Mom hasn't said a thing about that night with the assholes who tried to jump me in an alley, and it's been a couple of weeks, so I'm guessing that Squire kept quiet. He probably told Mr. Doyle, but Mr. Doyle doesn't tell mom any more than he has to. He's kind of like a teenager that way.

But he's old. Not as old as Clay or Eve, but pretty damn old. Old people scare me sometimes, because they've seen things teenagers haven't. You look in their eyes and you can see the memories of wars and death and things rotting away slowly. At least I can. I think it's the horns. They let me look a little deeper, especially when it comes to things like death.

My horns are little pointy psychopaths. You know in those cartoons, when they show the little angel and the devil arguing on the good guy's shoulder? That's me, only I've got two devils. And they're not arguing, they're shouting.

Sometimes they scream.

I'm looking out of the window now and I'm staring at that woman and her dog. I'm not thinking about punting the dog like a football any more. I'm thinking worse things.

Things that scare even me, and between ghosts and hobgoblins and clay men, I've seen a lot of scary things.

Do it, the horns tell me. You could climb down there and do it.

I could, too.

Maybe later I will.