“There’s something there,” said Sarah, in a remote, utterly disconnected tone. Dominic stopped. “It’s big. It’s old. And it’s hungry.”
“Where is it, Sarah?” I asked, keeping my voice level. Most telepaths respond better when people don’t sound concerned by the fact that they’ve fallen into a fugue state. I don’t understand the psychology behind it, but I’m not the telepath.
“I don’t know. Close. There’s too much earth between here and there, and the subway system is in the way —I can’t see it clearly. But it’s big.” She hesitated. “Did I say it was big?”
“You did,” I said soothingly. “How big is big? Is it bigger than a bulldozer?”
“It thinks big thoughts. It dreams big dreams.” Sarah twitched. “It’s asleep. It’s been asleep for a long time. I think … I think it’s hibernating. Waiting for something to change before it wakes up again.”
“Is it a dragon?” demanded Dominic. I shot him a warning look. His attention was focused fully on Sarah, posture tight with a degree of tension that I recognized from my own mirror. He was itching for a fight.
“I don’t know,” said Sarah, a note of peevish irritation creeping into her voice. “What does a dragon think like? You tell me, and I’ll ask it.”
“She can’t really do that,” I said, before he could ask her. “Sarah, is there anything you can give us as a pointer? What direction do we need to go?”
“Down.” She blinked, the blue returning to her eyes as she sat up in the chair and looked at us gravely. “You need to go way, way down, Very. And you need to go now, because I think somebody’s trying to wake it up.”
Twelve
“The problem with people who say monsters don’t really exist is that they’re almost never saying it to the monsters.”
THE FIRST OUT-OF-THE-WAY MANHOLE COVER we could find was located on the edge of Central Park, about a block and a half away from the hotel. It was mostly hidden in the middle of one of those little seating areas that spring up around the city like mushrooms after a hard rain. The few people who did walk by pretty much ignored us. “I love big city life,” I said quietly.
“What was that?”
“Nothing.” Dominic had removed his duster and shirt before taking the crowbar Sarah somehow managed to wheedle out of the hotel manager—when a cuckoo gets involved, it’s better not to ask exactly how they accomplish things—and setting to work. Sarah was back at the hotel, gulping Tylenol and keeping a telepathic “eye” on the area. She’d let us know if she saw trouble coming.
In the meanwhile, I was absorbed with the all-important task of checking my weapons, including the emergency throwing knives and smoke grenades I’d retrieved from Sarah’s closet. Well, that, and watching the way the muscles of Dominic’s back moved every time he strained to get a better degree of leverage on the manhole cover. Sure, he was Covenant, and I might have to kill him before everything was said and done, but the man had the sort of physique professional athletes would kill for. In his case, he probably had. All the training in the world won’t take the place of knowing that your performance on the field literally means the difference between life and death. So what if he was a dead man walking? He wasn’t dead yet, and the way he was carbonizing my hormones reminded me, graphically, that neither was I.
Dominic glanced up, as if he could feel my eyes on him, and scowled. “You could help, you know,” he said sourly.
“There’s only one crowbar, and I’m busy making sure we get back from the lizard hunt in one piece.” I slotted another throwing knife into its holster. “Don’t worry. It’ll be my turn to sweat soon enough.”
Muttering something in a language that sounded suspiciously like Latin, Dominic shook his head and went back to work.
I nearly stabbed myself in the leg. The first time she pulled that trick, I actually did—cuckoos mature into projective telepaths in their teens, riding what Antimony and Sarah call “the X-Men effect.” (My sister and my cousin: both enormous nerds.) Before that, she’d been strictly limited to feelings and vague impressions that were to actual sentences as interpretive dance is to the Viennese waltz.
“God, Sarah,” I muttered. Dominic glanced sharply in my direction, and I offered him a quick, reality-show- perfect smile. He shook his head again, looking baffled as well as disgusted, and bent back to his work.
“One subterranean tour of the island of Manhattan, coming right up,” I said, sheathing my last knife before sliding off the dumpster I’d been perching on. I trotted over to help Dominic get ready to descend into the darkness. The things I do to keep potentially extinct monsters from eating the human race, I swear.
The New York City subway system is a large part of the reason for the city’s massive cryptid population. Many species of cryptid prefer to live in darkness—hence the popularity of creepy old houses, supposedly haunted forests, and complex cave systems. When those aren’t available, a sufficiently large and complicated subway system will suit most cryptids just fine. As an added bonus, city subways tend to come with water and power systems that can be tapped with relative ease, allowing city cryptids to live in comfort, yet not miss out on their modern conveniences. A surprisingly large number of bugbears really enjoy their daytime talk shows.
Because of the city cryptids’ tendency to retreat underground when given the opportunity, I never go anywhere without a light, bug spray, and a water bottle in whatever bag I happen to be carrying. Just in case.
The manhole opened to reveal a rusty metal ladder bolted into the concrete and pointing straight down into the sewer system. Dominic insisted on taking the lead, presumably so he’d have the first opportunity to fight off anything that felt like attacking us. I didn’t object. If he wanted to feed himself to the monsters, it would both keep them from eating me and solve that nagging question of whether or not to kill him. Two birds, one stone.
By bracing my feet against one side of the narrow tunnel and my shoulders against the other, I was able— barely—to get sufficient leverage to let me pull the manhole cover back into place. Most of the light died once the opening was sealed, leaving only a few narrow beams to illuminate our descent.
“In a sewer, in the dark, with a Covenant member,” I muttered. “Can this day
The ladder ended after about fifteen feet, when my questing foot hit a chilly layer of half-congealed water. Grimacing, I dropped off the ladder, letting water soak through my socks, and pulled the cave light out of my bag,
