Harry let out a long breath. “Okay. But next time, why not just duck when the bullets start flying? All right?”

Singing Rock nodded. There wasn’t time for any more banter. The night was crisscrossed with flashing spotlights, and hideous with the whooping of sirens, but over it all they could still hear Misquamacus as he completed the incantation for calling down the first of the Indian demons. They could feel the rumble of thunder through their feet, and the lightning that had stalked the distant hills was now flickering closer.

“Listen,” said Singing Rock. “Between them, those medicine men are calling down Nashuna and Pa-la-kai and Coyote. The demons won’t be able to resist their summons, because they’re too powerful, all together like that.”

Neil, wiping a smudge of dirt from his face, said, “What are we going to do if they do call the demons down? How can we possibly fight them?”

Singing Rock took a look at the spirit cage he had left on the fence. So far it was quiet, and showed no signs of activity. He rearranged the ribbons and beads, and finished casting the powders he had brought with him.

Then he said, “What you have to remember is that almost every demon can be appeased. Some demons want blood, others want manitous. If you can offer a demon what he needs to survive and maintain his strength on the great outside, then you can usually succeed in dismissing him.”

“Usually?” asked Harry. “How often is usually?”

“More often than never,” replied Singing Rock. “And right now, we’re clinging on to every straw we’ve got.”

There was an earsplitting burst of thunder, and they looked in fear up at the sky. All the way down the dark length of the lake, huge trees of forked lightning sizzled and crackled, and the air reeked of electricity. Then darkness swamped them again, and the heavy clouds rolled over the mountains and blotted out the stars and the moon and the night sky.

Misquamacus was calling now, at the top of his voice. “Nashuna, we summon you! Nashuna, we command you! Nashuna, god of darkness, we summon you!”

Above the circle of medicine men, a hundred feet in the air, a roiling knot of darkness appeared, darker than the clouds. Out of its threatening, amorphous midst, Harry could make out scores of what looked like red glittering eyes, evil and ravenous, and from beneath its cloudy bulk, dark smoky tentacles trailed toward the ground. The spirit cage on the fence began to rattle and shake as if it were being worried by a mad dog.

There were heavy bursts of gunfire from police and soldiers on both sides of the bridge, and again both Highway Patrolmen and onlookers were cut down by slicing bullets. Over the transmitter, Harry and Neil could hear the National Guard colonel insisting on a cease-fire, and phoning Travis Air-Force Base for an air strike.