[EDITING] One day on the farm, Ciara climbs her favourite tree, only to find a magical creature lives there. A white dragonfly transforms to a baby dragon when she reaches to touch it. She lands in a world of magic, where she finds the mysterious Sk...
"Arvid, we might have found her!" Mrs. Runyon came running from the farmhouse, wiping her hands on a towel.
Arvy had been poking ants in the dirt, but when he heard his mother's words, he sat straight upright on the bottom step. "Where? Is she all right?"
They hurried to join Mr. Runyon with the police officers in the front of the house by their car.
"I think so, don't know yet." The police officer was calm, as his job had taught him to be—no matter what.
"Where?" They all said together—almost in perfect unison.
"Not sure about that either. Looks like we had some pretty strange help." He looked at his partner. "She might have wound up at a different—wrong school."
"How do you know that?" questioned Arvy.
"Well—a deputy—" He looked sideways, at his partner. "—who was rather embarrassed about this, thought to ask his great-uncle who's one hundred and three and suffers some kind of psy-sight, as he believes. This Deputy—not to give names—on a whim of desperation, said he wanted to just see if his Uncle Walter received any, er—'instinctive impressions' from the remains of your sister's lunch. So, he took them to him."
The policeman reached up to remove his hat and scratch his head. "The old man apparently got very excited and said, 'That's the girl! That's the girl,' then described a school, out of doors—must be somewhere abouts—so it could be very soon that we find her, if this is a lead."
"That's it? But that doesn't tell us anything." Arvid sounded disappointed.
Mr. Runyon put his hand on his son's arm. "What do we know?" he asked the policeman.
"Can you think of a place I might not have heard of? It would have to be along the river somewhere, unless she had help getting to someplace else entirely."
Mrs. Runyon muttered a silent plea at the thought Ciara could be even further away.
"We're checking all schools. It seems now she must have gone up-river. We had been looking down river in the wrong direction. It's only time now."
"But how could you know that—?" Arvy insisted.
The Deputy shifted, self-conscious, gave the police chief a look, then casually squatted down and picked up a small rock. From his crouch, he looked up at Arvy. "She had a white crow with her."
"What?" Mrs. Runyon gasped in surprise turning to hope.
The Deputy's face broke out into a hesitant smile. He watched their expressions. "She called it, Arvy."
"Ciara!" they all said at once.
"She's such a wild-child," Mrs. Runyon was crying and smiling and hugging her husband. "At last—!"
"It is her!"
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