Dragon Moon (22 page)

Finally, one night Chloe says, {
It's time. Are you strong enough, Peter?
}

{
Yes.
}

{
Mum told me you're hopeless. I think she may be planning to give you a different potion, a fatal one soon. Lila will come to you later tonight when my parents leave to hunt.
}

{
But if your parents are out hunting, they may spot me once I take to the air.
}

{
That's not the way you're leaving,
} Chloe says.

I stand as soon as I hear the key in the lock on my cell door. Philip swings the door open, gives me a wide grin. A short black, gray-haired and wrinkled Jamaican woman who I guess is Lila, the servant who brought up Chloe, stands beside him, holding a lit candle. I hold up my hands in front of my eyes, wince at the light.

“You sure you want to go that way?” Philip says.

Looking down at my naked human body, I shrug. “Your parents never saw fit to return my clothes.”

“They'd just get wet anyway,” Lila says and turns. “Follow me.”

I look at Philip for an explanation. He holds his hands up, showing me his palms, “Hey, my job was to get hold of the key and let you out. From here on it's up to Lila.”

She leads us past the cells to a large empty room at the end of the corridor. Dozens of old, rusty iron shackles hang on the walls. Skeletons and bones litter the floor. The air smells of ancient decay. “This is where the Bloods used to punish their enemies,” Lila says.

She picks her way through the bones, walking farther toward the back of the wall. As I follow her, I begin to feel a faint breeze, cold and wet, smelling of bat guano and stale air. “Here,” she says, standing in front of a crack in the wall, narrow but possibly just wide enough for a determined man to squeeze himself through.

The candle's flame dances with the breeze. “There's a river flowing through a cave on the other side of this. Some of us have escaped from here this way,” she says.

“Did they make it out?” Philip says.

“I don't know. At least they never came back.”

I reach toward the candle. “May I take this?”

“You may, but it won't help very much.” Lila hands it to me. “Please lead us out of the room before you leave us in darkness.”

Taking them back to the corridor, I say to Chloe's brother, “Are you both going to be okay, once your parents find I've escaped?”

Philip smiles. “They'll rant and rave, but as long as they don't know for sure how it happened, I think they'll leave all of us alone. For sure, neither Lila nor I are going to say anything.”

“Thanks,” I say to them. “If I can ever help you ...”

“Hey, we're doing it for Chloe,” Philip says. “My parents were wrong to do what they did. This has nothing to do with any tradition. They just want your wealth. Come back, rescue your wife, that's all we want.”

20

The ragged masonry scrapes my skin, scratching my back and my chest as I push through the crack in the wall sideways. When I'm finally on the other side of the wall, I hold up the candle and examine my surroundings.

Its feeble light barely penetrates the darkness. A few scattered stalagmites point up, waist high near me; otherwise, the ground looks smooth, wet, slippery. I have a sense of standing inside a huge cavern, but I can see neither the top of the cave nor its other walls. Wrinkling my nose at the dampness in the cold, stale air, I listen, hear only the dripping of water everywhere and the faint rush of flowing water somewhere, off in the dark.

{
Peter. Are you on the way?
} Chloe mindspeaks, masked.

{
Yes.
} I look at the half-melted candle, the darkness crowding around me, and smile. This is a fine mess you've gotten me into, I think. Taking a deep breath, I walk forward, toward the sound of running water.

{
Peter? Is everything all right?
}

My foot slips and I grab onto the tip of a stalagmite with my free hand. {
Everything's fine,
} I say. {
I'm in some sort of enormous cave and I have no idea where I'm going. What could be wrong with that?
}

{
If you think it's too dangerous, come back.
}

I turn, look behind me. Already the crevice is lost in the darkness. {
Not an option,
} I say.

{
We should have thought of another way. I don't want to lose you.
}

The candlelight glints off running water. I rush forward, sigh when I find a rivulet, no more than two feet wide. I decide to walk alongside it, see where it goes.

{
Peter?
}

I sigh again, stop. {
I don't plan to be lost and I don't plan to lose you either. But I need to concentrate now. Tell me what time it is.
}

{
One-fifteen in the morning.
}

{
If I don't call to you by ten, mindspeak me then.
}

{
I will, Peter. Be careful.
}

Sure, I think as I walk forward, I'll try to avoid being lost forever. I'll make every attempt I can to step around any deep holes. I'll be intent on not starving to death.

The bubbling and gurgling of the pool alerts me to its presence before I see it and the wall behind it. About ten feet in diameter, the tiny lagoon accepts the rivulet's flow without rising. I hold the candle high, try to see where the water might be flowing.

I find no sign of it, realize the water has to be flowing out somewhere beneath the pool's surface. Stepping closer, I find skeletons scattered around the water's perimeter. Lila's escapees, I think and shake my head.

Squatting by the pool, I study it, then look at the small nub of wax in my hand. As a youth I used to practice holding my breath underwater. In my human form, I rarely could go longer than six minutes, but in my natural form I never had a problem staying down thirty minutes or more. I put the candle on the cave floor beside me and will my body to change, sighing as my skin and bones shift.

At my full size, I'm almost too big for the pool. I go in headfirst, feeling around the wet, slippery walls until I find the passageway, the rushing water tugging at me to follow it. Once I'm sure the hole is large enough for me, I surface, take a great gulp of air and then another. After my lungs are so full that one more breath is impossible, I dive.

The current takes me and I swim with it as it carries me away from the candle's last few flickers into complete darkness. All I can hope is that the river surfaces somewhere before I run out of air.

Lost in wet darkness, I find only the gradual increase of my need to breathe gives me any sense of how much time has passed. When my lungs finally begin to burn, I sip water to ease my distress. It provides little relief and I sip again. Chloe, I think, I should say good-bye to her while I can.

The passage thins and the water shoots me forward — the walls scraping against my scales, a roaring sound growing somewhere ahead of me. A stone jutting from the wall clips my right shoulder, another cracks into my head and shocked, stunned, I inhale water, my lungs convulsing. I try to expel the fluid from my lungs but have no air left to push it out.

Suddenly, I'm spit out, carried along with a torrent of water falling through dark, open air. Coughing, sputtering, I gasp deep breaths. I try to open my wings but the pressure of the water cascading from above me batters them closed.

I slam into a wet surface and the waterfall drives me under. This time I use every part of my body — my wings, my legs, my tail — to fight the current. Finally, I break the surface of the water and gulp air, filling my lungs once again, swimming forward in the dark until I bump into a muddy bank.

Digging in the mud with my claws, I eventually get enough purchase to climb up and reach dry land. Breathing hard, my body battered and scratched from my underwater journey, I collapse to the ground immediately and surrender to sleep.

{
Peter? Peter?
}

No, I shake my head, try to cling to sleep.

{
Peter, it's after ten. Are you okay?
}

I groan, turn on the sandy ground. {
Mostly,
} I mindspeak. Opening my eyes, I'm surprised to find a faint light illuminating my surroundings.

{
Do you know where you are?
}

My muscles ache. As I stand up, every injured part of me registers its protest. I look around. {
I have no idea. ... I was in a river last night and I think it carried me a long way. There's a little bit of light here, a very tall waterfall and a huge circular lake. ...
}

{
Is there an opening?
}

{
I don't know yet.
} I look above the waterfall and my mouth drops open.

{
Peter?
}

{
The cave's gigantic! There's even room for me to fly.
} I stare at the cave's roof hundreds of feet above me, the few thin beams of light coming from narrow crevices surrounded by thousands of hanging bats. {
And every bat in Jamaica must live here. The place reeks of guano.
}

I study everything again. {
But I don't see any crevices large enough to use.
}

{
I wish there were,
} Chloe mindspeaks, her thoughts sad, muted.

For the first time since I entered the cave, I think of my bride's position. What agony it must be for her to sit in her room and wait, unable to do anything. {
Are you all right? Is something happening there?
} I say.

{
Pa and Mum are furious. You had to know they would be. They know we can mask our thoughts to each other — all of us can. They've told me, if you don't return soon or tell me where the treasure is, Henri will suffer the consequences.
}

{
Would they really hurt their daughter's son?
}

{
I don't know. Pa might. It's really up to Mum. Derek will do whatever he's told. Pa said he'll give you a few more days. After that he plans to drive to Kingston, to see what messages Derek has sent. If my brother found your treasure, I'm sure no one will be harmed.
}

I think of the secret passageway, the door hidden in the bushes. {
I doubt your brother will ever find the treasure room.
}

{
Then we need you to find your way out soon.
}

{
If it's possible, I will,
} I say. I wish I were as positive as my words, but I know all too well how much my body needs rest, nourishment and healing.

{
We should have found another way.
}

{
We didn't
}
,
I say. {
So we'll just have to make this way work.
}

{
What are you going to do?
}

The light within the cave flickers as a few bats leave their perches. I stare at them and scowl. Disgusting foul creatures. But, if I'm to go on, I need nourishment. {
First, I'm going to feed.
}

{
On what, Peter?
}

I look up and scowl again. {
I'll tell you later.
}

Flying to the cave roof, I gorge myself on dozens of bats, gulping them in midair as they swarm and try to escape me, grimacing at my need to feed on the tough, leathery, foul-tasting beasts, wishing there was another way to provide the meat and blood my body demands.

Afterwards, I return to my bed of sand and stone and heal my scrapes and bruises, reinvigorate my muscles. Sleep tries to take me but I resist. Chloe and Henri need me to press on.

I search the cave, working my way around towering stalagmites, scooting under dangling stalactites — like a creature working its way through a giant monster's teeth — until I find a small stream flowing from the end of the lake opposite the waterfall into a dark passageway.

I follow the stream, a weak breeze pushing me forward into the inky black. Stopping just before the darkness engulfs me, I gaze back at the relative comfort of the lighted cavern and a sigh escapes my lips.

Feeling my way forward, I keep my foreclaws in front of me, always following the stream, letting the wind at my back keep me on course. For what feels like hours, or days, I walk through passage after passage, working my way through forests of stalactites and stalagmites as the river widens and strengthens.

{
Peter?
}

I resist the temptation to stop.{
Is it morning already?
}

{
It's already nine, love. Are you doing okay?
}

{
For someone who has no idea where they are, I'm doing fine.
}

{
I hope so,
} she says. {
Pa asks me every morning, when are you going to tell him what he wants? You have to get here before he leaves for Kington.
}

Rushing on as quickly as I dare, I bump against rocks, stumble over projections of stone. One cavern gives way to the other, the river growing, getting louder — the breeze shoving me forward. Chloe lets me know when the day has passed, when midnight arrives.

Not daring to rest, I stumble forward, only stopping when I hear the roar of the river as it falls into a chasm somewhere in front of me. The breeze doesn't follow it and I let it guide me, feeling the way with my feet, smiling when I find a small lip of stone which thankfully skirts the chasm and then widens into a gravelly path.

“Way cool!”

“Fucking A!”

I grin at the sound of the voices, obviously American, almost laugh with delight when I see the faint glow of the cavers' lights.

Changing to my human form, I rush toward the glow, bumping and scraping against rocks, ignoring the scratches and the blood that follows. I find the light comes from a narrow passageway to the right of my path. I squeeze into it, sigh when it widens almost immediately.