fast.
“It was brown and yellow, about as long as her arm. It’s not one she knows. It went back into the brush after it bit her.”
“All right,” Jerusha said. “Everyone be careful, that snake is still around here. Tell Efia it will be okay. Just lay back and relax. Here…” She handed Cesar a roll of bandages. “Tie a strip of this around her leg and arm right above the wounds-tight, but not too tight.” There was cobra antivenom in the kit, but without knowing if the snake was a cobra or not, Jerusha didn’t know whether it might do more harm than good. The instructions in the kit were of little help.
Efia was crying. Jerusha stroked her head. The girl was sweating. “Kafil-get some water and a cloth. Put it on her head.” Jerusha opened the suction device in the kit and placed it over the wound, pulling on the plunger. An ugly mixture of pus and blood came out. The children gathered around made noises of disgust, and Efia’s cries became louder. “Hush!” she told them. “Let me work…”
She knew from her experience in the parks and the occasional snakebites there that suction usually did little to remove the venom, nor could it stop the necrosis of the tissue. She also knew that victims needed to be seen by a doctor as soon as possible after a bite. Here, there was only Jerusha and whatever was in the kit.
The swelling was worsening, and Efia’s breath was shallowing. Her eyes were closed. Jerusha could feel panic rising in her own chest. She quickly filled a syringe with the antivenom and injected it into Efia’s arm.
She resumed using the suction device on the bite sites. “Come on,” she breathed toward Efia, who had slipped into unconsciousness. “Come on, girl…”
She worked on the girl, as the jungle howled derision at her, as the children watched, as monkeys chattered and chased each other through the tree branches overhead, as the shafts of sun slid through the gaps in the canopy overhead. Efia’s breathing continued to worsen. Sweat poured from her, then ominously stopped. The skin around the wounds putrefied sickeningly.
Jerusha suddenly realized that she hadn’t heard Efia take a breath in far too long. “No!” she shouted. To the jungle, to the children around her. “No! Efia… ”
There was no answer. Only the still and silent body in front of her.
Damascus, Syria
The Caliphate of Arabia
Damascus lay on its plateau gleaming like scattered self-luminous jewels in the night.
Tom Weathers touched down in the old town on a plaza in front of a giant white building whose dome and minaret, lit respectively gold and blue, marked it as a major mosque. Under his arms he carried Ayiyi and the Mummy. The Darkness rode his back, her arms around his neck and her pipe-stem legs wrapped around his waist.
There wasn’t much traffic here this late. Tom let them down to the pavement. “Okay, this time you’re on your own,” he told them. “The Darkness will give you cover; you other two wander around and, y’know, spread the love.” He looked closely at the Darkness. She had her arms crossed and a dubious expression on her dark pixie face. “Candace, you sure you’ll be okay by yourself?”
“Of course I will, silly fool,” she said. “No one can see me. No one find me.”
Solemnly she touched the eyes of both other children. Venom dripped from Ayiyi’s spider jaws and fell hissing on the pavement. The Mummy only nodded, her face unreadable beneath the bandages that covered her.
Candace raised her arms, and Darkness issued from her mouth, ears, eyes. Rolled away from her like smoke. In a heartbeat she was gone, shrouded in black fog.
Before the cold black tentacles closed around him Tom Weathers was in orbit.
20
Tuesday,
December 15
On the Lualaba River, Congo
People’s Paradise of Africa
The Lukuga river jagged sharply to the north just before joining the Lualaba. Wally studied a map in his guidebook. The Lualaba was itself a tributary of the famous Congo River.
He passed a village nestled where the two rivers met. Kongolo, according to the guidebook. He slowed down, so that the villagers could get a clear look at the metal man driving a PPA boat. Most fled. But a few folks saw him and pointed. He sped up again when Kongolo was behind him.
A barge floated somewhere on this tangle of waterways. A barge that had supplied the Nyunzu lab with the virus that had killed Lucien. Wally kept reminding himself to leave a few survivors when he finally found the barge. Survivors who could report his whereabouts. Which, he hoped, would keep people off Jerusha’s trail.
The files from Nyunzu said the central lab, the centerpiece of the PPA’s project to create an army of child aces, was in Bunia. He found the village on the map, tucked up in the northeastern corner of the PPA. After taking care of the barge, he’d go as far upriver as he could, then strike out over land toward Bunia.
Wally was so preoccupied with the map, glancing up only occasionally to keep the boat on course, that he didn’t notice when the river widened and slowed. Thud. The boat ran aground on a sandbar at the edge of a marshy stretch of river. The impact jarred the guidebook from Wally’s hands; the pilot’s chair creaked under his shifting weight.
“A www, heck.” Wally slammed the throttle into reverse, but the boat didn’t budge. Its sleek prow had sliced into the sand like a knife, but now it was wedged in there good and snug. “Nuts.” He killed the throttle and climbed out. Muck squelched underfoot. It oozed up to his ankles. “Well, that’s just great.”
The marsh was an expanse of chest-high river grass dotted with a smattering of wispy, droopy trees. Jerusha could have told him exactly what kind of trees they were.
Jeez, do I ever miss you, Jerusha. Stay safe, okay?
Here and there, rivulets of brackish water cut channels through the stands of grass. Wally thought about this. The barge had to come through here on the way to and from Nyunzu; he’d traveled the entire length of the Lukuga River without seeing it. So there had to be a way through.
Twenty minutes of searching revealed a circuitous channel just wide enough for a barge. It was almost invisible until he was right on top of it, hidden by the river grass. But entering the channel at its outlet would have meant turning around, heading back up the river, and searching for the entrance. That would take a couple of hours. On the other hand, it wasn’t all that far from his boat to the channel. Wally decided to portage.
The important part was getting a good grip. He lifted the prow out of the muck, then walked his way under the boat, hands overhead, until he reached the center of balance. Another heave freed the stern. He sank to his knees, but he managed to heft the boat overhead. So much for my bandages, he thought.
As strong as Wally was, carrying a boat through a swamp took a lot of work, even for him. Each step was a struggle to free his legs of the sucking mud without losing his balance. Rivulets of sweat ran down his face. Water and marsh slime pattered from the hull onto Wally’s pith helmet. The occasional portage during canoe trips up in the boundary waters had never been this tough. But slowly, carefully, he made his way.
Wally gave one final heave. The patrol boat splashed back into the navigable portion of the river, ready to resume its pursuit of the barge.
He hunkered down for a breather at the water’s edge, panting like he’d just run a marathon. This was the river, all right. The water rippled where the current picked up again. He unwrapped a granola bar.
Something launched out of the water, clamped on his leg, and yanked him into the river.
The next thing Wally knew, he was facedown on the river bottom with what felt like a hydraulic press squeezing the heck out of his leg. It flipped him over. Wally caught a glimpse of green amid the bubbles and froth in the murky brown water.
His lungs ached. He couldn’t see. Something rough smacked him in the face.
Wally aimed a fist, blindly, at the crushing pressure just below his knee. He poured everything he had into it. The blow landed on something scaly with a muffled crunch. The dazed crocodile loosened its grip.
Wally pulled free. He flailed for the surface, desperate to pull air into his burning lungs, but he wasn’t much of
