That was one of my many thoughts. I was wondering whether, if it is a dragon, it’s the one we escaped from earlier. Are there many of them in the underworld? If so, do they normally stick together, or are they solitary? Do they band with demon sects willingly, or are they trapped? If it’s the latter, can we offer it a way out somehow? What about other potential flying things?
Back to the dragon from the circus, since that is the likeliest scenario, I am calculating the amount of ground it must’ve covered so far, what that means for its speed, not to mention the quickness with which it was able to organize and head out. Taking those numbers, I can—
“Okay. Good call. You need more time to think. I’ll sneak around and try to see it again to cut down on some of those questions.” Before he could stop me, I ran through to the other side of the tree. No wonder the guy wasn’t worried about mind-fuckery. He lived in a constant state of it inside his own head.
Taking care to go slow, I pushed the layer of leaves to one side and looked out, immediately seeing a demon sitting at the base of a different sort of tree, staring up and to the right. It leaned forward a little, to track whatever it was, and I quickly hopped out and followed its gaze. Empty sky.
When I looked back, the demon was surveying me.
I pointed at the sky, not sure if no violence also meant no talking. In this kingdom, it probably did. I took a chance, anyway. “Did you see that thing?”
It pointed at my legs. “Where’d you get human clothes?”
Not important, demon!
I walked beside the cascading leaves, my eyes on the sky, letting silence drift between us. I was hoping its thoughts would give it away. Nothing was coming, though. “Was it a dragon?” I asked.
“Those pants. Those are human pants. Where’d you get them?”
Apparently this thing didn’t realize I was human, which was good news. It also didn’t seem to care about the flying object, which did not help my information-collecting efforts.
I chanced a step out into the open, ready to dodge back in.
“I trade you for them,” it persisted. “I tell what fly by.”
What did it think I was, born yesterday?
Two more steps into the open area between the trees and the visible sky was still clear. Although the slice of sky I could see was small. I would need to get away from the trees to see into the distance.
Or just get the information out of my new pants-loving friend.
I turned to the demon. “These pants are worth more than your paltry information.” I hadn’t meant to sound so rough. “What else?”
“How about that pouch around your waist?” the demon said, standing. “I trade you.”
“Thank you for calling it a pouch. That’s great. But not on your—” I paused, remembering the old pouch I’d stashed in my backpack. The one that had seen me through some tough battles.
It would get a chance to help me out again. What a champ.
“Wait.” I scampered over to my backpack and pulled the pouch out from the bottom of my bag. Lumpy and stained, it was not a prize like the pants, or even the new pouch, but beauty was on the inside, and I’d rip out that demon’s heart if it didn’t see that.
Whoa, girl, I thought, heading back. Don’t kill the thing that has information for you.
The demon’s eyes widened and it rubbed its hands together in excitement as I held out the old pouch. It was clearly not a poker player. It was also clearly keeping its thoughts to itself.
“What do you give me for it?” I asked, shooting glances at the sky.
“I tell you what I saw.” He pointed upward.
I felt Darius’s presence behind me, watching. It was time to go.
“Fi—” I cut off as stars blinked out in my peripheral vision. A shape interrupted the empty purple.
I quickly walked backward toward Darius’s location in the willow tree.
The demon glanced up, and its eyes stuck to the shape overhead. Frustration and disappointment crossed its expression as it shifted its gaze back to me.
Trying to show that I was taking the unintended hint, I edged forward until I could get a peek without being easily seen from above. My blood ran cold.
A rainbow shimmered against the background, beautiful to behold. Great wings beat at the sky twice before the creature resumed its silent glide through the air. Straps crossed its chest, and I could barely make out something on its back leaning over its shoulder, looking down.
A clown in a harness on a dragon.
“This place is one giant acid trip,” I murmured.
Clown Demon wanted vengeance. Or answers. Or all my shit. Any of those options spelled disaster for me.
“No dice,” I said, turning.
“Wait! I give this.” The demon grabbed the tail end of a snake that had worked out of its scabby skin on its side. It held it up.
“Good God, no.” I grimaced at it. “Why would I want your pet snake?”
Its brow puckered. “Healer. Fair trade.”
Take the snake, Darius thought. We must go.
I didn’t want to touch the snake, so how was I supposed to take it?
The demon misread my hesitation.
“What else you need?” it asked in urgency, shaking the snake at me. Its eyes shifted to the pouch and it licked its black lips with a green tongue. “What else? Trade!”
Directions, Darius thought. Hurry. We don’t have much time before it doubles back.
After a hasty deal featuring a snake, exchanged information, and the realization we’d been speaking English all along—more evidence that I couldn’t tell the difference between the two when I was hearing and saying words—we ran through the willow tree to the other side and looked up. All clear.
As fast as we can. Stay to the trees.
I ran beside him, doing as he said, but I couldn’t stop myself from looking back. In the sky, floating along in the other direction, was the majestic body of our violent foe. Its wings pumped before it continued to glide, moving like a great bird of prey.
“If it turns around, we’re screwed,” I said, putting on a burst of speed.
It doesn’t know we are here, and it doesn’t know how fast we can run. We have time before they zigzag back in our direction.
We couldn’t be sure they were zigzagging at all, since this place wasn’t logical, but I let it go.
A demon sat forward as we passed, confusion written across its face. Two others popped out of a willow tree, interrupted from some intimate activities, by the look of it.
I had a brief curiosity about their reproductive abilities, but let it go. If there was ever not a time to talk about demon sex, this was surely it.
The purple tones around us darkened and turned muddy brown before sliding into black. Stars still speckled the sky, but that was the only light. Velvety moss turned into wild grasses that scraped my legs. I knew without testing it that it would rip up human skin.
“Are we sure we can trust that demon?” I asked as we veered left. My foot splashed into water. My other foot did the same, the land turning marshy. Not deep water, however, which was good, if annoying.
Considering how star-struck it was with your pouch, I would be inclined to say yes.
I sure hoped this wasn’t the one time he was wrong.
Some indeterminate amount of time later, which felt like hours but was probably less than one, we slowed as we came upon our first sect on the new route. Shades of molten blue interrupted the black of the sky. A full moon shone through the clouds, shedding light on hard-packed dirt in strange patches, like it was shining through tree branches high above, although no trees surrounded us. Ahead, a huge church or gothic mansion—maybe a combination of both—rose into hazy bluish fog. The ground dropped away on either side into jagged cliffs.
A stream of thoughts invaded my mind: Darius working things out. Calculations, distances, a catalog of the architecture before us, the time it would take to go around it all, the probability the dragon would head this way, the likelihood of an attack by the sentinels posted at the entrance with rigid frames and weapons—on and on, round and round. Finally, it ground to a halt and he said, “Let’s continue on as planned.”
“All that just to keep moving as we were?” I angled right, like the demon had said. “And what did the architecture have to do with anything?”