The Key. Michael Grant

that about you, Mack: you rock your own special style. No one else has twigs in their teeth. It’s a built-in toothpick.”

      The golem had to think about that for a moment before finally saying, “Yes.”

      “So,” Camaro whispered conspiratorially. “Sometime within the next few days, it’s me and Tony Pooch at the usual place.” She cracked her knuckles, flexed the biceps displayed by her sleeveless T-shirt, gave her neck the old, familiar Stefan Marr warm-up twist, and spit a wad of gum at a passing geek.

      “You’re going out with Tony Pooch?” The golem was bothered by this. He enjoyed spending time with Camaro—he found her random destructiveness charming. He almost felt jealous. Yes. Almost.

      Camaro threw back her head and laughed. Then she gave him an affectionate punch in the arm—a punch that would have reduced anyone else to whimpering and a possible blood clot—and said, “No, no, Mack. I mean I’m going to kick his butt.”

      “Ah.”

      “I’m your girl,” Camaro said affectionately, and followed that statement up with a snarling warning that he had better never forget it. Not if he wanted to keep all four of his limbs.

      He did want to keep all four of his limbs because it was crucial to passing as Mack. Coming home without an arm would definitely generate uncomfortable questions from Mom. And if he lost two or more limbs, even Dad might notice.

      “You’re my girl,” the golem said contentedly. “And I’m your big boy.”

      Mack was going to have a lot of explaining to do when he got home.

      But at the moment the golem had given him an opportunity. . . .

      I am the Wizard of the iPhone!” Mack cried, sounding a little desperate. “Gaze upon this and be afraid, William Blisterthöng MacGuffin! Behold, as I kill a pig using only an angry bird!”

      MacGuffin sat back hard when he saw that. Then he leaned forward to look closer, because the screen was pretty small. But Mack could see the fear in the old ginger’s eyes.

      “I, too, am a wizard!” Jarrah cried, getting into the act. “I can make nanobots take over a human brain!”

      “And I can look up words and translate them from German to English!” Dietmar announced.

      This assault of smartphones baffled and amazed the thousand-year-old man. In MacGuffin’s world the very height of technology was the windmill, the crossbow, and something very new and exciting: the fork.

      He had never seen a phone, let alone a phone that contained tiny people within it and could play music. From his point of view, Mack and his friends were indeed magicians. Wizards! Who else could cause rectangular lights to appear in their palms? Who else could plant tiny crops of wheat and corn inside that rectangle of light? Who else could reveal pictures of themselves playing volleyball at their cousin’s birthday party?

      “Give us the Key, William Blisterthöng MacGuffin, or we will unleash the power of the iMagic to shrink you to the size of one of these captive pigs, and we will pelt you with the angriest of birds!”

      Mack put that out there in his deepest, most impressive voice, and he wore his most serious and solemn expression.

      And it would have worked. Maybe.

      Except that something like a very large dragonfly suddenly zipped into the torchlight.

      “It’s a trick,” Connie the fairy said. “Don’t believe them, Willy.”

      MacGuffin leaped from his chair. He stood there and stared, stared hard like he was seeing the end of the world or maybe like he was seeing something impossible or maybe like he was seeing another Transformers sequel and just not believing it.

      His mouth moved but no sounds came out.

      And then a single great sob.

      “Con?” he said through quivering mustachioed (top and bottom) lips.

      “Yes, Willy, it’s me. It’s me, your Connie.”

      “Efter a’ thae lang years, mah yin true loue?”

      Which, to the amazement of absolutely everyone, even Stefan, meant, “After all these long years, my one true love?”

      The fairy flew—that’s not a metaphor, she flew—to him and wrapped her arms around his hairy red head, and MacGuffin lifted a massive paw with amazing gentleness to cradle her tiny face.

      “Willy, this is all Frank’s doing,” Connie said, and made the fist of forcefulness again. “He’s shown them the way to take the Key. In exchange, they’ve sworn to release the All-Mother.”

      “She wha haes vowed tae string a fiddle wi’ mah tendons, then speil a jolly tune ’n’ dae a jig?”

      (“She who has vowed to string a fiddle with my tendons, then play a jolly tune and do a jig?”)

      “Aye, my love,” Connie said, stroking his Gandalf eyebrows.

      They gazed into each other’s eyes with the tenderest of love. Such love.

      With sinking heart, Mack faced the terrible truth: Connie had betrayed her fellow fairies.