Welcome to the final episode of the Soup Legacy. This segment should take the Soups all the way from R to Z. I hope you'll enjoy the story.

It begins where the Rock Soup story left off, with the household about to arrive in a strange new place...

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Tibble raised her head as morning sun began to stream in the many windows. Rising to her feet, she stretched, jumped down off the couch, and trotted over to a window, jumping up onto the sill to peer out. Her ears twitched as she looked around, craning her head from side to side. Suddenly she froze, staring off to the right.

"Damnation, it's the wrong place!" she muttered after a moment, and jumping down from the sill, hurried out the door and down the hallway into the playroom, where Rock was working on building a Water Wiggler. "Rock!"

The servo turned and looked down at the fox. "Yes, Tibble?"

"Get the children, I need to speak to them. Now!"

He nodded, and putting down his tools, hurried upstairs to where the six teens were going through their usual morning routines, getting ready for school. He soon had them all dressed and gathered together downstairs in the TV room.

They were chatting together when Tibble walked in and sat down, looking at the six of them. She waited a moment, then spoke. "Children!"

They fell silent, all of them turning to look at her.

"Children, there is much to tell you, and little time to tell it in. When you and I first met, most of you were still just toddlers, too young and helpless to look after yourselves, traumatised by your recent abduction from your parents. I have kept you all safe for a time, giving you time to grow, in safety and peace. But my ability to protect you could only be stretched so far. It is time for you all to remember," Tibble said.

The teens all gasped, eyes widening, and stared at each other and the fox as their memories of their lives before their kidnapping returned in a flood. They each reacted differently to the returning knowledge, some gasping or moaning, some crying out, some bursting into tears.

The fox looked frazzled. "I am sorry, children - had things gone entirely as I'd hoped, you'd have time to adjust to the return of your memories. But - well, suffice to say, things have not gone entirely according to plan. Look out the windows and tell me what you see."

Several of the kids rose and walked over to the windows, peering out. Their gasps brought the others over to peer out as well.

"It's... it's like Stonehenge!" Raspberry exclaimed.

Tibble nodded. "Yes. And it means that the house has ended up in the wrong place. We should have come out far from here, on the other side of the river."

"What river?"

"There is a river to the east of us here, flowing down from the north. And you children will need to find it, and cross it."

"What? Why?"

Tibble sighed. "I'm sorry, but there is little time for questions and answers. You will need to do as I say. You must leave the house, and head north, past the Henge. You'll find the river, and you must follow it north, to a bridge, and cross to the other side. Once there, head north again, and you'll come to a small city. That is where you need to go."

"But, why?" Raspberry asked.

Tibble sighed. "Because you will be safe there, or as safe as it is possible to be in this world. And you must go, now, quickly, before others notice this house's arrival and come to investigate."

They tried to question the fox, but she was adamant that there was no time, and in a short while they found themselves gathered outside, reluctantly moving towards the Henge, while Tibble and Rock watched them leave. "Remember what I said!" the fox called after them "North, along the river, and across the bridge, and then north again."

Rock and the fox watched until the children vanished into the woods around the Henge, then turned and went back indoors.

"Will they be all right?" Rock asked, worried.

"I hope so," the fox told him. "Come, someone is bound to show up soon to investigate the house... you and I must be ready to deceive and delay them, to give the children time to get away."

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Ok, now I know why I couldn't sleep. It was because I knew this was coming. Yay, you started it! *subscribe*

They found the river easily enough, a wide deep blue body of water snaking across the landscape at the bottom of a steep-sided ravine. In the distance, on the far shore, they could make out the darkness of forested hills, and beyond them in the furthest distance, the tallest buildings of a small city were dimly visible. They stood and stared for a while.

"I wonder where we are, in relation to home," Raspberry suddenly said.

"I don't know that we are," Raphael slowly said. "Anywhere in relation to home, I mean. Tibble talks - it was only in children's books and fairy tales that animals could talk. I don't remember anything like Tibble back home - nor that chicken, or the penguin, either!"

"Or the goat," Raspberry nodded, then sighed. "I suppose we'd better get a move on," she said. "Tibble did seem to think it was pretty urgent we get across the river as soon as we possibly could."

"I wonder why," Raphael said, as he turned and followed her north along the lip of the ravine, the other kids trailing along behind them.

They walked for a couple of hours before the bridge finally came into sight, a narrow stone bridge arching out across the gorge to the distant shore. All of them were hot and tired by then, not to mention foot-sore. They were almost to the bridge when Romano, glancing around to see where Rose was, caught sight of something.

"Look!" he exclaimed, pointing off to the west of them. "Don't those look like knights of some kind!?"

They all turned and looked, seeing a small troupe of mounted men in the distance, their armor flashing in the sunlight as they galloped along the road. The kids stood staring for a long moment.

"Hells!" Raphael suddenly exclaimed, looking from the moving men to the bridge. "They're trying to cut us off! Run!"

The kids pelted down the last hillside towards the bridge, suddenly feeling very frightened, through they weren't sure why - except that Tibble had been so adamant that they needed to cross, that this side of the river was unsafe for them.

Raspberry and Romano reached it first, and started across, Raven right behind them. Raphael reached it and stopped for a moment, turning back to see where the others were, just in time to see Rose trip and fall on the hillside, rolling a few paces downhill in a tangle of limbs before coming to a stop, motionless.

"Rose!" he cried out, and pelted back towards her. "Keep going, I've got her," he called to Robert as Robert, hearing his cry, slowed and started to turn back as well. Robert glanced nervously between Rose and the rapidly approaching horsemen, then hurried after the other kids as Raphael dropped to his knees beside Rose.

"You okay?" he asked as she pushed herself up.

"Ow, my ankle!" she gasped, going pale.

"That'd be a no, then," he said, and helped her to her feet, putting one arm around her waist while she put her arm over his shoulders, then the two of them hurried towards the bridge, her keeping her injured foot up of the ground and using him as a crutch as they ran as best as they could. They were almost to it when the mounted men swept past to either side of them, then closed together and stopped in front of them, staring down at them.

Raphael and Rose stared back. The men... weren't human. One of them nudged his horse, moving a few steps closer towards Raphael and Rose. He smiled down at them, slit-pupilled yellow eyes glittering as he shook his mane of fiery red hair back, the great curling horns on his head shining in the sun as if polished.

"What have we here?" he wondered, looking the two of them over. "Strangers, on our land."

Raphael glanced beyond the men, seeing the others stopped in the middle of the bridge, looking back towards him and Rose. "Run!" he shouted, feeling a moment of satisfaction as they turned and moved, someone - Raven, he thought - pulling a reluctant Raspberry along.

The man looked over his shoulder at the fleeing children, and snorted, then smiled down at Raphael and Rose. "Lady deWinte will want to see these two," he remarked. "Let us ride."

They sprang into motion again, plunging past to either side of Raphael and Rose, two riders pausing and stooping over to pluck up the two of them before charging off after the others. From his precarious perch in front of one of the riders, Raphael looked over at a frightened Rose, wondering what was going to happen to them, who these strange beings were.

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Oh no Raphael & Rose pray's for their safe return

what a start

Raspberry and Romano were both in tears as the kids reached the end of the bridge and plunged off the road into the woods around it. Raphael and Rose - gone!

"Stop!" Raspberry exclaimed after they were hidden among the trees, and dropped to her knees, panting for breath and crying. The others threw themselves down on the ground as well, all of them winded and upset. Romano sat with his head resting on his knees, seeing over and over again in his head the moment when the four of them had realised that Raphael and Rose had fallen behind, had been cut off, and captured.

"We should have done something!" he suddenly exclaimed, raising a tear-streaked face. "We should have tried to rescue them...!"

"How?" Raven tiredly asked. "Four kids, against that many mounted men in armor? Raphael told us to run."

"We could have... tried something," Romano insisted, wiping his face on his sleeve.

"Four youths against eight of the Sidhe?" a strange voice said. "It would have done you no good."

They froze, then looked around. A slim blond figure dressed in brown leathers stepped out of the surrounding forest and stood looking them over out of calm pale blue eyes.

"You cannot help your friends now," he said. "And it's best you not linger too near the bridge. This is a chancy place. Follow me," he said.

"Why should we trust you?" Raspberry warily asked.

He shrugged. "Trust or not doesn't enter into it," he said. "You can stay here and find out what lurks in this area after dark, or follow me to the city, where you'll be safe."

He turned and started to walk away. The kids looked at each other, then tiredly rose to their feet and limped after him.

He glanced back, and seeing their footsore pace, slowed his own. "I am William," he told them. "A ranger. I was patrolling the shore when I saw you crossing, and came to find you. This is not a good area for ones so young to be in."

They followed him away from the bridge. Eventually he stopped on a hill crest, looking up at the sun. "It is well past noon, let us stop and eat," he said, and dropping down crosslegged, dug a packet out of one pocket and unwrapped a sandwich. He'd taken a coupel of bites before noticing the hungry way the kids stared at t.

"Have you no food of your own?" he asked, sounding surprised, then sighed as they shook their heads. Sighing, he tore the sandwich in half, then dug around in his pockets, producing a second sandwich and a small pastry. Raspberry got the pastry - an apple pie, it turned out - while the three boys each got hald of a sandwich. William quickly disposed of the remainder of his own half sandwich.

"We will rest a bit before moving on," he told them, and lay down in the shade of some nearby bushes, closing his eyes.

The kids wearily finished their food and found their own patches of shade. Romano only lay down for a few minutes, then too worried about Rose to nap, rose to his feet and paced around the top of the hill, staring off in all directions. To the southwest he could see the bridge, and to the southeast, a swampy area, with a few houses poking up above the trees here and there. East of them was an area of large buildings along a road - factories of some kind, judging by the many chimneys, though they all seemed strangely silent. And to the north east, a large town or small city, a few bigger buildings towering over a huddle of smaller ones around them.

"That must be where Tibble told us to go," Raven said, having joined Romano where he stood staring that way.

"Yeah," Romano agreed, then looked back to the southwest again, frowning. "I don't like leaving Rose and Raphael behind," he said, "We should have done something!"

He looked over to where William, Raspberry, and Robert rested in the shade, all of them seemingly napping, then suddenly set his chin. "I am going to do something!" he said, and plunged back down the hill in the direction they'd come from.

"Romano! No!" Raven exclaimed, and hurried after him, catching up to him at the foot of the hill and grabbing his arm. "Stop... think! What can you do? You, versus that many grown men? You wouldn't have a hope!"

Romano looked on the edge of tears again. "I can't just walk away!" he said.

Raven sighed. "I know you love Rose," he said. "But going off after her when we have no idea of who those men were, where they might have taken her, just on your own - that won't help her."

Romano looked off towards the bridge again. "You're right," he said after a while, looking defeated. "Come on, we'd better get back to the others," he said glumly, and turned, then gasped in surprise as two figures rose out of the bushes and tackled him and Raven. They barely had time to yelp in surprise before they'd been overcome and were being carried off through the trees towards the swamp.

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What this is too much hope your writing the next update now (I think) hope you don't have any other shocks in store

William had been grim when he and the remaining two woke to find the other two teenagers missing. He'd quickly scouted around, finding traces of the two boys heading back down the hill. He followed them, and looked around at the base of the hill for a moment, examining the ground closely, before turning and peering towards the distant swamp. With a curse, he hurried back up the hill. "We must go, now, and quickly," he told them. "Your friends have been taken."

"Taken where? By who?" Robert asked as he and Raspberry rapidly followed the ranger away from the hill, towards the town.

"Swampies have them," he said, "And no, that's not a good thing. If we hurry, the Lord should be able to get them back. I was taking you to his manor anyway... it's standing orders that all strangers are to be brought before him."

Raspberry and Robert exchanged a worried look, then hurried after him.

It was a long trek, to the town and around its outskirts. It was early evening when they finally reached a beautiful stone house at the foot of mountains to the east of the town. William sighed in relief as he lead them indoors.

"The Lord should be down shortly," he told them. "We will sit and wait," he added, gesturing towards a nearby couch. Rapsberry and Robert sank down on it, exhausted, while William sat down in a nearby chair. They sat in silence, waiting.

Just after dark, William rose to his feet as footsteps were heard descending from the upper floor. A long-haired figure entered the room, stopping and staring at the two teenagers occupying his sitting room.

Raspberry stared in astonishment at him. "Octavian!" she exclaimed, jumping to her feet.

He stared back at her in equal astonishment, then stepped forward, enfolding her in a warm hug. "Dear gods, Raspberry!" he exclaimed. "It's really you! I gave up hope of ever seeing you children again, centuries ago... but, where are the rest?"

Raspberry burst into tears.

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What a high charged start to part three! Even if I wasn't already hooked on my dose of Soup I would be after those updates.

Sue

Ye Octavian is back every thing will be ok now

Centuries ago? So this is the future? Wonder how that came to be! Great start. As I am sure many have pointed out you ought to write books.

I wonder what's happened throughout the centuries. :sits down and waits patiently:

So much happening! And this is just the beginning!

Wow, what a beginning! I'm sooooo glad Octavian is back! I was missing him terribly.

Oh, wow! What a great start!

I just can't wait to see what happens next!
Your writing has become terribly suspenseful lately, you know.

-Taco

William spoke up. "Two of them were taken before I reached the children, sir," he said. "They were approaching the bridge from the far side, and were intercepted by a force of the Sidhe. Two were taken then - a boy and a girl."

"Raphael and Rose," Robert spoke up from where he was comforting the distraught Raspberry. She cried harder at the mention of Raphael's name.

"Raphael!" Octavian exclaimed, his face lighting up at the mention of his great-grandson, before he frowned again. "But taken by the Sidhe... this is not good. And the others?"

William sighed. "I am sorry, m'lord - I failed to keep them close by when we stopped for a rest. Swampies have taken them."

"That would have been Raven and.... Romano, wasn't it?" Octavian asked, searching his memory.

"Yes, Raspberry nodded, wiping at her tear-streaked face.

"Well," he sighed, "Those two at least should be fairly easy to retrieve."

He walked over to a nearby desk, and sitting down, rapidly penned a letter, folding it and sealing it shut, then passing it over to William. "Deliver this," he told him.

"Yes sir," William nodded, and hurried out of the house.

"Come, you two are tired and hungry," he said to the others. "I'll make some dinner for you, and you cna tell me everything that's happened to you since you vanished - or at least as much as can be told in one sitting."

He lead them across the hallway to a dining room, and had them sit there while he went through an archway into a small kitchen next door, where he quickly put together a small meal for the two of them.

Raspberry talked as she ate, telling him all about how they'd been taken somewhere after they were snatched, a long journey away, where Clay had sent the six of them "somewhere safe". She told about them waking the servo, and meeting the fox - at which point Octavian looked very intrigued, though he remained silent.

"We grew up in that house," she finished her explanation. "Looked after by Rock. And then this morning Tibble - that's the fox - told us we had to leave, though she said there wasn't time to explain why. Just that the house was somewhere unsafe for us... we were right beside a Henge of some kind."

Octavian nodded slowly. "Yes, that wouldn't have been a safe place for you to have been found," he agreed. "It's a holy site for the Sidhe. They'd have been very unhappy to find pure humans lurking in the vicinity, for whatever reason."

"What are these Sidhe? Where are we?" she asked.

"Is there any way home from here?" Robert asked quietly, crumbling a bit of bread. "You said... centuries."

Octavian sighed. "I'm sorry children - but no, there is no way back. This is not the world you were born on, and even if it were, that time is centuries in the past now. Everyone and everything you knew is beyond reach."

Raspberry felt her lip trembling again. "Oh, gods... mother, father, everyone... gone? Dead?"

Octavian nodded. "I will tell you more tomorrow, once you have rested," he told them. "You've had more then enough shocks for one day, I think. You need some time to adjust. Come... there are beds upstairs, you two should sleep."

The two numbly followed him upstairs, barely taking in the beautiful darkly polished wooden walls, the inlaid stone flooring, enormous golden chandeliers and sconces. It wasn't until he'd lead them into a bedroom with two fabric-draped beds in it that Raspberry really looked around. She fingered the top of a nearby small dresser, her fingers coming away dusty. "This is your home?" she asked, distractedly.

Octavian nodded. "Yes. It was like this when I found it. It is apt to my purposes, though I use very little of it. It reminds me of a place I lived with my mother when I was very young, actually. But enough of that - you two need rest. Sleep," he told them, putting just a hint of will behind it.

The two yawned and nodded, rapidly changing and crawling into their seperate beds, asleep almost before their heads touched the pillows.

Octavian stood and watched Raspberry sleeping for a long time, his thoughts on a distant past, where he'd lived in a house with many people, and loved them all - Portobella and Pony, Quail and Quest, Quince and Qinawa, Raven, and Raspberry. And nearby, his daughter Peridot and son-in-law Percival - and downtown, his grandaughter Quartz and her husband Peregrin, and his great-grandson Raphael. Raphael, in the hands of the Sidhe - getting him back would be no easy task, though at least they were great respecters of blood-ties. That would give him at least a chance.

He blinked back sudden tears of mingled grief and joy. He'd found them, at long last, after giving them up for lost or dead centuries before. He walked down the hallway into his own room, and stood a while looking at the faded pictures hung on his walls, remembering the world before it had changed, and changed again.

Finally, he went outdoors and settled in beside the pond in back, fishing. It was something to do to pass the time until morning.

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Aww, poor kids.

I hope everybody gets back together safely, and that everyone will be able to cope with the fact that they are the only ones left that they used to know, besides Octavian of course. By the way, I loved how you used his 'immortality' here.

-Taco

I'm not much of a poster, but I'm an avid reader and I just love where this new arc is going! Glad to see Octavian back too.

*screams* OCTAVIAN!!!!!!
I knew he was coming back, but not so soon! Oh, thank you MsB...
I'm still worried about the kids, though! And Portobella and Pony are gone...
On the edge of my seat here...

The horses pulled to a halt at one end of a stone bridge arching across a small lake towards a house in the middle of it. Raphael and Rose found themselves being swung down from their seats, lowered to the ground, as the being - the man - who'd spoken before dismounted as well. He looked the two of them over.

"I am Sere Helot," he abruptly told them. "Follow me."

He turned and walked away across the bridge. Rose tentatively tried putting weight on her foot, and when she found it didn't do worse then ache a little, limped after him, Raphael trailing behind.

The bridge arched from the shore over to the lake house, a large edifice of brown stone with arched stone-edged windows and a large ornately carved door. Sere lead them inside, and into a small sitting room. A woman in an ornate greay dress with pale blue skin and hair was playing chess - she looked up with a smile as Sere entered, and rose to her feet, reaching out to take him by the hands.

"Sere!" She exclaimed. "I wasn't expecting you today," she said, then looked beyond him at Rose and Raphael. "What is this you bring me?" she asked, then waved at a nearby couch. "Sit, children, sit!"

Rose and Raphael exchanged a look, then did as told and sat down.

A teenaged girl with icy white skin and silvery-white hair and long black horns had been sitting reading on another couch nearby, and was now beaming happily up at Sere.

"Soro," he said, bowing to the pale blue lady, then turned and bowed again, to the girl. "Lilly." He smiled tenderly at the girl, then turned back to the woman. "We found traces this morning of an new entry to the world, and tracked them to a house that has appeared by the Henge. From there it was clear a group was moving towards the bridge - we tried to intercept them, but most of them made it onto the bridge before we arrived - save for these two."

"I see," she said, and turned to walk over and look at the two teenagers. "You are new to this world, then?" she asked Rose.

Rose glanced at Raphael before answering. "I guess so," she said. "We were... somewhere else, until this morning."

"And how many of you are there?" Soro asked.

"Six of us..." Rose answered hesitantly. "And a servo."

"Ah," Soro said, blinking. "Well, you are here now. And, having been fairly caught on this side of the river, you fall under my jurisdiction. What are your names?" she asked.

"I'm Rose Watson, and this is my cousin, Raphael Yonge," she answered faintly.

"Well, Rose, you will be staying with me and my daughter for now, while I decide on your disposition. Sere, you will have to take the boy, there is no room for him here."

"Yes, m'Lady," he nodded.

Soro smiled. "You may visit with Lilly first, seeing as you are here anyway."

"Thank you," he smiled, and went over to talk with the girl.

Raphael watched the two curiously while Soro continued to grill Rose. While their looks were certainly unusual, they did make a strikingly handsome couple as they talked together. And the way the girl look Sere - it reminded him of the way Raspberry looked at him. He felt a pang, hoping she was okay, wondering where she and the others were.

After a while Sere finished his conversation with Lilly and came over to Raphael. "Follow me," he commanded.

Raphael rose to his feet, exchanging a worried look with Rose, then followed Sere away.

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And a couple more pictures for the previous post...

You never cease to come up with interesting characters!

But who are they, is the question.

-Taco

What a fantastic start to the final part of the Soup story and what great use of Enayla's wonderful skins

Ah, MsB, have I told you lately how much I love you? This is fantastic.

P.Dilly

Laughing loudly together, their captors dragged Raven and Romano out of the bushes and around to the front of a dilapadated brick house. They shoved them up the stairs and indoors, pushing them over towards a worn-out couch.

"Sit!" one commanded, standing over them, glowering at them as he ran a hand through his bright red hair. Raven and Romano quickly sat, looking nervously around at the stained and cracked plaster walls and worn floors, the mildewed ceiling and dusty windows.

The other man, who had a short black mohawk and a lot of piercings, went and leaned through a nearby archway, shouting towards the upper floors of the house. "Karen! Hey sweetie - we found a nice present for you!"

"What is it this time, Gavin?" a female voice called back, sounding irritated. The click of heels of steps was followed a moment later by the appearance in the room of a slender woman with short-cropped hair and an even shorter dress, wrapped in a voluminous fake-fur coat. She looked blankly at the two boys sitting on the couch, then turned to the men. "What would I want with a couple of wet-behind-the-ear kids like these!?" she asked belligerently.

The two men exchanged looks. "Ummm... I dunno," Gavin said after a moment. "That priss William had 'em, before they wandered off from him. Larry thought you'd like 'em."

"Oh, him," she snorted, looking annoyed for a moment, then turned back and looked at the boys, and suddenly grinned in a highly unpleasant manner. "Well, if Billy-boy wanted them for something, I suppose they're worth having. We can get some work out of them, if nothing else, I guess," she said, then went over to a window and rapped on the glass, gesticulating at someone outside. "Rabbit! Get your scrawny backside in here!" she called.

The two men laughed uproariuosly. "Yeah, give 'em to Rabbit to look after," the red head chortled.

Raven and Romano exchanged a look, wondering just what they'd gotten themsleves into when they'd made the mistake of leaving the others.

A slight blond teenager came into the room, looking sullenly at the three adults. "Yeah? What do you want now?" he asked.

Karen smiled. "Look what Gavin and Lawrence brought home - guests!"

The kid shot a look at the two of them, then turned back to the woman. "So?"

"So," she said, "I want you to keep an eye on them for me. I'm going to be... busy," she said. "They can help you with that garden you're putting in or something. Just keep them out of my hair for an hour... or two... okay?"

"Yes, Karen," he sighed, and turned to the two boys. "Come on," he told them. "Follow me."

"And don't try running away," Karen told them as they rose. "I'd just have to send Gavin and Larry out after you again. Or chase you down myself. You wouldn't like that."

They weren't even out of the room yet before she'd latched onto Gavin, pulling him through the archway into the adjoining room. By the way their hands were already all over each other, it was pretty obvious just what she expected to be busy with for the next little while.

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They followed Rabbit around to the back of the house, where a freshly turned square of bare earth showed that someone - Rabbit, presumably - had begun preparing a garden. He nodded at a pile of bags nearby. "That's fertilizer," he told them. "Help me spread it."

They exchanged a look, then started to do as told.

"What're your names?" he asked after a few minutes.

"I'm Raven, and this is Romano," Raven answered. "Who are you people!?"

"We're swampies," Rabbit answered, a hint of defiant pride in his voice. "We don't let no one run our lives but ourselves."

"Are you related to those three somehow, or just living with them?" Romano asked curiously.

Rabbit worked in silence for a minute. "Gavin's my Pa," he said after a while. "Ma died when I was born. He hooked up with Karen and Lawrence when I was a kid."

"Oh," Romano said, blinking, and picturing the multiply-pierced man. He was old enough to have a teenaged son!? He barely looked out of his teens himself.

"Why doesn't Karen like William?" Raven asked.

Rabbit shrugged. "Cause he's a ranger. They's all full of rules about hunting and stuff. William caught her and Lawrence after deer out of season one time, got her in trouble for it. She's hated him ever since. You be careful not to get on her bad side, okay? She holds grudges until the end of time, that one."

"We'll keep it in mind," Raven said. "So what happens to us now?"

"Not much. Couple days, maybe three, and they'll have forgotten why they wanted you. Don't have much attention span. Then you can just leave, if you want."

"Say what!?" Romano asked surprised. "Then why'd they grab us in the first place!?"

Rabbit shrugged again. "It's like a jackdaw seeing something shiny," he said. "They wanted you so they took you. But once they have you, they loose interest, unless you do something to keep their interest, like make 'em mad, or run away. Running away is the worst," he said, frowning darkly. "They like to chase things."

"Is that the voice of experience talking?" Raven asked quietly.

Rabbit hunched his shoulders, finished pouring the last bag of fertilzer, and picked up a hoe, thudding it savagely into the dirt before talking again. "Yes," he admitted. "Got mad once as a kid, when Pa decided I was old enough to not need to go to school no more. I'd liked school," he said softly. "We had an argument about it, and I ran away."

Raven and Romano exchanged a look. "What happened then?" Raven asked.

"They chased me down, of course," Rabbit said. "Never been so scared in my life as that night. If I'd been thinking, I'd have waited for morning to run, not run in the early evening."

Raven straightened up, lowering his hoe to the soil. "Daylight would have made a difference?" he asked, then frowned. "They're not vampies, not with them having dragged us here in the middle of the day... which leaves..."

"Weres!" Romano exclaimed, sounding shocked.

Rabbit nodded. "Yup. Karen is the alpha, and Gavin and Larry are her pack."

Raven looked at him curiously. "If they're all weres... why aren't you?" he asked.

Rabbit shrugged again. "I'm not a good one to be a were," he said. "I don't have the right personality for it. They can tell by smell, which ones would make a Were and which ones won't. I smell all wrong to them, so they've never been tempted to nip me. Even they're not crazy enough to want to chance making a rogue."

"That's the last of the seeds planted," Raven said. "Do we have to go back in, or what?"

"Nah," Rabbit said. "Better if we stay outside, probably. Karen will be keeping busy for a while. She's a real wild one. Doesn't like having any but her pack around her when she's in that mood, either."

"Oh," Raven blinked, then sat down on the grass near the garden. "Then let's just hang out here for now, I guess."

Romano and Rabbit nodded, both joining him on the grass.

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