“There’s steps to the right! I’m going up.”
The steps rose up from below the surface of the water. Anya held back as Ardent jumped up, and she turned aside just in time as he shook himself, so hundreds of droplets of disgustingly dirty sewer water flew onto her back instead of straight into her face.
“Ardent!”
“Sorry. Forgot,” said Ardent.
Anya followed the dog onto the steps, almost slipping because the lower ones were covered in algae or something even worse. Smoothie followed quickly, muttering complaints under her breath about what had been done to the canal and, by connection, the river.
At the top of the steps, Shrub was studying some marks painted on the door there, a rough oak barrier that was already slightly ajar. Anya held the lantern high so she could see too. The marks looked like they were painted in blood.
“Thieves’ Guild marks,” said Shrub. “Don’t know what they all mean, but that one is ‘Beware.’ ”
“Like the giant,” said Anya. She peered more closely at the marks, and a broad stain below them. A big puddle of dried blood.
“Is that … The thief must have died here!”
Nah,” commented Shrub. “That’s spilled orange paint. Looks red in the blue light.”
“Oh,” said Anya. She started to take a deep breath of relief but managed to stop herself in time. Even breathing through her mouth the stink was almost unbearable. “Well, we have to go on. But this time, everyone really needs to be looking out, in case there is a monster guarding the way.”
“What do we do if there is one?” asked Ardent. “Bite it?”
“We either sneak past or sneak back,” said Anya. “Very quietly and carefully.”
True to her words, she leaned over Shrub and pushed the door open as gently as she could. It creaked and groaned a little, but moved fairly easily. Shrub stuck his head around when it was open wide enough.
“All clear,” he whispered. “More steps.”
Anya pushed the door a little more, and squeezed through after Ardent and the newt. Her lantern was flickering now, and she regretted not bringing another candle stub from the tin box on the boat. But if it did go out, the animals would still be able to see, and they could guide her. She really hoped it didn’t come to that.
At the top of the steps, Shrub halted. Ardent went to his side and crouched, sniffing. Anya came up, keeping the lantern low. Smoothie edged in behind her, so they were all crouched close together.
Ahead lay a vaulted chamber that had once been a very large wine cellar. There were still the remnants of a few huge barrels against one wall, and the collapsed timbers of a wine rack mixed in with a mound of broken bottles.
“What’s that sound?” whispered Anya.
She could hear a clinking noise, like forks and spoons being put back in the cutlery chest one by one. Clink-clink-clink-clink. But there was something else as well, a strange warbling or clucking sound.
“Bluck, bluck, bluck, bluck … ”
Ardent moved past Shrub, his ears up, tongue hanging out. Anya lifted a hand to restrain him, but then let it fall and followed him instead, walking as if in a daze. Both of them were drawn inexorably to that strange clucking sound and the clink of metal.
“What are you doing?” hissed Shrub, aghast. But they trod past him without taking any care to sneak or be quiet.
“What are they doing?” asked Smoothie. She stepped past Shrub to clutch at Anya’s sleeve, but the princess shrugged her off and kept moving into the open cellar.
As she walked straight out, a hideous creature emerged from behind one of the decaying barrels. It had the head of giant rooster, connected to a ten-foot-long lizard-like body covered in greenish scales. Two scarred stumps on its back showed where it had once had wings, the stumps moving even now, as if in its tiny mind it still was trying to lurch forward in flight.
A thick metal chain was fixed to a manacle on its back right leg, the links rattling as it trudged forward.
Its piercing red eyes were fixed on Ardent and Anya, but it was the dreadful bluck-bluck-bluck coming from its blackened beak that kept them mesmerized.
Princess and dog continued to walk straight towards it, and the cockatrice reared back, preparing to strike with its deadly beak—straight at the defenseless Anya.
But the blow never landed.
Smoothie ran forward, and with her otterish grace, swept up a piece of plank from an old barrel and swung it like a bat at the cockatrice’s head. There was a very loud squawk, an explosion of feathers, and the creature slowly subsided to the floor, its red eyes dimming.
Anya came instantly, horribly, fully aware of herself again. So did Ardent, who barked and ran first one way and then the other, biting at the air. Both of them had known what was happening, but hadn’t been able to resist the compulsion to walk towards the creature.
“That horrible warbling noise,” said Anya, fighting back the shakes. “I thought it was their stare that was meant to hypnotize the prey, but it was that awful sound it made!”
“Whose stare?” asked Smoothie. She had the plank ready to hit the monster again.
“That creature’s,” said Anya. “It’s a cockatrice. Head of a rooster, body of a dragonet. Sir Garnet Bester’s book never mentioned the horrible sound. It got into my head, and I couldn’t get free of it … ”
“Should I kill it?” said Smoothie unemotionally. She raised her plank.
Ardent calmed down enough to sniff at the unconscious monster. He only needed a few sniffs before he shook his head at Smoothie.
“He was human once,” he said. “I c-c-an smell it, under all the magic and great age. He was transformed a long time ago. Chained here, in the dark, to guard the back door.”
“We can’t kill it … him … then,” said Anya, correctly interpreting the look from Ardent. She hesitated, then bent down to touch the creature’s head. “I’ll return one day, and change you back. I … ”
She hesitated, then added, “I promise.”