Not necessary.
The thought made Sasha pause. It wasn’t her thought.
One of the odd creatures settled down in front of her. It was larger than the others and streaked with silvery fur around the face and head. It tilted its head with interest. Throw no stones. Please.
“What?” she said.
We will not harm you.
Sasha sucked in a quick breath when she realized the thoughts she was hearing were coming from the creature in front of her, projected right into her head. “Are you reading my mind?” she asked, though she didn’t loosen her hold on the big stone in her hand for one moment.
No. It considered, making low chirping noises, its wet black nose twitching. We are reading only the thoughts you project to us. We can read those and respond appropriately.
“Like telepathy.”
It thought about that. Yes. In a way.
She turned to glance at the others. “Can you hear what he’s saying?”
Toby frowned. “I think so. He doesn’t want us to fight him or his people. Or something to that effect. He doesn’t want a war.”
“I don’t want a bloody war,” Quinn added, looking especially peevish. He stood taller and pulled at his tattered frock coat, straightened his cravat, trying desperately to put himself to rights while still keeping a hold of the stone in his hand. “Do you know who I am, sir?” he said with an air of authority that made Sasha consider hitting him with the rock in her hand. Before she could stop him, he’d lunged at what she could only think of as the leader.
The creature raised its wing and struck Quinn across the side of the head, knocking him to the floor. Muk, he told Sasha. I am the leader, yes.
“Bloody hell, why is it always the head?” Quinn said, sitting up and rubbing his skull.
She ignored Quinn and examined the leader, wondering if she ought to thank him or be upset with him. “Muk?” she said with caution. “Is that your name? Or is it the name of your people?”
The others in the cavern started making excitable clicks, but the leader flicked his wing irritably and the others quickly settled down. My name is Muk. My people are the Sen.
If Muk could speak, and was willing to communicate with strangers, it was likely that he was civilized, Sasha thought. He certainly wasn’t anything like the animals they had seen in the jungle. Maybe the Sen weren’t as fearsome as they looked. Maybe the three of them would find their way out of this yet. Her heart lifting with optimism, she took a step toward the Sen leader, her hand outstretched in a universal sign of friendship. She smiled, hoping she looked friendly and unthreatening. “Thank you for saving us from those giant creatures, Muk. We are very grateful for your assistance.”
Muk narrowed his wise, dark eyes. You need give us no thanks.
“I disagree. In my world, it’s a sign of goodwill to thank someone for a great act of kindness. You have been kind.”
Muk leaned down and sniffed her hand. Both Toby and Quinn inched forward as if to intervene, but Sasha shook her head, warning them back. Muk might be a queer creature to look upon, but she was beginning to like him. And after all, perhaps this was just their way of saying hello in their world, the way the Chinese bowed to each other.
“I don’t like this,” Quinn complained. “I don’t bloody like this one bit!”
Sasha ignored Quinn’s dramatics. “Is it customary for you to rescue complete strangers, Muk?” she teased.
You are not strangers, Muk answered with gleaming cold eyes that seemed to pierce right through her flesh and into her bones. He grinned, showing razor-sharp eyeteeth. You are food.
CHAPTER 7
“You cannot eat me! I’m British!” Quinn shouted to the roof of the cavern.
Sasha cringed, sitting with her back to the bars of the crude, narrow wooden cage where she and the others waited to see what would become of them. There were three cages in a small semicircle at the back of the Sen’s volcano. She, Toby and Quinn occupied one, one was empty, and a third held a small group of proto-humans who looked more like apes than people, though they stood upright and seemed to have a crude sort of communication that involved hand signals and soft groans. She’d tried multiple times to communicate with them, even going so far as to use basic hand signals—she had seen apes use Sign Language in zoos in London—but so far, the four primates stayed huddled together, eyeing the darkness around them with big, glassy eyes.
Sasha thought she knew what they were feeling. Terror of the unknown. She felt it herself.
They were in trouble. Really in trouble. The kind of trouble that Mr. Verne and Mr. Wells had written about but always seemed to have a way out of. She reminded herself that that was fiction, and this was reality. There would be no clever escapes, no last-minute rescues. They were going to die tonight, and it was all her fault. She had to stifle the desire to cry.
Toby slid down beside her and offered her a lopsided grin. “Hey…” he began.
Sasha put a hand up on his chest, stopping him. He felt warm through his clothes, a vast contrast to the coolness of the cavern. She wanted to bury her face against his shirt. But she had to be strong. This was all about their survival. “Don’t say it, Toby,” she whispered.
Toby put his arm about her shoulders, pulling her close. “I was only going to ask if you were all right.”
“I’m not all right. None of us are all right.”
“You certainly have that right, girl,” said Quinn from the opposite side of the cage.
Toby glanced over with a hostile frown. “You, sir, are exceptionally rude.”
Quinn offered the boy a nasty little laugh that rode Sasha’s spine like a knife-edge. He had long since given up trying to salvage his clothes. Instead, he let them hang off his lanky frame in dirty tatters and had resorted to smoothing his unruly hair as if he might somehow recapture his pride.
“I beg to differ. I’m only speaking the truth. We’re in a fine mess because of your girl there.” He shot Sasha an even nastier look. “What now, Sasha? I don’t see you inventing a way out of this mess you’ve gotten us into.”
Toby climbed to his feet. Evidently forgetting his status—or lack thereof—he marched forward and took Quinn by the remnants of his frock coat, hauling him to his feet. “How dare you speak to Sasha like that?”
Quinn smiled grimly. “What a sad, lovestruck little stable boy you are. Your girl there has doomed us all and you don’t even see it.” His eyes simmered with rage. “Now unhand me, you toerag before I….”
“Stop it, just stop!” Sasha cried, burying her face in her hands. It was all she could do to keep from panicking. They were all going to die tonight, and there was nothing she could do about it…that is, if they didn’t tear each other apart first like animals. To her upmost surprise, both men backed down and returned to their respective corners like boxers who’d had second thoughts about going a round in the ring. Toby rolled his shoulders and clenched his fists, eyeing Quinn like he was looking for the soft spots. Lord Quinn yanked fretfully on his clothes, pulled loose his pocket watch and clicked the clamshell open, then cursed loudly when all the broken clock parts fell out into his lap. It must have been smashed when the Sen dropped him in the cavern.
She had to do something, bring them together somehow. She didn’t want to die like this, with all of them hating each other. Wiping her tear-clogged nose on the dirty sleeve of her dress, she turned her positively red-eyed attention on Quinn. “How did you known about the Ceratosauruses’ hunting pattern?” she asked. It was an odd thing to have such intricate knowledge about. She doubted Quinn was into archeology or the study of extinct animals.
“An animal is an animal. They follow the same patterns everywhere, regardless of species or size,” he answered simply, flatly, his shoulders sagging against the bars of the cage. He put his pocket watch away, clearly disappointed. She waited. There was nothing else to do but fight or talk, and all the fight had gone out of him. “I have a tobacco plantation in Rhodesia. I know Africa, and this p
lace very much reminds me of it.”
“Tell me about Africa.”
He looked on her warily, like a man unused to kindness. “Africa is only about teeth and meat. That’s all there is. You hunt and eat or are hunted and eaten by something bigger and more sophisticated than yourself.”
“Very clever.”
“Those creatures follow the same patterns as lions in our world. There’s nothing very clever about it.”
“So this world is no different from our own,” Toby guessed.
“It seems to be millions of years younger,” Sasha explained, glancing at both men. “If you’d lived about forty million years ago, you would have seen creatures like those beasts roaming everywhere.”
“Then I’m glad I didn’t live forty million years ago,” Quinn quipped, and Sasha had to suppress a smile. She hadn’t known that Quinn lived in Africa, that he had a plantation there. Africa had always seemed so foreign and exciting to her, hardly a place that a boor like Quinn would call home. His words made her curious, and sad.
“Is that all there is in Africa, Quinn?” she asked. “Death?”
Quinn looked on her finally with something that wasn’t contempt. She saw his eyes soften just a bit at the memory of the Dark Continent. “No, of course not. There is great beauty in Africa. The skies taste like rain. The earth itself seems to breathe beneath your feet. But it’s a primitive place, Sasha. Survival depends on not making even one mistake.”
“I see.” She watched him carefully. “Did you love Africa?”
Quinn frowned. “One does not ‘love Africa.’ Africa loves you. That or it destroys you.”
Sasha waited for him to say more—his notions were incredibly romantic for such an angry man—but he’d fallen into a contemplative silence, his chin resting on his chest as if he were seeing other places, other times. Better times, presumably.
Sasha felt terrible all over again. “You’re right, of course. All this is my fault. I don’t know what to say except that I’m sorry.” Toby started to say something in her defense, but she raised her hand, cutting him off. “Don’t. Quinn’s right. This is my mistake. I invented the Tuning Machine. I sent us here. I was naïve, and if the two of you die here tonight, it’s entirely on my head, I realize that.”
“Sasha, it was a mistake,” Toby insisted.
“Still a mistake,” she said, watching Quinn’s drawn face as he stared off into space. She finally understood what he’d been telling her. She had made the error, but all of them would pay for it. She had thought Quinn an angry, boring old man without a single thought in his head. She hadn’t known he’d lived in Africa. She wondered what his life had been like back then, what he’d seen and experienced. She wondered what had brought him back to London.
She was about to ask when they were interrupted.
Muk had returned. And he wasn’t alone.
CHAPTER 8
The Sen leader and a small circle of fellow tribesmen moved about the cages, speaking low to each other in chirps and clicks. Sasha wished she knew what they were saying, what their fate would be.
Muk was dressed grandly in a kilt made of elaborate palm fronds and spiky yellow flowers. Around his neck he wore a heavy mantle of bone decorated with trinkets and baubles. It looked heavy, which was probably the reason he didn’t wear it while flying or hunting prey. It would only weigh him down.
As he drew nearer, Sasha’s two companions edged back. Sasha stayed close to the bars. If they were going to die, it was only fair that she go first, seeing how all this was her fault. She swallowed, wondering how brave she could possibly be. She stared at the necklace. Small skulls, tusks, teeth and bones hung from it, some of them bronzed. She thought they were probably hunting trophies or good luck charms. She was sure Quinn could have educated her in tribal customs in Africa...had they lived. But among the trinkets was something very unusual, something especially un-Senlike.
One of Muk’s hunting trophies was a gold pocket watch with a hunter case and fob.
Five little Sen the size of children flitted around Muk, squawking excitedly and reminding Sasha of baby birds begging for food. Muk indicated the apelike creatures in the cage beside them. They became even more excited, evidently more accustomed to such creatures. The young Sen flapped their wings and took off into the air, attaching themselves to the cage where the ape creatures were stirring. There was nowhere for them to run so they started pulling at the bars of their cage, whimpering in terror. Pushing their faces between the bars, the Sen opened their squashed up little faces and unrolled long, bright red tongues that acted like barbs, sticking into the backs of the ape’s skulls and holding fast. The apes’ cries turned to shrieks, the sounds thankfully short-lived as they dropped to the floor one after another as the young Sen began to feed right through their tongues.
Sasha dropped to her knees, a hand clapped over her mouth to keep her vomit down. A cold sweat made her shiver like a victim of fever. Someone moved to kneel beside her. At first, she thought it must be Toby, but the smell of spirits on clothing made her turn. Quinn leaned close to her, observing the feeding with an almost scientific detachment.
“How horrible,” she said.
“Is it? I think it’s rather interesting, actually.”
“Quinn, please…”
“This is just their way. The only way they can feed, Sasha.”
“How can you be so cold?”
Quinn looked at her then. His once bloodshot eyes had cleared and he looked keen and focused. He still looked rough, his hair mussed and a light shadow at his chin and throat, but somehow that improved his appearance. She couldn’t explain it. He seemed more alive now than he ever did in London. He touched her shoulder and for once she didn’t want to run screaming from him. “I don’t know that you would survive Africa, Sasha.”
“This isn’t Africa, Quinn.”
“Perhaps,” he answered, watching the Sen draw the last nutrients from the ape creatures lying in a heap on the floor of the cage. “But it’s close. There are tribes in Africa that still engage in a form of cannibalism. They eat the hearts and brains of respected enemies in an effort to absorb their bravery and knowledge. It’s actually considered an honor.”
Sasha looked away. They were going to end up the same way. She had no idea what they were going to do.
Quinn watched the display before them, his eyes steady. Evidently, he was made of stouter stuff than she was. “Perhaps we can negotiate our way out of this. I’ve dealt with primitive tribes in the past.”
“Were they planning on eating you?”
“Well, no,” Quinn admitted. “We had disputes about hunting grounds and water rights. But it’s the same thing, in a way.”
“Dear God, we’re going to die.” Toby leaned his head against the bars of the cage and closed his eyes.
Quinn narrowed his eyes. “We just need something to negotiate with. Something we can give the Sen that they don’t have, but want.”
“Like our blood?” Toby asked sarcastically.
“I was thinking of something more practical. Something we wouldn’t miss. Do you have anything in your pockets?” He looked at them both. “Something that Muk might find of interest?” He too had noticed Muk’s preference for shiny trinkets.
Sasha and Toby began ransacking their pockets. All she had were her gloves and a small emerald ring her father had given her when she turned sixteen; these she gave to Quinn. Toby came up with a few pence, a handkerchief, and a three shoeing nails. Quinn added his broken pocket watch to their collection and spread their coffers out on the handkerchief. After a moment, he added his cufflinks, which were small but made of real gold-plated elephant teeth, he said. It wasn’t much, but hopefully the items were novel enough—and shiny enough—to interest the Sen.
Muk flitted up to their cage, eyeing the objects that Quinn had laid out in plain sight. He studied them carefully, tilting his head.
“I hate it when he does the head thing,” Toby whispered. “It means he’s up
to no good.”
“Shh,” said Quinn, presenting the items to Muk with a flourish, like a magician performing a trick.
Muk leaned close and sniffed the items. The trinkets on his mantel flashed, the pocket watch again catching Sasha’s eye. It was obvious that someone had come before them, someone from their world. There was no way a pocket watch would have come into Muk’s possession otherwise. As Muk examined their offerings, Sasha said, “Who was the man who came before us?”
Muk looked up. His eyes were cold, mechanical. Sasha had to remind herself that he wasn’t really a monster, that this was just the way of the Sen, as Quinn had put it. It proved difficult. His name was John Ulysses, Muk said.
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