A Well-Timed Enchantment by Vivian Vande Velde Page B

thought she heard it one more time, but that may have been a breeze rattling the leaves; and after that they continued to the crossroads in silence.
Baylen's plan better be worth it,
she thought. It'd better have convinced Algernon to leave the watch untended. Otherwise she'd have to face Leonard again, and how could she do that?
    She knew they were close when Baylen put his finger to his lips although nobody had said anything since the pond. Silently he pointed to a wooded area, then made a curlicue gesture that she assumed meant they'd circle into the woods and come up onto the crossroads from behind—longer but safer. She nodded.
    The woods were dark, with exposed roots to trip her up, and twigs that hung down and snagged in her hair. No telling how many insects were nesting in there by now. The night was hot
and humid and her hair and her clothes stuck to her.
    There was no path that Deanna could see. Baylen stuffed Leonard's clothes underneath a bush and began to pick his way with a self-assurance that Deanna figured would in no time either get them exactly where he wanted or have them hopelessly lost. She kept turning around to make sure Oliver was still there, because he never made a sound.
    Finally—it must have been four o'clock where people had clocks—Baylen turned around to once more place finger to lips. Then he got down on his hands and knees and very, very stealthily crawled forward.
    Deanna and Oliver followed, and in a few moments were at the edge of the trees. They had come out in the angle where the two roads intersected, and were maybe a hundred yards away; it was hard for Deanna to judge: perhaps the distance from her front yard to that of her best friend Lynn, two houses away. Two houses, and about nine hundred years. There was no cover at all—nothing to hide behind—just wild grass and weeds between them, crouching at the edge of the woods, and the cauldron, sitting by itself in the middle of the road.
    But there was nobody else there. Apparently Algernon had believed the story Baylen had invented about the watch and the gold and the "let no human eye..." Apparently.
    Deanna squinted into the shadows up and down the lengths of the two roads, same as Baylen and Oliver were doing. Crickets chirped, mosquitoes whined, but nothing out of the ordinary seemed to be stirring tonight.
Don't forget you're stirring,
Deanna told herself. But even with a cynical outlook she could find nothing suspicious in the colorless landscape she surveyed.
    Baylen started to get up and Oliver tugged on his sleeve. He pointed to the left, where there were some bushes across the road.
    "What?" Baylen asked in a barely audible whisper.
    "Someone sitting there," Oliver whispered back.
    Deanna and Baylen tried to pick a shape out of the shadows. "I see nothing," Baylen said. Deanna's thought exactly.
    "Two men," Oliver described to them. "The one on the right has light curly hair and a sleeveless leather tunic. The other has longer, darker hair and a short-sleeved shirt. I can't make out the color in this light They have their backs to us and appear to be asleep, although it's hard to say for certain."
    It took Baylen a good second to remember to shut his mouth. He glanced from Oliver to the shadows across the road. He gave a low, appreciative whistle and said, "You must have the eyes of a cat."
    "Yes," Oliver said.
    "If there're two, there may be more," Deanna whispered.
    "With instructions
not
to look at the cauldron," Baylen reminded them. "Uncle Algernon believed every word I told him. He thinks he's making gold. He'll have told his people
not
to look at the cauldron. They'll be facing away from us. If they're awake—which they probably won't be. If there's more than the two sleepers to begin with."
    Deanna looked at Oliver, who appeared none too pleased by all this. "What is it?" she asked.
    He seemed to be listening to the night sounds. He shook his head. "Something's not right."
    Baylen sighed impatiently, as though to