"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 in. 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.
I stood in a crypt.
A small noise made me turn. The pool ended a few feet in front of me, and beyond it, across the expanse of tortoise shell floor, just past the edge of light, rose a rectangular platform. On the platform waited three women.
The woman on the right could've easily qualified for a center spot in a five-generation family portrait: withered, gaunt, frail. She had seen seventy some time ago. Her thin hair surrounded her head like a nimbus of fine cotton. The black silk of her gown served only to accentuate her age. But her eyes stabbed me with sharp, predatory intelligence. She sat ramrod straight, poised on a heavy chair that was more a throne than a common seat. Like an aging raptor, old but ready to strike at the first hint of blood.
The woman next to her was barely older than Julie. She reclined on a small Roman-style sofa. Black silk streamed from her in folds and curves, so much of it that the fabric threatened to drown her. Sallow, almost translucent against that silk, she rested her head on her bent arm. Her cheekbones stood out. Her neck was barely thicker than my wrist. By contrast her blond hair fell from her head in twin braids, luxurious and thick.
The last woman sat in a rocking chair, knitting an unidentifiable garment from brownish yarn. She looked like she had sucked up all of the flesh the other two lacked. Plump, healthy, with her thick brown hair braided, she watched her knitting with a knowing half smile.
Maiden, mother, and crone. How classic. Double, double, toil and trouble?
I looked above them, to where a large mural darkened the wall. A tall woman towered above the platform, drawn in a simple but sharp style, the kind a genius child artist might employ. Three arms rose from her body: the first held a knife, the second a torch, and the third a chalice with a tiny snake winding about it. To the left of her sat a black cat and a toad. To the right lay a key and a broom.