Shadow: Bloody Fairies Part 7

Pierus put a hand on Hippy's shoulder and bent down to her level. "Humans don't know about us," he said in a low voice. "Try and be a little more circ.u.mspect, my dear."

"Circ.u.m what?"

Pierus sighed. "Never mind. Come along, we've wasted enough time. If my calculations were correct, we shouldn't have far to go. You, human, bring me your bright light, would you?"

"Why not?" Poppy picked up her light and followed him to the walls.

Hippy trotted behind while Pierus studied the rock. She was far more interested in the human. Really, she could have pa.s.sed for a fairy if she was shorter, or a muse if she was a lot taller. But something bothered her. She couldn't quite put her finger on what it was.

"Here," Pierus said.

The light stopped over a series of markings on the wall. Next to the markings, a tunnel branched away.

"These are fascinating." Poppy leaned forward. "This is a Greek script, but I'm not familiar with it at all."

"Of course you're not, women have no place reading the ancient texts," Pierus snapped. "Would you keep that light steady?"

Poppy glanced over her shoulder at Hippy. "Is he always this pleasant?"

Hippy barely heard her because underneath the unfamiliar letters, she saw an etching of a lady with snakes on her head. "Hey, that's like the statue in your tent! The little one. I smashed the big one over a vamp's head."

"You broke my statue?" Pierus scowled.

"That's Medusa," Poppy said. "She could turn men to stone just by looking at them. You're very small to be smas.h.i.+ng heads, aren't you?"

Pierus strode down the tunnel. Hippy hurried to keep up. Poppy walked beside her, her light bobbing around their feet.

"He your boyfriend?" Poppy whispered.

"Ew! He's way too old." Hippy screwed up her nose in disgust.

"Your dad?"

"No, he's a muse. My dad's fighting vamps."

"A muse?" Poppy flashed her light at Pierus's silhouette. "In what respect? Are you an artist?"

"Don't be silly, I'm a b.l.o.o.d.y Fairy."

"No need to snap dear, you could be a b.l.o.o.d.y garbage collector for all I care, I'm just trying to understand how a pack of lunatics came to be in a cave that's supposedly been sealed off for thousands of years."

"We came through the rip."

"Through the what?" Poppy's question was cut off when they followed Pierus around a bend in the pa.s.sage and almost stumbled into him.

"You, human woman." Pierus motioned her forward.

"Call me Poppy," Poppy said. "It makes you sound less like an a.s.s."

"How many years have elapsed since the sorcerers separated the dimensions?"

"How many years since who did what now?" Poppy pushed her gla.s.ses up on her nose and shone the light on Pierus's face.

He put a hand up to s.h.i.+eld his eyes and squinted. "Would you stop that, you dreadful creature?"

"Didn't you say she doesn't know anything about Shadow?" Hippy said.

"Oh, yes of course." Pierus sighed. "What number do you put on the lapsing of time?"

Poppy blinked. "Are you asking me what year it is?"

"Yes!"

"It's 1982."

"One thousand nine hundred and eighty two years since what?" Pierus scowled. "I know for a fact Dream is older than that. From which catastrophic event are you counting?"

"The birth of Christ," Poppy said. "Where are you people from?"

Pierus walked up and down the tunnel. He counted on his fingers and muttered to himself.

"What's he doing?" Poppy whispered.

"I don't know." Hippy decided not to admit she'd lost track of the conversation. She wasn't that good with numbers.

"Ah, religion," Pierus said out loud. "How like humans to use it as a marker of time. I know where we are now. Human woman-"

"Poppy," Poppy said.

Pierus made an impatient noise. "Where are we, geographically?"

"In the tunnels under the old city of Thebes in Boetia. At least, it's where I believe old Thebes is located, even if-"

"And what exactly are you doing here?"

"Looking for my hat."

"Irritating woman. Why are you here?"

Poppy folded her arms. "You first."

"We are seeking an ancient treasure with the power to send an army of vampires back into the Darkness from whence they came," Pierus said.

"That's fascinating. I'm looking for a herd of unicorns to ride around in the moonlight."

"What's a unicorn?" Hippy asked.

"It's a horse. With a horn coming out of its head."

"They live down here?"

Poppy groaned. "Honestly, is there something wrong with her?"

"Apparently she was dropped on her head as a child," Pierus said.

"Hey!" Hippy kicked him in the ankle.

Pierus ignored her. He spoke through clenched teeth, as though dealing with two particularly fractious children. "Now young woman, you strike me as an intelligent sort, who wouldn't blow holes in caves for nothing. Tell me why you're here."

Poppy straightened her back. "Pandora's Box," she said.

Pierus went a step closer to her. A tic jumped in his forehead. "Is that what they call it now? What makes you think it's here?"

Something changed in Poppy's demeanour. Her eyes sparked. She paced up and down on the spot, using her hands to emphasise her words. "I've been following the trail for a while," she said. "I happened to have the opportunity to read a very, very, ancient fragment of text that led me to believe Pandora's Box was not in fact an a.n.a.logy for the dangers of arcane knowledge, or the loss of innocence, or whatever else, but in fact an actual physical object of immense value. According to what I read, the myth about Pandora opening the box was all wrong. It was a cautionary tale. The box was in fact created to hold something the ancients feared, and she guarded it. Of course I searched in all the wrong places, until I found irrefutable evidence that led me to believe Medusa was invoked to guard the treasure. I knew there was a temple to Medusa in ancient Thebes, so naturally I came here. To a sealed cave. And found you two and your acrobatic friends."

Pierus scowled. "You were nearly right," he said. "We are in fact in search of the same artefact. And it is indeed hidden here."

"How do you know?"

"Because I helped to hide it. And if I have my bearings right-" he turned in a slow circle. "We must be close. Now tell me young woman, what did you intend to do with what you call Pandora's Box once you obtained it?"

Poppy straightened her gla.s.ses. Her voice was perfectly friendly and even. "It would have to go to the museum, of course. It would be a national treasure."

Pierus gave a low, deep chuckle and walked on down the tunnel. "Really. So you are not down here for any kind of personal gain?"

"I absolutely resent what you are implying," Poppy said. "I'm trying to build a professional reputation as an archaeologist here."

"And what do you intend to do when the fairy and I return to Shadow with it and leave you here?"

"Well seeing as you're obviously both insane I'm not all that worried about you disappearing."

"Then you won't mind accompanying us for the moment."

Hippy trotted alongside the two of them, only half-listening to the conversation. Somewhere nearby she could hear the unmistakable sound of water trickling over rock. She wandered away from them, seeking the source of the sound. The tunnel dipped down and the sound grew louder. All at once she teetered on the edge of a hole in the path. She yelped and jumped back.

"Hippy?" Pierus called from somewhere nearby.

"I found water!" Hippy dropped to her stomach and looked in the hole. Three feet below, a shallow, dark stream rushed past. She shuddered. She didn't want to fall in that.

Pierus and Poppy caught up and leaned over the hole.

"Well done my dear," Pierus said. "This is exactly what we were looking for."

Hippy beamed.

"We'll need to go down there."

Her smile vanished. "Down there? Into the water?"

"Is that a problem?"

Hippy scooted back from the edge. "You go. I'll wait here."

Pierus raised an eyebrow. "I thought you came to help me, not sit around while I did all the work."

"Oh for Heaven's sake, you two." Poppy put her hands on the edge of the hole and dropped down into it.

"Come along my dear," Pierus said.

Hippy pouted. "I don't like water."

"Now."

Hippy heaved a sigh, stalked back to the hole and dropped into it. She landed with barely a splash in icy cold water that went right up to her waist. She screamed.

Poppy, just a few feet away, put her hands over her ears. "Would you not do that? It echoes in here!"

Hippy quickly hiked up her belt to keep Fluffy Ducky dry and put her arms out to get her balance. "Yuck, yuck, yuck!"

Pierus swung himself down from the hole and slid into the water behind her. He had to bend his head to avoid hitting the roof of the tunnel. He looked both ways. "In which direction are we from the temple?"

"Just south," Poppy replied.

"Upstream," he said, and started walking against the current.

Hippy followed him. Walking against the swift flow of the water was difficult enough to start with. The wetter her leggings and dress got, the more difficult it became. Her bare feet slid on the slick rocks. Poppy's torch lit up the black water just enough to make it look murkier and more dangerous. Hippy tried not to think about water monsters. Huge fish with sharp teeth. Swimming vamps. Eels with lights on their heads. Dragons. It was harder and harder to keep her balance when she started to shake.

Poppy grabbed the back of her dress and kept her upright when she almost slipped. "Steady on."

Hippy grabbed her arm and held on tight.

"So let me get this straight," Poppy said. "You can scale a vertical wall and drop ridiculous heights without batting an eyelas.h.i.+ haven't figured those out, but I willbut you're afraid of water?"

Hippy nodded.

"What are you, a cat?"

She shook her head.

"You're an odd one."

"I'm a b.l.o.o.d.y Fairy."

"Yes, you said that before. What is that, some kind of circus cult?"

"No, it's my family. We're all afraid of water."

"Why?"