Bestiary

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Even as he pulled the door of the limousine shut, Carter knew this was no ordinary car. The door was heavier and more solid than any door, of any car, that he had ever felt. It closed with a thump like the sound of a bank vault being sealed. And when he looked at the front console, his suspicions were confirmed. There were enough meters and screens and dials to fill the cockpit of a 747. This, he guessed, was what you’d call an armored car, fully equipped and state-of-the-art — exactly what you’d expect a man like Mohammed al-Kalli to travel in.

The late Mohammed al-Kalli.

He put that thought from his mind as quickly as possible — there’d be time enough later to mull over all the horrors he had seen that day; right now, he just needed to pilot the car down from Bel-Air, across the freeway, and up again into Summit View; on an ordinary day it would take fifteen minutes. Today, however, as dusk began to fall and wildfires loomed, there was no telling how long it would take.

For a vehicle of such size and weight, Carter found that it steered with the ease and delicacy of a nimble sports car.

He made a tight circle in the forecourt of the house, and as he passed the front steps, he saw the door swing open and Jakob, his arms holding a big iron box, standing in amazement. Carter glanced in the rearview mirror and saw that Jakob was shouting, then he dropped the box and groped for something at his belt. Carter couldn’t hear what he was saying — the car was virtually noiseproof — but he knew damn well that it wasn’t a good idea to wait around to find out.

He touched the gas pedal more firmly, and the limo smoothly accelerated down the drive; he hesitated even to guess what kind of horsepower this engine could muster — or what all the brightly lighted controls were for.

But one of them had to be a phone. Without taking his eyes off the driveway for more than a second or two, he glanced at the console, saw something that said COMMUNICATIONS, and assumed that would be it. He pressed the black button, expecting perhaps a voice prompt, but instead he got nothing. He pressed it again, and this time an ear-splitting siren went off, a sound that was so loud, so prolonged, and so forlorn in its way that it might have been the cry of some ancient beast, like one of those whose lives he’d been working to preserve in the bestiary. The siren blared for several seconds, then went dead, and just when Carter thought it was over, it went off again. Several peacocks suddenly skittered across the drive, their tail feathers dragging, crying out in alarm — and when Carter rounded a turn, passing the fountain, he saw, off to the right, a roseate glow in the sky. The windows were thick, no doubt bulletproof, and tinted black, but even so Carter could now make out flames, rising and falling, moving like a glowing tide through the trees on the western border of the estate…

… And moving before them, lurching oddly but swiftly across the hillside, a huge dark shape.

The klaxon went off again, its plaintive wail piercing the air, and the dark shape seemed to change its direction, heading straight for the armored car.

Oh my God, I’m drawing the gorgon, Carter thought. He slapped at the dashboard controls, while steering the limo with one hand down the hill. The siren seemed to stop, but a blue light continued to flash. Carter had no idea what it meant — global positioning? Silent alarm?

He could see the gatehouse a few hundred yards ahead, but the gorgon was clearly tracking him now, and had even begun to adjust its course to cut him off before he got there. Carter gunned the engine — the Mercedes responded like a thoroughbred — but the driveway was narrow and curved, and suddenly he saw a white horse — with Bashir, the stable boy, riding him — right in front of the car. He hit the brakes, and the car ground to a halt just as the horse reared up in terror, throwing the boy to the side of the driveway. Before Carter could roll down the window and call out to him, the boy was running, running for his life, and the horse… the horse was whinnying and pawing in the air, at first at what looked like nothing, at a great black shadow, but which Carter could now see was something more. The glow of the approaching flames caught the dark green scales and the lacerating tail, snapping like a monstrous whip, of the gorgon — how could it have covered the distance so quickly? — as it savagely mauled the horse with its claws. Carter pressed the steering wheel everywhere, and the horn blasted, but the gorgon was undeterred. The horse turned to run, its white mane stained with blood, but the gorgon pounced on its back like a monstrous rider and the horse went down with its legs splayed out, broken, to either side.

Carter hit the accelerator and tried to drive around the beast, but instead he caught its swishing tail, the front tires bouncing over its fleshy tip, and the gorgon swiped with one paw at the chassis of the car. Its claws screeched across the black metal and it swung its heavy head away from the dying horse to snap fiercely at the rear bumper.

The gatehouse was just ahead, but there was no sign of Lee, the guard, and the gates themselves were closed… but Carter counted on the car to plow on through. He pressed down on the gas, sat back in the seat with both arms extended, his hands gripping the wheel, and hit the gates flying. The metal clanged, blue sparks shot up from the lock, and the gates flew off their hinges. The limousine spun half a turn into the road outside, its tires squealing, before Carter was able to gain control of it again and shoot off down the hill.

No air bags? he wondered. Then thought — an armored car is built for running right through barriers. An air bag could actually incapacitate the driver. Al-Kalli’s car was made to thwart any ambush and keep on running.

But all Carter wanted the car to do now was get him through the increasingly surreal landscape — the wispy clouds in the sky were tinged with a fiery glow, the air was bitter and acrid, the palm fronds were rustling like parchment high above — and deliver him to his wife and son. He drove down the winding road as fast as he could go, encountering dozens of other cars quickly exiting through their own private gates and drives. All the way, he had one eye on the road before him, the road back down to the city, and one eye on the rearview mirror; don’t turn around, as the saying went, something might be gaining on you. What he had left behind him, he knew no one would ever believe. And what, if anything, would be left of it once the fires had swept through, he could hardly bear to contemplate.