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“Bee!” I called.
Grass crackled. A huge cat with wicked curving canines and eyes as golden as my own sprang up to me. He nudged me with his head, then licked my forearm where a trickle of blood oozed along my skin. The rough trail of his tongue startled me into a laugh.
“Cat?” Bee’s voice rose out of the darkness. I still could not see her, but she sounded panicked. “Everything hates me here. This wasn’t a good idea! Ouch!”
“Where are you?” I cried.
Rory loped into the darkness. The whining spiked into a shrill buzzing. The big cat returned out of the gloom with Bee pressed to his side. She was waving an arm frantically in the air. I made a few cuts of my sword around her. The buzzing vanished as a cloud of tiny creatures scattered.
She dumped the packs at my feet. “I hope you’re happy, Cat. I didn’t think I would really cross through. I only meant to pretend to do so, because I was afraid you would refuse to go if you thought I was in danger.”
“You were in danger!”
“At least there I could have thrown myself into Amadou Barry’s arms if I had no other choice. Here I’m going to get eaten, and you’re going to have to carry all this alone.”
The cat sniffed at Bee, then staggered sideways in a showy manner as if her smell revolted him.
“Stop that!” She smacked him on the nose. “You may find your puerile jokes amusing, Rory, but I don’t!”
A cry like that of a rabbit being disemboweled shrieked out of the darkness. Bee leaped backward, only to slam into the wall. Rory pounced in front of her as his tail lashed. Wings fluttered in the grass. The scrape of a sword being drawn shuddered the air, followed by a leaden thump, a squawk of anger, and a battering like a body being beaten to death.
A figure lumbered out of the darkness.
“Bright Jupiter! What is this cursed Tartarus? Where are we?”
Amadou Barry thrashed out of the grass and into the circle of light made by my sword’s gleam. He had his military hat in one hand and a drawn sword in the other. The blade was coated with a viscous fluid to which white feathers clung.
“What attacked me?”
Rory opened his jaws to display his teeth. Amadou raised his sword.
“The cat is our ally,” I said sharply. I looked up, hearing the flutter of wings. “Down! Get down!”
Of course he did not comply. Why would a patrician Roman legate who was also a Fula prince listen to a bastard girl whose mother was a northern barbarian and had been an Amazon soldier in the army of his most hated enemy besides?
A creature with a human body and the head and claws of a harpy struck, claws closing on his shoulder. Hat and sword fell as he shouted in pain and shock. The beast lurched upward, trying to carry him away, but his mortal weight brought it to a crashing halt.
I lunged. My focus narrowed to the beast’s emotionless face, for it looked not like a woman but like a creature wearing the mask of a woman. The tip of my blade pierced its golden eye. Its howl shuddered down my blade. I pulled back. My blade slid free as ichor sprayed. In a thunder of wings it sprang into the air and vanished from sight, bleats fading as it flew away.
Bee dropped beside the legate, who lay facedown on trampled grass.
“Bee, is he dead?” I demanded.
“I’m not dead.” Amadou sat up with a wince. His fancy cape was shredded. Blood stained his tunic.
Ghastly cries chittered out of the darkness. Huffing heat as of a steam engine chugging stirred the wind. Perhaps my tone was harsh, but I had no patience for ridiculous displays of masculine pride. “Next time you should listen to me, Legate. The spirit world will kill you.”
“Legate?” said Bee gently. “May I help you rise—?”
“I do not need your help.” He shook her off and rose with a grunt of pain.
“You’re just angry that she spoke those truthful words to you which you do not want to hear and aren’t accustomed to hearing,” I retorted, for I could see Bee’s expression twist as she pretended not to be hurt by his curt rejection. “Why were you so stupid as to follow us?”
“To take Beatrice back. You may remain in black Tartarus for all I care.”
Bee gasped, but I forestalled her retort.
“How do you intend to take her back, Legate? You have no idea where we are or what to do here. Your steel won’t cut the creatures here, although you can beat them with the hilt until they eat you. That creature would have killed you just now if Rory and I hadn’t fought it off.”
