved lettering. Built in 1625 by Attar Aldrich Wildwood. Lux Pacis Lucet Hic.

"So what do you think of your family homestead, Danzellan?" asked Mr. Murray. "Sorry it's so small."

Danny stared wide-eyed as they approached the front of the house. "Small," he said.

Gnomewood Home rose above them high against the cold, gray sky. Its crumbling red bricks held themselves up with neglected dignity, a thick carpet of beleaguered ivy keeping it from falling apart.

The structure was three stories high if you included the row of attic dormers. It stretched out on one side to a round, cone-topped turret, and a long glass enclosure coated with dirt and ivy all over it. On the other side was a room with tall windows, curved at the top. In between that was a whole lot of house, way more house than Danny had ever seen in real life. It reminded him of some of the Smithsonian buildings in Washington DC.

The vegetation surrounding it looked overgrown and wild, bushes and trees left to do their own thing with no gardener to keep them in line. Wide marble steps led up to a covered porch and the front door, painted in cracking blue and decorated with a brass door knocker in the shape of a dragon's head. The snow fell silently around the car as they all looked up at it. The windows looked back, considering them in return.

Danny was gobsmacked. "I thought you said it was a farmhouse," he said.

"It is," said Ali. "Just a big old farmhouse. A really big old farmhouse."

"It's a mansion!" Danny said.

They all stared silently up at the mansion. Nobody moved.

"We could stay in a hotel," said Ali, breaking the silence.

"I suppose we could," said Miss Grace slowly. "Enzo suggested we stay here, and I thought that sounded like a fine idea at the time, I just...it feels so odd to be back here."

They all looked at each other.

"This is ridiculous," said Mr. Murray taking on a tone clearly meant to jolly everyone up. "Why are we all just sitting here? We loved this place when we were kids." He pushed himself across the seat. "Someone help me with my braces."

Danny opened his door and popped out into the coldest air he'd ever felt on his skin. He froze in place and made an involuntary noise of instant shock and discomfort. He felt like someone had sprayed him all over with that stuff that had shattered the T-1000 in Terminator Two. He uttered a choking, whispered swear, and hurried to open Mr. Murray's door.

He helped Mr. Murray swing his legs out and put his special walking canes on his arms. Ali and Miss Grace had mobilized too, Ali coming around to help Mr. Murray on the other side.

Miss Grace hurried up the steps, hunched into her coat. She muttered through chattering teeth. "The temperature must be at least minus ten with the wind chill." The wind gusted over them, making them all exclaim.

"This cold spell," said Mr. Murray, making his way to the steps, "was all over the news, Gloria. It's been brutal all over Northern New England for over a week." He launched into a complex explanation of what meteorological events had caused the unusually cold temperatures, but Ali cut him off.

"Wonderful," said Ali. "Good to know. Let's get inside."

They helped Mr. Murray up onto the covered porch, where they were out of the snow and in the lee of the wind. Miss Grace rummaged in her bag for the keys.

Danny looked out across the property. There were no neighbors, no nearby lights. The house was surrounded by woods, dark and deep, the trees winter black and crouched like hunting panthers. White frosting lay thickly on their branches. It was so quiet he could hear the soft sound of snow falling on snow.

"Look at this," said Mr. Murray to Danny, drawing his attention away from the woods and toward the door. "I've always loved this," he said, running a light hand over the door knocker, its dragon's head showing tarnish.

"Your mother and Enoch called him Bruce," said Ali, laughing.

"Go ahead, give it a bang," said Mr. Murray. "It makes a tremendous racket. You can hear it almost anywhere in the house."

Danny reached out and put his hand around the brass ring hanging in the dragon's mouth. The metal was so cold it was like touching an iceberg. The dragon moved it's carved, burnished eyes to look at him. It made eye contact. Danny froze.

My imagination, he thought.

"Go on," Mr. Murray prompted.

The metal warmed under his hand. Quickly, he picked up the ring and let the hammer underneath fall. Then he let go and pulled his hand back quickly.

BOOM. He could hear the sound reverberating within the house, echoing into eternity.

He put his hands in his pockets and stepped back. The door knocker was still looking at him. Just on the edge of hearing, he thought he heard it whisper something. Danny scooted back, almost falling down the icy steps.

"Be careful," scolded Miss Grace. She reached around in her bag. "Where are those keys?" With a grunt of extreme frustration, she thumped her bag down. "I had them. I had them back at home, I had them when we stopped in New York. I've had the whole time, and now I can't find them."

She looked furious. Things didn't usually go wrong for Miss Grace. She was always together, always competent. Gloria Jean Grace didn't lose things. "I suppose we'll have to call Enzo," she said. "Maybe he has another set."

"Now wait a moment, Gloria," said Mr. Murray. He hobbled over to a large planter full of dead vegetation and dry dirt by the edge of the porch. "Maybe it's still here."

He leaned over and gripped the edge of the planter making a very weak attempt to pick it up while balancing on his crutches. Miss Grace and Ali went over to help.

They moved the planter. It must have been plenty heavy, Danny thought, because even Ali was straining to lift it.

Mr. Murray bent down and came up with an object in his hand. He showed it to everyone. "See, still here," he said.

They all looked at the black iron key in his hand. "Anthea always hid it there so we could get inside in case of an emergency," said Miss Grace. "You remembered. I'd forgotten."

Danny's Keepers smiled at the key, sharing some thought or memory Danny wasn't privy to. Mr. Murray handed the key to Danny with a ceremonious flourish. "Go ahead, Danzellan," he said. "Open the door to Casa Wildwood, jovem principe. "

Miss Grace turned away, covering some fleeting emotion she didn't want anyone to see. Danny knew they'd all been friends with his mother, Anthea Wildwood, but he'd never thought about it deeply or really considered what that meant to them. It meant enough to raise her kid for her after she'd boogied off, anyway, he thought.

Keeping a sharp eye on the door knocker for any funny business, he inserted the key into the lock and turned it with a loud 'click'. Desperate to get out of the cold, he scrabbled at the fancy brass handle, and the door swung open.

With cover from the cold available, they all pushed into the dark space inside, laughing, shuffling into each other, trying to see. "Ugh," said Ali. "What a warm welcome our little town is giving us, huh?"

"Hold on," said Mr. Murray, and Danny could hear him fumbling around by the wall. The space they were in was small and dark. An enclosed entrance way or vestibule, he realized. There were indistinct shapes and shadows all around them.

He saw another door ahead, an inner door leading into the house, he presumed. Then Mr. Murray made an 'aha' sound and said, "Moment of truth, everyone!"

"Go for it," Miss Grace said.

Danny heard a 'snick' and the vestibule was bathed in warm overhead light.

Danny saw a horrifying figure standing directly in front of him, looming over him, holding something in its hand to smash him over the head with. "AAAAGH!" Danny yelled, and jumped backward, banging into the wall behind him, upsetting an umbrella stand.

Ali grabbed Danny around the shoulders, laughing. "It's just Anubis!" he said. "I'd forgotten about him!"

Danny looked up at the seven-foot-tall statue of the Egyptian god Anubis, its jackal head held regally high. It stood up against the patterned wall of the vestibule next to a coat rack and a table that was covered in papers. Someone had hooked a cane over one of its arms.

"I was always very suspicious of him," said Miss Grace, wagging a finger at the statue. "I used to think he went walking around when people weren't looking." She put her hands on her hips. "Well, the electricity is still on, that's good news. I wasn't sure."

"Let's hope the heat is working, too," said Ali, hugging himself. They could all see their breath puffing out, even though they were inside.

"If it's not," said Miss Grace, "there are plenty of fireplaces."

"And several hotels to choose from," said Ali. "Just saying."

Miss Grace gave him The Eyebrow and went over to the inner door. Made of heavy oak, it had a stained-glass window in its center depicting what looked like the Gnomewood tree from the front yard in brilliant glass colors. "Come along," she said.

She opened the door into a massive, darkened cavern. Danny walked forward, peering into the shadows and gloom. The windows on the front of the house had their curtains drawn, but the tall ones at the back were open and allowed weak light to enter. Danny could make out an enormous room with a high ceiling, a sweeping staircase leading up to a wide, carpeted landing over which a row of windows stood guard. Everything else was just shadows and shapes until someone turned on the lights.

Danny squinted at the sudden brightness. He opened one eye, and then the other, and gazed around in awe.

The light was provided by a chandelier that hung high above. It was made of silver metal that had been worked and twisted to create a highly detailed octopus, nearly life-size, each of its eight legs holding a glowing candle-bulb. They were in an entrance hall, with green and silver patterned wallpaper, random sconces, oak trimmed archways leading off into different parts of the house. Wooden flooring, mostly covered with a worn oriental carpet, creaked under their feet.

On the landing at the top of the staircase was a tall grandfather clock, made of burnished ebony black wood. Its silver pendulum was the size of a dinner plate, motionless behind the etched glass door on its front.

The house was silent as the grave, and just as cold, but it gave Danny an odd warm feeling. Did he maybe remember it a little, even though he had no memories of it?

"I'll go down to the basement and see to the furnace," said Miss Grace. "Since I'm not too scared to go into the basement." She glanced pointedly at Ali.

"I'll check the kitchen," said Ali quickly.

"I'll go through the downstairs and make sure it's secure," said Mr. Murray.

"You're just heading for the library," said Ali. "You can't fool us."

Mr. Murray looked wounded. "I'm just making myself useful," he said. "But I'll be checking the library first, yes."

They all headed for different doors, and Danny wasn't sure what he was supposed to do. He was suddenly alone in the entrance hall, just him and the clock. He could feel its presence like it was a person, a stranger he'd been left alone with.

He crept up the stairs toward the clock. As he got closer he saw that the face wasn't the face of a normal clock. Instead of numbers, it had all sorts of symbols in concentric rings, and many pointy black hands of different sizes, all of them bent at right angles in the middle. That's weird, he thought. So if it doesn't tell time, what does it tell?

He walked up to it, gazing up at the face, trying to work it out. Some of the symbols looked familiar, others were shapes or maybe lettering he'd never seen before. Some of these symbols were etched into the glass pendulum cover as well. They surrounded a circle that had a larger symbol engraved at its center. He reached out a hand and ran a finger over the complex shape, tracing, fascinated. It felt almost familiar.

In his mind he looked up at it and it was hazy, tall, like he was smaller, and an unfamiliar voice said, "It's the key, Danzellen, the great door to everywhere."

He traced and traced, trying to figure out if it was an actual memory he was having or just one of his little imagination glitches when sharp glass nipped at his fingertip.

"Ow," he hissed, pulling his hand back. A tiny bubble of blood sprouted from his fingertip. He looked up and saw he'd left a light smear of blood on the fancy glass, at the top of the etched symbol. He squeezed his finger and put it to his mouth.

It bit me, he thought, and then-

"BONG!" The clock roared. "BONG....BONG....-" Danny backed up and covered his ears.

The clock boomed eight times, the sound reverberating through the walls, making the chandelier tremble. The whole house shook, dust flying as if the house was shaking it off like a dog would shake off water. After the eighth boom, the quiet returned.

The pendulum clicked, making him jump. It began to swing back and forth in wide arcs, making a whoosh, whoosh, whoosh sound like a heartbeat. The face of the clock flickered and then gently illuminated with a soft bluish glow, the hands spinning, spinning, and then settling into stationary positions, all pointing at different symbols.

Apparently finished, the clock sighed gently and settled.

It's alive, Danny thought. He reached out and touched the side, the wood warm under his hand.

Hearing a throat clearing sound, he turned to see Miss Grace and Ali standing at the foot of the stairs, staring at him.

"What just happened?" Ali asked.

"The clock started," he said, putting his finger in his mouth to suck off the blood.

Gnomewood Home began to slowly awaken from deep slumber, dimly becoming aware of the presence of something it had been waiting for. Waiting for a long, long time.

"I think it's happy to see me," Danny said, and smiled.