The door was already open.
Something was coming through.
51
The explosions were the signal to run. Pierce and Lazarus had told her to be ready, warned her that their diversion would be unmistakable. But when the moment came, when the first explosion drew half of Tyndareus’s men away, and then a second, much closer blast, triggered a localized geothermal event, Gallo did not flee. She was not going to leave without Fiona.
Even as she heard the young woman speaking the strange words, chanting a language that sounded like it might be a Native American dialect, she knew that she should grab Fiona by the arm and drag her away, but she did not.
Part of it was curiosity. Even though she had been an unwilling participant in Kenner’s quest, she had traveled so far, followed the clues, done so much… She just had to know. Even though she knew there was a very good reason for it, she hated the fact that the Herculean Society demanded such discoveries be kept secret from everyone.
But that was not why she remained where she was. She was not curious about whether Fiona could master the Mother Tongue and transform the rock slab in front of them into some kind of magical portal to the Underworld. In truth, she did not doubt it for a second.
What kept her from fleeing, from physically pulling the young woman along with her, was Fiona’s confident smile.
You need to trust me, she had said. Everything is going to be okay.
Though she did not know why, Gallo believed her.
But the second explosion was so close that she almost panicked. The ground heaved beneath her, not just the shock wave but the beginning of an earth tremor. A blast of heat rushed down the length of the ravine, followed by a vapor cloud that smelled like rotten eggs, which stung her eyes. Then the shooting started.
She caught a glimpse of Lazarus bounding down the hill, a colossal figure, like Hercules reborn. After him came the considerably less imposing forms of Carter and Pierce, sliding down the slope, charging into the fray.
Still, she did not run.
Fiona stopped chanting and leaped back from the slab. She shouted something, a taunt probably meant for Kenner’s ears, or possibly for Tyndareus, though it was unlikely that either man could have heard her amidst the unfolding fury of battle. Gallo heard the words, but did not grasp their significance until she heard another noise, a rhythmic thumping that reminded her inexplicably of hoofbeats.
Even stranger than the sound was the fact that it was emanating from inside the rock slab. And it was getting louder.
Something was coming through.
Now Gallo understood why Fiona was smiling and why she had shouted the words: “It says, ‘Beware of dog!’”
In their eagerness to unlock the gates of the Underworld, and to find the Well of Monsters, Kenner and Tyndareus had forgotten a critical element of the myth.
Hell had a watchdog.
“Cerberus.”
Gallo’s mind raced. It couldn’t be Cerberus. Hercules had captured the hellhound. Gallo knew this to be true. Pierce had once told her the truth behind the legend, how Alexander had jokingly referred to the beast as ‘puppy,’ downplaying the facts behind the legend. And that had all happened three thousand years in the past.
Three thousand years was a long time for a portal to the Underworld to go unguarded. Something had taken the hellhound’s place.
What emerged from the wall, which was still visible, but somehow immaterial, was not Cerberus, not a gigantic dog with three heads, but it was no less monstrous. Gallo’s first impression was of a bear, but one that was easily three times the size of the biggest Kodiak grizzly she had ever heard of. The creature’s head was broad and bear-like but wrapped around it like a crown of thorns was a rack of sharp-tipped antlers, as thick as tree limbs.
The beast lumbered into view, passing through the wall as if the stone were no more substantial than mist. Gallo scrambled back, so close that she could feel the creature’s hot breath on her face and see the primal fury in its dark eyes. One heavy paw, tipped with curving claws each as long as Gallo’s leg, slammed down on the place where she had been standing a moment before, eclipsing her view of Fiona. The beast however, barely seemed to notice her. Its eyes were on the pandemonium unfolding further up the ravine.
With a roar that shook Gallo’s bones, it reared up on its hind legs and threw its forepaws wide, as if to gather all of Tyndareus’s men in a crushing embrace. The crest of its horned head rose as high as the top of the ravine, its reach almost spanning from one side to the other.
It was a bear, but like the other chthonic monsters, it had incorporated characteristics of other animals. Its limbs were longer, the musculature rippling beneath a pelt of fine reddish-brown hair that reminded Gallo of deerskin.
Despite the fact that they were still repelling Pierce’s assault, Tyndareus’s men seemed to grasp that this new arrival was a much greater threat. They brought their rifles around and began firing into the beast’s exposed underbelly.
Fat drops of blood began raining down on Gallo as the bullets found their mark. The creature snorted and began pawing at its torso, as if trying to swat away a swarm of bees. But it appeared otherwise untroubled by the attack. The noise of the shooting seemed to irritate it even more than the sting of the bullets, and after another thunderous bellow, it dropped back onto all fours and started forward.
Gallo craned her head around to watch. Behind her and just a few feet away from a stunned Kenner, a stern-looking woman — the only female she had seen in Tyndareus’s employ — drew a pistol and started firing, shouting curses in a language that Gallo did not recognize. The shooting and the swearing were silenced by the swipe of a paw. Gallo saw a puff of red, as pieces of the woman flew in different directions. Kenner dove aside at the last instant, narrowly avoiding the same fate.
As the creature thundered past, smashing gunmen aside with its paws and spearing them on its antlers, Kenner raised his head and looked back at Gallo.
No, not at me, she realized. Behind me. What he wants is on the other side of that wall.
He stooped, picked something from the ground — a gun? — and then he was running toward her. She started to backpedal out of his way, but then realized, almost too late, that she had misread his intention. There was something else behind her…someone else.
“Fi! Get away!” She tried to put herself between Kenner and Fiona, but he anticipated the move, stiff-arming her out of the way. She stumbled back, flailing in vain for something to arrest her fall, and she landed painfully on her backside.
Kenner seized Fiona by the wrist and dragged her toward the wall.
Into the wall.
They vanished without even a ripple.
Gallo leapt to her feet, and without a moment’s hesitation, she followed.
52
As the monstrous bear-elk hybrid bulldozed a swath of devastation through the midst of Tyndareus’s forces, Lazarus pulled Pierce and Carter out of the way.
At first, it appeared the creature was going to win the battle for them. Its thick hide might not have been bulletproof, but the rounds failed to penetrate deep enough to do any real damage. It was like trying to bring down an elephant with a BB gun. And while the animal might not have understood the connection between the projectiles impacting against its body and the loud flashing things in the hands of the men scattered across the ravine, the noise was driving it into a frenzy.
The battle was so one-sided that Pierce found himself hoping that one of the gunmen might get off a lucky shot and strike some vital organ or at the very least, wound a leg to slow it down. He didn’t feel any sympathy for the men, but he knew that to reach Gallo and Fiona, they would have to get past the battle’s victor.