snowball was starting to melt, and that would never do. He meant to keep it in the freezer as a symbol of his conquest of the Continuascope-his first step toward taking his rightful place as the master of Ordinary Farm.
He wrapped the snowball in his handkerchief once more and placed it carefully back in the pocket of his jacket, then headed up the stairs.
The rain was pelting down as he left the silo, making his hood bounce above his eyes as he headed back to the house, but beneath his jacket Colin was already sweating-the coat had been good for the Ice Age, but was way too warm for even a rainy summer evening in Standard Valley. Still, he barely noticed. He was already trying to decide where he would go next-or when, more likely, since he had a better grasp on how to set the time coordinates than those that seemed to control location. Would he have to compensate for how the earth changed position over time? That might mean he’d have to create or find some complicated computer program. Of course, if it meant he could travel back to ancient Egypt to see the pyramids built, or to the walls of Troy to watch Achilles fight Hector, it would be worth it.
He was just wondering whether he could take a video camera with him to the past, and if there was a way to make money from that-a feature-length movie of real dinosaurs, maybe, which he could claim he animated-when he realized that something was wrong. The worst of the lightning and thunder had passed, although he could see flashes and thunderheads beyond the western hills and headed toward them, but the expanse of ground between the silo and the driveway was empty but for a tractor deserted when the storm got bad. As he stared he noticed a rather curiously large amount of crawling shapes were scuttling across the mud as though the rain had flooded all the small animals out of their tunnels. It was a strange, lonely scene, but it didn’t explain why he had the distinct and disturbing feeling that something was watching him.
He stopped, squinting at the distant house, but although he could see lights in the window and what might even have been shapes moving behind the curtains in a couple of the rooms, he couldn’t imagine anyone being able to see him out here in the dark. He took a few more steps, then the wind changed, and suddenly a new scent swept over him, sharp and sour as vinegar.
Startled, Colin turned and looked back toward the silo. Something was coming around the tall old structure, walking toward him on all fours with slow, measured steps. An animal. A really big animal. Its head lifted even as Colin stood staring, as though it had not noticed him until now, and the lights from the distant house reflected orange in the lamps of its eyes, as if they were windows and some terrible flame burned inside the low, slanted skull.
One of the manticores was loose.
Colin whimpered in terror, then turned, taking a few running steps toward the house, but he was overbalanced by his backpack and the clumsy coat. He skidded in the mud and tumbled to his knees, then could not get up for a moment as he thrashed helplessly in the muck. He looked back, certain he would see that pale, horribly humanoid face right on top of him but the manticore had not increased its pace, as though it knew he could not outrun it. And the monster was right-it was a hundred yards to the house at least and Colin knew he couldn’t possibly outrun the thing. He whimpered again. The creature kept coming, but now he could see something wasn’t right about it. Its head trembled a bit from side to side, like Gideon’s after he took Colin’s mother’s medication, and its steps seemed awkward, as if it had hurt itself. Despite this, though, it continued toward him, slowly but relentlessly. He scrambled to his feet and began to run again but he stepped on something that burst wetly beneath his foot, and he fell again. His backpack with the precious Continuascope slid down around his arms and he had to shrug it off, still making little noises of terror. When he had finally freed himself the monster was only yards away. Colin tried to get up but knew it was no use. Even if he ran now, the thing would be on him in a second. The house waited, but far out of reach, an impossible distance away.
Lightning flashed, and the manticore’s eyes flashed too. “Help!” Colin screamed. “Help! Mr. Walkwell! Mother!” But the thunder drowned his cries. He scooped up a handful of mud and threw it at the beast but it only spattered harmlessly against its already mud-smeared legs. As it drew nearer he could see the foul yellow teeth in its drooling mouth, the weirdly apelike nostrils flaring as it inhaled his scent.
“Go away!” he shrieked. “Leave me alone!” His hand settled on the wrapped snowball and he threw it, handkerchief and all; it struck the manticore square on the snout and burst in a puff of white. The thing’s head and neck continued to shake and tremble, but otherwise it showed no sign of having noticed. The handkerchief caught for a moment on the creature’s bristly cheek, then slid off and fluttered away in the rising wind.
Jaws grinning, eyes glowing like a jack-o-lantern’s, the beast slouched toward him.
Chapter 35
Lucinda didn’t think she had ever been so scared in her life, and she was a girl who’d been dangled upside down in mid-air by an angry dragon. But the night she had been tangled in Meseret’s harness had been so absurd, so crazy, that even at the time it hadn’t felt entirely real. This was different. A bad, bad man was holding a knife against her throat-a man who she knew wouldn’t hesitate to kill her if it would benefit him. And on top of everything else, he smelled awful , rank with sweat and stale tobacco, as though he had been wearing the same clothes for days: she was terrified she might be sick, might startle him by gagging. “Please don’t hurt me,” she whispered. “I’m not going to scream or try to get away.”
“That’s good,” he told her just as quietly. “Because I want to hear what that little Patience is saying.”
That little Patience was Mrs. Needle, of course, who was facing Stillman and his gun across Gideon Goldring’s sickbed on the other side of the window. Gideon was struggling in his restraints but his eyes were unfocused and he hardly seemed aware of what was going on right in front of him. Dankle the lawyer- everyone’s lawyer, it seemed- cowered against the wall beside the door, doing his best not to be noticed.
“God,” Lucinda could hear Stillman saying, “I almost feel sorry for Gideon Goldring, and that’s something I thought I’d never say. What must it be like having a viper like you as an employee, Ms. Needle? Challenging, I’m sure.”
“I have done nothing but sacrifice for Gideon and his needs.” Mrs. Needle was very carefully not looking at Stillman’s gun. Lucinda wondered how much the witch knew about modern weapons-she had been born five centuries ago, after all. For a moment Lucinda half-hoped she would try something foolish and get shot. “But it has come to the point where Gideon has put the farm at risk too many times,” she went on in her calm, precise voice. “Some of us… some of us have nowhere else to go.”
“Yeah, that’s sad. You should find somebody who cares and tell him about it.” Stillman waved the gun around as if it were a laser pointer, as if they were in the middle of nothing more serious than a boardroom dispute. “This farm belongs to my family-which means it really belongs to me. The polite fiction that Gideon’s wife ran off somewhere doesn’t hold water. I knew Grace Tinker since she was a little girl. She loved Gideon, astonishing as that might be. She wouldn’t have gone anywhere.”
“Our aims are not so different, Mr. Stillman.” Mrs. Needle still wasn’t looking at the gun, but she was looking at Edward Stillman with an intensity Lucinda had never seen-almost like some hypnotist in an old movie. “You want what is best for this place. So do I. Perhaps
… perhaps we could work something out… ”
Outside the window, Kingaree tightened his grip on Lucinda, then leaned even closer until his lips touched her ear and tears of fright formed in her eyes. “Listen to that little earwig getting ready to sell me out,” he snarled. “Oh, she’s fine to look at, but she is rotten all through. I should have known she would never make good on all those promises.”
Thunder boomed just overhead, near enough to make Lucinda gasp. More fat drops of rain began to fall. One of them splashed down her forehead, but she didn’t dare move with the sharp blade at her throat.
Stillman laughed. “What about your cowboy friend, whoever he is? Have you already got everything you want out of him?”
“Please, Mr. Stillman… ” began Barnaby Dankle, but no one was paying attention to him.
“Kingaree? He’s nothing,” said Mrs. Needle. “A bravo, a common criminal. I only brought him in to make certain neither Gideon nor Mr. Dankle turned tricksy… ”
