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few times, imitating an opening and closing beak. Negotiate. He wanted me to engage a lunatic who had already turned four people into smoking meat. Okay. I could do that.
“Alright, Jeremy!” I yelled into the night. “Give me the salamander and I won’t cut your head off!”
Jim put his hand over his face and did some shaking. I thought he was laughing, but I couldn’t be sure.
Unlike him I didn’t have the benefit of enhanced night vision.
Jeremy’s cackle reached a hysterical crescendo. “Stupid bitch!”
Jim peeled himself from the support and melted into the darkness, tracking Jeremy’s voice. His vision worked better than mine in low light, but even his sight failed in absolute darkness. He had to hunt by sound, which meant I had to keep Jeremy talking. While Jim stalked Jeremy’s melodious voice, Jeremy, in turn, stalked me.
Nothing to worry about, just a homicidal pyromaniac armed with a salamander in a sphere of enchanted glass and intent on setting what’s left of Atlanta on fire. The main thing was to keep the salamander’s sphere safe. If that thing broke, my name would be more famous than Mrs. O’Leary’s cow.
“Damn Jeremy, you need to work on your vocabulary. So many good names to call me and the best you could come up with is bitch? Give me the salamander before you hurt yourself.”
“Suck my dick…whore!”
A tiny spark flared into existence to the left of me. It hung suspended in the darkness, illuminating both the scaly outline of the salamander’s mouth and Jeremy’s hands clutching the glass sphere with white-knuckled need. The enchanted glass parted and belched the spark. The air hit the tiny packet of energy and the spark exploded into a fireball.
I ducked behind the support just as the fire smashed against concrete. Flames shot past on both sides of me. The acrid stench of sulfur stung my nostrils.
“That last fireball missed me by a mile. You shoot blanks with your other salamander, too, Jeremy?”
“Eat shit and die!”
Jim had to be close to him by now. I stepped into the open. “Come on, you sniveling shit for brains!
Can’t you do anything right?”
I saw flames, lunged to the side and hit the floor rolling. Above me the fire howled like an enraged animal. The handle of the knife burned my fingers. The air in my lungs turned to heat, and my eyes watered. I pressed my face into the dusty concrete, praying it didn’t get any hotter, and then suddenly it was over.
Screw this. I jumped to my feet and charged in Jeremy’s direction. The salamander flared within the sphere. I caught a flash of Jeremy’s crooked smile above the glass. It wilted as Jim’s dark hands closed around Jeremy’s throat. The arsonist slumped, ragdoll limp, the sphere rolling from his weakened fingers…
I dived for it, caught it three inches above the cement, and found myself face-to-face with the salamander. Ruby-red eyes regarded me with mild curiosity, black lips parted, and a long,