Every year when the harvest has been gathered a festival is held in the village near Deb U to celebrate the end of the growing season. There are costume parties and dances. People play jokes on each other and tell scary stories around a large bonfire.

One of the favorite stories is *The Terrible Legions of Tartarus* and how they come to haunt the woods around Deb U. at harvest time each year.

The story they tell in the village is full of demons, monsters, kidnapped children and every other horror you could imagine. This is the true story of what happened......

The grassy strip of land warmed by the slanted rays of the late autumn sun that reflected from the weathered back wall of the stables had become a favorite meeting place for the three friends. Here they could lay quietly, napping , discussing the days events or joking about the foolish misadventures of their special humans and the others who lived in this place called Deb. U. Most of the non-human residents were either not interested in these discussions or ventured into the sanctuary only rarely out of respect for the venerable Lucky who, as the oldest of the old, was considered their leader.

The one exception to this rule were the five kittens of one of the stable cats who being very young had not yet learned about respect or indeed much of anything except that the three friends made excellent playground equipment. All that fur was perfect for climbing and hiding in and they spent the afternoon ambushing each other from behind the tails, heads or bodies of the dogs. Heidi and Nanook occasionally swatted or growled at the youngsters but Lucky having dealt with several generations of kittens for the most part ignored their play and continued the current discussion.

"Heidi, you said your human has suddenly started making clothing?" she said in the gestures of canine language. "Why? Does she think the time when the bright one is weak will be especially cold?"

"No", replied Heidi. "She has no weather sense, to speak of so I don't think it can be that. She spoke of it as a costume. It is quite flimsy, and wouldn't keep a flea warm much less, Jackie."

"Kheata is also making something like that", Nanook added. "It's really ugly and she is tearing holes in it and spilling gooey stuff on it on purpose, I don't understand at all. It's for a party, a Halloween Party, whatever that is."

"I remember Halloween", Lucky murmured almost to herself, " When the children were young, they used to dress up in strange clothes on one night at about this time of year. My human was very strict with them and normally would not let them outside alone in the evening but on that one night she would let them go out without her. They would get so excited and when they came back to the house they had bags of wonderful treats. Yummm, I can almost taste them still."

Heidi pricked up her ears at the mention of treats and after a moment of thought said, "Do you suppose if we dressed up somehow in funny scary things we could find bags of treats?"

Nanook shook his ruff into place and said, "My fur is fine with me I don't think I want to trade it for something gooey and full of holes." But after thinking about the wonderful treats Lucky had described he decided to go along with the plan.

An old horse blanket that had been dinner for several generations of moths served as the basis of their costume.

"I said I didn't want anything with holes," grumbled Nanook.

"You are the biggest and have to be in front," Heidi answered, "Besides, the holes will let you see where we are going."

"And where the bags of treats are", Lucky added, knowing the young wolf's weakness for the forbidden goodies.

To make him happy they stuffed straw in some of the holes, and some sticks with curvy twigs in others. As a finishing touch, Lucky placed a gardening tool shaped like a big claw in the hole just behind Nanook's ears.

"How do we look?" Heidi asked. The kittens were rolling on the ground laughing out loud at the sight as Lucky with an old feed bag over her tail took her position as the last one under the blanket.

"Evidently not very scary according to them," said Nanook, still not sure that the treats were worth all this and the laughter of the kittens.

"It will be worth it, it will be worth it", Heidi assured him. But he was still grumbling as they walked around the stable testing out their costume.

Later that evening as the moon was greeting the night the three friends met again at the barn and put on their costume for the *wonderful treat hunt*. At the last moment the bravest of the kittens jumped on Lucky's back, crawled up her neck and resting her chin between Lucky's ears carefully hooking her razor sharp claws in the long hair.

They trotted out of the barn and down the road heading for the village but had no real idea as to where to go for the wonderful treats. Just ahead of them were two little girls, the daughters of one of the kitchen workers.They decided to follow the girls reasoning that they seemed to know where they were going. The road made a wide bend around a part of the forest where the ground was too rough to drive a wagon. A foot path led through the woods cutting by almost a half league the trip to the village.

"They're going to take the path," Lucky said in a disapproving tone. "Blue always told the children not to.'There are dangers in the woods at night', she would say. And I believe she was right."

"If we don't follow we won't know where they find the wonderful treats", reasoned Heidi and Nanook agreed.

"Well, all right, but lets stay back from them just in case".

Under the trees it was dark and Nanook found it difficult to see especially since the blanket holes kept sliding around obscuring his vision in first one eye and then the other. The trail twisted through the trees and the friends soon lost sight of the road.

The little girls skipped down the path chattering about girlish things and disappeared around a bend. Their chatter stopped abruptly and turned to screams.

Forgetting all except their inborn instinct to aid and protect humans, the three friends rushed down the path to rescue the children. Lucky ran faster than she had ever run before but her short legs were no match for her much larger friends. The, still blanket draped, larger dogs soon left her far behind with only her faithful kitten rider for company.

"Hold tight little one," she called to the kitten as she ran at her top speed after her friends.

Rounding the corner she saw four half grown village boys who had been labeled *gallows fodder* by Blue only a few days ago when she had caught them trying to start a fire in the straw pile behind the stable. They were holding the screaming girls attempting to search them for dinars by the light of a lantern.

"Where's you money, girlie," the biggest boy yelled as he twisted the arm of one of the girls. "You university girls always have plenty to spend. Hand it over!"

Nanook and Heidi growling fiercely rushed into the clearing still shrouded in their costume. The startled bullies reacted with terror as they were attacked by what appeared to be a demon out of their worst nightmares and true to their nature fled down the trail. The one holding the girl, however, shoved her cruelly to the ground, drew a rusty evil looking knife from his belt and advanced on the dogs who by now had lost most of their disguise. Lucky had stopped just short of the circle of light cast by the lantern and crept quietly behind the bully. Nanook meanwhile had turned about and was charging across the clearing to stand over the still whimpering little girl. The bully seeing an easy target raised the knife and prepared to throw it at the snarling young wolf.

"Now little one", Lucky whispered and the kitten launched herself from Lucky's head to land on the bully's back. Digging her sharp little claws in as deeply as possible and holding on for dear life she hissed and yowrled as loudly as she could. The knife flew wildly in the air and became imbedded in the trunk of an oak tree. The bully now convinced that he had been attacked by the Legions of Tartarus ran down the trail towards the village.

The kitten having finished her job dropped lightly to the ground and strutted back to the clearing. The girls picked her up, hugging her and saying how brave she had been and that when they got home they would ask their mother if they could keep her.

The three friends escorted the girls safely back to the university and retired to the stable to discuss the nights adventure.

"But we didn't get any treats," complained Heidi.

"Things don't always turn out the way you plan", Lucky said and thought she sounded very wise in repeating one of her humans favorite sayings.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Nanook said sarcastically.

"Well, at least the little one now has a good home.So the night wasn't a complete waste." Lucky added , still thinking wistfully of the lost treats.

The village bullies in an attempt to explain the loss of a good lantern embellished the story, somewhat. Of course they never mentioned the real reason they were in the woods that night. And so over the years the story of the terrible "Legions of Tartarus" who haunt the woods near Deb. U has been told and retold and as with most legends it grows and grows and grows, and grows, and.......