A Gathering of Wings (32 page)

Sky’s head jerks up and he growls. He pulls violently away from Malora, leaving wisps of mane hairs trailing between her fingers, and launches into a brisk jog, circling the torches.

“Calm your horse!” the Sphinx screams. “Agitation will taint the meat!”

Sky lets out a shrill whinny as he picks up a lope.

“He’s going to do it,” Malora whispers, eyes on her horse.

“He’d better do it soon,” Neal says, his own eyes on the Sphinx, who has begun to rise from her crouch.

“If ever there was a crisis,” Honus says, “this would be it.”

The flames of the torches bend and sputter as Sky sweeps past them, mane and tail whipping.

“Hold still, I tell you!” the Sphinx cries.

As she has once before, Malora can hear the steady creak of Sky’s leg joints, the air whistling in and out of his mouth and nose.

“Look!” says Honus, his finger following Sky. “He’s doing it! He’s
doing
it!”

And now Malora sees it, too. The scars from the Leatherwings have come alive, dancing and flying above Sky’s back like black snakes.

“That’s my boy!” says Neal.

The Sphinx screams as, with a crackling sound, two huge sleek black wings emerge from the bed of the Leatherwings’ scars and unfurl above the stallion’s shoulders.

Meanwhile, oblivious to all this, Orion opens his eyes and raises a finger. “I have the answer. It is the winged horse, Pegasus!” he shouts. He looks around for his congratulations but instead sees that Sky has, in his way, beaten Orion to it.

“It’s a trick!” the Sphinx growls.

“No, it’s not,” says Malora, bathed in relief. “And now you don’t get to eat us.”

Honus turns to the Sphinx. “Madam, you see with your own eyes the irrefutably correct answer to your question: the creature with the legs of a horse and the wings of a bird is standing before you as big as life. He is Malora’s stalwart stallion, Sky! And, completely unnecessary, but correct nevertheless,
the centaur lad has given you the answer you sought in the first place. It is Pegasus. We are right on two counts, and your banquet is hereby canceled.”

“All of you! Get out of my sight!” the Sphinx hisses.

“Gladly,” says Orion.

“Happy to oblige,” says Neal with a mocking bow.

“Wait,” says Malora, holding up a hand to the others. “Before we leave, I have a few questions for the Sphinx. Information.”

“Oh, ask and be gone!” the Sphinx snarls.

“Tell me how you came to be in this place?” Malora says.

“That’s an easy question. This place is my realm. The gods made me and set me down here for all eternity,” says the Sphinx. “We are one of a kind. We were so perfect, the gods needed to make only one copy of each of us.”

Honus nudges Malora and nods as if to say,
I was right, wasn’t I?

“The Scienticians, you mean,” Malora says to the Sphinx.

She nods. “They are father and mother to me, god and goddess.” A tear rolls out of the corner of one painted eye. “Alas, we are all that is left of them.”

“And the centaurs of Ixion worship you,” Malora says. “And keep your larder stocked.”

The Sphinx shrugs. “By an ages-old compact, they see to our needs. They feed my brother, and he feeds us. Our brother doesn’t mind going up. We do. We hate it up there in the Narrow World.”

“We?” Orion says.

“Me and my sister,” she says.

“So there are
three
Beasts from Below,” Neal says grimly.

“Why can’t you hunt your own food?” Malora asks. “You seem fierce enough.”

The Sphinx’s head swivels left and right. “Do you see any herds of impala running through here? The sinkholes deliver us up only the occasional prey but not enough to sustain us. Even children of the gods must eat. And if horse meat is the order of the day, horse meat is what we will eat.”

The Sphinx licks her puffy lips and points to the bones lying all about. “My brother prefers centaurs, but I myself don’t care to eat anything with a human face,” she says.

“That’s comforting to know,” Neal mutters.

“As a rule, I toss the human half aside and leave it for the rats to gnaw at,” she says.

“Not so comforting,” Neal mutters.

“Do the wild centaurs come down here often?” Malora asks.

“To refuel the torches. Now and then one of them tries to get at the treasure,” she says.

“What treasure?” Honus and Orion chime in.

Malora asks, “Where is this treasure?”

“We’re not here for treasure, pet,” Neal warns.

“We might need it to bargain for Zephele’s life.
In place of horses
,” Malora adds.

Neal nods, then speaks up: “You heard her. Where is this treasure, Hul?”

“
Abu al
Hul—and wouldn’t you like to know, my handsome little lion-stalker!” she says, her heavy-lidded eyes flirtatious.

“Actually, we all would,” Malora says. “And if you tell us, I promise to go away and bring you back a delectable horse to lick. The most wonderful horse you have ever tasted.”

The Sphinx’s face lights up. She smacks her lips. “Do tell!”

The others stare at Malora as if she has taken leave of her senses, but she continues. “This horse is really something special. It is the prized possession of the Apex of Kheiron. Everyone who sees it covets it. It’s a stunning golden steed with rippling muscles and a fiery spirit.”

The Sphinx salivates.

Malora says, “Tell us where the treasure is and the horse will be yours. I will personally return and present it to you.”

“My brother, the Minotaur, guards the treasure at the heart of his labyrinth,” says the Sphinx. “Keep following the torches and eventually you will find him! If he doesn’t find you first.” She chuckles nastily.

“Thank you! We’ll be going now,” Malora says as she backs away from the circle of torches. She finds that she is soaked in sweat. She will not turn her back until the Sphinx is no longer in her sights.

“Have you completely lost your mind?” Orion whispers. “Promising to bring her a horse of all things!”

“I never said I would bring her a
real
horse,” Malora says. “I was talking about the Golden Horse of Kheiron. The Apex will be more than happy to make a gift of his trophy to her, especially if her information leads us to the rescue of his daughter.”

The torches are spaced farther apart now, and the travelers find themselves groping along in the near darkness that stretches out between. The floor begins to tilt downward, so gradually that no one notices it at first. Then Honus slips and falls backward, his head hitting the glass with a thud.

Malora and Orion kneel beside him. Orion gathers him up in his arms. Honus groans. Malora gently probes the back of his head. “There’s a lump rising, but there’s no blood.”

Honus revives himself and sits up. “Onward to Ixion!” he says gamely. And on they go.

Ahead of them, Sky, his wings retracted once again, continues to advance in small, shuffling steps. Baby slips and slides behind him. Malora gets down and inches along on her bottom, as does Honus. Orion and Neal creep forward on their haunches. The incline steepens and Sky falls onto one hip, continuing to slide as the heavier centaurs move out in front of Malora and Honus. Soon they are all careening down
the steep glassy chute. Malora has the sensation of falling through space as the slide grows ever steeper. Faster and faster she flies until she crashes once again into a big powdery pile of sand, her face planted in Sky’s neck.

Sky rolls one blue eye toward her as if to say,
What have you gotten us into now?

“I’m sorry,” she whispers to him.

Baby clamors to her feet and trots ahead. Sky heaves himself up and follows.

“However deep beneath the earth we were before,” Honus says grimly, “we are deeper still now.”

They get up slowly, dusting the sand off, and forge onward. The ground is level again, and they no longer have to crawl. They stop now and then to wet their tongues from the flasks. The fish they packed in leaves is so full of sand they leave it behind for the rats.

After another eternity, up ahead in the tunnel they see flashes of lightning, followed by a thunderous roar that sounds like the ocean crashing against the shore. Malora is wondering whether the cavern might be leading them to the sea, when Sky and Baby come racing back, nearly bowling her over. Sky’s sides heave. His hide is lathered, his eyes rolling up to the whites.

“Easy, big boy,” Malora says, making calming motions with hands that feel anything but calm.

Sky snorts and pulls back, refusing false comfort.

“He saw something that scared him,” Orion says.

“Any other glaringly obvious observations you’d care to make, Silvermane?” Neal says.

“I’ll go and see,” Malora says. “Sometimes the things that
spook horses are really nothing.” While she doesn’t believe this for a moment, she says it anyway.

Malora makes her way slowly forward. As she rounds a bend in the corridor, a wall of intense heat rolls toward her, followed by a deafening roar that knocks her onto her hind end and sends her scrambling backward. Through a smoky haze that smells of her own singed hair, Malora peers up at the monster.

There is no germ of human being here. She has the head and body of a lion, with a goat’s head sticking out of its back and a long, thick serpent’s tail. Smoke trails from her mouth as she draws herself up and glares down at Malora.

“We mean you no harm,” Malora calls out in a trembling voice.

The monster gives no sign of having understood. Malora has never seen a lion with such a malignant look. Her eyes are huge and white and spindled with black. Her shaggy head is twenty times bigger than that of a normal lion.

All the breath goes out of Malora as she watches the monster puff up her chest. She opens her mouth and emits a loud bawling noise, equal parts roar, howl, and hiss. A long forked serpent’s tongue pokes out and a column of fire shoots from the back of her throat. Malora dodges the flame and rolls over. She has just enough time to sit up before the monster howls again. Moments later, another gout of flame comes rolling toward her. She scuttles backward as the creature howls, and this time she feels the bottoms of her boots half-melt away. The smell of singed impala skin, and her own flesh burning, fills her nostrils. Choking, she staggers to her feet and hobbles back around the bend.

“I gather it’s not nothing,” Neal says, sizing up her appearance.

“It’s huge!” Malora says, panting. “Vicious. Our weapons will be useless against it. And there’s no way through this tunnel but past it.”

“We’ll never make it back up the chute we slid down,” Honus says.

“We’re as good as stuck here,” Orion says bleakly.

Neal draws his sword. “We’ll see about that.”

“No, Neal,” Malora says, her hand shooting out to stop him. “You’ll never get close enough to use your sword. You’ll be roasted alive.”

“Roasted?”
Orion echoes, his pale eyes huge.

“She spits flames,” Malora says.

Honus is the only one who doesn’t look stunned and terrified. Instead, he is deeply thoughtful. “Exactly what does this monster look like?”

They listen as Malora describes the creature that blocks their passage.

“What an indescribably fifthly mess of a hibe,” Orion says.

Neal turns away and spits, as if ridding his mouth of a foul taste.

“Ah, and yet it is a masterpiece,” Honus says.

They stare at Honus in bafflement as the faun begins to pace. “I begin to see what the Scienticians were up to,” he says, his eyes shining. “They must have amused themselves at first with the likes of us, the simple splicing of horse and human, goat and human, amphibian and human, and so on and so forth. But after a while these primitive forms must have
bored them. They wanted to create something mythic. Like us, but more powerful, more frightening, and more monstrous. So they created the Sphinx. They created the Minotaur, whom we have yet to meet. And they created the fire-breathing monster we now face: the Chimera. I know it seems hopeless, but I have good tidings for one and all.”

“Then stop lecturing and tell us,” Neal says, throwing up his hands in exasperation.

Honus stops pacing. “I know how we can slay it.”

“How?” Malora asks.

“Orion, can I trouble you to give me one of your darts?” Honus asks.

Orion digs a dart from his belt and hands it to Honus, a doubtful expression on his face.

“What are you up to, Polymath?” Neal asks.

Honus has untied the pouch at his waist. He rummages around in it one-handed as he mutters to himself. “I know I have it, I placed it in here after Malora salvaged it from the barge, along with my quills and my flask of ink. Ah! Here it is! And to think I almost jettisoned it as useless.” He pulls out a small red plug of sealing wax. He takes the dart and trots over to the nearest torch, but it is too high on the glass wall for him to reach it. “Neal, come here, please. I’m going to need to stand on that sturdy young back of yours, if you would be so kind.”

Neal obliges, and Malora boosts Honus up onto his back. Honus teeters.

“Ouch,” Neal says. “Easy with those sharp little trotters.”

Malora braces Honus with one hand as the faun reaches up and holds the plug of red wax to the torch’s flame until it
softens and begins to drip. With the other hand, he turns the dart slowly, letting the wax drip down onto the tip. When it is completely covered with red wax, Honus hands it to Malora and asks for the remaining darts so he can do the same with them. When he is finished, he says, “Very good. You can help me down now, if you would, Malora. Thank you for the use of your back, Neal. I trust it will be worth the temporary discomfort of being trod upon.”

Honus turns to Orion. “All right. You, young sir, are the master of the blowgun, are you not?”

“So Neal has always told me,” Orion says glumly.

Malora steps forward. “I’ll do it,” she says. “Orrie, teach me how to use the blowgun.”

Neal says, “Don’t be ridiculous.”

Orion says, “It would take more time to teach you than we have. Didn’t I wing at least one Leatherwing with my sharpshooting?”