Tongues of Serpents Page 0,77

hear the singing," Temeraire said, but sighed, and did not press further.

* * *

He pushed himself up standing with an effort, when it was time to get the belly-rigging on him; and now several of the convicts made excuse for not climbing in, and abruptly had small personal errands which required their attention, or needed to refill a can of water; Laurence rounded several up and sent them aboard, and went down to the water-hole after another handful of stragglers - they would not stir save in pairs, anymore - who insisted they were coming, only they were taking turns filling their cans: they had drunk them all dry, and he could not ask them to sit aboard for hours in this heat, without so much as a drop.

"That will do," Laurence said, "fill your can on the other side, and enough of this malingering, Mr. Blackwell; if tomorrow you cannot provide yourself with water over the course of a pause of three hours without delaying us, you will fly thirsty; and if that is not enough we will consult the lash," with more acerbity than his usual wont; he was in no spirit to spare sympathy for the men who were dragging out Temeraire's discomfort.

"Aye, sir," Blackwell said, tugging at his forelock, and stepped across to the other side of the water-hole, and was gone: a red flashing of jaws, talons, tremendous speed - then he was jerked down and away; the bushes rustled over him once and were still.

Laurence stared; Jemson and Carter stared; the unreality of it - "Temeraire!" Laurence bellowed, as the men backed hastily scrambling away, their canteens tumbling and water spilling over the dirt - "Temeraire!"

Temeraire lunged over the dune and nearly brought half of it down spilling into the water-hole, and when Laurence pointed at the bushes, he seized them in his talons and began to tear them away. "What is it?" Temeraire said. "I do not understand, where did it come from?"

"It was concealed beneath them," Laurence said, "or so it seemed; I scarcely caught a glimpse."

Forthing was hastily organizing the aviators: they had their pistols drawn, and swords, and stood warily back while Temeraire dragged up the bushes one after another, their long spidery roots dangling red dirt. When he had cleared them, there was nothing there: only the dirt, and grass, and stones, and Laurence would have thought himself mad, if only there had not been Jemson and Carter to swear to it, also; but Jemson said, "I didn't see it; only Blackie was there, and then he weren't," and Carter said, "It was big as a house, it was. It et him whole in one big bite, and then it went into thin air."

"Perhaps it did," Temeraire suggested, sitting back on his haunches; he nosed at one of his talons, abraded by his struggles with the tough bushes, "like a spirit? That would account for why we have not seen them."

"No," Laurence said, "whatever it was, the creature was perfectly corporeal, and it took him: can it have tunneled away?"

Temeraire raked his claws through the dirt, and they caught: with a heave he brought up a ragged mat of dirt and branches and a knot of grass atop it, which when thrust aside showed a gaping hole descending into the earth: narrow and rough-edged, dug out of the loose sand.

The sides were packed with stones, and plastered also with some yellowish green matter, flecked with larger bits of leaves and of grasses, as though these had been mulched, all to give it stability, although not very much. The walls yielded easily as Temeraire dug into them, and Caesar was now helping, too: they made rapid progress into the depths, but the tunnel crumbled as they dug. In a little while, they broke through into something like a junction: Laurence, crouching by the side, had a glimpse of many passages branching; then the walls collapsed inward and the whole fell in upon itself. Caesar nearly slid forward into the depression.

"That is certainly where he was taken, but if the bunyip has retreated, perhaps we may find some other entrance to come at its lair," Laurence said, pulling himself free from the heavy sand, which had buried him nearly to the knee in collapsing, and they began with shovels and talons to scrape at the ground around the water-hole.

"I think I have found one," Roland said, thrusting the handle of a shovel deep into the earth, a little way back from