Jon-Tom’s heart was pounding against his chest as he clung to the black leather straps with a death grip. “Yes. Quite a ways down, in fact.”
Teyva spun in midair. “My but this is interesting up here.” He glanced down again. “Look at them all jumping up and down there. They seem quite exercised about something.”
“I imagine it’s our escape.”
“Oh yes, our escape. We have escaped, haven’t we? They were going to kill us.” His gaze narrowed. “Cook us and eat us. Nasty mean old people. We should teach them a lesson.”
“No no! I mean, we don’t have time to teach them a—nooooo!”
Folding his wings against his flanks, the stallion dropped like a stone toward the corral. What the startled villagers below took to be war cries were actually screams of utter terror. Wolves, foxes and others scattered in all directions. Some didn’t flee fast enough and the stallion’s front hooves cracked a few skulls. Teyva repeated his stuka-like dive several times. Then he hovered over the center of the village and emptied his bowels and bladder. Having lastly knocked over a brace of torches, thereby setting half the village on fire, he fluttered overhead and surveyed the havoc he’d wrought with an air of equine equanimity.
“That ought to teach them to think twice about trying to eat any helpless strangers.” He glanced back at Jon-Tom. “I owe you everything, man. What can I do for you?”
Aware that his skin must by now have acquired something of a greenish cast, Jon-Tom fought to form a coherent sentence. “Could you take us to a town called Strelakat Mews?”
“I don’t know where that is, I’m afraid.”
“How about Chejiji, then?”
Teyva’s expression brightened. “Ah, Chejiji! Of course I know Chejiji.”
“And quickly.”
“Why quickly, mate?” a woozy but exultant Mudge inquired.
“Because I’m getting dizzy and I don’t know how long I can keep this up. I guess I neglected to mention it while I was trying to cure Teyva of his fear of heights, but I’m afraid of heights. Always have been.”
“Oh, this is going to be fun!” And to demonstrate how much fun it was going to be the stallion executed a perfect loop-the-loop, thereby allowing Jon-Tom to add the contents of his stomach to the gifts Teyva had already bestowed on the devastated populace below.
“Afraid of heights, man?” The stallion let out a whinny that could be heard across half the continent. “What a foolish notion! It seems to me that I was once afraid of heights. I can’t imagine why. You must let me talk to you about it sometime.”
“You betcha.” Jon-Tom wiped his lips. “Could we go now—please?”
“To Chejiji it is.” He leaned forward, a determined look on his face, and in a minute they were out over the silvery expanse of the ocean.
“Wait, wait a minute!”
“I thought you said quickly.”
He pointed downward. “We have to get our things. That is, if you think you can handle a little additional weight.”
“Weight? What is weight?”
Mudge searched until he located the outrigger where he and Weegee had stowed their backpacks. Teyva executed another heart-rending dive, waited impatiently while they gathered up their supplies.
“I could carry the boat as well, if you like.”
“That won’t be necessary.” Jon-Tom resumed his seat on the stallion’s broad back. With weapons, food, and the splinters of his precious duar once more in hand they rose again over the water.
Anyone on shore who chose that moment to look skyward would have seen a most unusual silhouette crossing the face of the full moon, and might also have heard the whinny of pure delight the stallion Teyva emitted. Might have also heard the sharp smack of paw on furry face accompanied by a feminine voice saying, “Mudge, don’t try that again.”
“But luv,” another voice then plaintively replied, “I never did it on the back o’ a flyin’ ’orse before.”
Arguments, whinnies and wings shrank toward the starlit horizon.
XII
TEYVA WAS ALL FOR striking out straight across the open sea, but Jon-Tom didn’t trust the stallion’s navigational skills enough to abandon the coastline entirely. So they stuck to the shore, following it steadily southward until it began a long westward curve that would carry them to the vicinity of Chejiji. The farther they flew the more they saw that this part of the world was virtually unpopulated. Not even an isolated fishing village appeared beneath them.
“Not bad country.” Cautious gazed down from his perch at the terrain slipping past below. “Wonder why so empty?”
“Tropics, swampland,” Jon-Tom commented. “Hard to fashion a city in dense jungle.”
Mudge pointed suddenly. “Somebody did. ’Ave a look at that, would you.”
“Bank left,” Jon-Tom directed their mount. Teyva dropped his left wing slightly and they began to turn.
Below them, hidden by vines and creepers and parasitic trees, lay the ruins of a great city. The massive stone bulk of huge pyramids and decorated walls poked through the choking vegetation. Shattered towers thrust skyward like broken teeth.
“Wot do you make o’ that, mate?”
“I don’t know.” Jon-Tom drank in the sight of the ruined metropolis. “Plague, tidal wave this close to the ocean. Who can say?”
“Let’s ’ave ourselves a closer look, wot?”
Jon-Tom looked back in surprise. “Why Mudge, I thought you were anxious to get back to civilization.”
“That I am, but lost cities tend to be chock full o’ things forgotten. Maybe bushels o’ corn an’ dried-up old vegetables, maybe bushels o’ somethin’ else.”
