own self never did agree about which of her sons was best suited to be cacique after me. She wanted me to choose Haubey because she always favored him. But I wanted him to serve in the army. Caonabo was my choice for cacique all along because he is the steadier man. But me sister the noble cacica is a stubborn woman. She would never see one single change to the law. I respect the ancestors as much as she do. But there come a time when change must happen. We have contained the salt plague with our behiques, and now we have wars to fight elsewhere. I need Haubey back from his exile.”
“He’s gone ahead to Europa with a small advance party,” said Bee.
“He’s a scout gone to Europa, that is certain. Yee shall take the cacica’s head to him and he shall make of it a cemi. With the cemi of Anacaona in his possession, he shall be allowed to return to the court of Caonabo. War shall come, from the west or the north, from the Purepecha Empire or the Empire of the Comanche. I’s not sure. Caonabo shall administer. Haubey shall fight.”
At the cave mouth, the big cat put his ears back. The hair on the back of his neck was all a-bristle. Wind spattered burning sparks of sand all the way up the tunnel, so hot Bee and I had to shield our faces. When we lowered our hands and turned back to the cacique, the opia was gone.
12
“We’d better go.” I picked up my end of the chest.
Bee stared at the spot where the cacique had been standing, then grabbed the other handle. With the chest swaying between us, we emerged out of the cave onto a beach.
The sky was as gray as northern slate, and the sea was a churning boil of smoke. Currents and swells roiled the surface, and wind kicked up spills of mist like choppy waves. Whitecaps flicked into existence and vanished. The strand that ought to have been sand was red coals and smoking ash. Only the sandals Vai had gifted me with protected my feet, for although common sense told me the leather ought to be burning, it did not. Bee wore boots. Rory sat in the cave mouth, ears flat, not coming out.
“I can see why it’s called the Great Smoke.” Bee wiped her eyes. “Do you think that could be the mist I walk through when I dream?”
I smacked my lips. “I hope your dreams don’t taste as nasty as this air does. How can we possibly cross that?”
Smoke rushed up from the shoreline exactly like a big wave crashing in. Sulfurous fumes engulfed us. Coughing, I sucked for breath. Surely this was what lungs full of hot tar felt like! Beneath my sandals the ash of the shore hissed. A current like the blast of a furnace dragged at my body. I staggered, boiled off my feet, but the chest anchored me to Bee. She was immovable.
As quickly as it had poured in, the wave of smoke drained away.
I blinked gritty tears out of my eyes. Tufts of mist like the dregs of cigarillos bubbled off my limbs and drifted to the sand. We hadn’t moved, but the beach was now smoldering. Fat balls of greasy smoke puffed along its length and rolled downslope into the sea.
“We should have gone with General Camjiata,” said Bee.
Gagging, I licked a stink of rotting eggs off my lips. “I’m afraid I made a terrible mistake by listening to the opia.” I took a step back, but Bee stayed put, tugging me to a halt.
“No, wait, Cat. Listen! There are voices in the smoke.”
Movement chased through the swirl of the Great Smoke. Shapes flashed beneath the surface, but the churning gray fog obscured their features. All I heard was a bass humming like a hoarse man with a very deep voice singing a single tone.
A sweep of color washed through the smoky sea.
“Is it the tide of a dragon’s dream?” I croaked, incandescent with terror. I groped for my sword, but it was as inert as lead.
Bee’s tone was more breath than voice. “It’s a dragon.”
Night swept down. Lights like fireflies twinkled against a black sky. The sea surged, lifting like cloth raised from beneath by a hand. A bright shape emerged, smoke spilling off it in streams.
The dragon loomed over us. Its head was crested as with a filigree that reminded me of a troll’s crest, if a troll’s crest spanned half the sky. Silver eyes spun like wheels. It was not bird or lizard, nor was it a fish. Most of its body remained beneath the smoke. Ripples revealed a dreadful expanse of wings as wide as fields, shimmering pale gold like ripe wheat under a harsh sun. When its mouth gaped open, I knew it could swallow us in one easy gulp.
We had come to a place we ought not to be.
Awe deadened my heart and silenced my voice as I waited for the leviathan to devour us. Because wasn’t that what they did? Eat foul little creatures like me?
Bee’s voice rang out. “Greetings, Mighty One! I suppose you are one of those whose dreams I am obliged to wander on my restless nights. It’s very disconcerting. I must say, I could not appreciate that vision of my dearest Cat embracing a man so enthusiastically. There are some things I really do not care to see, and that is one of them. But be assured! I do as I am told. I’m very obedient! Furthermore, I should like to remind you that my cousin and I at great risk to ourselves unearthed a nest of hatchlings in the spirit world. I must suppose that any hatchlings who survive will grow to become such resplendent creatures as you.”
I gaped as the filigree crest flared, tightened, and widened again. Colors flashed through the dragon’s skin like spears from a rainbow.
Bee went on as in answer to a reply I had not heard. “So, if you please, Honored One, as a favor, and possibly because we have done you a service beforehand, could you please convey me and my cousin here and that cat over there and everything we carry safely across the Great Smoke to the shores of the land we call Europa?” She dipped a courtesy. “If you would be so kind.”
Down its head came like the inexorable fall of fate when the unsuspecting victim’s eyes are at last and too late opened to her doom.
“Don’t run, Cat,” said Bee. “Never run. Stand your ground. Look them in the eye. You were right for us to come here. And now I’m right.
I was so scared that I was actually afraid I was going to pee myself. That was the only reason I didn’t run, because I knew if I ran I would lose all my dignity and be very sticky afterward.
The dragon rested its head on the burning sands. The head alone was as big as a cottage. Its jaw opened to reveal a pale pink tongue. Instead of teeth, its upper mouth was rimmed with what looked like white, hairy combs as long as I was tall.
“It doesn’t have teeth,” said Bee. “How interesting! So you see, Cat, it can’t eat us.”
I found a croak. “It can still swallow us.”
“Rory!” she called, ignoring my perfectly rational observation. “We’re leaving.”
He began to pad away into the darkness of the cave.
“Rory!” I was suddenly more afraid of losing him than of the dragon. “
Head down, he crawled over to us as if I were dragging him on a leash. Maybe I was. Perhaps I had inadvertently leashed him to my service, just as I had been chained by my sire.
When he reached me, I extended a hand. He hissed.
“Don’t you dare bite me!” I slapped his nose. “You’re coming with us whether you want to or not.”
His answering growl was more of a pathetic moan.
“Trust me, Rory.” I set a hand on his big head.
The dragon’s silver eyes had ceased whirling and now, like mirrors, reflected all that lay before it. I saw myself bedraggled, with the basket over my shoulder and my locket and sword like dull lumps of stone. Rory had fluffed out his fur to make himself look bigger than he already was. Bee shone like a queen, as radiant as a lamp.
I met her gaze in the mirror of the dragon’s eyes. I nodded.
She exhaled. “Not every young woman gets to march into the gullet of Leviathan.” The crack in her voice