Descent into the Depths of the Earth

She cleared her throat. Jus contrived to carefully lever up the fallen maple leaf and examine the indentation left in the mud below. The footprint could not have been made by a creature any heavier than a modest house cat.

Escalla took a step closer, and the sheer radiance of her blush made Jus look up into her coy smile. Looking at him from the corner of her eye, Escalla held her necklace stone in her hands.

“It’s, aah, a beautiful necklace.”

Jus knelt in the leaves before her, and Escalla cleared her throat.

“It’s slowglass. It sees everything I do and filters it outthe back in a fortnight’s time.” She blushed a deeper shade of cherry pink.“They’re called newlywed stones.”

Jus bared his head, slipping Cinders down onto his shoulders and letting his unhelmeted head gleam in the light. Escalla ventured a little closer, suddenly feeling an urge to pat the velvet stubble of Jus’ skull. Sheinstead bit her lip and smiled down into the fallen leaves.

“This is just too too sweet!”

Blinking, Jus looked at her from her tight little leggings up to the roots of her hair. “The necklace suits you.”

“Well, it is gorgeous. It’s tailor made.” The girlhalf turned away, hugging herself and casting one eye back across her shoulder. “Jus, I can’t! This is, like, really expensive!”

Looking a little confused, Jus sat back on his heels. Muscles moved under his shirt, making Escalla’s heart flutter in strange ways.

Jus scratched thoughtfully at his chin and said, “It doeslook expensive, but if it’s what you want…”

“Oh, oh, I want!” Escalla whirled, paled, blushed, and hidher face behind one hand. “I mean… it’s really appreciated. I know you think,well, that maybe I didn’t understand. I just wanted you to know…” Escallabit her finger, struggling her thoughts past her embarrassment. “I just wantedyou to know that, well, I’ve been thinking.” Her cheeks were aflame.Escalla pressed the backs of her hands against her face to cool them and felt a lump in her throat. “I’ve, ah, been thinking it through. I know that’s whatyou’d want me to do.” She felt her hands shake and hid them behind her back. “Imean, we have to be careful about all of this. It’s a change-not a badchange! — but it shifts everything into… well, you know… a new light.”

Jus rubbed at his nose, his confusion growing. He raised one brow and asked, “What have you been thinking?”

“Um, well, I’ve been thinking that it’s all right. You’vesort of grown, I’ve sort of grown…” The girl swallowed. “I… I think it’stime.”

Jus’ brows creased. “Time?”

“Oh, I know what you’re saying!” Escalla whirled,all-of-a-passion. “I know size differences might seem a… well, you know, abit of a problem! But, ah, I think there’s a spell somewhere that can help! Youknow, I could make myself a better scale. More able to, ah… to share… ah…” The girl suddenly blushed beet red and began prodding the tips of herindex fingers together. “Well, it just opens up possibilities, but we can wait.We have to wait. We might just have to be patient. You know-for a while…until we find the means…”

Sucking on a tooth, Jus crossed his legs, collected the faerie and arranged her on his knee. He hunched down to meet her eye in concern.

“Escalla, are you all right?”

“I’m fine!” The girl almost jumped out of her skin. “Justfine!”

“Good.” Jus tilted his head to examine her as if she might bemad. “Escalla, what are you talking about?”

Escalla felt the blood drain out of her whole body and go into storage somewhere on another plane. She wilted like a boiled lettuce as she stared at the Justicar.

“You didn’t give me the necklace, did you?” Still mystified,Jus shook his head. Escalla felt her whole life sliding into a horrible pit of embarrassment. “You didn’t give me roses, and you didn’t give me the sweetseither.”

“Ah, no.” Jus scratched his head. A mind used to sifting tinyclues and solving crimes struggled with the events of the last five minutes. “What was all that about scale?”

““Nothing!” Escalla jumped to her feet in fright. “Nothingat all! It was-” The girl looked for something neat and glib to save her face.“It was wing scales! Like butterflies! I need to change my scales! Dust themoff, polish them! And it will all take time!” The girl fluttered like a mad mothin a bottle. “Yep! Time! Which implies anticipation! Lots of anticipation, allworking toward, ah, fruit. No, not fruit. Cherry picking!” The girl whirled andgrabbed Jus by the armor. “No, not cherries! Bananas! Apples! Yes! Gottahave my wings ready by apple blossom time! Faerie tradition!”

Suddenly Escalla stopped, stared at Jus, and leaned away. “You gave me none of those gifts?”

“Nope.”

“Not roses, not my favorite sweets, not this tailor madenecklace just for me?”

The Justicar spread his hands in innocence. “Escalla,really!”

“Shhh!”The faerie’s face went blank. She lifted a hand forsilence as horrible thoughts skittered through her mind.

“It wasn’t you…” Sudden cold fear griped Escalla, andshe whirled to stare around at the forest in fright.

She fired off a battery of spells-an anti-scrying shield,then an illusion of herself and Jus still sitting talking by the stream. The girl grabbed Jus by the shirt and dragged him into a run, yanking him back toward the cart.

“Run! Come on! Run!”

She snatched her ice wand, Enid’s stun scroll, and herspellbooks all in a single mad second. Polk began wrenching his cart around to follow as she dragged Jus out across the stream. The girl took one look at the cart and fired a swarm of little magic bees that slashed the mule’s traces andcut them in two.

“Polk, get on the mule and ride! Hurry!”

“My cart!” Polk stared at the abandoned vehicle. “My cart!”

“Lose it!” Escalla whacked the terrified mule across itsrump. “Go!”

With a bleat of fear, the mule sped into the trees, plunging Polk through a bramble bush. Jus backed away from the stream, his hand on his sword, trying to cover Polk and Escalla’s backs.

“What is it? What’s there?”

“Just run! Just do it!” Escalla felt tears of panicflood her eyes. “Come on, man. I don’t want to lose you!”

The girl dragged Jus away, and he broke into a run. He led the way past Polk and the mule, twisting sideways down a deep gully filled with leaves that helped cover their trail. They fled past fallen statues, past another giant’s skeleton, and sped out onto an old road with weeds jutting upbetween the cobblestones. Escalla danced in a cold fright, keeping her companions in the cover of the trees.

They ran for a mile. Breathing hard, Jus stopped beneath a broken oak to look behind him. Nothing moved. The world seemed still. Escalla shot out of the skies, her eyes roaming in fright across the leaves.

“Jus, if we get separated, meet me at the Hydra’s lair! Justwait! Wait as long as it takes!” She half tore out of his hands, surged forward,gave him a kiss, and broke away. “You’re my friends! I’m not losing you!”

Something unseen flashed through the leaves high above. Escalla whirled, stabbed a spell into the treetops, and blasted a web across the trees. Something small and invisible struck the web, kicking and cursing. Escalla shot aside, invisible again. A line of golden bees hissed from midair to show her position as she passed. She blasted the branches and tops from trees, sending a cascade of debris tumbling through the forest.

Something invisible hovered in the falling leaves-somethingthat cursed and threw up a shield to ward away the debris. Stabbing upward from below came another spell, and another of Escalla’s webs hit something full forceand plastered a struggling shape against an old dead tree.

Leaves jerked as Escalla sped invisibly away-until a vastwall of fire suddenly thundered upward in her path. Escalla’s voice could beheard cursing, then cursing again as another fire wall blocked her escape off to one side. In a sudden flash, Escalla’s invisible body was somehow outlined insparkling light as an unseen enemy neutralized Escalla’s camouflage.

Jus was already running to her aid. He tackled the girl, balling himself about her as he leaped through the fire wall. Cinders’ peltshielded them from the heat. Rolling to his feet, Jus released the girl. Breaking away, she sped hard and fast through the underbrush.