Chapter 24
After they had flown for a while, Gregor remembered that Ares hadn't rested after the long trip through the tunnel. "You want to find a place and take a nap?" he asked. "I can keep watch." But even as he spoke, he yawned. He hadn't had much sleep, either.
"I am strangely wakeful," said Ares. "Why do you not sleep while we fly? I will rouse you when I have need of rest."
"Okay, thanks." Gregor stretched out on Ares's back. The fur was damp, and it smelled of rotten eggs, but Gregor's clothes were in no better condition. Beneath the fur was the warmth of Ares's body. He closed his eyes and let oblivion take over.
Ares let him sleep about six hours before waking him. They camped in a niche high in the rocks of a cavern. The bat conked out immediately after providing Gregor with a few raw fish.
Gregor picked up one of the fish and ripped off a strip of skin with his teeth. Then he took a bite of the cold meat. Howard had always cleaned the fish with a knife, cutting neat pieces away from the bones. Gregor didn't have a knife or even a sword now. And what did it matter, anyway? Still, hunched over his fish on the stone ledge, he felt like he was in a time warp. He'd become a Neanderthal man or something, tearing into raw flesh, just trying to get the life-sustaining calories into his body. That must have been a hard life. Of course, his own wasn't exactly a picnic.
He thought longingly of rich, fatty foods. Mrs. Cormaci's lasagna, loaded with cheese and sauce and noodles. Chocolate cake with thick frosting. Mashed potatoes and gravy. He ripped off a stubborn piece of fish with a grunt. It didn't take long, he thought, to erase hundreds of thousands of years of change if you were hungry.
Gregor wiped his hands on his pants and leaned back against the stone. He found himself staring into his flashlight beam, drawn toward the one bit of light in this huge, dark place. He was down to his last set of batteries. If they ran out, he'd be entirely dependent on Ares to get him out. Who was he kidding? He was already entirely dependent on the bat. In fact, it didn't really seem fair. Ares kept them alive about ninety percent of the time, anyway. Gregor didn't feel like he'd really been holding up his end of this bond thing.
"So, stop staring at your flashlight and keep an eye out for trouble!" he thought. Disgusted with himself, he swept the beam over the surrounding rocks. Nothing new. Still, he had to get better about being on watch. Howard had said there were tricks to keeping your mind alert. Gregor did his multiplication tables for a while; that seemed to help. Next he tried to remember the capitals of all fifty states. But that only lasted for, well, fifty states. Finally, he forced himself to calculate something he'd been consciously ignoring: the number of days he'd been in the Underland.
It was almost impossible to figure out. He'd been in Regalia less than two days before they'd set sail on the Waterway, he was pretty sure of that. He thought someone had said the trip to the Labyrinth was about five days. Then another day or two until he met up with Ripred? Nine days? Ten?
His family must be a complete wreck. He would be coming home right around Christmas. Without Boots. Forever.
Gregor went back to his multiplication tables.
When Ares woke up, there was more raw fish and then they took off again. They followed the same pattern for a day or two. Gregor sleeping while Ares flew, Ares sleeping while Gregor kept watch, until finally Gregor awoke to the words, "Overlander, we are here."
They were not moving. Gregor sat up and rubbed his eyes. The light was brighter than any he'd encountered for days. He slid off Ares's back onto a polished stone floor and looked around. They were in the High Hall. It was completely empty. Somewhere, not too far away, he could hear music playing.
"Where is everybody?" asked Gregor.
"I do not know. But if there is music, there must be some sort of gathering," replied Ares. "I believe it is coming from the Throne Room."
They shuffled along a few corridors and came to the doorway of a huge room that Gregor had never seen before. The floor sloped down slightly, like a movie theater, and was filled with rows and rows of stone benches. The place was packed with bats and humans, who were dressed a lot fancier than usual. Many people held objects wrapped in cloth and tied with ribbons. Presents, maybe? Everyone's attention was on a large stone throne at the far end of the room. Nerissa was sitting on the throne.
They had cleaned her up for the occasion. Her unkempt hair had been worked into elaborate braids and piled on top of her head. A jewel-trimmed gown hung loosely off her bony shoulders. Vikus stood behind her. He was reciting some sort of speech as he lowered a large gold crown onto her head. It was hard to imagine either Nerissa or Vikus looking sadder than they did at this moment.
"What's going on?" whispered Gregor.
"A coronation. They are crowning Nerissa queen," Ares said softly.
Luxa had been right. If she died, Nerissa would be crowned, and not Vikus, and his family. At least, not yet.
"So I guess Howard and those guys got back," said Gregor. How else would they know that Luxa was dead?
"So it would seem," said Ares.
If Mareth had survived, he would be down in the hospital, but Howard and Andromeda should be here. Gregor looked around the hall but couldn't find them.
Vikus finished speaking just as he settled the crown on Nerissa's head and released it. Her thin neck bent forward under the weight, and Gregor thought how ill-suited she was to be queen of this violent, warring place. Whether she was mentally unstable or actually could see the future wasn't the issue. The girl was too weak to hold up her head with a crown on it. The image of Luxa shoving back her gold band flashed before Gregor's eyes. Whether she wanted to be queen or not, there was no doubt in his mind she would have been up to the job. But she was gone now.
Howard was right: They should have made Vikus king. Vikus would make a good leader; he was smart and diplomatic. And he did not seem like he would let power go to his head.
As Nerissa braced her hands on the arms of the throne and managed to raise her head, her eyes caught Gregor's. Something registered on her face, and then she fainted dead away, tumbling to the floor. The crown hit the stone with a clank and then rolled off.
There was a big commotion. A stretcher appeared almost immediately, and Nerissa was carried away. There was a lot of head shaking and murmuring in the crowd from the Underlanders who had probably been opposed to Nerissa being made queen in the first place. Then somebody spotted Gregor and Ares. They had been standing in the doorway, unnoticed, since everyone had been watching the crowning. Now hundreds of faces turned their way and began to shout questions. Gregor could see Vikus waving for him to come down. This wasn't really how he would have chosen to reveal the story about the Bane. He had planned to tell Vikus, alone, and then head home. But that option was gone.
As Gregor and Ares made their way down the aisle to Vikus, the crowd parted and gradually grew silent. By the time they'd reached the throne it was as if everyone was holding their breath.
"Greetings, Gregor the Overlander, Ares, we are happy to see you alive. What news do you bring us?" asked Vikus. "Did you find the Bane?"
"We found it," said Gregor.
The Underlanders broke into chatter. Vikus motioned for them to be quiet. "And did you drain its light?" he asked.
"No, we took it to Ripred," Gregor said.
There was a moment of disbelief, and then the crowd went crazy. He could see the faces, human and bat alike, twist into fury. Something hit him on the side of his head. His hand went up and came away bloody. A small, ornate crystal jar was down by his feet. It must have been meant as a present for the new queen. More objects began to rain around him. An ink pot. A medallion. A goblet. The one thing they had in common was that they were all made of stone. Gregor realized that it didn't matter how beautifully the gifts were carved. You could call them works of art, but it didn't change the fact that he and Ares were being stoned to death.
Ares tried to get between Gregor and the mob, but it was no use. It was pressing in, forcing the pair up against the back wall. Voices cried out for their death.
Gregor remembered Ripred's words. "And you know, there will be hell to pay in Regalia." The rat might have been a little more specific!
Through the chaos he heard a horn blowing and then the crowd was falling back. A ring of guards formed a semicircle around them. They were escorted out of the room.
"You will follow," said a woman who seemed in charge, and Gregor did, happy to be getting away from the mob.
They went down flight after flight of steps, and eventually reached a quiet hallway deep under the palace. The woman held a stone door open for them, and Gregor sensed that this was odd. There were few doors of any kind in the palace.
He and Ares went inside the torchlit room, and the door swung shut behind them. There was the sound of something sliding into place. "Where are we?" he asked Ares. "Is this like a special room to keep us safe?"
"It is to keep others safe from us," said Ares. "This is the dungeon. We have been placed under arrest for high treason."
"What?" said Gregor. "What for?"
"For committing crimes against the state of Regalia," said Ares. "Did you not hear the charge?"
Gregor hadn't heard anything but a bunch of people yelling.
"Oh, man!" He pounded on the door with his fist. "Let me out of here! I want to talk to Vikus!" There was no response. He gave up pretty soon since it really hurt to hit the stone door.
He turned back to Ares. "So, treason, huh? That's great. What happens if we're found guilty? We get banished or something?"
"No, Overlander," said Ares. "The punishment for treason is death."