“You said you were worried about Julie and then your face looked like you had a hemorrhoid attack. Or a really hard…”
“Derek, you just don’t say things like that to a woman. Keep going this way and you’ll spend your life alone.”
“Don’t change the subject. Andrea is cool. And she smells nice. It will be okay.”
Apparently I was supposed to sniff people to determine their competence. “How do you know?”
He shrugged. “You just have to trust her.”
Considering that the two men I had most loved and admired spent my formative years drilling into me that I could rely on myself and myself alone, trusting other people was easier said than done. I worried about Julie. I worried about Julie’s mom, too. Since I’d gotten the liaison position with the Order, I made it a point to hang out in the knight-questor’s office, because I knew next to nothing about investigative work, and he, being an ex–Georgia Bureau of Investigations detective, knew pretty much everything. While there I had picked up a few vital crumbs of information, and I knew the first twenty-four hours of any investigation were crucial. The more time passed, the colder the trail grew. In a missing person case, that meant the chances of finding that missing person alive dropped by the hour.
The first twenty-four had come and gone. The first forty-eight were waving good-bye from the window of the “you suck at your job” train. None of the normal procedures applied in this case: canvassing the neighborhood, interrogating witnesses, trying to determine who wanted the person to be missing, none of it applied here. All the witnesses were missing with her.
I had no clue where Julie’s mom had gone. I wished she was safe back at her house. I had left a note on her kitchen table, explaining that I had Julie, she was safe, and asking her to contact the Order. Until she showed, all I could do was to tug on the tail of the only lead I had—the cauldron and Morrigan—and hope there wasn’t a woman-eating tiger on the other end.
We turned to the left onto Centennial Drive, following Ghastek’s vampire. A solid wall of green towered along our left, blocking the view. Pre-Shift, the park was open and airy, a large lawn, sectioned off by paths and carefully planted trees into predefined areas. You could stand on the lookout at Belvedere and see the entire layout of the park, from the Children’s Garden to the Fountain of Rings.
Now the park belonged to the covens of the city. The witches had planted fast-growing trees, and an impenetrable barrier of verdant green hid the mysteries of the park from prying eyes and sticky fingers. The park was larger, as well. A lot larger. It had swallowed several city blocks previously occupied by office buildings. All I saw was a wall of green. It must’ve quadrupled in size.
The fact that so many covens had banded together to purchase a park was always a puzzlement to me. If you piloted vampires, you belonged to the People, and if you didn’t, they would quickly make a very persuasive financial argument in favor of your signing up with them. If you were a merc, you belonged to the Guild, because you wanted 50 percent off your dental, 30 percent off your medical, and access to a Guild lawyer. But if you were a witch, you belonged to your coven, which usually topped out at thirteen members. Witches had no hierarchy outside of their individual covens. I always wondered what different covens had in common. Now I knew: the Oracle.
It’s a good thing Saiman was high on magic. God alone knew how much this information would’ve cost me under normal circumstances. Of course, under normal circumstances, all this mess wouldn’t have happened.
The city gave the park some berth but not too much. Across the street the ruins had been cleared and a new timber building rose, proudly bearing a YardBird sign. Under it in big red letters was written “Fried Chicken! Wings!” And lower, “No Rat!”
The air smelled like fried chicken. My mouth filled with drool. The good thing about chicken is that it’s hard to disguise dog meat as a chicken wing. Mmmm, chicken. Thanks to Doolittle’s efforts, I still had the metabolism of a hummingbird on crack. The fried chicken aroma beckoned me. After the witches. Once we were out of Centennial Park, come hell or high water, I’d get myself some chicken.
The carpenters from the new construction going up ahead had much the same idea. They sat outside at small wooden tables, munched on wings, and watched the afternoon sun broil the streets. Laborers and craftsmen traveled up and down Centennial Drive, feeling the pavement through their worn shoes, staying on the other side of the street, away from the green. The sidewalk peddlers recommended their wares with hoarse voices. Up ahead at the intersection a fetish vendor, a short middle-aged man, danced about his cart, shaking colorful twine and cord charms.
A street sign announced we had reached Andrew Young Boulevard. Judging by the sign’s location, the boulevard sliced off the southern chunk of the park, probably cutting straight through Centennial Plaza. Except no boulevard remained. The greenery grew wild, in full revolt against all things that pruned. Leafy branches hung over the path, their shoots lying on the pavement. Rose vines spread in thorn-studded tangles, binding the myrtles and evergreens into a solid mass that promised to leave no skin unbloodied. I’d need a chainsaw to get through there. A machete wouldn’t do it. And I didn’t even have a machete.
Witches: one. Kate and Co.: zero.
“We seem to be boulevardless,” I said.
“I could’ve informed you of that, had you bothered to inquire.” The vamp favored me with a ghastly attempt at a smile, sure to send any normal person to a therapist.
That’s right—the Casino was built on the lot of the old World Congress Center. If it weren’t for the fifty-foot trees blocking the view, the sky would be gleaming with its silvery minarets. The People and the witches were practically neighbors. Hell, they probably wandered over to borrow a cup of sugar from each other.
“There is an entrance up ahead.” The vamp scuttled north, toward Baker Street. The sun chose that moment to strip off a small cloud, filling the world with golden sunshine and setting the vamp’s wrinkled purple hide aglow.
“There is just something so wrong about this,” I mumbled.
Derek answered with a light growl.
I trudged along the green wall. The air smelled of flowers. Birds chirped.
The greenery dipped. A narrow path burrowed into the green, twisting to the left, like a dim tunnel to the heart of the wood.
Derek raised his nose and inhaled deeply in the manner of the shapeshifters. “Water.”
I strained to recall the layout of the park. Baker Street wasn’t that far. “Must be the Water Gardens.”
The tunnel lay waiting, like an open mouth. Ghastek’s vamp edged closer to it. Derek and I dismounted and tied our horses to a twisted rhododendron. I looked into the tunnel. No time like the present.
“Any ideas on how to approach this?” I asked the vamp.
“None whatsoever,” Ghastek said.
I sighed and ducked into the tunnel.
CHAPTER 15
I HAD CONQUERED THE FIRST TEN FEET OF THE PATH when the magic hit. It rocked me like a shotgun blast. My breath escaped my lungs in a startled cry, my heart squeezed itself into a hard fist, and I bent over, cradling my chest. The pain released me in a heady rush of power that spread through my arteries, into my veins, into the vessels, into the capillaries, until my whole body tingled with magic. The exhilaration claimed me and lifted me up, as if two wings had thrust from my back.
Around me, deep within the green, flowers opened, glowing stars of white and pale purple. The branches rustled. The vines slithered. An amalgam of scents spiced the air: sweet and honeyed, reminiscent of a rose.
Derek padded out of the green gloom, silent and stealthy on velvet feet and looked at me with wolf eyes from a human face. I fought an involuntary shiver.
The vampire crouched on the side of the path, snug against the greenery, shivering, head tucked to its chest.
The bloodsucker raised its head. Its eyes burned bright red. The vamp mouth opened but no sound issued forth. It showed me
its fangs, two yellowed killing teeth. I showed it my saber. I only have one tooth, but it’s a lot longer than yours and it will turn the stringy meat on your bones into pus.
“No need for alarm,” Ghastek said. “He’s quite docile.”
The vampire slunk from the path, arched its back, and brushed against my leg.
It took every shred of nerve not to recoil. “If you do that again, I’ll kill it.”
“I was always curious about your aversion to the undead. What is it that upsets you so much?”
“A vampire is a walking corpse. It oozes undeath that makes the living want to vomit, it has no mind, and left to its own devices it would slaughter until there was nothing left to kill. And then it would cannibalize itself. What’s there to like, Ghastek?”
And most of all, Roland had made them. They were his creation.
“Their usefulness far outweighs their few shortcomings,” Ghastek said.
I motioned with my saber. “In that case, please go first. Let’s benefit from some of that usefulness.”
Ghastek took the lead, and we went down the path, single file, vampire, a man on the verge of becoming a beast, and me, bringing up the rear.
The canopy dipped so low, I had to nearly crouch. I scooted through, the twigs snatching at my braid, and finally emerged into the clearing.
Tall pines rose straight and smooth like the masts of a gargantuan underground ship. Their branches stretched to each other, filtering the light, muting the sun to a pleasant green gloom. The ground was thick with decades of autumn, and spongy pine needles gave lightly under my weight. The air smelled of moisture. A gentle murmur of water spilling over man-made waterfalls emanated from the left.
The vamp leaped onto the nearest pine and perched twelve feet off the ground, its body nearly perpendicular to the pine’s trunk.
“Two o’clock,” Derek whispered.
Beyond the pines lay a sunlit glade, sectioned by neat rows of herbs. Between us and the glade stood a woman.
She was on the heavy side, built solid and thick, but without flab. A plain black dress hung off her shoulders, its hem brushing the ground. Her thick arms matched the color of the pine straw. A mask of beaten iron hid her features, a round stylized face with thick locks of hair radiating from it like the sun’s corona. On second glance, those weren’t sun rays. Sun rays didn’t come with scales and fanged mouths.
A Gorgon Medusa mask. My quip about Medusas in the Honeycomb Gap was coming true. Me and my big mouth. Next time I would imagine a warehouse full of fluffy bunnies instead.
“I’m a representative of the Order,” I said. “I’m investigating the disappearance of the Sisters of the Crow. This is my associate.” I nodded at Derek. “This is my other associate.” I nodded at the vampire. “I request to speak to the Oracle.”
The woman said nothing. Moments ticked by, like falling pine needles, one after another. In ancient Greece, Gorgon Medusa could turn a man to stone with her gaze. I had a nice big pine to my left. If that mask left her face, I’d make a break for it. Perseus, who finally chopped off Medusa’s head, had a mirror shield. I had nothing. Even Slayer’s blade was opaque, so no dice there.
She turned and strode into the sunshine. I followed.
THE COBBLED STONES OF THE PATH VEERED LEFT and right in a gentle curve. The witch’s black dress swept them clean as she moved. Her mask flared to cover the back of her head like some bizarre motorcycle helmet and all I could see was a narrow strip of her dark skin right above the neckline.
A vast herb garden stretched on both sides of us; flowers and grasses were separated in rows, bordered by a dense evergreen hedge in the distance. Basil, yarrow, mint, brilliant red poppies, yellow cornflower, fuzzy bush clover, white umbrellas of elderberry…They never needed to leave the premises to look for wild plants. Most covens used the same herbs in their rituals. Very convenient when the herbs grew right by the gathering place.
My memory claimed that there was a big grassy lawn somewhere here, but beyond the herbal field rose trees, massive dogwoods and oaks tinseled with Spanish moss. The trees looked entirely too old to have grown naturally. I couldn’t recall how I knew the lawn had been there, but I remembered it. And the fountains. Many water jets shooting from the ground.
And a woman. A very tall woman who laughed a lot. Her face was a fuzzy blur in my memory.
Derek wrinkled his nose. I glanced at him.
“Animal,” he said. “Odd.”
“What kind?”
“Not sure.”
The trees parted before us, revealing a hill sitting in the middle of a large clearing. More of a kurgan, actually, rising straight up out of the herbs, like a cap of a colossal mushroom. Kudzu and grasses blanketed the hill in a green shroud, but at the very top the bedrock broke through: smooth, polished dark gray marble, tinted with swirls of malachite and flecked with gold.
If I had a marble dome that pretty, I doubt I’d let it get overgrown like that.
The Medusa impersonator circled the hill and stopped. We stopped, too. Ghastek sent the vamp up onto the hill and it perched among the kudzu like some gaunt ghoul.
Derek sneezed.
“Bless you.”
He sneezed again, pulled a canteen from his belt and washed his nostrils out.
The guide waited. We stood with her. A light breeze rippled through the tree branches. Birds sang. The sun, highly amused by our presence, did its best to barbecue us.
The vampire sprang straight into the air and landed ten feet behind us. Derek snarled. And sneezed again.
A deep rumble shook the ground. I backed away.
The grassy soil fell away in heavy slabs. The hill quaked and crept up, higher, higher. A colossal brown head emerged from underneath the kudzu, the flesh hanging from it in wrinkled folds. Two eyes stared at me, black and shining like two giant chunks of anthracite.
A tortoise.
I quested: not a shiver of magic. No scent of burning grasses associated with illusion. It was an actual living tortoise.
The curve of the gargantuan mouth widened. The jaws opened and a black maw gaped before us. I braced for a wave of turtle breath, but no discernible scents emanated from the mouth. The mother of all tortoises rested her chin on the grass and held the pose.
Okay, now I’d seen everything.
Our guide bowed her head and pointed into the tortoise.
“In there?”
She nodded.
“You want us to go into the tortoise?”
Another nod.
“It’s alive.”
Another nod.
“No.” Derek sneezed again.
“I must say it’s a bit irregular.” Ghastek’s voice vibrated with excitement. It’s easy to be deliriously happy about investigating something, when you’re in no danger of being swallowed.
I glanced at the vamp. “How fast can you rip it apart if it eats us?”
“The shell is quite thick. We’d have to exit back through the neck. If it withdraws its head, we’ll have to carve through a lot of flesh.”
“In other words, if it eats us, we’re screwed.”
“Crude but accurate.”
I faced the guide. “Are you coming with us?”
She shook her head.
Nice plan. Take the gullible outsiders, walk them around for a bit, then feed them to the giant tortoise. The tortoise is full, the outsiders are dealt with, and everybody’s happy.
“Derek, what do you smell?”
He stepped forward, took a deep breath, and doubled over in a sneezing fit. My werewolf was allergic to tortoises. Why me?
“Anything sour? Animal breath?”
He shook his head. “Water. And flowers.”
I pointed my blade at the guide. “If it eats us, I’ll kill it, and then I’ll find you.”
The guide nodded again. She didn’t take a step back and flee in horror. Perhaps I just wasn’t scary enough. Maybe I should invest in some horns or fangs.
“I’m going i
n. You two are welcome to stay outside.” I bent my back and took a step into the tortoise’s mouth.
CHAPTER 16
THE TONGUE GAVE A BIT UNDER MY FEET. LIKE WALKING on a saturated sponge. Ahead a deeper blackness indicated the opening of the throat. I bent lower to clear the roof of the mouth and headed for it.
Behind me Derek sneezed.
“Decided to come after all?”
Sneeze. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
The throat sloped gently, its bottom flooded with a murky liquid. Long strands of what looked like algae hung from the top of the throat-tunnel, dripping more liquid. Hopefully it wasn’t acid. It didn’t smell any different from the ordinary pond water, a touch fishy. I pulled a throwing knife, stretched and dipped the tip into the water. No discoloration. I touched the wet blade. My finger didn’t melt. Very well.
I stepped into water, slipped, and landed on my butt. Why me?
The vampire scuttled past me, throwing me a look over its shoulder. “As always, a picture of refined grace.”
“Shut up.”
My boots were full of tortoise throat spit.
The vamp took a step and vanished under the water.
I scrambled to my feet.
The vamp’s head reappeared. “A bit deep through here,” Ghastek warned.
Ha! Served him right.
The water came up to my waist. I waded through the tunnel in the gloom, the quiet splashing of the vampire ahead the only guide as to direction. Derek’s sneezing finally stopped.
The tunnel turned. I splashed through and stopped.
I stood in a shallow pool, among a dense blanket of lily pads. Cream-colored lilies glowed on the water.
An enormous dome lay before me. High above, at its very top, the carapace became transparent, and pale light filtered through, highlighting the translucent ridges of the tortoise shell. The walls darkened gradually, clear at the top, then green with the colors of the grasses and kudzu sheathing the shell from the outside, and finally deep black and green marble. Large rectangles had been cut within the walls, each with its own glyph etched in gold leaf and a name. The arrangement was strikingly familiar, but so unexpected, it took my brain a moment to recognize it.
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