Page 78 of Death Dance

TWENTY-FOUR

Days like today, I regret I hadn’t held you over a cliff by your ankles and shook common sense into you.

Gorgona belonged to the reptiles and the dead. Sun-bleached bones decorated the sandy shore, and I lost count after thirty skulls, which had been picked clean by some form of predator or scavenger. One skull served as a house for a snake, a black, red, and yellow one, and our guide, a Columbian man, made a warding gesture against evil.

“Coral snake?” I asked, grimacing at the thought of such a venomous reptile getting a hold of me.

“Indeed,” Emerick replied, and he made a displeased sound. “This is going to be a problem.”

“It’s less of a problem than you think,” my father replied, and he crouched and whistled, holding his hand out over the sand, his palm facing the sky.

The coral snake lifted its head, hissed, and slithered to my father, raising itself up before climbing onto his arm and coiling in his hand.

I would miss my father if the snake finished him off.

Worse, more snakes slithered out from the underbrush and nearby trees, forming a mass around my father.

“He communes with them,” the priestess murmured.

Alheen heaved a frustrated sigh. “Days like today, I regret I hadn’t held you over a cliff by your ankles and shook common sense into you.”

My father laughed. “I would rather not be bitten by one of these beauties, and this is safest for all.”

Then he said something in some other language, placed the coral snake on the sand, and waited.

The snakes turned, pointed their noses at something deeper in the jungle, and slithered away. My father rose and followed. “Come along. We will be safe enough. Follow in their wake. I have asked them to show me what has disturbed their island.”

“Necromancy has been used here,” the reformed necromancer announced. “There are a few active presences, likely his focal pieces. These would upset the snakes and cause them distress. I would not have thought to ask the wildlife to show us where the problem is.”

“I may have offered promises to deal with what is disturbing them. It’s not free information.”

Great. We would have to appease a bunch of venomous, lethal snakes if we wanted to leave the island alive. “I am going to make you pay for this for the remainder of my lifespan, Dad.”

My father laughed at me. “You’ll be fine. You’ll learn the trick of it. Of course, you may regret learning the trick of it, as your kittens will tell you precisely what is on their minds, insist you pay full attention to them, and require that you serve them even more than you already do. I will enjoy your downfall.”

“You’re a jerk,” I replied, shaking my head. As he showed no fear of the snakes, I followed in his wake, swearing I would somehow get my revenge. I could handle vampires out to murder me.

An entire jungle of snakes serving as an escort, any one of them capable of killing one of us? That went beyond my limits. Rather than attempt to hide under my husband, I picked my way through the jungle, taking care with every step so I wouldn’t run afoul of a reptile.

The first time a scaled beast dropped from a branch and landed on my shoulder, I froze in place, making a squeaking sound. The second, I questioned how I hadn’t fainted.

By the time I’d acquired six hitchhikers, I managed a whimper. As none of them had bitten me, I continued my journey, regretting everything about my life. Emerick chuckled, and like me, he’d acquired a snake or two, which he situated over his shoulder and petted. “Just think about it this way, Pepper. They view you as an ally. They’re waiting for you to solve a problem for them. Should anyone associated with the problem show up, you can escort them to their graves in a new and interesting fashion.”

“You cannot take any of the snakes home. We already have endangered lizards coming home with us. We do not need any snakes that can kill us living with us.”

He laughed at me. “Judging from what your father said, they want their home purified so they can continue living in it, not go on adventures with us. I’m sure they’ll depart without taking a nip once we find these focal items and get rid of them. Can we get rid of them?”

“We can, but we will remove them from the site, take them somewhere remote, and destroy them where the local wildlife is not bothered. Depending on their strength, I may need to use them to drain them.”

“Well, there are plenty of skeletons on the beach. Can’t you make them get up and do a little jig or something?” I wrinkled my nose at the thought of a bunch of dancing skeletons. “Actually, please ignore me. I have no idea what I’m talking about.”

“It is actually an excellent idea, and I shall do so if we must. The dancing skeletons can escort themselves to where it is easier for us to collect their bones for identification and proper burial. Manipulating the bodies without attempting to read the truth from their remains is the kindest method I have of solving this problem. It will also do little to upset the wildlife. Charlie, we will need a boat to transfer the remains.”

My father dug out his phone, held it up, and went to work tapping on the screen.

“Alheen, could you talk with the snakes like this?” I asked.

“Of course. Your father is better at it than I am, and he tends to form a rapport and a sense of cooperation with the animals, where I just scare the literal piss out of them and they do what I need out of a sense of self-preservation. His way is better. You’ll likely have the same touch with it as him. Also, don’t listen to him regarding the chatty nature of cats. Even he has to deliberately work magic—tiring magic—to understand what the animals around him have to say. You’re a thousand or so years too young to be learning the trick of it. If it makes you feel better, your brothers haven’t learned the trick of it yet, either. You can compete with them to see which one of you is better at magic. They don’t try to use the magic of their bloodline, so they’ll be slow coming into their abilities. You? I feel you will be using every weapon in your arsenal as soon as you identify it is part of your arsenal.”