May Bird Among the Stars by Peter Ferguson, Jodi Lynn Anderson, Sammy Yuen Jr., Christopher Grassi Page A

mountains.” Then he muttered, “Beatrice teach me how.”
    May smiled. Fabbio’s blue lips curled upward, his mustache curling with them. His eyes darted to the mountains. “Anyway, I no sleep.”
    May thought the lights must have kept him up too. And then another thought came to her. “Is this place like where you died, Captain?” she asked, pulling a petrified twig from the ground and rubbing it thoughtfully between her fingers. She knew Fabbio had died parachuting into the Alps. That was where he had lost all his men.
    Fabbio stopped sewing for a moment, then nodded, his face taking on a cast as stony as the kneecap they rested against.“Yes…. But was not my fault!” he added sharply, his nose going red.
    â€œI’m sure it wasn’t.” May rolled her twig.
    â€œGood morning, you two.” Beatrice emerged from behind the kneecap. “Come on. I’ve built a fire.”
    May gave Bea a tentative smile, and, to her relief, Bea smiled back. It looked like she’d been forgiven.
    Somber Kitty quickly glanced at the mountains, then disappeared around the kneecap in a flash.
    â€œMy sentiments exactly,” May whispered.
    On the third day, a light snow began to fall. By the morning of the fourth day, far up the side of one of the steepest mountains, it had whipped itself into a storm, and May couldn’t see past the ends of her fingers. She, Bea, and Fabbio had to hold hands to keep from losing one another. Somber Kitty had let Pumpkin hold him for a while, pretending he didn’t like it, and occasionally he peeked out of the collar of Pumpkin’s coat, where he lay hidden, protected from the storm. Pumpkin drifted along happily, singing about a sepulcher in Sarasota, where his sweetheart waited for him.
    â€œWe
have
to be close to the peak,” May said, pulling herself uphill by a petrified limb. She shivered under her shroud.
    â€œWhat’s that?” Beatrice cupped her hand over her eyes and squinted forward.
    Up ahead of them, a dark hole opened up in the snow. A neon sign just at the top of it said NORTH FARM, THIS WAY.
    The travelers looked at one another. A warm glow came from the tunnel.
    â€œWhat do you think?” Beatrice asked.
    â€œI think we go!” Fabbio said. “Clearly, this is shortcut.”
    May gazed at the opening. It seemed odd that the Petrified Pass, seemingly so forbidding, should invite them in. But May was freezing, and everyone’s looks urged her forward. Even Somber Kitty had poked out of Pumpkin’s coat again, his ears pointed toward the tunnel with curiosity. A tiny voice inside May said to keep trudging uphill, but she wanted to ignore it.
    â€œLet’s just go in and see,” she said unsurely. The travelers hurried into the mouth of the cave.
    Behind them, the neon lights flickered and then went out.
    The zombies and goblins came to a stop and shivered. Ahead of them, the mountains of the Petrified Pass leaped from the horizon crookedly, sharp and menacing. Even Commander Berzerko’s fur stood on end as she paced the line that separated the pass from the highlands, sniffing at where the trail of the living girl and the living cat made a straight track toward the mountains.
    Now sure that the travelers had gone that way, and keenly able to scent that their trail led all the way into the mountains, she smirked, her canines poking out of her jowls.
    The commander motioned a paw to the goblins, who began spreading themselves along the edge of the pass and hiding wherever they could. The zombies she sent farther east, to hide themselves in the traditional zombie style. All the exits from the pass would be covered.
    Of course, it was probably unnecessary. No one who ventured into the pass ever came back out again.
    The commander sank back on her haunches to watch … and wait.

Chapter Thirteen
Petrified, Period
    I n the hush of the tunnel May’s and Kitty’s breath furled