"Yes, ma"am."
"Do you like dogs? We have three dogs. You"d have to take them for walks every day, and promise to feed them, and play fetch with them."
"I would! Every single day!"
The woman excitedly clapped her hands. "I adore him! What do you think, Charles?"
"I like him. He"s short but not too short. How old are you, Nathan?"
"Six."
"Ah, I remember when I was six. The world had endless possibility. Oh, how my days were filled with harmless mischief. Do you like to fish?"
Nathan nodded, though he"d never been fishing. It sounded like a gleeful activity.
"Wonderful! I think our search is over. Give us a great big smile, Nathan!"
Nathan froze. Would they still want him if they knew? What if they were repulsed? What if they threw up, right there in front of all of the other orphans?
He gave them a small, closed-mouth smile.
"Are you only that happy?" asked the man. "We"d hoped to bring overwhelming joy to a young orphan. How disappointing."
Nathan didn"t know what to do. He didn"t want to scare them off, yet he couldn"t very well refuse to smile if he hoped to be adopted. The perfect parents would love him no matter how he looked, right? Maybe they wanted a child with sharp teeth. Maybe they"d driven sixteen hours just because they heard that in this particular orphanage there was a little boy who"d been born with exactly the kind of teeth they"d dreamed their future son would have. If he didn"t smile, they might move on down the line and choose a boy whose teeth were merely slightly crooked!
He smiled, exposing his teeth completely.
The man and woman looked at him, their faces expressionless.
There was a long moment of silence.
"Oh," said the woman. "Oh, dear."
The man turned to Steamspell. "Are all of the children like this?"
"No, no, not at all. He"s our one aberration."
"Well, he looks like a fine boy, but obviously we can"t bring such a severely mutated child into our lives. Perhaps we were too hasty about the whole parenting thing." He put his arm around his wife. "We should go home and read some more books on the subject, don"t you think?"
"Yes, that would be best."
They left.
Nathan no longer smiled.
"You poor miserable beast," said Steamspell. "How disappointing it must be to have actually believed that they were going to give you a home." He laughed. "You"re a gullible lad, Boy With The Teeth. A most gullible lad indeed. Heh heh. I"d have given my right arm to be able to peek into your mind at that moment when he asked if you liked fishing. You must have been so excited." He laughed and laughed, belly shaking, until he was forced to wipe a tear from his cheek. "Ah, there"s nothing more amusing than the self-delusion of a six-year-old. Now, all of you, get back to work."
As Nathan stood there, drowning in humiliation, he wondered if Reggie was right.
Nathan had teeth that could easily bite through somebody"s neck.
Steamspell had a neck that deserved to be bitten through.
It was worth considering.
FIVE.
"Here"s the plan," said Reggie. "Steamspell sleeps with his door locked at night, but Milton here survived two years on the street by breaking into garages and sleeping under trucks, so he can handle that part. He"s a light sleeper, but he"s used to background noise, so Angus and Cyrus will pretend to have night terrors and scream in their sleep, which will cover the sound of the lock picking. Nathan, you will sneak in there-make sure to have your mouth open already, to save time-and bite his jugular vein. Do you know which one that is?"
"No," Nathan admitted.
Reggie tapped him on the neck. "Right there."
"Will there be a lot of blood?"
"Of course. That"s the whole point."
"What if it gets in my mouth?"
"You can"t do this without getting some blood in your mouth. That"s part of the sacrifice. Or perhaps the reward. Timothy"s mother was a psychologist before she abandoned him, so he"ll help talk you through any guilt or trauma afterward."
"What will you do?" Nathan asked.
"Supervise."
"That doesn"t seem like much."
"It"s the hardest part of all! If this plan goes wrong, it"s all my fault. That kind of responsibility changes a boy. I"m putting myself at the highest risk of being forced to brood afterward, so you need to appreciate it and follow my instructions."
"But do I really have to bite him? Why can"t we just smother him with a pillow?"
"There is too much dignity in being smothered. Steamspell doesn"t deserve it. I swear to you, if those were removable teeth I"d pluck them out of your mouth and do the deed myself, but they are not, and we must work with the gifts we"ve been given. So, Fangboy, are you with us or against us?"
"Can"t I be with you and not have to chew through somebody"s neck?"
"No."
Nathan sighed. "All right. I suppose I"m with you."
"Perfect! Tonight at midnight, our tyrant will lay dead before us!"
Ninety-six minutes after midnight, Milton was still jiggling a paper clip in the door to Steamspell"s bedroom, the unlocking of which was proving more of a challenge than antic.i.p.ated. Angus and Cyrus" throats were getting sore from all of the feigned night terrors screaming. And Nathan"s reservations about this whole murderous scheme were growing stronger and stronger with each pa.s.sing moment.
"I can"t do this," he said.
"Yes, you can."
"I don"t want to."
"Yes, you do."
"What if I go to jail?"
"We"ve already worked out the cover story. You smelled smoke. Not wanting this place to burn down, you entered Steamspell"s bedroom with the intention of awakening him to warn him. But you tripped. Oh, how careless of Steamspell to leave so many items strewn around the floor, and how ironic that it was his own poor housekeeping that caused his demise! As you fell you screamed, which is completely understandable, and your open mouth landed upon his neck. Such a shame! n.o.body will press charges, especially after they see what a paradise we"ve turned this place into with our captor dead."
"Got it," said Milton, removing the paper clip. He quietly pushed the door open. Inside, Steamspell lay sleeping on his back under silken sheets on his luxurious four-poster bed. A silver platter with an a.s.sortment of grapes, strawberries, and cheeses rested on the bedside table. He snored softly.
Nathan"s stomach grumbled. He loved cheese of all sorts.
Milton sadly handed Reggie a coin, having placed a wager on whether there would be a teddy bear. (There was not.) Reggie handed the coin back to him, since there wasn"t any thumb sucking.
Reggie nudged Nathan forward. "Do it."
Nathan stepped into the room. This was a horrible thing he was about to do. Even if people were bad, you weren"t supposed to bite out their neck. This was wrong. He"d be taken to jail or an even worse orphanage, perhaps one where they made you drink paint.
Or he"d be a hero, having saved his fellow orphans from a most terrible man.
Murderer or hero?
Murderer, hero, or spineless coward who did exactly as he was told?
He"d go with "hero." That felt best.
Nathan knew that if he kept thinking about it he wouldn"t be able to create the upcoming violence, so he walked right up to the comfortable-looking bed, avoided the temptation to swipe a piece of cheese, and leaned his face down toward Steamspell"s sleeping body.
Steamspell opened one eye.
Nathan gasped.
Steamspell opened the other eye.
Nathan had learned to control his bodily functions at a remarkably young age, yet it was only with the most intense concentration that these skills did not fail him now.
"You wretched cur!" shouted Steamspell as he sat upright. "What"s going on here? Why are you in my bedroom? Why is your mouth open in a biting position?"
Nathan looked back at Reggie for help, or at least at where he thought Reggie would have been if the need for help arose. Reggie had fled. It was an act of cowardice that Reggie a.s.sumed would haunt him for the rest of his years, but he actually got over it within a matter of hours, deciding that it wasn"t his fault that Nathan had fallen for his natural charisma and listened to him.
"Were you...were you..." Steamspell spoke as if he couldn"t believe the words that were about to come out of his mouth. "...were you planning to kill me?"
The line between the virtue of honesty and the usefulness of lying was sometimes a thin one, but not in this case. "Absolutely not."
"Fibber!" Steamspell shouted. "Homicidal fibber! If that"s the kind of environment you want, I"ll show you how to murder somebody!"
Both of Steamspell"s hands shot out, grabbing for Nathan"s throat. Nathan ducked and ran out of the room as fast as his legs would carry him. The other boys who"d been watching stepped out of his way, all of them thankful that they hadn"t been the ones born with the sharp teeth that had caused Reggie to hatch this particular scheme.
Steamspell followed right behind him. "I"ll kill you! Don"t think I won"t!"
Nathan ran through the orphanage, having no doubt whatsoever that Steamspell did indeed mean to kill him. He could never have imagined that somebody would actually want him dead! (He remained unaware that anybody had wanted him dead when he was a baby.) Nathan ran down the stairs, almost tripping over a three-year-old who slept there because it was more comfortable than his mattress. "Help!" Nathan screamed. "Help me, somebody! Anybody will do!"
Not all of the orphans were intelligent, but none of them were stupid enough to get in the way of an enraged Bernard Steamspell, and there were no immediate offers of a.s.sistance. As Nathan reached the bottom of the stairs, he felt that he was increasing the distance between himself and his pursuer, but yelped in terror as he felt Steamspell grab the back of his shirt.
Fortunately, Nathan was wearing the official orphanage garb, which consisted of clothes that were purchased because they were very, very cheap. (The clothing that the boys were wearing when they were admitted was taken away from them and sold to better orphanages.) So his shirt tore off in Steamspell"s hand as Nathan darted across the room toward the front door.
Did he really want to do this? Did he really want to rush out into a world of traps and wolves and hunters?
Yes. It was better than being strangled.
He reached the front door and turned the k.n.o.b.
It was locked!
He changed direction and ran toward the kitchen. As he ran, it occurred to him that the front door would have been locked from the inside, and he would have been much better off taking the half a second to turn the lock.
Behind him, Steamspell was beginning to wheeze. The constant beatings had given him superior arm strength, but did little to a.s.sist with a chase.
They ran in a circle around the kitchen. Though Nathan saw many items that he could grab and throw, there wasn"t time to do so. After their second circle around the kitchen, Nathan hurried back into the main room, "Go Fangboy!" shouted one of the boys, momentarily forgetting himself. He quickly fell silent and stepped behind a taller boy.
"That"s right! Go Fangboy!" shouted another boy, who was so into the moment that he didn"t care if Steamspell beat him later. It wasn"t as if he"d thought that his most recent beating would be his last. Why not enjoy a few seconds of exuberance?
Nathan raced back to the front door, twisted the lock, turned the handle, opened the door...and felt Steamspell"s hand clamp tightly on the back of his neck. Steamspell kicked the door closed again.
"Well, well, well, thought you could get away, did you? Not so tough when your victim is awake, are you? Give me one good reason why I shouldn"t squeeze right now and pop your head off?"
Nathan couldn"t speak.
"I should make an example of you right here. If there"s one thing I won"t tolerate, it"s attempts to kill me in my sleep. Get ready to join your parents, boy! Have you come up with your reason yet?"
Nathan still couldn"t speak.
"My G.o.d, are you so pathetic that you cannot even think of one reason that I should not pop your head off? What about the fact that it will hurt? That"s a good reason right there, one I came up with on the spot."
"Please-" Nathan finally managed to say.
"Please what?"
"Please don"t kill me."
Steamspell loosened his grip on Nathan"s neck. "I"m not going to kill you, you disgraceful ingrate. I"m going to give you what you want. You want to be free of me and the shelter I provide? Have at it. Who do you think will help somebody like you on the outside? n.o.body, that"s who!"