Sarah's ankle caught on something metal and she went down, hard, the skin of her elbows coming off on the pavement, leaves and bits of vine bursting up around her like green smoke. 'I'm alright,' she told Ptolemy, and started to get up.
The thing she'd tripped on was metal, black metal spotted with rust. She could kind of make out its shape, hidden under tons of vegetation, small trees and blowsy bushes that shook in the wind. She had tripped over a wing. The entire metallic object, which had to be fifteen feet across, was an airplane, a small airplane turned upside down with its nose buried in the ground.
She would have looked at it some more if she hadn't heard an air horn just then. The sound vented up out of the tree-clogged streets on every side. She couldn't tell which direction it came from. 'What do they want?' she asked, as if she didn't know the answer.
Maybe she didn't. When she reached into her pocket for the reassuring angularity of her pistol, her fingers touched the soapstone scarab instead.
they Celt came for relics the relics of the Celt,Ptolemy told her.
Sarah got to her feet'her ankle felt sore but not broken'and they headed uptown again. Away from the last place they'd seen the mold maiden. If she tripped again Ptolemy was going to have to carry her. She didn't doubt that he could but it would hurt her image as the leader of this farce.
'You were supposed to watch the Tsarevich,' she told him, panting a little. There was a kind of natural trail up Broadway, a strip of bare pavement where the trees hadn't taken over quite yet. The hot asphalt felt strangely good under her feet. 'Those were my orders.'
and were so I sentries did but there and were I sentries,he told her.i spotted was i spotted
It actually helped a little to know he wasn't perfect. 'So you came looking for me, to report?'
yes and found instead i found yes herThe mummy raced ahead and grabbed something out of a tree. Sarah stopped and leaned forward, catching her breath.more there is more, he said, but she needed to process this one piece at a time.
'Just a second. So the Tsarevich didn't even send her here to take over Governors Island. He sent her for these relics? What kind of relics?'
Ptolemy held an undead squirrel in his hands. Its tail would never be bushy again and it was missing one leg. When it saw Sarah it grabbed at her with its tiny paws, gnashed its teeth at her. Lovely. The mummy turned away from her and crushed the animal to oblivion. Had he not grabbed it when he did it probably would have jumped down onto Sarah's neck. It would have torn open her throat. It was desperate for her energy. For life.
'Thanks,' she said, and then repeated herself. 'What kind of relics?'
a sword armlet a rope a sword an armlet
Sarah sighed. He could be so literal. She lifted her legs, trying to keep them from stiffening up, and looked behind them. Scattered movement a couple blocks away got her moving again. 'A sword. A rope. And an armlet,' she huffed. 'What does he hope to do with them?'
make magic,Ptolemy answered, as if she had asked what a soldier did with a firearm.he ghost will make ghost he will magic.
Ghost magic. Yeah. She knew how useful that could be. Maybe they should have kept the squirrel around. Maybe Jack could have used it to give them some pointers.
She could use some. She was running uptown, away from the mushroom queen, but also away from her boat. The survivors on Governors Island had assured her that Manhattan was almost free of ghouls, that they had all headed west. She wasn't about to trust that, though, since she was already further up Broadway than any of Marisol's people had been in twelve years.