Memoranda

I looked around one more time to see if there was anything promising I had missed. The sight of the place in ruins saddened me, for I would have liked to have seen all of the products of the Master's obtuse mind. It was the thought of the werewolves approaching that brought me to my senses. "It's better off that all of this is destroyed," I said.

We made quietly and cautiously for the door. Misrix leaned over my shoulder, and whispered to me, "When we leave the building, don't stop ru

If the werewolves were there, I didn't see any and began to get suspicious as to whether Misrix had merely panicked again. I slowed down to a walk when we reached the boundary where the rubble began, mounds of treacherous wreckage sloping toward a distant ridge formed by the southern wall of the Ministry of the Territory.

"Hurry, Cley," the demon called back. "They're coming."

"I don't see them," I said, climbing onto the first boulder.

"You won't see them until it is too late."

"Where are they?" I asked. Just as I said this, I looked over my shoulder and saw ten sleek forms charge out of the laboratory door and head up the street in our direction. I scrabbled to the next rock and from there kept climbing, leaping with a precision that seemed u

When I saw the demon scrabble down into the rubble, I went to my stomach and followed him through a tight passage which led to a fall through darkness and an abrupt landing in the underground network. As I fell I heard the wolves pass overhead like a distant wave, their claws tapping on the coral.

Misrix helped me to my feet. "The beauty showed me this escape a long time ago," he said.

He motioned for me to follow him, and we began walking down the winding tu

The instant we left the tu

"This is part of the story," he said.

I nodded.

"I named this place Paradise," he said.

I looked through the jagged remains of the crystal shell and saw beneath barren trees the skeletons of exotic beasts scattered in the dirt. The fresh water that had at one time run through the center of the transplanted territory had dried up.

"Why that?" I asked.

"A strange thing," he said. "The first time I discovered this place, I found, lying on the ground out there, the head to one of my father's gladiators. I'd seen them before among the ruins, but this one caught my interest because it had belonged to the man that I, myself, had fought here in the underground. It was the man who had snapped off my horn.

"I picked up the head and considered taking it home for my collection. The moment I lifted it, I could feel a light vibration coming from inside. I looked down to where I had it cradled in my arm, and I saw the lips move. The gear work inside the head began to whine as the eye lids fluttered open. The mouth moved, and it whispered the word Paradise. I dropped the head and kicked it away from me. But ever since then, I call this Paradise," he said, pointing to where a cold, floating ash had replaced the once brilliant sun.

I said nothing.

We continued on through another tu

"Not good" said Misrix, and I saw the werewolves turn in our direction. They began to growl and slowly descend.

"Back underground," I said.

"No," said the demon. "Run for the hill and climb as fast as you can, straight at them."

"What should this accomplish?" I asked.

"I can't explain; go," he said and pushed me with all his might.

I ran forward and began climbing. The werewolves snarled, and I snarled back at them as we drew closer. Misrix climbed behind me, yelling for me to keep going. When they were within ten yards of me, I felt a breeze begin to blow at my back. I heard the wing thrusts just as I felt Misrix's hands grabbing me beneath the arms. He lifted us up, away from the gathering danger, straight into the sky. We remained there for a moment, treading air, and Misrix said, "Where are the birds?"

"There," I said, pointing off to the east.

"That's them," he said, and stopped beating his wings. We dived headfirst, then glided along an arc that swept us down over the leaping beasts and suddenly up toward the top of the hill. Misrix put me down beside the opening into the baths. The werewolves had reversed direction and were now climbing toward us.

"Let's go," I said, but the demon waited until he made certain that the metallic birds had fixed on our position. When they dropped in altitude to exactly the height at which we were standing, he called over his shoulder, "Now."

I slid through the hole and Misrix followed close behind, his wings snagging for a moment on the top of the entrance. Carefully pushing down on the dark flaps, I was able to free him. As he got to his feet, I crouched down and looked back through the opening. The birds were less than fifty yards away, and I could hear the growling of the werewolves directly below us. Again, he lifted me beneath the arms and leaped off the top of the inside mound. We flew low over the debris and dived into one of the cisterns. The water was freezing, and I had only had a second to hold my breath. I tried to struggle free of the demon's grasp, but he would not let me go.

He placed his hand atop my head, and I instantly felt my thoughts swirling through a storm that spun my consciousness into a globe. I became like a tornado in a paperweight and flew upward through a tu

Then there was the muffled sound of an explosion, and I came to beneath the water. Bits of rock and debris pelted the surface and fell slowly around us. Misrix pulled his hand off of me and let me float to the top.

The next thing I knew, he was dragging me out of the pool and standing me on my feet. "I don't know how many of them the birds destroyed, so we have to hurry," he said.

We made for the door and reached it without a moment to spare. As Misrix turned the key in the lock, one of the creatures leaped the width of a pool and came bounding straight at us. The door opened, I was pulled inside, and it was shut.

"We made it," I said, leaning back against the wall.

"Yes," he said, catching his breath, "but now they know where we are."

I dried off and was given an old suit of Below's to wear. The fit was unsettling in its perfection. In the room that had served father and son as a kitchen, Misrix made me a salad. I sat down at the table with my bowl of food and bread. The demon sat across from me with a cup of real shudder. I asked him if he could make me a cup, and he pushed his across the table to me. Then I asked him for a cigarette. Again he accommodated me, and together we smoked. The taste of the shudder almost brought tears to my eyes. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the scrap of paper I had taken from the lab. Spreading it out with one hand on the table, I took a quick look at the symbols and handed it to him.