23. This is almost entirely your fault. #3
Greedy chirps answered me, and I pulled out the bottle and dropped a capsule into the gullet of each of the scrawny demon chickens. “Sure, old man. I think I’m going to name the girl Annie and the boy Peter.”
“The names on the tags.”
I bristled. “Got a problem with it?”
“Not at all. It’s a very sweet gesture. They probably have their own names already, considering they’re immortal phoenixes.
They’ve probably been alive longer than most of our family combined.
Looks like Kevin guessed correctly. You even survived.
Well done. I wouldn’t have liked having to explain to my little grandson I let his wife get herself killed trying to be heroic. ”
The phoenixes gave a final chirp before cooing and burrowing into their blankets.
Demon chickens weren’t supposed to be so damned adorable. “I want to keep them,” I whispered.
“Pick up the baby nuclear bombs so we can find the dust and get rid of it. Little Samuel would not be pleased if I allowed you to bring the baby nuclear bombs home with you. There are limits, and I’m pretty sure this goes beyond the permissible.”
I gathered the birds and their blankets, tucking them into the crook of my arm. They weren’t much bigger than baseballs, and they radiated a soothing warmth. “Won’t the dust petrify them?”
“Bailey, they’re immortal. You gave them enough ambrosia in one of those little capsules for them to take on a god and possibly win. They’ll be fine. That said, no, you may not take them home with you.
The black of the phoenixes’ eyes paled to a vibrant sky blue. They chirped, and wiggling in my hold, they rubbed their beaks against my arm, scratching hard enough to break the skin.
I bled, and my blood gave off a faint golden luminescence.
“But they’re so cute.”
“Are we looking at—” Quinn’s grandfather blinked. “Oh. Little Samuel must be nearby.”
“What? Really? He is? How do you know?” I could worry about the glowing blood problem later. I needed Quinn. Surely I could talk Quinn into taking the phoenixes home. Someone had to feed them and care for them.
“Bailey, those two birds are uglier than sin. They’ll be gorgeous when they molt, but right now? They’re pretty hideous, and that says a lot coming from a gorgon.”
I cuddled the birds closer. “They are not!”
“Bailey, you have approximately six minutes before they grow up, torch the hive, and probably eat us before flying off to nest somewhere.”
“They—” The little bastards pecked my arm. “Hey!”
My grandfather-in-law chuckled. “Six minutes, Bailey.”
They pecked me again, and then they licked my blood. “You’re probably right.”
“Good girl. Take a deep breath. We need to find the dust, then you need to nicely ask those two phoenixes if they’ll take care of it for us. Then you can take your husband to the nearest hotel and get some rest.”
Why did I need to take a deep breath? I frowned.
“The dust, Bailey.”
Dust? Oh, the gorgon dust. Where was it? I chewed on my lip, staring around the entry. “It’s too dark.”
The phoenixes chirped, and golden light and warmth radiated from them.
Four walls, four corners, four doors, but no dust. “Where’s the dust?”
“Find it.”
“Find it? But how?”
“Oh boy. Earth to Bailey.”
I shook my head. I hated gorgon dust. Why did I have to go find it again? A flash of pink drew my eye, and a streamer of sparkling light slipped through an open doorway. “I hate gorgon dust.”
“I know. Show us the way, then we can make it disappear.”
“Burn,” a little girl’s voice whispered in my ear, accompanied by the crackle of flame. “We burn it. We play with fire. Yes! We like playing with fire.”
Yes, I liked playing with fire, too. I remembered the rush, the feel of it washing over me, and its roar as it consumed everything around me.
“Burn,” a little boy’s voice agreed.
The birds chirped, and I cradled them closer to me.
That was right. I needed to reward the birds.
I needed to convince them to help without burning my Quinn’s grandfather—without burning my Quinn.
“Ambrosia, if you burn the dust.” Thinking hurt, as though I had run a marathon, sat down after the race, and waited for a few hours before trying to get up and run again.
I didn’t want to think about anything, but I did it anyway. “Burn only the dust.”
“No fun,” the children wailed. “Burn, burn, burn!”
“Only the dust. Twenty pills of ambrosia each, if you burn only the dust.”
The birds quieted, their chirps softening to pleased coos.
I followed the light.
“Twenty-five,” they demanded.
“Twenty-five,” I agreed.
“Playing with fire fun! Burn, burn, burn.”
I remembered playing with fire and dancing within the flames, and I envied them for what I could no longer have.
The light led me underground. The phoenixes I cradled squawked and shrieked their complaints. The shimmering pink ribbon weaved through twisting corridors of rough-carved stone. Every step I took, the temperature dropped until my breath emerged in white clouds and I shivered.
Not even the phoenixes’ glow warmed me.
“A minute and a half, Bailey.” Quinn’s grandfather sounded worried.
A minute and a half until what? I frowned and decided to ignore the interloping gorgon. Had I paid ambrosia to keep him alive? Whatever for? He wasn’t fire.
“Not fire,” the children agreed. “Burn?”
“No. Only the dust. For twenty-five pills of ambrosia each.” I remembered. Yes, that was important. My baby phoenixes needed their ambrosia. I also needed Quinn.
I couldn’t let my babies burn Quinn.
They snuggled against me, their beaks scraping my arm again so they could dip their soft little tongues into my blood.
The tunnel opened to a cavern with a steep staircase carved into the wall which descended to the ground far below. At its center, a vat filled with dark brown fluid bubbled.
“Look there.” The gorgon touched my arm and pointed at something beside the vat. “He is Ozmose, a middling prince of the Rockwell family. A strong enough line.”
What did I care for gorgon princes? I couldn’t burn them. The vat could burn, however. “If you burn the vat but nothing living here, thirty pills each. The rest of the bottle, all yours, if you purge this whole place of dust,” I murmured to the precious birds I cradled in my arms.
Yes, that was what I needed to do. Everything needed to burn so the dust would never bother me again.
“Yes,” they whispered, and the air shimmered with heat. “You live. He live. You all live. The rest burns!”
Flame burst to life around me, blinding me with its intensity. Heat enveloped me, but it didn’t sear my skin. Sharp beaks and talons pierced me, and my arm dropped limp to my side. The blankets fell, and the phoenixes went with them.
Sharp claws I couldn’t see tore at my hip, and as I blinked away the bright spots in my vision, living fire shaped like birds winged down into the cavern below, blankets clutched in their claws. One held the bottle of ambrosia in its beak.
A pillar of flame spiraled from them and engulfed the cavern. The phoenixes cried, their song shrill and piercing. Then, in a flare of blue-white light, they disappeared.