anted.
“Sterling,” I grunted.
He sipped from his coconut, his eyes staring directly into the sun.
“Sterling!”
Still nothing. Artemis whistled, and my heart quickened when a gorilla burst out of the undergrowth. It glanced at Artemis, nodded once, then headed straight for me. I panicked, because gorilla plus incapacitated man tangled in a hammock? Never a good combination.
I stammered randomly in my confusion, bleating Sterling’s name a couple more times, then Artemis’s once as I prepared a clump of fire in one hand. But the gorilla patted me on the rump, as if in reassurance, then carefully laced its fingers through the hammock, untangling and freeing me from the netting. I blinked at it, confused. The gorilla held out one hand, helping me down to the ground, then gave me a toothy smile. I think. It was baring its teeth, at least. Never a good sign.
“Holy shit,” I breathed.
The gorilla grimaced.
“Don’t be so rude, Dustin,” Artemis said lazily. “Priscilla here likes to make herself useful. That’s not how you thank someone who helps you out.”
I blinked at my rescuer, studying her. “Priscilla the gorilla?”
She smiled again.
“Thank you,” I said.
Her smile grew even wider. She collected my empty coconut, loped over to Artemis, gave her a high five – seriously – then shambled back into the vegetation.
“I have so many questions,” I said.
“Oh?” Artemis chuckled. “But you were in such a rush to leave.”
“Right, right,” I stammered. “About that. We have a friend and the magical animal in question waiting outside your portal. Which you shut very quickly, I might add. What was up with that?”
“Oh, sure. No offense meant, but I wasn’t about to let the dog in my domicile. Because then I’d be tempted to look at it.” Artemis leaned back, adjusting her sunglasses. “Nothing personal against the werewolf, you know? He just happened to be carrying it.”
I watched her, carefully.
“No one said it was a dog, Artemis.”
She watched me back, frozen.
“I think it’s time for you to go,” she said icily. Somewhere in the distance behind her, just among the trees, I spotted Priscilla. Her demeanor was changed, her eyes hard and menacing. She cracked her knuckles.
“Okay,” I said. “Geez, sorry I said anything. We’ll get out of your hair. Come on, Sterling.”
He whined when I tugged on his jacket. “Just a few seconds more,” he said. “Come on, please.”
“You can come back any time you want, vampire,” Artemis called out, sticking her paper umbrella in her hair. “It’s Dustin the Convocation doesn’t want here. He’s nosy. Asks too many questions.”
“Oh my God, I get it,” I groaned, tugging Sterling harder. “Let’s go.”
Artemis gave us a lazy salute. “Thanks for the Snacky Yum-Yums, boys.”
It was as polite a dismissal as I’d ever gotten from the entities. Artemis could have threatened me with a hail of arrows, or she could have had Priscilla rip me from crotch to cranium, but nothing. I took that as a good omen, of this really just her being loyal to the Convocation, and not truly detesting me specifically. I filed that away for future use.
A shimmering emerald portal made of vines and shrubbery waited for us in the jungle, very similar to the one we used to enter the domicile. The air back in Valero was so much colder, slamming into my body with such a chilly burst that I yelped out loud. Oddly, it also made me miss Herald a little bit. Man, he would know what to do, who to ask about Banjo.
But no sign of Banjo, or of Gil, for that matter. Sterling’s pocket made a little beep as soon as we stepped back into the arboretum. He pulled out his phone, and I peered over his shoulder to read.
“Rude,” he grunted.