![Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Six)]()
Hunted (The Iron Druid Chronicles, Book Six)
would be Persian,” I said. “But I have no idea why he’s involved in this.”
“It’s a manticore,” I said. “And it shouldn’t be in Tír na nÓg.”
Oberon growled low in his throat, a steady rumble of warning.
“Can it attack us?” Granuaile asked.
I lowered my sword. “Not from where it currently is.”
“It’s right in front of us.”
“No, it’s in Tír na nÓg and we’re not quite there yet. We’d have to go around the tree once more, and then he could attack us.”
“Or he could go around the tree the other way.”
“No, that wouldn’t get him here. He can’t get out of Tír na nÓg without walking the proper path—it’s just as complicated from that side as it is from here. We had to take many steps to get this far, and he would have to take as many to get to us. And I bet you he doesn’t know the way. He can’t see the path in the magical spectrum like we can. He was placed there by somebody else, and he has to wait for us to come to him.”
“But he’s in Tír na nÓg, right? So if we get past him we’re golden, correct?”
“Well, yes. But getting past a manticore is next to impossible. Their venom is supposed to be a death sentence. Doesn’t matter if it comes out of the tail or from his bite. Even the claws are deadly, if reports are accurate.”
“Reports or myths?”
“Myths, you’re right; I’m sorry. There are no reportsof people surviving manticore attacks, because they would have to survive to report it.”
“Couldn’t we break down the venom ourselves by unbinding it? I mean, we’re sort of immune to poison, aren’t we?”
“I suppose we are in some sense. But that takes concentration, and while you’re working on not dying from poison, he’ll spill your guts on the grass or bite your head off. And the third member of our party is not immune.”
Oberon stopped the barrel roll of his growling.
The manticore’s face, a malevolent visage promising painful death, abruptly turned to one of earnest appeal. He raised a paw to beckon to us, indicating that we should come through.
“Okay, that’s really creepy,” Granuaile said.
“Yeah. It’s kind of a ‘step into my parlor’ kind of thing, isn’t it? Well, we’re not going to play his little manticore games. We have our answer now. The Morrigan was right—everything’s being watched. But it’s a bit staggering.”
“You mean, all this effort to kill us?”
“Yeah. It could be done in a simpler fashion, but whoever’s behind this wants to make sure no blame accrues to them.”
“Huh. Atticus, could every Old Way in Tír na nÓg be guarded without Brighid’s knowledge?”
I considered. “Probably not for an extended period of time, but for a short while I don’t see why not.”
“Well, I don’t see why. How can she be unaware?”
“She has to be informed, just like a president or a prime minister does. She won’t know there’s a problem until somebody tells her.”
“Okay, so that means she could conceivably be the one behind this, or she’s aware of it and complicit, or she’s flat-out clueless.”
“Don’t forget aware and incompetent. Conceivable, but doubtful.”
“All right. I want to talk about it some more, but let’s step away from those teeth first.”
“Yep, good call. We need to move on.” We’d doubtless ceded some ground to Artemis and Diana during this little side trip, and we could ill afford to give them any more.
The manticore’s face melted into desperation once we began to backpedal, and then he gave up all pretense of pacifism and sprang at us, mouth agape and claws extended. It was entirely silent and phantasmal: He passed right through me, not being quite on the same plane as I was.
Oberon taunted him.
The manticore faded entirely from view once we stepped off the path. We agreed to resume our run and continue northwest through Germany until we safely cleared the Harz Mountains, and then we’d head straight west for the Netherlands according to the path laid out for us by the elemental Saxony. It was already somewhere around midday, and we wouldn’t get out of Germany before night
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